The Garden Shedde

My whole student career the word is that every year, the administration of the school sets aside a certain amount of days in case it snows. Now I have also heard that when there is too many snow days that the school has to add how ever many days they went over to the end of the school year. This sounds like such a bummer to everyone. “They have to are add days at the end of the year? We have to wait longer for summer break? How horrible!”

I know it sounds bad, but when you think about it it’s pretty cool. First of all, it means you get plenty of snow that year. That means plenty of snowball fights, sledding, snow men, etc. You also get lots days off and that’s always nice. But the biggest thing I want to point out is if they add days to the end of the year then they would have to add them either before or after final exams. If they add them before then it wouldn’t make much of a difference. Before the exams the teachers shouldn’t be teaching anything new. They will just be reviewing for the exams.

Now if the administration decides to add the school days after exams then that is even more ridiculous. That means that teachers definitely won’t have anything more to teach and even if they did the students wouldn’t pay attention or take notes because they don’t have any upcoming tests or quizzes. So really we should keep on hoping for snow even if we are all out of school days.

Today is a dark cold day in January when it’s hard to stay warm. Soup will taste good for the evening meal. I decided to make some ham and white bean soup. Some people call it Senate Bean Soup. I think it must be real American food. I went about the task of peeling onions. Onion in English, the Spanish word for onion is cebolla. It was just a plain, ordinary yellow cooking onion. When I peeled it, that onion was purple! That sent my mind thinking.

How long have people been eating onions? Where did they come from? Well it turns out, we have been eating onions since 3500BC and onions grow wild all over ever continent. (I have eaten wild onions as a college student and willed them dead, as grounds maintenance professional.) Jewels to one are weeds to another.

The beauty of the onion is that it does not spoil in winter. It transports well and moved all over the world with humans. Onions went from Egypt to Greece, Italy, even to the New World with the Pilgrims. Onions mean that much to people. At the heart of all full- bodied recipes is the onion. They are bound to humans by flavor, texture, and tears. The dinner table would be a bland place without them.

How many of you have received a hand-written letter in the past year? Christmas cards do not count. I thought as much. Not very many of us send or receive hand written letters any more. I can remember when I used to write long convoluted letters on my old word processing program maybe twenty years ago before e-mail was around. That is not even a penned letter that I am talking about now. I am bemoaning the loss of the actual hand-written letter.

I am not a Luddite and wish to suggest that we reject technology nor am I suggesting that we begin spending the time to writing letters that express our thoughts and feelings. Blogs seem to be satisfying that need just fine. What I am suggesting is the immense emotional value that a hand-written thank you note can create in your customers. Talk about creating a bond with the human beings that choose to do business with you. I think that will blow your competition out of the water and help to seal the connection you have with your customer. Happy trails with the pen!

If you haven’t heard of vertical gardening, you will. It seems to be the new rage this year in gardening though it isn’t really anything new. People have been planting vine vegetables up walls, trellises and arbors for many years. They called it survival or planting food wherever you could and if that was by a wall where the plant grew up it; so be it.

It is us who seem to need all these fancy “vertical walls” and “hanging hooks and hammocks” in order to plant vertically. But before you run out and purchase the latest gizmo, look around your house and yard and see what you have that you could try this type of gardening with; a pergola, arbor, trellis, wall, fence, etc. Do a little research to find out what types of plants grow well vertically and try it. It’s great to save space for those things that cannot grow up so you should be able to grow more if part of your garden is dedicated to vertical.

At our house we recently completed a survey sent to us from the power company to access the energy usage and potential savings we can have with some small and some large changes. I was very surprised at what they asked as it was more in-depth than I thought it would be. I had to go look at the frig and hot water heater to find out what the ratings were and how old they were. Unfortunately, there were a couple of things I was not able to do because of the weather but I felt I came close to getting it right.

It took about a month to get the results back and we have found them both informative as well as mostly doable. It broke the changes down into cost and let you know how many months it would take to recoup your investment, which helps you access what you should or could do. If you get the opportunity to do something like this I would highly recommend it because you learn what you have done right and what you can improve and; you save money!

Like many, I got some much wanted Christmas presents that now that I have them, I don’t really know what to do with them! The dehydrator is one such gift this year. It’s not that I have not had some success with it, it’s the fact that it takes so much time to cut stuff up, dry it and then you have to eat it pretty soon before it spoils because you’re not using preservatives, which is the reason you get a dehydrator.

Once you look at it you think that’s cool, I’ll be able to do quite a bit at a time but the reality is you need a lot of rows of racks to do any amount of drying at one time and they cost a pretty penny. In fact, at close to twenty bucks per set, after you buy five sets you could have bought another dehydrator. So after you realize that’s how they make their money, you have to decide if the time and effort is worth the overall cost (I find that with most things these days you have to count the costs) and for me that’s still up in the air.

Every year for Christmas I get money from my parents, who happen to be divorced so I get close to double what most people get. Up until this year, I have either used the money to pay bills or to just blow on whatever I want but I have found that to ring hollow and set out this year to find something a little different. Though you may think me a bit crazy, I ended up giving up the majority of money that was given to me. Though I found many places that were dissevering of the money, two of them captured my heart; Heifer International and Blood Water Mission.

Heifer International does more than just give animals away to families. They train the families to take care of the animals as well as put them under contract to pass along the animals as they can and the knowledge. This not only gives people a way to make a living but a way to thrive and pass on the good luck. Blood Water Mission simple saves lives by providing families and villages much needed biosand water filters that eliminates up to 98% of disease causing bacteria in the water. If you feel moved to give this year to something greater than yourself, check out these two fantastic organizations and give. You will discover what Christmas can be for you.

Nobody who eats bacon really wants to know that we are much more like pigs than we might want to think. If you have ever listened to scientists you would notice how many tests are done on pig’s right before human testing. The reason is because our systems are a lot like there’s. If you have to get a valve replacement or bladder one of your choices are pig’s valves and bladders as they can be assimilated with our systems pretty easily.

If it makes you a little bit uneasy that one of your favorite foods comes from an animal that may also save your life one day, it’s totally understandable. Pigs are more than a food source, but they are a food source and as long as they are treated with grace and dignity it’s okay that they are food. However, we also need to realize that pigs are also really very smart and are self-aware just like monkeys, dolphins and elephants. Maybe if they painted pictures and were in zoos they would get a little bit more respect. Until that time comes, just remember the next time you order a pork chop to honor the pig that gave its life for you.

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to realize that you can’t know everything. That is the conclusion I come to every year as I start to clean up and trim back trees, shrubs, vines and plants for the winter because every year I have new questions. I have tried to find answers on the internet but you get a lot of conflicting answers because we all live in such varied areas. What works in Texas doesn’t make since in Tennessee and so on and so forth. That’s why I turn to my friends at Teacup Gardener.

They are always open to design and consultation for gardens and landscape and I have yet to get bad advice. Of course they are local to the Nashville, Tennessee area where I live and have been in business here for over twenty years. This gives them the experience I can trust in and the staying power I need every year I go back to them for advice and help. It is rare to h=work with a company that you can consult with and do the work yourself or work with in any capacity. They realize that some people love to do what they can and when they can’t Teacup Gardener takes it from there. I also love that they are such believers in saving the earth through conservation and care. They just do it right.

The first time I was asked about using a mandoline I was so confused. As a lover of Bluegrass music I was thinking about the mandolin that is played with the guitars and upright bass with a bluegrass band. I was surprised when the lady pulled out a portable slicer and unfolded it in front of me and proceeded to slice almost every type of vegetable and fruit known to man and I was impressed. It wasn’t long until I went out and bought one and now I am hooked.

Using a mandoline is much easier than hand slicing and just as easy as using anything else on the market. Most of them come with a few different slicing attachments for wedge cuts and crinkle cuts for potatoes and raw cucumbers or zucchini. You will now be able to spend most of your time actually cooking and not slicing. I love this because I like to cook but I do not like to prep or clean. I am open to any short cut or time saver that I can get in the kitchen and the mandoline has been one of the best I have ever used.