Grow Grow Garden

Y'all may remember that little garden we planted awhile back. Well, time has passed and, surprisingly, we managed to grow a few things! It wasn't spectacular (but it also sounds like this year was rough for lots of gardens in Indiana), but we got enough to eat and make some stuff.

One fun thing we grew this year was tomatillos. Those got blitzed up according to this recipe for salsa verde. It came out pretty great, but maybe a little hotter than I was planning. If we make this again I think I'd only use one jalapeno instead of the two I put in. It's still really good though, and Leslie even used it to make one of my favorite recipes we posted about last year.

Our garden also produced a few chilies, so we decided to do something different with those as well. What did we do? Make hot sauce! We didn't have a lot from the garden, so I supplemented our Habanero, Dragon Cayenne, and Carmen with some Jalapenos and Hungarian Hot Wax. The sauce came out pretty well, I think. It's not overly hot, and is rather sweet actually, but has a good flavor. I haven't used a ton of it yet, but I've enjoyed it so far. Hopefully we'll get a few more chilies next year and can make a bigger, better batch.

We also managed to get some good sized zucchini out of the garden. Leslie made some delicious zucchini bread and we shredded and froze the rest. I'm looking forward to more of that lovely bread all winter.

And lastly, tomatoes. They did about the best of anything in the garden. We ended up with quite a few and decided to try our hand at making some sauce. We blanched them, skinned them, and stuck them in the slow cooker with some onions, garlic, and herbs for a day before blending and freezing it. Ideally we would have canned it, but we don't have canning equipment yet. Maybe that will be our next experiment next year.

Leslie and I are also big fans of bread (in the words of Matt Bellassai, "You don't need people to have fun, you just need warm carbohydrates."), so we will occasionally make a meal out of bread and dips. One of our favorites is a bruschetta recipe with balsamic vinegar (we bust out the good, garlic-cilantro infused stuff for this). This recipe tasted even better this year when we used tomatoes and basil we grew ourselves. Delicious.

And that's about it. We used some more of our garden goods for a new recipe, but that's another post you should be on the lookout for soon. Thanks for reading and we'll see ya soon!

Puppy's Big Roadtrip

One of the things I do (and Leslie isn't a huge fan of) is backing stuff on Kickstarter. I just think it's really cool to be a part of getting a business started and, hopefully, seeing them continue to succeed long after the campaign ends. It's also a great way to pick up some nifty board games that you might not see otherwise. So when I come across a cool campaign on Kickstarter I like to get involved. Sometimes I give a good amount of money when it's for a good cause (like Reading Rainbow), sometimes I just give enough to get the product they're hoping to make (like Exploding Kittens), and most of the time I just give a few bucks to show my support and to be able to keep up with how the project/company does (like the Carpool DeVille or Edyn). One of the random projects that I backed a bit ago was Grandpop's Hops - a hop farm in Ohio. It's no secret that I enjoy good beer, so I was drawn to the project with the hopes that a local (while it's not exactly in my backyard, Ohio is pretty close) hops farm would help enrich and diversify the Midwest's craft beer scene.

I backed the project and so did enough other people that they met and exceeded the project goal. This summer was the farm's first crop, so they decided to put on a party to celebrate and invited all their friends, family, and Kickstarter backers. Normally we're busy on weekends with stuff around the house or seeing friends, but it turned out that Leslie was going to be away that weekend and I had relatively little to do. So... should I drive three hours out to a farm in Ohio where I'd know absolutely nobody? Yeah, why not!

But why not make a whole day of it? We (Leo and I) left the house around 11:30 and headed east. Our first stop was at a rest area just over the Ohio border. I love rest areas and have memories of some really cool ones from trips north through Minnesota and out west through Colorado and Utah. Unfortunately this was not one of those rest areas. But it did provide a place for us to get out for a bit and for Leo to... water the grass.

We journeyed on and reached the park quickly. We drove around a bit to check out the marina, campground, and overlook, then parked and headed to the beach. The beach itself wasn't all that impressive - it was basically just a bunch of gravelly sand along a reservoir. But the sun was out and the weather was nice, so who cares? We set up camp near a tree just off the beach (so Leo could be in some shade) and I read while he rolled in the grass and chewed on a rawhide.

Another dog at the beach that Leo really wanted to play with

He also thought my towel was for him

Eventually it was time to head to the farm, so we packed up and headed out. But, why go straight there... how about some ice cream first! Leo loves when we take him to the park at home and then visit the local ice cream shop, so why not do the same now? Plus there was a Dairy Queen a few minutes away, so clearly it was meant to be. We stopped there for a quick treat and then off to the farm we went.

Leo loves his ice cream as much as any other member of the Miller family

After about an hour drive we arrived at Grandpop's. I pulled into the drive, parked on the grass next to some other cars, and Leo and I headed to join the party. I didn't know anybody, but it wasn't a big deal. Everyone was very nice and, while most of the crowd was a relative to Michael Ford (the owner), there were a few other random Kickstarter backers there too. Now, over 200 people from all over the country and the world backed the Kickstarter campaign, so I didn't expect to be the only backer there, but somehow I ended up being the one that traveled the farthest and stayed the longest. (I think many of the backers that lived nearby just stopped in to see the place, whereas I didn't exactly have a huge urge to jump back in the car right away... three hours is a long enough drive to make you want a good break before doing it again.) Soon word got around that I was just some random guy that traveled from Indianapolis, which I guess isn't such a bad thing to be known as at a party. There was good beer, good food, and friendly people. I ended up talking a lot with some of the family, who were all very welcoming and answered my abundance of questions about the farm operations. I heard about what was going well, what some of the challenges the farm had faced, and what the future would hopefully hold for Grandpop's. The whole evening turned out to be a lot of fun and I genuinely wish I could have stayed longer, but the thought of that three hour drive wouldn't let me linger too long. I said my goodbyes around 8:30 and Leo and I headed back west.

Hops grow vertically, so twine is used to give them something to climb

The hops are harvested and dried in here

Eventually the whole barn will be used for processing

Michael Ford - owner of Grandpop's Hops

Leo, Jose Gonzalez, and I made it home a little before midnight, tired but content. We got some sun at the beach, met some great people, and had plenty of good food / beer / ice cream. Plus it was Leo's first time outside Indiana! It was a very long day of fun - so much so that Leo and I were still sleepy from it the next day. But it was a blast and I'm so glad we did it.

So where should the next adventure take place? Leo would love to see a few more states, and I'm sure Leslie could be talked into coming along next time too.

Thanks for reading and we'll see you next time!

Room For Activities

A recent post showed the benches that we made. Apparently these look good enough to make people think I actually know what I'm doing when it comes to woodworking and whatnot. Which is silly, as I'm certainly no expert. But that didn't stop a family from our church group from commissioning a loft bed for their (at the time) soon to be six year old daughter. They wanted it to be a surprise for her birthday and thought I'd be able to custom make something just the way they wanted. I said yes because, why not. Also, she's such a sweet little girl... and I'm secretly a softy.

We started out by having a quick meeting to discuss what they were looking for. They had a bunch of pictures from Pinterest and the like, so it really helped show me what I was getting into. They didn't want anything too flashy (no princess castle beds or anything like that), which was good. The pictures they showed me had a small staircase going up to a platform halfway up the side, which the child then climbs from to the actual bed. For a small child I think this makes sense - scaling the whole loft could be dangerous and this platform makes for a shorter climb. We kept this basic design but eliminated the stairs leading up to the platform to cut down on size. After that I got to work making a model of the bed on SketchUp. I emailed back and forth with the parents a bit before finalizing the design and eventually we settled on what's shown below...

I based my design on the pictures we looked at, but added some of my own touches. The whole thing is designed with mobility and assembly in mind. The top half comes off the bottom so it can be disassembled into manageable pieces and so that the top can just be used as a tall bed should she ever outgrow the loft. So your pieces are the platform, the lower half of the support on the right, the two top pieces that hold the bed, the two side pieces (if you look closely you can see that the two top side rails aren't attached to the head and foot of the bed, just the lower rail is), the crosspieces under the loft in the back, and the slats that support the mattress. This makes for a total of ten pieces and that's it!

After figuring out our design I went to work getting everything cut and sanded and stuff. The connections are mainly pocket screws so there aren't screw heads visible everywhere. The platform was made with a 2x4s frame that supports 2x4 slats and a 1/2" plywood shelf. It's all pocket screws except for the top slats which were screwed in from above. I then drilled holes in the top of the two legs that connect to the rest of the bed and inserted 5/8" dowels that line up with holes in the next piece. I also added these dowels to the lower support for the opposite end that's also 2x4s and pocket screws.

The next are the two top side pieces. These are essentially the same design and size as the lower support piece, but they have notches in the sides where the 2x8 side rails sit and one of them has more crosspieces to serve as a "headboard" of sorts. The side rails are 2x8s with a 2x2 rail on the inside for the slats to sit on and 2x4 rails attached to serve as safety rails. As mentioned before, the safety rails don't connect to the head and foot, but instead are just connected to the 2x8 using three mitered 2x4s on each side. I didn't use any pocket screws here and left the heads showing in case it's ever used as a bed and the safety rails need to come off. These two pieces sit in the notches on the side pieces are and held fast with bolts.

Next up are the crosspieces in the back. These are just to add some support and to keep the legs from ever getting to out of line. They're just 2x4s with threaded inserts in each end that connect to screws that come through each of the back legs. This was a better solution than pocket screws because the threaded insert won't get stripped and will allow the bed to be taken apart and put back together how every many times you want.

And lastly are the slats. I lined these up on the rails and then only secured two of them - one at the head and one at the foot. I then stapled three strips of nylon along the length of the bed to each of the slats. This allows all of them to simply be rolled up together into a bundle. So, to install them, all you do is place the roll on the rails, screw in one of the ends (it's best to start at the head), and then unroll the lot and then fasten the foot piece in when you're done. It's pretty brilliant, actually.

I got all the individual pieces assembled, put the whole thing together, and then took it apart again to start staining. I stained, applied polyurethane, and then sanded the whole thing down again. After that I put it all back together again and made the final connections (securing the platform slats and mattress slats, mostly, as it would have been too hard to stain/poly them while they were connected) and made sure everything fit together. We even put a mattress up there and Leslie tested it out.

A few days later it was the little girl's birthday and we delivered it that day while she was away. They sent us pictures of her coming home and seeing it for the first time and boy oh boy was she happy. Seeing that made all the hard work worth it.

So no, I'm still no expert carpenter. But I did learn a few things during this project (and got a few new tools!) and had fun doing it (most of the time... it's too bad her birthday wasn't in the fall when it would have been a little cooler while working out in the garage... but oh well). And no, I'm not about to quit my job and start making children's furniture for a living. But I do think my design is pretty cool, so I might put together an Instructable for it. In the meantime, if you have any interest in building one of these for your kids just let me know and I'll be more than happy to provide the plans, bill of materials, and some guidance... but probably not the work. I think I'm going to take some time before launching another project this big.

Thanks for reading and we'll see ya next time!