Well hi there! Only 17 days till the big day. Does that stress you out a little bit or are you ready for the holidays? Shopping, baking and decorating all done? Whew! Me neither!
Hubs and I are doing the cleaning and decorating this weekend. Unless something unforeseen happens, the first weekend in December is always set up day for everything except the tree. Our tree usually goes up later, but we have decided to do no tree at all this year, as neither kid is able to come home for Christmas. This will be our first time ever without the kids and grandies here. Insert a very sad face here!
Anyhoo… today we put up two advent stars, light the second candle, put out some evergreen boughs in vases, and play some Boney M while we clean and put up Christmas. I say we, but it is really mostly me ; )
White paper advent star / Cord for lantern light / Paper star lantern
*As an Amazon affiliate, if you buy an item(s) from one of the links, I get a small commission to support my blog. It does not cost you any more to purchase through my link than if you went to the link on your own : )
Gardening Bits
17 simple garden ideas for every size, style, and budget. I love all of these ideas, though cottage style and potagers will always have my heart. Even if you have a style, you can borrow some ideas from balcony gardening for your deck, or city gardens and herbaceous borders for town or city gardens. Lovely ideas and photos.
If you are in a warmer gardening zone, in the pnw, you can direct sow hardy cool weather veggies like broccoli, brussels sprouts, kale, leeks, carrots, and parsnips this month in the garden. Broad beans, too. Sow your lettuce, spinach, kale, all the leafy greens under cover, like an unheated hoophouse.
Those of us here in Alberta are harvesting our goods from the freezer, pantry, and cold room, while we dream about planting in March ; )
These 11 plants that are good garden companions with lavender. Now, we are hard pressed to overwinter lavender here on the prairies, in a zone 3, however, some of these companions are great for our hot summers, like the catmint. Catmint is one of my all time favourite plants, both here and on the island : )
While we are on the topic of border garden plants, these 15 border plant ideas are food for thought. Love the sunny one, so carefree, colourful, and pretty.
Sweet onions versus yellow onions. What is the difference? This is a good read with great variety ideas added, as well. The one thing to keep in mind is that sweet onions do not store for very long, unlike the yellows that last for many months. Ours were still great in April!
This bit of news makes me worry… Canadians expected to spend even more money on food in 2025 | Dished.
I will be offering some ‘How to grow food organically’ workshops at the new potting spring, now that it is finally ready to go. Something for everyone from beginner to experienced. Stay tuned for workshops, dates, times. Do you have an idea for a workshop? Something that you want to learn more about? Message me or put it in the comments. Would love to hear from you : )
Picture of inside the studio as I made my wreath for the front door.
Homey Bits & Yuletide Ideas
These free printable gift tags! I am still working on painting my watercolour tags, but these are so very nice that I will print some of them off, too. You can never have too many, eh?
Seriously cute crocheted mushrooms and other mushroom decor ideas.
This sweet Scandinavian Christmas table and tree.
Love this idea from Rocky Hedge Farm blog to DIY your own laundry scent booster. Like a deodorant for your laundry machine. I like this idea, have made mine with lemon verbena scent.
Sweet Treats & Other Recipes
Having a sourdough starter is like having another pet in the household. You have to give it good care on the regular. My daughter says she will never do sourdough as she is busy enough with 2 children, does not need more commitments, hahaha. In the year or so that I have been baking with sourdough, I have only once felt like tossing it away, and that was quite recently, just after my bout with covid. I just did not care. However, I now back on track, loving every minute of having to bake something with my starter each week.
This week, I made…
- This gingerbread sourdough cake
- A couple loaves of caraway rye bread
- A double batch of these thumbprint cookies as they went over so well a couple weeks ago. I made half of them with a really good quality raspberry and apricot jams (meaning more fruit than sugar). They are so good, you all! You need to make these!
These are the ideas I found this week for our Holiday Cookie Boxes…
- No bake cookies with old fashioned oats
- Snowball cookies
- Or… this recipe for sweetened condensed milk snowballs (hmm, which one to choose?)
- Roly-poly Santa cookies (plus many other cookie recipes for your cookie box, too)
- These spritz cookies! When we moved from the island to the prairies, I donated my cookie press because I felt that I did not use it enough. Of course, now I am regretting that decision so much! They were one of my favourite cookies, despite the fact that I only made them once a year.
Cranberry Orange Scones. I may have mentioned this before, but I really love scones. Our friend out on the island makes the best scones in the whole world, so they have become the ultimate treat. Whenever I see a scone recipe, my eyes light up and I just have to try them out.
Lastly, I wanted to leave you with this… Pantone has come out with the new colour of the year for 2024, check it out here. What do you think? For the home? For the garden? I sure do love that colour in roses.
The Marigold Potager - A Zone 3 Prairie Garden 
Leave a comment