Sunday, September 2, 2012

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?

Thursday, August 30, 2012

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.