Hi everyone! Sorry this is so late today! I had trouble logging in to the blog and shop this morning and couldn’t get back into my computer until now! Sorry!

Hello Sweet Shoppers ☺ It’s Dana here 🙂 Happy Sunday! I hope you are all enjoying your summer (for those of you living in the Northern Hemispere)! Today, I wanted to talk about one of my favorite things about my summer this year – FRESH VEGETABLES! I do NOT have a green thumb, nor do I particularly enjoy gardening, so this year, I joined two CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) Farms, which means that each week I get a share of vegetables produced by the respective farm that week. One of the farms is about 5 minutes away from where I live – and I drive to it each Tuesday afternoon to collect my vegetables and fruit. The other CSA is a delivery arrangement, and I have a box of vegetables, eggs and fruit delivered to my doorstep every 5 days. Check out these pictures of some of the goodies I’ve been getting each week!

Here is a link to a website that I used to find my local CSA (Dover Farm). You should check and see if there is anything local to you!

I love heading out to Dover Farm each week – I get to speak to the two farmers first hand, see the chickens running around (my girls loved this) and pick my own fresh fruit (this week the raspberries are ready – yum!)

I actually joined my other CSA, Harvest Delivery, through Groupon – and it’s been great. It’s so fun to get a box of goodies delivered every few days. And, they are going to start fresh fish and lobster delivery soon as well – I can’t wait!

The hardest part about getting all these vegetables is actually knowing what to do with them! LOL!

I do a LOT of salads, just because I love them! Plus, it’s fun to add in new things each week based on what is delivered. I don’t usually add raw beets to my salads, but it’s really yummy! Also – I LOVE LOVE LOVE to juice! I have had a juicer for a while, but it wasn’t the best for juicing leafy greens – so I recently purchased a new juicer that works well with all the Kale I’ve been getting. I love making my own juices, using a variety of green vegetables and a usually some pineapple, apple and/or pear. Even my kids will try the juice (although I admit they don’t drink a lot – haha)

I also like trying out new recipes – both of my CSA’s put recipes on their blogs, which is usually where I start looking for new ideas each week. Last week I really enjoyed the Beet and Parsley Salad listed here – so, so easy and so good! We didn’t finish it all the first night, and I thought it was really good the next day too! I also had a lot of squash, so I made this Summer-Squash Soup with Parsley Mint Pistou (from epicurious). Soup and Salad is one of my favorite meals, so this was great! I also love grilling vegetables – so I’ll throw various veggies on the grill almost every night – they are all good!

I have big plans to scrap my summer CSA adventures – and luckily there are some kits here at SSD to help ☺ Have you all bought these yet? I know that I’ll be getting them VERY soon!

So tell me – what are some of your favorite recipes using fresh veggies? Have you ever joined a CSA? Do you grow your own veggies? Have you scrapped about it? Let me know here in the comments!

And have a wonderful day!