Check out this monster tomato!! It was the highlight of my morning. I’ve been canning for 12 hours now! Luckily, I’m done with the hard part. Now I can sit back and relax and just switch out the canner every so often. Yahoo! These are my pitiful little onions…I’m still not sure exactly why they flowered instead of growing. They are so cute that I almost don’t mind except that they’re already gone! Don’t they look almost like little purple light bulbs?
Continue readingMonth: September 2009
The Bottomless Bucket of Tomatoes (sigh)
It may never end! Okay, maybe it will, but I’m afraid it won’t be this weekend. A batch of spaghetti sauce with meat calls for 30# of tomatoes. I already used approximately 30# from our garden and got 12 pints out of it instead of the 9 that the book says. I have enough left from our garden to do 1 more batch. The neighbors, Brian’s aunt and uncle, offered him what was left in their garden. He brought home one basket full that turns out to be just shy of one batch worth – and there is probably one or two more batches left down there. So add that all up and I have a minimum of 3 batches left to do, assuming I get to them before they rot. The hard part is not the actually canning it is prepping the tomatoes. There are so many different ways to do this but here’s what I’ve been doing: Put a few tomatoes in boiling water for 30 second to a minute. Scoop them out and in to a pot of cold water with ice in it. Pick them out one at time and peel off the skins with my
Continue readingFall Festival: My Favorite Fall Recipe
Share your favorite fall recipe at LifeasMOM. All participants will be entered for a chance to win The Autumn Book by Susan Branch. This is somewhat of a repost but I can’t help it, the following truly is my favorite fall recipe. It is great because you eat it at all three meals and dessert. This recipe came on the back of my electric bill and gives credit to Bernice Hass: Apple Bread 1/3 cup shortening2 eggs1 tsp vanilla1 tsp baking soda2 c chopped apples1 c sugar2 Tbsp sour milk (or buttermilk, I use a little milk and vinegar)2 c flour1 tsp salt1/2 cup nuts (optional) Topping: 2 Tbsp butter, 4 Tbsp sugar, 1-2 tsp cinnamon Cream shortening & sugar. Add eggs & beat. Stir in sour milk, vanilla, flour, baking soda, & salt. Add chopped apples and nuts. Put in greased bread pan. Add topping and bake at 350 degrees F for 40-45 minutes. MMmmm!
Continue readingFall Festival: Gone to the Dogs
Now it’s your turn! I’d love to hear all about how you and your family amuse yourselves as the seasons change. Do you have special activities that you do with your kids? Are there certain movies that you watch during the fall? Do you have fall crafts, games, books or field trips that you enjoy? Share your favorite autumn vacation spots at Daily Dwelling. Today’s theme is all about fun. For me, the fun part of fall is feathering my nest by doing the things I shared yesterday. I also enjoy decorating my porch. I set out pumpkins and tie cornstalks to the porch posts. Dressing up is fun too, although I don’t always do that now that I’m a little older. Last year I went up to the bar dressed as a hippie. It was great because I love to people watch and I could do a lot of it with those big glasses on! For us, for now, our dogs are like our kids. So, one of the best parts about fall is watching them play and have fun. Good luck trying to rake with them around!
Continue readingFall Festival: Feathering your Nest
How will you be feathering your nest for Fall? What do you to get ready? Decorations? Winterizing? Stocking Up? Preserving Fall Produce? Harvesting Said Fall Produce? Cleaning? Organizing? Overhauling your Calendar? Whatever you do to ready your Home and Hearth for the new season, we want to know about it at Hoosier Homemade where Liz is offering up a fun giveaway of sewn fabric pumpkins to fall-ify your home.Fall is one of the busiest seasons around our farm, tied only with Spring. This year I’m welcoming Fall with open arms and have been enjoying the tasks that come with the season. Here are a few things we do to prepare for the colder months: At the top of the list, canning is in full swing. I’m putting up corn, tomatoes, and apples all within the next few weeks. As the garden offers up the last of the vegetables it is time to clear away the dead plants and prepare for spring. I’ve been weeding one last time, then I’ll spread some compost and mulch the whole thing with straw. The garlic goes in and dormant plants (strawberries, raspberries, rhubarb) can be transplanted. Last week I dug out the flannel sheets
Continue readingFall Blogging Festival
Where did the summer go? Autumn begins next week. Well, Fall is one of the best times of year, anyway. So, let’s make the most of it! Why not celebrate, plan ahead, exchange great ideas, traditions, and recipes? Join us for a great week of autumn-themed festivities. Five blogs, five days, five great ways to welcome the change of seasons. It sounds like anyone with a blog is welcome to join in the fun. If you miss Monday there is still plenty of time to participate! Just post a bit about the festival and link to each hosting blog. I’m enjoying the thought of fall this year and am glad to share in the fun! Monday – Feathering Your NestHow will you be feathering your nest for Fall? What do you to get ready? Decorations? Winterizing? Stocking Up? Preserving Fall Produce? Harvesting Said Fall Produce? Cleaning? Organizing? Overhauling your Calendar? Whatever you do to ready your Home and Hearth for the new season, we want to know about it at Hoosier Homemade where Liz is offering up a fun giveaway of sewn fabric pumpkins to fall-ify your home. Tuesday – Falling For FunHow do you and your family amuse yourselves
Continue readingThe Ewes Have A Date…
Today we took our flock of 7 ewes and ewe lambs to meet their new boyfriends. We split them up over 3 different rams based on who would best compliment each one’s physical features. The stocky, big ewes went in with stylish, finer boned rams and vice versa. It made for a long day since the handsome bachelors live almost 2 hours away. We made a lot of stops on the way back too. We ordered a new back door for the house so that when the builder comes back to install the new front door he can do them both at once. That will be soooo nice. It is hard to juggle paying off our debt with cash flowing the farm and fixing up the house all at the same time. I’m glad we can still fit in some improvements here and there.We had a gift card for Cracker Barrel so we had dinner there – we even got my Mom and sister to come with us so that was nice. I’m tired, off to bed. Hope everyone is enjoying their weekend!
Continue reading5 Roosters = Soup
Last night we took our 2 remaining turkeys and 5 roosters to the processor. The roosters were all Barred Hollands from the batch of heritage breed chickens I ordered in the spring. I had high hopes for the heritage breeds but the Barred Holland is not a winner in my book. The roos are very aggressive, much like the Barred Rock rooster that we gave away to our neighbor last year because he was beating up all the other birds. I watched them for quite awhile during feeding and the Holland roosters would grab feathers out of the other birds for no reason at all. The Buckeye hens were taking a real beating because they are so docile. I’m very happy with the Buckeyes and the Buff Chanteclers so far, more on that some other time. I googled how to cut up a chicken and studied several of the results. Last time I attempted to cut up some hens it didn’t go well. This time I removed both legs and both wings, then I cut the birds through the ribcage on each side. I discarded the back and neck and kept all of the other pieces to make canned chicken
Continue readingIf I’m Not Here…
If I’m missing it will be because our computer got a virus last night. Hopefully it will be fixed tonight and back to me tomorrow but if I’m gone for awhile, that’s why. So long for now!
Continue readingOnion Confusion
I planted onions in the spring… So apparently I’ve been having a blond moment for the last several weeks now. I’ve been excited to collect seed from whatever garden plants I can. My onions sent up nice big flowers that now have thousands of seeds in them. I thought great, yippee, I get to save some onion seed. Ummm, no. Well, yes, I get some onion seeds. But no freakin’ onions!! I pulled them up today and the aren’t much bigger than the sets I planted.Duh, I guess I should have thought about that. Apparently onions are not supposed to flower in their first year and if they do the bulbs will be very small. The bulbs also won’t store well since they have been pierced where the flower stalk pushed up. The only explanation I can find for this is extreme temperature fluctuations during the growing seasons. Yep, we’ve got that going on here in Michigan. So what do you think? Has this happened to you? Am I missing something? Is this more likely to happen when you grow from onion sets? I’m so bummed.
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