Spring has arrived, so have the Dandelions. To many this little yellow/orange flower represents nothing but trouble in the lawn. A weed that has to be plucked and destroyed before it takes over and changes the entire landscape look.
I first enjoyed this little weed ( actually it is an herb ) as a young child. I was lucky to have a grandmother that knew all about wild plants and spent time teaching and introducing us to the many benefits of same.
All parts of the dandelion are edible and have medicinal and culinary uses.
I'll focus on the culinary here.
Dandelion roots can be harvested during any frost free period and enjoyed steamed, roasted, or eaten raw.
They can also be roasted and ground into a coffee substitute. ( my mother did this during WWII, when coffee was on the list of rationed goods.)
The flowers are best known for making wine. They can also be tossed into a salad along with the leaves. The leaves are rich in potassium, antioxidants, and vitamins A and C.
If you wish to grow your own selection and not have them cropping up all over your lawn, this is easy to do.
" Clio " is an Indian variety that produces high yields of upright greens that are easy to harvest.
You can order the seed from: http://www.johnnyseeds.com
Dandelions are self seeding and will always come back , year after year.
Wilted dandelion greens , red onion , thinly sliced avocado , and sweet purple grapes make a marvelous salad.
Enjoy and go wild for a day!
Bea Kunz
http://www.sagehillfarmsandvintagestore.com
Saturday, March 29, 2008
Friday, March 14, 2008
St. Patrick-Man or Myth
Saint Patrick was a missionary credited with converting the Irish to Christianity
in the A.D. 400s.
His real name was Maewyn Succat.
As with many holidays the celebration has become vastly different from it's early beginnings.
Have fun, think "green" and "peace."
To a Mighty March holiday!
EatWell-BeWell~
Bea Kunz
http://www.sagehillfarmsandvintagestore.com
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
March Madness-In The Gardens-at Sage Hill Farms
March is that month that gives and then takes away.
I'm speaking of the weather of course. It gives beautiful sunny days and tempts us to go digging in the gardens only to welcome us overnight to the coldest day of the year.
What's a gardener to do to keep from going mad....well, just put the brakes on and go with the flow. On those warm and sunny days, walk through your gardens and get aquainted with every little nook and cranny. Dig a few inches into the soil and meet the little guys that keep your soil rich and workable. ( earthworms) without these your soil will be hard and compacted.
Look for places that are inviting to toads and lizards, what? You don't have any!
Toads and lizzies are a must in the garden, they eat all manner of not so welcomed guest. You can make little homes for them by building a stack of rocks or broken bricks around a large flower pot-drain saucer. Keep the saucer filled with water and the toads and lizzies will thank you by working hard to rid your garden of unwanted pest.
Most every garden has a resident snake, you may not see it often, but know that it is there. Depending on where you live, make a point of knowing the kinds of snakes you can expect to see. There are good ones and bad ones...knowing the difference can be very important to your health and the health of the snake. My hubby thinks the only good snake is a dead snake. While I don't subscribe to that thinking, I also don't go out of my way to make friends with any snake.
What stage is your compost pile at this month?
You should have a bin full that has been working during the winter and ready for spring planting. Composting is the most valuable asset to your soil, right up there with the earthworms, in fact the worms turn your soil into natural compost.
Now, for those days that are dark, rainy and cold.
Curl up in your favorite spot with a good garden book and a cup of warm and nourshing tea from Sage Hill Farms. http://www.sagehillfarmsandvintagestore.com
Many flavors to pick from and if you want your own blend, just let me and I'll see what I can do.
Make March a Mighty month in your garden!
Bea Kunz
EatWell-BeWell~
I'm speaking of the weather of course. It gives beautiful sunny days and tempts us to go digging in the gardens only to welcome us overnight to the coldest day of the year.
What's a gardener to do to keep from going mad....well, just put the brakes on and go with the flow. On those warm and sunny days, walk through your gardens and get aquainted with every little nook and cranny. Dig a few inches into the soil and meet the little guys that keep your soil rich and workable. ( earthworms) without these your soil will be hard and compacted.
Look for places that are inviting to toads and lizards, what? You don't have any!
Toads and lizzies are a must in the garden, they eat all manner of not so welcomed guest. You can make little homes for them by building a stack of rocks or broken bricks around a large flower pot-drain saucer. Keep the saucer filled with water and the toads and lizzies will thank you by working hard to rid your garden of unwanted pest.
Most every garden has a resident snake, you may not see it often, but know that it is there. Depending on where you live, make a point of knowing the kinds of snakes you can expect to see. There are good ones and bad ones...knowing the difference can be very important to your health and the health of the snake. My hubby thinks the only good snake is a dead snake. While I don't subscribe to that thinking, I also don't go out of my way to make friends with any snake.
What stage is your compost pile at this month?
You should have a bin full that has been working during the winter and ready for spring planting. Composting is the most valuable asset to your soil, right up there with the earthworms, in fact the worms turn your soil into natural compost.
Now, for those days that are dark, rainy and cold.
Curl up in your favorite spot with a good garden book and a cup of warm and nourshing tea from Sage Hill Farms. http://www.sagehillfarmsandvintagestore.com
Many flavors to pick from and if you want your own blend, just let me and I'll see what I can do.
Make March a Mighty month in your garden!
Bea Kunz
EatWell-BeWell~
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
Seek And Be Inspired~
March is almost with us, and not too soon for my wishes.
I'm always ready and waiting for the earth to warm, the rain and snow to gradually give way to sunny days, in short..gardening weather.
While dreaming of all the changes and additions I have planned for my gardens this spring I was also touring garden sites all around the world.
Australia, Belgium, England, France and Japan have awesome gardens.
But...one thing I see regardless where I'm visiting, for the most part, gardens all seem to have many of the same attractions.
Then I came across this website, link below.
I was so inspired, I discarded what I had planned to write about and felt the desire to share this with you all.
This is what I call a very successful garden project.
Pacific Garden Mission~ Enjoy and let me know what you think.
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/religionandethics/week1030/cover.html
Welcome to the upcoming Spring~
Bea Kunz
http://www.sagehillfarmsandvintagestore.com
I'm always ready and waiting for the earth to warm, the rain and snow to gradually give way to sunny days, in short..gardening weather.
While dreaming of all the changes and additions I have planned for my gardens this spring I was also touring garden sites all around the world.
Australia, Belgium, England, France and Japan have awesome gardens.
But...one thing I see regardless where I'm visiting, for the most part, gardens all seem to have many of the same attractions.
Then I came across this website, link below.
I was so inspired, I discarded what I had planned to write about and felt the desire to share this with you all.
This is what I call a very successful garden project.
Pacific Garden Mission~ Enjoy and let me know what you think.
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/religionandethics/week1030/cover.html
Welcome to the upcoming Spring~
Bea Kunz
http://www.sagehillfarmsandvintagestore.com
Sunday, February 17, 2008
President's Day? Washington's Birthday? Both and More.
1796 -- The country first celebrated the birthday of George Washington during the last full year he was president.
1866 -- One year after Abraham Lincoln was assassinated, both houses of Congress gathered for a memorial address on his birthday, February 12. Although Lincoln's birthday became a holiday in many states, it never became an official federal holiday.
1885-- President Chester Arthur made Washington's birthday a federal holiday.
1968 -- Congress passed legislation moving the observance of George Washington's birthday from February 22 to the third Monday in February.
1971-- The legislation passed in 1968 took effect in 1971. Some people think that the legislation combined the birthdays of Abraham Lincoln and George Washington to create Presidents' Day. Congress never combined Lincoln's and Washington's birthdays. The holiday is still officially called Washington's Birthday.
Confused yet?
Don't sweat the small stuff, just be thankful if you are among the many who can stay home and not have call it a sick day.
Happy Birthday to all of our past presidents.
Bea Kunz
http://www.sagehillfarmsandvintagestore.com
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
Valentines Day-From Heart To Heart .
As with most holidays there are many stories passed down through history.
Some are so undocumented that we just have to pick the one we like best.
February has been the month to celebrate love since the Middle Ages.
I kinda like this version of Valentines Day~
The Man Valentine
A day celebrated with gifts, yummy chocolates, lovely cards, and sparkling diamond rings? What is the real story behind such a highly celebrated day?
Some say the day is named after a bishop named Valentine, who was stationed in the Roman Empire. Claudius II was the Emperor at that time. He thought that unmarried men made better soldiers, so he decided to make it a law that young men could not marry. Around 270 A.D., Valentine took pity on the ostracized soldiers who were not permitted to marry or see their sweethearts.
He became an advocate of these young lovers and began to perform secret marriages. He was soon found out and jailed. Emperor Claudius II attempted to convert Valentine to begin worshipping the Roman gods, but Valentine refused. Instead, he tried to convert Claudius to Christianity and Valentine sentenced to be executed on February 24, 270.
Another version of the history of Valentines Day tells that Valentine fell in love with his jailer’s daughter. Just before his death, he sent her a note and signed it “from your Valentine.” An aura of romance surrounded his demise and those who knew about it spread the tale. Bishop Valentine became Saint Valentine with his fame extending to England and France.
After his death, Valentine then became what is known as a “Patron Saint.” Some considered him the spiritual overseer of an annual festival in which young Romans would distribute cards of affection to those they wished to formally see. This festival was held each February 14. There are Valentine cards in museums worldwide that date back to 1415.
If you have a great love in your life~celebrate it!
If you don't, celebrate yourself !
Happy Valentines Day !
Bea Kunz
http://www.sagehillfarmsandvintagestore.com
A Good Man-A Great President .
This should have posted yesterday, for some reason it did not.
Abraham Lincoln warned the South in his Inaugural Address: "In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow countrymen, and not in mine, is the momentous issue of civil war. The government will not assail you.... You have no oath registered in Heaven to destroy the government, while I shall have the most solemn one to preserve, protect and defend it."
Lincoln thought secession illegal, and was willing to use force to defend Federal law and the Union. When Confederate batteries fired on Fort Sumter and forced its surrender, he called on the states for 75,000 volunteers. Four more slave states joined the Confederacy but four remained within the Union. The Civil War had begun.
The son of a Kentucky frontiersman, Lincoln had to struggle for a living and for learning. Five months before receiving his party's nomination for President, he sketched his life:
~~
"I was born Feb. 12, 1809, in Hardin County, Kentucky. My parents were both born in Virginia, of undistinguished families--second families, perhaps I should say. My mother, who died in my tenth year, was of a family of the name of Hanks.... My father ... removed from Kentucky to ... Indiana, in my eighth year.... It was a wild region, with many bears and other wild animals still in the woods. There I grew up.... Of course when I came of age I did not know much. Still somehow, I could read, write, and cipher ... but that was all."
~
Lincoln made extraordinary efforts to attain knowledge while working on a farm, splitting rails for fences, and keeping store at New Salem, Illinois. He was a captain in the Black Hawk War, spent eight years in the Illinois legislature, and rode the circuit of courts for many years. His law partner said of him, "His ambition was a little engine that knew no rest."
He married Mary Todd, and they had four boys, only one of whom lived to maturity. In 1858 Lincoln ran against Stephen A. Douglas for Senator. He lost the election, but in debating with Douglas he gained a national reputation that won him the Republican nomination for President in 1860.
As President, he built the Republican Party into a strong national organization. Further, he rallied most of the northern Democrats to the Union cause. On January 1, 1863, he issued the Emancipation Proclamation that declared forever free those slaves within the Confederacy.
Lincoln never let the world forget that the Civil War involved an even larger issue. This he stated most movingly in dedicating the military cemetery at Gettysburg: "that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain--that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom--and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth."
Lincoln won re-election in 1864, as Union military triumphs heralded an end to the war. In his planning for peace, the President was flexible and generous, encouraging Southerners to lay down their arms and join speedily in reunion.
The spirit that guided him was clearly that of his Second Inaugural Address, now inscribed on one wall of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D. C.: "With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds.... "
On Good Friday, April 14, 1865, Lincoln was assassinated at Ford's Theatre in Washington by John Wilkes Booth, an actor, who somehow thought he was helping the South. The opposite was the result, for with Lincoln's death, the possibility of peace with magnanimity died.
Lincoln was born in Hodgenville. Hardin Co. Kentucky
Lincoln was our 16th president
From 1861-1865
Lincoln died April 15-1865 in the AM after being shot at Fords Theatere in Washington DC by John Wilks Booth, an actor.
Bea Kunz
http://www.sagehillfarmsandvintagestore.com
*Article is in part information taken from A government site about our presidents.*
Abraham Lincoln warned the South in his Inaugural Address: "In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow countrymen, and not in mine, is the momentous issue of civil war. The government will not assail you.... You have no oath registered in Heaven to destroy the government, while I shall have the most solemn one to preserve, protect and defend it."
Lincoln thought secession illegal, and was willing to use force to defend Federal law and the Union. When Confederate batteries fired on Fort Sumter and forced its surrender, he called on the states for 75,000 volunteers. Four more slave states joined the Confederacy but four remained within the Union. The Civil War had begun.
The son of a Kentucky frontiersman, Lincoln had to struggle for a living and for learning. Five months before receiving his party's nomination for President, he sketched his life:
~~
"I was born Feb. 12, 1809, in Hardin County, Kentucky. My parents were both born in Virginia, of undistinguished families--second families, perhaps I should say. My mother, who died in my tenth year, was of a family of the name of Hanks.... My father ... removed from Kentucky to ... Indiana, in my eighth year.... It was a wild region, with many bears and other wild animals still in the woods. There I grew up.... Of course when I came of age I did not know much. Still somehow, I could read, write, and cipher ... but that was all."
~
Lincoln made extraordinary efforts to attain knowledge while working on a farm, splitting rails for fences, and keeping store at New Salem, Illinois. He was a captain in the Black Hawk War, spent eight years in the Illinois legislature, and rode the circuit of courts for many years. His law partner said of him, "His ambition was a little engine that knew no rest."
He married Mary Todd, and they had four boys, only one of whom lived to maturity. In 1858 Lincoln ran against Stephen A. Douglas for Senator. He lost the election, but in debating with Douglas he gained a national reputation that won him the Republican nomination for President in 1860.
As President, he built the Republican Party into a strong national organization. Further, he rallied most of the northern Democrats to the Union cause. On January 1, 1863, he issued the Emancipation Proclamation that declared forever free those slaves within the Confederacy.
Lincoln never let the world forget that the Civil War involved an even larger issue. This he stated most movingly in dedicating the military cemetery at Gettysburg: "that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain--that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom--and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth."
Lincoln won re-election in 1864, as Union military triumphs heralded an end to the war. In his planning for peace, the President was flexible and generous, encouraging Southerners to lay down their arms and join speedily in reunion.
The spirit that guided him was clearly that of his Second Inaugural Address, now inscribed on one wall of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D. C.: "With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds.... "
On Good Friday, April 14, 1865, Lincoln was assassinated at Ford's Theatre in Washington by John Wilkes Booth, an actor, who somehow thought he was helping the South. The opposite was the result, for with Lincoln's death, the possibility of peace with magnanimity died.
Lincoln was born in Hodgenville. Hardin Co. Kentucky
Lincoln was our 16th president
From 1861-1865
Lincoln died April 15-1865 in the AM after being shot at Fords Theatere in Washington DC by John Wilks Booth, an actor.
Bea Kunz
http://www.sagehillfarmsandvintagestore.com
*Article is in part information taken from A government site about our presidents.*
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