MerryHeartCrafts.comMountain Momma… Country Living

Today has been chilly here in Floyd.  Wind gusts of 30-40 mph with temperatures in the mid 20′s.  We let our chickens out every evening so they can scratch and peck.  Well, this evening they just wanted to come up on the back porch and hide from the wind.  We all laughed and said soon they would be wanting to come in the house. 

Other than cold, today has been a nice day.  We started school back today.  After a 3 week break, I thought it would be difficult to get going again but it went well.  We had a nice visit with Jess and the kids yesterday.  David needed to work on his book and so Jess brought the kids up to play at MawMaw’s house for a while.  We were sitting around talking and Daniel looks at me and says “MawMaw, we need to go cook something”.  He dearly loves to help cook so we decided we needed to make chocolate chips cookies. 

Well, I guess that’s about it.  I need to go put more wood on the fire.  Enjoy your evening and God bless.

Hubby took this picture for me this morning.  I thought you all might like it.  It was very beautiful.  Today has been a gorgeous day here in Floyd.  Temperatures have been in the low 50′s.  Lots of sunshine!!  Amazing.  Need I say, I LOVE it.

Not a lot going on here other than just enjoying this warm weather.  I have finished another apron and have started another one.   I need to get a few supplies though before I do any more.  I plan on going into our little town tomorrow.  I want to go to Schoolhouse Fabrics.  I think I have mentioned it before.  It is an old 3 story school house that has been converted into a fabric store.  3 levels of material and any thing else a person might need for sewing. 

Tonight’s supper is chicken alfredo with homemade garlic breadsticks.  We are having homemade cinnamon rolls for dessert, thanks for the idea , Cary Ann.   I hope you all have a great evening and God bless.

Today has been a good day here in Floyd.   The girls and I decided it was definitely time to put up the Christmas tree.  We had lots of fun.   We put on some Christmas music and got busy.   They decorated the gingerbread house.  Then we put up the tree, the nativity, and a few other decorations.   Simple, nothing too complex.  Temperatures here have been much warmer than normal.  I like that. 

Our van is fixed.  YEAH!  Dave, Jess and the kids came up Sunday so Dave could help Hubby work on it.  Thanks so much, Dave!  Hubby finished getting it all put back together Monday.  Monday evening we rode it to the feed store to get chicken feed and everything worked fine.  Yesterday, the girls and I rode it to Sam’s.  No problems!!  I am so glad.

Yesterday, the boys had a terrible stomach virus.  They were both very sick.  Daniel was hit especially hard.  He told his mom he felt like he was living in a bad dream.  Today they both seem on the mend.  We are all praying no one else gets it.  Jess said that baby Sam was calling for his “Maw” when he was sick in the night.  You know that just touches my heart.  We are hoping to go down Saturday to do Christmas with them.  Lots of good food planned. 

Well, I guess that’s about all that has been going on here.  Enjoy your day and God bless.

Hello ladies.  It has been very cold here in Floyd today.  Temperatures have been in the upper 30′s but the wind has made it seem like 20′s.  We had snow flurries yesterday but nothing stuck to the ground.  This morning was extremely overcast but by late afternoon the sun came out for a little while.

The girls and I worked on school in the morning and then we helped Hubby set up Jessica’s bed.  No pictures yet as he has not put the headboard and footboard on.  He says we will have to put them on after we take it down to Jess.  It would be too big to fit in the van if we put it together here.  We are thinking we will take it down to them Saturday, if all goes well. 

Yesterday, the girls and I went down to Jessica’s.  Sam and Katie had appointments so we went to help.  On the way back home, Sam feel asleep.  I carried him up to his crib, we ate lunch and then left.  Sam was very upset when  he woke up and found out MawMaw was gone.  Jess had to call me and let him talk to me on the phone.

I hope you all have a great evening.  God bless.

My Christmas cactus is blooming.  I don’t think it has ever bloomed at Christmas but it’s very pretty no matter when it blooms.  I love the bright pink color.  It always makes me feel happy when I look at it.

Temperatures here this morning were mid 20′s with a heavy frost.  It has warmed up already to low 30′s and the sun is shining.  I think it will be a nice day.  We will be doing school as usual, then we have some wood to unload.  We also need to go into town to get some chicken feed.  Thank the Lord, we have once again sold enough eggs to pay for the feed. 

Jess and Katie are doing well and big brothers are adjusting nicely to having a little one in the house.  Katie seems to be (as of right now) a very content little girl.  She sleeps very well at night, 3-4 hrs between bottles.  Amazing!  David will be going back to work on Thursday.  He took a week vacation during Katie’s birth. 

Well, it is almost time for school and I have clothes to hang out.  Enjoy your day and God bless.

Here are a few more fall pictures.  These was taken last Saturday during our hike at Bottom Creek Gorge.

Fall is such a beautiful time of the year.  We have been working on school, cleaning up the garden for fall plowing and working on an afgan.  Not a lot going on.  Yesterday evening we gave Mr. Rooster away.  YEAH!  We gave him to a family that wants to hatch baby chicks for their young daughter to take of.   He will be so happy.

Yesterday, it was rainy and foggy here.  Then the temperatures dropped quite a bit during the night.  It was 36 degrees this morning when we got up.  The sun is out now though and it looks like it will be a beautiful day.  Yesterday, I was reading a blogger friend’s post, http://theboydbunch.wordpress.com/, and she was having crockpot parmesan chicken for supper.  I thought that sounded good and I had already planned on having chicken for supper so I looked up a recipe for it.  I’m not sure if this is the same recipe she used or not but it was really good.  I got my recipe from betty crocker.  I did make a few changes. 

Slow Cooker Chicken Parmesan with Penne Pasta

1 egg, 1/3 cup bread crumbs, 1/3 cup parmesan cheese, 1/2 tsp. italian seasoning, 1/4 tsp. salt, 1/4 tsp. pepper, 4 boneless, skinless chicken breast, 1 jar spaghetti sauce, 1/2 cup shredded cheese, 2 2/3 cups penne pasta.

1.  Spray crockpot

2.  In a small bowl, beat egg until foamy.  In another bowl, mix bread crumbs, parmesan cheese, italian seasoning, salt and pepper.  Dip chicken into egg, then coat with bread crumb mixture.  place in crockpot.  Cover chicken with spaghetti sauce.

3.  Cover and  cook on low for 5 to 6 hrs.   (I cooked mine on high for 4 1/2 hrs.)

4.  Cook and drain pasta.  Serve chicken on top of pasta.   Sprinkle shredded cheese on top.  (I used mozarella).

Makes 4 servings.

I hope you all enjoy your day and God bless.

I wonder what they are doing?

Someone is feeding them.  I see a hand behind the tree.

Of course, it is my sweet Julie, who can’t resist feeding cows no matter where she is.  We went with Hubby today to help him hang ceilings.  The girls went in search of something to do.  What do farm girls do when they are bored?  Feed cows, of course.  We had a nice day, enjoyed a picnic lunch with Hubby, then came home and went to piano lessons.  Temperatures here have been nice.  Upper 70′s with a  nice breeze.   Feeling more like fall every day.  Enjoy your day and God bless.

Yesterday, we went to our Pastor’s home.  They had some corn to give us and some peaches.  I thought you all might enjoy seeing some pictures we took.  As you can see, I think fall is coming on us pretty fast.  Some of the trees are already losing their leaves.  Our temperatures this morning was 55 degrees.  Our morning temps have been in the 50′s for about a week now.  So much nicer sleeping weather.  Anyway we got about 2 bushel of corn and almost a bushel of peaches.  We will  be busy today working all that up. Grace is my helper when it comes to shucking corn.  She loves it.  Julie will be inside doing other work  while Grace and I shuck.  Then I will let Julie help with the blanching while Grace has other chores.  

 Also, a couple who go to our church told us we could come and pick plums from their tree.  This is exciting for us.  We have never known anyone who had a plum tree.  We want to make jelly and I was thinking about trying plum juice.  I wonder how that would taste?  I guess we’ll find out.  We probably won’t get to go pick them until later in the week.  I let you all know how it turns out. 

This is a picture of some of the trees in the Pastor’s orchard.  If you look close, you can see the ladder at the tree we picked peaches from.  I will show you all a few more pictures next time.  Well, we better get busy.  Enjoy your day and God bless.

Saturday we got the chickens more space in their lot.  They really seem to enjoy having more room.  We put the additional 5 hens in with our hens.  It will take them a while to get used to being in there.  You see the coup at the far side of the lot.  That is what they have been in since they were bought by the man who gave them to us.  They don’t really understand the concept of being able to run about.  When we turn them all out in the evening, those 5 don’t really know to go outside.  I’m sure they will figure it out pretty soon though.  The small coup you see in the front is just for emergency use.  In case we need to separate a hen from the rest of them for a short time. 

Yesterday, we made salsa.  We ended up with 16 pts.  The Horn’s came over for a while in the evening.  We ate supper, talked, picked a few blackberries and talked some more.  It seemed like it had been a long time since they had come over.  We had a really nice evening and even got a little rain.  God is good!  Our temperatures have definitely been cooler this week.  This morning it was 60 degrees when we got up.  There is a slight feel of fall in the air.  Humidity is not near as bad.  That always makes it seem cooler. 

I hope you all have a great day and God bless.

Very exciting news here today.  We got our first egg!  I guess maybe we need to get out more, if just getting an egg gets us this excited.  But we think it is beautiful.

Well, we finally got the pink apples worked up today.  This is what they looked like when we cut them up.

They are so pretty.  Remember last year, we purchased the steam juicer and the Roma sauce maker.  They have been so helpful already this year.  We just quartered the apples, no peeling necessary.  Put them in the steam juicer and let them cook.

This is what the juice looks like.  Such a beautiful color.  We got 5 pts of juice.  The juice is concentrated.  For every pint you get a quart of juice. 

Then after the apples cooked in the steam juicer we ran them through the sauce maker.  We got 6 pts of applesauce.  Thanks so much, Donna, for sharing these with us.    We are working on peaches now.  They are canning as I type.  We saved the peelings from the peaches.  We are going to put them in the steam juicer and make juice from them.  I like the fact that there is hardly any waste. 

Remember how I said last weekend was unusually cool here.  Well, I can hardly remember that now.  It has been HOT all week.  I know not as hot as many of you but still hot.    Temperatures have been in the 90′s outside and about that hot inside our house.    I am so thankful to a blogger friend who gave me the idea of using a propane unit to do our canning on.  We put it on the front porch and it makes such a difference keeping the house a little cooler.  Most of the heat is out there not in the kitchen.  

Well, we better get busy doing some cleanup.  Enjoy your day and God bless.