Those CRAZY Kniskerns are at it again!

And early Christmas presents. . .



James and I have spent the last several days collecting, mulching, and spreading leaves. We usually confine ourselves to gathering leaves from around the neighborhood, but chose to go farther afield this week. Last Tuesday the county yard waste collectors came around -a day early!-and collected all the bagged leaves we were planning to bring home that afternoon after our walk. That left us feeling short of leaves to enrich our soil. Sunday afternoon we were visiting a friend and saw TEN! large bags of beautiful oak leaves, just waiting to go home with us to feed our garden worms. Then the twins' middle school had another 19 or so bags piled up and waiting for a good home. (We had lots of fun teasing the kids about making sure we got taped by the security cameras!)

James got those mulched down just in time to work on the huge pile of leaves our neighbor's yard man hauled to fill our driveway. Add a few more trashcans of leaves from another neighbor, and we pretty much have six inches of shredded leaves covering everywhere we intend to have food beds next year, as well as a supply to mix in to our compost pile, and a few more to use to mulch the potatoes we'll be growing next year.

James has also been generous with my early Christmas presents this year! He was looking for a project last weekend (the first quiet weekend at home in seems like ages!), and ran out to Home Depot for supplies. By Saturday evening, I was able to admire my four-tier grow light shelves. Unfortunately, I can't really start on the seedlings yet, since I don't want them getting rootbound waiting for the weather to warm.

Looks like I'm going to try starting artichokes inside this year. Don't know if we'll be able to keep them as perennials (very tender), but I found a couple of references that suggest growing them inside for six weeks or so, then setting them out in a cold frame to trick them into thinking they've had a winter, and then planting them out to grow for what they think is their second season-so they'll set fruit. Even so, I am going to try the mulching technique to try to save them for the following year also.

The big, and unplanned, present was a semi-spontaneous purchase. Saturday was the annual Quaker Market at Meeting, which meant that the Meetinghouse was full of "leftovers" on First Day, including the beautiful array of jewelry, scarves, and rugs Fahima Vorgetts brings each year. Fahima is an Afghani woman, married to an American, who imports such handmade gifts, sells them, and then-through the auspices of Women for Afghan Women-uses the funds to build wells, set up cottage industries, and build schools for girls in Afghanistan. James and I were both drawn to the same beautiful rug, and it happened to be half off, so James decided this would be our major purchase for the holidays. One of the blessings of living a simple life is being able to make such purchases without wondering how we are going to pay for it. (We've postponed the purchase of such a rug for at least two or three past markets- and I'm glad we did! This is the most beautiful of all the rugs we've considered!)