A Heart For Home

Preserving Fresh Produce {Finished Friday #49} Come and link up your finished projects, too!

Link up your finished projects at the bottom of this post.
Also be sure to check out our Early Learning Prize Pack Giveaway ($60 Value).

This week we've been overwhelmed with fresh produce from our garden. This definitely isn't a bad thing, but we have so much that we've decided to freeze most of it until we can get around to canning.

There's been lots of yellow squash that is easily sliced and frozen for making Creamy Summer Squash Soup later. We have even more stored in our extra freezer at my parents' home.

We've also had lots and lots of tomatoes, which we've blanched, peeled and frozen for making tomato sauce later. I like to freeze the gallon bags on a flat surface and then stand them upright so they take up less room. (You can also see a glimpse of a bag of chopped banana peppers and our veggie scrap bin that we store extra bits in until we have enough for a big batch of vegetable broth.)

We also have these tomatoes that were blanched and cooled before we peeled, bagged, smushed (the kids' favorite part) and froze. This filled another 2 1/2 gallon bags. We combined the last half with the half filled bag you see in the freezer above.

And the tomatoes in this 5 gallon bucket filled another 4 bags for a total of 12 bags of tomatoes in our freezer alone. (We have a few more bags in our extra freezer.)

Oh, and these green and yellow tomatoes that we picked off of a couple plants that had to be pulled up because the bugs were getting crazy. (Plus the big batch of Salsa Verde that is already in the fridge ~ thanks, Tim.)

We also have a bag of unexpected potatoes that I don't know what to do with yet.

So while we might have a lot done we still have a long way to go. Wish us luck!

While we enjoy the fruits (and vegetables) of our labors, we are also still enjoying many, many garden books together. Check out some of our favorite garden and plant books for kids with pictures and reviews.

Today's Questions: Have you preserved any fresh produce so far this summer?

I'm trying to hold myself accountable to finish some of the projects on my to do list by posting each Friday about a project I've completed.

Would you like to join in? Link up to your own projects below.

1. Link to your project post, not your blog's home page, so we can find it easily.
2. Let us know what project you are sharing in your title, for example: Spring Wreath
3. We'd love it if your post links back here so that your readers can come join the fun. Feel free to copy & paste our Finished Friday Button into your post. (Just copy the text in the box below the button, click on the "Edit HTML" tab for your post and paste it there.)

Where the linky says "Your Name" please enter the name of your project or the title of your post!

Labels: Finished Friday, Frugal and Simple, Gardening, Health and Nutrition, Homemaking, In the Kitchen, Natural and Green

Summer Squash Soup for the Freezer {Finished Friday #46} come link up your projects, too!

link up your finished projects at the bottom of this post

During the past two weeks we've been harvesting some more produce from our garden. First there were lots and lots of carrots.

The carrots had to have the stems cut off, be scrubbed clean and placed in the fridge. We were able to fill over 10 gallon-sized bags!

Next there was a steady stream of yellow summer squash.

Most of the squash was washed, chopped, and placed into freezer bags for using in soup and pasta sauce later (since we'll be using the squash in the next couple of months we chose not to blanch the squash first.)

Yesterday, since we had gathered even more squash, we had a fresh batch of homemade vegetable broth, and Tim had a day off from work, it was time to make a double batch of one of our favorite soup recipes for the freezer.

First, Tim and the kids washed and chopped the squash. Then they washed, peeled, and chopped the potatoes and carrots. Next, I was called in to chop the onions since Tim's eyes water like crazy if he tries to chop onions.

Making a telescope out of the squash is completely optional :)

Once everything was chopped, most of the work for the soup was finished. (And we made sure to save all of those veggie scraps to make even more delicious homemade vegetable broth.)

We could barely fit all of the double batch of veggies into our 10 quart pot, but we piled it on and once everything cooked down a bit there was plenty of room to stir.
After it simmered and we blended it up with a handy immersion blender (we've blended in batches in a regular blender before, too) we ended up with 7 quarts of deliciously creamy soup.

Creamy Summer Squash Soup
adapted from Epicurious

3 Tbsp unsalted butter
1 medium onion, halved and thinly sliced
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 cloves of garlic, minced
2 pounds (about 8 small) yellow summer squash thinly sliced
2 carrots, thinly sliced
1 yellow-fleshed potato (1/2 lb), peeled, halved, and thinly sliced
2 cups chicken or vegetable broth

Melt butter in a large, heavy pot over medium heat.

Cook onion and garlic with salt, stirring, until softened, about 8 minutes.

Add squash, carrots, potato, and stock and bring to a boil. Reduce heat, then simmer, partially covered, until vegetables are very tender, about 20 minutes.

Remove from heat and cool soup, uncovered, 10 minutes.

Working in batches, puree soup in a blender until smooth (use caution when blending hot liquids) and transfer to a bowl. Return puree to cleaned pot and thin with water or more broth if desired. Or use an immersion blender to puree the soup. Simmer 3 minutes. Season with salt.

We also made a batch of Parsley Mint Pistou to freeze in an ice cube tray. This pistou is wonderful swirled into the hot soup.

I'm linking up to these parties.

Today's Questions: Did you plant a garden this year? Have you harvested anything yet? What produce would you love to be able to grow yourself? (The big thing I'm waiting for is our own land so we can plant some fruit trees.)

I'm trying to hold myself accountable to finish some of the projects on my to do list by posting each Friday about a project I've completed.

Would you like to join in? Link up to your own projects below.

1. Link to your project post, not your blog's home page, so we can find it easily.
2. Let us know what project you are sharing in your title, for example: Spring Wreath
3. We'd love it if your post links back here so that your readers can come join the fun. Feel free to copy & paste our Finished Friday Button into your post. (Just copy the text in the box below the button, click on the "Edit HTML" tab for your post and paste it there.)

Where the linky says "Your Name" please enter the name of your project!

Labels: Finished Friday, Frugal and Simple, Gardening, Health and Nutrition, In the Kitchen

Quick & Easy Summer Meals {TIPsters}: Summer Salad Inspirations

Make sure you visit Kristin & Christy for their thoughts on today’s topic, as well as our guest TIPster Jillian from Hi! It's Jilly.

As I've mentioned before, our family eats very simply, so almost all of our meals would be considered quick and easy. I love how planning and preparing the same simple meals frees up some time for making more food from scratch.

If I spent more time making dinner every night I'd probably be overwhelmed by the thought of cooking my own dried beans, preparing fresh milk kefir daily, picking a year's worth of blueberries to freeze, making vegetable broth, and baking soaked whole wheat sandwich bread. Most definitely, I'd be discouraged about trying to find time to tend to our own organic, pasture raised chickens. So for our family the trade off is very much worth it (and my husband agrees).

But, during the summer my dinner plan gets even easier. Most nights during the summer our family enjoys a delicious main dish salad. I try to add some type of protein, which for our family typically means cooked chicken or beans, although nuts and hard boiled eggs are sometimes scattered on top of our fresh veggies.

While I love salads at restaurants, sometimes eating a salad at home can get a little boring. We've found that having lots of different veggies and a variety of toppings and dressings can help break up the boredom. I've been experimenting with homemade dressings and I'm dreaming of having several dressings mixed up in mason jars and stored in the fridge for salad duty rotations.

A few years ago we hosted a blog link up for salad recipes, but recently I've been turning to Pinterest for some ideas to freshen up our salads. So today, I'm sharing my top 10 Summer Salad inspirations.

Now, let's face it, some salads require a lot of chopping which cuts down on their quick and easy label, so I often pre-chop a large number of veggies at one time and store them in the fridge. At the very least I like to get everything chopped up during naptime so the before dinner scramble doesn't catch me by surprise.

And remember these are inspirations, salads aren't an exact science, so feel free to substitute what you have in the garden or already in your fridge to make these salads work for your family.

50+ Homemade Salad Dressings

Grilled Chicken Corn Salad

Pizza Chicken Salad

Cilantro Lime Chickpea Salad

Green Bean Summer Salad

Grilled Chicken & Fruit Salad (with homemade poppyseed dressing)

(Our kids love when we add fruit to our salads, in fact we add some apple slices to most salads. We cut the apple in quarters, cut out the core and slice the apple very thinly with a mandolin slicer. We use half of an apple divided among all of us.)

Rainbow Asian Slaw

Chicken, Avocado & Black Bean Salad

Cranberry Avocado Salad

and my personal all-time favorite Asian Noodle Salad

Check out the blog parties we like to join

Please visit my fellow TIPsters:

Kristin @ Bits & Pieces from my Life and

Christy @ A Living Homeschool, and
our guest TIPster, Jillian @ Hi! It's Jilly.

Coming Soon:

July 17: Taking Family Photos
August 7: Schooling Kids of Different Ages
August 21: Teaching Kids to Read

(Remember if you'd like to guest host an upcoming TIPster post, just let me know.)

Labels: Frugal and Simple, Gardening, Health and Nutrition, Homemaking and Organizing, In the Kitchen, Natural and Green, TIPsters, Tri-Moms

Free Kids Look & Learn Chicken eBook

Two weeks ago we started an adventure of raising chickens. For a few years we've been trying to figure out how to squeeze the cost of organic, pasture raised chicken and eggs into our grocery budget. Finally, we realized that we can only afford those items by thinking outside of the box.

Two Fridays ago Tim went and picked up our chicks. Our first night was a little rough and we ended up with over 40 chicks (including almost thirty 5 week olds) spending the night in our townhouse!

Thankfully, those camping out in our living room are now limited to the 10 actual babies we have in boxes behind our couch.

I'm sure we'll be sharing more as we venture along on our chicken raising journey, but I just came across this free Chicken ebook download from Amazon and wanted to share it with all of you.

I'm sure we'll all learn a thing or two from this free ebook.

The price of this ebook is currently $0.00, but that can change at any time. Make sure you double check the price before checking out.

This ebook is sold for Kindles, but you can easily download this free application that enables you to read Kindle ebooks on your PC. This is how I read all ebooks, and it works really well.

This post contains affiliate links.

Labels: Books, Children, Free eBook, Frugal and Simple, Gardening, Natural and Green

Plant & Garden Nature Study Extensions: Peter Rabbit & Beatrix Potter

Here are some Plant & Garden Nature Study extensions we've enjoyed so far:

The World of Peter Rabbit and Friends
This DVD includes three delightful tales: "The Tale of Peter Rabbit and Benjamin Bunny," "The Tale of the Flopsy Bunnies and Mrs. Tittlemouse," and "The Tale of Tom Kitten and Jemima Puddle-Duck." This high quality BBC production has charming animation. We love how calming it is, it's great for before nap or bedtime or in the middle of a muggy summer afternoon. (Each tale is about 25 minutes.)

If your family enjoys this first DVD you may also like The Beatrix Potter Collection. This is the complete 9 episode box set of Beatrix Potter tales produced by BBC. This set is a total of 225 minutes with each tale being about 25 minutes long.

After watching some of Beatrix Potter's work your family might enjoy the story of her life in Miss Potter. This 2007 movie is rated PG and stars Renee Zellweger, Ewan McGregor, and Emily Watson. Here's a movie review from Focus on the Family. It is definitely a very clean movie (much less controversial than many animated films) and is not a complete romance as the cover would have you believe. This would also be a good way to involve the whole family and would be a good addition to an author/illustrator study of Beatrix Potter.

Here are some more activities to incorporate with Peter Rabbit:
:: Answer Mr. McGregor's questions about plants and gardening (this is really cute)
:: Peter Rabbit Stand Up Dolls Printable
:: Little Peter Rabbit Singing Hands Song
:: Emergent Reader Printable Book
:: Rabbit Pre-Writing Cards
:: P is for Peter Rabbit Do-A-Dot or Magnet Sheet
:: Feed the Rabbit Printable Game

Other Plant & Garden Nature Study Posts:Creating a Nature Study Binder (and lots of ideas for what to put in it)Plant & Garden Books for Children (over 25 suggestions with summaries/reviews)

Labels: Books, Children, Free Printables, Gardening, Learning at Home

Gardening with Kids: Plant & Garden Books for Children

Our whole family has been enjoying the start of our summer-long plant & garden nature study. Tim loves that we’re all out in the garden together, I love that we’re incorporating what we already spend our time doing with “official” learning, and the kids think it’s just plain fun!

To go along with all the garden and plant learning we’ve been doing, we’ve compiled a great list of garden themed children’s books.

There’s a nice mix of fiction and non-fiction represented. I think almost all of these books could be used in some form with children from preschool through elementary school.

A few of these books are from our home library, but the majority of them were found at our local public library. Almost all of these books can be purchased on Amazon (a great way to use gift cards from Swagbucks).

	*A Fruit is a Suitcase for Seeds* by Jean Richards The illustrations in this book are fantastic! The book is a good introduction to seeds, their purpose, and their growth. I did stumble upon a common misconception (that seeds need sunlight to grow), but found the book to be a good introduction and a great discussion starter about what “vegetables” are technically fruits.
	*A Garden Alphabet* by Isabel Wilner Emahry received this book for her first birthday, so it’s an old favorite. Our copy was purchased second hand and is signed by the author :) The kids like the gardener dog and his (dog-sized) frog friend. This alphabet book is written in rhyming verse and includes the capital and lowercase of each letter. My favorite letter is “Uu’s underground, where some vegetables grow, Like the beet, carrot, radish, and the poe-tay-toe.”
	*A Gardener’s Alphabet* by Mary Azarian This is a much different style of alphabet book than the one above with only one word on each two-page spread. The illustrations are what makes this book so beautiful. The detail on each page really captures the imagination of the reader.
	*A Seed is Sleepy* by Dianna Hutts Aston A wonderful mix of poetic phrases, science concepts, and beautiful watercolors makes this book a great addition to any seed study. This book really make informational text approachable and easy to understand.
	*Compost Stew: An A to Z Recipe for the Earth* by Mary McKenna Siddals This A to Z book of composting is written in rhyming text and tells what household “trash” can be thrown into the compost. The vibrant collage illustrations use recycled and found materials. There is one mention of “Mother Earth.”
	*From Seed to Daisy: Following the Life Cycle* by Laura Purdie Salas This book follows the life cycle of a Shasta Daisy from seed to seed bearing flower. Plant facts and vocabulary such as germinate, photosynthesis, perennial, and pollen are naturally sprinkled throughout and accompanied with easy to understand explanations. The illustrations are crisp and bright and the book also includes fun facts and a glossary.
	*Grandma’s Gloves* by Cecil Castellucci This beautifully illustrated book tells the story of a little girl whose Grandma teaches her all about flower gardening. “You are my most special flower of all” her grandma tells her. But when Grandma is hospitalized and later dies, the little girl is the only one who knows how to care for Grandma’s flowers. The book ends with hope as the girl promises to teach her mother everything Grandma taught her.
	*Growing Vegetable Soup* by Lois Ehlert The story in this book follows the process of preparing a garden, planting seeds and seedlings, watering the garden, weeding, picking vegetables, and finally cutting things up and making soup. It’s a great way to lead up to a family cooking time.
	*How a Seed Grows* by Helen J. Jordan This simple introduction of seed leads readers through the process of growing bean plants from seeds and helps with a basic understanding of how seeds work. It’s a great guide for a seed growing science experiment.
	*Jack’s Garden* by Henry Cole “This is the garden that Jack planted,” begins this spin-off of “The house the Jack built.” Each page adds to the description of the steps needed to plant and care for a garden. Each beautifully illustrated two-page spread is surrounded by labeled drawings of tools, insects, birds, eggs, and flowers. These detailed drawings make this a wonderful book even for older children.
	*Mortimer’s First Garden* by Karma Wilson We first fell in love with Mortimer last Christmas and this second story is just as sweet. When the small mouse hears about how planted seeds grow and produce more seeds he decides to plant his last sunflower seed. He is often discouraged and almost digs up his seed as he waits for the miracle to happen. The Christian message of trusting God is clear as Mortimer “hears” the voice of God and thanks God when the springtime miracle finally happens. Be sure to give Mortimer a nice squeaky voice when reading this one :)
	*Mud Pies and Other Recipes* by Marjorie Winslow This isn’t exactly a gardening or plant book, but it is filled with wonderfully imaginative “recipes” for children to make outdoors. Some recipes include "Stuffed Seashells" and "Mud Puddle Soup," "Dandelion Soufflé," "Roast Rocks" and "Pine Needle Upside-Down Cake." Just don’t be surprised if your children start bringing you bowls of indistinguishable mush.
	*My Garden* by Kevin Henkes After a young girl describes how she helps her mother in the garden she imagines the garden of her own dreams with chocolate bunnies, tomatoes as big as beach balls and flowers that grow back the instant they’re picked. This is a cute book to spark children’s imaginations and could easily lead to creative storytelling, writing, or artwork.
	*Oh Say Can You Seed: All About Flowering Plants* by Bonnie Worth The Cat in the Hat examines the various parts of plants, seeds, and flowers; basic photosynthesis and pollination; and seed dispersal in this Cat in the Hat’s Learning Library book. The flow isn’t quite the same as Theodore Geisel's(original Cat in the Hat author), but it’s very close and teaches a lot of plant basics at the same time.
	Planting a Rainbow by Lois Ehlert This colorful book follows the yearly cycle of growing a rainbow hued flower garden. It discusses planting bulbs, ordering seeds, anticipating the first spring shoots, and planting seedlings. Our kids really liked the six pages of varying width depicting all the flowers of each color of the rainbow.
	*Once There was a Seed* by Judith Anderson This is a great little introduction to the life cycle of a seed through the eyes of a little girl and her green-thumbed grandfather. There are notes for parents, as well as suggestions for learning activities that will reinforce the information in the book.
	*One Bean* by Anne Rockwell This simple little book is perfect for following along with your own bean growing experiment. The illustrations are charming and show exactly what happens to the bean throughout the growing process.
	*Our Community Garden* by Bethany Roberts Audrey lives in San Francisco, where she and her friends have plots in a community garden. They plant, weed, and water to raise their favorite vegetables which reflect their cultural heritage. This book discusses working, and playing, together. At the end everyone eats together to enjoy the fruits of their labor.
	*Secrets of the Garden* by Kathleen Weidner Zoehfeld This book is a marvelous way for children to learn about nature and food chains. It follows a family as they prepare, plant, care for, and harvest from their backyard garden. The family’s two comical chickens lecture about the garden and how it connects to the food chain and food web.
	*Seeds and More Seeds* by Millicent Selsam Published in 1963 as an “A Science I CAN READ Book” this story/science book follows a young boy name Benny as he sets up and performs his own experiments to learn more about seeds and the plants that they grow into.
	*Ten Seeds* by Ruth Brown The artwork in this book is beautiful! I also love the unique style of counting book that starts with ten seeds and one-by-one each seed or plant is destroyed until only one last flower remains—and drops ten seeds so the cycle can begin again.
	*The Carrot Seed* by Ruth Krauss This is a simple story about a little boy who plants a carrot seed and knows that one day a carrot will grow. This book can begin a wonderful discussion about standing up for what you believe in and working hard for things you want.
	*The Curious Garden* by Peter Brown Liam finds a struggling garden in a city all gray and dull. Over time the curious garden spreads to make the city vibrant, lush, and green. There is definitely an underlying eco-friendly theme, but nothing that jumps up on its soapbox. There’s also a wonderful inspiration from real life on the final page.
	*The Little Composter* by Jan Gerardi This lift-the-flap board book is filled with playful rhymes that show what parts of foods can be added to the compost pile. Our toddler loves this book, but don’t let the fact the this is a board book keep you from sharing it with an older child—it’s a wonderful springboard to creating your own whole food to compost art projects.
	*The Oak Inside the Acorn* by Max Lucado Little Acorn doesn’t believe he’ll ever be a big strong oak tree. He struggles with finding his purpose and being “the tree God made [him] to be." This is a beautifully illustrated (and heftier) book that can lead to several different discussions, including becoming who God want us to be.
	*The Tiny Seed* by Eric Carle As seeds are scattered, one small seed struggles to survive while other seeds meet various disasters. This story of a small seed is a little odd if read alone. However, Amanda suggests a great way to use this book along with the Parable of the Sower found in the Bible in Matthew 13.
	*The Wind’s Garden* by Bethany Roberts A little girl tells the story of the garden she planted and compares it to the wild garden that is planted by the wind. This is a great way to discuss the beauty of domestic and natural gardens and a good practice for comparing and contrasting.
	*This Is the Sunflower* by Lola M. Schaefer This book starts with one sunflower and through the “This Is the House that Jack Built” style rhyme ends with a patch of sunflowers. The watercolor illustrations are bright and vivid and it’s just plain fun to read.
	*Yucky Worms* by Vivian French This fun book takes a humorous approach to explaining why worms are considered a gardener’s friends. Readers are shown where worms live, how they move, and how they help make gardens better. Great for boys or any child who loves creepy crawlies.