Salem Massachusetts – Page 13

~Just a Few of My Favorite Houzz Thanksgiving Ideas

Gosh I love Houzz. It is just so much fun to sit with a snack or cup of coffee for a few minutes and look over all of the ideas. Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday and I like to make it special so I usually make place cards and decorate the table with a little twist. I need some inspiration this year so I spent a few minutes looking around Houzz.com this morning. I could post a thousand photos, but here are my favorites so far:

Thanksgiving Tablescape traditional-dining-room

See more traditional dining room designs

This first arrangement is just classic and pretty. I like the way the textures of the runner and ribbon accent the shapes of the pine cones.

Custom Dining Room traditional-dining-room

Photo by Jennifer Grey Interiors Design & Color Specialist. See more traditional dining room designs

Beautiful pinecones and textures again, but with a little bit of glam…

Photo by It's The Little Things.... See more contemporary spaces designs

I don’t have a mantel but I have a server that I could decorate like this.

Photo by Ann West Interiors. See more spaces designs

Simple and restful… I love it!

Photo by Delicate Creature. See more spaces designs

And a different take on the idea,pumpkins that were painted white. The “white” centerpieces really allow the food to shine.

Photo by FOCAL POINT STYLING. See more spaces designs

Candles and acorns…

Strictly Simple Style traditional-dining-room

See more traditional dining room designs

More white (white seems to be all the rage this year) embedded with upholstery tacks…

Photo by Rikki Snyder. See more dining room designs

And finally, mason jars, candles, greenery and a nice natural wood base…

At the moment I may use white pumpkins, pine cones,mason jars, candles and some greens, with some asparagus foliage for color.

I’ll keep you posted!

Love, Michele

Thanksgiving Tablescapes (interiorsbystudiom.com)
White and Gold Tablescape for Thanksgiving (30smagazine.wordpress.com)

Garden Blogger’s Bloom Day- November 2013

I didn’t think that I’d have a November GBBD post to share but I just can’t quite give up yet.

We still have a few blooms to enjoy here on the coast of New England.

Still a few knock out roses, the rest of the roses are gone. I’m really in love with this color that I chose for the front and side yards. We planted several of these recently. You’ll see more of them in the spring.

Some snapdragons too…with the right kind of winter I may be able to post a photo of these in the February and March GBBD posts (just kidding, probably)..

Not quite a bloom, but the asparagus foliage and seeds almost qualify. I love these!

And just enough foxglove to make sure that we don’t forget about it.

That’s it for me! Looking forward to looking at the other Bloom Day posts at May Dreams Gardens!

Hope you do too!

Michele

ps/ It’s the weekend! Be sure to take a few minutes to check out the video that I shared here the other day of Margaret Roach‘s gardens in New York State. It’s great!

Now THIS is Horseradish….

It started out like this. I remember saying something like “there’s the horseradish” and going on to my next thought.

Yesterday I was cutting back and cleaning up the garden and realized that the horseradish had died back from the frost and was ready for harvest. I thought I’d pull some out for Michael to enjoy. I didn’t get the horseradish gene but he and my mom eat it like it’s candy. So I started digging, for at least an hour. Long story short, we have a lot of horseradish root out there and it’s buried very deeply. There will be horseradish on our property for many years to come.

Here’s what I was able to dig out. It was getting dark and I was tired. We had pizza for dinner.

… a view with my hand to give you a better sense of the size of this root.

I soaked it a little and washed the dirt off. My middle daughter, the Harry Potter fan, saw this and immediately went downstairs and put in the Harry Potter movie with Professor Sprout and the mandrakes and watched the whole thing, lol.

It looks like the large one is actually six roots that fused together. I might of missed it last year.

The smaller, normal size root was easily peeled and chopped.

Then I processed it with some water and red wine vinegar.

And my Michael was happy.

He doesn’t smile like this for just anything.

The larger root is still sitting on my counter. I think that I’m going to try to cut it into smaller pieces and freeze it to grate later since the refrigerated version only lasts for up to six weeks.

Looking forward to a nice horseradish cream sauce with the roast beef on Christmas Day 🙂

Enjoy everything!

Michele

A Little Bit of Haunted Happenings

We’re right in the middle of our wonderful, amazing, scary, fun, not so scary Halloween celebration here in Salem, Massachusetts. Yesterday Michael and I left the garden (yes we do that sometimes) and ventured downtown with our youngest daughter and one of her besties to take it all in. Haunted Happenings just gets better and better every year! Here’s a few photos from our visit. Be sure to check out the photography here on the Social Palates facebook page as well. I absolutely love John Andrew’s work. He captures Salem in a way that no one else can!

Happy Halloween from the Salem Garden!

Click on any image to enlarge and view as a slideshow

Look familiar? This was the high school in Hocus Pocus… Michael and I watched them film the scene in the movie where the witches run away from the fence just a few steps to the left of here. No kidding!

the crowd on Essex Street on Sunday afternoon

A fairy playing on the Common playground

Crow Haven Corner was originally owned by Laurie Cabot, the Official Witch of Salem. I believe it’s run by her daughter now. The Wicca presence is strong here!

Crow Haven Corner has the ingredients you need for potions and spells can be found in Crow Haven Corner

You can also find these beautiful crystal balls and goblets if you need one.

Still blooming, I wonder what the pepper like plant is?

The police and fire departments sell t-shirts and memorabilia. I believe it’s used for kid’s programs.

a not as friendly witch

Frankenstein with the girls… they loved this!

The girls flying on the “roller coaster” at the common

Motorcycle Parades, Herb Freezing Time and Spiders

Life here in Salem, Massachusetts is so much fun and so crazy right now.

Yesterday we enjoyed one of my favorite Halloween activities, the annual Motorcycle Ride for Muscular Dystrophy.

Really, where else can you see this? I read a conversation on Facebook last night about moving the event to a different month because it disrupts traffic and creates confusion for other visitors. I guess it would be successful at any time of the year but I think that it adds a lot of fun to our Halloween season.

These are nice people dressed as superheroes

and pumpkins.

Hundreds of them ride into the downtown together, then they enjoy the city and give the economy a little extra lift, all for a great cause!

Before we left for the bike parade I chopped back some parsley yesterday.

I left some to keep it growing as long as I can.

Truly fresh parsley is the best!

I separated the chicken food from the good green stuff…

washed it off well..
chopped off the leaves…
and then chopped them finely.

I put it into an ice cube tray..then I added some water and froze it until today.

Now I have parsley ice cubes, all ready for winter cooking!
I stuck them in a freezer bag and stored them away.Another easy way to freeze parsley is to just pop it into a bag like Michael’s mom does. I was feeling pretty ambitious yesterday when I made the ice cubes. I enjoy that moment in January when I come home from a busy day and just pop the little cube into the dish I’m making. It’s really your preference.

And lastly, I’ll leave you with this photo that I took downtown yesterday:

How great are these guys?

We love our Halloween here in Salem!

Enjoy Everything!

Michele

What’s Happening In the Garden– September 10

I am hanging on to summer, that’s what’s happening here. With fall on our doorstep people keep saying that fall is their favorite season. I’m sorry, I just can’t join them, I’m a summer girl, that’s all there is to it. That said, the mums are getting ready to pop, which does help a little with the transition.
The oregano is still beautiful. I gave this a good cut back a couple of weeks ago. I’d like to dry some to enjoy this winter.
We still have plenty of green tomatoes. I’m hoping that the sun that’s forecast for today and the heat of tomorrow will help these along.
The romano beans took off and are climbing. Next year I think I may start some of these earlier in the season. This cute little gourd just peeked out and surprised me. I need to scrounge around and see if there are more hiding along the fences. We still have zinnias! And here’s the asian cucumber that I planted from seed in late July. It kind of took off. I don’t see much fruit but there were several bees flying around it pollinating the other day. It may still happen. The morning glories reseeded from last year and are happy in the herb garden. We have several banana peppers to enjoy. I may try drying a few of them. Broom corn, so pretty! Next year we’ll plant a nice strong row of it and make some serious brooms. Lettuce, with broccoli next to it. I’m kind of surprised by this broccoli. I wonder if it’s one of the few plants that likes being close to the chicken coop. I’ve been reading about broccoli and learning that it responds well to the high nitrogen content of chicken compost. The trick seems to be growing nice leafy plants before the flowers form. I think we may be on our way here. I’m growing these at work too but I believe that the heat on the rooftop caused flowers to form before the plants really matured. We deadheaded those, then composted and fertilized them heavily with poultry manure a week or so ago, so I’m watching and hoping that they’ll take off.We have lots of tomatillos, another nice surprise. I froze several over the weekend. It’s as easy as taking off the outer skin and putting them into a freezer bag. This week I’m planning to make some salsa verde, and I’ll likely freeze a nice gallon bag or two of them for the winter.
The foxglove is back in all it’s glory! I love this plant. It will probably reseed all over the place!
This is tucked into the front border on the outside of garden… is it ragweed or goldenrod? Pat at Commonweeder (one of my favorite garden blogs), just talked about this yesterday. I’m not sure, but I think it’s goldenrod.
And I’m already missing the black eyed-susan. It’s hard to see them go.

How’s your late summer garden doing? What were your biggest surprises this year?

Tell me about your garden, I love to hear from you!

Happy still summer! Enjoy Everything!

Michele

What’s Happening In the Garden- August 7

Let’s see, where to start…After lots of rain early on the weather has been beautiful for the past couple of days. We’ve had a few perfect garden days. I love, love, love those days!

Here’s one of our very recent freecycle finds! I’m pretty excited about this. We’re hoping to collect rain from the roof of the chicken coop to water with. That should save some time and money!

The tomatoes are coming along slowly. I’m hearing a lot about “lots of foliage but no tomatoes” from friends and family. I think the heavy rain we had early in the summer is to blame. In spite of my efforts I have a good amount of blight out there and I think it’s largely caused by the rain bouncing the fungus right up on to the plants from the ground. Does that make sense?

Tomatillos… they are just so darned cute! Now I have figure out how to eat them.

Cosmos above the Brussel sprouts…a nice pop of color but their out of control!

A few peppers… we’ll see. Their kind of a late August crop.

The cabbage is coming along too. It’s slightly shaded by the cosmos so I keep moving them (the cosmos) to other areas. This cabbage has been munched on a little bit. I probably need to put some slug traps out there.

I planted a little bit of swiss chard over the weekend. It’s so pretty! I hope it settles in and takes off.

Here we have asian cucumber, with chard to the right, a sad little zucchini plant tucked in and cauliflower right behind it.I haven’t had luck with zucchini here or at work this year. The squash borers were hard at work everywhere.

Dill in the foreground (the dill volunteers all over the yard) with relocated cosmos and some romano beans coming up in front of the fence. The beets in the bacdground may become beets after all. I wasn’t sure a few weeks ago but their looking okay.

Shallots are curing… I need to store them in a cool dry place. Their a bit smaller than I expected but after researching it I think that may just be the variety.

Eggplant… well… I don’t know… I think it needed more sun. To be honest we don’t really like it so it’s not a huge loss. I think the garden knoll is enjoying it though.

I’ve been pretty distracted this summer so I feel some loss about the garden. Part of the problem is my tendency to sit on this deck and enjoy the view 😉

I’m okay with that.

Enjoy everything!

Michele

This Week In My Garden : : August 1 (beautythatmoves.typepad.com)
swiss Chard benefits – 6 healthy benefits (amiretkhadra.wordpress.com)

My Favorite Gardening Books, and Yours?

Yesterday one of my co-workers asked me what gardening book I would recommend for beginners and I had to stop and really think about it. I love so many gardening books that it’s hard to choose, and I tend to rely on the internet these days as my first go to when I have a question. I started looking through my books today and thinking about all of the joy that they’ve given me as I’ve studied and learned. There’s nothing as wonderful as a good book!

I can quickly identify my favorite gardening book as ” The Moosewood Kitchen Garden Book” by David Hirsch. Mine is a first edition and as I think back I’m sure that I purchased it in 1992, before I had children. It includes all of the basics for anyone who wants to grow edible flowers, herbs, veggies and fruit and it’s readily available on Amazon in original and revised formats. I have happy memories of rocking my babies and planning gardens with this book in hand.

Another of my favorites is the classic herb guide, “Herb Gardening in Five Seasons” by Adelma Simmons. Adelma’s unique and wonderful take on herbs and herb gardening throughout the year comes to life in this book. I tend to pull it out at the beginning of each season to help me think about what’s coming next.

I have certainly enjoyed all garden joys and herbal magic in the years since 1994!

When I was talking with Andrew yesterday the first resource that came to mind was Rodale. Anything published by the Rodale Press seems to work for me and the guide just above is perfect for answering basic gardening questions. I also use their website, organicgardening.com on a daily basis.

While looking around for one of my current favorites, “The Garden Primer” by Barbara Damrosch, I realized that my nightstand is full of gardening books too. As you can see I love to read about adaptive gardening and container gardening and I always have a few Organic Gardening magazines in the queue and free books on my kindle.

Here’s my current favorite “The Garden Primer” by Barbara Damrosch. This is an original edition that I found at the used book store recently. It’s a great resource for the more experienced gardener who’s looking for details, but it’s also simple enough to work for someone who needs a basic understanding. Like the Moosewood book, it’s easy to read and digest and has beautiful hand drawn illustrations. When I googled Barbara Damrosch I learned that she’s published several books, speaks extensively, writes for the Washington Post and owns an experimental farm in Maine.

So, there you go Andrew… my favorite garden books! Let’s put this out to the blogosphere: What book would you gardeners recommend for a new gardener?

Let us know in the comments section… just a quick note for my facebook friends, comment here rather than on facebook so everyone can see what you have to share!

Michele

Camping At the Beach~

We love to spend time family camping so early this week we spent a night on site 27 at Winter Island, the coveted first spot right next to the beach! It was wonderful to fall asleep on Sunday night listening to the waves roll in a few feet away. I think that this family was meant to live on the water. We love it so much! Here are a few of my favorite Winter Island photos. Needless to say, we had a good time!

the view from our campsite…

the Winter Island lighthouse

What is this cool pole called? Maybe a peace pole?

The now hidden lagoon, it used to be part of a moat around the fort.

Looking north toward Beverly…

How the lifeguard chair is used after hours…

This kid is too much.

Seriously, he just cracks me up!

The sunset reflection, looking north.

and south, with the moon rising.

The boys heading to the beach.
One of our friend Casey’s creations. Still used and loved all the time, if you happen to see this Casey 😉 .

Boats in the moonlight… one of my favorite things to do at Winter Island is to watch the boats come into the harbor at night. It’s so peaceful and quiet.

Early morning fog at low tide…

Playing on the beach in PJ’s is the best!

Camping is also the best (next to gardening 😉 )

Enjoy everything!

Michele

Strolling in Salem Gardens, A Garden Tour!

This weekend is the Salem Garden Club’s Garden Stroll and I had a wonderful time “strolling” and taking in gardens all around the Common yesterday. The gardens were beautiful and the members and volunteers so welcoming along the way. Every stop was inspiring and interesting and fun! There was even an adaptive garden! I took lots of photos so here’s a gallery for you to enjoy. Click on any one to enlarge them and view as a slideshow. If you live locally you can still enjoy the tour this afternoon. Tickets are available at the Salem Common. It looks like it’s going to be a great day to get out there! Michele