Wow it has been a while since I have put anything here.
The weeks have been flying by! School has been going really well. I am enjoying almost every minute of it. I have made some really great friends, and have settled into the routine. Andrew and I have been having date night once a week. This has been very nice, it is a time to slow down and catch up with one another. We have been having fall picnics in a local park (next to the llama/sheep farm in the middle of town), packing hot tea and soup to keep warm.

Minestrone:
Yesterday was the first day that really felt like fall to me. All of a sudden the leaves started to fall and the air became crisp. As Garrison Keillor said yesterday, there really is something about that feeling of fall that causes you to recall memories you haven’t thought of for years. We got up and went to one of the last Moscow farmer’s market for the season. It has switched to being mostly apples and squash. I got all the ingredients to make Minestrone. Making Minestrone also means it is fall. Having a warm pot full of the freshest veggies all cooking together is so wonderful! I made a very large batch and froze three, two serving portions in addition to what we ate last night and saved for today. We have started getting Northern Exposure on Netflix. It was on our ‘recommended’ list, and really so much of my life now reminds me of that show.

Prairie Home Companion
Also yesterday we went to see Garrison Keillor record a live Prairie Home Companion. It was soooo fantastic. In addition to being a wonderful show, it was a great experience. It was so heartening to see as many people there with Birkenstocks and Kerry bumper stickers, as there are with Wranglers and Bush stickers at Wal-Mart. (not that there is anything wrong with wranglers, I have a pair or two myself)

Plum jam
Shortly after the peach jam experience Andrew returned from a trip home with several pounds of Plums. So he made freezer jam with them. He also added a few cups of raspberries. This jam is the best jam I have ever had!!

Applesauce
After all the jam, we decided we needed to learn how to can. We went up to a great orchard up in Garfield and picked 55 pounds of apples….
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You can see the results!

Apple Cider
Also at the same orchard they have apple presses so you can press your own cider. Which we did the weekend after the applesauce, four gallons worth!

Peppers
Once we knew how to can, Andrew found it absolutely necessary to preserve some of the literally dozens of varieties of peppers they have at the farmer’s market. So now not only do we have applesauce and jam coming out of our ears, we also have peppers!

Butternut Pasta
So seeing as how one of the only things left at the market is squash, I needed to learn to make use of it…. The result was an absolutely fabulous roasted butternut squash puree pasta sauce.

Barn opening
Weekend before last we went to the most wonderful barn opening: http://artisanbarn.org/

Painting the bedroom
Somehow in the middle of all this we found time to paint the bedroom (Manchester tan).
Also I painted the bathroom:***

Cooking class
The other night we went to a (vet school sponsored) cooking class. The theme was eating health on a budget with little time. It was very fun!! There was a short intro, but mostly it was everyone broken up cooking different dishes and we all came together and shared what we had made.

This is a very quick synopsis of the past few weeks. I didn’t include any recipes. If anyone wants any of the ones I mentioned I would be happy to post them J

Also dad got me doitinthebarn.com !!!
Stay tuned

***for some reason my pictures aren’t up loading, I will try to add them again later