Ahhh...The Beauty of Winder, GA

You know you live in Winder, GA when a soldier is welcomed home by red, white and blue Solo cups pushed through a chain link fence in the pattern of the American flag.

You know....when the sun hits it just right...it's rather beautiful, indeed.

This isn't the flag/fence I'm talking about, but it gives you the idea.

Welcome home, my friend.

What? It's November!?

I have no idea when the days started churning by, but I'm completely caught off guard by it being November already. I know it's frosted each night for the last week, but I still haven't gone out there and done my final clean up. I've neglected that garden far too long.

Last week I did manage to get out there and plant my garlic. I wonder if I can find some onions at the stores yet. I may just have to give that a try tomorrow.

Tonight, I decided it was bean soup night. It's not often we have bean soup, maybe only twice a year, but it's ggod when we do have it. Sometimes it's more like mortar and sometimes it's more soupy as it was tonight. I think it's the inconsistancy of it that keeps me from making it more often. I did manage to throw in a handfull of the dried tomatoes from this summer which is why I snapped this picture. You could completely tell when you bit into a canned tomato and when you got a dried one that had been reconsituted. They were still so flavorful! I can't wait to make more next summer.
Last night was senior night for our football players. I sponsored a player this year which meant I got him snacks and goodies for his games and wore his jersey to school on game days. I wish I had a snapshot of me in the uniform. It was rather insane. I suppose I could count myself lucky as some poor teachers couldn't fit in their player's jerseys, but I, on the other hand, wollowed in mine. My player is an offensive lineman and although he's not a big kid by any means, he's tall and broad. The jersey reached mid knee on me and was too long to bunch up and tie back. The joke was always that I could throw on some stockings and a belt and STILL meet dress code. ;)

Anyway, we had to walk our players onto the field last night and I had the kids with me. I did the best I could and broke out the masking tape and let them cheer him on as well.

They had fun on the sidelines cheering while we did our business. We got to stay for a little less than a quarter. The girl had a meltdown and it was best to remove her from the situation.

Tomorrow, I'm doing another 5K charity run with Keychains for a Cause. Christmas orders have been starting to come in already which is nice. I just cut the school a $400 check for Relay for Life in September and I'm ready to cut them another $350 check already. It makes me happy. Here's an order that went out today. The music ribbon was custom ordered for the woman. I like it!

The morning comes early - actually, it should come later, but the kids surely won't understand. Sweet gardening dreams.

Happy Halloween!!

Cats and Mice

This weekend, the boy and the man had their first Boy Scout campout ever. I was nervous for them. It rained Friday night and they had frost warnings both Friday and Saturday night, but when they called last night, it seemed everything was going well. The boy couldn't stop playing to talk and the man seemed like he had teamed up with some of the other dads and caught the Georgia/Florida game on the radio. GO Dawgs!

I asked the girl what she wanted to do when the boys were gone:
G: You could paint my nails.
R: Yes, I could do that.
G: Then we could vacuum.
R: I suppose we could.
G: OOH! Can we do laundry?!

That's when I decided an intervention was necessary. Instead of domesticated chores (which we completed when we got home regardlessly) we picked up her grandmother and went to the Center for Puppetry Arts in Atlanta. They have a whole Jim Henson museum with an entire Big Bird, Ernie and several other puppets. My favorite was Dr. Teeth, oh yes it was. We went to see a production of "Silly Hollow." It was cute, but I think she got rather bored in parts. They wouldn't allow pictures there at all, so all of our pictures came later when we met her grandfather for lunch at a local 50's style diner.

She loved the juke boxes at each booth.


Here's her best Popeye imitation.
No lunch is complete without trying on Grandma's earings.
We got home and found the man had sent a picture of the boy camping. It looks cold, but he also looks like he was having a great time.
Such it is. We're on our last hour or so of manlessness as the boys will be home soon. Guess I better finish that housework I ignored yesterday.

The morning comes early. Stay warm, my friends.

Nothing Like a Good Rivalry!

Everyone loves a good football rivalry. Within a county of 18 high schools, not including alternative high schools, rivalries are plentiful and not so hard to come by. Some, however, reign above all others.


Such it is with this Friday's game between the Grayson Rams and Brookwood Broncos. These two teams have taken spirit and rivalry to another level with amazing results.


Both schools have taken to YouTube to showcase their school's prowess in video and song. Grayson issued the challenge with their video "Brookwood, Where You At?" and Grayson answered this week with "Grayson, Step Your Game Up." Both teams' songs are now available on iTunes and they're giving the proceeds to the American Cancer Society's Relay for Life.

The kids at my school are so impressed by these songs, and honestly, so am I. I'm most likely going to jump on the interest and have the kids break down the songs to study them for alliteration, assonance, consonance, allusions, similies, metaphors, etc, for whether they know it or not, rap is a literary form that we've yet to fully recognize the power of.

Check out their videos - I promise you you won't be dissappointed.

Grayson's film: "Brookwood, Where You At?"


Brookwood's resonse: "Grayson, Step Your Game Up."

Sir Gawain and the Green....Tomato?

We knew it would likely happen. Yesterday while I was in the Foods lab preparing to teach for the day, an administrator brought in a ton of green tomatoes. You know, I thought...I have a lot of green tomatoes sitting out there as well.

The day went on and the foods teacher talked about doing a demo on fried green tomatoes. Yummy! Then, she said, I wonder if we could can them.

Why, yes. Yes we can.

I started the process today during my planning period, but it became obvious rather quickly that I wasn't going to get done in time for my last class. It just so happened, that my last class was during her planning period. I relocated my class to her room and we finished up Sir Gawain and the Green Knight while canning the green tomatoes. It made for a nice change of scenery.

Here are two of the tomato jars - I can't wait to try them to see if they're as good as the ones I had this summer. I also snapped a shot of one of the roasted garlic jelly jars from yesterday.
I've come to the conclusion that powdered pectin doesn't work worth a .....you can fill in the blank. I've never had a problem with anything using liquid pectin, but recipies that call for powder usually stay runny. Can I just substitute the two bags of gel for the one box of powder each time or do I have to stick with the variety the recipe calls for?

The morning comes early. Sweet canning dreams.

Changing Hats

I'm so lucky that once a year the foods teacher at our school allows me to come in and teach the kids about home canning. I just love it. The foods teacher was kind enough to be the best sous chef there could possibly ever be and she had absolutely everything chopped, measured and ready to go the class before we needed it.
You can see on the counter I also brought a sweet potato, peppers and the dried (desicated - vocab word for this week) tomatoes and basil. Poor woman took several pictures throughout the day, but even said herself that she couldn't get one of me without my mouth running.

I always bring things for the kids to try. Usually, each class gets to try two different things from jams and jellies to pickles. They're always very appreciative and are surprised at how flavorful things are. One kid said he was never buying store grape jelly again and several each period asked if they could buy cans. When I told them I couldn't sell them, they asked for them as Christmas presents.

We try to stick to the crowd favorites as we can. We like to do grape jelly, banana jam, and apple conserve. Last year we also did pickles and salsa. Each year we try to do something new. Last year it was onion jelly. I thought it was gross; she loved it. This year we tried roasted garlic jelly. This is where she was a life saver. She started roasting the garlic, steeping it and draining it while I was doing the easier batches of grape jelly and banana jam in the morning. By the time we were ready to do the garlic jelly in the afternoon, everything was ready to go. She's amazing.

We tried some of the garlic jelly that we had left over and it was really rather good. I can picture it would be great on a bagel with swiss cheese. I pour the apple conserve over brie and serve it with graham crackers. Does anyone know a good soft cheese that would be good with the roast garlic jelly? I'm looking for something I can just pour it over and people can scoop out some for crackers.

Here are some of the cans when we were done. There's not a picture here of the garlic jelly since we did that last. It's a beautiful light amber color.

It's always fun to take a break from literature and put on a different hat. That.....and I got to add great things to my lecture about the Botulism Broad (had to make it alliterative somehow) from the festival a few weeks ago.

Still...talking about her makes me want pumpkin butter all the more. I may make some and freeze it. I hear it holds up pretty well. Any good recipies out there?

The morning comes early, and my cupboard is full. Sweet gardening dreams.