Mountain Musings

Recent Visits

We enjoyed having some guests in our home over the past few weeks, so I'm finally getting around to sharing a few pictures of their visits.

Carolyn and Garnett, friends of Mom and Granny from many years ago, arrived to join us for the evening on their way home to South Boston. It had been awhile since we had seen them. Mom fixed a delicious meal, and our time with them included conversation around the table and singing some hymns to send them on their way.

One Sunday afternoon, we had a family from church follow us home for the rest of the day. We enjoyed chatting during the afternoon and learning more about each other.

The ladies talked around the table and pitched in to help with the meal preparations.

It was a beautiful evening, so we walked around viewing the gardens, and everyone got a chance to see Jonathan's new bee hives. Comb is busily being built!

After supper we got out a few instruments and then sang together for awhile in praise to the Lord.

Their family blessed us with several songs they had learned as they ministered at nursing homes. What a treat to hear them sing harmoniously as a family!

It has been a joy to get to know these fellow believers.

~Hannah

Preparing for Market: Part 3

Sarah and I are on the home stretch of getting everything ready for the farmer's market's opening day!

Here I am making a batch of Lemon Poppyseed castile soap to introduce at the market in the upcoming weeks of spring. It's bright citrus-y scent is combining with all the other fragrances drying on racks in our schoolroom and is wafting throughout the house.

We each had a vinyl banner made to hang from our 10' x 10' canopy--we were pleased with how they turned out! Dad spent this evening helping me figure out how to secure it to the tent, so we'll be ready on Saturday morning when we set up.

It was decided that we needed sandbags to weight down our canopy from any wind, so I quickly sewed up 2 bags from....old denim jeans legs!
 

After filling each lined leg with sand, I closed up the opening and sewed a reinforced grommet opening.

This final week will be full. It's not long now!

~Hannah

Caesar Salad, Chocolate Bowls, Flavored Butters

When my night to cook fell on February 14, I decided to try some new special recipes. But the first step was to don my red vintage apron Granny surprised me with for Christmas. Thank you, Granny! I wore it most of the day, not just in the kitchen.

(Camera strap cover made by and won from Quilty Girl.)

The idea for these chocolate bowls for our ice cream dessert came from Bakerella via Pinterest.

Here is the final product, filled with Honey Vanilla ice cream, strawberries from last summer, and served on Granny's pink depression-glassware that I stole from my hope chest closet shelf.

Then I made a huge Caesar salad with the homemade dressing found at this food blog.

Along with our Tomato Corn Chowder (found in the Stuffed Cougar cookbook and of which we did not get a photo), we had dinner rolls with cinnamon and strawberry whipped butters. The rolls were warmed and served in a vintage enamelware tray.

This is our family dinner table all set.

 We had a delightful evening!

~Hannah

Summer's End

October's frost means bringing in the last of the tender harvest from the garden. We are still enjoying summer's tomatoes that Granny brought with her from SC, the green ones ripening daily. I picked a whole grocery bag or two brimming with crisp green bell peppers, so yesterday for lunch I made Elise's recipe for Stuffed Peppers. They turned out delicious.

I didn't do nearly as much canning/freezing this season as I had anticipated, but here's the tally of produce that we did put up:

• 8 quarts of green beans, frenched and frozen (these won't last long!)
• 6 quarts black-eyed peas, frozen
• 13 pints pizza sauce, canned
• 3 pints tomato sauce, frozen
• 2 pints dill cucumber pickles, canned
• 14 pints cinnamon cucumber pickles, canned (Granny loves these)
• 6 1/2 quarts sweet cucumber pickle, jarred
• 7 pints zucchini relish, canned
• 25 quarts strawberries, picked locally and frozen
• 3 gallons blueberries, picked locally and frozen
• 1 gallon cantaloupe, chunked and frozen

It will be nice to have these fruits and vegetables preserved over the next months.

...He did not leave Himself without a witness, in that He did good and gave you rains from heaven and fruitful seasons, satisfying your hearts with food and gladness. ~Acts 14:17

~Hannah

Apple Days Craft Show

What a beautiful day we had Saturday for a fall craft show! Granny, Sarah, and I spent the day at the 35th annual Apple Days Craft Show, where we set up a booth selling our baskets, cards, and soaps.

Granny was her usual saleswoman self and enjoyed talking to the customers who came out looking and shopping, convincing them of why they needed one of her beautiful baskets. Sarah helped her with making change, bagging purchases, and arranging the tables.

I was stationed near my soaps and debuted a new seasonal scent Pumpkin Maple Spice among the other 24 varieties. It was interesting to see what each person chose as their favorites.

This was the same venue where we were in April, and we were thankful the crowds were much more plentiful this time of year, which made sales 10 times better. Although there were not as many fellow vendors there as we expected, it was worth trying this year.

We now look forward to one more autumn show in Granny's hometown next month. Come meet us at the Holiday Living Show in Halifax, VA on November 12th.

What was your October weekend like?

~Hannah

Family Encouragement Weekend 2011

Meeting other families, eating, and talking...

Singing and listening to messages and testimonies...
 

Playing games outside...

...and cultivating family harmony!

Read more thorough accounts and photos of the weekend shared by the Wilkes, Neely, Staddon, Hynes, and Martin families.

~Hannah

Has not My hand made all these things?

"He covers His hands with the lightning, and commands it to strike the mark. Its noise declares His presence...."~Job 36:32-33a

"At this also my heart trembles, and leaps from its place. Listen closely to the thunder of His voice, and the rumbling that goes out from His mouth. God thunders with His voice wondrously, doing great things which we cannot comprehend." ~Job 37:1-2

"...But to this one I will look, to him who is humble and contrite of spirit, and who trembles at My word." ~Isaiah 66:2

We had a great time with our aunt while she was here, including hiking Humpback Rocks in the fog. It had been almost 20 years since we'd last done this with her!

~Hannah

Hymns and Hiking at Humpback

We had an enjoyable visit with the Hynes family as they were traveling in the area; one activity was an excursion on the Blue Ridge Parkway to do some hiking at Humpback Rocks. It was a blessing to spend time in fellowship with their family.

I'm pressing on the upward way,
New heights I'm gaining every day;
Still praying as I onward bound,
"Lord, plant my feet on higher ground."

Lord, lift me up, and let me stand
By faith on Canaan's tableland;
A higher plane than I have found,
Lord, plant my feet on higher ground.

From the end of the earth I call to You when my heart is faint;
Lead me to the rock that is higher than I. ~Psalm 61:2

This is the beautiful view that awaited us at the top of the trail, looking west across the Shenandoah Valley. As has become our tradition when taking families hiking here, we sang hymns for half an hour as we rested on the rocks looking out at the majestic scenery.

My hope is built on nothing less
Than Jesus’ blood and righteousness.
I dare not trust the sweetest frame,
But wholly trust in Jesus’ Name.
On Christ the solid Rock I stand,
All other ground is sinking sand...

Standing on the promises I shall not fall,
List'ning every moment to the Spirit's call.
Resting in my Savior as my All in all,
Standing on the promises of God.

Be to me a rock of habitation to which I may continually come;
You have given commandment to save me, for You are my rock and my fortress. ~Psalm 71:3

~Hannah

Curds and Whey

"He will eat curds and honey at the time He knows enough to refuse evil and choose good." ~Isaiah 7:15

We recently had the chance to attend a dairy workshop with several other families. There were demonstrations on dairy products such as mozzarella, ricotta, cream cheese, yogurt, and butter; we even sampled homemade ice cream made from farm-fresh milk.

Arielle is the cheese-making expert for her family and has the task of using up all the milk they get from their cow. She shared her knowledge by showing us the process for each type of dairy product.

Here she is draining the mozzarella curd before we all helped stretch the cheese as the final step.

How does your garden grow?

Catchup Post # 2: Inside the Veggie Garden (especially for Leigha and Sherrin :))

Although these photos were taken 2 weeks ago, at least they will give you an idea of what our garden is currently looking like. Everything is filling the beds with greenery and vegetables!

In this first photo, you can see the top of the garden entrance gate. In this long bed are growing zucchini, yellow squash, lettuce (which I have since pulled), spinach, kohlrabi, and cucumbers. So far we have enjoyed the delicious results in several dishes, and the cucumbers are becoming pickles as I write.

Here is the southern end of the picket fence garden, looking towards Granny's basket shed; you can see not only the pole beans on their supports, but the clothesline around the top of the lower garden, a new feature Dad added this year for stopping the deer.

In the middle of the long raised beds grows a row of herbs, such as bushy Greek oregano, cilantro, thyme, dill, and rosemary. There are some sugar snap peas and Swiss chard in there, too.

This is a photo looking southwest, towards the tomato bed. We have about 6 varieties growing, 35 plants total. Hopefully the harvest will be fully ripening any day now, although many of their leaves are blighted.

In the corner of this view is a large bed containing turnips past their prime, beets, carrots, and peppers.

The tomato bed is intermingled with basil and marigolds, and I recently mulched it with leftover hardwood mulch. The cucumbers climb a chicken wire trellis.

This is the first year I have planted pole beans; Granny and I strung the string supports between metal snow poles. Garlic had been growing at the end of this bed since last fall, and I replaced their spot with some okra which is sprouting up nicely already. More pictures later!

How is your garden growing?

~Hannah