New Coloring Page- Hope

 

Hi Everyone! I know it's been a really long time since I've updated this. So I'll get the pictures up then the explanation why. 

I hope you enjoy this "Hope" themed coloring page. Click the images below to download, print and color!

Small jpg version:

Large transparent png version:

So it's 2020. This year started out with some personal issues, then everything else happened. So most of this year has been spent with my family making sure I'm safe because of the ways I'm in the "vulnerable" category. 

I'm not saying it's been a bad year. There has been a lot of good in it. But one of the things that happened because of everything that I had to sort through personally is that I stopped drawing really regularly. Instead, I've been making clothes. A LOT of clothes. I'm coming out of isolation dressed in rainbows and calico and recycled t-shirt dresses. I sewed myself several Halloween costumes. Last year I got a couple overlockers and a new Brother sewing machine and they've been getting used nearly daily. It's been fun. 

I'm not sure I'm back yet, but I do feel more like drawing now. So we shall see!! 

Eating Weeds: Dandelions

I was just asked on Facebook about eating dandelions.

The answer deserves it's own blog post, not just a reply to a comment.

Dandelions are one of those superfoods in every way. Every part of a dandelion is edible. My family doesn't eat the stems, because they take some preparation and can cause stomach upset. But the rest of it we do. Fortunately, when my children were little they blew lots of dandelions and my lawn is not chemically treated.

First thing: Make sure your dandelions come from places that are not treated with chemicals or close to busier roads with exhaust particulates that will fall on the dandelion. You don't want to eat those things.

Okay, have a safe place to harvest?

In the spring, young green leaf rosettes can be pulled up or cut off at the base. Rinse them, pat them dry, and fry them in a tempura batter for a nice treat.

Later in spring, start looking for buds close to the ground, the buds should be tightly closed and sort of squared off at the top. A tapering bud like formation is after blooming but before going to seed. A new bud tapers down to a rounded end at the stem and has a flat wide top in comparison to the base. (I'll post a picture here later). The buds can fermented like pickles to use as a substitute for capers. I have some fermenting now! You'll use a basic salt brine, plus seasonings you like. Mine have garlic, red pepper, onions and peppercorns in them. A basic salt brine is 2 Tablespoons of salt to 1 qt of water. Clean all your ingredients, chop your onions if you're using them, and put them in the brine. Weight it down using either specially made weights, a smaller jar full of brine or a small zip bag full of brine. Make sure all your vegetables are completely submerged. Put the top on the jar finger tip tight and put it in a warm but not too warm part of your house. Check every day to make sure that it's not building up too much pressure. You'll see bubbles forming, that's normal. If the button on the top of the jar won't press down, relieve the pressure by carefully opening it just a little. After two weeks, check the tartness and if it's where you want it, put it in the fridge to slow (not stop) the fermenting. Eat within a couple months. If you want it more sour, let it ferment longer. Watch for mold, but as long as everything is properly submerged, there shouldn't be any.

Also in spring, young leaves can be used in salads. They are delicious, and considered a bitter.

Dandelion blossoms can also be fried, made into jelly or made into wine. A quick internet search will turn up a lot of recipes for dandelion wine.
My Dandelion Jelly Recipe
My Fried Dandelion Recipe 

You can rinse and freeze dandelion blossoms for later use in wines or jellies. Rinse, use a salad spinner to extract excess water or even squeeze it dry, freeze in single layers, then put in a labelled bag in your freezer to make the jelly when you have time.

For fried dandelion blossoms, any basic tempura batter works just fine though.

Older but not huge leaves can be boiled as any other vegetable, then used in soup. Discard the boiling water. Boiling helps get rid of some of the oxalates.

The bigger they get, the more bitter they get, so there is a point where you won't want to eat them.

The seeds can be collected, and threshing them lightly in a paper bag then using a fan to blow away the fluffs makes for a free seed that you can use to grow microgreens in the winter. Just sow as you would any other seed. They can also be sprouted, but I find microgreens a more effective use of time, plus if you miss some fluff, it won't matter with microgreens which you are cropping.

Dandelions are high in vitamins A, C, K and a good source of dietary fiber.

In the late fall, you can dig up the roots, cut them up and let them dry to hard, roast them either in the oven at 350 degrees Fahrenheit or toast them in a cast iron skillet. Store in an airtight jar. A decoction made by simmering the root in water makes a tasty non-caffeine coffee substitute.

More dandelions on this site include:

Dandelion Printable Recipe page

Dandelion and Bee coloring page

Dandelion Lined Paper Printable

Dandelion Jelly!!

Most of the time, we have enough dandelions in our yard for fried dandelions but not much past that because we really love fried dandelions. This year though has been a banner year for those happy sunshine flowers.

I know my yard has not been touched with weed killers or dangerous chemicals in the 16 years we've lived here, so I don't have any problems with harvesting from my yard.

My daughter is the jelly and jam maker in our home. She was enthused about trying this recipe from her grandmother.

Well, until I told her we had to pick about 11 cups of dandelions.

But picking the petals off of them went a lot faster with 3 of us. We just pinched the green ends off, then peeled off the green to get all the petals. It wound up being 8 cups of petals total.

So this is a recipe we don't double- but we do make enough tea to make 2 batches back to back.

We used pint jars because well, we do use pint jars usually for personal use jellies and jams. If you're going to gift it, use half pints.

This recipe makes about 2 pints or 4 half pints.

You will need:

5 cups of blossoms- cut and pick the green parts off, use only the white and yellow parts
4 cups of boiling water
3 Tbs. lemon juice
6 Tbs of powdered pectin
4 1/2 cups of sugar

First you'll make a dandelion tea. Pour the boiling water over the petals in a non-reactive bowl cover, and let steep at least until room temperature. We let it go overnight which made an orange-y yellow tea.

Strain the blossoms out of the tea, and press lightly. Pre-measure your sugar.

Measure 3 cups of dandelion tea into a pan, add the lemon juice and pectin and bring to a boil.

Add the sugar, bring back to a boil and let it boil for 2 or 3 minutes.

Put in jars leaving 1/4 inch head space and water bath process for 10 minutes.

It tastes like a honey jelly, bright and sunshine-y. It's delicious with Brie on crackers, which is how we have it served in the photo above.

It's absolutely a new family favorite, and despite the time it took to get just the petals, TG plans to make it again!

Book Review- Healing Herbs

I'm a big fan of foraging and using the things that grow wild around my neighborhood, so this is a book that I was very interested in reading.

Healing Herb's- A Beginner's Guide to Identifying, Foraging and Using Medicinal Plants is a lovely collection that's great for beginners because it covers easily identifiable plants and has recipes and tips for using them. Tina Sams has a blog and a magazine called The Essential Herbal and is very knowledgeable in her field. The photographs in this book are clear and gorgeous.

Starting with my favorite- dandelions, which are close to the end of the book.

The dandelion chapter is being used as my example of why this is a great book because I really love dandelions.

Each chapter starts with some history and scientific information about the plant, along with the medicinal uses. Then it gets into recipes! The recipes included are ways to incorporate easily found "weeds" into your skin care regime and diet.

Recipes include an infused skin care oil, dandelion fritters, dandelion root cocoa, a tea for PMS symptoms, green eggs and an infused vinegar.

I love the way this book is laid out, and the flowers and plants chosen for inclusion. There are recipes I've never tried before like gulkand, an uncooked rose petal preserve. The book includes things that can be found in your yard like plantain and dandelions, and a lot of things that can be easily grown or ordered if they don't grow wild in your area. For example, lavender doesn't grow easily here, but there is so much wild chamomile in my neighborhood that I've never even considered planting it in my yard. Raspberries grow wild up here, but I also have my own little thicket.

Chamomile

There were some things not included, so I'm hoping for a sequel that will have recipes for things like shepherd's purse and spruce tips, but I'm really happy with what is included.

If you're someone just getting into foraging and wild crafting, this is a lovely book full of great photos, information and recipes. If you're more experienced and have a good library already, this may not have any new information for you but it's still a very pretty book. 

On Facebook:

The Essential Herbal Magazine

Fair Winds Press

Shala's Beadwork and Printables (me!)

Amazon.com affiliate links don't affect your cost, and provide extra income to me personally, which helps support this site.

I received a complimentary copy of this book to review, I received no other compensation, and my review is my honest opinion of the book. You can read more about my review policy here.

Catching Up with June

June gets to be really busy really fast. With festivals and fairs, and with things growing in the garden and other stuff that needs to be done. The photo above is from Pride Fest 2014. The woman to The Amazing Turnip Girl's left is Daphne DoAll LaChores- a short film about her was nominated for an Emmy in the Cultural category, and you can see that here. If you've never been to your local Pride Fest- it can be a whole lot of fun. It's been a family event for us since TG was very little, and it's something she looks forward to every year. The last couple of years, instead of having a parade, there is an Equality March, and TG dressed up like the Doctor and painted that sign to carry.

More Amazing Turnip Girl! This time at our local ren faire. The first day, even though she didn't know it, was a PIRATE theme. She had decided on her costume without knowledge of that, and closet cosplayed Captain Hook from Once Upon a Time. For people as seriously non-cosplay as I am- closet cosplay is when you put together a costume using what you have on hand, and what's in your closet rather than going all out for an exact replica. The hook is made from a plastic cup, a "gigantic twist tie" (I didn't see it, that's what she told me), layers and layers of the ends of various rolls of Duck tape, and spray painted. 

The newest of my swatch dolls. Recently Spoonflower let people who ordered one of their knit fabrics try a swatch of their performance pique. I really love this stuff for swatch dolls, it prints gorgeously, and it's very soft feeling. A little trickier to sew, but worth the extra care. You can get this swatch here.

Today was dandelions- but what we did was gather seeds.

Just wrapped our fingers around the puff balls, pull, dump the little seeds and fluff into a gallon zip bag. Then after we had denuded a lot of dandelions of fluff and gotten some very odd looks from the neighbors- I brought the bag inside, closed it tight, and just started playing with it. Rolling it in my fingers, rubbing it, and shaking it. After a bit I wound up with about a 1/4 cup of seed defluffed. So now we are going to try sprouting the seeds. Also, somehow I wound up covered in dandelion fluff.

OH!!! and the BIG news!!!

Look look!!! Pre-orders are available now on Amazon, and the books are coming out in November and December.

Affiliate links help pay for this site, and seeing these ordered would also be personal exciting. Really.

So how is your month going?

Book Review- All You Need Is Less

I'm a second generation hippie so most of this book is things that I know, it's the way that I grew up. That didn't stop me from reading it (nearly) cover to cover in one sitting.

It's funny, there are parts that I read out loud to my husband because they made me giggle. The style and pacing is informal, well-written and breezy with a good dose of humor. The author talks easily about the silly moments that make up day to day family life and joy. The chapter I skipped was the one about diapers. My own children are young adults, it's a non-issue at this point. There are some adult topics covered, and some adult language, but nothing that I'd have a problem letting a 14 year old read.

There are some great tips in here, for easy ways to change up little things in your routine to live a greener lifestyle, but unlike a lot of books about living in a more eco-friendly way- the emphasis in this book was on reducing. On getting away from consumerism and improving your quality of life and the things in it.

It has lots of the tips and solutions for getting away from harsh chemicals and using more natural things in day to day life and less petroleum by-products. Instructions for cleaning sprays, how to shine your stainless steel, how to wash laundry in less harmful ways. There is a good chapter on gardening for the absolute beginner with some truly helpful tips. She also talks about shampoos, scrubs and skin care.

The author isn't crafty, she freely admits that cooking isn't her strong point and that she's never touched a sewing machine. This is truly attainable greener living by making small changes. My favorite part though was when she pointed out how much redundancy there is in neighborhoods, so many people owning the same things when people could be sharing. It's something to think about.

It's also really funny. She talks about the weird looks you might get when you choose to use a pickle jar for coffee, and how to avoid to being THAT person, you know the one. The one who is so green and smug with it that people try to avoid them.

Yes, I do recommend this book and plan to share it with friends.

You can find the author's blog HERE.

--------the part that isn't going on my Amazon review and it's just for my regular readers-------

I do have one quibble about the whole thing. She talked about how to get rid of DANDELIONS.
I yelled at the book at that point "You just lost major hippie points."
You all know how I feel about dandelions right? They are one of the first foods available for bees, they are bright and pretty, fried dandelion blossoms are a favorite food in my family and we plan to try sprouting dandelion microgreens soon. We eat the leaves in tacos and salads, and they are what I consider the "first crop of summer".
Why would anyone want to get rid of dandelions? I've watched kids come to my yard to gather handfuls for their moms- and they can because my daughter made so many wishes when she was little on them. She also used to pick them for me.
Be kind to dandelions.
(disclaimer- I do understand that sometimes your neighbors or landlords object strongly to dandelions, so knowing how to kill them without using toxic chemicals is a good thing. I just really, really love dandelions)

Published by Viva Editions



Amazon.com affiliate links don't affect your cost, and provide extra income to me personally, which helps support this site.

I received a complimentary copy of this book to review, I received no other compensation, and my review is my honest opinion of the book. You can read more about my review policy here.

Dandelion and Bee Mandala to color

It's GLORIOUS here. The weather, my garden and the incredible amount of dandelions that comes from living in one place since your daughter was little and blowing dandelion clocks all over the place. Fortunately, I like dandelions. They taste good, look bright and cheerful, and they are a good plant for bees.

I hope you enjoy this dandelion and bee inspired mandala. Click the image for a larger version to print and color.
Small JPG:

Large transparent PNG:

The image above is on my Facebook page if you'd like to share it. 

Friday was my birthday. My husband got me the camera I wanted. I'm all sorts of thrilled, and so is the Turnip Girl, because she got my old camera. There will be a summer photo post soon! 

The Hunger Games and Dandelions

Remember the part of The Hunger Games (the book, I haven't seen the movie yet) when Katniss found the dandelions? Since we consider them our first summer harvest, it made me smile. We eat the early shoots in salads, fry the blooms, and blow the seeds for more dandelions. The cheerful yellow dotting the yard is cheerful. I decided to use the 3 photos shown to make some printable pages for journals or writing down recipes. Click on the images for larger versions. All are in JPG format.

Facebook Cover Photos

 Going through my photos to find the one I wanted for a cover image, I found a bunch that I thought would make good cover photos. So here they are. Click on the images for a large view to download and upload to FB, they are 850 pix wide by 315 pix tall. All have a small ©Shala Kerrigan in the right hand corner. Please don't remove the copyright information for the photo.

Pair of bald eagles

Dandelion clock

Dandelion bloom

Duck butt (I thought someone might like it!)

Duck

Fireweed

forget-me-nots

graffiti on a sidewalk

full moon

lilac

wild rose

seagull

Flower photos

Just a quick post to share some flower photos I took in June. All of these are size at 5x5 inches, 300 dpi, and you have my permission to use the photos in non-commercial projects. Click on the images to see them full sized. I'm really wild about how well the spiral in the button center of the daisy shows!

Printable Dandelion Recipe Pages

I hope you like this layout as much as I do. The font used is Written in the Stars by Kimberly Geswein, you can see her wonderful handwritten fonts on her webpage, Kimberly Geswein Fonts with a Heart. Downloading and using the fonts for personal use is free, and a commercial use is inexpensive. They are great fonts for digital scrappers.

These pages are 300 dpi in PNG format for very clear printing. Click on the small versions to download the full sized 8x10 versions. 

Blank for your own recipes or digital scrapping.

Dandelions are wonderful

Photo taken by me using my HS10 Fujifilm camera-

click on the image to see the pollen on the bee's nose!

If you're considering growing food to eat, dandelions deserve a lot of consideration. They grow easily and well. To plant, all you need to do is wish on a dandelion gone to seed and blow. Nature will take care of the rest. Please pick dandelions away from roads and places where animals are walked. Also don't eat dandelions that are treated with fertilizers or weed killer. I get mine from my yard which I know is a safe place to harvest.

They are super healthy. A cup of greens is higher in vitamin A than carrots, has 1/3 the amount of vitamin c recommended for a day, and a fair amount of dietary fiber. 

They taste good too, young, tender leaves have a faintly bitter taste that goes well in a lot of salads. Making dandelion wine is traditional for St. George's Day (link to Tarragon & Thyme), the roots can be roasted to make a tea. 

The blossoms are lovely floating a jar, but even better battered and fried.

I *love* fried dandelions.

You can find instructions for a vegan version with photos here. 

Edited to add: Printable decorated version of this recipe is available HERE.

My version is not vegan. I based my recipe mostly off hazy memories of being a kid and picking dandelions for my best friend's grandmother to fry for us. She used a boxed tempura batter. I made my own batter.

Fried Dandelions Recipes

You will need:

Lots of dandelion blossoms- pick big, healthy looking heads and snap them off as close to the head as you can.

Prepare the dandelions by picking off the bottom set of leaves and trimming off the bottom- I used my very clean finger nails and pinched it off, if you're fussier than I am, use a small paring knife. It's very easy to trim off too much then instead of a blossom that's easily fried, you have a nice pile of dandelion petals. Rinse and lay out to dry.

In a bowl mix-

1/2 cup of flour

1/4 cup of corn starch

1 tsp of baking powder

1/2 tsp of salt (I used sea salt)

In a cup or another bowl:

1 egg

1/2 cup milk

1 tsp. vinegar 

1 cup water

Mix well and mix the liquid ingredients in with the dry ingredients.  If you prefer a thinner batter, add a bit of water to make it as thin as you prefer. 

Heat a couple inches of canola oil to about 350 degrees, I used my electric wok, I like it for frying small things because I use less oil with it than I do with my frying pan and the temperature is so easy to adjust.

Dip the dandelion blossoms in the batter, then fry until golden brown on both sides and drain on paper towels. Now convince people they are really worth trying, because apparently people have serious doubts. 

Salt and pepper to taste, use dipping sauces if you like them.

My son thinks these are fantastic, and they are still one of my favorite treats of summer. The reason I use the baking powder and the vinegar is that the chemical reaction between them makes a very light batter. It puffs up in the oil and it's just wonderful. 

Dandelions part 1 and a bonus

This is actually sort of a grab bag. I'm planning to make some dandelion recipe cards because I'm sort of dandelion obsessed right now, and because knuckstermom mentioned dandelion wine in the comments. But while I was working out designs, I drew something that I thought would be a good coloring page, and some art I'm just not sure if I like it or not. Looking at my templates, I found an old 100 dpi one that I don't use anymore, so that's getting posted as well.
The colored art is 300 dpi. The template and coloring page are both 100 dpi. Click on the images for the full sized versions. Feel free to add text to the art for personal use only, maybe something about wishes if you wish on dandelions!