Pinned! – Top Five Articles

Posted on December 31, 2012 by Dave @ HappyAcres

I’ll have to admit, I have only recently become a convert to Pinterest. I first heard about it from my wife, who is much more on the cutting edge of social media that I am. I eventually set up my own account (Dave HappyAcres), and started merrily pinning away. I have found it a great way to keep track of all those great sounding recipes, articles, and such that I run across while browsing blogs and other websites. And it sure beats my old system of using bookmarks in my browser or writing notes to myself that I usually couldn’t decipher later on.

I’m not sure I’m using Pinterest like a real social media though. I don’t follow many other people’s boards, nor do I have many followers myself. What I do find interesting though is seeing what other people have pinned from my blog. It helps me know what others are finding useful, which can hopefully lead me to post more meaningful articles in the future. If you have a blog or other website you maintain, you can see what has been pinned from it by using the following link: http://pinterest.com/source/yourwebsite.com/. It makes for entertaining reading, and I thought I would share some of what I discovered as sort of a 2012 year-end recap. So now I’d like to list the top 5 articles and blog posts from Our Happy Acres, with link to the articles themselves.

1. Cold Frames

Cold Frame construction

I have to say this one was a complete surprise to me. My 2011 article about cold frame construction has been pinned and repinned more than anything else I have blogged about in the past three years. Even though I didn’t intend it to be a step by step tutorial, it does have enough information so that anyone handy with tools can construct their own cold frames. I’m sure it helps that this post wound up on Tipnut, which does bring in a lot of people who are searching for ideas on now to build a cold frame.

I guess it shouldn’t have surprised me though. I have been using cold frames myself since the early 1970’s, ever since I saw James Crockett using them on his PBS TV show Crockett’s Victory Garden. They are a great way to extend the season, and serve as a mini greenhouse for seedlings, cuttings and other plants. I’ve made them a lot of different ways, and used a lot of different materials, but my method I shared in this post is still my favorite. I have four of these cold frames in use myself at present. In 2011 the materials cost about $35, and I think every one I have built has been money well spent.

2. Zucchini Tomato Bake

Zucchini and Tomato bake

This was another surprise to me, even though I know I am always looking for new ideas on what to do with zucchini. This is an easy and tasty way to cook zucchini in summer when you also have access to some fresh and ripe tomatoes. I’m not sure how I came up with the idea for this recipe, but I’m sure glad I did. It is healthy, quick to make, and scalable to fit any baking dish by adding a little more or less of the zucchini and tomatoes. Looking at the photo in the dead of winter, with snow on the ground, I wish I had some squash and tomatoes to make it right now!

3. Freezer Tomato Sauce

Freezer Tomato Sauce

This one didn’t really surprise me. I know I do my best to preserve lots of our homegrown tomatoes in summer, especially in a good year when the counters are often covered in red, ripe goodness. My recipe is for a basic tomato sauce that can be used in a variety of dishes, and I make several batches of it every year for the freezer. My wife is using some today as I write this post, making a batch of Chicken Chipotle Taco and Burrito Filling with some leftover turkey we have. I rarely use store bought canned tomato sauce anymore, as long as I have some of this homemade sauce in the freezer!

4. Whole Wheat Sourdough Pita Bread and Baking Pita Bread

Whole Wheat Pita Bread

I am a big fan of flatbreads in general, and in the last few years pita bread has become my favorite flatbread to make, bake and use in the kitchen. I have posted recipes for both a sourdough version and one that uses yeast for leavening. I most often make them using whole wheat or spelt flour. I need to post my version using spelt, since my technique is a little different for that version. I don’t know how many people are actually making pita with my recipes, but they are sure getting pinned on Pinterest a lot.

5. Hamburger Buns

Moomie’s Famous Burger Buns

This one is no surprise to me either. Since I first posted it back in 2010, this recipe for Moomie’s Famous Burger Buns has been printed off quite often by folks looking to make their own homemade buns. I make them all the time for us, and freeze leftovers for use later on. If you’ve never tried homemade hamburger buns before, this is a good place to start. With 50% whole wheat flour and 100% great flavor, they are sure to become a favorite for anyone who tastes them.

Other Favorites on Pinterest

Fairy Tale eggplant in container

Also getting pinned numerous times were a few other articles, including Growing Eggplant in Containers, Whole Wheat Sourdough Pancakes, Sourdough Apple Cinnamon Coffee Cake and Dehydrating Garlic. Another topic of interest lately has been my various posts on Christmas ornaments. And homemade condiments are popular, with folks pinning mustard and hot sauce recipes.

bead and sequin ornament, circa 1970’s

I hope you have enjoyed this look back at some of the popular articles here at Our Happy Acres. As 2012 draws to a close, I wish all of you a Happy New Year, and hope 2013 brings peace and happiness to each and every one!

Posted in Baking, Food, Gardening, Holidays, Homemade, Recipes | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 7 Comments

An Almost, Sort Of White Christmas

Posted on December 28, 2012 by Dave @ HappyAcres

After two years of almost no snowfall here in our area, a Christmas evening blizzard came through as forecast. We were lucky, and only wound up with 3 to 4 inches of wet, white snow here. But if you go about 10 miles to the west, the snowfall was around 5-8 inches. And if you go 25-50 miles north and west of here some folks got over a foot of snow!

First snow of 2012 (click on any image to enlarge)

Threats of snow generally send people flocking to the stores to stock up on milk and bread. We already had milk on hand, and plenty of grains to grind up for homemade bread. But what sent us scurrying out of the house before the blizzard hit?  Cat food! We were almost out, and didn’t want to risk getting snowed in with two hungry kitties. I doubt they would have been happy with the vegetable soup and bread that we made for ourselves.

cold frames after snow was removed

The snow was mostly a non-event for me and my wife. We were quite happy to be snowed in for a day. Two of my cold frames didn’t make it though. The lightweight row cover material I used for the cover is no match for a heavy, wet snow. And I really didn’t feel like getting out in the middle of the night and clearing the snow as it fell. So when I lifted the lids the next day to clear them, the snow came off and took the Agribon material with it! I’ll have to cover them up again. We have more snow forecast for the next couple of days, so I will see if I can secure the material a little better this time. We will see!

 

 

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Homemade: 2012 Christmas Ornament

Posted on December 25, 2012 by Dave @ HappyAcres

Just in time for Christmas, I finished making my new ornament. As is our custom, I waited until Christmas morning to hang it on the tree. I wound up not using paint and stencils after all, because I didn’t like the way they looked when I did some testing with them. I used some stick on lettering instead, which gave me exactly the look that I wanted.

To start with, I had some lovely little dried Thai bird peppers that I thought would look great inside the clear ornament. They gave me some red and green colors to work with, and I settled on gold glitter letters and ribbons to complete the decorating. I went for a simple look, which matches a conscious effort my wife and I have made this year to simplify our holiday traditions and eliminate some of the stress that too often goes with the holidays. I also didn’t want to do anything that would cover up the peppers too much.

Thai bird peppers (click on any image to enlarge)

If there’s one thing I have learned from years of making different handmade items, it’s that things don’t always go the way you first envision them. I had an idea I could fill a glass ornament with something from the garden, then embellish and decorate the ornament. That was a good starting point. But first I discovered that my ornament was made of plastic, and not glass! Then I decided that I didn’t like the way the stenciled and painted letters looked on the ornament, so I wiped the paint off before it dried. But that didn’t slow me down too much, because I knew stick on letters were another option. After a quick trip to the craft store I had exactly what I wanted, and it was time to start creating.

finished 2012 Christmas ornament

I’m pleased with how this year’s ornament turned out. I chose to feature two themes that are close to my heart this Christmas season: Peace, and Joy. I made the ornament so there is no front or back side, keeping both sides very similar in design.

other side of ornament

The little peppers came from a plant I grew out from seeds given to me by a local cooking class instructor, Aumpai Holt. My wife and I took her Thai Green Curry class last year, and Aumpai  grows this pepper every year for use in her home cooking. My one container grown plant gave me loads of little hot peppers, more than I could possibly use up in a year, given how hot they are. I like the idea that I was able to turn some of her favorite peppers into a keepsake Christmas ornament for us. I think it looks great hanging on our little tree too!

2012 ornament on tree

My wife also joined in the fun and made an ornament this year. She made a lovely angel using some material from a shirt she bought at a resale shop. She had bought the shirt awhile back specifically for crafts, and was happy to finally put it to use. She cut out an angel, then used some backing material in the middle to firm it up, and some flannel over that to finish the back. Then she made a matching Christmas card for me. You can read about what she did here. She did a great job, and it can now join our collection of angel ornaments and other angel decorations. I just love the casual look of it!

Lynda’s 2012 angel ornament

For breakfast Christmas morning I made us some Chocolate Chocolate Chip Sourdough Waffles, using a recipe I adapted from the King Arthur Whole Grain Baking book. I’ll have to share the recipe here sometime. The waffles would be great for special breakfast occasions or as dessert waffles. I gave them a light dusting of powdered sugar and topped them with sliced bananas. They were good without any butter or syrup, and with 100% whole wheat flour, we could feel a little less guilty about eating all that chocolate goodness!

Chocolate Chocolate Chip Sourdough Waffles

Wishing all of you Peace, Joy, and a happy holiday season. This blog is a labor of love for me, and I am happy you all choose to take the time to stop by and read it. And I thank all of you for your kind words and comments. You make it all worthwhile.

Posted in Crafts, Holidays, Traditions | Tagged , , , , , | 4 Comments

Homemade: A Tradition of Christmas Ornaments

Posted on December 22, 2012 by Dave @ HappyAcres

Regular readers may remember that making Christmas ornaments is a tradition here at Happy Acres. I’ve been making them since I was a teenager, and it actually was sort of a family tradition back then with my mother and several aunts joining in the fun too. I still have most of the ornaments I made back then, at least the ones I didn’t give away. I continued the tradition in my adult life, making ornaments occasionally, typically wooden ones. All of that means I have a lot of old homemade ornaments, and some of them usually find their way unto a tree each Christmas, like the one in the below photo that I painted back in 1990.

Christmas ornament from 1990 (click on any image to enlarge)

After I met my wife in 2005, I got into the tradition of making a new ornament every year. That first ornament was fashioned from a papier mache birdhouse I painted and sprinkled with glitter. It has a roof made of pine cone scales from a cone we found while out walking together. That ornament almost never came to be though, since we had parted ways in October that year. We got back together just in time to put up our first Christmas tree together, and I got the ornament made just in time for Christmas day. It has been on one of our trees ever since then. It is safe to say it has a lot of sentimental value to both of us.

Birdhouse from 2005

This year we decided not to put up a big tree, since we have young cat Ace in the house who is fascinated with anything that even remotely resembles a toy. One of his favorite pastimes lately is knocking over the wastebasket in my wife’s office and dragging out the contents all over the house. So we decided that a big tree with ornaments hanging on it might be too much of a temptation for him. We put up a small tree on the mantle above our gas fireplace in the hopes that it was up high enough to be less tempting. And so far he has behaved and stayed away from it.

Do I look like I would bother the tree?

With a smaller tree, it meant we had less room to display some of our favorite ornaments. We picked some of our favorites, and those with special meaning to us. And of course we had to leave room for a new ornament or two.

Christmas tree on fireplace mantle

As a gardener, I like to work in natural materials for my ornaments whenever I can. This year I am working with a glass ornament. That means I will need some special supplies, like paint made specifically for use on glass. I am going to borrow some of my wife’s Martha Stewart paint and stencils that Plaid sent her to demo. She did a great tutorial on using them back in November that I can reference. Now, I can just hear what some of you are thinking: “Dave is going Martha Stewart on us???”. Rest assured, that is probably the only time you will ever see my name and Martha’s in the same sentence!

supplies for 2012 ornament

My custom is to unveil the new ornament(s) on Christmas morning. Which means I have three days to get something made. I guess I better get going on this project then! I’ll be back next week with the finished ornament. Until then, Happy Growing to all of you gardeners out there, and wishing all of you a Happy Holiday season.

Posted in Crafts, Holidays, Traditions | Tagged , , , , , | 5 Comments

National Moment of Silence

Posted on December 21, 2012 by Dave @ HappyAcres


Moment of Silence for Sandy Hook Victims on Dec. 21

Please join all of us at Happy Acres today in a national moment of silence in honor of the Sandy Hook victims called for by Connecticut Governor Dannel Malloy. At 9:30 a.m. EST, spend several minutes reflecting quietly on this terrible tragedy and take a five minute pause from all online activity.

In the coming weeks and months, we must come together around common-sense solutions that will prevent the gun violence that has become all too frequent in communities across the country. 2013 is the year to take meaningful action; observing this moment of silence on Friday, we can signal our resolve to stop senseless deaths like these from happening again. Visit the White House We The People website and sign a petition to make your voices heard.

To learn more about today’s event go to http://www.causes.com/momentforsandyhook

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