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Hi Reader,

Welcome to October! As always at the beginning of a month, I'm sharing some dinner menus I will be putting on our calendar from the October Dinner Menu Plans, which you'll find below.

But first I wanted to share a little more about the garden. I got quite a few responses from my complaining sharing last week about how poorly my garden produced this year - it's nice to know I'm not the only one who felt it was an off year, and from all around the country, too!

And while I will definitely amend the soil more than just compost (probably with manure), there were a few things I did differently this year that I realized (after writing 😂) may have impacted my harvest numbers.

1. The first thing is that I didn't use red plastic mulch when planting the tomatoes for the first time in probably 15 years. The squirrels decimated it last year, making it not worth the trouble (WHY did they want to tear into red plastic??). And while the red color was shown in Oregon State University studies to improve ripening tomatoes by 10-15% (I can't remember the exact %), the plastic also covered the soil which helped even out the wet-dry soil issue that can cause blossom end rot. So guess what I had more of than ever? So next year I'm going to make sure to use either a heavy black plastic (the squirrels didn't bother this) or a thick layer of straw and see what happens. Then I'll know for sure if the red plastic helped produce more ripe tomatoes or if was the more even soil moisture.
2. The second thing is I worked to plant more by intercropping, succession planting, and basically trying not to have bare soil. This meant that I didn't use the thick black plastic I've used for peppers for many years. The black color helped warm the soil and the plastic helped keep the soil evenly moist. My pepper harvest was the worst ever and the plants were not as big and didn't look as healthy. AND the lettuce I interplanted with the peppers was all eaten by ground squirrels, ugh.

So for me the lesson really is to cover the soil for these two crops especially (my other beds interplanted with everything from lettuce to carrots to cabbage were all fine and I DID get more produce from those things overall by planting more). Raised beds benefit from methods to keep the soil evenly moist between waterings.

I'm going to try straw, I think, for both and evaluate next year since using straw would still let me interplant a few things with the peppers (I planted celery at the corners of the bed which did well, as well as chard on the edges - apparently these are not tender enough for our squirrels, lol.).

Have you experienced similar things? What do you use to cover your soil?

October Dinner Menus

These are the menus I'm adding to our plan for sure (but I always refer to it throughout the month as I make our weekly menus).

• ​Black Bean and Sausage Soup (easy pantry recipe), Soft 100% Whole Wheat Rolls​
• ​Quick Mini Meatloaves with Chipotle-Honey BBQ Sauce, Garlic-Mashed Potatoes, Amazing Garlic Green Beans, Tomato and Feta Salad (So excited for this comfort-food menu!)
• ​Slow Cooker Spiced Whole Chicken, Simple Barley Pilaf, Caesar Slaw​
• ​20 Minute Mediterranean Chicken Pesto Pasta (using leftover chicken), green salad with Honey Mustard Dressing​
• AND/OR Chicken-Spinach Frittata with Feta & Tomatoes (depending on how much leftover chicken we have), green salad, Quick & Tender Breadsticks​
• ​Salmon Patties with Flax, green salad with Honey Mustard Dressing​Simple French Baguettes​

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In My Kitchen

It's slow cooker season! Did you know some people call this month "Crocktober"? 😂 I'm planning on sharing a few new recipes because I love my slow cooker even after getting an Instant Pot because there's something about that low-and-slow plus absolutely hands off that can't be beat.

Over the years I have experienced a number of different slow cookers and have had some bad experiences with the Crockpot brand spitting hot water all over my counter - imagine coming home to that after many hours?

So now I only have and recommend the "cook-and-carry" style of slow cookers because their lids have a cushion around the lip:

• I have this more basic Hamilton Beach portable slow cooker.
• Crockpot also makes a portable style that includes the cushioned lid that doesn't allow hot water to spit out.

The other benefit of the portable slow cookers is that you CAN easily take them in your car with no risk of spilling by attaching the side hooks (which totally happened to my daughter who didn't have one - guess what I gave her for her wedding?).

Have you had your slow cooker spit hot liquid like mine did?

From The Blog

​Good Things List No.89​ An new month means a new list! I'm sharing more about Glacier and Waterton plus plastic alternative covers, my new cookbook, and 6 books I read. ​ READ IT HERE! ​

​Easy Artisan Bread Recipe (Yeast, Dutch Oven, Whole Wheat)​ I've completely revamped this classic OC recipe with new photos and step-by-step instructions! Come see why one commenter called this her "Goldilocks recipe." ​ RECIPE HERE! ​

A Few More Things

Brian and I are listening to a new book about Aimee Semple Mcpherson and we don't know what to think!! Her heart always seems to be in the right place, loving people and wanting them to know Jesus, but her methods! And her leaving husbands! And not seeing her children for years at a time! We've had many times already we just look at each other with our jaws on the floor - 30,000 people in San Diego Balboa Park? Thousands lined up for healing - and leaving crutches and wheelchairs behind? I looked it up and newspaper reporters at the time took down names and followed up with the healed and more than 90% said they had some sort of healing and it was continuing.😳 Wow. I read a quote by her son who took over her ministry that he thought too many people believe in science over faith so that he couldn't see anything like that happening now. Hmmm.

I've been making more homemade ice cream and it's always a bit softer than store-bought because it doesn't have all the gums and emulsifiers (thankfully!). But it was melting so fast that I went online to see if there was a solution and in some forum someone mentioned insulated bowls. Oh my gosh, how we LOVE these insulated silver bowls! While not exactly my style, the ice cream barely melts at all - really! AND you don't need to chill them, AND your hand doesn't get cold holding it, either. (Stay tuned for more of what I've been making and what I've been using to make it...hint: creami 😀).

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I hope your week is wonderful! Thanks for reading along 💜

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