Good morning, everyone!  It looks like I will be up at 7:00 a.m. from now on.  Rhaq has decided that he needs to get up at about 5 to 7 each morning.  He comes and stands by my bed, wagging his tail so it knocks against the curtains.  If that doesn't move me he starts to whine.  If that doesn't work he then puts his front paws on the bed.  I really want to avoid that so you can be sure I am up and out of bed, grumbling at him, but out of bed all the same.

An overcast day, but no rain.  Today I must make my currant jelly and freeze the green and yellow beans.  After that I have to fix the bird feeder that the dogs wrecked.  I guess they were after a mouse living under the spool that held up the bird feeder.  At any rate, the thing is now in pieces. 

I was out in the greenhouse this morning.  Things are still looking mighty fine in there.  I do have heat on now so the cost of my peppers and tomatoes is rising!  Oh well, it is more for fun than profit!  This is my first year with a greenhouse.  I am learning as I go.  I am thrilled that I actually got cucumbers, tomatoes, peppers and basil.  I LOVE fresh basil!  So here is what it all looked like this morning:

Pretty nice peppers, if I do say so myself!  I'm not sure how yellow the yellow ones have to get, but I think they are ready to pick, so I will pick some today for my salad.  You can see a green pepper hanging to the left of the red ones.  They all start green then with sun and time turn to whatever colour they should be.  Quite interesting, I think.

Here is my basil.  I have had a lot of pickings and it keeps growing.  I have put some in vinegar to preserve it for use over the winter.  Plus, I will use the lovely basil flavoured vinegar in dressings.  I have a book on preserving without freezing or canning so I'm trying a few of these very old ways of preserving.  Most of the methods come from France.  I am also going to take a few cuttings and try to root them for planting in the house.  I am trying to have fresh basil over winter.  I wonder if there won't be enough daylight though, even on the south facing window sill.  We'll see.

I have a lot of green tomatoes, a little pumpkin and some more cucumbers.  There are still a few more cucumbers than the ones you see, but they are rather small.  Honestly, I have never eaten a sweeter tasting cucumber than the ones I have picked from my greenhouse.  Actually, it's Susan's greenhouse.  It was a gift for her when she graduated with her Master's degree from UNBC.  Susan has moved to Kamloops so until she gets a permanent residence, I will baby sit the greenhouse. 

Dennis is off to Houston to get a bundle of fence posts, plywood and other odds and ends for finishing the barn.  I had better get busy on my list of things to do: make currant jelly, freeze beans, fix bird house, take the scale apart and try to fix it, laundry, etc.  My two big projects will be to re-build my herb bed and to build a foundation for the generator.  More on that later.  In the meantime it's off to deal with my task list. 

Have a good day, everyone!