Yo ho yo ho... a Farmer's Life for Me!

Anastasia finally seemed to feel better Wednsday... her fever reduced from 103.8 to 97.8. What a relief! Unfortunately she has been rather congested and that seems to bother her quite a bit and makes her grumpy. Perhaps because all she will eat/drink is milk.

I have decided to eat as much local food as possible. There is such an abundance around here! Tomorrow I am going to hit a couple farmer's markets prior to the grocery store. I read recently that if every American family ate one locally produced meal per week, we would save 1 billion gallons of gas per week (I think it is a statistic from the Barbara Kingsolver's book "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle".) That seems so huge. So I was thinking, if I ate 3 locally produced meals per week... that could save two people the trouble. I have this excellent cookbook called "Simply in Season" that my mom gave me for my birthday with recipes using produce specific to the season. I like the idea of eating organic but sometimes that can get pricey. But most local farmers use far less pesticides on their plants than the large Cooporate farmers and local simply tastes better. I am so happy that my neighbor gives me/sells me fresh eggs because now I don't see a need to have my own chickens. Now if only someone would deliver fresh, organic milk to my doorstep my life would be complete. :)

My mom came up yesterday and we went berry picking. It was a little hot in the sun for Anastasia so we took turns picking and ended up with 13 lbs of Strawberries which have made 15 jars of freezer jam, 2 freezer bags of frozen berries for smoothies/baking, 4 cups of frozen sugared berries and 4 pints divided between my mom and I for eating straight. There is nothing that beats fresh picked berries warmed and sweetened by the sun!

Then guess what I found the other night? A cherry tree in our yard covered in cherries!!! They are a bit sour but completely edible and will make yummy jam, pies, and cobbler! I need to make jam with the ones I picked yesterday and hopefully pick some more this evening if Nick will watch the munchkin. Then last night our neighbors pointed out our miniature pear tree, a plum tree and an apple tree!!! And I thought I only had a peach tree! Speaking of which, I just purchased an organic bug killer to spray it with made from Chrysanthemum. I hope I am not too late as the peaches are already a little hole-y. I am so excited about our fruitful yard. I feel in touch with my ancestors as they were amazing Czech farmers. And I didn't have to do anything except reap the harvest and make jam! It doesn't get any more local than your own backyard!