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Headed out for the official family reunion! #judgefest19 #alaskarailroad #chugachmountains #ilovealaskaSo good to be in Alaska with my family! (Especially my niece 😂) #judgefest19It’s peach season, especially at our house, and so it’s time for my obligatory annual post to remind you to make peach salsa! If you want a recipe, search my blog (link in profile) for “peach salsa”. If you already have a fresh salsa recipe that you like, leave out the cilantro, and add lots of chopped peaches, sliced basil, and olive oil. The flavor is amazing! 😍🍑 . . . Nik has been working really hard the past two weeks, picking the peaches from our tree. The second picture is the last major picking, which he did on Saturday. He picked about 150 peaches. 🙌🙌🙌. Last year‘s harvest was better, but we learned from our mistakes from this summer and we’re hoping next year will be even better. Fruit farming is its whole own knowledge base. We will probably end up with about 4 gallon bags of sliced peaches in our freezer for the winter. 😍 . . . If you have been following along in my stories over the past five weeks, you will know that we recently under took a total gut renovation of our kitchen. We are oh so close to being finished and the steel gray granite in the background of the first picture is our new countertop. I told Nik that now that I have such a dramatic background, I’m going to become a Instagram food influencer. 😂 Swipe past the peach picture to hear the first dishwasher load in our kitchen in over 2 1/2 years. It is so nice to have a working dishwasher again! . . . #salmonandsouvlakigardens #salmonandsouvlakicooks #peachsalsa #ediblelandscaping #growyourownfood #organicgardeningDouble Rock never disappoints. 😍 #getoutside #wildandfreekids #salmonandsouvlakiexploresLook! I’m growing a garden patchwork quilt! Also, it’s my best spring garden ever. The secret? Sprinkle SO many seeds, way more than you think you need. Currently growing: arugula and lettuce, 2 kinds of snap peas, 3 kinds of radishes, 2 kinds of turnips, chiogga and golden beets, Swiss chard, cilantro, bok choy, tatsoi, 2 kinds of kales, mustard greens, and an Asian green mix. As I told Nik last night, we are officially in the “eat salad for every meal” season. 😍 Also, my dianthus appears to want to take over the world. I just planted this clumps last year and they have probably tripled in size! #salmonandsouvlakigardens #growwhatyoueat #organicgardeningLast fall, we were raising five swallowtail caterpillars. They turned into chrysalises and then did not emerge as butterflies, meaning that in their wisdom, they knew that they were the generation to overwinter and emerge in the spring to continue the lifecycle. Each chrysalis was in its own quart glass jar and we put them out in the garage to stay cold through the winter. I checked on them a few weeks ago and there were no signs of life. And then I FORGOT ABOUT THEM. 😩 Today, as I went out to our garage to get our wagon for the walk to co-op, I realized I needed to check on what was probably the awful butterfly carnage. Instead, we found three live butterflies!!!!!!!!! Releasing them into the world was one of the coolest things I’ve done in a long time. ❤️😍❤️ Now, we just need to plant a bunch of parsley, to convince the adults to lay their eggs in our garden so we can raise swallowtails all summer. There are still two intact chrysalises, so we moved them to our porch where we can see them . Hopefully, we will be able to release two more soon. 🦋#swallowtailbutterfly #savethepollinators #salmonandsouvlakigardensI finally managed to get this name tag in the mail and it’s been received so I can show it to the public. This is one of the secret sewing projects that I posted in my stories a few weeks ago. For the recent @baltimoremqg name tag swap, I English paper pieced three-quarter inch hexagons in 17 different green scraps. Elaine said she liked greens and cream. This was a fun little project! . . . For perhaps the first time in my life, I was also brave enough to hand write those letters, rather than printing some off from the computer. Go me! 👊 #salmonandsouvlakisews #englishpaperpiecing #eppeverywhere #baltimoremqg #charmcitysewcialChrist is Risen! Happy Easter! (Click the link in my profile to get to my blog for our full Easter post.)Today I had the fun of teaching an English paper piecing workshop to about 25 students during QuiltFest! at the Maryland Historical Society, @marylandhistory. I taught as part of a team of women from the @baltimoremqg. We explained the history of EPP, did a show and tell with lots of EPP projects (first picture, not all my own work), and then each student got a chance to sew their own hexie flower. We are so grateful to @createdomesticity, @paperpiecesepp, @andoverfabrics, and @aurifilthread for their exceedingly generous donations of class materials. Everyone was thrilled to be able to take home fabric, paper hexagons, and thread! 😍 #baltimoremqg #aurifil #andoverfabrics #domesticitystudio #paperpiecesepp #englishpaperpiecing #eppeverywhere #salmonandsouvlakisews . . . Many thanks to @summer_k_rankin, @urokeay_imokeay, Deanna, and Bobbi for being a great teaching team!Quilts, quilts, and more modern quilts with the @baltimoremqg at the @marylandhistory QuiltFest! My work here includes #fancyforestmedallionquilt, #laurashexiequilt, #carkaihexie, Marko’s HST quilt, and the Facing East mini, pattern by @carolynfriedlander. It’s fun to share the love of modern quilting! #salmonandsouvlakisews #baltimoremqg #marylandhistoricalsocietyWe’re camping at Elk Neck State Park this weekend and the weather was glorious this afternoon! Just right for wading and digging and soaking up some spring sun. And why yes, I have picked up knitting as another portable hobby because I really want to use this yarn that I bought in Iceland when I was pregnant with Marko. 😉 #elkneckstatepark #chesapeakebay #driftwoodbeach #salmonandsouvlakiknitsAHHHHHHHHH!!!! A dragon is living in our yard and keeps trying to break through our windows! First the dragon started chasing Marko. He escaped but then it started chasing Ellie!! What should we do?!?!?! Scream the dragon’s ears off?????? Send help!!!!! . . . This spring silly is brought to you by Ellie and Marko with technical assistance from Mama, as partially inspired by Martin and Sylvia of @sparkle_stories. 😉Categories
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Monthly Archives: November 2012
KIOS: On Hiatus for Now
This post is part of my series, “Kickin’ It Old Skool: Why and How We Are Old-Fashioned” or KIOS for short. If you’re new to the series, please read my disclaimer before continuing on. I’m keeping a table of contents … Continue reading
Posted in KIOS
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Sing, Sing a Song!
Ellie has recently begun singing independently and I love hearing her versions of the songs that we sing. “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star” is a current favorite of hers. This is crazy to me because I hardly ever sing it to … Continue reading
Posted in Ellie, movie
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Ellie and Baby = The Same
Ellie’s Yiayia knitted her a new hat (which she wears almost constantly now, even inside) and also made a tiny hat and scarf for her baby doll. This has invited lots of fun conversations about how we all have hats, … Continue reading
Posted in Ellie
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A Little Joke for Your Monday Afternoon
Last night, we had dinner at the home of some friends. On the drive home, Ellie was asking to “go ‘ome” and it was so cute to hear her say that! When we got home, I said, “Ellie, are we … Continue reading
Posted in Ellie
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Allow Me To Brag for a Moment About My Amazing Husband and Our Incredibly Delicious Turkey and Thanksgiving Meal
Yesterday, Nik took charge of roasting our almost-19-pound turkey. He decided to use the braise/roast method (as illustrated here on Michael’s Ruhlman’s blog). It was, hands down, the most amazingly moist and delicious turkey we’ve ever had. We’ll probably never … Continue reading
Posted in cooking, love
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A Little Photo Shoot for Ellie’s Cousin Alex (the one in Alaska)
Ellie’s five-year-old cousin, Alex (the one in Alaska who’s a girl as opposed to the one in Virginia who’s a boy) gave Ellie this little skirt when we were there in April. It had been her favorite skirt that she … Continue reading
Posted in Ellie, family
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Happy Thanksgiving!
This year, we are so grateful for this little girl, who keeps us laughing every day. We are also grateful to Ed, Earl, Henry and so many others who worked hard to raise and grow the food which we will … Continue reading
Posted in Ellie, reflecting
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