Free Peppers

At a meeting last month someone offered me free bell peppers and various peppers. I accepted and took just a few. She pointed out that everyone had taken some, so I could have the rest. Well, give me a plastic bag. The rest of the basket was cleaned out by me!

Some of the green, yellow, and orange bell peppers were so tiny. Remember, these were home grown. Later in the week I saw the tiny colored peppers in Publix and they were tiny. I thought they were tiny because someone grew them at home and they just did not get big. Now, I wonder if I was given bell peppers.

Foolishly, I passed on the hot peppers. It never occurred to me until too late that I could string these and dry them, later making hot pepper relish. When I grew peppers, I either dried them on a string or gave them to a friend to eat. Later in the winter I ground up the dried cayenne peppers and made pepper jelly.

Around My Home Today

The battle of the dandelions commences

One year, I decided that I would just make dandelion jelly and use a plant I could not thwart. Of course, that was the year of fewer dandelions, as it looks like this one will be. When I pick the heads for disposal, I will pick the greens for the hens.

eggs galore

After getting one egg a week for most of the winter, maybe two if I were lucky, this is the most eggs that have been in my egg bowl since I put the girls into their fortified pen outdoors last fall. All their energy went to staying warm after their house-warm experience for over a year. The really tiny one may belong to Pepper.  It is on the top row, left.

angry mama?

She had to be a pregnant raccoon, because of the nesting behavior in my house after being elsewhere all winter. Hopefully, there are no babies up there. I have not heard mewing for mama today, so maybe I caught her in time. The Animal Control Officer commented that I had caught a huge one.

two vehicles and two men for one raccoon?

growling but gone

Louise, Thelma, Pepper--happy, happy hens

I ate leftover, cooked-from-scratch--chicken and dumplings.

I hung clothes outdoors.

Cherry Laurel is blooming

more azaleas blooming

Yoshino Cherry blossoms

Hostas coming up

The tiny Cherry Laurel volunteer will be repotted. I don't know what the plant in the upper right is, but I like it, so it stays.

 

Redbud tree and overcast sky

mystery holes

These holes appear, more each night. I thought at first they were holes like the squirrels dig early each morning. But, these holes are six- to eight-inches deep, about two inches, cylindrical, and straight down. Raccoons dig holes sort of like this. So, maybe I will have no more holes. The policeman said that it looked like armadillo holes. He was teasing me about things, so I think he was teasing me. Have you ever seen anything like this?

My favorite umbrella, ruined

I got lime on my beautiful umbrella. Since lime is caustic, I really don't want to use this and have caustic water running down on me. It seems to have gotten little holes in it. The rain did not seem to take all the lime off.  My other favorite umbrella, a red one, tore up first. But, this looks like a huge flower in the yard. Maybe I will strip it to the ribs and make it new with a pretty fabric and recover it.

That's all that is happening at my house today, unless you count the robins that have been courting for the last three weeks.

 

Your turn

Do you have snow or grass that needs mowing like mine does? Are the wild animals under control? Are the tame ones happy? Did you cook from scratch or eat leftovers? Did you have sunshine instead of a perpetually overcast day? Are your hens prolific? Tell me something about how it is at your house today. please.