Doings

Black Raspberry-Gooseberry Jelly

Traded two jars of finished jelly for the gooseberries. They're such a pretty shape. They remind me of slightly fantastical hot air balloons.

Berries ready for cooking. I picked the black raspberries myself.

Battle scars.

Frog at Battelle-Darby Creek Metro Park.

In April, I went to the annual Salvation Army fabric sale. I finally got all the cottons cleaned, pressed, and sorted (and put away!). A few of these fabrics were picked up elsewhere, but most of them came from the SA fabric sale and cost a total of $4. Yay, thrifty! Probably not fabrics to make art quilts out of, but definitely good enough for experimenting and learning to machine quilt.

Handspun Yarn

Here is my first yarn spun on a spinning wheel. It's a little odd and lumpy in places, but that's ok. Next time, I'm going to try to spin more intentionally and pay more attention to what I want the final product to look like. #1 on the list is spinning a bulkier yarn, since I would rather knit with something thicker. #2 is trying to get the twist more balanced.

Water Down the Drain

We lose a lot of water down the drain. When I go to take a shower, I usually let the water run until it gets hot. So I lose about a 1/2 gallon of water on every shower. Since there are two of us in the house, that amounts to about 365 gallons per year (assuming one shower each, every day). We aren't living under drought conditions, but that's no reason to waste all that water, and besides it costs money. We're charged about 50 cents per cubic foot of water (1 cubic foot = ~7.5 gallons), which works out to about $50/year. In the grand scheme of things, that's not a lot of money, but again, there's no reason to put that much money down the drain (hehe).

I was inspired by a post on Radiant Things about how she saves water. Now, when we run the water to get the shower to warm up, we catch the water in an old detergent bottle and use it to water our garden. Maybe it only saves us a little money, maybe it won't save the planet, but really, there's no reason not to.

Strawberry Season

I went strawberry picking yesterday with one of my friends and my boyfriend. We went in the afternoon, so it was hard work (a case of the early birds getting the worms), but we still had quite a good haul.

Yesterday, we canned strawberry jam (left) and strawberry-rhubarb butter (right). The strawberry-rhubarb butter recipe comes from Food in Jars, a nifty canning blog. I think I like it much better than regular strawberry jam: more flavor, less sweetness.



I'm also making strawberry-balsamic ice cream today. The balsamic vinegar is a souvenir from our trip to Italy in January. It's three-medal grade and amazingly good. Makes me wonder what five-medal balsamic is like.

Pesto!

The first basil harvest of the season.

This year I decided to have lots of a few things in my garden, and so far it's working. Last year, we had a small handful of tomatoes. This year we already have enough basil to make pesto. mmmm, tasty.

Jam Muffins

Things in my life that are true:

1. I'm not a milk and cereal person, but I like my breakfast.

2. Mostly my boyfriend eats breakfast only if I make it for him.

3. We canned way, way too much jam.

It just so happens that our plan to give away jam as gifts, did not actually result in net less jam, because people kept giving us their jam in return. Hence, an overabundance of jam.

So, every week, I try to come up with something that will address all three problems. Eventually, I settled on baking bread for toast. I found a wonderful recipe over at Orangette, but bread requires planning, and somehow, we've gotten all the way to Tuesday with no time for bread until next weekend.

But I'm hungry when I wake up in the morning.

I've taken to reading Joy of Cooking on the couch when I get home, and while I don't have the ingredients to make fancy muffins, I do have jam. I took the regular muffin recipe from Joy of Cooking and filled the muffin cups half full, spooned some jam in, and put more muffin batter on top. They baked up really pretty.

Service

I've been thinking a lot about Service lately. When I was in New Zealand, I met a girl who was recently discharged from the Israeli army. Military service is required for all people in Israel. 3 years for men and 2 for women. Mandatory state service requirements are not uncommon in other countries, but we don't have one in the United States.

Military service is not for me, but I have great admiration for people who have chosen to give their lives in Service. This includes the living and the dead, members of the armed forces (although I may disagree with the means, these people have offered their lives and for that they command my admiration), members of the clergy, and others. I'm a great believer in Service. Imagine the good that could be done in the world if every person gave one year of their lives to improve the world.

While I've been mulling over these thoughts, one thing became shockingly clear: I haven't given my year.

There were a number of options for me right when I finished college. I could have joined the Peace Corps or AmeriCorps or Teach for America or gone to work for a nonprofit. I could have done these things, but I didn't. I went to grad school instead.

The way I see it, I owe the world one year of my life.

So how much is a year? Let's say that one year is 40 hours a week for 50 weeks (somehow, this seems stingy to me, but for the sake of having a number, let's go with). That's 2,000 hours. Well, I'd better get started then.

About a month ago, I put in a request to volunteer at the Homework Help Center at the Library. I did my first 3 hour shift on Monday. It was great to work with the students, and I think it will be a very rewarding experience. I'm looking forward to making Service a regular feature in my life, and little by little I'll accumulate my year.