You just can't escape the truth....

especially in this day and age of technology. Not saying it is all entirely one party or the other's fault, but it is a combined fault. Not as it has been touted since President Obama took office. I ask that each of you share this with a few friends or family, it NEEDS to go viral, people NEED to be reminded of who said what and did what, when. As I said above this mess is the responsibility of BOTH parties, now it's time to hold them all accountable.  The only way to change the course of things is to vote for those you think will work for the best interest of the people and then HOLD their FEET to the fire, make them accountable for any and all actions. We as a nation can no longer sit back and let the politicians run this country, "We the People" NEED to oversee everything, remember they are working( supposed to anyway) for our best interest.

I WON!!!!

I'm so excited, I never win anything until this week!  My friend Goodwife over on Thickin and Thinnin

had a giveaway last week. I didn't get one answer right, so thank goodness she and her Dd drew names.

Below is what I won. I love homemade dish cloths and rustic flag heart was an added bonus :o)

                               More of a closeup, so you can see the beautiful colors!  Thank you Goodwife, I
                                absolutely love them. It made my day when the package arrived :o)

Let's stand together on this.....

I'm sharing this via Homesteading and Homekeeping at Whisper Wind Farm:

Attack on Raw Milk and Small Farms

One of our members over at the Homesteading Today forums is currently under attack for selling raw milk cheese. Now mind you they have been doing so for 30 years, have never had a case of illness from their cheese and have a substantial client base that is happy with their product. Here is a news article on their story. You can follow their saga on their blog here. One of the members over at HT came up with the idea to "Sponsor a Cheese" to help out Morningland Dairy and to help show that people are willing to stand up for our family farms. Here is her idea:

Sponsor A Cheese, Save A Dairy!
I'll assume most of us are aware of the assault against Morningland Dairy that began back in August, and has resulted in anti-raw milk pencil pushers (and toadies of corporate dairy concerns) demanding that the dairy destroy all their cheese in stock (SIX MONTHS WORTH OF PRODUCT!) -- despite the fact that all FDA testing done at the dairy proved that there is absolutely NO contamination of their healthy food.

So... I had an idea. Here's what I am going to do, and if you'd like to do the same, I certainly encourage you to join the Un-Cheese Party!

Here's the low down:
If Morningland can't sell the cheese because the Missouri Milk Board and the FDA are against wholesome food, they may well lose their family business of THIRTY YEARS. (And through all those years they are able to boast that NO ONE has EVER been made ill by their cheese!)

I'm not going to let that happen if I can help it.

I'm going to "sponsor" a few pounds of that embargoed cheese. I invite anyone else who is interested to join me in our

CYBER-SPACE UN-CHEESE PARTY!


I've got a call in to Ozark Jewels, to find out exactly how many pounds of cheese are in the cooler, and I'll let you know how much there is.

Here's how to SPONSOR A CHEESE:

The average price per pound is $5. You can send your sponsorship checks or money orders directly to the dairy. Just let them know what the money is for, and a note of encouragement would certainly be appreciated.

Morningland Dairy
6248 County Road 2980
Mountain View, MO
65548

Now, folks, this is a PARTY, so INVITE YOUR FRIENDS, your neighbors, your mere acquaintances to join us!

Plaster the message on other boards you frequent, put it on your Facebook Status, make a YouTube video and hey! maybe it'll go viral!

We have to stand together as raw milk consumers and producers, or we WILL see the day where we can't even grow food for our own consumption!

(see the thread, "Another threat against raw milk" for sample letters to write to your politicians to make an even bigger impact.)

Let's get Morningland back on its feet -
SAVE THE CHEESE!!!

We'll be sponsoring some cheese, how about you?  If we, as small farmers and consumers don't stand firmly together, it isn't just Morningland Dairy that looses, we ALL do!  Below are some links that you may well find interesting and informative. The government; FDA, CDC, DHHS and others, have no business telling you what you can consume and what you can't, but if SB 510 passes that is exactly what will happen. Please call your Senators and let them know what you think and ask that they vote "NO" to SB510.There are proposals to ask for an amendment but IMHO this bill needs to be killed, completely. I've even called our Governor asking that "if" this bill passes that they block it with state law. Remember it's your freedom of choice that is at stake and all because of the GREED  and CONTROL of Big Industry!
http://usfoodtrace.com/information/political/sb510
Farm to Consumer Legal Defense Fund
Farm and Ranch Freedom Alliance

After supper play time and What was for supper?

There is no recipe, it's one of those throw it together with whatever you have dishes*wink*

I threw in; 1-1/2 lbs loose style Italian sausage

Green onions

 Garlic(minced)

Green pepper

                               Sweet basil( dry, approx. 1/2 tsp.)

                                       Fresh rosemary( 3 small sprigs, minced)

           Fresh Parcel(minced)

     Shredded carrots

        Thin sliced zucchini

I browned the sausage, added approx. 1Tbsp of olive oil, then added onions, potatoes, green pepper and herbs. I simmered this; stirring every so often, when potatoes were still crisp but softening, I added the shredded carrots, added a lid and lowered the flame. This simmered( I stirred it a couple of times) for approx. 12-15 minutes, or until potatoes and carrots were soft. I then added the zucchini slices over the top, replaced the lid and turned off the heat and let it sit for 10 minutes.  It was a HUGE hit!  We also had fried eggplant on the side.*wink*

This and that...

This is one batch of each; of the Plum Butter(left) and Plum Jelly(right)

The recipe is shared on yesterday's post.

A mix and match of assorted, end of the garden veggies.

                                            Here is our plan; as to what we'll make with our mix and match veggies.

                                          I'm going to make a batch of each, with the sweet and sour sauce, as well as, the
                                           spicier sauce.

                                          Our next door neighbor blessed us with a couple of surprises yesterday, the
                                           6- half gallon canning jars below .......

                                          and an "All American" canner large enough to hold them. They had two of the
                                          All American canners and have decided they really only NEED one. Plus,
                                          if by chance they may need to borrow it back I assured them we'd loan it to       
                                          them. :o)
                                          I am going to take it to the Extension Office in the city and have the gauge tested,
                                          it's a free service. If it needs to be replace we'll replace it. :o)

Blessings for your weekend.

Up to our elbows in....

Dirt, plums, cabbage, peppers and all of the End of the Garden stuff. :o)

We made plum jelly without pectin or sugar, only using honey and it turned out beautiful!  This is the second year we've made all of our jams, jellies and butters using only honey and they turn out so beautiful. I found the recipes in an old book I picked up at a garage sale called " Stocking Up" it was originally published in the early 70's and it has been revised twice since then.  The Basic Recipe for Jellies, using fruits high in natural pectin is as follows
Basic Recipe for High Pectin Fruit
Juice your fruit and for every cup of juice add 3/4c. mild flavored honey. Bring to a boil over medium heat, stirring often. Test for jelly point or use a candy thermometer. Pour into hot sterile jars, seal and water bath for 10 min.  Ours always sets up nicely.
For a Butter in High Pectin Fruits Use 1/2 c mild honey to each cup of pureed pulp. Mix together and add to a slow cooker, cook until desired thickness, add to hot sterilized jars, seal and water bath for 10 minutes.

 Tonight's full moon, the picture just doesn't do it justice, it was much more beautiful in person.  Many people think it's a old wise tale but when the moon is full I don't sleep well. It seems I go to sleep okay but then around 1:30- 2am I'm wide awake.  Two nights ago I was awake from 1:20 am to 3:30 am, so instead of tossing and turning disturbing Mike I got up and looked through a cookbook a friend has sent to us.

Not much else new here, just working on garden cleanup, then yard cleanup and finally we'll get everything mulched for winter.

Blessings to you and yours :o)

I have learned....

 I Have Learned  This touched my heart and there are many I am still learning.

We're in cleanup mode for the main garden area and back again into planting mode in the hoophouse.  Our weather seems to have settle into an nice Autumn, with temps holding into the mid to high 70'sF, with Sunday getting as high as 80F :o)  This weather will help the hoophouse tomatoes to ripen at a steady rate and I don't have to water everyday.

This weekend we butchered approx. 20 chickens, some were to old to bother with( 4-5 yrs old and one 7 yrs old) and 10 roosters, they were the Plymouth White Rocks, we ordered, to raise up as fryers. We still have approx. 15+ fryer hens and 6 turkeys to butcher in two weeks. We've sold all but one of the turkeys and that will be put in our freezer :o)  Next year, we won't have any turkeys to sell, the hens didn't set their typical 3 nests this year and the one they did hatch some poults, only one survived. Such is life on a homestead.*sigh*
This should help cut down on our feed/ grain costs and we'll be able to cut back to one coop again. We'll keep two Toms( a Narragansett and a Bourbon Red) and two hens( Narragansett and a Bronze wit hopes of finding a Bourbon Red hen)

I will admit, I'll be glad when the lawn slows or quits growing, I have better things to do then mowing. We're still picking raspberries, actually we're letting friends and neighbors pick now, we've already put up jam, jelly and 8gallons frozen and we have some frozen ones left from last summer.

This week we hope to begin our kraut making and we're actually going to lacto- ferment some red beets( shredded), with onions,carrots( shredded) chard stalks and kale  I hope it turns out well. :o)

We still need to harvest our millet, bundle and hang to dry and collect our bush bean dry pods as well as the dried climbing beans pods. The radish pods are still green but mature and the deer are eating them, so will harvest and hang to finish drying. 

May your week be filled with much productivity and many blessings :o)

How to spend a chilly Saturday afternoon

Although the sun was shining and little to no wind, what a blessing. :o)

Guess what I saw this morning????

Snow flurries, I kid you NOT!

                                This picture was taken at 11am .Our high of 56 was at midnight and we dropped steadily all day, with our forecasted temperature at 6pm being, 39F!

It's to....... early for this, first we have summer without summer and now we're skipping Autumn too*sigh*

Cortney did harvesting and clean up yesterday, here is her pile of pumpkin vines.

                                  The cucumbers,sadly still loaded with yellow blooms :o(

The zucchini, harvested and pulled up and placed in piles to dry.

The millet, this is one of our favorite grains and so very beautiful too.

                                A closer view and when dried they are a beautiful golden yellow hue.

                                Okay here is my find of the day! We ended up running an errand for Mike, to pick up hydraulic cylinder parts for cylinders he's repairing, and Cortney and I decided to stop at Goodwill and this is what I found. A unit similar to this one in the Lehman's catalogue sells for something like $180 +S/H and I picked this up for $4.99( if you click the photo you'll see the tag) It made the last minute trip to the city worth while! Whoot, whoot!

                                 It will be interesting to see if we wake up to some snow tomorrow.
                                 Blessings for your weekend everyone :o)

"Fhoto" Friday

Cortney worked with our friend, Annabel, on Wednesday morning. She works for her during lambing season, as well as off and on throughout the summer, as needed.

                                       Moving the lambs, after weighing and marking for sale/butcher.

Heading back to their pasture. Somewhere in this herd, are Brownie and Sonny, the bottle lambs Cortney raised up this Spring.

                              "Dillon" ever watchful, he is one of two lamas our friend's have to protect their sheep.
This has been a particularly hard year for our friends, as the losses due to coyotes has been high.*sigh* A beautiful view of the valley.

"Jake" and Cortney," Bringing up the rear!"  Jake is a Canaan dog and he's in training for herding the sheep :o)

Almost there! Look at the beautiful view from the hill.

                                             All done, taking a break on Cortney's foot! Jake is such a character! LOL!
                                            The scenery is beautiful.

                                          Heading back to the house( left to right) Lacy, Trixy and Jake. Jake and Lacy are Canaan dogs and Trixy is a mix( beagle and ?)  Cortney loves "the gang" and they love her, of course taking cookies for them helps!*wink*
                                           Thank you Annabel for permission in using your beautiful photos :o)

We've been busy, busy here harvesting, preserving and cleaning up the garden. Bless Cortney's heart, she collected/ harvested all of our cukes, zucchini and her pumpkins yesterday while I was canning and making supper.
She ended up with a wonderful harvest of pumpkins from 6 plants,they produced 35 pumpkins!  She's been taking orders, we'll keep 5-6 for our use and she's hoping to sell the remainder and some Indian corn bundles, advertising with a sign at the end of our drive.

Blessings for your weekend everyone :o)

I'm going to keep harping this folks, I want you to make that 20% increase

Jeff Rense and Gerald Celente; We are what we eat. 

Update on our progress :o)

We canned 10qts of peaches and.....

these peaches are going to be made into Peach Rosemary Jam. It's a new recipe shared by Farmgirl Cyn

Check out her blog, it's wonderful and she shares the most fabulous recipes.

Half of our Painted Mountain corn is picked, we still have 6 rows to go. It rained last night, so we'll wait for them to dry back out before harvesting those rows. It's such a joy to shuck these ears to see what colors God put together.

Here you can see blue, pink and green( click on any of these photos to see an enlarged close up.), words just can't convey how beautiful these colors are.The ear at the top of the photo is purple and I mean grape ape purple!

Purple, in all shades, red, red with orange and a brownish orange.....

You've gotta click for a enlarged version of this one, it has variegated kernels, so beautiful!

Can anyone guess what type of seed this is? I'll reveal the answer in the comments, tomorrow. It's a first for me to collect this much and I look forward to experimenting with growing it.

Next on the list, I picked these yesterday while Cortney was cleaning up our firewood storage area, in prep for more wood to be split and stacked. Mike brought home this load of wood last weekend( see below) with approximately 3-4  more loads just like this to be hauled home over the next few weekends. This will finish off our wood supply needed for this winter and get a good start toward 2011's winter wood supply. :o) Mike has been so busy with his job( they moved the entire store to a temporary location, while their new store is being built) that getting time to cut, split and stack firewood this year has been a challenge. We knew this and forewarned my parents that maybe they'd better stock up on the pine slabs my Dad gets from a lumber mill 60+ miles away.

Cortney and I also removed the plastic from our small greenhouse( sometimes, you get what you pay for) We'd purchased this 8x8 greenhouse at Harbor Freight( for something like $130), last Spring and although the frame is sturdy and we will revamp it adding 4 yr greenhouse plastic for use next Spring, the plastic it came with didn't even stand up to a years worth of weather.*sigh* 

Well, got to run and get busy making jams, then off to plant some salad greens in the hoop house. Praying the remainder of your week is productive and filled with many blessings. :o) 

Root cellars, how we built ours.

We had a small root cellar 5ftx8ft, when we bought this place. We used it but

I always worried about the safety of it. When my parents build their home here, it was in the way of the contractors and we opted to collapse it, fill it in and build a new larger cellar in a different location. My parents agreed to help rebuild a new cellar and they paid for the materials. It was decided that 12x12x7ft was a good size. Mike bartered with a man to dig the hole 5-6 ft deep with a backhoe. We couldn't go any deeper because of our high water table( water is at 8 ft.)

Mike and my Dad planned out how to build it and the best ways to preserve the wood. It has a vapor barrier and then is wrapped in tar paper, with rolled roofing on the roof( you can see that in the photo) It is vented at ground level and at the roof level as well( you'll see the vents a few photos below)

It was filled in entirely by hand. 

My Dad who did the majority of filling in and packing the dirt.

All filled in around the back, sides and some on the roof, but needed to build the outside entrance and steps

Here it is before being completely covered by dirt

This is what it looks like in the summer months, now that it is completely covered with dirt. It hold at a fairly regular temp. from 42-44F in winter( when sub zero outside, we block the vents) and 44-48F in summer. We did have to add a vapor barrier to the floor due to excess humidity. The humidity is just about right for root crops, and cabbage.  The squash and pumpkins will store, after being hardened off and coated with a thin coat of olive oil or lard, for 3-4 month before mold spots begin to show up. We did however have to add some additional support beams along the center support and added some additional 2x4's in the walls for added strength. It's amazing how much dirt weighs, especially when wet!

Here are the shelves and bins we use to store our potatoes, carrots, onions, cabbage, squash, turnips, etc...

The potatoes on the shelves were dug when it was wet( 3 summers ago), so we let them dry and cure for several weeks before adding to the potato bin

Our carrots are stored in dirt( our soil is sandy), laying them flat, not touching one another and covering with soil, then layer again, repeating until the bin is full. We also use a plastic tote for this as well. Our carrots typically keep from one garden season to another, after approx 11 months in storage, they begin to get hairy with roots and dehydrate down some.

We couldn't live without a cellar now.

A photo story, The Day in the Life of Cortney!

Pelicans, we love them. They are so graceful when floating on the wind currents

( this is their undersides)

Here they are turning, so you can see their topsides

Please......., can we come in now!

Hello! This isn't candid camera hour, Geesh!

This bumble bee was so HUGE! "Busy as a Bee" collecting good nectar and pollen

Another shot

Hoss, boy is he growing up

"Addy", heading for the trough, for a drink.

"Button" in tow to the water.

                                       Hey, Girls, wait for me!!!!!!!

                                                 Good night everyone!