Merry Christmas

I'm Back!!!!!

Merry Christmas!!!!

 

Condo Update:

Cabinets brought:

Then installed:

 

Ceilings throughout un-popcorned and smoothed and textured ready for paint:

Ready to go living room: The entire bottom floor is in the middle of being tiled in- they started yesterday, will finish tomorrow.

After tile, counters are next. But I have this sneaky feeling we'll be all moved in before then. Paper plates, plastic cutlery and plastic cups and take out food here we go!

 

My husband already packed part of one room for me and informed me we don't have a lot of stuff. But he used about 1/2 the boxes I've brought home already! Good thing the order comes in at work today! I'll save every last one of those boxes- unless they had raw meat in them of course!

 

I'll probably not find the time to post for a while at least not till we have our Internet set up at the condo and are situated a bit. I feel we have a lot of junk and I'll be busy making piles again to get rid of stuff so we can find a place to sleep!

 

Have a good couple of weeks until I post again! We'll have Internet for a few more days until we move, so I may update on the tile! I'm thrilled it will be finished before we move in this time!!!!

Trisha.

Wah Lah!

Scene of the crime with the prime suspect: (guilty eyes)

Yup! I fixed it with elmers glue and mud and paint!

No one will notice right????

Close up. It looks 100% just the same! You can see also where I touched up parts of the paint along the windows... I'll have to sand after it dries, then paint.

I popped the screen back on just before the appraiser guy came into the back yard. He never even knew the screen was off. I told him that the white part would look just as good as new before the house sold because see? I started working on it.

 

Hope he agreed with me... We'll know by Monday or Tuesday.

I can't wait for my husband to come home!!!!!!

Trisha.

Guess What I Came Home To?

This:

He chewed through this board:

Tore the screen right off and bent the 2 metal clips to hold it on:

Mess:

And tried to chew his way into the house.....

What ever shall I do tomorrow....

The appraiser is coming 9:30 AM...

Hmmmmmm. gotta think of something... Do you think she'll notice? Maybe I can just put a flower pot right on the door step....

 

Hope you sleep well. I'll be up all night fixing the door with mud and paint. SHHHHHHH..... Don't tell the appraiser.

Trisha.

Dehydrated Apples

Remember these?

They are now this:

I now have dehydrated pineapple and apples to munch on while we pack and move.

 

We had the inspector and a termite guy here at our house yesterday and they had a meeting and showing with the people buying our house. While the inspector was talking with the guy in the kitchen, the lady was looking at the other side of my house and asked my husband why the inspector was so nit-picky about showing every tiny minuscule hairline crack here, or this spot there or... So it sounds like they don't care about the tiny things that don't matter. They've already made up their mind; they want our house. She told my husband she hopes all the paperwork and appraisals finish by the end of the month so they don't have to wait till the 9th next month to move in.

 

So do you think I should start packing yet???

                                                 I dunno and think I'll wait a little longer just to make sure they get the house so I don't have to unpack it all again.

Trisha.

Yum

It always amazes me how condensed food can get when you dry it.

The 2 jars are my dehydrated pineapples. The apples are next.
Trisha.

How to Plant a Pineapple Plant

First take your pineapple and evaluate it. Pay no attention to those who tell you it will grow no matter what. It won't if it's too yellow, or if most of the leaves are looking brown and rotten, IT WON'T.

Also, make sure the center leaves are green. These are the most important ones.

Starting at the bottom,:

Start pulling leaves off in a circular pattern. You have to work one edge up, and peel/tear the rest of each leaf off. It can be difficult, but at this point, just get the leaves off.

You will start seeing roots if it's a really good pineapple. Keep peeling leaves off:

Keep peeling and peeling until you're about 1 inch up from where the roots start appearing. Don't try to leave/save the leaves. They'll die anyways and mold the plant to death:

See the roots? This pineapple is a very good one. Sometimes you have way less. You will have better luck getting it established if you have at least 1 root. Like I said, this one is a very good one.

Plant the pineapple to about where my thumb is so the entire bottom is in potting soil, and make sure you press VERY firmly on the soil around it. Keep the soil wet for about 1-2 months until you see it's firmly in place. Don't touch it before then. If it gets knocked out of the soil, just push it back in or add more soil. If it gets moldy, throw it out. It won't grow. If it turns all yellow or brown, and dies, it didn't take. Try again. About 1 in every 4 won't make it. Don't cry if this happens to you.

Here you can see an established one. the bottom-most leaves will die. leave them there until about 3 months you might be able to pull them out, or just trim them if the tips are brown if you don't want to see them. They won't kill the plant to leave them. If you pull them, MAKE SURE THE PLANT IS ESTABLISHED AND THE ROOTS WILL HOLD! or else hold the plant firmly still with one hand and pull the dead leaves gently with the other. (can you tell I'm OCD?) If they don't come easily, leave them or trim them.

Here is an example of a pineapple plant where I trimmed all the brown tips off. Leave a little brown or you'll kill the leaf further. You can also see in the picture that the center leaves have grown out and are longer. This means it's rooted and will survive. All new leaves come from the exact center at the top. I had a plant that the center leaves died but the rest of the plant looked healthy and when I pulled the dead leaves out, (They just fell out) saw little tiny fresh new leaves filling in too take their place! It survived!

This morning I had to restrain myself from planting this new one because I have enough. (Don't you agree?) And I'm moving. Yup! We got an offer on the house! We just have to accept it!

Just imagine. Every last one of the pineapples I planted here looked just like this new fresh one either bigger or smaller, some with 1 root, some with a huge mass like this new one. And most turned into real plants (some died). I haven't gotten fruit from them yet, but I guess after 2 years, you put an apple in the middle, cover the entire plant, and let the apple rot. I haven't the heart to waste an apple! The 2 bottom plants are going on 3 years. But after you get a fruit, twist off the top, and restart! The fruited plant won't fruit again, so dump it and plant it's baby!

If you live in Phoenix, they do best outside under the shaded patio on the south side, only recieving about 2 hours sunlight a day total with morning and evening sun combined. The filtered shade/light is all they want to keep them happy! Just remember to water them!

I must be weird to like the look of Bermuda grass "hands" waving at the sun in the morning even though they're in my garden. I guess I REALLY enjoyed them this morning because it won't be my garden grass is growing in soon!

I don't get it how those "hands" "waving" make me happy. Maybe they're waving bye to me with good riddance. (Imagine me trying to kill them all these years and they're still here!)

Remember the goat head ground cover picture yesterday? I pulled them. Very roughly. I killed some watermelon vines. Oh well. They'll freeze in the next month or so anyways. Maybe since I started showing interest in my garden we got an offer? I should have done that sooner!

I'm really going to miss my wild zinnias!

And my wild marigolds!

But I will take all my cantaloupes! I just picked this one today! We have 1 month to move out and that's all it will take for them all to ripen! Into the freezer for smoothies they'll go! The last of garden fresh fruit for a while!

Hope you enjoyed today's post and will try this! I have so much fun planting them! Probably too much!

See you later!

Trisha.

How to Cut a Pineapple

First, sit the pineapple on the counter to ripen fully. It must smell wonderful first and be golden colored or don't bother with it at all. You need to buy a good one. It must not have too much green, and it must be darker yellow at least. You need to be very particular about this. I have gone to the store before to buy pineapple and go home with out if they have a green batch or one that looks yucky sickly yellow. Don't waste your time if they don't have good fruit. It's worth it to wait.

 

Twist the top off and rinse your fruit very well:

This top part you can plant. I'll show you about that tomorrow.

Don't worry about the hole; you're not going to use that part anyways.

Lay it on it's side, and trim off the top and bottom:

turn it right side up, and slice off just the outside edge. You don't want to waste all that juicy fruit!

See the little brown pieces? Trim them off very carefully. They are edible, but hard to chew. The smaller darker pieces are just seeds. You can leave them.They're edible.

Next, put the top or bottom facing up, and see the white ring in the middle? cut an X all the way through the entire pineapple staying centered on that white ring.

1st one way:

Then the next:

This is what your left with:

Cut off the center part with the knife at an angle:

So you're left with pieces looking like this: (You can eat the center. It's very fibrous and chewy. Or juice it. I choose not to eat it, but it would make great juice if you have a juicer.)

Next, slice it length-wise:

Then cut them into smaller pieces cross-wise:

You should have something that looks like this:

MMMMMMM. Fruit salad size! You can stop here and eat it, or refrigerate it. It will only last a day or two. You could probably freeze it too for smoothies.

To dehydrate, each pineapple makes 1 dehydrator tray worth of fruit. Try not to overlap them, but they can touch one another.

MMMMMMM! Dehydrated pineapple is a treat in our house and tastes better than candy!

 

Hope you learned something from this! I love pineapple and enjoy cutting it up as much as I do eating it!

Trisha.

My Plants

Remember this picture?

It now looks like this: Fire crackers!

 My garden is a violent burst of color and texture. Cantaloupes are producing again.

 Even though many people probably think my garden needs help, it did this all on it's own, and I admire the many layers. It just takes care of it's self. I like the loose carefree feeling it has. And it still makes fruit.

 Silhouettes of asparagus: (I dread having to dig them up- they are so happy here.)

 Asparagus seed pods:

 The only unwelcome thing is the goat heads that got out of hand because I haven't been in the garden for a couple of months to weed: Instant ground cover that keeps the dog out!

 And my date palms are still growing! A few have 4 leaves already! Now if I can just remember to water them! Then they can get strong and healthy before winter...

I have to be at work early one more day, then be there regular times for the rest of the week! I get a 1 day weekend on Monday, Then work 4 days, then I'll have 3 whole days off! I am more excited about that then you can imagine! I have my whole life planned on those 3 days! I'll get to live again! By that time, I'll have 2 new servers completely trained, and hopefully have started training 2-3 more.

 

Work is sapping too much of my energy right now and it feels like I'm being run into the ground. The extra help will be truely a blessing!

 

See you later! Have a bright cheerful day! Imagine wild zinnias in the gardens all over the world! Because I think the world would be so beautiful if everyone had a zinnia growing somewhere on their land!

 

Trisha.