Back 2 The Rain

A week ago I was sweltering and today I am cuddled under my wool blankets and duvets in my long underwear. Happy September. School is about to start, the grant deadlines lurk like nuclear subs and I'm worried about my tomatoes getting the dreaded blight. Anyway, the weather's supposed to clear up for the weekend and hopefully we'll get some beautiful fall days. So cheer up, Ms. Zucchini.

BTW, I made zucchini cupcakes for breakfast. That is the second batch I made out of one zuke from Catherine and their is still a big hunk of zucchini left! That's over four cups of zucchini already. Strewth!

Write, Rehearse, Repeat

So good to be writing and rehearsing again. Feels like I'm getting my mojo back. Mojo, mojo, mojo. (Sorry, private joke. You'll have to see the show to understand.) Repetition features prominently in our piece. As does the MILF.

Checked the bees again with J and gave them varroa mite treatment number two. They are doing all right, but not as vigorous as we'd like them to be. Fingers crossed. There were lots of practice queen cells too, which is odd.

We had a nice little rain shower today which the tomatoes need. I am looking after my neighbor's cat and their plants. I couldn't find the cat anywhere which kind of freaked me out, but finally I checked in a tiny crawlspace under a bed and there she was: pupils dilated and freaked out by a strange woman clomping about her house. She's so shy. Poor thing. Then there's Homer, the other neighbor's cat who is not shy about trying to let me into the house so he can eat all her food. Sorry mate, I'm on to your tricks. He fooled the last cat sitter who let him pig out and then puke all over the floor. Not on MY watch.

Shaktea has upped their game. The girls are now making their own desserts and have added some tea sandwiches to their menu. The chocolate chai pudding is to die for. Ules loves it as much as I do.

16 Oaks

The other day I visited this lovely community garden on Oak Street. It's fascinating how each plot is a reflection of the gardener's personality.

There is no water source here so the gardener's have to haul all their water in buckets.

In spite of this, and the dodgy quality of soil in some of the plots the garden is chalk full of produce.

I love the fact that many of the vegetable gardeners have added flowers to their plots.


And then there's this garden which is full to the brim with flowers.

Agapanthus. I just love that word.

In this flower you can see the lines leading to the center of the flower which are the nectar guides, directing the bees to the flower's stamens and nectaries. Given their ability to see ultra violet light, these lines would be even clearer to bees.

I gave a talk this weekend on biodiversity and encourage people to plant a rainbow of color in their garden.

Just look at this purple kohlrabi. I want to eat one right now.

Lots of people' tomatoes were late this year, so they are just beginning to ripen.

This garden is well pollinated and they've been smart to create a rock garden along the edges, adding even more food for pollinators.

Standing on the corner, watching the zucchinis grow.

Hoodoos and Banff Snails

What is this man doing? He is counting snails! There is a tiny brown snail that lives in the mineral waters in Banff and this scientist is working on a Sunday performing a snail census with a clicker in his hand. The cave basin is closed for renovations for two years, but the board walk up the hill is still open and you can see and smell the sulpherous mineral wasser. Yes, the pools are really that colour.

There is a little wild garden at the base of the hill in front of the mineral bath.

We took a mini hike up to view the Banff Hoodoos and I was thrilled to see some wild onions growing along the path. If you look closely you can see the river rafters in the bottom right of the photo.

Hot Enough fer Ya?

I am baked. I am alive in the morning and the evening, but in between, I am in zombie mode. Our house is getting warmer by the day. I stayed up late last night baking cookies and watering the school garden by moonlight. I've been pruning the tomato plants that are turning into Christmas trees. I've got to get them producing bigger fruit, so I've been trimming the plants every three days, but I can hardly keep up with the growth. The lemon cucumber plant is pumping out the fruit. The sunflowers are glorious.

On hot days like this, Thai takeout is a blessing. How are you coping with the heat?

Peaches, Green Tomatoes, and Cookies

The main ingredients we are focusing on these days are Keremeos peaches and green tomatoes. I eat my peaches for breakfast with hemp hearts and chia seeds and for dessert they are dolloped with a teaspoon of whipping cream and a sprinkle of cinnamon. I put the green tomatoes from Keremeos in an improvised green gazpacho, with crunchy cukes, amaranth and onions from my garden, veg stock, water, lime juice and garlic. It may be re-invented as a green salsa for our block party tomorrow if I can find some decent tomatillos. It occurred to me you could also make an yellow lemony gazpacho with yellow tomatoes and yellow tomatillos.

Tonight I made cookies to sell at our yard sale tomorrow morning. I made some nutty cookies with hemp seeds and pecans, chocolate mint pinwheels and lime peel and lemon verbena shortbread. I've got to wake up early, put up the yard sale signs and clean the kitchen. Why am I baking in this heat? Because I am a crazy lady.

The Grist Mill at Keremeos

After we stopped to pick up some organic peaches at the Blush Lane Orchard stand, we headed to the heritage grist mill just outside Keremeos.

There's a wee gift shop and tea room with a limited menu. We had some amazing iced tea. Now I have learned that an Arnold Palmer is a drink made out of lemonade mixed with iced brewed black tea (usually Orange Pekoe). I think this is what I really like the best. Maybe 3/4 tea and 1/4 lemonade would be about my favorite recipe. I'm going to have to experiment.

I actually ended up buying three books, one on natural dyeing and another on the biography of wheat. I was disappointed there was no flour for sale, but apparently the grinder the owner was using is broken.

It's a pretty little spot, with space for community events.

It's the Blob!


I'd never heard of a zucca melon before, but now I'm intrigued and I really want to grow one. However, it looks like you'd need a lot of space. That melon is about three feet long. It only blooms at night. Hmmm, I think I feel a story coming on.

I wonder if it's related to the zucchini? Or the blob?

The Iced Tea Tour

Those folks who know me well are familiar with my weakness for iced brewed tea in all its glory. I drink it all year round and it makes me very happy. There's something in the chemistry of it that puts me in a good mood and gives me courage. Sometimes, I admit I overdo it and my hands end up shaking with a caffeine buzz, which is what happened yesterday. I had two cups of a lemony citrus tea at this cafe in Linden Gardens. (See my post on Beespeaker Saijiki for more about the garden.) As Ules and Pietro played a game of Killer Bunnies (sigh), I wandered around the garden and tried to be very quiet so as not to startle the quails. They are very easily spooked however, and went flying off and sputtering in all directions every few steps I took. I really fell in love with that garden.

Later in the afternoon we stopped at the Preserved Seed Café in Chilliwack run by an alternative religious group that makes their own bread and grows a lot of their own food. I ate an excellent grilled turkey and mozza sandwich on a soft and malty spelt bun with a side salad topped with sesame sticks. I also had a glass of iced green tea which was not the best quality, but it was refreshing. I'm very spoiled by the quality of green tea at Shaktea in Vancouver. Some of the places that make good iced tea in Vancouver are Aphrodite's Organic Café, Trafalgar's, and Sophie's Comic Café. My live is mapped by journeys between these locations and others in search for the ultimate iced tea. What's your favorite recipe for a cool, refreshing iced tea this summer? I've been making lemon verbena tea from my plant. After brewing the tea, I let it cool and then pour it into my water bottle and add ice.

The Courage to Face the Page

I had a revelation when we are on holidays. There was a day where I just felt overwhelmed by the past and the future. The present seemed like a rickety suspension bridge that was doomed to rip off its mooring at any moment. Sometimes I just don't feel courageous. This summer, I feel I've really been nibbling around the edges of projects and not really taking things in hand. I felt burnt out and uninspired. The "things to do" list just didn't look appealing. Stands to reason that I needed a holiday and it has done me a world of good. Something has shifted slightly so that I can approach things with a different perspective. I'm one of those people who just gets killed by routine. It really wears me down until I don't recognize myself.

I need to stoke up the fire of inner courage. It takes courage to wake up and face the empty page, the pile of dishes and the unanswerable questions of the day. I have the vision of what I need to do and now I just need the courage to do it.

What gives you courage?

Traffic Jams

We are home from our holiday and a lot of intense traffic. The first day my boys complained and moaned all day about road trips and traffic while I tried to relax and enjoy the scenery. The second day we hit a major traffic jam between Golden and Banff, sitting on the highway for half an hour at a standstill at one point. There was a bottle neck of traffic due to miles and miles of construction work. We missed our dinner reservation and were pretty exhausted upon arrival. We had fun in Banff with the family, but it took the two days of holiday just to unwind and settle in before we had to hit the road again. The way back to Naramata was smoother going, and by today (the last day of our vacation) I was finally feeling that holiday glow. Then we got stuck in traffic from Surrey to Vancouver and I lost that glow.

We listened to Peter Pan in Scarlet by Geraldine McCaughrean, the "official sequel", which is a bit plodding, but very clever. I was thinking about how mothers are portrayed in this book as extreme saints on the one hand, to harpies on the other. There is no middle ground here. The whole acceptance of growing old requires a more balanced view of motherhood. We also listened to our old favorite, Midnight for Charlie Bone by Jenny Nimmo.

The trip today began with the couple in the motel room next door to us verbally tearing each other to shreds and when I returned home a couple in the house behind ours was having such a rip-roaring argument I considered calling the police. They seemed to run out of steam after half an hour, but it was fascinating the way they kept repeating the same things over and over and over even though they knew it was driving the other person crazy. Is this love or is this hate? Uhhh, hate. Pure hatred. Welcome home.

I dub this the vacation of very good sweets and very good iced tea. We found several places that made excellent home made iced tea and this kept my morale high. Photos and tasting notes to follow.

Zucchini Bundt for Breakfast

We finished off Anakana's zucchini in this cake (as described below). Of course we had to have some for breakfast. We're going to the Okanagan on the way to Banff on Thursday so we've got to eat all the cake by then but somehow I don't think that will be a problem. The zucchini in this photo are from the school garden and I will take them down to the summer camp tomorrow so they can have zucchini sticks for their snack time.

Got Bundt?

After a narcoleptic Sunday, I finally had a burst of energy today and did some major tidying up in the garden. I also transplanted some tomato plants into the garden because their pots were too small and were cramping their style. The wild bergamot is blooming and the bumble bees are really excited about those frilly mauve blossoms.

I decided to bake today after discovering a recipe for a meatloaf made with ground turkey and quinoa. It's from a charming book called Nirmala's Edible Diary: A Hungry Traveler's Cookbook with Recipes from 14 Countries by Nirmala Marine. The recipes are inspired by the author's childhood and travels in South America. I modified her recipe to suit our family and did manage to get Ules to eat some of it. I also sautéd some amaranth from the Mayan gardeners at UBC Farm and made it the way the man who sold it to me suggested: with garlic and chilies.

Since the oven would be on I also decided to make a zucchini bundt cake from this recipe on David Lebowitz's blog which has a crunchy lemon glaze. It's made with olive oil and it's very moist. Highly recommended. We had it with some peach ice cream we made today in our ice cream ball.