Welcome to the Madness

Building a Bucket Ladder/Poor Man's Greenhouse

2020-04-21T11:34:00.000-06:00

One of my projects that I have long wished for is a greenhouse.

Living in a wind tunnel and bald prairie makes a greenhouse difficult. Add in the occasional late season hail and it becomes a little more tricky.

So, we've been finding different options.

I found a picture of a person's bucket ladder, and Perry decided he could make that into a greenhouse type of thing.

Each level (there are three), has 7 buckets in it.
For a total of 21 five gallon buckets.

Each bucket has drainage holes drilled in the bottom.

We then covered the whole thing in greenhouse plastic. The front rolls right up for ventilation.

This spring I will be getting a 3 tonne load of topsoil. I will mix equal parts peat, perlite, and top soil to fill the buckets.
Top dressing with the plentiful organic matter my animals have donated. Haha

This spring I didn't get to plant early, I could have my hot crops out there right now (tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, etc). It is reaching close to 40 degrees Celsius in the day, and about 5 to 10 overnight.

This fall though, after my hot crops have finished, I will be planting one of the ladders full of cold crops. (Kale, chard, brassicas, etc) It should extend my season almost to February if the winter isn't too harsh.

I am very excited.
I will update with pictures once the plants start growing and give you better critique on what is or isn't working for me.

Side note: each bucket ladder cost an aprox $200. That is an excellent price for a poor man's version I would think.

Here is a small video of my llama saying hi. 😉 Ignore how loud and obnoxious my voice is on here. Sorry. 🤦‍♀️

Food Storage Fun - Sourdough Starter

2020-04-08T09:38:00.000-06:00

With the time spent in social distancing across the land, there have been many who have asked me sourdough questions.

I am by no means an expert.

I just really enjoy playing in the kitchen.

I also love food.

So, I thought I would put a few thoughts down on paper (well, screen) here for you in hopes of encouraging you to try this too.

There are many, many people who suffer when eating today's bread/gluten products. I was one of them. So, I went in search of an option my body wouldn't rebel over and found "natural yeast".

I won't bore you with all the cool science (you can totally read about it in so many places), but if I use my natural yeast (sourdough starter), I do not suffer. It is easily digested by my body.

So...

How to begin?

I would start here:

Buy this book.

I get nothing out of it if you do. I don't get any money or special stuff on the side.

It is just hands down the best book I've seen or bought so far about sourdough. (And if you have seen my book addiction...you know I am not saying that because it's the only one. Haha)

There are so many wonderful recipes and step by step pictures and tips inside this book.

You won't regret the purchase.

EDIT TO ADD THE RECIPE:

I've made a tonne of things with my mother starter.

Including bread, tortillas, english muffins, pancakes, cake, loaves and muffins, crackers, and even doughnuts!

So...I made you a very, very simple pictorial on how to capture your own wild yeast starter.

Because, social distancing. 😉

First, you have to use whole grain flour.

I ground some hard red wheat, hard white wheat, and a little rye for mine. You can do just about any whole grain, but wheat, rye, or spelt work best for wild yeast starts if you've never done fermentation in your house before.

Next, you add equal part flour and water.
I started with half a cup of each.
In a clean, glass jar.
Mix it up and set in a warm corner.
Cover it lightly with a covering (keep the bugs and dust out), but make sure it isnt tight. Tight will make it so the gasses can't escape. Ask me how I know. 😂

Every day, for the next 3 to 5 days, take half out - throw half away - then add in equal amounts water and flour to the remainder. This is creating a lovely place to grow yeast.

It will start to bubble.

See the bubbles?

It will also create a layer of liquid as it sits overnight.

This liquid can be stirred in, then do your half off and feed...or you can drain it off.

I drain mine off because I like my starter to be less tangy than some enjoy.

One note here.

At about day 2 to 4, you may think your start stinks.
It will be quite strong.
I don't particularly enjoy the smell of mine the first few days of feeding. My kids tell me it reeks. But it straightens itself out after a couple more days and become less tart.

This is freshly fed and ready to go.

After 5 to 7 days, your starter is ready for use.
Start with something simple like pancakes to test out effectiveness.
If it needs a few more days, then feed a few more times.
Or, it might be ready to go and you've got so many recipes to start playing with!

Enjoy and good luck!

Summer Tea

2020-03-23T21:49:00.002-06:00

I wrote this a while ago for my dear friend Tessa over at Homestead Lady (link here), (who just so happens to have a wonderful sale on her book all about prepardness. Grab it if you want an excellent work book to help you along!) but as garden season is coming, and so many of us are planning our gardens, I thought it might be worth publishing here as well...

Last year found me in my garden running from herb to herb, desperately trying to save my little friends before they succumbed to the frost.

I had a large, very large box, that I cut into as I went.

Freezing my hands off.

After I thawed, and washed all the herbs of their dirt, I noticed I had a massive pile of goodness I didn't know what to do with. I already had quite a bit drying, and this was extra.

Enter Summer Tea.

I had quite a selection of quite a few little things.

I collect mint, so there were 11 types of Mint. 2 types of Pineapple Sage. 2 types of Lavender. 8 different Basils. Rosemary. Catmint. Monarda. A few leaves of Yarrow and Mullin. And so much more.

From that, I just slapped them into a very large, flat box. Turned them once a week to break up the moisture, and kind of forgot about them.

Come January, I was cleaning up my storage room to find some mint tea. We do like tea at my house. I came across this lovely batch of dried herbs.

I crushed them all into smaller pieces and put them into a large glass jar. I used my immersion blender to crush into smaller pieces. This made the most lovely tea ever.

This summer I grew even more medicinal and culinary herbs and made it on purpose. Our family finds this to be very useful in keeping us healthy, and also keeping our tea addiction under control. haha

The first year we made simple tea bags, or used reusable strainers. This year, we even consume the leaf bits as we drink our tea.

If you have a surplus of herbals this summer, this makes a lovely way to use them up.

Flavored Rice Mixes

2020-03-20T09:44:00.002-06:00

Do you ever just want to have something super easy for dinner?

And ready ASAP because you don't want to wait?

Hahahahahahahahaha

Let's be real here. That is every day for me, but alas, I do not often get my wish.

This flavored rice makes my wish closer to reality though! Quite a few years ago, my good friend Lynn passed on her recipes, and as life here goes, we modified and chose our favorite combinations. Here are two:

Flavor #1 is super easy, and my kids favorite.

2C of rice
1C of thin pasta (broken small)
1/2C dried onions
2tsp Chicken soup stock powder
1tsp dried basil.

I like to pour some oil into a pan and brown the rice and pasta a bit, then dump in equal amounts of water, cover, and cook till tender.

It also cooks really nice in the Instapot or a rice cooker.

Flavor #2 is basically the same, but has some veggies added so it reminds me a bit of Mexican Rice.

2C of rice
1/2C dry Onion
1C freeze dried Corn
1C freeze dried Peas
2tsp Chicken Soup Stock Powder

Cook the same as above.
I have even added canned tomatoes as part of my water and that's amazing too.

I love simple mixes.
I also love food that comes right out of my storage.
Double bonus is that my kids can make this on their own!

Hope you enjoy!

Living Food Storage

2020-03-18T20:12:00.001-06:00

It's kind of a running joke/truth when we call our little farm our living food storage.

We don't keep anything here on our land that doesn't "work" for the food we feed it.

Just like my children. Hahaha

Seriously.

My kids work hard for our lifestyle.

Over the past 8 years of our living here, we've tried almost every animal.

Sheep, quail, several breeds of ducks, rabbits, cows, goats, chickens, turkeys, pigs of a few varieties, llama, maybe I'm missing something so I will say etc. ;)

So, if you are in the market for a living storage, let me walk you through what we have and why...

1. Goats

We have tried almost every breed of goat. We can't find cashmere or oberhaalsi, and I refuse to buy a myatonic goat, so those are the only 3 we haven't done.

Over the years of trial and error, this is what we have found that works best for us:

We love the high cream output of a Nubian. They are also some of the most friendly and social creatures around. I joke they are my big puppies.

Alpines and LaManchas have a nice high output for us. The LaMancha may look funny with their earlessness, but they have pretty darn hardy babies. Alpines seem to have pretty big babies as well so that's a bonus in the colder months of kidding.

Toggenburg goats are so wonderfully hairy. Like big shaggy beasts (as big as a goat gets anyway. Haha). I also love how their mohawks stand up when they are challenged.

These 4 breeds have become very mixed and mingled in our herd. We have bred selectively for teats, milk sacks, and output, and have kept our favorites back. But have ended up with a bunch of loveable mutts that give us massive amounts of milk each day.

2. Llama

No post about our farm would be complete without Tina.

She came to us with some injuries and has been a steady presence since then.

I adore her.

She is a calm protector.

She loves babies and is the herd babysitter.

She is a very small eater, but is a beautiful fixture on our little homestead.

So, even though she doesn't produce food, she protects it and earns her place in my food storage. (As do the cats!)

3. Ducks

Specifically Muscovy Ducks.

We have tried a few varieties of ducks and geese, but these little friends win.

They are excellent bug eaters.
Our backyard never has mosquitos, our front yard does.

They are amazing mommas.
Each one of our hens generally sits on 2 nests a year, and hatches an average of 8 ducklings per hatch.

They taste like beef and their eggs are amazing for baking.

They are pretty easy to keep contained in our yard. Although they fly, they are smart enough to stay close to home, and that makes me like them even more. Haha

4. Pigs

We have tried a few different pig breeds over the years, but our favorites are Berkshire and Large Black.

Berk for their beautifully marbled meat, and their tendency to not get fatty. They are also amazing mommas. So conscientious around their babies.

Blacks for their totally calm disposition. They are also wonderful mothers.

We have bred these so that we have a nice barnyard mix of both and love the cross.

They make amazing garbage disposals, wonderful ground breakers, and they eat weeds like no other! I honestly love having all those qualities.

Plus...
...bacon!

5. Chickens

We love eggs.

And chicken.

So, it was only natural to have chickens.

In fact, that was the very first animal we ever got here on our little plot of land.

I love the colors, textures, and sizes of all the different kinds.

I also love the egg colors of each variety.

So, we have a mixed bag here too.

A little of this, a little of that, and all bread together for a little hybrid vigor.

So there you have it.

Those are my top animals, the ones we will always have.

Our own living food storage.
With it we have fresh eggs, milk, meat.
We also have companionship and learn lessons each day from them.
We also have the opportunity to work hard.

If you have the ability, I highly recommend getting an animal or two.

How do I Make a Food Storage Anyway??!

2020-03-17T15:30:00.002-06:00

I have many friends and acquaintances who have seen what we do, or how we eat, and they think we have some sort of magic formula or way of acquiring food.

Often people tell me they can't get a food storage because they don't have a couple thousand dollars to buy it all in one shot.

I will tell you a secret - neither do I!!

What we do have though is determination.

When we were first starting our food storage journey, we were discouraged because we lived on a small budget and didn't have the cash to spare to buy more than one or two things here and there.

But, determination wins all the time.

Here are six ways we have made food storage happen at our house:

1. We grow a pretty large garden.

It is a whole family effort.
We have contests (last year my 3rd son and DH tried different ways to grow corn to see who could have the best harvest), we weed every single day for an hour as a family, we grow things that strike us as cool - but also things that will feed us.

We have a very large selection of seeds we've ordered...

...and saved.
I firmly believe that if we are storing food, we should also store enough seed for the next year to grow.
So, as a result, we save seed.

2. I never say no when someone offers me free canning jars.

As a result I have more than I need, but I also have enough to share.
I also have enough to give to my kids as they move out.
When my son got his own place in a nearby city, I had extra for his essentials and didn't worry about shorting myself.

That leads me into...

3. I can everything.
For real.
I am pretty sure there isn't anything I haven't tried now. Haha

Canning can be quite expensive.
Or, if you grow your own, shop sales, and barter, you can have quite a stash of food set aside for cheaper and healthier than what you get in the store.

4. I try really hard to never say no to free produce.

This means that sometimes I don't know what I'm going to do with that 50lb zucchini, or how the heck I'm going to process 100lbs of apples, but I always am thankful I took the time to put it up and found a way to make it happen.

5. I barter like crazy.

Everyone has something extra.
I've bartered pigs for photo sessions and taco shells.
Extra grain for chicks.
Soap for cherries.
Garden design help for honey.
The list is only limited by your own imagination! People are generally willing (even eager) to barter. This means that your food storage can grow while you trade your surplus.

6. I buy in bulk.

Maybe this means I find an excellent price on Oats, or dry beans.
Sometimes I run to the store for sugar and it's on sale, so I buy two.
Or, I'm picking up baking powder, and it costs $5 more to get a 2gal bucket of it instead of a 500mL container.
I always go for the bigger package because I tuck the rest away in my storage.

I know that some of these tips don't work for everyone, but at least some do.

You may not have room for a large garden, but you do have room for a few pots to grow some cukes or tomatoes. Then canning your extra.

You may not have room to store a million jars, but you do have room to tuck some jam away that you made when strawberries were on sale.

You may not have room to store 300lbs of wheat per person, but 5gal buckets store nicely tucked into that broom closet or behind your hanging clothes.

It has taken me MANY years to gather my stores. It did not come overnight. No matter where you are in your journey, there is always room for one step forward. The important part is taking that first step.

So, come with me.

Let's take that first step together.

I celebrate every single success of yours. If it your first time making jam, and you made 4 jars (!), or it is your 34th year canning and you tucked away 600 jars or produce.
Every success is 100% worth the celebration!

Please call, text, email, comment if there is anything I can help you with!

Food Storage Fun - Cornmeal Tacos

2020-03-14T18:36:00.000-06:00

I have been debating for a very long time about what I want to do with this blog if I start writing again.

I thought about writing practical lists.

Possible tips and things to buy.

Maybe something about this novel virus.

But I've decided I want to start focusing on practical things we can do to help keep our family alive during some sort of emergency.

Enter my first idea.

The other day I picked up 25 lbs of cornmeal for my storage.

I was asked 3 times what I was going to do with it.

I've also been asked about what to do with other things I keep in my long term storage.

So...I thought I would focus on how I use things in my storage. Enter "Food Storage Fun".

(Because food storage friday ties me to a day of the week and I'm just not that kind of girl anymore. 😂)

To start this fun off, I'm going to give you one of the easiest recipes you will ever see.

Cornmeal Taco Shells

1/2 Cup Cornmeal

1 Cup Flour

1 1/2 Cup Cold Water

1/4 tsp Salt

1 Egg

Mix it all together.

In a very hot, ungreased frying pan, swirl the batter on the bottom until it is covering the whole thing.

Flip when the edges start to lift up and the top is dry.

Remove when other side is cooked.

Seriously easy, and so yummy.

We ate ours tonight with a simple cheese sauce that I added scramble fried pork to (from our goats and pigs respectfully).
Also some home canned salsa, sauerkraut (get those probiotics!), and lettuce.

Simple and so delish.

These also taste yummy with:
*Peanut butter/hazelnut spread and apples/bananas.
*Scrambled eggs and salsa
*Refried beans and cheese
*Milk Meat and cheese and pico

And so much more.

I would love to hear from you about what you would like to know. I am by no means an expert, and honestly have changed quite a bit since I wrote here last, but I will try to share my practical experience if I have it to help you.

Meanwhile, here are some recipes to play with as you use your food storage (here), enjoy!

Solid Lotion

2014-01-23T09:46:00.003-07:00

I promise this is the last of my "home remedies" posts for a while. Promise!

BUT, these are awesome people. Gotta post them!

This is a lotion bar.

Solid lotion.

It works kind of awesome. ::)

You hold the bar in your hand, and the heat from your skin makes it soft enough to spread on your skin. So much for taking way too much lotion (wait - am I the only one who does that??!) and needing to smear it all over in places that don't necessarily need it.

I can just use this on the places I want it right then. I find it works especially good on my feet!

So, wanna make your own?

My oldest son and I experimented with a few different recipes, and this is our favorite:

Solid Lotion Bars

1 part Coconut Oil
1 part Shea or Cocoa Butter
1 part Beeswax

Melt the solid oils/butters together in a double boiler (or glass jar in some boiling water) and add:

2 Tbsp Infused Oil
60 drops of Essential Oil
Vitamin E

Mix well and pour into molds. I just used some silicone muffin tins. Let stand until hard (like about 8 hours) and pop out. Use on all your dry skin.

Cheers

How To Host an Herbal Exchange

2014-01-21T11:49:00.000-07:00

A Herbal Exchange?

An Herbal Exchange?

Oh well. It was an exchange!

A few months ago I ran across a photo of an exchange that a woman did. She did it just before Christmas and used the products for her gifts.

I loved the idea, but wanted to do it just after Christmas because I didn't want to overload my friends with stuff to do.

I asked around, texted, emailed, and told people to invite friends. After a couple weeks, I had 15 people committed to exchanging.

This was perfect because 15 is a do-able number.

Also 15 gives you a wonderful assortment of things to play with!!

I made a muscle rub based on the muscle balm I already make. Placed it in little jars and printed a recipe (see below if you want it). This is what else I got:
Flu Buster Kit (lotion and capsules to take)
Lavender and Calendula Body Butter
Shower Disks
Breath Easy Lotion
Balm of Gilead Burn Cream
Solid Perfume Sticks
Calendula Salve
Marigold Salve
First Aid Salve
Coffee Soap
Almond Lotion
Shampoo Bar and Pineapple Weed Infused Soap

Super fun!!

I knew all but two of the attendee's, but all of them didn't know each other as they came from different places. It was great fun to get together and discuss our methods of why we chose what we did, what it works for, and how we made it.

We had 3 ladies who had made only the one product they brought before. We had some who had a couple products under their belt. And we had the rest who had been doing this for at least a couple years. It was a grand showing and telling time for all of us!

If you ever get the chance to try something like this....grab it!! It was a wonderful time for all of us.

Now the recipe:

Muscle Rub

In a glass jar:
20 gr beeswax
25 gr Coconut Oil
20 gr Shea Butter (or Cocoa butter)

Melt and pour into a blender. When it is almost solid (but not solid), begin to blend and add in a steady stream:

3/4 C Infused Oil (I use a few kinds, comfrey, calendula, plantain, chickweed, arnica...to name a few options)
2/3 C Distilled Water
40 drops of Essential Oil (I use a pain blend I developed)
0.1 oz Vitamin E Oil

Blend just until mixed and thickened. Pour into glass containers to let solidify.

This will keep for about a year in a cool, dark place.

Rub onto sore muscles, headaches, pain, and inflammation.

Cheers!

Head and Muscle Ache Balm

2014-01-15T07:59:00.000-07:00

In my last post I talked about the balm I made for muscle aches and headaches. I thought I would share it with you.

It is amazing for temporary relief. I am a big fan of something that I can do that doesn't damage my kidneys as much as taking the massive amounts of drugs it requires to tame one of my headaches!

To use for muscle pain rub on affected area as often as needed.

To use for headaches (seems to work for most types of headache) rub on temples (be careful because the fumes make your eyes water so I always lay down after), back of the neck on your brain stem, and on the forehead. Apply as needed.

Headache and Muscle Balm

0.3 oz Peppermint EO
0.3 oz Lavender EO
0.1 oz Frankincense EO
0.1 oz Wintergreen EO
0.1 oz Birch EO
0.5 oz Cocoa Butter
0.2 oz Castor Oil
0.4 oz Bees Wax

Place the Essential Oils in a separate container.
Melt the butter, oil, and wax in a heat proof, glass container. Use a pan with some water boiling in the bottom. It will take about 5 min or so.
Add the EO's and heat till mixed well.

Pour into your containers.
Let set up and use on all muscle aches.
Be careful around eyes and mucus membranes. You do not want to get this in there. If you do, immediately flush with water and get it all out. (not speaking from experience or anything as I rubbed my eye frantically with a towel!!)

This causes a pleasant cool burn. It will be almost instant relief of muscle pain.

Hello Again!!

2014-01-13T15:23:00.000-07:00

Did you miss me when I was gone?

I missed you.

We had/have some pretty big happenings going on right now, and to be honest, at one time it was all I could do just to get out of bed
or breath
or even function
so my blog took a really sad back burner to everything.

Here I am trying to really quick catch you up on what happened in our lives since September.

We started school really successfully. We love having neighbours who also homeschool because it sure makes our co-op classes fun! This has been a great year for school. Busy, but great.

While navigating school, we also needed to harvest our garden. We got some super yummy stuff, and even managed to save seeds off things like tomatoes (above), peppers, tomatillos, and squash.

We also had a super yummy fondue with our friends. Fried food. Really, what could be better?!

Speaking of food....

DH is the YM president here in our branch, so for an activity he had the YM come out to harvest some chickens, ducks, a goat, and a goose. All but 2 went in my freezer to feed my family this winter. Those 2 fed the YM some super yummy tacos.

Then we had another harvest of chicken. We have had 4 this year. It feels good to know what my family is eating and to know that the animals are dealt with in a humane manner, and are loved and respected.

Plus home grown meat just tastes better!

We also had the super awesome experience in October to be part of our neighbours baptism. What a special experience to go through the discussions and baptism with them! It is amazing to be with them as they learn and grow.

We also acquired a puppy. She has grown since this photo, but she used to be so little. She is still just as bad though. Eating my dresses is sport to her...they blow around so therefore are game!

And because we weren't busy enough, on October 30th we got a phone call for a new baby!!

He is a foster to adopt baby. We got to bring him home when he was only 4 days old! We are currently fostering him until he either goes back to his mom, or he is adopted by us. Obviously we love him to pieces and he is such a member of our family already. We should know more by about May of this year if we get to adopt him or not.

Then the snow blew in.

Drifts as tall as our fence happened (which our dog loved because she could bark at everything from Waaaay up high, and our goats loved because they like to climb!) and we got snowed in for two days before we were finally able to be plowed out!

Although I can't complain because I got DH for the whole time!! It's not often that you get to take a snow day at work!

I also read some amazing books for our book club.

Having the temple so close gives me ample opportunity to attend at least once a month. Reading these books has given me a new perspective and opened my mind to so many beautiful truths that previously I didn't think about. It is amazing. I love going, even when it is to do baptisms with my boys. They constantly amaze me, and their dedication to going on a regular basis is inspiring.

I started taking a wonderful herbal course called "The Taste of Herbs" from Learning Herbs. I am loving it! I have also spent quite a bit of time playing with herbals and making new things, like the muscle rub above.

The muscle rub has come in handy after a massive accident that scared and really rocked our little family. On December 11th, I was driving my 3 oldest to the city 1/2 hour away to attend a ballet. We lost control on the ice and collided head-on with another truck.

That is my poor little Explorer. I am so very thankful that I was driving a tank though, because even though we were on the highway, and we were in a head-on collision, we all are OK.

My oldest was flown to the Alberta Children's Hospital in Calgary, AB. He had fractures in his orbital bone, a brain bleed, a large laceration above his eye, and was being watched for possible brain damage.

I have spent many hours crying, praying, and thanking our Heavenly Father for our blessings.

My oldest was released after 4 days and is so much better.

The most amazing part? I could literally see the hand of the Lord as he healed right in front of my eyes. He is still struggling with his brain injury, but it is not serious. He ended up having concussion like symptoms and is fully aware of how blessed he is to be alive and well.

We all have emotional trauma, but we are all fine.

We came home and had an amazing Christmas together. It was wonderfully healing to just be together as a family and love and play together.

Also for Christmas, my BIL came down from Edmonton. Everyone who comes from Edmonton, or is going past Red Deer knows that they should buy me donuts from the Donut Mill! BFF status is secured this way!!

Not only did he remember, he brought me 2 dozen!!

I also got a necklace that gives me permission to be bossy at all times.

What? You can't see where it says that??

The little portion that says, "be wise" is a joke. One day a friend of mine told me that she would listen to what I had just said because I was "wise". Her code for "bossy"!! Since then it has become a joke to the women I know around here. A friend found this in Saskatchewan and brought it home for me for Christmas.
Aren't my friend's amazing?!

Life here is good. We have had a few bumps along the way.

We are still struggling through a pretty major bump. But we believe that Heavenly Father has a plan for us. He has something in store that he wants to teach us. We are trying really hard to learn whatever that is.

I am going to try really hard this year to make this blog something of a journal of the bumps and learning opportunities along the way. Posting recipes, book reviews, happenings, and blessings we receive this year. Please bear with me as I fumble along this year, and please feel free to come along with me!

Cheers

How to Skin a Chicken

2013-08-21T07:00:00.000-06:00

***WARNING***

Graphic Photos are following. If you are not able to view them, please don't. This is a pictorial on how to skin a chicken.

We have been raising our own meat this year. We wanted to have our own control over how our chickens (ducks, geese and goats) were raised, what feed they were getting, how they were treated, and how they were housed.

We knew going in that our animals are not pets. They are respected, treated well, but ultimately they feed us.

My friend stated the other day as she was standing under her apple tree:

"I stood under an apple tree this morning that I planted and tended for about 15 years now. It's hard to explain, but I felt a wave of gratitude, kinship and history with this tree as I picked it's fruit and munched on the occasional one ( a mutual giving and receiving relationship). I felt I knew it and it knew me."

Isn't that beautiful?! It sums up my feelings so well.

I have been feeling a great connection to my food for a couple years now, and as a result this has been our next step into becoming more connected and responsible to/for our food.

We do not glory in the death of the animal (or veggie, etc) that has given it's life to feed us, we glory in the fact that we could care for it, raise it, and later use it in such a way to give us life.

We also have taught our children to be involved, having some beautiful teaching opportunities about the sanctity and beauty of life.

Because we got into raising our own chickens for meat, we knew this day was coming. We knew we would be harvesting our own chicken, but three roosters just came a little faster than we were planning. They were so vicious they couldn't wait till the normal 20 weeks for a chicken.

I searched and searched all over the internet for a pictorial on how to skin a chicken.

I didn't want to pluck because it stinks and it takes FOR.EV.ER!! I also can't eat chicken for a couple weeks after because of the smell.

I heard that skinning is easier, quicker, and less stinky. I am all for easy so I wanted to try it out.

Because I couldn't find a decent tutorial, or pictorial on skinning, I had my son take some snaps as we did ours. Here it is if you find yourself needing a guide to harvesting your chickens.

Get your space ready. We don't have a beautiful stainless steel sink and worktable like some, and we are still old school with a chopping block, but it all works great.

Some essential things we have found you need:
A super good axe you can handle with one hand. MUST have a super sharp edge.
Bucket for after you remove the head.
Plastic to keep your area clean.
Gloves (optional, but nice to keep your hands clean, they are easier to change than washing your hands each time they get dirty)
Garbage bag for feathers and skin.

Super sharp skinning knife.

I didn't post removing the head, but if you want to know how to do that, contact me and I will tell you. I was trying to spare some people's sensitivities.

After your bird has been dispatched, remove the feathers from anal to rib cage. This is so you can access the gut area.

Carefully cut into the skin. You will cut through a layer of skin, then fat. Stop there. Your guts are right under that and you don't want to pierce any of them.

Separate your skin by easing your finger in between the meat and skin. It comes off really easy.

Get some legs out, and the breast, cutting skin where needed to access the meat.

Place your hand into the cavity and work your fingers around the insides.

Remove them all.

It should be totally empty when finished. If you didn't grab all of them, go in and get the rest. Carefully so as not to puncture the organs.

The easiest way to remove wings and legs are to break at the joint. This will also remove all the skin and feathers. It just slides right off when you have the breast and up to the joints exposed. Just slide it all off and dispose of it.

When you are done it will look like this. You may have a few feathers on your skin, but we just wash them off as they were just strays, not actually attached.

All done.

Finished weight will depend on the breed and age of your chicken. These three averaged about 6lbs. They were Cochin roosters (which are supposed to be incredibly docile, but these three were not) at almost 17 weeks. The feathers were a pain to take off, and I am so glad we skinned instead of plucked as these little men had WAAAAY lots of feathers!!

There you have it. I am kind of in love with skinning as it only takes us about 7 min start to finish for one bird. Plucking takes us about 20-30 min per bird. I am all about time saving so skinning seems to me to be the better option!

Cheers

Burn Paste

2013-08-19T11:43:00.000-06:00

I have been having fun with herbs. :)

Picking herbs and drying them.

Making things with them.

The other day I thought I would try another herbal remedy for my stash.

Burn paste.

It was so simple I almost hate to tell you about it!

All you need:
Comfrey
Raw Honey (mine was not raw as I ran out, but use it if you can)
Wheat Germ Oil
Blender

Use equal amounts of honey and oil. Blend until emulsified.

Add comfrey until a paste is formed.

It will stand up on your spatula.

Place into bags, label, and store in the freezer.

If you get a burn (who am I kidding, WHEN I get a burn) remove a chunk - it does not freeze solid - place on your burn and wrap with a burdock leaf. If you don't have burdock ~~please come get some from me!!~~ you can just use gauze, but the leaf will keep your skin from peeling with your gauze when you remove it. Wrap the burdock in gauze. Replace your paste as needed to heal your burn.

This will help heal without a scar. (or minimize your scar) It will also minimize or take away the pain entirely. Bonus!

Cheers

Teaching This Year

2013-08-13T14:27:00.000-06:00

I know it may not be super interesting to some, but I am posting my outline to teaching my boys this year. Warning: Super long post...sorry.

It helps me keep track, and maybe it might help ideas for you, or something. :) (the links are for your reference, not because I make money from them...because I don't.)

Grade 9: My Oldest

English

Book study - The Hiding Place, My Mothers Secret, "Fake" Holocaust links (1 & 2) - Compare and contrast with opinion on what really happened. Maybe watch a movie like Schindler's List After.
-Beowulf or The Last of the Mohican's
Vocabulary Book C (BJU) - Bi-weekly
Wordsmith Craftsman - Weekly
Daily Grams - Daily
Reading Detective - Weekly
- Stop & Jot
- Photo of the day for storytelling/creative writing - weekly on blog
- 7 Steps to a Perfect story, then write me a story.
Spelling Bee - weekly (use the 100 words for HS)
Journaling on blog - at least weekly

Math

Teaching Textbooks

Typing

Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing

Misc "Home" Skills

Money Management for teens - bi-weekly

Art

Once weekly art class with co-op
52 weeks of drawing prompts
OR
Drawing Lab

Science

Once weekly class with co-op (I am teaching)

Home Ec

Once weekly class with co-op (I am teaching a year long in depth cooking class)

History

Once weekly class with co-op (they are doing story of the world)

Phys Ed

Twice weekly class with co-op

"Extra's"

Thursday School with our school board (they go all day to learn what our teachers have prepared once per week. This gets the hours with the board to qualify for "teacher led" even though it is 100% me leading the rest of the week)
Piano lessons once weekly

Grade 7: My Middle (all links that are the same book have been left out)

English

Book Study - Treasure Island
- Chains OR Fever 1793
- Door in the Wall OR Farmer Boy
Wordsmith Craftsman - weekly
Reading Detective - weekly
Apples - bi-weekly
Daily Grams - daily
- Photo for storytelling/creative writing on blog - weekly
- 7 steps to the perfect story - then write me a story
- Newspaper Generator - to use for a weekly newspaper for a month, reporting whatever he feels the need to report on!
Vocabulary A - weekly
Journaling on blog - weekly at least
Spelling Bee - weekly

Math

Teaching Textbooks

Typing

Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing

Misc "Home" skills

Money Management for teens

Art (my son who loves art, will be doing some extra art things)

Once weekly class with co-op
52 weeks of drawing prompts
OR
Drawing Lab book
- Draw in Faces
- Comic book printable
- Foam Armor
Creating a Masterpiece

Science, History, Home Ec, & Phys Ed

Once weekly class with co-op

Extra's

Thursday School
Guitar Lessons once weekly

Grade 3: My Baby (again, all links that repeat are missing)

English

Book Study - Frog & Toad Together
-The Mouse and the Motorcycle
BOB books
Kids Kit Magnets for storytelling
Story Teller Magnets for storytelling
- Photo of the day for story telling - weekly on blog
- "I am as..." starters for teaching similies and metaphors
Reading Detective
Daily Spelling
Journaling on blog - weekly
Spelling Bee - weekly

Math

Teaching Textbooks

Typing

Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing

Art, Science, Home Ec, History, & Phys Ed

Once weekly class with co-op

Extra's

Thursday School
Piano lessons once weekly

So, there is my plan. I hope it all works out. I have ordered a tonne of things from this new company that I found. They will direct bill to my school board so it does not come out of pocket for me. I kind of got out of control, but there were so many new things I thought would be fun to try, plus after schooling for so long, I am running out of things to spend my funding on. :) Just kidding, but it is getting kind of that way. We end up spending the last thousand or $600 on books or something at the end of the year.

What are your plans? What do you think I should include?

Are you excited for school? I am so excited to gear up for this year. I can hardly wait!

Cheers

Summer is Busy!

2013-08-09T13:04:00.001-06:00

Haven't been here for a while.

Like long time!

So here is a brief pictorial of what we have been up to...and why I was missing for a while.

Weeding a hugemongeous garden takes time. Lots of time! Lucky for us we didn't have a tonne of weeds. Thankful for that!

Exploring new abandoned properties, finding treasures and trees to transplant to our land.

Made some great new Hutterite friends. I went out foraging a few times with them, and they gave me tonnes of canned tomatoes I turned into sauce and salsa.

Making my very first poultices! Exciting no?!

Harvesting things from our huge garden. Onions are so good fresh from the ground!

Making pies!

Planning this year for school.

Drying yet more herbs.

Getting new baby ducks, chickens, and fully grown geese.

Watching how fast our other babies are growing! The black one is still just a baby and is already almost as big as the brown one who is just about a year!

Life has been really busy, but oh so very nice.

Cheers

Making a Poultice

2013-08-09T13:03:00.002-06:00

Once upon a time I was a normal kind of girl.

I would get sick, or get hurt and I would find something that a Dr. could do for me first, then go the herbal rout second.

Now it is so far past that.

I almost always go the herbal rout and skip the Dr. because it works so well for me to do stuff herbally.

So, this year I learned how to do something that I am sure all of you know how to do, but in case you don't, I thought I would share.

I made my very first poultice!!

My son came home from camp with a pretty good sized sprain. He gets them often, but always gets some steroid cream from the Dr. This does nothing for him, so I thought I would look into a herbal way of doing things.

I happened to pick a crap-load of Comfrey that day.

And I had an old sheet on hand to rip into long strips. (about 4' long, 6" wide)

Take some fresh herbs (I used comfrey for the healing of swelling, but you can use whatever herbs you need for yours) and add them to your blender with just enough water to blend.

Remove from the blender and add flour to make a paste.

It will stand up on the fork when it is done.

Pile about a burger sized portion on one end of your strip.

Wrap end over end until it is all wrapped up and wrap in wax paper.

Store in plastic bags in your fridge for short term storage, freezer for up to a year.

To use, remove from wrap. You can thaw and heat, or use cold. Unwrap, and place the "burger" where you need it. Wrap the remaining fabric around the limb to secure. Keep on for about 6 hours. Remove and repeat as needed. My son needed 6 days of once a night application. I put it on just before bed and right as he woke up. The pain was gone after 2 days, the swelling after 4. I did it an addition 2 days just to make sure.

I made about 10 of these this time, but next time am making more. For some reason sprains and strains are common around here! The next batch I make will also have mallow in them because I also have a crapload of that!

Cheers

Never Fail Soap Recipe

2013-07-08T06:00:00.000-06:00

Due to popular request, I am posting the recipe that I alluded to in my catch-up post last week. I have been searching for a simple soap recipe, one that I could use with whatever I had on hand, and one that was easy to sub things into. Enter this recipe.

I promise that you will make gorgeous soap no matter what. Seriously. I have tried this 4 ways (see variations below) and all have worked. It is amazing.

The soap lathers great, is simple enough to make within a half hour, and lends itself to experimentation and substitution.

Fine print: Please plug your substitution values into a lye calculator just to make sure yours comes out properly. There are several free ones on the internet, and some you can buy. I bought mine as an iPad app from Bramble Berry Soap Shop.

Basic Soap

21 oz Lard

16 oz Canola Oil

16 oz Coconut Oil

7.41 oz Lye

17.5 oz Water

1. Melt your solid oils together in a pan. Add liquid oils. Measure the temperature.

2. Freeze your water (or other liquid), place into a glass bowl. Sprinkle the lye on top of the frozen liquid. Stir until the lye is dissolved. Measure the temperature.

3. When temperature of both are within 10 degrees, add and blend with a stick blender.

4. Trace is when the liquids are all combined and it starts to get a little thicker. Think thin pudding. DO NOT blend past trace or it will separate again and your soap will be ruined. (been there, done that!)

5. Pour into your mold. I just use a cardboard box that is slightly bigger than a loaf pan, line it with parchment paper.

6. Wrap the box in a towel and place somewhere you won't disturb it for 24 hours.

7. Remove from your mold (box) and cut with a sharp knife into pieces. I use a pastry cutter. It is a long metal blade type thing and works great!

8. Place in a cool, dark place and let cure for 4 weeks. This is to reduce the strength of the lye. It will burn if you use it right away. Lye likes to have a little rest before it is used.

9. Use your soap and enjoy!

Variations:

Goat Milk Soap - substitute goat milk instead of water.
Goat Milk Oatmeal Soap - Sub goat milk for water, add 1/2 C finely blended oats (I put mine through the coffee grinder) just before trace.
Healing Goat Milk Soap - Sub goat milk for water, sub Balm of Gilead oil instead of canola (or dandelion, or a combination of both), 1/2 C finely blended oats
Coffee Scrub Soap - Sub triple brewed coffee for water, just before (or at) trace add 1/2 C coffee grounds
Goat Milk Honey Soap - sub goat milk for water, at trace add 4 Tbsp raw honey
Clay Soap - at trace add 1/2 C re-hydrated clay of choice
Lavender (or herb) Soap - at trace add 1/4 C crushed and dried herbs/flowers, 1oz essential oil (I have done lavender eo with lavender flowers, dried lemon peel zest with lavender eo, lemon eo with dried basil, rose eo with rose petal dust, etc)
Basic Scrubby Soap - at trace add 1 C cornmeal and 1/2 C poppy seed

Those are a few of the many variations that you could try. If you don't have the right amount of oil, you can also combine so the total reaches the need amount (I combined Avocado oil and balm of Gilead to make the canola requirement, and I also combined a few solids to do the lard requirement, both worked great) Please let me know if you try it out. I would love to know how it works out for you!

Hazel's Eulogy

2013-07-07T06:00:00.000-06:00

On the 20th of June, my dear friend Hazel Valentine Henderson passed on to our Heavenly Father's embrace. She was more than a friend to me, she was family.

I didn't get to attend her funeral, and I wanted to so badly, but I couldn't make it. I knew my Dad had given her Eulogy because he had contacted me a few days previously to ask for stories about her. When asked nicely, he shared his piece with me.

I wanted to have it here recorded so that I could keep it somewhere I wouldn't lose it. She was important and loved by many, but to me it seems she was just mine. In my Dad's voice, his words below. Enjoy if you like.

It was 1977 that Jenny and I were ﬁrst introduced to Hazel and Bob, just shortly after they joined the church. Jenny and I were still newlyweds, having been married less than a year at the time. As seems to be the case with most newlyweds, little did we know about where life would take us, not to mention the signiﬁcance of that ﬁrst meeting with the Hendersons...

Our ﬁrst child, Jaime was about three months old, when one day at church Bob and Hazel told us we needed to enjoy a night out. Because they were still so much in love, they knew something we had yet to learn, and that was to take time for each other, regardless of what else might compete for your attention. They also put their money where their mouth was... They told us not only should we get out, but they were going to babysit our three month old daughter, free of charge. That night was so signiﬁcant, I remember the movie we went to... The ﬁrst Star Wars movie. It was also signiﬁcant for them, because Jaime cried the entire time we were away. But even though our child terrorized them for the 2.5 hours we were gone, they were still happy and excited for us when we returned... And no, it wasn't fake.

That night started a relationship that went far past friendship. Shortly after Bob's death, our oldest son, Aaron, was born. Hazel had already made sure I knew she expected to be the one I called when Jenny went into labour. I didn't hesitate to call her. Nor did I hesitate when Jenny miscarried, nor did I hesitate when Malcolm was born, when Keegan was born, or when Seonaid was born. In fact, we recall with fondness the night Seonaid was born... Apparently we left Hazel in such a rush we weren't very grateful hosts, so she just curled up on our couch without any blanket, not wanting to wake our kids. Jaime, who was 12 at the time, got up and noticed Hazel on the couch and put a blanket on her so she could sleep soundly. Small payback for that night of crying she submitted Hazel and Bob to twelve years previous, but our kids had already developed a love for Hazel that will always endure. Hazel attended every important occasion in the lives of our children... Baptisms, piano recitals, high school graduations, weddings... You name it, Hazel was there, for every one of them.

Here is what they told me when I asked them for some memories...

From Jaime: When I was in high school, lunchtime was really hard for me. I struggled with not having any friends to eat lunch with when it was so very important to have friends. Hazel invited me over to her house once a week to eat lunch and play piano. She was a big part of making school more bearable for me. I will always remember that seemingly small act of kindness to a teenage girl. I may not have had grandparents
close but she was always there to ﬁll that role. When I had kids she adopted them as her great grands without a second thought. Gage was just telling me he truly loved her like a grandma and that is rare for kids. When Kolten was learning how to play piano she let him come once a week to play for her. No matter the song, she was so nice to him. She would gently encourage him and make him feel like he was a true performer. My boys also fondly remember the duck she had that delivered jelly beans out its
backside.

From Aaron: The most special thing I remember about Hazel is not an event... I just remember who she was. She was always considered our Grandma because she was there for our family and it was easy to feel her love. It made me feel special that she always remembered my birthday with a card and a phone call where she would sing Happy Birthday while playing it on the piano. When we started having kids she did the
same for them and made them feel special. She is such a kind-hearted lady and will be missed from our life. It's hard because I still remember the smell of her house and her big old car from Beny's. I love her and look forward to her hugs in the life to come.

From Malcolm: I remember her little suitcase that she'd bring whenever she babysat us. It contained clip on jewelry and necklaces... I don't think she was bringing them for me, but I remember getting good use out of them. Pizza parties at her house were always good times as well.

From Keegan: I remember Hazel taking us out for supper when we were baptized. She made us feel very special on a very special occasion, even though when it was my turn she dropped me off on the front step not realizing you guys weren't home. I also recall her performing at my school with her musical group of elderly people. They sang, "How much is that doggie in the window?" I was so proud to know a celebrity.

From Seonaid: I remember all kinds of cool things in her basement, but most of all I loved playing with her old typewriter. During high school I'd go to her home to play piano (she taught me several versions of chopsticks) and to have tea parties complete with pop and tomato sandwiches. I would gag down the sandwiches because I never had the heart to tell her I hate tomatoes.

To Jenny, Hazel was a dear friend... in spite of the fact nearly four decades separating them in age. Jenny only has fond memories of her and says they needed each other. She says Hazel made her feel so important and that she was always doing a good job. She feels so blessed to have Hazel consider our family to be like family to her, something Jenny didn't fully become aware of until about 10 years ago.

She remembers that Hazel loved to eat and that we had many home cooked family dinners together. (And, may I add, Hazel always had plenty of room left for dessert... She could put away at least as much as any of our growing boys.) These family dinners would often culminate in a game of Scrabble as Hazel would drink her cup of hot water. (Did I mention she likely had another piece of dessert?) Jenny visited Hazel at least weekly up to her dying day. During the last six months or so, Jenny ended each visit by giving Hazel a hug and telling her, "Remember I love you," to which Hazel would reply, "I love you too..." even when Jenny wasn't sure if Hazel knew who she was.

As we've heard, Hazel loved music, and in particular, playing the piano. She's played with, and for, many of you. Even the handmade greeting cards signed by "Hazel in The Hat" were adorned with musical notes. Just a couple of weeks prior to her passing, Kenzie and Kennedy, two of our granddaughters, each played a piano piece for her. In spite of the fact Hazel was in such pain, somewhat confused, and frustrated because
she couldn't communicate well, she still had periods of lucidity where she'd smile and say the music was lovely.

She also loved Scrabble and played it with a take no prisoners attitude, a fact that can be attested to by Barb Burton and others who spent many hours playing the game with her. (It's a good thing Scrabble isn't a contact sport or we may have seen a different side of Hazel, so great was her passion for the game.)

Hazel had integrity. While still living at home and driving herself wherever she needed to be, she came to our home for dinner one day and told me something had happened on the way over. Apparently she had driven through a red light and hadn't realized it until she got through the intersection. "I don't want to hurt anyone," she told me. "I'm going to stop driving." She took her car home that day, put it up for sale, and never drove again.

Hazel also had a great sense of humour. When she was living in the Valleyview and still well enough to come to our weekly Sunday family dinner, I once called her up to arrange a time to pick her up. She told me that some of the ladies had been talking about the fact some young man (me) picked her up so often. When I arrived in the lobby there were several of them, watching. Hazel gave me a big hug, took me by the arm, started walking out with me, then turned and said goodbye to them, adding with a twinkle in her eye, "I don't know if I'll be back tonight... Don't wait up for me."

Not long after that incident, Hazel asked if I'd take her picture so that she could send it out as a Christmas greeting. I decided Hazel deserved something more than just a snapshot, so I went to her residence at the Valleyview with a backdrop, lights, and all the associated requisite paraphernalia. Hazel insisted I leave her door open so that all the people walking the hall could see the model and her photo shoot. After seeing the
results of the photo shoot—the photo you see today—Hazel told me she had a whole bunch of people who wanted my services. "Because," she said, "If you can make me look this good, they all want it." Truth be told, all I did was set up the lights and backdrop and press the shutter release on the camera... The looking good part was all her doing, and it comes from a life full of serving her fellow man as the Saviour himself
would do.

Several years ago, when Dee Pitcher was the bishop of 1st Ward, Hazel told me how privileged she felt to have her bishop as her home teacher... Someone who would check up on her on a regular basis, perform acts of service for her, and leave a spiritual message in her home. She said, "I feel so spoiled." I haven't spoken to Bishop Pitcher about this, but knowing Hazel so well I can guarantee he would tell us he was the
privileged one and that, in fact, he was the one who was spoiled by being able to serve Hazel in such a manner.

This is all underscored by the fact that, after being unable to attend church for sometime due to illness, great efforts were made by her ward family to make Hazel feel welcome and comfortable when she was once again able to attend... Rides were arranged, a big soft chair was strategically placed at the back of the chapel, and ward members were once again greeted not by a handshake, but by a hug from Hazel.

And that is the legacy of Hazel Valentine Henderson. She will always be remembered as one who truly gave of herself and made everyone who crossed her path a better person for having known her. Everyone here has their own Hazel stories to tell; everyone feels like an adopted member of her family; everyone here has their own special reason for loving her. Isn't it comforting to know that some lucky dude named Bob once more has his Valentine by his side, never to be separated again.

What I Have Been Up To...

2013-07-05T11:59:00.000-06:00

Hatching new babies in my incubator...

...and admiring their beautiful new feathers.

I have two new breeds to test out, Barred Plymouth Rock and Giant Black Cochins. Both have beautiful babies.

Harvesting my first crop of radishes. So far we have baby beet greens, baby lettuce, and radishes.

Discovering my now favorite "go to" recipe for soap. I have made 4 batches (with variations) this past couple weeks and EVERY. SINGLE. ONE worked! That is awesome and the soap lathers so nice. It also looks pretty.

Weeding the giant garden that some wack job (me) thought would be fun to have! It is huge, but lucky I have 3 wonderful helpers!

Getting awesome presents from my friends! (because I really have one - Crappy Little Kitchen that is, I have a couple friends! :D)

Meeting some lovely ladies at the Hutterite Colony next door, and getting some awesome salve out of it. It is supposed to help with my arthritis...we shall see.

Harvesting some herbals for this coming winter, and making some infused oil out of it. I used some of the dandelion oil and Balm of Gilead I made earlier in my soap, so I am looking forward to making some first aid salve out of the fun things I acquired last night.

I also have been harvesting some plants on those trips to put in my yard. Wild Licorice, Bee Balm, Roses, etc. So awesome.

I have been so blessed to have found a group of women that accept me in and let me tag along on their foraging trips! It makes it so much better when you can have a group and not do it alone!

I am also a really bad mom and didn't take any photos of the SUPER SPECIAL weekend that my boys had.

My baby turned 8 and chose to be baptized a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. It was a beautiful day. He is an amazing young man and is such a good example to us all. We had many members of our family, and some great friends attend. Ice Cream supper after topped it off!

Then, my oldest was ordained to the office of a Teacher in the Priesthood the next day. He is also a wonderful example and such an amazing young man. We had friends and family out for dinner after.

It was such a great weekend and a witness to me that my boys are growing up good. They make choices that are good and right, they have friends that come to support them and see them grow, they have such amazing personalities and I am blessed to be their Mom.

So, although I have been busy, I have been keeping track so I could come tell you all about it. :) Enjoy your summer!

Cheers

Family

2013-06-20T13:55:00.000-06:00

I just found out that a dear friend and substitute Grandma died this morning. She was an amazing woman who taught me and loved me well. She needed to pass on to our Heavenly Father's embrace so this is not a sad occasion, rather a joyous one as she returns to loved ones and our loving Heavenly Father.

This however made me think of what our definition of family is.

Does it look like this?

Minus the perms I am sure, but we all have these little gems in our albums and memories. (I am the tall one in the back!)

Or maybe it looks like this...

Little more recent, little more just our own little family, no extended ones in the photo with us, but still in the extended picture.

But as I was thinking about that, I realized it would leave something very important and life changing out of the picture if that is all I counted as family.

It would discount the life changing friends I made in college (some of whom I keep close to my heart in memory and some I keep close through maintained life changing contact)

It would discount the women who changed my life forever and still do almost on a daily basis.

It would also discount the people whom I have met and love dearly, but are not related by blood. (even if we are so distantly related that we tell our kids we are cousins!!)

It would also discount those whom I have never met, but feel such a close kinship to that I truly feel like we are sisters.

Since that process of mind boggling thought (for me anyway! :D), I have come to the conclusion that we are blessed with many types of family!

I have women here that have loved and accepted me right into their families and I can't think of a time I didn't know them. I truly think of them as sisters and am baffled and amazed that others don't know them like I do or want to be with them all the time like I do.

I have people that I have maintained through time that are brothers and sisters to me just as much as my own blood brothers and sisters. Some who my family have accepted and adopted into their lives, and some they haven't.

I have people that I love dearly that have departed, that have no blood relation to me, that I rejoice in the knowledge that I will see again and get to greet in the great family reunion above.

As I have reflected on this, I realize that we are truly blessed in this life to make some connections with people that we meet. To call them truly, and honestly, Brother and Sister.

I am blessed to have such a family and I thank my Heavenly Father for them each and every day.

Cheers

Goat Lesson

2013-06-18T08:03:00.000-06:00

We bought goats a while ago.

Beautiful Nubian goats.

They came with ear tags.

Quite often a person will put ear tags into their herd to identify individuals. It makes it easier to remember things like who their mom was, what year they were born, and what their name is. The tags are big.

We took ours out when they came. We had one come that had her tag stuck in improperly so it was always bleeding because it would get caught on things. (fencing, trees, other goats, etc)

So their ears look like this:

See the small black dot on her ear? That is where we took out her tag. It is just like piercing your ear, and it leaves a similar hole in theirs.

BUT,

Our poor little girl, she is just under a year, got her ear caught on something (Fencing we think) and pulled her hole right out:

Yes, that poor ear got ripped right in half!

We put iodine on it and lots of vitamin E so it is healing up pretty good, but it is so sad that she got it ripped. We were out there just after it happened so I am sad I didn't go out just a little sooner.

You get attached to your animals when they are as personable as these ones are. It makes me sad that she has such pain in her ear. Especially because goats assert their dominance by biting another goats ear! I can only imagine how low on the pole she will be because of this.

So, lesson learned.

This is why you never tag your goats ears. It is not necessary. I know their names. I know their mom's and I know what year they were born. I have it all recorded in a book. I don't need the tags (as I already decided before this happened) and I wish I could have saved my poor little Jug all this pain.

The things you learn on the farm!

Cheers

Dandelions Are Awesome

2013-06-12T15:03:00.002-06:00

So, did you know I live in Canada?! hehehehe

I found this really wicked awesome dandelion cookbook on Amazon that I wanted badly, but turns out the publishers don't like us Canadians so I couldn't buy it!!

Not cool at all.

So I had to make my own versions of the recipes in there. :)

I found I had a surplus of these in my lawn:

WHAT??!

Yes, that is just a teeny tiny portion of the millions of yellow dandelions that populate my grassy fields.

So, no joke, I sent my kids out to pick me a 5 gal bucket of them.

Then I froze them.

Yup I did.

I stuck those little babies in my freezer for later so I can pull them out and use them for tea in the winter. (and yes, my Mom already mocked me for the fact that I felt I had to preserve dandelions!)

Then the next day I realized I froze all of them!

Ooops.

Sent the kids back out again.

Filled another 5 gal bucket. This time I kept them out of the freezer, and not to miss the mocking, but because I wanted to make a few things.

First I put a bunch in oil so I could have dandelion infused oil to make salves and soap out of.

Then, I took my handsome helper boy out and did this:

Seperate the yellow from the green.

Dig your finger in so the green splits in half.

Gently pull the yellow parts apart.

You should end up with yellow in one hand (if you teased it right out of the green) and a green part in the other.

Then you get a lovely bowl of yellow fluff.

We needed this for a couple things. My boy wants me to make some cupcakes with them and he really wanted me to make pancakes:

They were interesting.

Dandelion flowers have a sort of peppery, flower taste to them. It added a little chew as well to the pancakes.

All I did was added a couple of handfuls of the beautiful yellow to my regular pancake batter and mixed it in well. Cooked the same and everything.

Kids all thought I was fancy gourmet!

Speaking of gourmet...

This may look a little nasty, but it was so good!

This is dandelion pasta!

Here is a simple pasta to make that will surprise your kids and make you feel super fancy.

Dandelion Pasta

5 C Flour
pinch of salt

Pour onto clean counter and make a well in center of it. Add:

3 Eggs
6 C Dandelion greens blended with a tiny bit of water (I just did this in my blender)

Mix until well incorporated.

Roll as thin as you can (if you have a pasta maker use it, but if not, do your best with a rolling pin), add to water that is at a rolling boil. Boil until tender (about 5 min). Serve with butter, salt and pepper or your favorite sauce.

Try it, you will like it!

Cheers

City Girl Gets Excited

2013-05-23T15:31:00.001-06:00

So I had a strange conversation with myself the other day...

Suffice it to say, I have discovered that I am still a city girl, playing at the farm girl role. I really like playing though, so you get to hear about my adventures this week!

My Muscovy duck hatched out some babies last night!

She was really unimpressed that this city girl kept looking in on her though and attacked me a couple times.

Her babies are adorable (as most ducklings are!) but her beak is super sharp! This was the best photo I could get so far as she kept biting me and my phone as I tried to at least snap something I could text to my peeps.

I learned that DH is so much more patient than I am.

He kept at the bottle feeding thing with our poor baby goat long after I gave up.

Turns out that the shots the vet had me giving her (yes, I actually was not only giving my goats shots...I was doing it myself!! Yay city girl!) were actually making her worse. So, we stopped them and she blossomed!

She is a beautiful little goat now. Getting along as if she never were struggling at all.

Her and her brother are playing, jumping, running like little maniacs. It is a wonderful sight to see! I love it.

We went to a friend's house the other day to dig some trees (she often asks us to come dig suckers and whatnot. It is awesome!) and she had bought a new peach tree.

I am waiting to see if she can make it grow because if it does...Jaime's gonna get one! It looks awesome. If you are in a cold climate (zone 4 or so) check it out here, you might want to invest in one too.

Also, when I went out to collect eggs from our very old chickens (they are almost 4 years old) I found this:

Yup, you see that right. It is a super tiny egg. About the size of a large marble actually.

Old hens don't lay stuff like that!

I went out to chat with them and they didn't lay anymore though.

We cracked it open. I was sure it would be all white, or maybe empty, but it was complete with a tiny yolk and white. It was pretty fun to see. Much like this video only in reverse...quite a bit! (and another...appears his hen didn't listen when he told her to stop! :D)

Hope your week is awesome and full of adventure!
Cheers

Well Lookie Here...

2013-05-16T08:20:00.001-06:00

...see what happened in my barn on Tuesday...

My sweet little Ali had two little babies!!

This is Pete, he was the first out and almost double the size of his sister! He is a stinker and quite playful. We will keep him for a year or so, and breed him to our others and our neighbours goats. Then sell him before he becomes stinky as a "proven" buck.

This is Reet. (short for a couple things, but most of all Rita) She was born missing part of her cerebellum The vet said that she was retarded (his words) and would never recover but be able to do the things that goats need to do. He gave us shots for vitamins and penicillin (she may be aspirating slightly into her lungs) to give her. So far most of her symptoms have vanished! I hope it was something like oxygen deprivation coming out or something not the missing cerebellum. She is a beautiful little doe and I would love to keep her to breed if her problems do not pass on to kids.

Ali did really good and is such a good mom (after having her kids taken away for a night) and is doing so good. She was a pro. Which is good because I couldn't help her and all my help was somewhere else!

I will be getting better pics later, but for now, this is the best that my Ali would let me get. :) I am sure you will all get tired of me posting about my goats, but they are so much fun for me!

Cheers

Mish-Mash

2013-05-14T08:17:00.002-06:00

Here is another mish-mash/brain dump...or camera dump anyway!

My friend posted about these lip stuffs a while ago on her blog, but they weren't around here in Canada. They finally made their way over the border, and I picked one up. They are really nice, and I use mine often, but I am still really partial to these.

Did you ever watch this when you were younger?

I remember when I was littler (because we all know I have always been a giant!) I loved ALF. I even got an ALF doll for Christmas when I was too old to be getting things like that.

I bought these the other day for my boys so that I could introduce/indoctrinate them into the world of ALF. So far they love it. ("I would like a BLT for lunch...a bacon, lucky, tomato sandwich please"!)

Our front yard is going to be our fruit garden. We started with a pretty blank slate. I (and by I, I mean DH!) am digging rows to put my cherries, raspberries, currents, Jerusalem artichokes, etc in. So it is getting pretty full out there. (still plenty of room though!)

Each day I come in from outside, my feet look like this!

Then DH dug some more of my front for me to add some more fruit. We put some hundred or so strawberries in there. I am also putting a crap-load of melons in there. Super fun!

I have a few seeds to plant this year.

DH plowed a bunch of our back pasture for our garden this year though. I think I am going to plant a wack-load of peas and beans for my goats, and the rest for me. Super thrilled to plant so much!

BUT, hey - have you seen this before? We found one of these in our field and are finding treasures left and right. Plowing up an old field is great fun!

Cheers