Garden Bounty

Wow we are getting so much out of garden this year, it is CRAZY! I picked two rows of green beans on Wednesday and ended up canning  46 pints. I still have two rows yet to pick and feel confident that we will have a years supply of green beans, this is good.  The onions are doing well, the kale is going crazy, I made chicken kale soup today, it is very nice and a good way to use up quite a lot of kale :) I planted swiss chard for the first time ever this year, I had never eaten it before, what a delightful green it is.  We have enjoyed chard in a cheese sauce, this has become a family favorite, but it is also very nice sauteed in a little olive oil along with garlic and onion, tonight I am going to make a chard salad.  Another new to me vegetable I have grown this year is kohlrabi, it looks a little like a pale green sputnik, and although very alien looking it is an extremely pleasant vegetable to snack on, I have enjoyed it raw, and sauteed.
Today I picked a lot of broccoli, I will try to eat most of it while it is fresh as I am not a huge fan of frozen broccoli.  I also picked a lot of cucumbers today and I plan to make pickle relish this evening. Our corn has tasselled and is about six and a half feet tall now.  I have beets that I need to check on and the tomatoes are coming along nicely,  We have peppers galore coming along, and cantaloupe, watermelon, pumpkins and cabbage. When all is said and done we will have a good supply of food put away to take us through to next summer, not to mention all of the fresh vegetables we are enjoying almost daily.

Paint Panelling??? Yes YOU CAN!

A week ago I decided to bite the bullet and paint the panelling in our family room. Something I have been thinking about doing since we moved into our home fourteen years ago. Well I don't really know what got into me a week ago Sunday, but I suddenly decided that the panelling would be painted. I did a quick Google search, (what did we do before Google???) to see what I needed to do, and I was so amazingly impressed at the transformation of the room pictured in the "how to paint panelling" piece I read online that I was sold on the idea and immediately headed off to Menards. I was not sure what my final wall color would be but figured I could still apply the oil based primer, which I did, and the transformation was amazing, I knew I had made the right decision.  I decided to put blue on two walls, the same color I used in the kitchen, and then did the other walls in an off white called, Down Comforter. I painted the window and door trim in semi-gloss white. I am so in love with my new room, the change from dingy, gloomy, darkness to crisp, clean and bright is fabulous.  Why did I wait fourteen years to do this???

The book shelves, I left the wood alone and feel that it contrasts nicely with the light blue. I purchased the rocking chair this past spring for $50 from Ben's girlfriend's parents, they were having a moving sale. The rocking chair was Autumns, dad's, great grandmothers and they believe it was made in the 1880's. The chair is sturdy, rocks wonderfully, and is beautifully carved. 

I can now see my mantle clock, it no longer blends into the panelling!

The sofa looks so much nicer against a light, bright wall  and the crucifix is no longer camouflaged  by the panelling.

The room ties in nicely with the kitchen, I am glad that I kept the paint cards after painting the rest of the downstairs rooms a year and half ago, it made it easy to get the correct color mixed.

I just love the white window frames, the valance looks so much perkier with the blue walls. And, can you believe how amazingly green everything is outside, this is what happens when Indiana is blessed with daily rain showers in summer time :)

This picture, from Christmas time, shows the room in its's former state, as you can see it was rather dark and dingy.