Compost

Over the last couple of years I have become an avid composter. Initially, my idea was to start composting to supplement the soil in my garden (and yes it's definitely a bonus for some healthy plants and beautiful veggies!) But composting kitchen scraps also lessens your household waste and keeps less junk out of landfills. You don't need anything fancy to compost. I usually collect my kitchen waste in a plastic container and empty it out at the end of the day into my compost bin. It's important to add 'brown waste' to the compost as well as the 'green waste' kitchen scraps. Brown waste are things like grass clippings and dried leaves. Keep your compost pile moist and it will break down into black gold for the garden! If you'd like to learn more about composting, visit composting fundamentals--a guide to composting at:
http://vegweb.com/composting/

Maize Maze

Not long ago in Hartland we spent an afternoon at our local corn maze! A family farm grows a VERY large field of corn and in conjunction with our local university, the surveying department cuts a maze design through the field. This year the design was a honey bee with honey comb. Fun! They also have many different activities and educational booths set up so kids can learn about agriculture in our area. The girls had a blast (not to mention dad and mom...)

The farm also had tractor rides through pumpkin fields they had planted--they grew some monsters! Here you could guess the weight of these 5 pumpkins and if the weight we entered is correct then we win that pumpkin for Halloween! I don't think Zoey's guess of 7 pounds was right, but we'll see...

Out in one of the acres and acres of pumpkin patches--Camryn finds one just her size! She brought it home and named it Spooky. Spooky eats, sleeps and even takes baths with Cams. Hope it lasts until Halloween!

We had such a great day there!

Apple-licious!

Apple harvesting season has officially arrived! My Dad has a decent sized apple orchard and it was a pretty good year. My chef Zoey helped in the kitchen prep of washing, drying and coring apples to make apple butter! The house smells heavenly of a menagerie of apples, cinnamon, and allspice. One bucket down and 4 more to go! I let the cored apples cook down slowly in my crock-pot and then we canned them up. So delicious, Fall if officially here! Thanks Dad and Mom for the wonderful apples!