Pioneer Woman at Heart

The baked french toast was a hit.  The idea was to find a recipe for "picky" eaters, to take to the next breakfast.  Hubby's family has many "picky" eaters.  It'll go on the "potluck" take it list now. Sorry for the dark photo, but it was pretty early in the morning when I took it. Speaking of garden work, Hubby told me I could have the day off and to "do nothing."  Hm.  I told him the tomatoes still needed a bit of weeding, but I'd try to stay indoors if I could.  It was a hot day out while freeing up the green peppers and jalapeno plants. I did get 40 cups of sweet corn put in the freezer.  I have more to do today. Husband:  "What are you making?" Me:  "Washcloths for us." Husband (all excited and smiling) "Wow, you are really gonna make something for us ?"  Ha ha!  I really do create and sell more than for us, when I should keep up with us too.  We need them anyway.  Like I said, I hope to...

Yesterday's sunrise before I got started on the garden work. Rain was due at 4pm.  Time was cut short outside.  It was also already 83°F by 9:30am, but I went back out after another load of laundry and un-buried the green pepper plants. All but one.  A swarm of wasps continued to gather water and mud to make a nest somewhere, and they were around the very last plant I needed to weed.  I'll get it done this morning. Tried a new recipe for overnight breakfast - baked french toast.  I have made it before, but with cream cheese and blueberries.  I just wanted cinnamon/brown sugar ones this time.  We'll all do a taste test this morning. I have been asked about how we freeze our corn.  Here is the link to my post with the recipe for freezing it off the cob:  Puttin' Up Sweet Corn .  It is very good, and when I thaw it to cook, I do not add water. Just the salt (you can also add salt before freezing).  As the corn cooks, it ...

Baby red-headed woodpecker.  We are thinking of leaving this dead tree for the birds.  The woodpeckers love it.  We have seen 3 of them now.   Saturday we hit the garden early.  However, after a lot of curse words from Hubby's mouth (I warned him), we pooped out early as well.  We showered, sipped down more coffee, and went on a long motorcycle ride.  Boy it felt great. Sunday we hit the garden early again.  Tomatoes are dug out, and some of the potatoes.  Green beans were tilled and a lot of weed whacking accomplished.  All pepper plants look good, and we have blossoms on the squash (crossing our fingers).   Potatoes.  Nope.  Not doin' it!  Hubby weed whacked the tops, I'll water and see if I can find the plants.  If not, we are mowing it down.   We won't be planting a garden next year at all .  Not until we can hire someone to mow the pasture or purchase a tractor and...

The babies are hatched now, and being fed constantly.  I'm sure they'll be flying out soon.  Doesn't take them long.  Hopefully before my plant dies. Our neighbors, about 3-4 fields away got solar panels installed. My zinnias are finally blooming, and they are feeding our hummingbird and the butterflies. Our dinner one night - crock pot beef stroganoff.  I didn't have homemade noodles, so those were Amish made.  I just haven't had time to restock noodles but dinner was fabulous. TIP:  To make the beef very tender I learned this from a cooking show.  Although in the show they used soy sauce for their particular sauce recipe, here's what I did - add a bit of baking powder and corn starch and a bit of liquid to meat and let sit 20 minutes.  I used Worcestershire sauce and the beef literally fell apart. Another night's dinner, but I was not feeling the whole heat up the house at 450°F thing.    Biscuits and sausage g...

Everywhere I looked, there was a job to get done.  UGH!  It was also intern day, so outdoor time was limited (again).  Puppy duty day. Dishwasher needed emptied and reloaded.  Laundry needed done, crockpot dinner started, yard picked up, puppy pool emptied and brought up, hose pulled in (mower guy showed up), etc.   Bathroom needed cleaned.  Kitchen table cleaned off.  Carpets needed vacuumed.  Dog needed brushed.  Beef needed cooked for Jesse.  I needed to mail in a paper for daughter for her intern work. Trash needed to go out.  Chickens needed tending.  I got more orders for hot pads, but need to make them also.  Library books needed to be returned.  I needed to figure out what to make and take to a cookout this weekend, and the following (when is a girl gonna get time for a motorcycle ride with all this stuff going on?  Just say no?). Recipes needed written and filed.  Senior pictures needed t...

Yesterday's sunrise and guests that came by.  It wasn't the prettiest sunrise, but still pretty. Due to excessive rain, followed by a heat wave, this happened.  To no fault of myself either.   I blame the weather. Green beans are in there somewhere.  Oh what a mess it is. Three hours of work, before I had to take care of the puppy (not happy about missing out on my work time when she interns).  Not all survived, but I should get a good amount.  One plant already has starts on it.  The last row is iffy.  Tall grass everywhere.  I put an S.O.S. out to one daughter who I know will come help withe either puppy or garden.  I hope to get that help soon.   I hope to have a photo when it's tilled, but no promise.  I must move onto the potatoes or tomatoes next.  They are a hot mess too.  Row of wax beans looks great.  Beans on the plants too.  Second row (green beans), about 1/2 s...

The weather turned absolutely beautiful.  First things first - weed.  Oh where to start? The garden of course.  Woke up to a very nice, camping weather, of 59°F with a high of 80.  This week will be so much better than last week's heat wave. By the way, daughter's school uniforms were free this year.  Woohoo to that!  She got two of them too.  I didn't have to fork out $180.00 like last school year.   It's sort of bittersweet this coming year.  Last year for her and last kid to finish high school.  They are growing up way too fast. We have bats in our chicken barn.  I found a baby dead on the floor by the door.  I guess they love our place to come nest and have their babies.  I just hope they leave soon, since the babies are getting born.  We've talked about building a bat house.  We may need to now. My husband has been hankering for corn dogs, and I caved.  I don't fry anything, so he was a ve...

If you saw yesterday's post, I was up pretty early. I had to laugh when daughter came downstairs, and actually put her pup in the kennel.  She said, "he's been out but wake me up at 8am." Of course I let him out, fed him and loved on him until 8am.  We needed to kennel him to go to the school and do the "school" thing, which was a good half hour drive just to get there.  Poor pup.  I so wanted to take him with us. The school stuff messed up my day at home.  Add to that a trip to Michael's and the Dollar Tree.  My last yarn order came with half missing.  I had to see if I could pick up at least one ball of black.  I emailed about the missing items, but haven't heard back yet.   We also had to stop at my Mom's house.  She wanted milkweed plants so I pulled some from my flower bed and dropped those off. It was almost a perfect day to weed.  It drizzled all morning long. but by the time we were back home, there was no time....

We woke up to almost 80°F at 5:30am yesterday.  Yeah, it started out hot, and continued.  I could only hope we got more rain.  We hit a high of 106°F heat index yesterday.   Woke up to the sweet sound of rain early this morning.  It'll be hotter today than yesterday, so I'm sure I'll be taking crushed ice to the chickens. I got another bracelet done (requested colors).  Seven more to make yet.  I actually got 10 orders.  They are turning out so nicely too, but I'll be raising the price.  It's a good way to use indoor time, but the bathroom needed cleaned too.  Youngest was home, so she helps count the 196 beads for me, and helps string them.  I may need to raise the price after these 7 are all done.  I hope to get some made this summer for the fall holiday show I do.  I think they would sell very well.  So glad I tried the art of crocheting with beads.   Carpet shampooing will happen after thi...

Another new pattern to try out.  I love it!  Kitchen hand towel.  It however, takes 2 balls of yarn, and the kit it came in, uses yarn made in China (75% cotton, 25% polyester).  I couldn't make and sell them for a good price, so this one goes in my own kitchen, and some may make it in Christmas gift baskets.  Just depends on if I can find 100% cotton at a good price.  I don't like Herrschner's yarn  (Heritage Cotton) they sent in the kit.  Like I said, made in China, and so far every ball has had imperfections in them.  Our 17 year-old daughter wants one for her Hope Chest, but said she's "never moving out" ha ha ha!  She's gotten the chance of many trips this year, and she's loving it, so it's on the "winter" to-do crochet list.   The heat is now rising upon us.  I packed salty nuts and watermelon in Hubby's lunch.  It's so bad outside. I baked a new breakfast casserole early in the morning to avoid ...

Wednesday we heated up to 86°F by 11am, and the heat index was 95°F.  Just the start of our pre-warned heat wave. This is from this morning's sunrise.  The haze is so thick from the humidity.  I'll have to water the heck out of everything today.  At least we have well water, so they'll still all get a good soak of goodness. I went to town and Romeo finally got his pool!  Thanks Mother Em.  Farm and Home still had some.  He's not on board with it yet, but with a bit of training he'll like it.  He didn't mind standing in it in this heat.   After a soak in the pool and some running around.... ....this happened, lol! Up until about 2pm, I was up-and-at-um, cleaning my much needed bedroom.  Try putting away umpteen things that were never put in their home during the night shift ordeal. I do love my new sweeper.  Boy the carpet needed it.  With the heat wave and energy crisis notices to conserve, I stopp...

I got a start on one of the bracelets.  Each one takes 196 beads and it does take 45 minutes to an hour to string them. Crazier things could happen, but after I crocheted the "trial" bracelet and to check size, I had 7 orders for them by the next morning (thanks to my daughter showing it off on social media). Woohoo, but now I got work to do ha ha! I was back online doing some "unsupervised" shopping!  I'll have supplies soon, but I wish Aunt Lydia's yarn sold #3 cotton thread in a variegated color too. We got rain yesterday.  So thankful for that, but the weeding needs to resume again. I managed to get one bag of mulch in the flower beds and of course weeded that area prior to that. Our 17 year-old had a headache all day, so I cut some fresh feverfew and brewed a tea for her.  The main reason to plant it was for this purpose (migraines, headaches).  Over the counter meds would not work for her, so I brewed the tea, although the feverfew was fresh...

We had another gorgeous sunrise this morning, but we'll get more heat and hopefully rain.  Most of the area got rain, but not us, so I'll need to water some things this morning. I had good intentions on going to look at possibly adopting a 2 year dog, but talked myself out of it.  I think we need a puppy to train alongside the chickens, cats and the other puppy. Looked around for a pool for the pup.  So far, they are sold out.  Imagine that.  It's so hot that I'm not surprised. Reclaimed the kitchen table yesterday, and tried to put some order into the kitchen itself.  It was hot and the puppy was hating it, so he'll get a cool bathtub soak quite often this week. My beads are starting to arrive, but my crochet thread hasn't.  It would be great if it came today.  I'll be indoors this entire week, aside from watering. I'm on "puppy" duty today, as our youngest is interning at the salon, and has customers coming in today.  She ...

Good Morning Monday! I'm joining up with Sandra  at Diary of a Stay at Home Mom. Lots to do today. We literally went "off grid" over the weekend. We stole away to the island and took two of the girls.  Oh my gosh they loved it. Their first time there.  There is no cell service there on most of the island and it's spotty in one area.   By the way, we have to go back since we didn't get our traditional margaritas this trip.  They now have a hippie store there, and the girls fell in love.  One came home with tye-dye crocs and pink heart shaped sunglasses, ha ha! We got a flat tire on our golf cart, so we were sitting at an outside bar/restaurant. Oh darn, had to order a long island iced tea. We got help, but had to wait about an hour.  In that time I got a text message.  Had we not gotten the flat tire, I would not have gotten the text that said if someone didn't pick him up on Friday (we had already left), that t...