Spring in the Valley

Winter lasts really only 2 months where we live, December and January. November still feels very much like fall and in February, more blossoms are coming out and we have some shorts days. Even though winter is shorter (and much, much, much milder), we still anticipate the spring as much as anywhere else. It is a change and one we all look forward to. Our part of CA is known for it's fertile valley soil where we can grow most anything and we do grow most everything. One of the favorites though in the spring are the fruit and almond blossoms that send a beautiful fragrance in the air and and are gorgeous to look at when they are in bloom row after row after row. The colors of pink and white are everywhere. And it can almost look like you are in a fairytale when you are among them. It is a short time that they are in all their glory, but when the petals float away and the leaves begin to uncurl we know that something better is on its way. Soon the plump, juicy peaches, nectarines, plums and apricots will weigh the branches down and not long after that, they will be in our mouths with the juices dripping down our chins. And the almonds, oh I love them too!

Before moving here, I really didn't appreciate agriculture as much as I should have and as much as I do now. When I have taken the time to learn about the plants, the trees, the bushes, and the animals that produce the good healthy food that I so enjoy, I can't help but thank the Maker for his wonderful plan and provision for us. I see how He has provided the soil, the sun, the water, the pollinators so perfectly to produce a nourishing product that I so often have taken for granted. I appreciate the farming men and women too for their hard work in raising these crops and livestock.

Some fun agriculture trivia that I thought very interesting.

Over 3/4 of the world's almonds are grown here in CA. And did you know that 2/3 of what you eat are dependent on bees to pollinate? Even the milk you drink and the steak that you eat. Remember that cow has to eat something and that something was most likely pollinated by a bee. During the weeks of the almond blossoms in California, so many bees are needed for pollination that bees are brought in from nearly every state in the U.S. Have you ever seen a truck with bees driving down the road? I am sure you have heard of a sheep dog guarding the sheep from predators, but have you ever heard of donkeys and llamas protecting livestock? Well they do and are used here in California.

Almond blossoms

Look closely and you will see boxes on the left side of the road.

Those are bee hives.

No Snow

Well it didn't come. There were a lot of disappointed people. I, however, was NOT disappointed. I will go to the mountains if I want to be in the snow and look up yonder at them if I want to look at it. To most of you who have had snow for a few months now, it probably seems weird to want snow, but when you only get snow once every blue moon or so, it is a novelty. Growing up with it, myself, not so much. Maybe next year.

Rain/Snow Showers

I just checked the weather forecast and this is what it said:

Tonight

Rain/Snow Showers

Low 36

I have never since we have lived here seen that in our forecast. I heard about a snow over 10 years ago, and apparently everything shut down.

This will be interesting.

Looking Back - Winter in CA

Since I missed posting anything the last couple of months of 2010, I decided to start a series called "Looking Back". I took a whole lot of pictures and there is a lot to tell, but I don't want to recap 2010 all in one post (I doubt you want me to either) so I thought periodically I will put up a post about 2010. So here is my first one.

As many of you know, winter in CA is a bit different than many other places in the country. Even Fall is different. Leaves still fall off several of the trees, you will notice it especially when you are driving by a stone fruit orchard or nut trees. However, when you think of Fall, like October and November, our leaves are still very green. Then comes the change, when everyone else has moved on to winter (we have too, we have our Christmas decorations out) our leaves begin to change and we finally start raking the first of December. You drive around town and think "Oh, a beautiful Fall day" Of course you have the Christmas lights to look at too.

So you have the month of December, where you feel it should be winter, because you are singing songs about a winter wonderland and a white Christmas, but you are still raking leaves. What to do? Well this year we decided to do a typical winter activity, at least typical in colder climates.

We went ice skating.

Only this isn't typical ice skating, it is advertised as synthetic ice. Huh? The ad says you don't even need to bundle up. Well this we have to check out.

We find half price tickets on the internet and a group of us drive about an hour to this outdoor synthetic ice skating rink. We decided to pack heavy coats, mittens, scarves and hats, because where we are from, you dress warm for something like this. Keep in mind that we went with families who were not native Californians, one mom had lived in Colorado for many years, and the other lived in upstate New York.

Well we arrive to find a little rink (and I mean little) with a white picket fence around it and Christmas music blaring. It looked like ice from afar and they are using real ice skates. Then we get closer and see it is white plastic.

This will be interesting.

We lace up our skates and hit the "ice".

The problem is that the blades on the skates do not cut through the plastic like it does on ice and you end up sliding about a foot and figure it is easier to walk. The older crowd wasn't too happy about this. My young kids didn't think it was too bad. Of course they had nothing to compare it to. After about 20 minutes of this, the coats, mittens, and hats came off. After about 10 more minutes the skates came off. We found we could slide a whole better better on the plastic with our socks. I wasn't sure what the employees would think of this, but before long they were conducting sock sliding races and contests with our group. They must not have minded.



After our adventure, the socks went in the trash. They looked pretty bad. It was an experience, but we all agreed that we were especially thankful we didn't pay full price for this. But it will be a memory we won't soon forget.

Just Checking in...

Not much to write about. This morning started with trying to get to the farmers market as soon as it opened so I could get home in time to go to Clay's game. It was a foggy morning, I couldn't see more than 10 yards in front of me. I turned on the wrong road and didn't notice (because I couldn't see anything) I noticed when I was at least 3 miles down, thankfully I was headed in the right general direction. After talking to the lady I buy milk from, she happens to be from Chicago, we both decided we won't complain about the fog, not as bad as the weather from where we came. Thankfully I made it in time to get to the game and then Paige's game, then by the time the games were over the sun was out. It ended up being a beautiful, spending time outdoors with no jacket kinda day. But you sure wouldn't have thought that from this morning.

I think the fog here is like snow in other places, no one wants to go anywhere, schools are on delays, and you just want to cuddle up and read a book by the fire. The nice thing though, is that usually later in the day it burns off and you can be out and about. But it can be bad to where you are almost blind when it is thick.

When I first met my new dental hygienist, she learned I was from Indiana and asked about tornadoes. She had never lived in an area with tornadoes and was amazed at the damage they could do. But right away she said, "they may have tornadoes but I bet they don't have the fog like us" I kinda laughed to myself, I think I would rather have fog all around my house than a tornado.

Just to be really random, here is a picture below from around Christmas. Some days we have a beautiful view of the Sierra Nevada mountain range. Most days you wouldn't even know it was there. Our air quality is quite poor here in the valley. But on days of lower temperatures and after a nice cleansing rain (which unfortunately rarely ever happens) you can see every jagged, snow covered peak.

Romanesco Broccoli

In my post below, I talked about trying new vegetables that you might not otherwise try if it weren't for the Farmers Market. Well about a month ago I was introduced to a new vegetable called Romanesco Broccoli or Cauliflower. Click here for a link about it (and a better picture).

I thought I would introduce you to this odd vegetable. I think it is the prettiest of veggies and after hearing a farmer and some other people at the market going on and on about it, I started asking some questions. So I got the information I needed to try it at home, and I am oh, so glad that I did.

It you get a chance to ever try it (maybe your market sells it too). You have to.

Here's what I did.

Wash, cut and arrange on a baking sheet.


Press garlic and mix with extra virgin oil. Brush on the cauliflower. Sprinkle lightly with sea salt. In a 500 degree oven, bake for atleast 15 minutes or until it begins to brown. Remove from oven and sprinkle with freshly grated parmesan cheese.

Enjoy.

It doesn't even taste like cauliflower.

Farmers Market

Saturdays can tend to be very busy days around here and I am sure that it is true for you too. But most every Saturday we make time to get to the local Farmers Market. Maybe not all of us go, depending on what time games are and so forth, but at least one of us will go and hopefully several of us will get there. It has become part of our Saturday tradition.

Why?

For several reasons...

#1 You get very fresh, in season, local produce. It hasn't traveled across the country or across the world for that matter. It also hasn't been treated or coated to keep it looking good.

#2 You support local farmers.

#3 The kids get to meet the farmers that grow the food that they are going to eat. Maybe that sounds silly, but anymore kids think everything comes from a grocery store with having no idea of the work that went into growing it. I want the kids to understand that food doesn't just appear in the store. Meeting the farmers helps me teach them where their food comes from and to be thankful for the hard work the farmers put into growing it for us and to God for blessing their crops. It also teaches the kids about the seasons of vegetables.

#4 We eat a whole lot healthier. Vegetables have become a big part of our meals now. Maybe many of you started your kids out right even from the womb, eating lots of lots of veggies. Well, I admit, I did not. I use to hate veggies. Green beans were the only vegetables that I ate. But, they had to be grown by my grandpa and canned by my grandma in order for me to even eat those. So when my grandpa passed away and there were no more green beans, I was in trouble. Grandma finally encouraged me to try cans from the store, but I still didn't prepare them all that often. So the farmers market has changed that for us.

#5 It has us trying vegetables that we normally wouldn't try. The farmers at our Market are excited to share recipe ideas with you.

#6 It is just fun. Once a month there is a bounce house. The kids love that! I love the bounce house because it is free. We almost always run into friends (in addition to the farmers that we love).

So anyway, that is a glimpse into our Saturdays. I know that in most places, markets are only running in part of the year. We are fortunate to have ours all year round. But I do encourage you to attend. It is a lot of fun and healthy too.

Here are some pictures from about a month ago of one of our Saturday visits.

Sowing Seeds

The end of January the kids helped our dear friends, Joe and Gloria, sow seeds. Joe had surgery for a blocked artery and needed to take it easy, so the kids helped with some of the beginning garden preparations.



I know that the kids had a fun time and I think Joe and Gloria did too.

After all of the work, popsicles were handed out to the workers. And then we enjoyed the nice afternoon.

Below: Clay climbing in the olive tree

Below: Paige made friends with an earthworm

Rainbows in the Sky

For whatever reason this winter has seemed a little grayer than usual. The sun hasn't peeked out as much as I would like. But Saturday was different, it was out full force. Gorgeous day and we took full advantage along with a few other neighborhood kids that came over!




It was great to have the break in the grayness, especially since this week is all rain, we do need the rain though, and if we didn't have rain, we wouldn't get to see this:



Unfortunately, I couldn't get it all in the picture, but it was a full rainbow. Drew spotted it from his bedroom window, so the next thing you know, we are all out in the front yard. A great time to remember what the rainbow means. God promised Noah that he would never again flood the whole earth. And as the kids and I talked about, we know that what God said is true, because God ALWAYS keeps his promises!

How to make olive oil

This post is not going to contain a "How to" video, or even go through the steps one would take to make olive oil. Number one, because I couldn't really tell you all of the steps and number two, most of the people reading this do not have easy access to an olive grove anyway, so it wouldn't be too useful. This post will, however, show you some pictures of a place that does press olive oil and maybe you just might learn a little bit of how it is made.

We are trying to ease in slowly to school, so today we joined a homeschool field trip group touring an olive oil plant. It was very interesting, indeed.

Here are some pics below...

Above: Olives are taken through and the rotten olives are taken out along with any leaves that are still attached.

Below: The olives are washed and ready to be ground.

Below: The olives are ground up, seed and all. The result is a something of an oatmeal consistency. Then the liquid will be extracted.


Below: Here is the olive oil after the water has been separated out. There are still some impurities that froth up to the top.


Below: Paige and Drew in front of some olives that are about to be pressed.


Below: The kids enjoying a game of tag by the olive grove.

At the end of the tour we got a lesson on buying olive oil. I had read recently about how great California olive oil was because of the purity of the product. I learned more about it today. After the liquid is extracted out, the oil and the water are separated and you have olive oil in a very pure form. Italians do the same thing. Only that olive oil stays in their country. The waste that is left over, after the liquid is extracted, is pressed a second time using solvents and sometimes mixed with other oils. This is what is sent to your grocery store. The Italians won't use it. A lot of the nutritional value that olive oil is known for is now gone when this process is done.

It isn't always easy to find California olive oil, but I was happy to find that I can go directly to the grove (just down the road from me) where it is pressed and buy it by the bottle, case or gallon. So if you are looking for good olive oil, come for a visit, and I will hook you up!

Weather Weanie

Weather Weanie is a term that one of our friends that lives here in CA, but has lived elsewhere too, calls Californians that complain about weather being too hot or too cold (like in December and it is in the 60's and they are freezing). Well I have definitely developed into one. Today it wasn't about temperature, although I thought it was a bit chilly until my mom showed me a picture of my sister's neighborhood (I honestly forgot about the possibility of snow elsewhere) so looking at the picture I had to admit that no it really wasn't that cold here. Today it was rain. It rarely rains here which is nice in a sense because we can plan outdoor events and not worry too much about it raining. But not so good when we have a water shortage, which is all of the time. But anyway back to what I was saying. It isn't often that it rains, and even less often that I drive in the rain. So I am driving today to the airport to pick up my mom who is flying in leaving behind snow and ice and I am driving in the rain with a white knuckle grip because honestly I don't think I have driven in a real rain for a couple of years! Can you say WEATHER WEANIE!?!?