Survival Seeds

Good things come in small packages, that is for sure. A package arrived yesterday from Home Town Seeds http://hometownseeds.com/.



I had entered a drawing and won these survival seeds. I'm so excited to have these.

First I will share about why I'm so excited to have survival seeds then will share the blog site New Life on a Homestead that put this on. You will so enjoy the reads and info on this blog.

Survival Seeds:

I save seeds, grow heirlooms and save and share the seeds for next season, pure and simple. Also do some seed trading as well. That's always fun.

But to have a bag of survival seeds WOW . This is a what if you can't get any seeds, what if your crops fail and you don't have your own seeds to save. To me its like having insurance on almost everything we have, home ,car, health, life you name it . So why not seeds. Its the "what if's" happens. And we know "what if's" do happen. I got insurance seeds to grow more food for my family and others.

These seeds came from a new to me company and I think I'm going to do business with them. The package came real fast , their prices seem really good and the seeds look wonderful and everything is neat and comes to you just like they said. Also a nice information papers about the seeds and all the how to's from storing to growing.

Here's what Home Town Seeds sent me http://hometownseeds.com/




Its hard to believe that there's over 22,000 seeds in all those packs. It will plant more then 3/4 of an acre They are well sealed and labeled. I am storing them in the freezer for a longer storage life. They are a great addage to my preparedness way of life.

All are 100% non-hybrid so I will be able to save seeds from the harvest.

Here's the list of seeds that Home Town Seeds sent me.

1) Sweet Corn, Golden Bantam

2) Peas, Lincoln

3) Radish, Champion

4) Onion, Utah Yellow Sweet Spanish

5) Beet, Detroit dark Red

6) Tomato, Rutgers PS

7) Spinach, Bloomsdale Longstanding

8) Cabbage, Golden Acre

9)Swiss Chard, Lucullus

10) Lettuce, Romaine Paris Island Cos

11) Carrot, Scarlet Nantes

12) Pepper, Yolo Wonder

13) Winter Squash, Waltham Butternut

14) Cucumber, Long Green

15) Squash Zucchini, Black Beauty

Its a great package and they have other seeds like flowers and herbs. I think this would be such a nice gift to give to the gardeners in your life : ). Check em out

How it happen.

I was a new follower to this wonderful blog page, New Life On a Homestead http://newlifeonahomestead.com/

I was so liking it I put the sites button on my blog site. Life is busy and its hard to get reading everyone's blog pages and even blogging, as you all know . But it was the right timing and I almost missed it . I entered the drawing and won.

I am sorry I didn't blog about the drawing, my bad. Not only sorry my followers didn't get a chance to sign up but also finding a great site that has lots of good stuff. Read about how they solved the Acid Reflex problem in their family.

But I do hope I can make it up to you by sharing (New Life on a Homestead) plus on down the road sharing seeds from my garden : ).

So head on over and check both New Life on a Homestead and Home Town Seeds.

Have a great weekend
tc linda

Plant Camp Monday's

Last week was ok but this is summer and we need color. What a better plant to bring to the camp then the beautiful Echinacea's.

Most gardeners have them growing. They are great for background, along boarders, gosh just about anywhere. Who doesn't like Echie's? The butterflies and bees sure like em too! Echinacea I have to say are my all time favorites.

Echinacea purpurea , also known as Purple coneflower.
Aateracea, Daisy family

Here's some I grew from seed. I used the Winter Sow, http://www.wintersown.org/ method and had very good results. These pic's are from over at my other homestead but many have been moved to our new place in the woods. Its just these pic's are so much prettier then the ones I took over

here.

These others are Echinacea's I bought from co-op's and oh did this open a new world for me with these beauties.

This white one is so pretty , Its name may be White Swan



And these are????? I forgot : (



Here's a bouquet I picked with lime green Echie's. They are great for cut flowers and I like to dry
them too for arrangements.




Here's a nice link if interested in this gotta have it my garden plant : ) http://www.home-herb-garden.com/echinacea.html It also has an herb index!


Also I love this plant b/c of its medicinal values. I take the Echinacea capsules when I get that on set of a cold , seems to help. Heres a bit more about that as well.

http://www.home-herb-garden.com/echinacea-herb.html

I sure needed this color this week for the camp. I hope you have Echinacea's growing in your garden.

Happy Gardening and thanks for visiting the Plant Camp.

tc linda

Plant Camp Monday's

Did you guess the Christmas in July plant? Its a Christmas tradition! Yep its the Poinsettia.

I have it growing in my garden. DH always gets me a couple of Poinsettias from school that kids grow in Ag. and sell. The plants seem to do well for me during the holidays. But after that I just watch as each leaf falls off before I toss them out.

They usually last into the early spring but this year it would not die so I went ahead and planted by the garden. Its going to be a test plant to see if I can actually have it ready for Christmas this year.

Its just green now and I'll have to bring in before frost this fall.

Poinsettia, Euphorbia pulcherrima. The species is native to Mexico

Did you know there is a common misconception that the poinsettia is highly toxic. Not so, but it could upset stomach and sap can cause temporary eye problems if you get on your eyes : ( that's enough there to make me cautious of the plant.

Even though the plant is not very toxic, people who are sensitive to latex may suffer an allergic reaction and maybe should not bring the plants into the home. There goes Christmas tradition. Fortunately we are not allergic to latex.

The poinsettia can be difficult plant to reflower after the the first big show. The plant needs a period of uninterrupted long, dark nights for around two months in fall in order to develop flowers. I heard of putting the plants in the closet for a time.

The colors come from photoperiodism, this means it requires darkness for 12 hours at a time to change color. At the same time, the plants needs a lot of light during the day for the brightest color. This is really going to be a pain. Now I know why I see poinsettia's along curb sides , nobody wants to mess with em.

But I'm going to give it a try just the same.

Here's some more interesting Poinsettia facts.

http://urbanext.illinois.edu/poinsettia/facts.cfm

Even though a Christmas type plant its helping me think cool and snow on these hot muggy days of summer.

Happy Christmas in July

tc linda

Plant Camp Monday's

This week lets get Daylily Crazy. I just love Daylilies . For many years I just grew the orange ones, you know the ones that you see everywhere even along ditches. I would see others with beautiful displays of these beauties with so many colors. Maybe its about timing but I'm finally in the world of Day lilies .

Did you know you can eat daylilies (Hemerocallis fulva) from the flower to the roots? I tried an orange one in a salad it not only was pretty on the plate but tasty too. I'm going to give them a try in stir fry. Here's more info

http://www.ehow.com/how_4466550_eat-daylily-hemerocallis-fulva.html

I know I was starting this Plant Camp with my plants on the homestead but I just got to share some pic's from our botanical gardens that we live close by. I took pic's last week . They did have a plant sale so I got some plants and hope next season I will have lots of daylilies to show you.

The first group is taken at Powell Gardens and I'm sorry I don't have names for them , so if you know some of them or have these jump right in and tell us : ). Next time I visit I'll take a notebook with me and get those names.

Pictures are taken with a cheapo digi, so even tho pretty nice it still doesn't do the flower justice.

























Now this group are the ones I'm growing and I can't wait tell they start to expand.




El Desperado





Fooled Me


Stella De Oro


?


?




?

This is a Lily growing over at our old homestead, plan to get it started over in my new lily gardens

I do have these added and won't see a flower until next year I hope : )

Dixie Flamingo

Chicago Royal

Missouri Moon

Peach Horizon

Atlanta Rufflelette

Ruby Throat - I bought this one blooming

This is just a drop in the bucket to many beautiful Daylilies. A flower that last one day, so glad they grow many in groups and you have a nice showing for the early summer.

If you have some Daylily pictures on your blog pages please leave a link so we can go over and go Daylily crazy : )

Thanks for dropping by at the Plant Camp. Next week will be something strange growing in the garden this time of year. I'll give you a hint "Christmas In July" can guess what plant will be featured at the camp next week?

Have a great week

tc linda

Creek is rising and the beans are done

Oh the rains came today big time. Seems like almost everyday it rains, but today's rain made the creek rise and keep rising. It was over the bridge kind of rising, yikes.

Loud, roaring and rolling , nothing going to stop it .




Do I stay or do I go? (isn't that part of a song?)



Heck no I'll stay and have my bean dinner by the creek and watch this : ).

Where I sat is a 12 ft drop and the water was pretty close to my chair here. Now that's high water in a very short time.



It was like a huge river and all the noise it made. I always thought living by a big loud water fall would be nice but that's all you would hear, couldn't hear the birds and other critters. So I'm glad the creek is receding back to normal. It won't be the muddy look for long . Soon the water will be crystal clear and I'll see all the pretty rocks shining (wish it was gold). The soft sounds of water flowing down the creek and the sounds of the critters once again.

My thoughts watching this monster of a creek go wild was float trips. If only there would not be log hang ups and bridges with water over them in the way this would be one crazy ride to somewhere. But I just sat and enjoyed my bean dinner and glass of ice tea.

Beans were cooked w/ ham hocks, onions and herbs. Fried taters n'onions and cornbread. The stick to your ribs kind of dinner and oh so good.

Well if we don't have anymore rain tonight we should be safe from the creek. I was worried about my lower garden w/ 61 tomato plants : ( but all was safe.

Now we need a nice dry up, maters don't like their feet wet to long.

tc linda

Plant Camp Monday's

This week I'm combining three in one, Wild Ginger , store bought ginger root and fresh green beans from my garden. Sound's like a recipe to me.

My plant is Wild Ginger, Asarum canaddense




I have just this one plant that is new to the homestead. I have not seen it growing in our parts of the woods yet but I sure hope so. Just got to keep looking.

How pretty Wild Ginger is with its heart shaped leaves. . The odor and color of the flowers attract certain insects essential to pollination. Now I see why over at the ol homestead I have just one plant and its not producing that well. I need those bugs! Found out they are ants that pollinate the plant, I need ants ?

I should bring over the other Wild Ginger to get this patch growing.


The root is used from the Wild Ginger plants for making ales and medicals . If you scrape the root you can smell the ginger. Here's a link to get more info on the plant.

http://www.abnativeplants.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=plants.plantDetail&plant_id=99

Wild Ginger is not the same kind you would fine in the grocery stores, The beautiful ginger root you can buy and use in your cooking is Zingiber officinale. I'll be using this in my recipe.

Here's a link to tell about the ginger root that we see in the store

http://www.floridata.com/ref/z/zing_off.cfm

My sis and I love a chinese dish called Szechuan green beans

I couldn't wait tell my Wild Ginger grew to use this so I bought the big roots of ginger and picked some green beans for my garden. Along with some green onions. This dish is a bit on the hot and spicy side so you can tone it down a bit.



I dusted the ol wok to make this dish and went to town on making for the first time. I love cooking out of the wok but have not for a very long time. I think I'll keep it out and use more often. Hope you like this dish.

Total Time: 20 minutes

Ingredients:1 pound Chinese longbeans (also called yardlong beans or just longbeans)

1 tablespoon garlic, chopped

1 tablespoon ginger,

chopped2 scallions (spring onions, green onions),white parts only

1/2 teaspoon chili paste1 tablespoon dark soy sauce

1/2 teaspoon sugar

1/4 teaspoon salt, or to taste

Pepper to taste, optional

2 tablespoons vegetable or peanut oil for stir-frying, or as needed

Preparation: Wash the longbeans, drain thoroughly, and trim the tops and bottoms.Cut the longbeans on the diagonal into slices approximately 2 inches long.Chop the garlic, ginger and white part of the scallions.

Heat 1 tablespoon oil over medium heat. Add the longbeans and stir-fry until they start to shrivel or "pucker" and turn brown (5 - 7 minutes). Remove the long beans and drain in a colander or on paper towels.

Heat 1 tablespoon oil in the wok on high heat. Add the garlic, ginger and scallions. Stir-fry for a few seconds, then add the chili paste and stir-fry for a few more seconds until aromatic.

Add the longbeans and the remaining ingredients. Mix together and serve.

Serving suggestion: Szechuan Green Beans would make an excellent side dish to accompany Mapo Tofu but I made a fried brown rice.

Sorry no picture of finished dish , hubby started in and ate it all up. And he's not an Asian dish fan either.

I'm glad to be able to make different dishes with the green beans this year and also learn about my ginger i'm growing. I'd like to try making ginger ale someday.

If you have a favorite ginger dish or green bean dish please share.

Thanks for joining the Plant Camp this week.

Have a wonderful week with lots of Blessings

tc linda