Squash

I love how many different types of squash we get in our CSA share from Wild Earth Farms.

 

Each fall we collect some of the seeds from each of the different types of squash and try to grow our own plants in the spring.  We can usually manage to get them to sprout and sometimes even move them to the outdoor garden but beyond that we haven’t been very successful.


The squash we get from the farm is very interesting. There are so many different sizes, shapes and colours.  The textures of the stem, skin and innards are all so fascinating.

 

We compare the weight of the various sizes;

  

And of course we taste them too.  All the muffin, cake and loaf recipes made with squash are very popular.  The savory items are more challenging.  Still, we try.  They may never become permanent menu items but it is always fun to see what we can do with all our squash.

 

Slow-Cooker Vegetarian Chili

• 1 medium red onion, chopped
• 1 green bell pepper, chopped
• 4 garlic cloves, chopped
• 1 tablespoon chili powder
• 1 tablespoon ground cumin
• 2 teaspoons unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• salt and pepper
• 1 28-ounce can diced tomatoes
• 1 15.5-ounce can black beans, rinsed
• 1 15.5-ounce can kidney beans, rinsed
• 1 medium squash, peeled and cut into 1⁄2-inch pieces
• sour cream, sliced scallions, sliced radishes, and tortilla chips, for serving

In a 4- to 6-quart slow cooker, combine the onion, bell pepper, garlic, chili powder, cumin, cocoa, cinnamon, 1 teaspoon salt, and ¼ teaspoon black pepper. Add the tomatoes (and their liquid), beans, squash, and 1 cup water. Cover and cook until the squash is tender and the chili has thickened, on low for 7 to 8 hours or on high for 4 to 5 hours. Serve the chili with the sour cream, scallions, radishes, and tortilla chips.

The Squeaky Door

It was back in December that I rearranged the play space again.   When I looked back at that post I realized that I mainly wrote about the history of the loft and the reason for the changes.  The post was getting too long so I didn’t include pictures of the finished space.  I will have to do a full post about that soon but right now I want to focus on one small area.

The refrigerator in the housekeeping area;



The new block bin is now located on the right hand side of the refrigerator – this is where the entrance to the block area used to be.  The counter top above the block bin is centered over the block bin and overhangs the bin by several inches on both sides.  This was an intentional design feature.

Due to the placement of the counter top the right hand door of the refrigerator only opens part way before it touches the counter top.  The left hand door opens a full 180 degrees.  I didn’t think it was a major issue so I didn’t correct it then.  Months later the problem is getting worse instead of better.

Even though the food in the refrigerator is easily accessible when the right hand door is only partially open the toddlers insist on pushing on the door to force it to open fully.  Since it is physically impossible for the door to open that far all they manage to do is get the door jammed so tightly against the counter top that they can then not close it.  Meltdowns ensue.

The hinges on the right hand door had also begun to squeak.  Some of the children like to move this door slowly back & forth simply because they like the sound.  I do not like that sound – especially not for a solid 20 minute stretch of time.

Last Friday was an school inservice day which meant I had the older children here for the whole day.  It also meant that my school-bus-driver husband was home for the day too.  So, as the children and I were getting ready to go outside to play I said to my husband “We will be outside for the next 2 hours.  While we are gone please unhook the brackets holding the counter top and move it an inch to the North.  Also, grease the fridge door hinge.”

For the second half of Friday and all of Monday I have silently watched and waited.  Only one of the two-year-olds has noticed the change.  On several occasions he has stood by the refrigerator and slowly moved the right hand door all the way open and then all the way closed.  Sometimes he stands in the space behind the door so he can watch the hinge action from a different point of view.  I’ve been observing him as closely as he is observing the door.

The other children either don’t notice or don’t care that the door doesn’t stick or squeak any more.  I notice, thank-you very much.

Cold

I’ve had a weather station in my yard for the last eight years.  This has allowed me to get a more accurate idea of the actual weather conditions before we head outside.  Windchill factors in my sheltered yard are considerably different from those reported at the airport or the Forks.

Last month my weather station ceased to transmit data and replacing the batteries didn’t solve the problem.  So, I was very excited to find a new weather station at Costco.  It has even more features than my old one did.  You can read more about it here.

With or without a backyard weather station our recent weather conditions would be described as ‘unseasonably cold’.  We have not been spending much time however the temperature has not been the main reason for our limited outdoor time.

With four infants/toddlers I need allow a minimum of one full hour of time to get everyone dressed, outside, and back in.  Even then some days that ‘hour’ is really only 10 minutes of actual ‘play’.  Between arrival’s, departures, meals and naps there are rarely any time periods long enough to accomplish any more than 30 minutes of outdoor play even when they don’t argue about getting dressed.

Outdoor play is still a very new experience for this group and so far they are not so sure that the fun factor is worth the effort to get dressed. It would have been easier if we had a more gradual decent into cold winter weather.  Hopefully we will soon have some milder days when we can acutally enjoy spending some time playing in the wonderful mountains of snow that have accumulated in the yard.

There is another interesting ‘cold’ result.  Last month I wrote about how I rearranged the playroom.   In the old arrangement the ‘refrigerator’ had been located on an interior wall but it is now located on the exterior wall.

The walls in my 100 year old house don’t have a lot of insulation and when the refrigerator doors are closed  that section of the wall doesn’t get much warm air from the room.  Consequently, as one of the children recently pointed out, when you first open the refrigerator doors the items inside are actually cold.

I didn’t even plan for that – it’s just one of the benefits of our Manitoba climate

Remember When...

Friday was an inservice day so the school-age children were here for the whole day.  I decided it might be a good day to bring out ‘the bin’.

I had filled the bin months ago when I collected some of the leftovers from the garden.  I had intended to use it as a sensory bin for the toddlers.  Now, with a good layer of snow on the ground I thought the bin might also assist the older children to remember our past gardening adventures.

As the children gathered at the table in the sunroom I opened the bin – the aroma was amazing;

MMmmm, sweetgrass smells so wonderful.  There were other things in the bin too but the scent of the herbs was overpowered by the sweetgrass.  The children spent some time exploring the items and were able to identify both the wheat and the oats;

They selected items they wanted to include in a little sachet to take home.  They cut up the bigger pieces to fit;

And created their own sweet smelling little bundle;

The sunlight streaming through the sunroom window was so bright one of the children wished he had sunglasses – and suggested that we could use the craft supplies on the table to make some.  Good idea

He selected items from the craft bin that could be used to make sunglasses – egg carton pieces and colored transparent film.  Then the construction began;

As I assisted a toddler to put glue on the front of the egg carton the older child suggested it might be better to glue the film onto the inside of the egg carton – good idea.

He also suggested that if we attached a stick on the side of the glasses they would be easier to hold instead of trying to tie a string around your head – so creative.  The finished products may not have worked as well as we would have liked but the process was amazing to watch.

Do you remember when the product was your major concern and ‘I can’t’ was a common complaint?  I do.

The Delightful Mistake

I wanted to do some type of play dough/sensory activity with the infants and toddlers but didn’t have the time to make a batch of cooked dough.  However, I did have some flour and baby oil to make cloud dough – such an easy recipe.

I starting adding flour to a bowl containing the baby oil.  At first it was a little too sticky and wet so I added more flour.  Then it was too dry – this was a problem because I had no more baby oil left.  I considered other liquid options.

Vegetable oil would work but it would make the dough turn yellowish and I was hoping to keep it white for now.  I wasn’t sure what plain water might do to the texture of the cloud dough and I didn’t want to experiment at the moment due to the limited time I had.

I decided to check the cupboards to see what other liquids I could find.  First I had to wash the dry flour mixture off my hands though.  As I rubbed my hands together with the soap and water I made a discovery.  The white cream soap could be the perfect liquid for the dough.

It took a little trial and error to get the texture just right.  Too dry – add more soap.  Too wet – add more flour.  I was slightly concerned that it may just be an endless cycle but it didn’t really take long to get the perfect consistency.



At first the toddlers only poked at it.  Even with rolling pins and play dough tools they still prefer to simply poke the dough or tear off little pieces.  I provided some tissue paper for them to tear up and add to their dough.

This was why I wanted to leave the dough white.  I know when we use glue with tissue paper the dye from the paper tends to transfer onto hands and other surfaces.  Usually I find this a little annoying but this time I thought it could be helpful.  I hoped that as the children mixed little pieces of tissue paper to the dough the dye would spread through the dough.



It didn’t.  I guess that the dough wasn’t wet enough to release the dye from the paper.  The little flecks of colour still looked pretty and the children enjoyed adding the little paper pieces.

We also discovered that the addition of the cream soap instead of more baby oil made the dough stretchy.  Wonderfully pliable without falling apart even when the infants waved it about;



Then I gave them each a small container.  Their favorite activity is putting stuff in containers and taking it out again.  This amused the little ones and extended the activity for much longer.



Even though it didn’t necessarily go as planned it was still a wonderful engaging activity.

Surprise!

Sometimes the things that we do here don’t go the way we expected.  These surprises often end up creating even more interest than the ‘proper’ result would have.  For example, we planted sunflowers in the pots by the fence.  They were slow to start growing during the cool spring/summer but one of them has managed to grow taller than the fence;

So far it is just a ‘sunflower plant‘ without an actual flower but its neighbour has a flower – you have to look closer to see it;

We’ve had many discussions about ‘tall’ and ‘small’.  Our beans have created a lot of interest too.  There are so many of them in the garden;

But look – over by the neighbour’s garage, there is something tall growing in the blue barrel with the carrots;

Yes, the carrots look unhappy – they need some water.  We only planted carrot seeds in this barrel, what is that other plant?  It is taller than the roof of the garage.  Look closer;

BEANS!  We didn’t plant any here – we assume this plant grew from one of the ‘loose parts’ beans we played with  last fall/winter.

We cut down all the sweet grass in the garden.  It is drying on the upper deck and smells wonderful.  Haven’t yet decided what we’re going to do with it all.

But wait, now there is more sweet grass growing in the garden!

We didn’t expect that.  Maybe the recent rain rejuvenated it.  We were invigorated by the rain too.  Some couldn’t resist taking off their shoes to experience the sensation of bare feet on the wet deck/grass;

Notice her little friend?  Mister Slug rode around on her foot for most of the morning.  Every time he escaped fell off she carefully placed him back on the amusement park ride for another trip around the yard.

We also hoped the rain would help clean off some of the goop we created last month.  It is somewhat softer now but still very sticky and difficult to remove from surfaces;

However, it seems to be a fabulous crack filler on the old logs;

Surprise!

A Mouse Tale

It was about a month ago that my husband first saw the little brown mouse.  It was scurrying about in the side yard beside the upper deck.  We were not particularly concerned at first – maybe the little guy was just passing through our yard on his way to somewhere else. After all, the side yard is where the dog lives.  Mindy is an old dog but I’m certain a mouse would still feel intimidated by her.

A few days later my husband spotted the mouse again in the same area.  It was a bright sunny afternoon and the little mouse did not seem all that concerned by the presence of a human being.  I was getting concerned though.  The little mouse seemed to be content here – very close to my storage shed.  This was not a place I want him to make his home especially since he wasn’t very timid.

On our next trip to Rona we took a look at the various items available in the pest control aisle.  I certainly didn’t want to poison the little fellow.  At this point he wasn’t even being a nuisance but I didn’t want him to expand his family or move indoors when winter arrived.  We chose to get a live trap – if we caught him we could then relocate him.  I thought he might enjoy moving to the wooded area by the river.

We decided to get a Predator multi catch trap made by Wilson.  Just look at the picture on the box – cute little mice lining up to get inside — the ones already inside chatting excitedly about their upcoming move to their new home.  It was perfect.

We brought it home and set it up beside the steps where the little mouse had been seen to frequently visit.  We believed he probably lived under the deck.  We waited.  Every day we checked the trap but it was always empty.  In fact, for the next two weeks we didn’t see the mouse at all – anywhere.  Maybe he relocated on his own?

The instructions say the trap does not need any bait.  We wondered if maybe it did so on Tuesday we put a few Cheerios inside the box.  Then Thursday morning, as the children and I were heading out into the back yard to play, I looked over the rail into the side yard. Through the clear plastic lid on the trap I could see the little brown body.  It was huddled in the corner, motionless.  It looked….dead.  We assumed it must have had a heart attack from the ordeal.

We waited until after the last of the children had left for the day and then we went to empty the trap.  My husband was going to hold a bag while I opened the trap lid and dumped the poor little guy out.  As I picked up the trap my husband asked “What’s stuck on the bottom of the trap?”  I turned it over and saw two tiny little back legs and a really long tail hanging off the OUTSIDE of the trap door.

Eww, ewwwww, EWWWWW!  I dropped the trap – with force.  My husband bolted to the far side of the yard – I thought he might try to vault over the fence.  “Don’t throw it at me!” he yelled.

Poor little mouse.  It was supposed to be a safe, reusable mouse trap.  It turned out to be a single use mouse guillotine.  The mouse trap is in a bag in the garbage bin by the back lane.  It’s not the ‘new home’ I envisioned for the little mouse.  The trap could be used again – or recycled — but it would have to be cleaned out first and there’s no one here who’s willing to do it.

If we ever see another mouse we’ll have to find a different way to deal with it.

What a Mess

I love messy play but prefer to keep our really messy activities outdoors – easier to clean up and sometimes Mother Nature sends rain to help out.  Last week we tried to make a different type of play dough.

First we sorted fruity O cereal according to colour – some got eaten.  Then the children tried to crush the cereal using hammers, blocks of wood, and rolling pins.  Sorry, no pictures of this part as the children were working in various areas of the yard and I was busy trying to keep little hands from grabbing about-to-be-crushed-cereal.

The cereal proved to be much more difficult to crush than we had anticipated.  Certainly I could have tossed it in the food processor and made a fine powder but this was supposed to be an activitiy for the children.  They were content with the somewhat lumpy texture of partially crushed cereal.

Now we added some baking soda and water and mixed;

At this point I thought it looked like the stuff I clean off the floor after my cat eats her food too quickly.  Judging by the comments the children were making they were thinking the same thing;

From this point on I left it up to them what to do with their concoctions.

  

 

Interestingly, the toddlers were reluctant to participate.  The would occationally gently poke the gooey mess but then spend several minutes trying to remove the sticky goop from their finger.

I had just cut the grass the evening before so there was plenty of loose grass which I picked up and put on a tray.  The toddlers liked this;

The older children then began adding the grass to their goo – and the little ones were hooked;

This activity had the children engaged for nearly two hours and the results are still visible in my yard.  Seems the recent hot dry weather has baked the sugary creations into some sort of concrete.  Our own form of Oobleck coating the yard.

Now we have to experiment to discover how to get rid of this mess.

Mud Day 2013

I just spent the entire three day long weekend ‘celebrating’ Canada Day by rebuilding and reorganizing some of my kitchen cupboards.  The whole project actually took much longer than I expected and there was no time for any computer work.

I only have four days of ‘work’ left before my ‘vacation’ when we will tackle the major project.  I don’t anticipate much time for computer work then either so I simply must get in a few pictures from last week’s International Mud Day.

I loved that the school-age children were here for mud day this year.  We started with a bin full of dirt and we added some water.  Some of the the children were a little unsure about the activity – only one chose to watch instead of joining in.

Mixing the dirt and water together and then using the strainers to try to separate them again.

The school aged children were the first to move on to other activities – they miss the opportunity to play here when they are in school for so much of the day and there were other things they wanted to do.  Of course first there was some more excitement about using the hose to wash off the mud.

The preschoolers stayed and played in the mud for nearly an hour more – definately not going to wait until 2014 before we do this again.

Keeping Busy

We’ve been keeping busy.

Some of the children have done lacing activities many times but for the toddlers this was new and exciting;

Making designs with bags of coloured gel was a new experience for all of us;

In the playroom the boxes and ponies were used for chariot races;

It was part of a ‘video game’ dramatic play activity that the preschoolers created. They used this ‘timer’;

Tasks had to be completed before the spinner reached the bottom of the track.
They used this set-up to control the action – ‘press B to jump’, ‘press C to crawl’ etc.

This has been an ongoing activity that has evolved throughout the last month.  I’ve enjoyed watching the preschoolers play and develop more elements to their game.

We are still enjoying all the snow outside – running, jumping and climbing everyday.  My husband cleared the snow off the roof of the shed and completely buried the garden path.  I spent several days trying to dig it out again;

Even with help from the children this project is not yet complete;

We’ve run out of good places to move the snow to.  Besides, the children have decided that they like using this spot as the ‘booth’ for their restaurant;

Next week is Spring Break.  As much as we’re enjoying our time indoors and outside in the snow I’m eager for ‘real’ spring.  I have several projects planned but the snow need to go before work can begin.  I wanted an early Spring.

Keeping busy is hard sometimes when Mother Nature has other plans.