Just trying to keep cool these days, physically and mentally. We can’t spend all day outside anymore, as we’d prefer. It’s crazy hot and dry and we’re losing the crops at a rapid clip in these unprecedented June temperatures.
Fortunately, we can spend the hot afternoons in the cool kitchen, adding to our skillsets and our supply of delicious homemade staples—such as ferments, my domain, and canning, Hubby’s expanding speciality.


It’s so hot and dry, and generally miserable day and night, that I find myself continually amazed at how resilient some species are.



Also getting supplemental water and looking great, the most cheeriest of all the flowers, no contest.

We’ve lost the tomato crop prematurely. It wasn’t a total loss though, we’ve got enough for fresh salads and salsas, but not a bumper crop for canning, unfortunately.
And the fresh ones are delicious! Literally, the variety is called ’Delicious’ and they really are not fibbing. Saving those seeds for sure.
And, we’ve got a cucumber first, a volunteer! And with that another mystery with a pleasant surprise.

I’ve planted this variety for several years now because it’s been such a great producer. But I’ve not planted it with any intention of seed-saving, so it’s gone in right next door to other cucumber varieties, and melons, and squash, without a second thought.
And yet, it’s produced a true-to-type volunteer, which I most certainly will be taking seed from! We regularly get cherry tomato volunteers that produce beautifully, and always get volunteer tomatillos, Luffa, cilantro, basil, but this is a first for cucumber.

Other crops like the peppers are still producing fine, but the spaghetti squash is also starting to peter out already.







The birds and bees and 4-legged manage much better than we do.
Though, let’s not forget, they are watered and fed and do no real work and lay around all afternoon and evening!




There’s not nearly enough milk for cheesemaking yet, but I’m studying up!
Thankfully for the good old-fashioned snailmail I’ve gotten a divine treasure—a guide to traditional French goat cheese-making—originally published in the 1950s, in a humble effort to save the world from industrialized cheese.
Obviously, he did not succeed, not by a long shot.
But it is still a fascinating read on a sweltering Sunday.
