I can just write a little tonight, but I wanted to share one of my favorite photos from my seed-saving work this fall. Look at this bowl of green beans! Have you ever seen anything more lovely? Well, maybe you have, but these beans have to be up there.

I have the best story about these seeds. It was the end of the harvest season, and I had been working so hard to seed save so many things. I am not super skilled at some of the smaller seeds, so I had some trial and error. I was determined though and worked diligently all fall to save as many seeds and as many varieties as I could. I just had this strong feeling all fall that it was important this year to really step up my seed-saving game. I wanted enough for us and enough to share.

Green beans are the easiest to save and, somehow, I nearly forgot them. The night before our first big freeze, I suddenly woke up from sleeping and remembered I had not saved the green beans.

“There’s time in the morning,” I told myself as I went back to sleep, thankful I had not forgotten.

The next morning, when I got up to collect these seeds, there weren’t as many as I had hoped because I waited so long, but I was in awe of these beautiful beans I was able to collect. What a gift?

Green beans are the food that made me fall in love with garnering and growing food. They are magic, just like in the folktale–only all of them are magic. You plant one little bean and get all of that food. What is more magic than that?

And these look magic, don’t you think?