Growing Things

Some gorgeous winter squash from a local produce stand. Perhaps for a yummy squash pie?

Fresh black-eyed peas.

Local olives right off the tree. I think they must need to be cured before being eaten-SO bitter.

The cats were fascinated with the black-eyed peas. They were grabbing pods and running with them. And, for the next week, I kept finding hidden pea pods all over the house.



Vodka with fresh raspberries and a bit of sugar. Dave can be such a doof in the kitchen without supervision. He was watching the football game online Sunday and he asked if the raspberry vodka was ready since he was going to make a drink to have with pizza. 10-minutes later I came into the kitchen and he had poured himself a gigantic mug of the vodka over ice--at least 2/3 of the bottle. I asked him to take a taste and tell me what he thought. He took a small sip and his face immediately turned beet-red and his eyes started watering. Duh! I guess he thought that the vodka was some sort of a pre-mixed drink with just a little liquor in it, and not straight vodka with some crushed berries. I remade his drink with just a shot of vodka and lots of cranberry juice.

Just picked pomegranates from our friend's tree.

I spotted a leafcutter bee in our back yard actually cutting this rose leaf. Too cool! I've never seen one in action before.

Our pomegranate tree.

An interloper in our garden. I have no idea what plant this is but it grows wild around here and produces huge, gorgeous white flowers.

**It's an Angel Trumpet (thanks Julie!). And, I had no idea that is was toxic so I'll have to be careful to keep it away from the critters.

We have two preying mantises in our yard this year--Mickey and Mikey. Very neat! They love to hang-out on the mint plants.