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Has anyone else noticed that if you make a whole loaf of garlic bread the whole thing gets eaten?  There’s really no reason for 2 adults (in our case) to eat a whole loaf of bread at one meal.  Plus, it gets expensive.  Since homemade bread became a staple around here we’ve started to make a few pieces of garlic bread at a time when we want it.  It is easy to do but you have to warm up another skillet, slice the bread, butter it, add seasoning, and keep it from burning.  Not exactly set it and forget it, and not what I want to be doing with a baby and everything else that needs my attention around here.  So… I’m making my bread now.  It’ll be there when we need it, and it’ll taste even better because I’ve taken the time to season it just the way we like. Ingredients: Bread – French is our favorite (TIP:  this is the perfect place to use bread off the discount rack in the bakery section.  I scored my loaf for $0.90!  Throw it in the freezer until you get time to do this and pull it out a few hours

These are delicious, and relatively good for you.  They even pass the husband test.  He’s been taking them for breakfast. Muffin Ingredients: 2 cups Raisin Bran (R) cereal (or generic) 2 cups flour* 1/2 cup sugar 1 heaping Tbsp. baking powder 1 tsp. salt 4 eggs 2 cups applesauce (preferably unsweetened or lightly sweetened) 1/3 cup oil (I prefer canola) 1/3 cup milk Topping Ingredients: 1/4+ cup graham crackers crumbs 1/4+ cup brown sugar 1 tsp. cinnamon generous sprinkle nutmeg Crush the cereal to break up the bran flakes a bit.  I did this in a bowl with the back of a large spoon.  To the cereal add the flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt.  In a separate bowl combine the eggs, oil, milk, and applesauce.  Beat well with a fork.  Gradually add dry mixture and until well combined.  Pour in to greased muffin tins.  Combine all 4 topping ingredients.  Spoon over tops of muffins. This recipe is equivalent to 2 dozen regular muffins but I prefer a larger muffin so I fill my tins more than the standard halfway full.  This time I used my extra large muffin tin and produced 5 huge muffins from this recipe.  Baking time

This week I’m trying to get back in the swing of things around here.  In another words, the “babymoon” is over and the real world is calling.  Last week I was able to keep up with my cleaning rotation but didn’t attempt much more than that.  It is going to take some experimenting to find a routine that works for everything else now that I’m home full time. The theory I’m testing this week is one general focus for each day.  Example:  Monday = Baking Day.  There are a lot of things I can make from scratch to save $$$.  Some I have been making regularly, others will be new for me.  I need to make bread on the weeks that we run out of the good stuff from our neighbor.  Muffins for breakfast, snacks for Brian’s lunch, rolls for dinner, granola bars to munch on while nursing – the list is endless.  I’d like to tackle any freezer cooking/big meal prep on Mondays too so the kitchen only looks like a war zone one time each week. So, here’s what I made on this very first “Baking Day”: No High Fructose Corn Syrup Granola Bars – double batch Apple

Hehe, forgot to mention that here!  If you’re not on Facebook you may be out of the loop. Introducing… Kent Keith Born 7/7/11 @ 9:58AM 6# 3 oz. – 19 inches long In answer to all the popular questions: How was the labor?  Speedy, very intense, but the best I could have asked for really.  We left for the hospital at 6:30 AM still not convinced it was real labor, my water broke on the way there, and he was born at 10. How do I feel?  Great!  I kept myself pretty quiet for the first couple weeks and just lately have started to venture down the stairs, lift laundry baskets, etc.  I was never very sore or anything like I expected. How is the baby doing?  He’s wonderful.  We could not ask for a better baby.  We had one rough night and part of a bad day while we figured some things out and since then it has been pretty smooth sailing. Is he sleeping through the night?  This one is sort of silly.  He’s a baby, he’s supposed to eat every few hours.  However, he has already established a routine and goes to bed between 11-12 each night

Disclaimer:  This is not a pleasant condition to talk about.  I’m sharing it to A)help other shepherds who find themselves dealing with it for the first time and B)to remain transparent to our customers.  Things like this are a part of raising animals and it’s our job to educate ourselves on how to best care for the animals and avoid the problem in the future. The technical term for flystrike is Myiasis.  It is a condition where fly larvae infest an animal and feed on their living or dead tissue.  Blowflies are the most common parasite involved.  Apparently, flystrike is a big problem in the sheep industry.  However, most of the information I found referred to Australia and New Zealand as being most affected.  It appears to be far less common in the Midwest where we are. Insecticides are available that can be applied as part of a routine flock health program.  Such products may help prevent the occurrence of  flystrike in susceptible flocks.  Most of the products I found were pour-ons.  Many of them that claim to specifically treat and/or prevent flystrike don’t have suppliers here in the U.S., only overseas.  I did find Permectrin II available through Valley

Stick with me – I know inventorying your freezer sounds like an OCD thing to do.  I’m not crazy!!  (Well, maybe a little, but not in regard to this!)  We have 4 freezers in our house and a small one in the top of the shop fridge.  If I can’t keep track of what’s in there I might as well forget we have all that food.  Nothing is worse than having an overflowing freezer and “nothing to eat”.  So anyway, here’s how I did it. There are a lot of helpful articles and videos out there if you google “inventorying your freezer”.  There are also several printable templates available to make your job easier.  I wanted a template that allowed me to set my own categories and made it easy to add to the list as we put more food in the freezer.  My favorite pick was this template from organizedhome.com.  Look around, if you don’t find one you love than whip up something.  Heck, use a piece of notebook paper for all I care.  Just do it! More specifically: here’s how to do it.  You’ll need someplace to sit all the food so you can empty the freezer out

Brian always harasses me when I make a batch of cookie dough just to nibble on.  He prefers the real cookies – odd, I know!  😉  The dough tends to sit in the fridge for a day or two before I get around to baking any cookies.  Wouldn’t it be nice to have dough all ready to go when I have a craving for it, or when someone wants fresh baked cookies!? Well, now we have that luxury.  Prepare the dough as discussed in my post on the perfect chocolate chip cookies.  Use a regular flatware spoon to scoop out chunks.  Roll each scoop in to a little ball about 1 to 1 1/4″ across.  Flash freeze on a cookie sheet until solid to the touch.  Store in an airtight container or freezer bag.  Pop out as many little dough balls as you’d like at a time.  If you’re eating them raw they’ll just need to set at room temperature for a bit.  To bake, spread frozen dough balls on a cookie sheet.  Drop your baking temperature back to 350 F and bake for 10-15 minutes.  Keep a close eye out to avoid burning. Yum!

Whew – it takes FOREVER to plant potatoes when you don’t crowd them.  According to my favorite gardening book main crop potatoes should be planted 15″ apart in rows 30″ apart.  I planted 10# of Red Pontiac potatoes in rows this way.  I cut them in to pieces with at least 1 or 2 good “eyes” on each piece.  They’ve been sitting around on a cookie sheet for weeks now waiting for the garden, the weather, and the worker to all be ready at that same time.  It took 3 days but they’re in! You may remember that last year we planted our potatoes in tubs instead of in the ground.  Our yields were pretty poor and the potatoes we did get were small.  However, I believe we would have had a lot better results if we had water the plants regularly.  The tubs dry out easier than the ground anyway but we just happened to try it during one of the hottest, driest summers I can remember.  In a normal year we could have kept up with the watering but last year was too extreme and the plants suffered.  I’m not sure how the weather will be this year

I could have taken advantage of the day without rain to plant my potatoes but I didn’t.  Instead, I finished up a sewing project in the house.  I have my Mom’s rocking chair.  It’s really sturdy and good looking but lacked a cushion.  I used cut up paper bags to make a pattern.  The back and seat are two separate pieces.  I stuffed them with some wool roving from our sheep. I’ll try to post more pics of the nursery as I get it organized for you family out there. 🙂

It was pretty productive day.  I can only do about half of what I normally do and I’m twice as sore.  I guess the baby isn’t much for weeding! Guess I better do an extra good job with my mulching this year.  😉