Pioneer Woman at Heart

Last night, I used some of my canned tomato sauce, to create a pasta dinner.  I boiled up some whole wheat pasta, and added to it, browned ground beef, onion, garlic, green and red peppers, and 6-7 fresh tomatoes.  I added home grown oregano, salt and pepper and a bit of crushed red pepper flakes.   Some of the kids topped their dinner with grated parmesan cheese also.  This would be good with a bit of mozzarella cheese mixed in too.  After I mixed it all together, it was heated in the oven for about  30 minutes.  The only thing we lacked in this recipe, was my homemade noodles. With all these tomatoes coming in right now, I have not had a day free enough to get my noodles made.  Hopefully, I can get them made this week. These are just some of the tomatoes my husband and I picked last night.  I have enough roma tomatoes to make another batch of tomato sauce, and can more tomatoes.  I borrowed a book from the library and hope...

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My 9 year-old daughter made this cute frog (felt) pin cushion last night.  Of all days, she picks a busy day, to ask for help.  I had just come home from the dentist, and was madly working away on laundry, dinner, and other things I got behind on. This time, I told her she needed to trace the pattern, make her templates and complete the project 100% by herself.  She came to me often to ask questions, but did the entire project herself, aside from sewing on the eyes.  She had a bit of trouble and I had to help her with that. I would not let her use my good sewing scissors, as they are extremely sharp.  She was very careful with my next best pair of scissors, and did pretty well cutting the patterns out.  She's so proud of herself, she now wants to make these (and needle holders) to sell in my handicraft store. 

I've been chatting with a park district expert, in regards to the wild flowers, weeds and invasive plants on our property.  At first I thought it was fun to press some of them, but it's been more that just that. I've not only found out we have some very interesting flowers, but some weeds that are the cause of our bad allergies.  In fact, the dork that I am, went out and pulled Common Ragweed from the goat's pen area.  I had gloves on, but after pulling two armfuls, I had to stop.  My neck broke out in welts and it had the appearance of poison ivy or oak.  My neck was read and very itchy.  However, after wiping it with a cold, wet washcloth, it disappeared.  Phew!  I woke up congested and could not smell my clothesline fresh bed sheets.   In this one picture I took, you can see three wild flowers, and they surround one giant weed.  The Tall Ironweed in the picture is taller than me, and I'm tall.  I am pressing some of the ...

Over the years I have collected odd books from used book sales.  In the beginning they were placed on a shelf for homeschooling, and for my public school kids.  So far, every book has been helpful with school reports and other needs. One book I am using a lot lately, is a book on our state wild flowers.  I've had a flower press for many years, but have not used it recently.  I got it back out after finding these wild flowers on our property. The other day I was flipping through the pages of the book, and said, "Hey!  I know this weed.  I've seen it before." My husband responded with, "What your mother really means to say, is that she probably fed it to you." Ha ha ha ha ha!

I pulled 2 nice sized heads of cauliflower and 2 head of home grown cabbage.  For the first time, I canned a slaw recipe, using every vegetable ingredient from the garden.  The boiled syrup was the only thing I had to buy ingredients for.  This was a simple recipe we can't wait to taste it.  Here is the recipe:  Canned Slaw The cauliflower was used for dinner.  We tried a pizza crust recipe I found on-line.  Cauliflower Pizza Crust It was soooooooooooo good, that my hubby took a small slice and drove it 5 miles or so to his nephew's house to share.  It's a wonderfully tasting, healthier, and low carb pizza.  Yum!  I topped ours with garden veggies and cooked organic chicken pieces.  We will be growing more cauliflower next year.  This is one vegetable that we have not been eating enough of.  Again, you have to try this recipe.  The person who created this recipe should be on Food Network.  Th...

I shot a hand gun and shot gun today, for the first time in my life.  The first gun I shot with was the shotgun.  I hit my target on the first shot (a small baking pumpkin).  I love the shot gun.  It's not as bad to shoot with as I thought it would be.   I learned gun safety, and learn to load both types of guns myself.  They only thing I need to learn now, is how to clean both of them, and learn hunting safety. I am so excited that I hit my target on the first shot, that I kept the shot gun shells to make into a craft.  I am working on a new craft for them, but until then, visit my S.C.R.A.P. blog to see other ideas that are already on the Internet. Shot Gun Shell Crafts (click here to visit my other blog)  I also kept these: I may make earrings or another project with them.  I haven't decided.  I'm just proud of myself for asking someone to teach me about guns and gun safety.

When I went outside to assess a barn repair, I noticed a few hawks flying low.  I had my camera with me, but I am still not good at catching a good photo of one.  I guess I keep practicing.  Before Repairs We not only got these repairs completed, but repaired the bottom split door hinges on the goat barn, and one gate lock. Now we need to build the top split door and the side door for the goats, and then tackle the new coop for the barred rocks.   My husband was driving home one day and saw this roost sitting outside on someone's property.  I guess this person also sells other used items.   My husband snatched this up for $20.00. Today we fixed it up a bit and it's now in with the barred rocks.  As along as we have 2 roosters, they won't get along together in the same coop.  Once we get the new coop built, we can move them from their temporary (night time) coop.

Our pantry was blessed with 4 1/2 more quarts of home canned tomato sauce.  This time I did not add any of my larger tomatoes.  I used all Roma tomatoes and my kitchen smelled so good.  I use the seasoned tomato sauce recipe in the Ball canning book.

~Pickled Hot Peppers ~ This is the recipe I used, only I did not have any serrano peppers.  I simply used thick cuts of banana pepper and one cut jalapeno pepper to each jar.  We have not tasted them yet, but hot to in a week.  We like to let it sit and allow all the flavors to permeate for a few days before opening one and tasting.  Note:  We took one reviewer's tip, and added the peppers to the jars first, then added the boiled liquid into the jars.  Hubby may be trying these today even though it's only been about 2 days.  I'll update you on the flavor. UPDATE: These had a good warm flavor with the jalapeno in the jars.  They are soft, not like crispy cucumber pickles.  They are good alone, or added to other recipes or sauces for flavor.  I definitely would add the peppers to the jar first, or you will have mushy peppers (if you boil them for 5 minutes per the original recipe).

While reducing my tomato sauce, and cooling my slaw syrup, I found this Web site on-line. If you are a survivalist and you read my blog for frugal living tips, learning to be self-sufficient and preparedness, you'll love it too. Pioneer Living Survival

Last night, as I was taking clothes off the line, I looked out at the garden.  I forgot to check on my cauliflower and cabbage.  I walked over and found 2 nice heads of cauliflower ready to harvest.  I also found 1 head of cabbage ready.  Back inside I went, and started searching for recipes.  I already have a basket full of green beans, the last of the potatoes, and some organic bacon for dinner tonight.  I needed a way to preserve or store up the cabbage. Visit back to see what we decided to make with both of them.  I'm busy cutting up tomatoes for another batch of tomato sauce.  I ran out of onions.  I went to the garden, and begged the earth to give me just a few more, but we have used all that we planted.  Next year, we need more.  While hubby is out buying me more onion, I will finish cutting up the tomatoes.  We were surprised that the produce stand, just down the road, does not have onions.  We use onion and g...

Canning is a lot of work.  Phew!  With all of our tomatoes this year, I am very busy canning today.  I can tell you that canning tomato sauce, although lengthy and tedious, was well worth it.  The taste is unbelievably better than store canned sauce.  I canned mine as seasoned tomato sauce, and plan to be doing that again tomorrow. As for today, I was successful in canning my first tomatoes ever. 

Co-workers of my husband's, have gifted us with garlic (homegrown), and jalapeno peppers.  We made 3 quarts of hot salsa with both of those.  We plan to plant some of the garlic very soon also. We were also gifted some sweet corn.  We cooked it last night and the leftover was cut off and added to crock pot Spanish Rice (also made with fresh garden goodies and my very own tomato sauce). Repairs and repairs.  They don't seem to stop, so I want to learn how to fix them myself. Recently, one of the head lights in my van went out.  I told my husband, but he's been busy every night with more urgent repairs, that it didn't get replaced.  One night he was driving to a nearby town, he was stopped by the police.  The next day he bought a new headlight, and I asked for him to teach me how to change it.   He showed me how, and I helped.  Next on the list is how to repair my windshield wiper spray nozzle.  It's not spraying out on the d...

A bad storm cut our power off last night about 11pm.  Even though I reported it, it was off until about 9:15am this morning. We were actually more calm then ever this time.  I mean, we have been through it so many times, including 2 times during the summer.  We are becoming pros at handling it.  We keep large plastic cat litter jugs filled with water.  Those are used to flush toilets.  We keep 2 extra jugs of water just for the dogs, and other drinking water that we had to use to water the goats and chickens.   I used our bottled drinking water to give to the barn cats this morning also. We were very well prepared for no lights.  With camping equipment we had several lanterns and flashlights.  We also have candles and oil lamps.  We have a string of battery operated camping lights that we used in the bathroom so the kids could get ready for school. The main issue with the power out, is that when it does go out, we can't do...

If I got paid for every time I signed my name yesterday (and the day before), I'd be rich.  School papers are not our favorite thing around here.  I was sat down, while my tomato sauce reduced, and a pen was placed in my hand. "Sign this Mom," they all said. You can definitely tell school started around here.  My e-mail inbox fills up daily with stuff from scholastic, Market Day, school newsletters (to save on school paper), and many other e-mails.  Pretty soon the fundraisers will start flowing in, and I'll start to hear "Mom I need $$ for this and that." Last year, about this time, we were winding down with the garden goodies.  We made lot of salsa, but never canned anything.  I did freeze many tomatoes, but last year we had mostly Romas.  This year, I have many larger types of tomatoes.  Yesterday my sauce took about 25 pounds of Romas, and that is about 125 of them.  Today I cut up and froze 3 very full quart bags of tomatoes. ...

My kids, especially my 9 year-old daughter, say the funniest things.  For example, we went went camping last weekend, I noticed my camping tote was a mess.  In fact, we were missing important items such as our lanterns.  The older girls held a backyard camp-out earlier in the summer, and used my camping supplies.  I had mentioned that they need to learn to put things back or simply stay out of it, when my 9 year-old said this: "Hey Mom, just put a sign on it that says Mom's reusable panty liners ." It just made me crack up laughing.  I did get a sample from Naturally Cozy , and they all ran when I opened the package.  You never know if the economy will be worse next year, so I wanted to be prepared for anything. Anyway, aside from that funny story, she told me something after she got off the school bus.  She told me how the kids went around and talked about their family.  She boasted about having 25 animals around here, and proudly told me...

It was a happy/sad day today.  The kids were up very early and pretty excited about going back to school.  Me on the other hand, was a bit down.   I did have a lot to keep me busy.  If fact, my first canned tomato sauce is still reducing.  In between cutting up all those roma tomatoes and onions, I pulled 2 watermelons from the garden and cut them up.  I also pulled about 5 more zucchini.  I think I will put the relish canning and tomato freezing jobs off until tomorrow.  Five loads of laundry wore me out, on top of all the other work around here.   I never got my "porch time" as my Dad surprised us with a visit.  The kids were very excited and can't wait to show him the goats.

Our garden blessings went camping this year.  I was much smarter this time in packing our food.  Instead of putting a carton of eggs in my cooler, I cracked them, whisked them, and poured them into recycled glass peanut butter jars (canning jars would work too).  In the cooler it went.  We also took homemade Queen Anne's Lace jelly and peanut butter. I also chopped all the veggies and packed them separate for our first grilled stir fry and rice campfire dinner.  The only thing I need to change on that part, is to pack them in glass jars. Our cooler smelled like onions, because I used a ziploc bag - blech. I pre-cooked our brown rice, and it heated up nicely on our campfire griddle pan.  Served with chopsticks Breakfast was easier with the eggs pre-cracked and whisked.  Instead of buying main stream frozen potatoes, I pulled a bag from our freezer that contained garden potatoes.  I also pre-cut garden green peppers and onions to mix with ...

While away, I finished another shawl for one of the kids. . .  I watched another sunrise . . .  The kids practiced folding napkins . . . I got a good start on setting up and organizing my writing nook (yep, that's a dish drainer and that's a Christmas album in the very back)   . . . Here is a close up of the frame that my youngest daughter gave me for my writing area . . .   (Be Joyful and Happy) I finally got around to cutting 2 pillow cases and a sheet into strips, and sewed them together for rag balls (future rag rug).  The pillow cases were over 20 years old and worn very thin.  The colors are barely visible . . . I practiced a new knitted square.  I really did too.  I kept taking it out and knitting it over and over.  Tip:  Never try a new pattern when kids are in the same room (ha ha ha ha!) (Seed Stitch)  And I finally took a few of the kids camping . . .  Look for an update on our camping trip in a day ...