Around Our Little Homestead!

The weeding fairy has visited my garden area and it is oh so LOVELY!! And now I can share more of a "whole picture" of the garden although that tomato jungle is hard to photograph around!

Also my crazy waterer-tipping chickens got their new un-tippable and un-poopable in watering system. Those red waterer nozzles are called chicken nipples. Ha Ha! My whole life revolves around nipples! They are growing fast and a few of them enjoyed a field trip to my garden area during the weeding to help with the massive pincher bug colonies. Bleck!

And we had the most lovely summer evening cake last night!! It was light, not too sweet, still warm, and just wonderful! It is a Lemon-Blueberry Bunt Cake I found over at Acorn Soup that she adapted from Smitten Kitchen (who served it with a frosting but it was too perfect as is)! We tweaked it further to be both gluten and dairy free.

Lemon Blueberry Bundt Cake

Ingredients:

2 1/2 cups plus 2 tablespoons all-purpose gluten-free flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 3/4 cups sugar
Zest of 1 lemon
3 large eggs, at room temperature
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
3/4 cup coconut milk + 3/4 tsp. apple cider vinegar 
3 cups blueberries

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and generously grease and flour the bundt pan. Combine coconut milk and apple cider vinegar and set aside for 5 minutes.

In a bowl mix together the 2 1/2 cups of flour, baking power, and salt. Set aside. Using an electric mixer cream the butter, sugar, and lemon zest. Beat for 2-3 minutes. Make sure you scrap the bowl a few times. Add eggs one at a time, mixing well before adding the next. Add vanilla. Then take the flour and milk and add alternating, half the flour, half the milk until it’s all incorporated. In a separate bowl mix the blueberries with the 2 tablespoons flour. Then add blueberries to the batter using a spatula. Careful not the break apart the berries.

Pour into pan, smoothing the top and bake for 55-60 minutes or until a cake tester comes out clean. Let cool for about 30 minutes before turning out onto serving platter. (Not sure we made it that long...)

YUM! 

The Jungle aka: My Garden

And it is such a jungle since coming home after our 4th of July road trip that I could not get a picture of the whole thing! Crazy! Here is the tour:

This is the bed we eat out of most often right now, chard, wild kale, and soon cucumbers on the end!

The center bed behind has a tomato, 2 cucumbers, 1zucchini, & 1 crook neck.

This was the bed I had to scrape out of the weeds, two zucchini, and one patty pan in the middle.

This is a crazy bed, peppers, eggplant, watermelon, dino kale, lettuce, cilantro, and basil!

These are the three potato boxes, they're doing pretty good.

And the tomato jungle! These grew so much while we were gone it was amazing! They have popped a couple of the pvc ribs and man are we going to be in tomatoes soon! 3 different kinds of cherry tomatoes then 3 different large heirlooms.

There is now also water going to each bed and as soon as we figure out the soaker hose issues we will be set! We have grand plans but this is a good start!

How does your garden grow?

Yarn Along!

Joining Ginny today for the Yarn Along!

We've been home for 3 days from our road trip, everyone is still tired and "off" none more than myself (it's no fun for anyone when mama is off). The 100 degree weather and yesterday's high humidity (we live in the high desert so thats not normal) makes everyone just a little more restless. Plus we just seem to be in a season of bickering kids. NO FUN!

Ok to the topic at hand: Knitting...it's going...fine. I could frog this or finish it and it would be...fine. Maybe it's just the off-ness of this week. Hopefully. Maybe I should go look at buttons, picking out new buttons is always fun! (Still the In-Threes with Cascade 220).

Reading: I finished Call the Midwife at my mom's and then started My Story by Elizabeth Smart off my mom's shelves. That was a quick read and so now I have started my book club read, The Mists of Avalon. It's good but not compelling yet but I know that will come.

Adios till next week!

Yarn Along-the Road!

I'm yarning along on the road today!! It's nice to actually have to sit and only knit! Thank goodness for the long strait parts!

I'm knitting another In Threes and I'm reading Call the Midwife. My hubby bought me the set in London last time he was there! He knows me so well!!

Last weeks post has links for the project and yarn and BEAUTIFUL project bag!

Happy Trails!!