In a Time of Destruction, Create

As I watch the news, the world around seems to be descending into chaos. I'm reminded of the beautiful soul, Maxine Hong Kingston, who said, "In a time of destruction, create..."

This week's "creating" has been practical things.

We preserved of the rest of Thanksgiving's frozen cranberries and leftovers. Here are a few quarts of cranberry juice and turkey bone broth.

Links and how to's are imbedded in yellow font for you to click on, if you are interested.

Here I'm using a soldering iron like a weapon to prep winter sowing containers for calendula and lavender seeds. These home made "mini" greenhouses stratify cold hardy seeds that require blustery temps over a period of time to grow. I'm planning to use the petals to create teas and salves.

Two major wins from winter sowing cold hardy plants:

1.) I get an early harvest ready to transplant at the beginning of spring

2.) Seedlings are already "hardened off" producing stronger, more prolific plants.

Here's more:

In the last post I mentioned our move away from single use plastics to glass containers. Sometimes it's simply not possible to win the plastic battle, but if we're unable to avoid it, we're attempting to recycle food safe containers as seedling pots for short term use. Check out Garden Answer's how to videos for this topic going back several years. She's an amazing grower!

Here's the calendula field I'm dreaming of walking through with a whimsical flowing dress.

We're getting closer to spring now. Already the sun's light is returning in greater length after winter solstice. Today the sun set at 5:20 instead of 5 PM. We then caught sight of the rare green comet (C/2022 E3) through the binoculars. Although it looked like a smudge, it was an epiphany to know it last visited earth 50,000 years ago and that human eyes can even perceive it.

And finally, in celebration of creation and the spring to come, please enjoy this most exquisite moment of music. It's a reimagining of Vivaldi's famous work through the modern lens of Max Richter. I hope you close your eyes, set back, and Let it fill you with light and dreams.

Warmly,

Disclaimer: If new to canning, avoid getting sick by using a bona fide pressure canning device (not an instant pot) at 240 degrees F at 10 PSI (depending on altitude), to can low acid foods like meat broth. Use water bath canning only for approved high acid foods.