Monday

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.

August 22, 2011 4

Plums

Here is a picture of the plums we picked yesterday.

We picked a half bushel of them.

This is the view behind the plum tree. Beautiful! Temperature here this morning is in the mid 50’s. Enjoy your bday and God bless.

August 20, 2011 4

A Lovely Walk

Isn’t this a beautiful place to walk? I love walking in the leaves.

Yesterday, the girls and I went down to Jessica’s to play with the boys while she went for her doctor’s appointment. All is going well, praise God. Katie is measuring a little big though and at this time she has turned to the breech position. We are not sure what will happen with that. God is in control, this we know.

We are getting ready to go pick plums. As I mentioned earlier, a couple from church told us we could come and pick all we wanted. I will try to get some pictures to show you all. The tree is very beautiful with all the plums on it. I’m sure Grace will take lots of pictures.

Enjoy your day and God bless.

August 19, 2011 4

An Old Barn

This is an old barn that is at our pastor’s house. I love old things, even old barns. Yesterday we worked with the corn. We got it all shucked. We put some up in the freezer on the cob and some we are cutting off the cob. We will be finishing working it up today and then we will start on the peaches.

Our temperature this morning was 50 degrees. Amazing! All indications are that we will have an early fall. Yesterday, we noticed the geese were forming groups. Several groups flew over with about 40 geese in a group. They were flying in the “V” formation. So pretty! This is another picture from our pastor’s house. I hope I don’t bore you all too much with these but the girls took lots of pretty pictures at his house that I want to share with you all.

This is the view from his front porch. Lovely! Well, our little break is over so I guess I should get busy. Enjoy your day and God bless.

August 17, 2011 7

Fallen Leaves

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.

August 16, 2011 8

Naked Lady

I’m sure everyone is thinking what a strange name for a post but it really is the name of the flower. For the last few years we have had these flowers come up in our yard. They are a gift from God. We love them. I guess they are called Naked Ladies because they have no leaves. They just grow up straight and have a beautiful flower on them. We had 2 others but something broke them before they got to bloom. (probably small 4 legged creatures-kitties).

This morning’s temperature was 56 when we got up! I think it definitely is starting to feel like fall. I really enjoy all the seasons but I think fall is my favorite. (Even if it does mean time to cut wood). I hope you all have a great day and God bless.

August 12, 2011 6

More Space

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.

August 11, 2011 5

Sunday Morning

It seems I have so much to share with you all. Our church has a fellowship breakfast once a year at Smartview Park on the Blue Ridge Parkway. Sunday was a beautiful morning for eating outside. Saturday we were wondering if we would get to have it or not. We had lots of fog but Sunday morning was bright and beautiful. I took sausage gravy, biscuits, fresh churned butter, and scrambled eggs-fresh from our hens. God is so good!

Jess and the boys came up Saturday morning to spend the weekend. David was at a conference in Georgia all day Saturday. He came to our house after the conference. He got here about 1:00 A.M. Jessica’s friend Leah came over on Saturday to visit with her. Our house had lots of action-five children all together chasing after kittens. They all had lots of fun. We made peach ice cream Saturday evening. It was VERY good but I am partial to peach ice cream. I got the recipe from Allrecipes.com

2 1/2 pounds fresh peaches – peeled, pitted and chopped

1/2 cup white sugar

1 pint half-and-half cream

1 (14 ounce) can sweetened condensed milk

1 (12 fluid ounce) can evaporated milk

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 cups whole milk, or as needed

Mix all ingredients together and put into ice cream maker.

Yesterday I made homemade tomato soup from our tomatoes. I got this recipe from allrecipes.com also.

4 cups chopped fresh tomatoes

1 slice onion

4 whole cloves

2 cups chicken broth

2 tablespoons butter

2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons white sugar, or to taste

Directions

In a stockpot, over medium heat, combine the tomatoes, onion, cloves and chicken broth. Bring to a boil, and gently boil for about 20 minutes to blend all of the flavors. Remove from heat and run the mixture through a food mill into a large bowl, or pan. Discard any stuff left over in the food mill.
In the now empty stockpot, melt the butter over medium heat. Stir in the flour to make a roux, cooking until the roux is a medium brown. Gradually whisk in a bit of the tomato mixture, so that no lumps form, then stir in the rest. Season with sugar and salt, and adjust to taste.

I did do a few things different. I used about 1/4 tsp celery salt instead of regular salt and I only used 1/2 tsp sugar. I made enough of this to can 5 pts. According to the Ball canning book, you process this for 20 min. on 10 lb pressure. I ended up putting mine in the freezer as I was pushed for time.

Okay, one more recipe. I told you all I had a lot to share. That’s what happens when I don’t make a post for several days. Anyway, today I made a peach simple syrup. I had a few peaches left and wondered what I could do with them. Something easy. I cut the peaches into chunks. Enough to make l cup chopped peaches. I then brought to a boil 1 cup sugar and 1 cup water. Pour the boiling water over the peaches and let sit. I let mine sit all day. Strain the mixture and you have a great tasting peach simple syrup. Then I put about 3 tbsp. peach simple syrup into an 8 oz glass. I then added ice and sparkling water. I would have used club soda but I was out of it. I got this idea from http://theblessedhearth.blogspot.com/. She did something similar with ginger. I think I might even try mixing the peach and the ginger syrup together. I might try adding this to tea as I really like peach tea. Well, I’ve bored you all enough with all these recipes. Enjoy your day and God bless.

August 9, 2011 4

Double Duty

Here is a picture of our hens hard at work. For some reason, they all want to use the same nest. Yes, they do have other nests. At least, these are big enough for two at one time. Our rooster is still under consideration. We have not put the new chickens in with the old ones yet. We plan on increasing the size of our lot this Saturday. Anyway, I have a few questions to ask. My experience with roosters is not too pleasant so I think I might be prejudice. When I think of roosters, I think of flogging and aggressiveness. What do you all think? Have you all had good experiences with roosters. The girls have made such big pets of our hens. They will sit out there in the lot and pet them and the hens love it. Do you think a rooster would go along with that or would he try to run the girls out of the lot? As I said, I have not had good experiences with roosters and I do not want this to happen to the girls. We so enjoy hearing him crow but I’m just not sure. Please share your opinion on this. Here are a few pictures of flowers that are blooming around the house.

A rose of sharon bush my mother-in-law gave me when we first moved here.

A white hibiscus. Or as my aunt used to call them “a high biscuit”. We had a great time with the boys yesterday. We played outside, saw the chickens LOTS of times, picked blackberries and drank homemade apple juice. God is good!

Today, the girls and I will spend some time cleaning our poor, neglected home. Canning takes priority and the housecleaning gets behind. Enjoy your day and God bless.

August 5, 2011 4

He Needs A Name

Well, we have decided to give Mr. Rooster a chance. If he is a good boy, I guess we’ll keep him. We all think he sounds so cute when he crows. We have decided his crow adds a little something to our day. Wow, we really DO need to get out more. Anyway, we’ll see how it works out.

Yesterday, we worked with blackberries. We made some blackberry juice. Then took the berries we had cooked down to make the juice and put them in the Roma sauce maker. The sauce maker takes out all the seeds. We then make blackberry freezer jam. We had some blackberry puree left over and I wondered what I would do with it. Then I thought HOMEMADE BLACKBERRY ICE CREAM! It was so good. I tried to take a picture to share with you all but I couldn’t get it to turn out right. I got the recipe online at Cooks.com but altered it some to better suit us. Anyway, here is the recipe I used:

2 cups blackberry puree, 2 cups sugar, 3 eggs beaten, 1/4 tsp salt, 1 tsp vanilla extract, 6 cups milk, 1 can (12 oz) evaporated milk. I mixed all the ingredients together and put it into the ice cream maker. I plan on making peach ice cream this weekend when Dave, Jess and the boys come up.

I went to work with Hubby this morning and helped him until lunchtime. Then came home and the girls and I started working on the peaches. We made some peach freezer jam and then canned some of the peaches. We saved the peelings again and got 2 more qts of peach juice. We also had a peach cobbler for supper. I love peaches.

I am looking forward to tomorrow as Sam and Daniel will be coming up to spend the day with us. Enjoy your evening and God bless.

August 3, 2011 3