Using Fresh Herbs:Infusing Oils

If you have ever grown mint or Lemon Balm you know how crazy and fast it grows! I only plant one of each plant and have of a lot more of  it than  I know what to do with!
 I have recently found a few recipes for infusing your own oils at home. Now that  I am making my own skin care products I see where this is going to come in handy. Any of the oils that you would use to make lip balm  for example, can be infused with the herb of your choice and then use way less (if any) essential oils. It is very easy to do, it just takes a little time. So this is how I am doing mine.

Items needed:

Dried Lemon Balm       I used mine that I  dried for about 24 hours (or you could buy it)
A glass jar with a lid     Make sure they are clean and dry, before you start.
Olive Oil                          I like Olive Oil because it has a low rancidity rate

I filled my jar about 3/4 full with the dried Lemon Balm and then poured in olive oil until it just covered it. Put the lid on and date it with a done date of 4 weeks from the day you make it. Store in a cool dark place and shake once a day or whenever you remember. At the end of 4 weeks you will take it and strain it through cheese cloth into a jar. Make sure you squeeze out all the oil from the leaves in the cheese cloth, waste not want not! If it doesn't smell as strong as you want you can repeat the process using your finished oil and adding in more dried Lemon Balm and let sit for another 4 weeks. Two months is a long time to wait for the finished product, but it will be worth it!. I should have started doing this earlier in the summer and it would be ready now for winter crafting Store your oil in a dark container if you can other wise a cool dark place is good.

Happy Crafting

Welcome to My Garden:Happenings in the Garden

Last weeks load of tomatoes is going to be made into tomato sauce and stored in the freezer. I am just not getting enough tomatoes at on time to can them. It is so much work that I really want a larger haul of those little beauties before I bust out the steamer/caner again.So far I have only gotten about 6 pints of tomatoes canned and that was in two batches of three pints each and a couple jars of salsa and of course the tomatoes from last week. 

These tomatoes made me 2 quarts of freezer tomato sauce that turned out yummy! I just cooked down the tomatoes all day in the crock pot with about 6 cloves of garlic, a whole yellow onion, a couple handfuls of fresh basil and a few sprigs of fresh rosemary.

Today's harvest includes a couple of jalapeno peppers that I will put into some fresh salsa I am going to be making later. The rosemary will go into the freezer for seasoning dishes throughout the winter months and with all the cucumbers I have gotten and ones from friends I will be making a cucumber salad.

Love harvesting out of the herb garden! Today's haul is a whole bunch of lemon balm and that's not even close to how much I actually have!!! I planted two lemon balm plants in the herb garden and have many baby lemon balm plants in the back yard from before when I just had one plant in a pot and kept moving it around my flower beds!!

The lemon balm is going to be dried for use later in lip balm and tea. Right now I am infusing some of the lemon balm I previously picked in some Extra Virgin Olive oil so I can make some cold sore lip balm. I will post more on the lip balm later! I still have to get the mint picked and prepared to dry. Maybe I will fit that into today's chore list.  

Happy Gardening!!

Craft Corner: Yard Art

I have been busy around here lately just working on some yard art. I found a big gear looking think in my boyfriend's dads' yard and saw a fun flower and it took off from there. Here is the first one I did using the gear and some shelf dividers we also found in his yard. I am still looking to add something to the center but haven't found the right piece yet.

This next flower is just a old saw blade that I put a watch on, wrapped in fishing line and a couple of beads. The petals are made out of some scrap wire from Russ's shop and the spider I found the inspiration for on Pinterest. 

This is a work in progress, but I wanted to share it. It is an old fryer basket from a restaurant that my daughter got for me. I did a dream catcher in the center and put a beaded spider that my oldest daughter made.Now I just need to make some petals for it and find something for a leave on the handle to help it look more like a flower.     

Here is a close up of the little spider she made.

Welcome to My Garden:Update

I had really planned on sharing more about my gardening experience, but just didn't have as much time for it as I thought I would. I did have a good harvest, but it wasn't a big one. I thought I would have a lot more tomatoes and bell peppers than I got. Don’t get me wrong I have a lot of tomatoes I just don’t get enough at one time to can them like I wanted, so next year I will grow more plants. This year I did 2 early bird varieties, a Roma and two cherry tomatoes. The Roma’s ended up the size of the cherry tomatoes so I really ended up with a huge harvest of tiny tomatoes.

I am very pleased with my first harvest and am excited to see how I do with my fall garden. I used a web site called www.sproutrobot.com  to find out what could be planted right now according to my zip code.  This site is awesome it tells you how to plant in a garden or container and whether you need to direct sow or start inside!

I was gifted a greenhouse this summer, so that is all set up and planted too. I am growing all the same stuff in both places I figure I won’t fail in both places, so I get some food out of this grow! 

Here is a quick peek at my garden it is already much bigger with the beans, peas and radishes are going crazy!I also planted radishes, cucumbers, lettuce and spinach to round it all out! I am also trying to grow a couple of tomato plants out in the green house.

I have decided to not add any fertilizers to my garden I am just using egg shells on the top of the soil to deter creepy crawlies and give some calcium and then the Epsom salt water spray on the tomatoes. So far my produce is growing well without any.

For What Ails you!:Eucalyptus Shower Discs

The weather is changing just a little here in Northern California and with it comes the dreaded cough and runny/stuffy nose. With a toddler in the house it can be pretty frustrating when they can't sleep , so when I found this recipe I was thrilled! I don't own one of those humidifiers, so I just take one of these little disks and put it in her bed. I put it by the top of her bed after she falls asleep and it puts of fragrance all night long. I use a half of one in her bath before bed too! They work great in the shower, but the fragrance doesn't last  very long.

Eucalyptus Shower Discs

Ingredients:

1 cup Baking soda
1/3 cup Water plus a little extra
Eucalyptus essential oil
Rosemary essential oil
Lavender essential oil

Tools Needed:

Bowl
Muffin tin
Muffin liners


Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees. Put baking soda in bowl add the water ( if its too thick slowly add more water a tsp at a time) until it's thick. Put the liners in the muffin pan and then spoon in the paste. I just equally divided it up and it made 6 disks. It might make more using a smaller pan. I may have to try using a mini muffin pan next time! Bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes. Remove from oven let cool completely before removing liners from pan.Once they are cool add 15-20 drops of each essential oil to the disks and then seal in an air tight container.