We're Earthy Like That

Salem County is rich in farms and the earth is important to the people here. The county has a website for the Improvement Authority with some tidbits of information to help citizens practice green habits and they even offer compost bins at a very attractive price. Here's a link to the site, in case you have a hankering to see how even a small and financially strapped community can reach out to help folks live a greener life. http://www.scianj.com/
Now, the Earth Machine, which is the composter of choice for the county, retails for almost a hundred dollars- so the county price(which WAS 22.50- but is now 26.50) is very enticing!
La Principessa and I put aside a few dollars every month until we had enough to buy an Earth Machine for Cape Coop.
And, here it is- ladies and gentleman, allow me to introduce to you Billy, Cape Coop's compost bin!
We bought him a few weeks ago, but once we got him home it was apparent that we are not bin builders- he had one tiny piece that we could not insert into the proper tab, no matter how we maneuvered and wrangled- so frustrating! The composter sat in our tiny living room, forlorn and bereft of the tidbits we had eagerly been saving up to feed it. We had saved scraps for over 2 months, in happy anticipation of Billy's arrival-and we were sorely put out when we realized that we would not be filling the composter immediately.
I admit that Mommy actually kicked Billy a few times, in frustration, as Billy lolled on the rug in the tiny living room, waiting to be fixed in a place of sun, OUTSIDE.

Somehow everything always works out, though, don't you notice? Last week I sold some fabric on Craigslist, and the man who bought the fabric was kind enough to finish the bin building for us when he came to pick up his super bargaintastic bolt of gray velvet.
Woohoo, yipppee- we have a composter in our yard now!
La Principessa and I placed Billy in the furthest South West corner of the property- right where we will someday, we hope, put up a back fence. If you look carefully you can see the posts which are already thoughtfully in place- Cape Coop is just waiting for that rear fence!

Isn't our composter adorable? Even with our 2 months plus worth of scraps AND many shovels full of dried leaves, we have only a few inches of material in the tummy of the bin- and I can't imagine that we will ever fill the thing, for he IS a behemoth of a composter and there are just the two of us, after all, but we have our very own composter for the first time in almost a decade, and that's a great feeling. I can really feel the beginning of a garden for our dear Cape Coop now. Having Billy is the first small step!

I have a reason to order gardening catalogues now! Oh, how I've missed my gardening and planning and such! I hope that La Principessa has lots of energy and patience this coming spring, for I have lots of plans for her muscles, and for the barren spots that are Cape Coop's lack of landscaping!
We are going to have a mostly edible garden- I hope for some blueberry bushes to please La Principessa, and a tiny plot for vegetables and fruits, as well as some bulbs to decorate the front yard- I just have to decide on a c0lor scheme, don't I? We don't truly have room for a tree, but I am sorely tempted to acquire one of those adorable dwarf varieties(something with fruit, of course!) and perhaps I can plant it in the swale... we'll see!
I am going to have to add another envelope to the budget now, aren't I? "GARDEN" it will be named, and tools, soil, seeds, plants, hoses and a shed will all be forthcoming- I'm sure!
I've already got sugar pumpkin seeds all ready to trade- send us a note if you're interested!

Wish You Were Here!

SNOW! Doesn't this photograph of Cape Coop look like a vintage postcard? Our little Cape Coop is so sweet, in every season!
La Principessa went out and took these photos of our cozy Cape Coop this morning. The snow had begun to fall a few hours before. When we awoke at *:00 AM or so, we found ourselves surrounded by a soft and chill blanket outside.
Gray, white and black have overtaken the world.
These photographs ARE in color. What is the name of this unusual color, you might ask? First Snow.

Oh! This snow is so soft! Very cold, white, a heavy blanket of powder on every surface. I shoveled the front walk and cleared off the post box a bit later, in hope of attracting the mail carrier. The snow practically floated off of the walkway- it is that soft and dry! We are enchanted.


Our little car, Kim Chee Kia, is even MORE buried now, as it hasn't stopped snowing as yet at 5:00PM, and these photos were taken at 11:00AM. 21 ½ inches so far, according to my tape measure.
Our neighbor's son came by and shoveled the alley for her this morning, and we gave him a hot cup of oolong to warm his dear self. We have heat, we have lunch and tea, and, oh, the world is lovely and quiet.
I look out of my window here and see a flock of birds flying West. I feel sheltered and peaceful.
The world feels so calm and sweet as I look upon the snow outside, there just isn't a proper phrase come to mind to explain.
So, yes, I am homesick, for the warm, the endless summer that is our home state of Florida, but NO, I am not weary of this adventure in Salem, New Jersey. I do not tire of the seasons and the challenge, the lovely of it all. Wish you were here!

Insert Disappointed Sigh HERE

Today I ripped at the dining room carpet a little bit, to see WHAT WE ARE FACING.
Um, not good, it seems.












The dining area is Cape Coop's North front room.














In the rear it is the kitchen, which has cloud gray vinyl stick-em-down tiles. I suppose that the flooring will be a double room job now. Bleagh. (Pay no mind to the odd placement of the refrigerator- PLEASE. And, don't get excited over the five feet of cabinets- they are in scary disrepair.









UNFORTUNATELY, the floor beneath the carpet is NOT lovely- but isn't this photo close up of the disaster gorgeous? I can't discern even if this is wood, or some other odd sort of surface material that is something like cardboard. The hidden surface is covered in swirls of old flooring glue, dusty and dark brown. I imagine that I can pull up the carpeting and either recover the floor in some stick-em down tiles (we're not enjoying carpet in the dining/kitchen area!) or, even, just clean up what's there now, if it turns out to be something usable (I fear not!). I'm not inclined for now, because my secret hope is to eventually do a remodel of the entire area, turning the dining 'room' and the kitchen into one large, more cohesive area- an eat in kitchen/family room sort of idea is in my mind. An old fashioned kitchen similar to the main rooms of colonial times- although NOT in a colonial theme. SO, I would like to cover both floors with ONE material, returning them to their original singular state- because I do believe that the chicken house did not have multiple flooring surfaces, unless the lady of the main house liked decorating that much? Or thought to inspire the chickens to a happy mood with a variety of decor choices? I can imagine a woman thinking to herself whilst choosing floor coverings "Ah, THIS vinyl will be the perfect accent for the West side, and THIS lovely wood for the East!"
FORTUNATELY, although she DOES have a virulent dislike of the 'Horrid Carpet', La Principessa does NOT have a sense of time, or urgency, regarding these things- my darling Kiddle is in no hurry to GET THINGS DONE.
This will be a daunting job, and I will need to ruminate. For AGES, I think.
Again, FORTUNATELY, today is bank day- our monthly adventure to the city of Glassboro- and we have been invited to dinner by new friends... yes, a 40 minute drive is what we consider to be neighborly here- we're thrilled!

ALSO, FORTUNATELY, we had these sweet whole wheat biscuits for lunch, while my cake offering for dinner baked in the oven, warming the kitchen up to a toasty 52 degrees Fahrenheit!

Photos of the cake may or may not be forthcoming- it is a naked cake, and while fruity and moistly delicious to eat, Kiddle may not feel inspired to photograph it.


Can you tell that I'm having difficulty figuring out layout code? Yipes.

Away from Marlboro TO Marlboro Anew...

When we moved here to our new home, we moved FROM a small town in New Jersey that is near Marlboro Township- a so called 'bedroom community' of NYC- where the people work hard to acquire the trappings of America's financial upper middle class-everyone is beautiful, and their homes are beautiful, glossy as a magazine cover, as fashionable as the malls will allow, and then some!
There are 2 farmer's markets in the Marlboro area, both as glossy and citified as the people require- and we rarely indulged ourselves of their bounty- for the prices reflect the preciousness of having a farmer's market in such a fashionable township.
Imagine, now that we are in Salem, we find that just down the road another Marlboro has come into our lives, but a very different flavor of Marlboro-a real country farm!
Marlboro Farm, with a market, open year 'round, called, appropriately enough, Marlboro Farm Market. We have been going there every week or so, since we found the market on one of our leisurely "what will we see if we go in that direction" drives.
The vegetables, fruits and plants- they are beautiful!
Just as the Marlboro Township folk, their homes and their farmer's markets are beautiful, so is everything at Marlboro Farm Market, albeit an entirely different kind of glossy beauty- the timeless beauty of nature- the beauty of vegetables and fruits freshly arrived from the land- a gorgeous sight to behold.
The market is a rustic building, with foot worn cement floors that are a companion to our own foot worn wood floors at Cape Coop, and a rustic theme that belies the modern refrigeration against the back wall- and the computerized registers that the smiling young ladies who ring up purchases at the center counter depend on.




We walk around and look at all of the always varying produce, and we sidle to the back of the market and fill our basket with the discounted "yesterday's" produce that the farm puts into bags every day- 2 pounds of yellow string beans for half a US dollar, an immense purple cauliflower for 75 cents, a 10 pound bag of sweet potatoes for $4.00- 6 large local apples of various varieties for another dollar. We spend almost all of our weekly food money at this market - and we eat the most delicious meals all week with the finds that we have acquired!





Of course, there is always the local squash, the riotous colors and frenzied shapes calling to La Principessa, and we do indulge- at a dollar or less a pound- it's an affordable adventure- the multitude of gourds and soft skinned beauties calling to us, their colors just DELICIOUS to the eye- their shapes offering no clue to the shade or flavor of the flesh therein.
We roast or bake the lovelies in our kitchen, we eat the flesh in simple ways- with a drizzle of maple syrup, or a dusting of cumin- sometimes I will keep aside a cup of the squash meat and make a soup of it, or a tiny stew- with onions- and lots of Kiddle's favorite spices, so sumptuous! With homemade croutons atop the dish, or a hunk of our own kitchen's bread, what a feast for lunch on a cold day! We roast the seeds and snack on them- so much pleasure from these many globes of such amazing shapes and colors!
And that is where we are going today- Marlboro Farm Market-our new neighborhood Marlboro- and one which is a bit more in tune with our own sensibilities, humble as they are. I wonder-what mealtime adventures will stem from the upcoming visit? I hope that you all have a local market to adventure in, as we do in our new hometown- and, if you don't, don't fret- come for a visit- and we will take a drive down the road together, to Marlboro Farm Market- we'll spot you a fiver for a treat, and I'll cook it for you, in Cape Coop's kitchen.

Box by Box...

As you can see from the accompanying photograph, we are getting the boxes up the stairs and Out Of The Way. The front room actually has space for Kiddle to set up her easel and paint, and for me to sit on the carpet and go through my papers. Always, I am busy with these boxes of papers- shifting them from one box to another, for I'm always meaning to do something with the reams of paper information that I acquire, but how can I even begin, when there is so much to do?
We have hung a few pieces of art on the walls, but only where there are already nails- I have discovered that I know NOTHING about how to put a nail into a plaster wall! So, there are dozens of paintings in the dining area, leaning on the credenza, awaiting a place.
We have yet to decide what to do about bookshelves in the house either- we have thousands of books, but of course! Unfortunately, we are supposed to be Grown Ups and so, more Grown Up cares are forcing themselves into 0ur minds for now. Heat is the thing that we are going to focus on for the winter- not shelves.
Heating! What a terror! The weather is already icy here and we have yet to figure out the heating system. We have OIL HEAT- and that means that one must choose an OIL SERVICE- and there are so many- how to choose? And, then, of course, one must buy a full tank of oil in one go- that's 275 gallons- a LOT of oil, perhaps, but also a lot of money. So, we are waiting, and as I always say when I am confronted with a challenge to my wits- we will Take Care Of This Soon.