Drowning in Greens

Cousin Michael and his wife Frances and their two adorable kids arrived yesterday!  Our kids are thrilled to have yet more kids from home to play with.  I'll tell you all about our visit after the weekend.

Meanwhile, I haven't posted a "creative" post in a while, so here's what I've been up to when not playing tour guide.

We're really enjoying our weekly farm box.  Due to a lot of rain recently, we're getting a LOT of greens (apparently they hold up to the rains).  I'm talking mesclun, spinach, bok choy, red lettuce, arugula, broccoli rabe, various herbs and this strange thing:

(garlic scape)

A big part of the fun of getting this box each week (and the kids do in fact think it's so fun - starting on Monday they ask constantly, "Do we pick up the vegetables today??"), is finding and trying recipes for things I've never eaten before, let alone cooked.  So if you have any garlic scape recipes, let me know.

As you can guess, we've eaten a lot of salad recently.  And since we've been getting a lot of strawberries, they make it into our salads too (even though Kevin HATES fruit in salads).

 

We're also getting the farm fresh eggs weekly.  And I'm not the only one who's noticed how much better they taste than store bought.  Ella, my non-egg eater, actually asked for scrambled eggs yesterday for breakfast for the first time in her life.  We're also eating them for dinner, with other farm box goodies thrown in, in this case asparagus.

We've gotten rhubarb for the last couple weeks.  I have never, never even touched rhubarb before.  Luckily, the CSA's website provides recipes so this morning I made homemade rhubarb, strawberry lemonade. It's still cooling so I haven't tasted it yet, but warning: do not eat raw rhubarb.  It's disgusting.

 

I've been doing a tiny bit of sewing.  Cousin Bonnie just got the most awesome Teardrop Trailer.  I'm completely jealous.  I've wanted one for ages.

Anyone who knows Bonnie also knows that to say she has a thing for bunnies is an understatement.  Her house is named Hare House.  Anyway, I saw this fabric and thought of her.  I decided she needed a toiletry bag for 'glamping'.

Apparently her cat approved.

(And how cute is that card I found on Etsy?)

There is much more sewing in my near future, if I can find the time and space between house guests, because my niece turns 8 on June 30th and I always whip up a few things for her.  Will post those pictures when I'm done.

Finally, we proved that it's always good to be flexible and spontaneous on Wednesday night.  At 6:30pm a friend of ours called Kevin and said he had two extra free tickets to see Willie Nelson play in Newark, New Jersey.  The show starts at 8.

Kevin: Let me see if we can find a babysitter.  

Friend: We'll send ours over.  

Kevin: Not sure how we'd get to New Jersey.  

Friend: We'll pick you up.

How do you say no to that?  

We had a great time seeing Ol' Willie.  And it was only slightly strange to leave our kids with a babysitter with whom we spent exactly 30 seconds with and then leave the state entirely.

Please post in the comments below, your favorite greens recipes!