And Valentine's Chocolates, Too!

Heart Shaped Box ~ Dark Chocolates


And....


Rectangular Shaped Box ~ Dark Chocolates


MMMmmmm........creamy rich comforting calories...

Happy Valentine's Day to me from my partners, Bob and Jack!

Such Sweeties, both of them.









© Copyright 2010 Mountain Harvest Basket

Tulips for My Heart

So I was down by the chicken coop when I heard the Fed Ex truck roll up my gravel driveway. The nice Fed Ex lady handed me this long cardboard box:



I had been warned to stay home to receive a Fed Ex delivery, but I was not completely sure what to expect.

Here is what I saw when I opened the box:



This is how they deliver flowers nowadays. No water. A nice vase. A packet of flower-fresh powder to mix into the water. A nice cellophane, raffia and gauze wrapping:



Colorful Spring tulips! Aren't they beautiful??

So I carefully mixed up the water and the contents of the flower-fresh packet, trimmed each stem a little bit to help the flower drink more easily, and then arranged them as best I could in their very nice vase:

My sweet kitty Jessie supervised the whole process, but I didn't get her picture this time. I think she thought I was preparing something good to eat since I was so busy in the kitchen. Given the chance, she would eat these beautiful flowers as a snack!

So these beautiful multi-colored tulips are a Valentine's Day gift from my partner Bob. Thank you Bob, my Sweetie, for bringing Spring into my home a whole month early!


Beautiful Spring Tulips

I Love Tulips!

Happy Valentine's Day everyone!

© Copyright 2010 Mountain Harvest Basket

Too Busy to Post Anything

Close Up of my Christmas Tree

As you may have noticed, I have been way too busy and preoccupied with other happenings in my life for the past several weeks to keep up with posting photos and stories in my blogs. I miss writing to you, and I miss the interaction with my readers.

Life has been moving so fast for me lately, that I have been struggling to keep up with it in "real time" and have not had the time or energy to process it, reflect on it or write about it.

So I just wanted to check in to let you all know that I am still alive and still here. I will do a "catch up" post soon and then hopefully get back to more frequent and "newsy" blogging.

As you can see from the photo above, I did manage to get and decorate my Christmas tree, so there has been some joy and some holiday spirit around here in between all of the chaos.

For now, I wish you all a very Happy Winter Solstice, Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, Season's Greetings, Happy Hannakah, Kwanzaa and/or whatever winter holidays you celebrate!

I leave you with this photo of hot cocoa adorned with a homemade (I bought it at our Xmas Bazaar) marshmallow to keep you warm and cozy on these cold winter nights.

Love to you all,
Farmer Jen


Hot Cocoa with Red Sugared Homemade Marshmallow



© Copyright 2009 Mountain Harvest Basket

Some Days are Like This

© Copyright 2009 Mountain Harvest Basket

Halloween Jack-o-Lanterns

Scary Toothy Grin in the dark



Not So Scary in the Light


This is just a quick post to show off our pumpkin carving talents to make this year's Jack-o-Lanterns for Halloween.

First off, we went out and bought field pumpkins because we only grew sweet pie pumpkins this year in our gardens, which are way better for making pies than for carving into jack-o-lanterns. Since Bob really wanted to grow his own pumpkin and make it grow really, really big, I have saved some seeds from these field pumpkins and we will plant them next spring to see if Bob can nurture "the Great Pumpkin" in his garden for his 2010 Halloween jack-o-lantern.

So on to the pumpkin carving. We gathered in my kitchen the night before Halloween, carved designs into our pumpkins, drank hot spiced apple cider and ate Halloween candy. (we don't get many trick-or-treaters around here, so we didn't need to leave much candy for them!)

First up is Bob's fancy design showing off his knife skills (a very sharp knife!) especially around the eyes & eyebrow areas:



Next is Jack's toothless design that seems to have some anxiety and stress going on. Great expression on that one! Kind of disturbing too. Bob mentioned that this face reminded him of someone he knows.



Then there is mine. Sort of cat-like, but with more teeth than one would expect for a cat. The guys said mine was the scariest face. (my pumpkin, not my own face...at least I think that's what they meant!)

Here's the full family trio of scary jack-o-lanterns, lit up and slightly out of focus.

Great fun and great family time. I love pumpkins.

I hope everyone had a wonderful Halloween and got only treats and no tricks this year.

© Copyright 2009 Mountain Harvest Basket

Curious Cat

Louie Watching TV


Early this past summer I noticed a stray cat hanging around my place. It's not unusual to see visiting kitties out here in the country, some belong to neighbors, some are strays looking for a handout. This cat kept his distance, but seemed to want to come closer and be friends. Friends with me and also friends with my outside cat who spends his days safely outside in the large enclosed "patio" that we built for him years ago.

Unfortunately, since this new cat was obviously an intact male, and I mean obviously, he stressed my outside kitty who is also a male, although neutered and quite friendly. My boy was so upset by this stray cat intruder that he didn't want to eat his food, which is a huge sign that something is really wrong for this particular cat. He always wants to eat his food!

So I checked with my neighbors to see if anyone was missing a cat, and no surprise, that nobody claimed him. One neighbor who has many outside cats told me that this kitty had been "beaten up" by some of her male cats and he looked it too. He had some scars and cuts around his ears and a hurt paw.

I informed our local no-kill shelter about the cat and asked that they take him and get him neutered and adopted out to a good home. They cared, but had too many cats to deal with at that time. So I was on my own if I wanted to take care of this cat and also get him far away from my kitty so that he would relax and eat again.

I made friends with the stray cat by feeding him and day by day he got closer and closer and let me pet him a little bit. I took him to my vet and had him neutered and tested for all the normal cat diseases. He got his basic vaccinations since I doubted he'd ever had any. The vet told me that he was between 12 and 18 months old at the time, which would put his approximate birthday around March 1, 2008, a pisces kitty.

I named him Louie. And then I did my best to convince Hardware Bob that he needed a young cat companion to liven up his house with youthful cat antics. Somehow my convincing worked and now Louie and Bob are best of friends.

Bob sent me the photo above of Louie watching a movie about sled dogs. I just had to share it with you all. It cracked me up with its great amount of cuteness!

So, everyone, please meet our new, and youngest, kitty Louie Blue. (he has light blue eyes)


Louie Blue




© Copyright 2009 Mountain Harvest Basket

Gala Apple Harvest

Beautiful Gala Apples

I have several apple trees. One of my apple trees is a "triple graft" that grows 3 different kinds of apples on one main rootstock. This is nice because we only had to dig one hole to plant this tree, but we get a variety of apples. Gala, Jonagold and Mutsu apples are all on this one tree.



The Gala apple blossoms are the pollinators for the other two varieties, and the Gala apples ripen earlier than the other two. Usually I can pick ripe Galas in late August, but this year everything was wacko and delayed a bit. I didn't get to harvest these nice eating apples until about the second week in September.

They were numerous for my small tree, but smaller in size than they have been in the past. All of my apples were small this year. Again, I think it was our crazy weather, especially the extended heat wave we had. I probably should have watered my fruit trees a bit more deeply and more often to help compensate for the extra hot weather. But I didn't.

Anyway, my Gala apples make very good fresh eating apples for snacks and they also add a nice sweet flavor to apple crisps and pies. They are softer than the more common pie apples like Granny Smiths or Golden Delicious, so they do break down more when cooked, but they are still very tasty. I've been snacking on them when I want something sweet instead of grabbing a cookie or some candy. (not that I keep any of those things around my house, mind you)


Gala Apples up close ~ you can almost just reach out and grab one!

Happy Autumn!


© Copyright 2009 Mountain Harvest Basket