Wild strawberries

On one of our trips this summer we discovered fields of wild strawberries.

Those meadows lay off the beaten track but so close to the top of one of the most visited mountains (hills?) that is located close to the place where my great grandmom was born. Ž suggested that we come again. So we did. My dad joined us.

We picked around seven litres of strawberries in about three hours, had a delicious snack in between, eaten lots of strawberries while being bent over the ground and thought about coming again next year.

Now most of those strawberries are frozen and will be eaten during the winter time when all fruits in the shops will be imported from Spain or Italy or some other far away country.

Yum!

Fruits of autumn

I've been cutting rose hips for the second day in a row. It is a slow work, and a messy one too. I use plastic gloves because those little hair inside of the hips are rather stingy. What I do reminds me of those days spent at my grandparents' when we were all sitting behind a desk and doing similar work. Preparing and storing food for winter. I gathered a bucket of carrots and other goodies from the garden yesterday, I shared some with my colleague at work. This is how it is done - I get plums from her and she gets vegetables from me. A good barter indeed. It feels like in the old days when there were no shopping malls and computers and mobile phones. Days are passing by quickly at this time of year, there's lots to be done around the house at the moment. Like mowing grass for the last time this season, cleaning the mower and the tiles and the flower pots, wiping away spider's webs from the front of the house, cleaning windows, gathering and cleaning and storing vegetables from the garden. This all takes time, more time than one can imagine. I hardly wait to move inside; I have lots of plans for rainy and gloomy days.

Sunny weekend

I spent these past two days mostly outside:- doing some voluntary work at the reserve that is managed by the society I work for. I found out that I've been doing quite a lot of such work since I'm together with Ž. Sometimes I would rather stay at home but for some unknown reason I keep doing it anyway. It is good to meet people from time to time, and make fire outside on a meadow and fry sausages over it. Or cheese if you don't fancy sausages. This time many children joined us and there was less chatting about birds than usual. And my eyes were focused on those mountains far away most of the time.

- making some more lace. Practice makes perfect but the truth is that my lace is far from perfect. I will show you some pictures of what I do in one of my future posts.

- driving all the way to the coast (well, it's only about an hour drive away from my home, so not really far) to deliver about 100 kg of spelt (Triticum spelta) to my colleague. He will sow it together with some weeds/flowers that used to grow among cereals in times before pesticides & co. I keep thinking of growing my own cereals too, but I don't have any land where I could sow the seeds. Though, one can never know what future holds for him/her.

- picking fruits of Sorb Tree (Sorbus domestica); Google gives also names like Service Tree, Jerusalem Pear, Whitty Pear for this tree. Fruits are not ripe yet and they are still very bitter at the moment but when they become a bit soft and brown they will be eatable. I won't make jam out of the fruits although it is very tasty because we have to use all that jam from last year first.

- wondering how beautiful it must be in June at those places when all those Dog Roses (Rosa canina) are in bloom. We met many people who were, like us, picking rose hips. This year we will dry them for winter teas.

- gathering some Winter savory (Satureja montana) to dry too. I will grind it and use it to spice the food I cook. I use it a lot and this one smells nicer than that savory that I grow in my garden.

I had to wonder at this blooming shrub I came across. It should be blooming in spring and not now. And I smiled when I watched Ž among all those shrubs and trees. We were picking and gathering our own food for winter. It felt so good.

Fruits of autumn

It is time when we go to the woods to pick chestnut. Last week Ž brought some home, but it was full of worms and it didn't taste good. This week he went to some other place to pick it, and he was lucky - it is so delicious! Very sweet. Usually we cook it, and I like it mashed with maple syrup and cream.I read yesterday in a magazine, that Napoleon Bonaparte ordered to plant chestnut trees in large quantities in order to avoid hunger, as they bear fruit every year. Wise man. Chestnut trees don't grow in all parts of Slovenia, because they need warm climate for growth. The book on trees says that trees may live up to 1000 years! Imagine that! What a tree!

Fruits of the nature

The other day I made one small jar of barberry jam. It took me two hours! But it is a delicacy, well worth a trouble.And it is raspberry season again! There have never been so many growing in my garden. Of course they are eaten straight from the bush. My grandmom used to make syrup out of them, but there are not enough of them growing in my garden for that. It is healthier if I eat them straight away. Well, I do share them with Ž ... sometimes. :)

Helping hands

My dad knows that he won't be able to work much longer due to his illness, so he is trying to do something good every day and trying to follow well known proverb - seize the day. Sometimes this is a bit annoying for other people, who are not aware at this moment that they will not live forever either.

On Saturday we were helping him to cover the roof on a weekend house that he built mostly by his own hands. We spent almost, really almost every weekend there up to my 17th year of age when we moved to our new home. It was actually our second home, to where my parents escaped from my grandparents and some other relatives. We used to live in a cellar of my grandparents' house, in one room with a kitchen and bathroom. So, when coming to my parents' weekend house, it was like coming to a castle. It was spacious, bright and warm. Older we got, less willingly my brother and I were coming up there to the woods.

Today my brother lives there. I enjoy my stay up there whenever I visit him or my parents in that rather charming house. Nice memories bind us to that place.

We did a good job on Saturday. My brother baked vegetarian pizza and made delicious lemonade. We had a chat with local farmer and were working diligently from morning to late afternoon. It was nice day indeed.

Yesterday Ž and I drove to Slivje, a place where dogwood grows. Instead of picking its berries (not ripe and too dry), we came home with barberries. I will use them for jam. Well, at least that's a plan...

I hope you had a wonderful weekend!

Not from my garden

Many of us go through life without ever acknowledging the love that we encounter every day. This is a good time to let people know how much you love them.

~Robert Hand, Planets in transit~

The redcurrant season is here! With whipped cream and sugar. Yum!

Another great swap

Cookies for figs. Once again. This time I have received the sweetest ones, those that most people wouldn't buy on the market. Their core is like marmalade, real sweet. Lucky me, starlings left those for me...

There's nothing to see if you don't look closer

Landscape is becoming dull and colorful fruit and flowers are hiding among the high grass or below bushes and trees. I took a long walk yesterday in the afternoon, it felt so great to stretch my legs again. I took the loneliest paths but I met my neighbor anyway. I guess he was avoiding people too. :)

Goodbye summer, welcome fall

The temperatures dropped from above 25 degrees C to around 10. After all, in one week the fall will officially start on the calendar too. This is time of fairs, of harvest, of colors. Time to go around and see what the year has provided for us. It was time to go to the coast again, to pick figs and other fruits to make some jam. My face brightened when I saw the trees full of fig fruits but most of them were already rotten. The fig season is definitely over. Cornelian cherry didn't have any fruits on and also plum trees were empty. I saw quite many passion fruits and some pomegranate bushes with beautiful fruits on them but I couldn't pick those because they were on people's gardens. If I had some place to store such plants during the winter, I would have pomegranate plant and lemon one too. I love the color and shape of pomegranate blossoms, I love the smell of lemon ones. The house smelled of freshly baked bread on Sunday morning and I have been making myself a fruit breakfast since Tuesday (instead of eating chocolate children's food). One peach, an apple, some oat flakes, sunflower seeds, dates and curd, that's what I had in my Sunday's breakfast bowl. It has been raining since Friday evening but yesterday it stopped for a while, so I went to the castle of Ljubljana where medevial days were going on. Ljubljana has this huge castle which dates back to 16th century. Some of the buildings stood there already in 12th century. It was very cold, so I just looked around a bit, bought some delicious sweets and walked through wonderful narrow streets back to my car. It was lunch time and I could hear the sound of tableware and plates from behind the windows, I could smell the food people were eating, I walked down the street where mom lived when she met dad, I heard music coming from one of the houses, I passed by the garden which I would love to have, big and full of trees in the city center. While driving back home this thought crossed my mind: I am so grateful to be living here in this little peaceful land.

My Blueberry Nights

One of my favorite fruit are blueberries. I got fat from eating too many blueberry pies while traveling in the USA in 2001; but they tasted soooo good. How could I resist?For some time now I thought of seeing a movie My Blueberry Nights and last evening was perfect day to take a ride to the movies and indulge myself a bit. Not that I really liked the movie but I felt so content while driving back home. I had plan to do some traveling this summer but I suppose it will have to wait a while. Last evening it felt like traveling, the only thing missing was radio in my car and some good music. Then it would had felt like being on a long holiday, driving around with no plan and enjoying whatever life brings.