Autumn leaves, new grounds, beetroot…

The autumn colours are particularly abundant and vibrant this year. We have our own word for the autumn leaf colour here in Finlandautumn leaf colour is called ruska in Finnish.

It’s exceptionally warm for October in many parts of Finland this weekend – over 15 degrees Celsius.

First just a few pictures that I took in our garden today:

October

October

October rose

We still have rose blooming in the garden, in front of the porch. We planted the plant in the summer this year.

October rose

October rose…

Okay, and what else am I doing…? 🙂 Hmm, for example, working by my computer for a bit again. And we, my boyfriend and I, we’ve been familiarizing ourselves with new grounds and exploring a new land – thanks to my boyfriend who had the chance to buy some land – forest and field, in the region of Etelä-PohjanmaaSouth Ostrobothnia, about 180 kilometres north from our home. So, that’s my boyfriend’s project, but there’s plenty of space also for me to learn new things and to help out, and in fact, we both already attended our first day-long course on how to take care of forest.

I already wrote earlier that we are growing beetroot for the first time ever, this year. Here’s now our pickled beetroot that we made yesterday:

pickled beetroot

I used water, vinegar, sugar, whole white peppercorns, cloves, a cinnamon stick and salt when I was cooking the pickling liquid. And I put also cloves of garlic into the jar. Should be nice. 🙂

-Leena

About some of the edibles in the garden

Today I’ll write a bit about some of the edibles in the garden right now. Here’s really only some of the edibles in the garden – about a few more a bit later…

sweet corn

This is the second time that we are growing sweet corn in our garden. Last summer our sweet corns grew from seedlings, these are grown from seed now. This summer has been very good for growing sweet corn here in Finland, it has been very warm and sunny.

sweet corn

The tallest plant is much taller than I am.

sweet corn

There are cobs growing in three plants or stalks, two cobs in each plant. We had several sweet corn stalks growing, but only three grew taller and are now growing cobs. Hmm, I’m still not sure how to talk about the different parts of the corn plants, how to call them, and not even in Finnish… :p But yeah, I’ll write about the harvest of our sweet corn then later. 🙂

potato

Our potato patch this summer – new patch for potatoes this year again… We haven’t dug up any potatoes yet.

carrot

This is how our carrots grow this year; a raised garden bed with a wooden frame. Neat, no weeds.

beetroot, parsnip, turnip

Beetroot, parsnip and turnip. A raised bed with the frame as well. And we are growing all these three for the first time ever. We haven’t dug up beetroot and parsnips yet.

carrot & turnip

But we have dug up some carrots and turnips already. I used these in soup.

tomato

And we have only one tomato plant growing this year, we had more than one, but only this bears fruit. But yeah, the plant doesn’t look very good anymore. The nights can already be a bit colder, and a bit cold for tomato plants, but we still have warm days. The temperatures have been around 20 degrees Celsius in the daytime.

tomato

But there’s fruit turning red all the time now.

tomato

tomato

Our first ripe tomatoes this year. I will never stop wondering at the taste of home-grown tomatoes – they taste so sweet and amazing. 🙂

-Leena

It’s been winter

When it’s freezing cold, the sun is shining. When the temperature goes up, there will be clouds. It’s -3 degrees Celsius today, and was already yesterday, when I took these pics.

January boat

By the frozen lake Pyhäjärvi

January

On the ice, there was a cool breeze…

Winter, like in Moominvalley...

Don’t you worry… it’s only winter here now, like… in Moominvalley…? 🙂

This tiger of ours likes to warm himself up beside a warm radiator in our living room. He sleeps there beside the radiator, or looks out of the window warming up his front paws. His sister doesn’t do that.

I'll have my say...

“I’ll just have my ass on it… If anyone tries to turn down the thermostat, I’ll have the time to have my say…”

ice lantern

Making magic, when it’s freezing cold – an ice lantern! – Below freezing temperatures, a bucket and water. And, for example, some beetroot water (from a beetroot jar), too, if you wish to have a pink ice lantern, like this one in our garden now. 🙂

-Leena