The Friday Feedback Forum

September 26th, 2009 - filed under: Furthermore » Feedback

Oi there darlings! Happy weekend!!! I think that you deserve to relax especially diligently this weekend. So get to it, unwind! But don’t forget to stop by for comments, critiques, thoughts, support, and suggestions.

So, what’s will you be doing this weekend to cam yourself and make sure you feel extra good? What can you do to give yourself that extra treat? And what’s going to be knocking around in your head, inspiring you or intriguing you this weekend? I want to know what matters in YOUR world!

As usual, the Feedback Forum will remain here at the top of the page all weekend, so if you’ve got an idea or a question or you just want to introduce yourself and say ‘Oi!’, you can stop back by any time.

Have a lovely one my dears!

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  • Tenise Rae

    I’ve been wondering if it’s time to go pick pumpkins yet? That’s pretty much it. Hehe.

    I’m here in southern Oregon and I know there are pumpkin patches all over. I haven’t heard of any opening to the public yet though. I’m really getting into fall this year already. I’m just getting anxious. It’s gotta be soon since Halloween is creeping up on us! :D

  • http://calcioedamore.blogspot.com torie

    I’m so excited for our Greek Festival here in town… the Greek community spends all of September getting ready for this one weekend! I’m definitely looking forward to some home-made hummus and pita!! (There something about a Greek touch that makes theirs better than mine :P)

  • http://thegreengeek.webs.com Courtney

    Today my fiance, myself, and a friend went to The Ohio Renaissance Festival. It was soooo much fun! And I wish I had more money because there were so many great things there that were totally natural and would be really nice to have.
    Tomorrow I’m going clothes shopping at Goodwill. Hopefully I’ll have good luck and really be able to add to my wardrobe!

  • http://flightsofthevalkyrie.blogspot.com/ Valerie

    For some unknown reason I have developed an obsession with glass bottles in the past few weeks. Glass bottles with screw on lids that can be reused. Wine bottles, pasta sauce jars, other beverage bottles, a few gallon size ones. I keep peeling off the labels, washing them out and saving them. I have now amassed almost 20! The problem is I don’t know what to do with them. I want to use them to hold food,or store other household items, not arts and crafts projects. The only thing I can think of using them for is to store homemade lemonade, but really that’s a ton of lemonade. Got any ideas? drink recipes to share? Any help would be awesome, Thanks!

  • http://bonzaiaphrodite.com Sayward

    @ Tenise Rae – I’m anxious too! I haven’t seen any pumpkin patches open, but I did see pumpkins in Fred Meyers last week. So they’re around!

    By the way I’ve been meaning to ask you, how do you pronounce your name? Is it like Denise with a ‘t’? Or more like tennis? It’s really pretty, either way. =)

    @ torie – Where is ‘here’? Not Portland, right? My old home town in SoCal had the *best* Greek festival. MMm, I miss that food. I haven’t hear of one in Portland but I should check it out . . .

    @ Courtney – Ren Festivals can be so inspiring for that sort of stuff. And good luck with your thrifting! I haven’t been in far too long, and I miss it! I’ll need to make a trip for fall clothes though . . . muahaha

    @ Valerie – That’s awesome! Glass bottles are the best, and endlessly useful! First of all, you can throw away all your plastic tupperware. Plastics have been shown to slowly leech into food – especially hot food – so it’s best to store leftovers in glass or tin. I keep all our leftovers in mason jars, and every day I pack my husband his lunch (so geeky, I know) and I use the jars for things like carrot/veggie strips, crackers, apple slices, popcorn, whatever I’m sending for him. I just use glass instead of baggies.

    One of my favorite things to do is to buy a big bag of dried beans, and then cook them up at home – a huge pot of them. Then, I’ll portion them into glass jars and freeze them for later use. It’s much more cost effective, not to mention eco-friendly, than buying canned beans.

    You can also do this with chickpeas, for defrosting to make hummus, or lentils, or any other soup. Make big batches of stuff and then freeze portions in glass.

    The wine bottles would be great for making flavored waters, if you’re into that. You could have one for lemon water, one for mint water, one for rosemary water, whatever you like. So much easier to stay hydrated if there’s always a chilled batch of elegant, flavored water around!

    Those are just the first ideas that spring to mind. Hope it’s something you can work with. Good luck! Let me know what you come up with.

  • Jackie

    I read something online recently about it being the perfect time to start planting garlic. Any tips on that? Have you ever grown it? I live in an apt in Chicago and it seems that growing it in a container is fine, and so it leaving it outside, but we have a squirrel problem around here and I’m pretty sure they’d eat it. So, I was wondering if you knew, Sayward, or if anyone knows if it can be grown in containers inside???

  • Tenise Rae

    Yup. It’s Denise with a ‘T’. :D I can’t even tell you how many times I’ve said that in my lifetime….especially over the phone.

    We saw pumpkins at the store yesterday too! I sooo can’t wait. :D

    You know what would be cool too? If I got an email telling me that someone had responded to my comment….or something similar anyway. Sometimes I don’t remember to check past Sayward posts that I commented on already, ya know? Just my two cents….hee hee. :D

  • Dylan

    @Jackie, yes, now is a good time for planting garlic …outdoors! Indoors you will just confuse the poor fellows. Squirrels will not bother your garlic, trust me. In Chicago the temps may get too cold, esp. for container plantings, so either insulate well or bring them inside to protect when it gets cold (below 20 degrees Fahrenheit). But sunshine on their heads will be good when they pop out of the soil and the seasonal temperature changes will tell them when it is time to do their thing. They should get some green shoots above ground before winter and then hold until spring when they will shoot up to about two feet tall by summer. After that they begin to die back and it’s time to harvest! Fall plantings do yield better (and sooner)but in hard winter areas many wait till spring.

  • http://twitter.com/erosan EroSan

    @Dylan: How about shallots? They are the same family as garlic, aren’t they?

    I was doing some shopping in the market and while I was picking my shallots, I noticed 2 that were already sprouting. So I bought those! I meant to plant them, but I have no idea how to cultivate those.

    I did the only thing i could think of… I put them in a pot with the green sprouts sticking out of the dirt, but I have no idea if they need special care.

  • http://www.herveryown.com akeeyu

    Re the beans:

    I thought a full glass jar would crack in the freezer. Do you freeze it with liquid and beans, or just beans? DO they ever explode?

  • http://bonzaiaphrodite.com Sayward

    @ Jackie – I have never grown garlic, but now I’m inspired to try! I’d definitely listen to Dylan – he knows what he’s talking about. ;)

    @ Tenise Rae – I totally understand. The amount of times I’ve said “Like you ‘say a word’, but just ‘say-word’, get it?” is uncountable.

    I’ve considered the comment notification but I’m not sure how to implement it in a non-annoying manner. The way my comment system is set up right now, it would have to be like on Facebook, where you get an email anytime *anyone* comments on a thread that you’ve commented on. That can be really annoying and it’s not the route I want to go.

    But I get what you’re saying. I’ll think about it some more.

    @ Dylan – THANK YOU! You are becoming our unofficial resident gardening expert. =D

    @ Erosan – I’m pretty sure shallots will work the same way, though I could be wrong. Um . . . Dylan?

    @ akeeyu – The jar will only crack if the liquid has nowhere to expand to. I freeze the beans in their liquid, but I leave about an inch gap at the top of the jar. Then, I don’t screw the lids on tight at all – just barely set them on the jars in the freezer. The next day, once the beans are totally frozen and all expanded, I screw the lids down tight. Never had a jar crack!

  • Tenise Rae

    Totally understand the annoyance of Facebook comment emails. However, I do enjoy them as well. Personally, I think that’s what keeps a conversation going.

    Maybe that could be a topic to write about?? Ask the community what they think. :D

    I know that if I was seriously annoyed with the Facebook emails I would have changed it in my settings already. Heheh.

  • Dylan

    @Erosan- yeah shallots are in the same family, Alliums, with leeks, onions, garlic, scallions and chives (actually they are a type of onion-Allium cepa, with a slight garlicy flavor and similar growth habit to garlic). I find them to be even more frost tender than garlic and less robust in growth (more like chives, you can use the tops like green onions!). You should separate the individual cloves (only one green shoot per plant at first) to get the most out of them, and make sure to keep weeds etc. away. I’m not sure if they will bulb up well inside your house. They like sun and fertilizer and loose soil but do relatively OK in less ideal conditions. Good luck!

  • http://twitter.com/erosan EroSan

    @Dylan: Excellent! Thanks for the info. I already took them outside so they get more sun.

  • http://bonzaiaphrodite.com Sayward

    @ Tenise Rae – Hmm, I wonder if I could make it an option? I’ll have to consult my husb . . . er, programmer. ;)

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