Independence Days- week 13

Another week gone by. My how time flies...

It's been a busy week, although today I paid the price for pushing myself too hard. I woke up this morning with a sore throat and generally felt like I'd been hit by a truck, I ached all over. So I called in sick to work and slept until 10!!! I must have needed it. I generally can't sleep past 630 or 7, even on weekends. J15 got back from her trip this morning at 530 am and also slept away the morning, having been on a charter bus for 18 hours straight.

V has been working hard in the basement to try to have her room ready for her but things haven't been going as quickly as he would have liked. But...

She has two walls framed and another in progress!!

Through her wall you can see my freezer in what will become my food storage room. The freezer and the shelves for my canning jars will be in there. I'm a bit excited to have an entire separate room for food storage. We're purposely not putting heating vents in it so it will stay cooler during the winter

But on to the business at hand- Independence Days. I'm feeling a bit more "independent" recently as we are getting settled in.

1. Plant something- nope.

2: Harvest something:

Behold! This evening's harvest.

The first India Paint Eggplant and my first bell pepper. We've still got loads of hot peppers. We've had broccoli this week and I have tomatoes starting to ripen- but only the cherry ones.

3. Preserve something- um, no.

4. Reduce waste- recycled, repurposed and used cloth bags at the store (most of the time). I also perfected the morning commute using the bus system last week so I don't have to drive all the way into town.

5. Prep and storage- Construction on the basement continues. I stocked up on pasta that was on sale. Oh, and V discovered two boxes of canning jars that I didn't know I had. They were stashed way back in this little closet under the basement stairs. Amazing what you find when you move- one case was even wide mouth jars. Hm, I didn't know I had any of those.... That tells you how disorganized I am. Or how much my priorities have changed in the 15 years we have lived in that house.

6. Build community food systems- stopped at the Farmer's Market but didn't pick up much. Only brats (our favorite- from local beef and quite lean and tasty) and some summer squash since my vines rotted with all the rain and I didn't get any. I had a nice conversation with the vendor about the bizarre garden summer it's been. I also picked up some sweet corn from a roadside stand since ours isn't ready yet.

7. Eat the food- My meal board is found! I'm amazed at how dependent I had become on planning and organizing my meals for the week. Not that I couldn't have planned without my meal board but it somehow makes me feel more in control.

We have a call into the realtor about putting the town house on the market but haven't heard back from him (that surprises me). I got all the painting done including the back landing and I finished painting the garage on Sunday afternoon. The floors have been vacuumed, the toilets and tubs scrubbed, the counters cleaned. There is STILL the broken window in the dining room that V keeps saying he will fix - maybe he's waiting for me to get fed up with waiting for him so I'll fix it myself. I also got my volunteer marigolds transplanted into the front flower bed although they look kind of pathetic. At least it's better than the flattened plants that were there.

Things are coming along- we're looking down the throat of August. EEEK.