CRUNCHY!

Crunchy. That's the word that keeps popping up in my mind when I am outside. I walk around the yard and -sob!- the garden and it is crunchy. The first day of summer was a mere 2 weeks ago yet it feels like we've been in summer for months already. I saw a post my friend Fred wrote the other morning that said, "Good Morning! We are one day closer to rain...". I thought on those words ALL DAY. I find it really difficult to stay positive when it is...well...crunchy outside. I have let most of the garden go. I keep 2 beds watered. Every 2 or 3 days I saturate those beds and catch all the runoff to water the few plantings left alive in other beds. But even then, I question the effort I am putting into it. The tomato plants look big and bushy, but can't even muster the energy to set blooms. The squash plants are sprawling everywhere, but only one-an heirloom Italian squash-puts off any fruit to speak of. ONE slender, but oh so tasty, squash a week.

The only thing that seems to be thriving in this day after day 100 degree heat is the cucumbers. They are happy indeed, full of blooms and fruit and subsequently, bees.

We are eating lots of cucumbers!

We have been adding some new fowl to the farm. Picked up 4 minorcas from my farm and garden mentor, Bernadette. Small chickens, not as frenetic as bantys (thank goodness!), but not a whole bunch bigger. And last weekend a white leghorn and 2 Araucanas from my inspiring friends April and Hal. I used to have lots of white leghorns. They are a small bodied chicken that lay HUGE white eggs. Oh! And also these guys...well, one guy, one gal and an as of yet undetermined:

The two white ducks are Pekin and the black is a Black Swedish. I am quite taken with them. Really calm and entertaining and their quack is quite endearing. They get their own swimming pool today.

So many projects going on around here. We are living in a construction zone, but for the first time since all this change started, I am seeing glimmers of what it will all become and that cheers me. Progress moves slowly, but at least it moves, marching to its own beat as much as I would like to speed it along. The heat seems to stall things out and we find ourselves most afternoons from about 4-6 sitting on the bed in front of the fan reading or writing. I go back and forth about air conditioning. Sometimes I wish central air was a reality for us. But most times, I can't imagine being that cut off from the sounds of the outside-especially now with the quacking that has been added to the cacophony.

I hope, in the next month, to transfer all the recipes on this blog to my neglected website, http://www.theteachingkitchen.com./ They will still be here with the nifty link list on the left hand side of the page, but they will also be on the website, which I hope to make easier to navigate. Stay tuned!

And, of course, stay cool!