Garden Update 7-22-2016 – peppers, cucumbers, carrots, corn

0-stuffedpeppersMy blogging buddy Dianna mentioned in a comment on my pepper post that she used to make stuffed peppers.
I’d never made stuffed peppers and since I have oodles of them at the moment, I found a simple recipe and made some.
I used a green pepper and a purple pepper so we could compare their taste.
I served the stuffed peppers with a baked potato and cornbread. We really enjoyed it.
The purple pepper was really good. It had a nice smooth taste to it.
We didn’t care much for the green pepper, it had a harsh taste to it. The stuffing was good so we emptied the green pepper’s stuffing out on our plates and ate it that way.

I used a recipe for Broccoli and Rice Stuffed Peppers by Knorr
I made some changes and additions to it:
ground turkey instead of ground beef
chopped fresh tomatoes
chopped fresh basil
in the casserole dish bottom I put 1/2 tbsp Worcestershire sauce with 1/2 cup water.
After the peppers were done, we sprinkled them with the Worcestershire water
my husband topped his with mixed shredded cheese
I topped mine with ricotta and sour cream cheese
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0-cucumbersMy blogging buddy Sheryl posted on her blog about fried cucumbers. It sounded like something I’d be interested in trying except I would bake them. I peeled a cucumber, quartered it up, coated it in a bit of olive oil, coated it in crushed herbed croutons and grated parmesan cheese and added them to a tray of squash sticks prepared the same way.
The cucumbers had a nice texture and smelled great, but I think the taste would be described as an acquired one.
I think if I had of used the recipe on Sheryl’s post and deep fried the cucumbers they may have been more to our liking.
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0-carrotsWe planted a pack of mixed color carrot seeds. So far only a few of the white ones have matured enough to pick. I topped them, washed them and scrapped the skins clean.
Well, the taste was really not very carroty. It was more like a big crunch with very little taste, for some reason it reminded me of a very bland radish.
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2016-02-01 10.18.55We harvested, shucked, cleaned, cooked and tried to eat some of the ornamental corn. We didn’t care for the plainness of the taste. I think if I had of add a lot of sugar to the water and it would have been better. It’s edible though and would be welcome if one was hungry.
Thankfully, we didn’t grow the ornamental corn to eat. We grew it just to be growing it and maybe get some to dry for decor. If the birds and critters leave us any for that.
We have a large patch of sweet corn for eating, so we’re still hoping for some delicious corn on the cob.
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P1040229Here’s a photo of our bounty for the week. I’ve got a few last stragglers of squash. My squash didn’t do very well this year. We’re still getting a few tomatoes. We’ve been eating the tomatoes like candy. Yum! I’ve got oodles of peppers and I’ll be up to my elbows preparing and freezing them someday soon.

Next year we don’t plan to use the variety mix of color seeds. They were a disappointment. We plan on buying individual colors in plants or packs of seeds.
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And that’s all of my gardening updates at the moment.
I wish you all a nice relaxing weekend.

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Tracing Paper Troubles

tracing1I had to take a break from making my wallet because the pattern has oodles of fold lines and guide dots that needs to be marked on the fabric. When I was doing redwork, I used a makeshift light-box to trace the designs on my fabric. That method won’t work with my printed fabric. I decided to use tracing paper to make sure I get the placement guides and fold lines in the right spots.

I have a pack of tracing paper that I bought about 1985. I used tracing paper a lot in them days. I sewed constantly back then making toys and clothes. I went to my old sewing box and got out my old tracing paper and my tracing wheels. I lined the tracing paper in the fabric and pattern. And began to trace a test spot… imagine my surprise when no line was on my fabric. I tried a dark color and again no marks.
Well, horse-feathers I reckon that after 3 decades my old tracing paper doesn’t work anymore. Imagine that? :/

Time to go shopping:
I went to 2 different department stores: they had fabric, patterns, pins, scissors, buttons and many other notions, but not nary a bit of tracing paper. ~bummer~

I know that sewing is a fairly big industry since so many folks are running home businesses selling homesewn bags, clothes, accessories, etc… A lot of patterns have fold lines and guides that needs to be marked or traced.  I think tracing paper is best for that task. I went online and nosed around to see what the sewers are using now-a-days. Well, I discovered that the favorite suggestions was to either use a long baste stitch along the pattern guides or take a sheet of paper and heavily scribble/color on it making it tracing paper; they did warn that it was awfully hard to remove the traced color lines from your fabric.
Um, nope… I don’t want to fight with removing color marks from my fabric. If the color lines won’t come off, the newly sewn project would be odd looking.
*I’ve always used a baste stitch for darts. However, I choose not to use basting stitches for marking oodles of fold lines and guides.

tracing2I shopped online and ordered some tracing paper. I had to wait for a few days for it to arrive.  Of course when I have to wait, I get sidetracked with other projects. Finally, the tracing paper arrived, but I haven’t used it yet.  At least it’s on hand whenever I need it. Hopefully, I’ll have an updated sewing post on my wallet soon.

Do you use tracing paper or something else for guides, fold lines or darts on patterns, when you sew?

Do you have problems finding supplies for your crafts and creations in your area or do you have to order them online like me?

Wishing you all much success in your creative projects.

*Just an added note here:
I haven’t finished my redwork project. I stopped working on it in early 2014. I put it away until I’m ready to work on it again. I hope to get back to it and finish it someday.

Bell Pepper Harvest

P1040187We harvested our bell peppers yesterday. Unfortunately, out of the 50+ plants only about a dozen produced fruit. It’s possible over the next few days some of these green peppers will change ripen to a different color… or not… you never can tell about peppers.
Whatever they do, I plan to chop them up and freeze them using my flash freezing method. It’s handy to have frozen bell peppers for cooking any time of year.

I hope you all are having productive flower and vegetable gardens.

2016 WordPress Weekly Photo Challenge – Details – Robber Fly

2016 WordPress Weekly Photo Challenge
~Details~

Robber Fly – a really good guyP1030704Here’s a few details about the robber fly.
Robber flies are beneficial insects.
Adults eat bees, beetles, dragonflies, other flies,
grasshoppers, leafhoppers, wasps and other insects.
Robber fly Larvae eat organic matter, white grubs,
beetle pupae & grasshopper eggs.
They look like a huge mosquito and quite scary
looking to be such a helpful bug.

 Wishing you all fun with the WP photo challenge!