Thomas and I have some big news.  This is something that we have been working towards for a while now - pretty much since we got married, and finally, we’re just a couple of months away, so I’m ready to share…

But first… I’ve finally created a new blog. I’ve been wanting to do this for a while, and I figured this new chapter in our life would be a perfect opportunity. Check it out and leave me a comment to let me know you made it on over.

http://FortheJourney.net

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A CSA is a way for the public to create a relationship with a farm and receive a weekly basket of produce. By making a financial commitment to a farm, people become “shareholders” of the CSA. Most CSA farmers prefer that members pay for the season up-front, but some farmers will accept weekly or monthly payments. Some CSAs also require that members work a small number of hours on the farm during the growing season.

Each week, I go to the Local Food Stop website to see if I want to purchase the basket of produce they’re offering.  If it is things I’ll use, I pay and pick it up at our church Thursday evenings.  There’s no subscription commitment or requirement to work on the farm, and it’s reasonably priced - cheaper than both of us eating out all week, and healthier.  Because they’re working with several farmers, there is a varied selection of produce, and so far, it has all been top quality.

This is what we got the first week: apples, plums, a pomegranate, romaine lettuce, green peppers, an acorn squash, zucchini, cherry tomatoes, purple cauliflower, and a little basil plant.

The best part of it is that we’ve been cooking a lot more with this great food.

• Baked apples for breakfast - cut in half, spread with brown sugar, cinnamon, and raisins, and microwave for 5 minutes.
• Pomegranate Walnut Chicken - bread chicken with walnuts and saute, cover with sauce from pomegranates, juice, red wine, broth, and some seasoning
• Acorn squash - cut in half, spread with butter, cinnamon, brown sugar, thyme, and bake for an hour
• Beef stew - crock pot the beef, cauliflower, zucchini, tomato sauce, and potatoes
• Pesto sauce - mix olive oil, basil leaves, garlic, and walnuts and then pour over cheese ravioli - we added in a little cream sauce too

I snacked on the plums, and am saving some of the stew veggies for chicken curry.  I haven’t used the tomatoes or lettuce yet.  We had a couple of snaffus due to our inexperience in the kitchen - we didn’t know how to properly bread chicken but the delicious pomegranate sauce covered it up, and our beef stew was a little bland.  The pesto was awesome, and I discovered a really cool mini food processor that was under my cabinet.  (Mom, did you leave that there?)  So overall, it was good enough to try another week.

This week, we got: tri-colored shard, red leaf lettuce, snap beans, concord grapes, radishes, yellow squash, apples, pluots, mushrooms, green onions, and an avocado.

This week’s recipes haven’t been posted on the CSA website yet, so I’m a little unsure on what to do with some of these items.  If you have any great recipes these, particularly the chard, lettuce, radishes, squash, or onions, let me know.

It’s a cozy converted house with a patio outdoors where they have live music on Friday and Saturday nights. They have a bookcase with boardgames and books, and display (and sell) handmade Rwandan baskets. They even stay open until midnight.

This is exactly what I was looking for in a coffee house - it’s almost even better than Third Place in Raleigh. (Third place wins because I used always run into friends there.) We played a game of Scrabble - I won…barely - and then headed to Chaplins for dinner where we sat on the patio and ate and chatted in the cool Fall air. It was a great, relaxing night, and hopefully we can do it again soon.

The other was from Thomas - a print out for an online auction he won (it was delivered today). I still don’t believe it, but he bought me a sewing/embroidery machine - a Pfaff Creative 2140. He did his research and got me a really cool machine that does all kinds of tricks. I’m actually a little intimidated by it - it just has a screen, no dials.

The day continued with lots of birthday wishes, Facebook messages, phone calls, and flowers from Thomas’ dad. That night, Thomas and I went to the Melting Pot for a delicious meal of cheese, bouillon, and chocolate fondue. Yum!!  This weekend, we got together with a few of our friends to celebrate with some beef ribs at Smokejacks. Yum again! Afterward, part of the crowd headed back to our house for a game of Apples to Apples.  Thomas will post the photos from that later this week.

I didn’t expect my 30th birthday to be so calm, but it was a lot of fun, especially going out with my friends. Thomas was so excited about getting me a new sewing machine.  He already had it set up when I got home from work tonight. We messed around with it until we figured out how to sew letters and a few basic stitches. I can’t wait to see what else it can do.

Hi, I’m guest-posting over at Alissa’s blog today.  If you use a feed reader, you might have seen my post accidently show up on my site as I was trying to get the formatting correct.

Alissa is a cool photographer mom in Kentucky that needed a break from blogging, so she got her online friends to help her out.  She posts cute stories about her two young boys, working on their farm, and beautiful photos of the nature around her.

Stop by and check out her site: Life’s Little Adventures