2 years ago

September 3 2010 my youngest daughter Abby married her best friend Jason. They've known each other since she was 17. They finally realized they could not live without each other and were very much in love. And they got married! It was a beautiful wedding in a small chapel in Ringgold, Ga. The same place where my mom married my step dad almost 34 years ago.

I am so happy for them. So here is wishing and praying for a wonderful 3rd year of marriage. I hope you both grow closer each day and know how much you are both loved. You are an inspiration to me and so many others. Happy anniversary!

Love, mom

Let the breeding begin!

This morning I noticed some head butting amongst the does. I was going to start the breeding maybe Tuesday but went ahead and did some musical goats after I was done milking and feeding everyone.







I went up front and got Lil Red, the new Boer buck. He's a March kid so I hope he's old enough to figure it out. If you click on the picture, you can see he has the equipment but his body needs to catch up with it.

 Sandy took one look at him and said "Seriously? Get me out of here right now, woman!" And Penelope was agreeing with her.

 And Lil Red said " But shouldn't I be in there with these 2 pretty little ones? They are more my size." And Iris Josie and Floppsy Belle both agreed. But no, you are both too young right now. Maybe next year.











Here is John Henry with Abby and Zarah. The girls
don't seem too impressed yet. He is quite happy though.

And you can see what Adabelle thinks about the whole situation. She wants no part of this at all. It only took her 4 years to get pregnant. And it might take 4 more as far away as she is.





I'll be putting Iris and Floppsy up front when I can catch them. I can catch Iris but that stinkin' kid of Sandy's is hard to catch. But I will get her.





So here we go. Breeding season 2012 has begun. I'll leave them like this til about the end of October. Then John Henry will go visit some other ladies at The Pocket Farm over the ridge for awhile. I'll have to figure out what to do with Lil Red then.

Anyone else breeding yet?

Making bread and dog food

I thought my bread mixing machine was broken. It's been sitting in the dining room for about 5 weeks now. No bread making going on here. So yesterday, I called to order the timer switch for it. It was going to be $49 plus shipping and would have been here in a few days. I thought that was pretty good. My friend's machine was doing the same thing, so ordered her one also.

Well, a little later, a parts technician called. He wanted to know what it was doing. I have only had this DLX for like 15 years now.Have made hundreds of loaves of bread and thousands of rolls. I love this thing. Also have the Whisper Mill grinder too. Altogether it was around $800 back then. Along with a flaker for oats. I was looking at the DLX machines on line yesterday and they are around that price alone. With nothing else. I need this one to work.

So he told me to take off the plastic knob and get a pair of pliers and turn the knob with them. I did. It worked. So he wanted to know if I wanted to put that order on hold. I said yes, please.

And today I made rolls and some almond, cranberry, cinnamon bread. Because I didn't have walnuts. Or raisins. It smells good. And the rolls are so good right out of the oven with butter. Yum.

So this is all my equipment and ingredients to make bread. Milk and eggs from my goats and hens. Honey (which we buy by the 5 gallon buckets) olive oil, sea salt, lecithin, yeast and gluten.

                                            You can see the pliers and the timer switch on the left of the DLX here.

                                    This is what it looks like after the first rise in the warm oven.

                          This recipe makes 3 loaves or 3 dozen small rolls. I made big rolls this time.

                                       
                                          And here are the rolls and bread ready for the 2nd rise.

Here it is all done. Nice and browned and smelling SO good! This is made with fresh ground hard white, hard red, Kamut and soft white wheat.

These are the buckets I store all the wheat berries in. There is a group of us bread bakers that get a lot of  our wheat and supplies  from The Bread Beckers in Woodstock, Ga. We also get truck loads of 50 pound bags of grain every few years from Montana Wheat Co. Some people make a lot of bread and rolls. I sell it sometimes at the market too.

And this is my dog's food. I was getting a little nervous because I only had 2 baggies of beef hearts in the freezer. And the slaughterhouse where I get the hearts and bones from had not butchered any cows in a few weeks. I went today and still none. So I got a box of pork bones and they threw in some sausage. I cooked some brown rice. I had some green beans and mac and cheese in the fridge and some chopped tomatoes. Added all that plus the 2 baggies of cut up hearts. Added some garlic powder. And had flaked some oats so added some raw oats too. Bagged up 14 bags.

All ready for the freezer now. 14 days worth of free dog food. I also add some dog chow so they'll have some crunch. They love this stuff. They also get raw bones for their afternoon snack. About 5 every afternoon, there are 3 dogs looking at me through the kitchen door, wanting their bones. I am so thankful for a place I can go to get raw food for my dogs. They all love it and are thriving on it. They've been eating raw for a few years now.I think that's why Sophie, the 15 year old Rat Terrier, is still around. She's healthy. One bag is divided between all 3 dogs with a little dog chow too. They are all fat. Not too fat though.

If you have lots of peppers, just stuff 'em.

I have SO many bell peppers. So the other day I made stuffed bell peppers. I haven't done that in years. I cut up onions and the tops of the peppers. Cooked them with hamburger. Cut up some tomatoes. Added that and some corn and cooked rice, salt and pepper. I boiled a pot of water and put the peppers in for about 5 minutes, til soft. Then stuffed them full and added some cheddar cheese and baked. They were so good! I had a red one because I do not like cooked peppers but can handle the red ones.

I went to market today and all I had was bell peppers, sweet banana and hot peppers. And soap. Didn't sell a single pepper. But did sell some soap. So I think I might just stuff a bunch and freeze them. I have several bags of chopped bell peppers already in the freezer so don't need more. Stuffed peppers sound good.

I am in that gardening period where I am waiting on things to grow and it hasn't rained in awhile. My turnip greens are doing great though. And the radishes are too. So I hope to be taking some of those to market in the next week or so. Then I should be getting more green beans and peas soon too. And hopefully cucumbers. I'll wait to plant lettuce as it's still too hot for that yet. And I am waiting on Brussel sprouts to come. I need some bad!

Stick a fork in it and call it done!

I am done with hay!!!!! I did 16 more bales this morning before I left for town because it was starting to sprinkle and the tarp wasn't covering them all. Then when I got home I did the last 12 bales. I am officially DONE with hay til next year!!!

Did I mention that I do not like hay? At all. There is nothing fun about hay to me. I read other people's blogs and they say they have such a wonderful time getting in hay. It makes me sick! They obviously have lots of help and it makes it much easier and funner with lots of help.

But it's mostly just me and the hay. And it ain't fun at all. It's hard work, folks. It hurts too. It's like the little tiny hay particles stick in my arms and legs like needles. I bleed. A lot of blood. My arms look like that time I went to the allergy clinic and they stuck me with all those itty bitty needles to see what I was allergic to. One of which was hay. A few others were animals, like goats and dogs and cats and cows. Stuff that I live with.





There have been some fun memories getting hay when the whole family came to help. These are my grand daughters, Coryn, Chloe and Kansas. They were dressed to play in the creek, not get hay, as you can see.

Even my mom came once. She was the supervisor. She worked us hard that day! We had a beautiful field to get hay from up the road. Had a creek we had to cross over. Look at that view of Lookout Mt. Just amazing!

                              The kids and hubby and our daughter Heather playing in the creek.

                              This is our daughter Heather, my mom and youngest daughter Abby.

                                 And the grands chasing the truck full of hay. We almost forgot them.

So it is fun when there is help and lots of family around. But it's hard to get them all together anymore. But I am really thankful that I am able to do this work. And that I live on a farm. And that I have great sheep and wonderful goats and lots of happy chickens. And some pretty happy dogs and cats too. SO I guess hay really isn't that bad after all.

84 bales of hay, firewood and an old truck.

Last night my friend Garry B. called. Said the hay was laying in the field and to come get it. This is a few minutes after my husband left. He's a truck driver. He seems to have to leave at important times like this. I had just told him Garry would probably be calling this week. So hubby put more gas in the truck for me. He's a good hubby. He parks the truck where he parks his big truck, which is just about a mile from where the hay field is. 

Last time I got hay from Garry, he had hay helper guys. I didn't even have to get out of the truck. They had me loaded in about 10 minutes. This morning, there were no hay helper guys. Just me and Garry. He was already loading his trailer but hopped up in my truck to  stack. So I drove and threw hay. 42 bales. 

I took that home and unloaded that truckload. Went back for another load and Garry was not there. He had gotten his trailer full and was unloading at his barn. So I started loading hay. By myself. I got 26 bales loaded when they hay helper guys came to my rescue. Well, they loaded 17 bales. Really nice hay helper guys.

This is most of the hay all over the ground. Some on one side of the fence, some on the other side.

This is how I get the hay to the barn, in the garden wagon. ABout the handiest thing to have around. I can get 3 bales standing straight up. But then I realized I could get 4 bales another way. That made it quicker to haul.

On the right is hay from the spring. About 90 bales I think. I have them stacked in piles of 10. I think I might have between 175-185 bales right now.

This is what's still left outside. I'll have to get it tomorrow. I am tired and sore and my legs and arms hurt! I had a long day.

About half way home with the 2nd load, my friend Nancy called. She was having a tree cut down and wanted to know if I wanted the wood. Well, yeah, I do. So hurried up and got that load unloaded and got more water and headed to her house about a mile away. The tree cutter guys loaded my truck up with some really nice and really BIG White Ash wood. They wouldn't come with me to unload the wood, so had to do all that myself as well.. I did wait til evening to do that. But it was fairly easy as the big huge round ones just rolled off the truck.

But right after the truck got loaded and everyone left, I got in the truck to go home. The truck wouldn't start. It did nothing at all. So I called the husband. He said that's what he was trying to tell me about the other day, that he had to jiggle the gear thingy and turn the key and do that for awhile and it would start. So I did that for awhile and still nothing. He told me to get out and open the hood and jiggle the battery cables. I tried to get that darn hood open but couldn't. I told him good bye, that I was going to call someone to come start this darn truck. I wanted to go home.

SO called my friend Allan from up the road.  He came and got the hood up. I jiggled the battery cables. He got in the truck and started it right up. Yes he did. Do you know how many times this has happened to me? I do all the work, a guy gets in and it starts right up. Or I will pull and pull and pull on a lawn mower or tiller and a guy comes over and looks at it and it starts right up. Makes me mad! Everything mechanical just likes a guy.


So I have had a long day. I took the truck back and on the way home I stopped at Dollar General to get some ice cream. Because I think I deserved some. And it was on sale, 2 for $7.00! Edy's ice cream. My favorite! Mint Chocolate Chip, just the thing after a hard days work. And a good shower to get all that hay off of me and out of places hay shouldn't be.

                               Must be nice to be a cat, right? She looks so comfortable and cool.


But it feels good to have all the hay I'll need for the winter and a good start for firewood out there. Really good day, I must say.

Garden shed "lean to".

Yesterday afternoon, our daughter and our very favorite best son-in-law came over to help finish up the garden shed. SIL brought his handy dandy air nail gun. He did most all the work, and we let him. He's good like that. And we are too. So we got it done in half the time that me and Kenneth did the other side.

 We hung shelves inside and I had one of those kitchen shelves that I had upstairs then outside. Now it's inside the shed to hold all kinds of things. Also, mom gave me a bathroom cabinet to use inside too. We put a shelf outside to hold gas cans. Also hung my handy dandy seeder up out there.

This is the old sink that was in the kitchen when we bought this house. It's been in the back yard all these years, getting rusty. We brought it up front and I cleaned up the sink part. It looks good. I will have to get a wire brush and get as much rust as I can off then spray paint it. I have to decide what color now. Hubby says I should paint it back white. But I like color. I'll have to think on this awhile. But I am SO happy it's done. Well, I have to screw the roof down, then it's done.

I am loving my garden shed. I am SO glad I finally have one. It will sure make gardening a whole lot easier with everything IN the garden now and now way up at the house in the garage or milk room. And I am so thankful for family and friends to help and save me tons of money!! Thank you Abby, Jason, my husband, Tiny, and our good friend Kenneth. If not for these people, I would be broke and it would not be finished! So thank you all again!

Forgot to say that the sink will be used to wash all the garden veggies for market. I'll hang nails on the posts for bags and I'll have everything I'll need right there in the garden now!