Prepping for the snow, crafting , crafting and baking.

At 130pm the news said that snow was indeed on it's way.  Here it was still in the upper 70's but a just a state above us in Wyoming it was 31*.  

Dude road into town. We are pretty much prepared but always need water.  I got firewood loaded up in the house and he had rolled up all the water hoses before leaving. 

The chicken's waters were elevated and heaters ready just in case.  Warming lights for the smaller chicks were tested and installed. 

I baked oatmeal walnut chocolate chip cookies and bars.

Dude likes having a little snack in the evening. I saw these made with painted candlesticks over on pintrest. I didn't have a candle sticks but I did have a jar and a budvase.  I painted the vase and lid to the jar. Then attached the two with the glue gun. 

Then got the eyes put on the boxes for the dragon boxes being made this weekend. I love cigar boxes.  They are all braced on the inside with wood. 

Tonight I will make one to time myself and see how long it would take others to make.

Here is the one I made last time.  I found the directions over on Artfully Musing.

peace

Wednesday February 15

We are getting ready to continue our remodel again. When we bought this place it was for the land and definitely not the house. It was bank owned and run by field mice and rabbits. The smell alone almost knocked us out when we came to look at the place.  We have been working hard to make it a beautiful place for us to retire in.  We are still young at heart and that strengthens us. 

Here is part of what the home looked like when we moved in. We lived in one room and gutted the rest for over a year.

We used beetle kill pine for the siding and had to hand stain each piece. Surprising results. 

We gutted and remodeled the kitchen... well, Dude did one long weekend I was stuck in Denver during a snow storm.  He joked he had been a little busy while I was gone. 

This was a bedroom. We took out the wall and made it our dining room. 

Today, Dude got working on plans for a front and back porch so we can finish the roof and some rain barrels. He is making the plans and calculating the cost. 

I finished quilting one of the bee quilts. Binding goes on tomorrow morning.  I loved this morning. After chores we worked together and listened to music. Very comforting.

Food

Monday's Fish Dinner I wanted to try something different. We love fish and I had two meaty pieces of wild caught cod in the freezer that was begging to be baked. I wanted this to have more of a Scandinavian taste to it.  Here's how I did it. 

Preheated the oven 350*.  In an 8x8 pan I melted 2 tablespoons of butter and spread it in the pan. 

Then I placed the fish in the pan. Pour a tablespoon of lemon juice over each fish. Salt and pepper the fish. Grate 1/4 of a cup of muenster cheese and evenly distribute over each fish.  In a small bowl mix a cup of milk and a teaspoon of yellow mustard.  Then pour over the cheese covered fish. Top the fish with Italian bread crumbs - I sprinkled a handful over both. Bake for 20-30minutes. Half way through I spooned the sauce over the fish and bake it until done. 

Here's how it turned out. 

Dude said the only thing wrong with it was... there wasn't enough of it.  Score!

Time to hit the sack.

peace

January Planning and Backwards Day

A busy time of year and who would have thought January would be so  busy.  It is a lot of planning.  We are looking at our seed packets and planning gardens.  It is time to start getting our chicks again, both layers and meat hens. We need to decide where were we are going to build a permanent place (could be temporary if we decide this is the year for the barn to be built - we aren't getting any younger) for them before they go to the Big House.  They were in the greenhouse last year.  Soon we will get turkeys too.  We are raising turkeys for  more than just for us this year.  The BIG ADD to the homestead  will be the new copper roof and the rain barrels. And in the spring we plan to get a new little lamb to mate with Wilbur plus Wilbur will be sheared. 

But for now, we celebrate each day in small ways. Today is National Backwards Day.  My mom, being a military wife and home alone with six kids most of the time, had to get very creative...and creative she was!  We had Backwards Day twice a year... preferably when there was no school. We wore our clothes backwards (Even my dad wore his uniform backwards. He wore a jacket over it and changed as he got on the base!)

So here we go with our meals.  Dinner for breakfast. A cornbread /dog casserole!  Just your favorite box mix with dogs gently nestled on in there.  Back for 25 minutes at 400*.

Serving with ...okay, I couldn't do coleslaw first thing this morning! 

Next I had to get my lunch ready using homestead food!  Egg salad with dill pickle powder. 

Awhile back I dehydrated some of my dill pickles. Woooey! They are some powerful things dried. 

Here they are dried. 

Then ground them into a powder. 

Ohso, tasty! 

Hard boiled some of our hens eggs, added mayo and mustard, some ground pepper and teaspoon of ground dill pickles ...ohmy, this is good.  Lunch is ready and packed to go! 

Breakfast for dinner is granola with yogurt and honey topped with berries. 

Time to hit the road. 

peace 

Rough day, Pho, and a Cute Game

Today was the forecasted to be the only warm day for a while at 61*. We rushed out to run two errands - the library and pick up a new log splitter.  We have been saving our money for a while.  Wood is our primary source of heat and we need to get our wood cut fast. We drove to a farm and feed store after stopping at the library for a new splitter.  We went to three stores to compare prices and brands. After finally deciding on one, we headed home. We decided to take the back roads. Halfway home Dude decided to stop and make sure all was well.  Hmmm... it wasn't ... the bearings were broken on one of  wheels holding the splitter up.  We had to figure out how to get it home. We were stranded in the middle of nowhere.  The game warden stopped to see if we were okay.  We were .  While Dude thought of what to do, I was glad to have a book and something to crochet. We are so extremely blessed to have friends to call, understand homesteading , who we could call and stop to help us.  We drove the back roads at 20-30 mph praying the wheel did not totally fall off. Our friend Jamin and his son drove behind us with blinkers flashing to protect us. 

I told you it was in the middle of nowhere. 

Dude rode in the back of the truck watching the tire while I drove until we got to the highway (an over glorified country road) 

When we finally did get home the men tried to fire up our brand new log splitter. Nothing. It wouldn't fire up.  Crud! We did call the store and they will have a new one waiting for us tomorrow fresh out of the crate. 

Things we were thankful for  - 

It was a nice day, warm and sunny.

We were together.

We had water and snacks.

The wheel never came off. 

We have awesome, amazing friends.

And as someone pointed out... we were safe. 

And we were planning on going to New Mexico today to pick up a horse trailer...so thankful we didn't have these problems doing that -5 hours away!

I came in the house and opened one of our cans of grape juice.  Ahhh. 

Next up was a hearty dinner of PHO.  If you never had it... it is delightful !

I used this recipe HERE .  We used many of the fresh veggies from the garden plus a few from the store. 

It hit the spot and filled us up.

Game for the holidays

Fun game over Thanksgiving was with plastic candy canes from the Dollar Store. It is played like barrel of monkeys and with two people playing against each other , with the winner playing the next person.  We had a pile of  plastic candy canes. You put one in your mouth and try to pick up as many as you can and put them in the bucket. Put on the timer  for 3 minutes.  The one with the most in the bucket when the timer goes off wins. It was harder than it looked. Fun and full of laughs, even my mom got into it! 

~smile~ 

Yes, there were crafts afterwards :-) 

peace 

Sunday Funday, Family Fun and Pinto Beans!

Our weekend began yesterday with making breakfast burritos of egg(from our hens), cheese and potatoes for a Sunday family get together.  I made about twenty of them and by the time I got home from Saturday evening mass, five of them were gone. Mr Man was hungry.   We cleaned the house and got ready for family to come over on Sunday. 

Sunday came and we put tamales we had canned earlier in the year in the crock-pot to warm. 

The burritos were put in the bread warmer. 

Cheesy green chili pinto beans (from a local farmer)was put on the stove to warm. I forgot to get a picture of them but they were sure good.  It did my heart good to see all the food enjoyed by everyone. 

Everyone met the new horse Mr Buttons. 

We went to the pumpkin and squash patch and taught a young buck how to pick them without pulling up the whole plant. 

Everyone went home later with many zucchinis, spaghetti squash and pumpkins. 

Crafts were made.

Then it was time to sing happy birthday and have tons of laughs. 

After spending the day on the homestead everyone left, the day began to cool down and we thought we were settling in for the night. Dude's phone rang. It was one of the farmers he knows. Seems somehow during pinto bean harvest some were accidentally dumped. He said if we wanted to glean them we could have what we could get. We said sure, jumped in the truck, grabbed my crocheting and drove the 45 minutes to the farm. 

Pintos dry in the field before they are harvested.

This is what a harvested row looks like. 

I think it is all so beautiful. 

Someone had gotten to the beans before us but there was still plenty to glean. 

I was able to get 3 buckets of beans. I will clean them out throughout the week.  If you knew how much I love them you would know this is a treasure beyond belief! Plus I can share with others and I will can them too.

Combine harvesting beans

It was a very busy and fun Sunday. 

Hope yours was grand. 

peace, health and happiness