B&W Diana in the Country

I took these pictures with my Diana Mini last January... 

I guess it was about time I got them developed. 

My hipsterness is getting out of control.

Take it or leave it...

There's more where these came from.

Double Birthday

On Friday Nick and Heidi celebrated their 29th and 2nd birthdays.  Nick and I have been super busy working on graduation at the university we work at, so I've been pretty lame at planning birthday surprises this year.  In fact, I passed out at 8 o'clock last night and left him to watch TV alone, on a Friday night, on his birthday.  Wow.  I suck.  But at least on Thursday I did spend 3 hours slaving away in the kitchen making these... which some of you might remember I posted on this blog 2 years ago.

They were totally as delicious as last time, so if you haven't made them yet - find an excuse ASAP.  We also went out for a romantic dinner Friday night, leaving Heidi alone on HER birthday.  So today we decided to make up for it today by going on a long hike in the Peak District together.

Lately we've been bracing ourselves for what is looking like it might be an exciting but also a little challenging year ahead. But at least for a moment life seemed pretty near perfect in the Peak District this afternoon.  It's funny how blue skies can do that to you.

The First Year : Gardening Lessons Learned

As the end of the growing season is upon us, I just wanted to take a minute to say how awesome growing stuff is.  I honestly can't tell you how much I love it.  Well actually I love it so much that I have decided to make it my plan B in life.  If all else fails (and maybe even if all else doesn't fail) I am going to go to school for organic farming or horticulture and create an organic cooking school/retreat on a farm.  I know I told you that already.  Whatever.  It will be freaking awesome.  You can all pay me and I'll let you come.

Also I just wanted to recap some things I have learned in my first year of growing... for all of our benefits.

• Most importantly, plants WANT to grow.  It's not that hard, if you water them and give them sunlight they grow.  I don't know why before I started gardening I thought it was this big complicated mystery.  Here's a secret: it's not.
• Follow the instructutions on the seed pack.  This may seem like a "duh" but sometimes I would plant things too late and then they wouldn't really work out.
• Tomatillos are rock stars in the garden.
• Everything that is from a warmer environment than here should have been grown in the green house; ie: eggplant, cucumber, peppers, etc.
• lettuce and radish give you instant gardening gratification... and by instant I mean like a month.
• Potatoes are really easy and taste 100 times better fresh from the soil.  
• Don't dump water on seedlings, just mist them with a spray bottle.  
• Grow bags are not all they're cracked up to be.
• And finally, grow things you would want to eat!  

And here is what I am looking forward to in my quest for food self sustainability:

• Ducks and chickens... but especially ducks.  They're much cuter than chickens don't you think?  Chickens give me the creeps a little.
• Growing Jerusalem artichokes - most underrated and totally delicious vegetable ever.
• Planting fruit trees
• An asparagus patch : it takes a few years to get these started, so we have to wait for our forever home to invest in this.  
• A pumpkin patch : Pumpkins are my favorite and they keep for months in the pantry.  I have a few pumpkin recipes in mind for this month so hopefully I will get around to posting them.  I know I have been neglecting the blog - especially the recipes bit.  

Do you guys have any good growing tips?