The Day Before Spring

Today I planted my stash of amaryllis bulbs, a task that was due two months ago!  I realized tomorrow is the start date for planting seedlings so I started a few pumpkins and butternut squash.  Feeling very productive, I also transferred photos from my phone to computer from 2022 - 2023 summer.  

I worked outside a bit, letting cats out to roam the yard.  They seemed to enjoy the outdoors and beg to go outside every day.  

This is Aisha, enjoying sun while I had breakfast this morning.

Pesto Pepperjack Chicken Sandwich

Last year I got a basil plant that grew into a bush. I then learned to make pesto, from one of my favorite cooking blogs, The Chunky Chef.  I've used up my freezer storage of pesto a long time ago so it was time t move onto store bought pesto.  I got several from Trader Joes, and noticed they were using different ingredients, like cashews and other greens. So today, after having a severe craving for pesto, I decided to use what I had available! 

Cashews substituted for Pine Nuts 

Spinach and Arugula substituted for Basil 

All other ingredients, I had on hand, and followed the receipt verbatim

I found this new pesto to be excellent, and no longer will I hold off on having pesto until I have basil.  I will still grow basil, but happy to have an alternative.

For the sandwich: I cook one chicken breast for 11 minutes at 400 in the air fryer, covered in my favorite spice, AnonymousQ Disruption Beef & More. 

I slather pesto on both sides of a whole wheat bun, add one slice of pepper jack cheese, and melt in the air fryer for one minute on toast setting. 

Put the chicken and buns together and it's literally the most amazing juicy sandwich I've ever had in my life. Seriously, I won't even eat chicken sandwiches at restaurants any more because they usually come out rubbery, and so boring, or too salty. It's always great when you can master a food and improve upon all prior restaurant experiences.

While making lunch, I watched Megan Markle's new show "With Love, Megan", third episode.  I think it should have been named, "Learn New Things with Megan Markle", because she spends each episode trying new things and it's fun to watch how they turn out.  She has a great flair for making things beautiful and I have enjoyed learning from each episode.  I look forward to watching the rest of the series.

Perspective

Today I read an article about Octomom living in a 3 bedroom apartment (approximately 1500 square feet), and as a single mom she struggles to meet her children's needs. Then I read an article about Alex Baldwin who complained about living in a space too small for his family of 9, the space is over 6000 square feet. 

Yes, it's easy to poke fun at Alex Baldwin for feeling cramped in such a big space, but the issues probably has more to do with organization, and lots of children under 10, and little personal space. I think about my own space, and how it's starting to feel cramped. I have a 1918 square foot space townhouse with a tiny backyard, and street parking. 

In the right location in NY, a townhouse born similar year to mine is going for almost 4 million! 

I recently looked into buying a house of similar square foot size, smaller bedrooms, but bigger entertainment space and finished downstairs, but it would have put us a strain on our time to work on the new home and finish the current home to make it a rental, and the expense to maintain two properties until one could be rented would have put a strain on our budget. As I put away my dreams for this bigger space, and large yard, I decided that maybe it was time I put my considerable design skills to good use and make this place more comfortable, finish the projects needed to eventually make this a rental, and by the time it's ready to be rented, make it so fabulous that the future renters will feel like they are living in high class style, in Hagerstown. Game on!

FOUR Butternut Squash!

I received a free butternut squash plant, I think it was in exchange for some purple sweet potato slips, but it might have also been from cousin Amanda. Anyway, I was still excited about container planting and wanted to try it out.

In these photos you cannot even see the pot because it's so covered by greenery, but it's right in front of the large blue container. I'd estimate the pot was approximately 5 gallon. For the hot summer months of July and August, the plant stayed in it's pot and stayed alive. Then when weather cooled in late August, it started to climb out of the pot and travel the yard. It produced FOUR butternut squash, which is awesome! I wonder if it would do more in the ground, so I might try that next year. The soil was very dry when I did the fall clean up last week and I did not keep a consistent watering schedule. They did seem to burst to life with the fall rains, as you can see with the cracking on one. Too much rain produces cracks but it wasn't quite ready to harvest. It matured nicely and is not curing in my basement. I've read that on average a plant will produce 5-6 squash, so I guess I did okay with a container.

Why I should NOT do container plants

I am not consistent at keeping a garden watered and rely mostly on rainfall. Henseforth, my container plants do not last throughout a hot summer. Here's a perfect example of zinnias planted in a container, and one in the ground:

I think the reason I put some in pots was to give the garden more dimention, and I thought I could squeeze the pots into spaces that had previously been taken by spring flowers that had yet to die back. I may have thought I'd be more proactive in watering but that was sadly not the case. When the hot dry summer finally cooled down, the in-ground zinnia bloomed to awesome beauty while the one in pot died. It was such a contrast! The heat was so tremendous, we couldn't even get sunflowers to srout and grow from seed. Marigolds refused to budge until September! I'm afraid they won't have enough time to grow flowers before Day of the Dead.

My First Basil Plant

I was given a basil plant in exchange for purple sweet potato slips. I planted it with a few purple sweet potato slips just to see what would happen. Here is how it looked in September:

I started using the basil in August and found a profound love for pesto! It's insanely good on sandwiches, pizza, and pasta. I've made 3-4 batches so far and looking forward to making more. Here is a photo of Evie helping me de-leaf the entire plant right before frost season hits:

I'll update soon on my recipes for using pesto.

Evie's Neapolitan Cookies

Evie did not get accepted into the Saturday morning art class because I signed up too late, so I decided to do a weekly art lesson with her at home. She asked if we could make cookies together and that is a form of art so we decided on baking Neapolitan cookies. I've been avoiding these for a long time because they look time consuming, but once she sets her heart on something she's bound to return to it again and again until we get it done. So I actually had the freeze dried strawberries on hand for 10 months, thinking we'd do them over last Christmas vacation. Glad to say we finally made them, and they were awesome!

We followed the receipe from Sarah Kieffer's 100 cookies book.