Pioneer Woman at Heart

I kept about 3 cups crushed, homemade graham crackers.  I also have about 3 cups puree pumpkin I kept for making 2 homemade pumpkin pies.  I may post picture of those pies later, or tomorrow.

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I love this cooler weather.  We officially started our fall wood splitting last night.  Even though I had a very long day of work and a bazillion "to-do" items on my "to-do" list, I still went out to help.  We are going to need to wood too. Today I went to the store to get a few items we needed, and looked at the price of wood pellets - a whopping $5.00/bag (40 lb.).  Last year we paid $3.58/bag.  I was absolutely shocked.  Corn was over $6.00/bag and was not affordable last year either (to burn).  I am already baking almost daily, so I will have to figure out more ways to cut down our costs.  Maybe next year we can increase our meat chicken supply, our layers, and possible raise beef.  I am already searching for recipes on making butter with our goat's milk.    Today, I baked homemade graham crackers .  I will need 3 cups of them saved for homemade graham crust pumpkin pies tomorrow.  It's already hard to k...

While I was out taking laundry down, I thought I better double check the garden.  It's been raining here and everything is a soggy mess. I pulled on my mucking boots, and slushed out to the back squash garden.  I found a few more pumpkins, and believe it or not, 3 carrots.  I thought for sure I pulled all of them. I washed off those tasty carrots and blessed Peanut (our goat in milk) a treat.  She gobbled them down.  The younger goats are not interested in that type of food just yet, but our goat in milk, and our billy goat, love veggies. I roasted several of the pie pumpkins, pureed them and they have blessed the freezer "pantry" now.  I can take out what I need for future baking. Tiger, came right out to the kitchen when I sliced the first pumpkin.  I think he can smell squash a mile away.  We gave him the nickname "squash boy."  He looooves veggies, especially squash.  He's nibbling on some pumpkin in the photo. The freezer ...

. . . an unexpected baking/cooking day. Because I had a 1/2 jar of canned sweet pickle relish that needed to be eaten. . . I used it to make a pasta salad.  I found veggie spirals on sale for $1.00 a bag. Because I had pear butter that needed eaten . . . I used a portion of it, cutting the oil in half, to make 2 loaves of Pumpkin bread. Because I had 3 quarts of goat's milk . . . I made another crock pot full of cooked steel cut oats.  The kids eat this for after school snacks now. Because I still have more of that fresh goat's milk, fresh green peppers producing in the garden, and a few last carrots . . . I made a double batch of Confetti Corn Muffins . Yum! Because I had extra cranberries in my freezer . . . I made a big pot of hot cranberry punch.  The kids will be excited to see it when they get home today.  It's raining and cold and miserable here today.  It will perk them up and put a little sunshine in their day.  I like to ...

My hubby and I took our two younger kids to a state park fall campout this weekend.  It was a load of fun - absolutely the best camping trip yet with the kids! I had my doubts as it rained all day Friday.  I still packed up and away we went, and headed out about 6pm Friday night. That night we decided to skip a fire and watch the campground moonlight movie.  They have an outdoor amphitheater, and the movie was Harry and the Henderson's.  They served ice cream, rootbeer floats, and popcorn.  After that we simply went to bed. The next morning we had trouble getting our fire going - took forever to get breakfast made.  After that we drove down to the boat launch and they offered free canoe rentals for 2 hours.  Only 4 canoes went out that morning. My 9 year-old was a bit hesitant, so I stayed with her while hubby and my 12 year-old went out.  She later regrets not going out. When we returned, we participated in cookie decorating.  Th...

I've been watching the DVD's from Frontier House.  It's very interesting to watch, and see what these people really miss from their "real" lives.   Pioneer life can be romanticized so easily, and often we forget about their extremely hard work. I of course, know the hard physical work of splitting wood, hauling wood, and other chore challenges of self-sufficiency.  There are yet, going without things, that we have not completely experienced.  We are, however, learning and teaching ourselves about the "how-to" of making things ourselves.  I often think about the "what if" when baking, such as what would I do without flour, sugar, or salt. I recently found the entire book of Elinore Pruitt Steward, on-line, to read for free. Letters of a Woman Homesteader (click on it to be directed) I love to read about the history, real life situations, of the pioneers.  I often learn simply by reading those true life stories.  At the beginning of...

Even though the recipe said to use an electric mixer, I did not. Even though I did not have an entire 2 1/2 cups of diced green tomatoes.... I still baked my first tomato cake .  I was drizzling the frosting when the the first two kids got home from school. "OHHH!  That looks so good!  That would be great with coffee!" one of them said. Of course they kept telling me to stop reminding them it had green tomatoes in it too.  Ha ha ha!  It was pretty good too. I did not have enough butter to make the brown butter frosting, but simply used powdered sugar and goat's milk instead.  I had been out in the garden to check on things.  I saw one tomato plant had sprouted new tomatoes and I just couldn't let them go to waste.  I also brought in about a dozen more green peppers. I made another crock pot full of steel cut oats and goat's milk.  This morning, my daughter said she milked the goat in 15 minutes and got over a quart of milk....

Yesterday I thought I could work on some unfinished projects while the dinner potatoes got fried.  Ha!  For the first time every, I had a bad crafting day.  I was too much in a hurry to get some embroidery done. I have to get this towel finished before the pattern fades away.  I started to outline the cat in gray, but with the color of green I used on the dress, it appeared as a moss green cat.   So, after doing the bottom feet, tail and one paw, I started to take it out.  I re-did one paw in black, and it looks much better.  Now I need to take two paws and a tail back out.  This is the first time I have had a long, frustrating crafting day.  I decided that I was not even going to work on tatting - no way at all.  I did get some knitting done, but I still have a crocheted blanket to finish. I tried to teach my 12 year-old daughter how to do it, but she whined, "Moooooom! You made everyone elses!" Guess I can't get out that th...

Wolf Spider Grass Spider We get both of these types of spiders in our house.  Every time we come across one we call my son, who rescues it.  However, today, the grass spider got the shoe.  I had to borrow a photo on-line to show you what they look like.  They are not small either. I went to make my bed this morning and one was curled up in my bed covers.  The difference between the two spiders, is that the grass spider can crawl up things - ewwww is right. The other day, we discussed this, and I said to my 12 year old daughter, "just imagine what's in your clothes when you put them on." "MOOOOOOOOOOOOOM! she cried. I killed one the other day on the bedroom floor too.  We are getting more than we'd like inside this year.  I hope that's not a sign that we will have a hard winter.   I guess I better be cleaning down any spider webs there may be in here.  Sheesh.  I opened a tool drawer and there was one in there too. I g...

"Mom!" "Huh?" I asked in a groggy, sleepy voice. "You wanna still milk Peanut?" "UGH" That's right, I got woken up by my 14 year-old daughter.  She overslept, and was to be on a school bus at 6am for an all day farm display field trip.   I walked out to the kitchen, and said to my husband, "why don't you go milk her?" "Cause I don't have time. You always wanted to be a farmer," he said in a poor southern accent. We had both set alarm clocks at 4:30am.  We were supposed to be at the gym, working out at 5am.  Somehow, my alarm did not go off.   I was done milking by the time my husband drove past the barn in his truck to go to work.   Peanut did great.  She loves to turn her head and watch me milk.  She got a bit restless when I had her about empty.  Little guy, Rue, did not cry like a baby when we put her in the stall to milk her either.  Misty however, was being a hog with the food, so I had to give Rue so...

I really need to get a writing schedule going.  I participated in this last November, and my kids asked to read my story.  The novel has been under lock and key since then. I've been random writing daily, in between chores and baking, to get a routine going.  I think I write more on my blog than anything - ha ha ha! I best get back to work.  As soon as this rain and wet weather dry out, it's back to splitting wood, barn repairs, and finishing the goat shed.  Oh....and the chicken coop .....and.......... .........some long days ahead.  Winter will be here before I'm ready for it.

We have one hen that refuses to leave her eggs.  My 14 year-old daughter wanted to let her sit on some.  It's colder now, so it's probably not going to work out too well, but we do have heat lamps.  We marked the eggs and it takes about 22 days to hatch, according to my husband.  We don't even know if these are fertilized, but will soon find out.  This hen is so motherly, she picks up straw with her beak and puts it in her nest underneath her.  My daughter and I saw her lay this egg right in front of us.  After my daughter marked it, the hen went back in the roost, and pushed them around with her beak, and sat back down on them. We are getting about 2 quarts of milk a day from Peanut.  My daughter is enjoying it very much.  In fact, the goat does not even kick when she milks her, and she doesn't even use the hobble.  We re-purposed an old wooden coffee table that was stored in the garage.  We butted it up against the side of o...

I used pieces of cheese cloth to cover the head of my sun flowers, and tied it on with string saved from feed bags.  Hopefully the birds won't get to them anymore. I'm now on the hunt for recipes using sun flower seeds.  I mentioned, to the family, that foxtail grass seeds, and the other red flower we found, is edible.  My  husband looked at the kids and said, "you guys can all take the first bite." He's just a big chicken when it comes to foraging. Although, he is up for mushroom hunting.  We may be taking a mushroom hunting class to familiarize ourselves with what is edible and what is not.

We are heading out today, to bring home a new member to the farm.  Stay tuned for updates.  It's about a 1 hour and 15 minute drive one way.  This should be a fun day around here. We are finally back.  We originally called about a mini-lamancha goat, and when I got to talking to the woman, she also had a full sized purebred lamancha she wanted to sell, which was what we really needed. When we got there, we were talking about our billy goat, and she mentioned her purebred Nigerian wether.  She tried to sell him, but could not, and was thinking he would be going to the butcher.  She asked if we would like to take him, free of charge, for a buddy for our billy.   Meet Peanut (left) and Rue (short for Rudy on the right). Then, as we were getting ready to leave, we found out a nearby neighbor had about 50 guinea hens.  We drove over, but the younger ones, in the roost, were already asked for.  There was no way we'd catch the bigger ...

My 5 pumpkins resulted in 9 pints of pumpkin butter.  After researching canning recipes, I decided to heat my lids, after sterilizing jars, and simply attach the lids.  I allowed them to cool, and then moved them to the refrigerator.  They will last up to 6 months this way.   Canning is not recommended.  In fact, I plan to take the last of the pumpkins, and make pumpkin puree to freeze.  Then I can simply take it out to make pumpkin waffles, pumpkin bread, muffins, or pumpkin pie.  There are tons of pumpkin recipes to try it with.   Having always purchased sunflower seeds from a store, my husband was actually "giddy" when I shared these with him. "We grew those?" he squealed like a little kid getting candy (ha ha ha!) I will have to start covering some of them with cheese cloth.  The birds are starting to get into them, and they are not all ready to harvest. And once again, I am shocked at the fresh taste these little gu...

This was the first year for us to grow our own pie pumpkins (baking pumpkins).  Last year we grew the type the kids could carve out for fall. The weird weather this year, caused our pumpkin production to be less than what we thought.  We even had less of our spaghetti squash this year.  It was simply too wet. We were blessed to have enough baking pumpkins to make pumpkin butter and possible bake a few pies. There is something so gratifying to grow the pumpkins and make pumpkin butter myself.  Nothing is wasted.  The pumpkin seeds are saved and roasted, and the the goats will get treated to some pumpkin skins (and a few seeds), and any remaining will be composted.  I have to double check with my daughter, to make sure the goats can eat it first.  It sure feels good to not throw something in my trash, or have to recycle plastic, metal or glass.

I am so glad we are boarding Blondie at a stable right now, so that we can research the plants on the property (and get the fencing in place). I am finding plants that can hurt horses, and we need to remove them.  Here are some of the poisonous plants that we found here (I have milkweed growing along the creek and isn't near where the horse will go, or the goats): and Dogbane (no photo yet).  I guess we have some work to do.