orange on green surprise
heart shows garden trick, fall joy
love me some pumpkins
pumpkin heart by Angie Quantrell
Yakima Valley
Haiku Moment: pumpkin heart
Tag Archives: RV Life
2025 Pumpkin Report
Like last year, the “new seeds” portion of the pumpkin crop was off to a slow start. I repeatedly replanted several sections of the various garden areas I have. Not to great results.
BUT the “toss out some old pumpkins and let them rot and self-seed” portion of the crop performed with glee! Pumpkin glee!
Keep reading to find how many pumpkins were harvested in 2025!
Especially productive was the raised bed we have way out in the pasture. That’s where I left several pumpkins from 2024: a white one my son surprised me with after a trip to a pumpkin farm stand, a smaller orange one, and one of those tiny pumpkins. They rested in the bed over winter and sprouted early. Hundreds of sprouts. I had to rip out handfuls to give room to the rest. By pumpkin harvest day, the spread was huge! We actually had to curb the growth as it headed over to the horse pasture (not ours) next door. It took many hours to harvest them. And then more moving them, ripping out the vines, stepping gently to find any lost ones.
Also productive were the tiny pumpkins planted (but also I left some from 2024, so it’s a toss-up which ones actually sprouted) in the sunflower forest bed. I love these, because they vine and grow up. We had them climbing pumpkins, shrubbery, and some of the pine tree (which began as a twig with roots from the Arbor Day Foundation, and is slowly taking over said sunflower forest and patio). I love discovering where these cuties show up.
I had some muscle to help haul in the heavy wheelbarrows!
We even ended up with a wagon of rejects (partially eaten) for the animal farm on the other side of the pasture.
Plus 40 in the trunk to go to church for a potluck!
Finally, here are the 2025 pumpkin harvest totals! Drum roll please . . .
White pumpkins: 17
Tiny pumpkins: 67
Orange pumpkins: 158
For an amazing grand total of 242 PUMPKINS!
So thankful for a wonderful harvest! Can’t wait until next year!
Just for fun, check out totals from last year here.
come fall
come fall, my breath eases
garden chores relax
cozy becomes theme of the day
sweaters resurface from storage
colors vibrate with final goodbyes
crisp air invigorates
dew dampens pant hems and ankles
caws and honks sing seasonal music
rustles dance through dried sunflowers
zinnias fade and go to seed
pumpkins dangle from spent vines
birds fatten, cats fluff, people bundle
tea and scarves and throws
beckon me to breathe,
embrace
all that is autumn
come fall by Angie Quantrell
Sunday Peace
Welcome to 2025! Over the years, I’ve changed the name of this type of post. Sunday Moments and Sunday Joy are just a few of the titles I’ve used. This feels like a good year to focus on Sunday Peace.
Whether rain, snow, ice, or sun, be brave and stand strong like this little pansy in one of my uncovered plant pots. Peace to you.
Free Yard Sales, Wood Scraps, and Homemade Table (Kevin’s Woodshop)
Welcome to another issue of Kevin’s Woodshop. In today’s story, we will hear how free yard sales, repurposed wood, and a little elbow grease contributed to this lovely weathered outdoor dining area.
FREE YARD SALES
Recently I visited “free yard sales” with my friend and fellow thrifter, Alyson. We love the thrill of the hunt. Free is an awesome word! My prize for the day is pictured above. Four solid metal framed wood outdoor chairs. Friends, that is what we call a SCORE. At this point in the “free yard saling,” I was cut off. No more stuff. Well. We only had her small car. Tetris in the car is the name of the game. And the limit to the thrifting.
I was so excited to haul these babies home. One of my favorite sights when I pull in the driveway after being away is to watch my honey’s face. My car is small, a Mazda four-door. BUT it works big! Like a truck. I call it my truck. I can get huge items in my little white truck. But not a gun safe. That is a hard limit. That’s a different story, but we did try.
I follow my husband’s eyes as I back around so we can unload my haul. Heh-heh. It’s almost more fun than scoring the “treasure” from yard sales or thrift shops.
He shakes his head. In wonder, I’m sure, amazed at how thrifty I am.
And proceeds to help me figure out how to reverse the process of filling my little “truck” with stuff. What. A. Guy.
REPURPOSED WOOD
We’ve been weathering our deck wood for a few years, always considering when it would be done to our satisfaction and what project required the updating of the deck so we could use the old wood.
Ta-dah! A taller patio table was needed to match the lovely free yard sale chairs. Time to rip off the deck wood.
Perfectly aged to that gray beachy tone. Some people work in clay, watercolor, textiles. My honey works in wood scraps. The older the better. The wood imperfections create challenges, sure, but the results are unique and wonderful.
HOMEMADE TABLE
Woodworker Kev got right to it. As I mentioned, aged wood often requires ingenuity and rethinking. That was certainly true with this table project. Some pieces were warped, so the framing had to be redone. He is so good though. Just look at that beautiful table! My style for sure.
Now we can dine al fresco (as long as the weather holds). Though we have to first wipe off the sunflower shells and debris from our guest goldfinches, sparrows, and red-winged blackbirds. After that, it’s sit and chill time. Ahhhh.
And so concludes another issue of Kevin’s Woodshop. Readers, do you enjoy old wood? Free yard sales? Thrifting? Dining al fresco?
Do tell.
Haiku Moment: mine
this lap is mine, mine,
mine, mine, mine. I will not share.
go away. my lap
mine by Angie Quantrell
Monet claims her favorite lap. And her beloved human. (Not me).
Haiku Moment: tricksy
winter rolled out, gone.
spring swept in, bright sun, blue sky-
but tricksy came back
tricksy by Angie Quantrell
Valentine’s Day surprise, Yakima Valley
Haiku Moment: winter’s grasp
deep freeze encrusted
window seat blocked, but sun! blue
escapes winter’s grasp
winter’s grasp by Angie Quantrell
Yakima Valley, 2024
Haiku Moment: playtime
i often wonder
why the couch looks like this-yikes-
playtime strikes again
playtime by Angie Quantrell
inspiration: Monet, destroyer of couch and assorted other household locations
I woke up one morning composing this haiku in my head. I was literally playing with words and counting out lines while I was in that between fully asleep and fully awake stage. That’s never happened before. I grabbed for my phone to take notes before my eyes were even fully open. LOL. My honey thought something was wrong, I grabbed the phone so fast.
Have you ever sleep-dreamed a poem or story idea?
Monet would like to know. And wonders if you have a couch she can destroy, or at the least, rearrange.
Butternut Squash Soup is a Winner on a Cold Day!
Winter has hit our area with the first snow (followed by icy rain and skating rink roads). As I wondered what to make for dinner yesterday, I noticed the last butternut squash reclining on the bench. Hmmm.
Back in the day (pre-RV life) I used to purchase tons of squash-type produce and decorate the house. Then we would eat our way through the decor. Now, with space at a premium, that practice has halted. But. That butternut sat there looking at me. “Me, me! Pick me!” my over-active imagination called out.
Bundled up from the cold, I realized I had everything I needed to make butternut squash soup. Yay! It was a soup and salad kind of night.
Here is the recipe. Or, I should say, the list of ingredients I included. I did not follow a recipe per say, but I’ve made butternut squash soup in the past, and I always read the ingredients on interesting recipes when I peruse cooking magazines. Also. I did not measure much. Maybe not at all. It was all by look, feel, and experimentation.
Butternut Squash Soup
1 small butternut squash, peeled and chopped into 1-inch pieces
1 sweet potato (red garnet is my favorite), peeled and chopped into 1-inch pieces
1 medium onion, diced
1 tablespoon butter
olive oil
about 2 cups of chicken stock
dried sage (or fresh, which I have but I didn’t want to go out to harvest it), crumbled (lots)
black pepper
cayenne pepper
half and half
1. Melt butter and a few swirls of olive oil in a medium heavy-bottomed soup pot. Add onions and cook for a few minutes.
2. Add butternut squash and sweet potato to onions. Add the chicken stock, enough to nearly cover the squash and potato. I wanted this thick, so I relied more on the boiling liquid and steam to cook the ingredients. Add pepper and sage. I wish I had thought about garlic, which would been delicious, but I didn’t think about it until we were eating the soup.
3. Cover and cook until the squash and potato are soft, between 30-45 minutes. Stir occasionally.
4. Once everything is soft, remove from heat. I used an immersion blender to blend it all together, but a potato masher might work as well. Add a few swirls of half and half, stir, and serve hot.
This was SO tasty and it hit the spot. I’m already dreaming of soup leftovers for lunch today. It turned out nice and thick.
Some other options I considered as we enjoyed the soup: garlic (added at the onion stage), topped with crispy bacon, topped with garlic pepitas, or topped with homemade garlic croutons.
Cheers for soup season! What is your favorite soup?
Love, Laughter, and Life 