Denver eBay Sellers Group at White Fence Farm w/ Griff

The first time we were here was back in Aug.  This time was early December with all their Christmas decorations up.

The Denver eBay Meetup group met here and "Griff" eBay's 8th employee, eBay radio host, and Dean of Eduction was the guest speaker.  

They are famous for their fried chicken served family style with several sides. 

Each room had a different tree or theme.

This pink tree was in the kids area with a treasure chest for good kids to pick prizes.

"Griff" a very special eBay representative and a strong seller advocate.

Gene, Griff and yours truly!


White Fence Farm is sorta buried in the west side of Denver but well worth a visit. It's one of those kind of places that locals take visitors to.  Then they talk about it back home and friends, who come to Denver, want to go there too.

I wrote more about the restaurant in my blog from August.

We put in a huge garden for the 1st time. 5/22/11

When we moved into the house the yard was all grass except around the borders.  After we put the shed in we had a big pile of dirt, so we thought the area in front of the shed would make a perfect garden.  Last summer Gene started removing all the sod and spreading the dirt.  He covered it all with a large tarp to prevent any weeds from growing.  

Actually I was taking photo of the deer but the garden area and dirt pile is in the photo  yippee!  That day there were 9 deer in the yard - see that buck on the far left?!

Way in back next to the lilacs are 3 hills of pumpkin from seed, in front of them is 6 corn we started inside and in front of them is a row of corn seed.  Then staggered is 8 tomatoes - including 3 heirlooms!  And in front of them is 1 medium hot chile pepper and 3 mild Anaheims. Next are 1/2 rows of carrots and scallions then a row of radishes and mesclun, a row of onion starts, 4 leaf lettuce plants and finally a row of marigolds along the edge. 

 In back is 3 cukes we started inside, then an acorn squash.  Along side fence is a row of zucchini (a whole packet of seeds, and as prolific as they are we may be sorry - so I am thinking we will be stuffing a lot of blossoms).  hee hee. 

We also have 3 sections of green beans, 6 peas in little peat pots and a row from seed, 2 fennel, 4 Brussel sprouts started inside and 1 soy bean plant. 

I also have an herb garden - bottom left going clockwise is Rosemary, row of oregano seeds & basil seeds, oregano plants, dill seed row, large yarrow, basil plants, thyme plants, & cilantro.  Scattered are 2 dill plants and pots of dill and basil, we started in March. That is St. Francis in the middle. 

 

 This plot is at the bottom of our back steps.  Bottom section is curly leaf parsely and chives (in bloom).  Plus some scattered garlic.  Top sections is 3 different kids of strawberries. 

  

Along both sides of the driveway are these planters.  This one has 2 rhubarb, 1 red current bush & 2 red raspberries.  We have also planted 2 blackberries and 1 gooseberry bush in one the the border areas in the back yard - after we removed all the red landscaping stone.  yikes! 

There are also 40 onion sets scattered all over plus 20+ garlic cloves. 

As I write this on 6/3 - less than 2 weeks  since we planted - we have 10 corn seeds sprouted, 1 zucchini, 3 green beans, a lot of peas + the radishes, mescalin, carrots, oregano, dill and basil.  Plus lots of garlic and most of the onions are standing up big and tall.

Gene will not allow me to go to the garden center anymore this year (lol), so I have started a list of plants for next year. We are removing all the red rock along all the fence lines so we will have tons more places to plant.  Oh what to plant - what to plant! 

Now our big obsticle right now is protecting the plants from the deer and later this summer hail. Hoping having stretched some 6' wire fencing around the 2 sides of the garden to help keep the deer out.

So with everything hopefully we will have lots of herbs & veggies to give as gifts and to make crafts with.

How To Shop Economically on eBay

Sometimes we do something routinely and don't really pay attention to how we do it.  I was shopping the other day on eBay and realized that there are certain patterns I follow.

First thing I do is to change the search from the default best match to Price + Shipping - Lowest first.  By doing this I am also able to see the items with free shipping and move the listings that might have low prices but high shipping to the bottom of the list.

One caveat is that the 1 cent listings will show up at the top of the list.  I am very cautious of these because most of the time they will be sent from a country with no labor or human rights laws.  So be sure to evaluate each item and all the details about the seller. 

Typically I will customize the search from options on the left side of the page. As in our daily life I like to support a Mom & Pop business and really shy away from those sellers that have 10,000+ feedback.  

Colorado Springs is a city of chain restaurants and we try to support the small local establishments. I equate the chains to the big drop ship sellers that may ship from outside US. 
I don't want to wait 10 - 20 days for a delivery, so I control my search using the appropriate option. 

I hope you will support our Mom & Pop business and visit our eBay store where you can rest assured we have all the merchandise in stock and do all the shipping ourselves, usually within hours of us recieving the payment.

Thank you.

New Shipment of RUBBER DUCKIES Almost wordless Wed.

 And they are all sooooooooo cute. Vote for your favorite. The ahhh ones are last.

Monsters

 

 

 

Robots

 

Hairdresser

Get Well

Scarecrows (use for place setting on Thanksgiving)

Excersise - love the weightlifter (big muscles small head!)

Transportation

s

Fairies

 See all our ducks for the holidays including Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, patriotic and lots more. Perfect gifts, for a desk top, stocking stuffer, float in pool or hot tub, gift tie etc. 

Where to buy our ducks

LEGOS at Colorado State Fair 2010

Oh what fun for the kids!  They could play and build with the LEGOS all day long. 

Both sides of the trucks had pictures of all the LEGOS characters.

This is a traveling show that also passes out lanyards with LEGO trivia on it.  Did you know there are 915 ways to combine 6 eight studded bricks???

Colorado Springs Farmers Market, Fall 2010

Our Milkman.  They deliver 1 time a week,  year round.  The very best milk, farm raised eggs and the best dairy anywhere.  Love the cookie dough, and lemonade too. How awesome is that to have milk delivered in this day and age!!??

 

Our favorite farmer at the local markets.

Just part of their offerings.  What a bargain - fill a bag with anything on the table = $7.00 or pack a grocery, plastic bag for $10.00.

Our haul for $10.00 - Lots of eggplant, yellow and black bell peppers, 4 cukes, 6 ears of corn and fresh pulled onions.

V irtual Online Learning Webinar on ENTRECARD

Members of Danna Crawford's Virtual Online Learning are offered several opportunities, for learning all aspects of online business, through webinars, several times a month.

One of those topics was Entrecards!  This is a way for writers of blogs to promote their blog on other peoples blogs, for free.    

http://entrecard.com/

Once I signed up, I was given a virtual business card.  I visit other blogs and say "hi - I have been here", by dropping my card in the Entrecard box.  Each time I do that I get points that will allow me to place a link to my blog on theirs. 

The more cards I drop, the faster I move up in a search of different blogs under special topics. While I am watching TV in the evening I am also dropping.  Some days 50, some days up to 300.  My link is pretty much above the fold in the top 3 lines of the travel category. 

If you look on the right side of this page you can see someone else's ad on my page.  They have paid to be there and I get those points added to my account which will then allow me to place an ad on others pages.

The benefit from this is more visitors to my blog.  Google likes lots of hits and they will move that blog up in their search.  I have been on page 1 of a Google search on several subjects.  The most popular one right now is Euro Bubbles at the Florida State Fair. 

And by using Feedjit, I am able to tell where all the hits are coming from, which is from all over the world.

Has it helped my business?  I like to think yes because pro active efforts any self promotion helps.  

Once you add Entrecard to your Blog, please let me know so I can drop and advertise for you too.  

You too can be a student of these webinars that are less than an hour.  There are no assignments or time consuming homework.  There is no better bargain on the internet  

http://www.meetup.com/Virtual-Online-Learning/

Making Peach Jam Fall 2010

We made a new discovery this year.  Getting to the Farmer's Market fairly early let us get some bargains -specifically fruit that was slightly bruised and sold at a drastic discount.  The drawback was that it had to be prepared as soon as we got home.  Some of the peaches were soft but not rotten yet, but it would not take long before they were spoiled.

Just some of the peaches waiting to be processed, after they were washed and the bad spots cut off.

Putting them into boiling water for a few seconds, helps to loosen the skin making it easier to remove. That is the peach fuzz floating on the top of the water.

Notice how they look different after they are removed from the boiling water and placed in an ice water bath?

And the skin, slips right off.

After they were peeled, we put them through the food grinder with the medium blade. Here they are cooking in the pot following the directions in the Sure-Jel; package.

Processing in the water bath, again following directions.

MY 1st EXPERIENCE with CHOKE-CHERRIES

 

Late last week a very good friend passed on to us, 5 pounds of Choke Cherries, that she had gotten from another member of the Knights of Columbus.

I had never eaten them or even worked with them, so I knew it was going to be an adventure.

1st thing was to remove the stems and leaves. Phyllis said she popped the pit out at the same time.  Me, being a know-it-all, thought that certainly there was a tool to get the pits.   Boy was I wrong!!  

Following a recipe from the internet, I cooked them until they were soft, so that they could  easily be mashed through a strainer, sieve or food mill.

The strainer just let the juice go through and the pits got caught in the food mill.  Yee gads what a mess of this real, rich looking juice and fruit, that I know would stain our fingers, something awful.

At this point the fruit was still hot but we decided to let t cool and follow Phyllis's lead to do each one individually (daunting job to say the least!)

That worked but took the 2 of us, a few hours.  Fortunately we had plastic gloves!  

At times I can be alittle OCD and was curious how many cherries there actually were.  So we weighed 1 oz of pits and then all the pits.  There were over 4000 cherries that we had to touch them 2x.

  

 

The end result was 10 cups of fruit that I made into 4 pints and 5 -1/2 pints of jam and a pie.  The pie was yummy.  

Last year for our Christmas open house we heated Brie in the oven with raspberry jam on top and served with crackers.  This year I want to try it with the Chokecherry jam, maybe with some orange mixed in.  

Camping at Indy Lakes, Indianapolis, IN

4001 West Southport Road Indianapolis, IN 46217 (317) 888-6006.

The RV campground we stayed at in Indianapolis, IN is Indy Lakes. I found them a camping guide book and then checked out their website. Our spot was #10. All RV spots are back in. The young couple is the 3rd generation running the lakes.

http://www.indylakes.com/campgrounds.html

There are 3 lakes with a road around all of them. The RV sites are on the other side of that road and the edge of the lake is wide enough to allow primitive tent camping. It was lovely after dark when those campers had a small fire and the flames were bouncing off the water
The lakes are mostly stocked with catfish and carp. The Sat. we were there, the stock truck came from Ohio and we watched them put in over 40 carp. None of them were smaller than 15 pounds and the largest was 30 pounds. They actually weighed it before they put it into the water


Even though a license is not required, since it is privately owned, it is pay to fish. They have ongoing fishing contests all season with the top prize of $10,000.00. The fishermen catch the fish and net them in. Then bring them to the office to be weighed and put into a tank. The fish are held in the tank for a few days and then re-released. They say there is still an 80 pound carp in there.

I loved this power line. Folks were just a little ambitious with their casting.

Gene wandered over to talk to this man who is over 90 years old. He lives nearby and has been fishing here for many years. He told Gene that these lakes are formed from ground water in abandoned gravel pits. The deepest part is over 30 feet.

We had 6 tickets to the race and Gene’s daughter Kathy and Ray came from Maryland and my cousin Ed and Terry came from Florida. It was so special that they drove so far to visit and then to enjoy an event like the Indy 500. I was especially good since they are family.

There are more than RVers, campers and fish living in and around the lake. These 2 Canadian geese families would travel together and take the babies down to the water 2x a day and then wander off.

The whole area has lots of trees including female cotton wood trees. We do not have them in CO but know them from NM. They make long clusters of seedpods that look like grapes, only smaller. At this time of year they burst open and the cotton inside flies and it looks like snow.

There are thousands and thousands from each cluster. Each one looks like 1 piece of dandelion fluff, only smaller and more compact. As the wind blows them, they will build up along the curb, or stones or in the grass.

After the race and everyone was gone and the eBay packages were sent, it was time to kick back and enjoy. Notice the white spots on the water? It is the 'cotton' floating.

We highly recommend this campground and anytime we are crossing the country on I 70 we will drive the few extra miles to stay here for a few days.