Fall in the Raised Bed Gardens

Welcome!

We have a little raised bed garden on the side of the cottage. It is a bit of a learning curve for us but we are having a lot of fun with it. The climate at the cottage tends to be quite variable and we are not always there to water it or protect it from chipmunks and possibly beavers.

One bed is mainly herbs and we also tried for garlic but that just didn't work out. We have been using the herbs a bit but, more often than not, I forget that that is a cooking option out here! The herbs actually do pretty spectacularly. We put them pretty close together and the Parsley and Cilantro kind of crowded the other herbs but they still did fine.

I tried adding some lettuce seeds, purchased at Dollarama, to the spot where the garlic didn't grow.  I keep reading about how you can have two crops a year of  spring types of plants so I thought I would experiment.  They have popped up and look cute but really, it could freeze any night now.

This is our poor little squash which is still making efforts even though it is too late for this year. 

 Not even one flower was sucessful this year!

Here we have the beginnings of a delicious pasta sauce at the Lake Cottage!

Sea Grass Placemats

I have a real weakness for dishes. I got a small set of  non-breakable green dishes at the hardware store last year and we use them on the porch, especially when there are only two or three of us dining. I got a few sea grass placemats from IKEA and needed to place with them. The kitchen pass-through is nice to sit at for an evening snack or occasionally  a breakfast for two.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Window Flowers

 Flowers whisper "Beauty!" to the world, even as they fade, wilt, fall.

~Dr. SunWolf,

 

These flowers were gathered by my daughter almost 3 weeks ago and have been

 sitting in the kitchen window all this time. So pretty.

A New Light Fixture

 

We have never liked the original lighting fixture that was located over the pass through counter of our kitchen. We finally found something we could agree on at IKEA but it turned out to be the ultimate IKEA Hack. The light would not hook up to our unusual cottage electrical system, and besides that normal Ikea light bulbs, even though they are very energy efficient, drew too much power to light up.

 

The light is supposed to hang way down and the space is much too small for the lamps design so we umm...  rearranged it. Poor long suffering Bob made it work. It is amazing how Bob can find a creative solution to any problem.

 

We are even going to change it to a dimmer switch so we can have bright task lighting when needed, or perhaps a little mood lighting.

 

 

 

 

 

The IKEA Kroby Pendant Lamp started off like the picture below and is a great product.

The fact is that our Island Cottage is mainly solar powered and designed for minimal energy usage. This creates a lot of challenges that we take pleasure in solving.

 

The Corner of the Kitchen

My kitchen at the lake is full of my little treasures. I kind of have a thing for dishes and ceramics and here we have a mix of all sorts of things to make me happy.

I should start with the fact that 20 years ago Bob designed and built these great dark blue shelves. We started out looking at cupboards but decided the open look was best and Bob created the supports and worked hard rounding out the shelves. It was an early woodworking project for him and he learned a lot doing it. I still love them.

• The top shelf has an old brown coffee/cocoa set that was left at the cottage by the former owners. We mainly use it in the spring and fall when nothing quite warms you like hot cocoa by the fireplace. Next is a collection of wineglasses- some 50 years old from my parents house and some brand new. The great blue canisters are only a few years old and hold our sugar, brown sugar, tea, coffee and spaghetti. Below that is a cheap but pretty tin plate that is just perfect for butter tarts! That dark blue tea pot and mugs got a lot of use this year because I like multiple cups of tea in the morning while Bob nurses along his mug of coffee. The cow creamer was my grandma's.

• The green ceramic canister is my Mother's mother's "Cookie Bucket". It is peeked into a lot by people with very hopeful expressions. The tan container I have cooking utensils in was my mom's crock for making pickles. The bean pot ... is full of cookie cutters at the moment.

• More stuff I love on the adjoining wall. Old canisters, baskets, Italian ceramic pots, lots of Onion soup bowls. The wall displays a couple of other strange things; signs from dollarama last year, a copper rubbing I made when I was about 6 years old, a reindeer bell, and cookie cutters I really like.

The Troll in our Kitchen

Elizabeth brought back a surprise to keep at the cottage. This handsome little troll is an oven mitt that she picked up in Norway on her last big trip. I pulled it over a canister that was just the right size and put in on a higher shelf so he can keep an eye on us when we are cooking.

Wildflowers in a Mug

Wildflowers on my Windowsill