Friday, February 18, 2011

February 2011

Sorry it has been so long since I put a post up -- it has been a fairly turbulent winter 2011 for us so far -- maybe we are finally seeing the light at the end of the tunnel!

Two weeks featuring two different major snow storms for our area kept us bundled up and pretty much house-bound. For much of the time, I stayed in the city with my daughter (so I could make the drive to work) while Steven kept care of everything at home -- no small feat in that kind of blizzard weather! I really appreciate all he does.

We got very low on firewood, having to burn it hot and non-stop like that to keep the house at a bearable temp; but we got through it, and have since had a chance to cut more and get re-stocked.

This past week has been just the opposite of the former two: a week of record high temps (78 degrees yesterday!) with lots of sun -- all the snow has melted, and we can taste spring around the corner! I think Steven even put some onion seed out in the part of the garden I was able to till during the last warm snap -- he can't wait to get his hands in the earth and get the garden started - he just loves doing that so much.

Speaking of garden -- we have a bit of greenery inside the house this winter!

Late last summer, we were disappointed with how our green bell peppers plants had performed. They were slow to take off, we had a very dry hot summer, and we got almost no fruit from them at all. Most people just allow their peppers and tomatoes to die with the first frost and try again the next year.

But not Steven. He knew that in more tropical areas, peppers can survive year-round if there is no freeze. So he dug up his three pepper plants that were left, potted them in big pots and brought them in the house to set in the big bay window. And they have done great! I thought they would just survive during the winter inside, and we could replant them in the spring; but instead they have flourished-- blooming and setting on fruit inside!



It is amazing. Although I don't think these peppers will make it to full size inside, I went ahead and harvested a few of these little ones to use in Texas hash and other cooking projects. It was so good to smell fresh peppers in the middle of winter.

We have a busy weekend planned coming up (three day weekend off from my work). We will be removing a large elm tree in our back yard that has been mostly dead for some time and in danger of coming down on the house. That will also open up a bit more sky to his greenhouse. There are many more projects on the list!

3 comments:

Kelle at The Never Done Farm said...

Tracy, glad you have your Dd you can stay with and bravo for Steven for taking such good care while you were away!

The peppers look great, my rosemary is HUGE, can't wait to replant it outside( after a hardening off period of course*wink*)

Looking forward to Spring myself, even though we truly can't complain about our winter, it could have been much, much worse.

Blessing, safety and productivity for your weekend.
Kelle

Joe said...

I love the idea of fresh peppers all winter! Hopefully by next winter, I'll have my greenhouse up and running. I'm hoping to put a rocket stove in it so that I can grow some veggies all winter!

BTW, you've got a very nice blog!

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