Kitchen Home News

Isn't it enough to see that a garden is beautiful without having to believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too?  ~ Douglas Adams I believe in everything until it's disproved. So I believe in fairies, the myths, dragons. It all exists, even if it's in your mind. Who's to say that dreams and nightmares aren't as real as the here and now.  ~ John Lennon Of all the flowers I did not plant, there is one that is my favourite.  I don't know that it is polite to pick favourites when it comes to the flowers in your garden.  But I have one anyway. It sits in the corner of the faerie garden.  That strange strip of land where everything grows happily, no matter what it might be, or what its light or soil requirements are.  So many things have appeared there, just like magic. A vast selection of plants I did not seed in, or buy from a garden center.  "Weeds" like chickweed, plantain and dandelion sneak in, but that's to be expected.  What is unexpec

Midsummer dawned sunny and hot on Saturday, and I had a plan.  Which of course meant, nothing would go as planned. I took my walk beside the river, the plants growing tall and reaching for my knees after the rains of the previous week.  The Saskatoon berries were ripening and I picked as many as I could reach. It was a small harvest, but I'll return tomorrow for some more in the hopes of getting a few jars of jam out of the effort. Upon returning home with the tasty jewels, I noticed that my dear rue had started keeling over from the winds. It was time for a trim.  A huge armfull of green-vanilla scented bliss later, I strung lengths of twine in the basement and hung the charming herb to dry Later that morning I drove to the next town to the lakeshore in order to take part in a solstice gathering, but was turned away. There was a classic car show happening, and no parking to be found for blocks. I carried on to the west, up the hillside and stopped at the cemetery that houses the a

Canada Post has managed to distract from its rising postage prices this past week, by releasing the coolest set of stamps I've seen in a very long time - on Friday the 13th, no less. Based on ghost stories and hauntings across the country, the stamps feature foiled photos (print and digital "paintings") depicting legends from different provinces.  You can read each of the stories here . From a spectre bride (and bellhop) at a haunted hotel, to a nightly spotting of a train that no longer exists, to burning ghost ships - these are just a few of the strange stories depicted on the stamps, which will apparently spawn a series to appear each year. I nabbed my set right away, but I'm heading back to the post office to see if I can find more. Postcard anyone?

From the time that I was very small, my father would take my mother, brother, and I up into the hills surrounding our little town, and drive us up and down narrow roads with barely a tire track worn into them. We would find our way down these paths so many times that we would give them names. My father also named trees, animals and plants for us whenever he spotted something he thought was interesting.  Often, as we grew older, my brother and I would mumble some sort of affirmation that we had seen what he was pointing out, but our interest waned as our teenage years blossomed. Who knew that a short time later, I'd want to know the name of everything , and what healing properties it might hold, and what its flower might look like, and how it might continue on, leaving seeds or spreading roots behind for next season. How strange that my father used to tell me handfuls of odd names for plants I couldn't care less about, and now I want to remember why he calls creosote bush “buck