'Twas a good day today. The weather is cold. Only 6° when I got up this morning. Very gray with a bit of snow forecast. (I thought it was too cold to snow.) And lo and behold, it did start snowing with rather heavy, small flakes that managed to amount to about three inches on the ground as of 7 p.m. tonight.
Yes, it's beginning to look a lot like Christmas. Outside and, of course, inside. I can't remember a year when I've appreciated our inside decorations this much.
I do love to eat our evening meal by candlelight and this certainly is the time of year to do so. It's almost dark by 4:30 p.m. now, and certainly pitch black by 5. How different it is from a day in mid-summer. Truly like living in a different world.
Today I tackled a job I've been putting off for a couple of months. When I defrosted our main freezer at the end of the garden's harvest, for some reason I just couldn't fit all the bounty in there in a sensible, convenient order.
After weeks of not being able to find things, I finally did a massive rearranging and organization that I'm now very happy with. And as so often happens, when finished with the task, I found more room in that big white box than I thought there would be. Plus, while going through the contents I got all kinds of meal ideas and wondered why I haven't been using as much of the bounty as I could/should. I guess we'll just have to start eating more.
One thing I pulled out and defrosted was some good navy bean soup with ham which made a great dinner tonight with garlic cheese bread and coleslaw that I made with red cabbage, grated carrots and some chopped raw cauliflower. Vanilla pudding with whipped cream for dessert finished off a satisfying winter evening's meal.
More snow to come tomorrow, they say, and I think I'm going to declare Wednesday a low-key, take it easy day with some time devoted to handwork. After finishing whatever shoveling and snow plowing might be necessary, that is.
This is my latest x-stitch piece I finished and framed last weekend. I'm going to hang it on the outside of my quilt room door. (Chortle-chortle.)
Here's a peek into a corner of my quilt room. In order to fit the Christmas tree in our small living room, we have to remove this chair and floor lamp to temporary storage elsewhere . . . which is in my quilt room. The Christmas wrapping paper has been pulled out of storage and I'll start wrapping presents soon. I don't like wrapping presents so it's best I do it as the ordered presents come in. I'm behind already.
The canning jars to the right have been there (got tired of moving them around in the kitchen) since this summer because I still haven't made the batches of haskap, strawberry and blueberry jam yet. The frozen berries are waiting patiently in the freezer. Soon. I'll get to that soon.
What a 'loverly' post, Mama Pea! So cozy and yummy. Do you think doing some freezer diving would give me some meal ideas? Some days i just draw a blank. Lucky, lucky you with your cold and snow. It is expected to head over this way, but not for a while. We awoke to raindrops on the roof...again. I don't mind the dark evenings, but these long, dark mornings before daylight inches up....
ReplyDeleteYour latest cross stitch...truer words were never spoken! Great place to put it. Do you think a sign like that, hung around my neck would deter Hubby from talking to me when I am deep into counting my knitting stitches???
Hope you have a lovely, stitchy, low-key Wednesday.
I would dearly love to know your secret for an organized freezer. I did a clean-out and re-organization several months ago, but things I thought I knew where they were, aren't to be found!
ReplyDeleteI am just feeling down this year, as we cannot put up our tree or decor just yet. The living room project is moving along, but slow-going. I do have the radio on as I paint, but cannot wait for this big job to be complete. My back is so sore, but I continue to get up on that ladder. Love you stitch piece.
ReplyDeleteMy problem is I forget what is in the freezer. I do an inventory and start crossing things off as I use them and then I get lazy. I really need to do a new list. I also have several gallon bags of late season tomatoes in the freezer to can. I want to try making pizza sauce this year. I just need to find a good tested recipe but … Christmas cookies come first!
ReplyDeleteIt is still quite green here, after our last round of snow melted and stayed melted. In fact, it was foggy this morning as some "warm" air is rolling in. On my to-do list is to go diving into the freezer to see if I still have any bags of strawberries. I haven't grown strawberries in a couple of years now, but I froze many bags. I'm hoping there's still one in there, pretending to be rhubarb or ground beef and been overlooked.
ReplyDeleteGood for you organizing it all. Must feel good! -Jenn
Katie C. Check out Leigh's blog...she has one!
ReplyDeleteAbsolutely love an organized freezer. Or any other space for that matter. When you get ready to makes the jam, you won't have to dig around to find those berries.
ReplyDeleteRosalea - Thanks! Oh, I so know what you mean about the lack of ideas (and sometimes enthusiasm!) of having to come up with nutritious, delicious, appetizing meals day after day. Maybe I should make you a "soft" copy of that x-stitch I just did so you COULD hang it around your neck. I don't suppose there is one of us hand workers who have not had someone interrupt our concentration when counting or struggling through a difficult spot with an "important" question or statement!
ReplyDeleteLeigh - As I organize the freezer(s) I literally have to make a diagram of what is where. I keep that diagram on the side of the refridge and have to refer to it nearly every time I go to pull something out of a freeze. It's my saving grace!
Kristina - I would truly be a basket case having my house completely torn up as you have . . . especially at this time of year. Hang in there, girl. The picture of the living room you posted this morning indicates some real progress, though, so the end is drawing nearer. If I were you, I'd chalk Christmas decorations off for this year. Give yourself a break and maybe just put a small miniature tree on the kitchen table where you'll see and enjoy it.
Katie C. - Yep, as I told Rosalea above, I simply HAVE to keep my chart handy of where things are in the freezer. My brain cells aren't strong enough these days to remember everything I have to remember!
Jenn - Ha! I had the same problem a while ago when I pulled out a bag of haskap berries that were pretending to be blueberries. The haskaps make wonderful jam but are way too sour to be used as blueberries!
DFW - Yep, I cannot function very well at all if I'm not organized from my sock drawer to file folders to the freezer! Do I have OCD? Nah, just squishy memory cells of what's where. ;o)
Well...maybe your post will motivate my backside to go do the same to my freezers. I have that chore to do myself now. It is oh so easy to just put it off. And oh so easy to just stick a bag of leftovers into it! lost to the ages. I promise to follow your lead and do better! Cheers
ReplyDeleteTim - Yep, it IS so much easier to just keep plopping things into the freezer than to have a "proper" place in which it should be. (Human nature strikes again.) Too bad, but that habit just makes more of a discombobulated mess and frequently wastes good food, too. (Oh, we are so weak sometimes.) ;o) Doing the task does bring rewards though. I promise. Just this morning I was figuring out what to have for dinner tonight and thought of a yummy casserole I had in the freezer. And, by crikey, I knew just where it was!!
ReplyDeleteWell you’re most certainly ahead of me. Let’s see surrounding me in my kitchen five boxes of canned cat food ,one bag of dry cat food ,one bag of Trader Joe’s peppermint pretzel slims (be still my heart)my pressure cooker for canning the 3 boxes of pint mason jars that are awaiting applesauce from the multiple bushels that I got at the Apple Farm in late October early November. Which are in cold storage.
ReplyDeleteIt’s a zoo in here I tell you. And I do know what’s in my freezer. I have both a chest freezer and the freezer in the used refrigerator that my kids gifted me with when they got a new one now residing in the laundry room. I pretty much know where everything else which is a little scary. I also have a smaller fridge /freezer in the kitchen.I like your idea of a diagram though as sometimes I find myself moving stuff to find other stuff.”Wow is there still a chicken under there ?yup there’s two!”
Goatldi
Goatldi - I think you just wrote a stand-up comedy monologue! Isn't it amazing what we can get into doing? And it all needs to be done at once. Now go make your applesauce. (I'm in good shape for sauce as I think I was out of my mind last year because I might have made enough for three years.)
ReplyDeleteExcellent! One can never have enough apple sauce😊
ReplyDeleteAnonymous (Goatldi?) - Especially when our apple crop this year was kind of a failure! Although they probably would have still made good applesauce. Maybe.
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ReplyDelete