Something a little different. I took this from Aunt Jenny's blog and thought it would be fun to answer these as I was a early to mid teen in the 70's. I'm not one of those women who are afraid to share my age; I'm 43, soon to be 44 in June. It means so little to me, LOL! I had to actually stop and figure out just how old I am, in fact I put down the wrong age on Jenny blog in the comments( blond moment)!!!! Anyway, I thought it would be a fun trip down memory lane. 70's CHILD? IF you were a little girl in the 70's... You had that Fisher Price Doctor's Kit with a stethoscope that actually worked. No You owned a bicycle with a banana seat and a plastic basket with flowers on it. Yes, it was the cool thing, that banana seat anyway. You learned to skate with actual skates (not roller blades) Yes, this was a weekly activity with my friends. I never did get the hang of skating backward though. You thought Gopher from Love Boat was cute (admit it!) I only saw this show a couple of times, so I don't remember Gopher, I do however remember the Doc, he was funny. You had nightmares after watching Fantasy Island . No, and again only saw it a couple of times but I love thriller shows. You had either a 'bowl cut' or 'pixie', not to mention the 'Dorothy Hamill'. People sometimes thought you were a boy. I wasn't allowed to have long hair,my Mom hated stringy hair. I always looked like a bucked toothed freckle faced boy! This part of what I have long hair now, rebellion of a sort*wink*, and my Mom comments all the time, about how a woman my age should have short hair.*sigh* You had rubber boots for rainy days and Moon boots for snowy days. Yep, had both. I remember those rain boots were a pain to get on and Moon boots made you feel like you were walking on air. You owned a 'Slip-n-Slide', on which you injured yourself on a sprinkler head more than once. No, we swam in the ditch and made a mud slid down into the water(can you see that bucked toothed, freckle faced tomboy yet, LOL!) You owned 'Klick-Klacks' and smacked yourself in the face more than once ! Never own any, friends had them, we had Yo-Yo's Your Holly Hobbie sleeping bag was your most prized possession. No, everything I loved revolved around horses. You wore a poncho, gauchos, and knickers. Had a poncho but never wore knickers, just cut of jeans. I remember Star and Hash jeans were all the rage when I was in 7-9th grade. If you didn't own a pair you were a nerd-ola You begged Santa for the electronic game, Simon.My brother got one for either his Birthday or Christmas, most all of my gift related to me or my horse. You had the Donnie and Marie dolls with those pink and purple satiny shredded outfits, or the sun shine family No, I do however remember watching their show on TV. You spent hours in your backyard on your metal swing set with the trapeze. No, but friends had them, we instead played with matchbox cars, baseball, football( the neighborhood was full of boys I was the only girl) You had homemade ribbon barrettes in every imaginable color. No, my hair was short, so why bother. You had a pair of Doctor Scholl's sandals (the ones with hard sole & the buckle). No money was tight and they were expensive. I did have a pair of clogs, with the wooden sole and cork on the bottom, they were my favorite shoes! Otherwise we ran barefooted all summer. You also had a pair of salt-water sandals. Never heard of them, not much saltwater in MT You wanted to be Laura Ingalls Wilder really bad; you wore that Little House on the Prairie-inspired plaid, ruffle shirt with the high neck in at least one school picture; and you despised Nellie Oleson! Again TV wasn't allowed much, but I did read the books via the school library. In about 9th grade in Home Ec. I made a prairie dress, I wore it out, literally. You wanted your first kiss to be at a roller rink! First Kiss, Yuck, boys were for playing baseball, football and climbing trees with( again see the tomboy side?) I do however remember the first dance I attended in 9th grade and I dance with only one boy, he was the most popular boy in school and HE asked ME to dance! His name was Chip and he was, as we became friends in later years a real gentleman. PONG! ('video tennis' ) was the most remarkable futuristic game you've ever heard of !Never heard of it, in fact never played a video game until I was in college( Pac Man) Your hairstyle was described as having 'wings' or 'feathers' and you kept it 'pretty' with the comb you kept in your back pocket. When you walked, the 'wings' flapped up and down, looked like you were gonna 'take off' .Feathered was had to do, at this point my hair was short and permed kinky curly, so all you had to do was wash and pick it out! You know who Strawberry Shortcake is, as well as her friends, Blueberry Muffin and Huckleberry Pie. I remember seeing these items in the stores, but never own or watched anything to do with them. You carried a Muppets lunch box to school and it was metal, not plastic.I took cold lunch in a sack, I do however remember having a box, I think it was plastic and had a horse running on the front. You and your girlfriends would fight over which of the Dukes of Hazzard was your boyfriend. Again not much exposure to TV. YOU had Star Wars action figures, too! My brother did have a few items. It was a big event in your household each year when the 'Wizard of Oz' would come on TV. We did watch it, but not every year. You often asked your Magic-8 ball the question: 'Who will I marry. Shaun Cassidy, Leif Garrett, or David Cassidy?' Never actually owned one, but friends did. I remember dreaming about Shawn Cassidy, but couldn't stand Leif Garrett( one of my best friends loved him though, her room was covered in posters) You completely wore out your Grease, Saturday Night Fever, and Fame soundtrack record album. I never owned one, my folks thought they were to well... risky. I did go to the movie Grease and loved it! You tried to do lots of arts and crafts, like yarn and Popsicle-stick God's eyes, decoupage, or those weird potholders made on a plastic loom. We made these in school, art class. Otherwise I liked to draw, horses of course! You made Shrinky-Dinks and put iron-on kittens on your t-shirts! I have no idea what a stinky dinks are and most of my clothes were hand me downs from my cousin. I really liked this as she was stylish and I had really nice clothes for school, otherwise I wore wrangler or rustler jeans and a T-shirt of some sort. You used to tape record songs off the radio by holding your portable tape player up to the speaker..No, but I did have my own record player and 95% of my albums were western singers( Kenny Rogers, Dolly Pardon, Crystal Gayle, John Denver( I still love his songs) and I did have the sound track to Star Wars. You had subscriptions to Dynamite and Tiger Beat. No, it was considered a waste of hard earned money. You learned everything you needed to know about girl issues from Judy Blume books.No, I didn't like mushy books, but had a friend who devoured Harlequin Romances. You thought Olivia Newton John's song 'Physical' was about aerobics. Honestly I don't think I really gave it much thought. You wore friendship pins on your tennis shoes, or shoelaces with heart or rainbow designs.No, I wore cowboy boots, clogs or went barefoot You wanted to be a Solid Gold dancer. No, but loved their shiny outfits. You drowned yourself in Love's Baby Soft I do remember having this, my favorite was from Avon, called "Sweet Honesty" and I still like it, but they stopped making it years ago. You glopped your lips in Strawberry Roll-on lip-gloss till it almost dripped off. What I remember is the Chocolate/ strawberry lip gloss, it shimmered and it tasted like chocolate. I also remember Bubble Yum gum, being a big trade item! That was fun! Let me know if YOU do this one!

I was today reading a few of my favorite blogs and I realized that my blog seems downright dull, compared to many blogs. I'm not a professional writer and our life isn't full of excitement, that is just the simple truth. What you may or may not realize is that we have to deal with excesses as well as shortages on our little homestead. For example; we let our layer hens have a natural winter( we don't run lights as the days shorten to continue their laying), so... we drop from 20-28 eggs a day down to 2-3 eggs a day in a rather quick fashion. In anticipation of this shortfall we begin reminding egg customers that sales will probably stop for a period of a few months( all know and accept this fact) as well as we begin hoarding eggs for our holiday baking. Today, Cortney and I were pondering what to do with all of our eggs, we have 18 dozen in the frig. downstairs, laying is beginning to pick up again with longer daylight and warmer weather.We first call customers to let them know we again have eggs, for a short time period, on a "First Come First Serve" basis. We also now pull out our recipes books and began looking for recipes that use lots of eggs. Eggs( fried, over easy, scrambles,hard boiled, etc...) for breakfast everyday gets old quick. We came up with several, and will work them into our menu planning for this week. I wish I could get Angel Food cake to turn out, but I've had to many failures to even think of trying again( pantry items are to expensive to feed to the chickens or pigs) I'll admit, there are days when we feel a bit overwhelmed with make the best of what the good Lord provides( not trying to sound ungrateful in the slightest). Now that we are a dry family( no fresh cow, no milk), we think back to times when we were milking our Jersey cow. We had to be creative in using milk, because we had 2 to 2/12 gallons everyday( that was only milking in the morning and the calf got the rest all day.) When our son, Jon, was home we could count on a gallon of milk being used everyday just between he and Mike for drinking. This left 1 to 1-1/2 gallons to find other uses for. Cortney and I made yogurt every week, often times 2 gallons of milk, because we gifted my folks with yogurt too, well... until they got overwhelmed anyway. We also made cottage or farmer's cheese weekly and often froze it for late use. Often when milk would begin to build up in the frig downstairs we'd gladly share with the pigs, chickens and turkeys and none turned their nose/ beaks up at the offer either. Some quick and easy ways to use excess milk are puddings, white sauce( such is used in sausage gravy), scalloped potatoes, fruit smoothies, milkshakes, etc..... Now we still had by-products of milk to deal with as well, whey from yogurt and cheese as well as buttermilk from making butter. Weekly we'd churn 5-6 gallons of cream into butter, netting us 3-1/2 to 4 lbs butter a week and 4- 5 gallons buttermilk. Often times we'd freeze buttermilk for later use. We'd also add vinegar and make a ricotta cheese and then feed the left over whey to the animals or pour into the compost pile. Whey from cheese and yogurt is used in baking, casseroles, sauces, even in pickling of produce. Whey is loaded with wonderful nutrients, to many to waste in our opinion. In our homesteading life it is a situation of feast of famine, as well as learning preserve the excesses and to eat seasonally as our ancestors once did. That is another topic I'll touch on at some point. May your day be full of blessing as well as productivity.

This morning, Cortney and I were up and ready to go! We have been looking forward to today all week. It was our friend's 10th annual sheep sheering day. Now this was actually my first sheep sheering day,and what I know about sheep doesn't amount to much. Cortney on the otherhand has been helping our friend with lambing for 4 yrs. and helped sheer some ewes for the sale barn last Fall. It was very interesting to see the professionals working and then to learn about fleece types and how to see a good quality fleece. I also learned about the differences in breeds and their wool. There was one lady demonstating spinning wool and several booths set up with woolen items for sale( yarns, rugs, hats, scarves, socks, etc....) We have other friends who have sheep as well and they use their fleece for their own uses. I do know what needle felting is and actually saw a beautiful rug today that was ropes of wool needle felted and then crocheted together into an oval rug( much like abraided rug) It was a time of fellowship with old friends, as well as making new friends. Dinner was potluck style and there were tables full. I knew lamb stew was the main dish and offered to make buttermilk biscuits. We took three large pans, approx. 55 biscuits., and a 1/2 lb of homemade butter. The food was all great and the best of all, many of the dishes were made with organic foods. Typically we stray away from potluck meals because we try to carefully distance ourselves from foods not raised natural/ organic. Someone said during dinner, they'd sheered 89 sheep( from 8 am to 12:30 pm). Most fleeces were roughly cleaned up, rolled and placed in a BIG bag, then they were stomped down. Those fleeces will be sold later. Many of the brown and grey fleeces were sold on the spot. The grey fleeces were my favorite and had the best color variation, but again I'm a novice. We finally packed up the last pan of biscuits, leaving some, upon request, for our friend and her Dh and headed home around 2pm. It was interesting and I learned a lot of information today, but..... I just don't see us raising sheep anytime soon( if Mike has his way it would be never.) There was still a nice bed of coals in the wood cookstove, so added a few pieces of wood and waited until hot enough to shut it down. Then off to get the horse stall cleaned, Cortney did that while I hauled a bale of straw to the cows barn and bedded their stalls in preparation for evening chores. Our temps. have dropped with an incoming cold front, so we're back to breaking ice off their troughs and hauling water by hand. Back to the house again we cut ham slices from the ham cooked yesterday. This is pork we raised and butchered ourselves but the first ham we've had smoked( no nitrates used) and it turned out wonderful, although it was a bit spendy, if you figure in the value/ cost of the meat added to the curing/smoking charge per pound. A smoke house is on our Honey Do list but have a few other projects of greater need, to be done first. The ham slices will be warmed in a skillet and served on a biscuit with a slice of sharp cheddar cheese. We have sliced carrots( raw) as well as leftover scalloped potatoes to add to this. Nothing fancy but most assuredly filling. Good evening and may the Lord bless you.

Homemade Laundry Soap

The Lord moved me to search out more frugal and healthful ways several years ago. The amount of chemicals we ingest and absorbed from our environment is alarming! I am seeking to reduce our families exposure to chemicals as much as possible. Also, the savings of homemade over store bought is a definate plus.

Here is the recipe we use.
4 Cups hot tap water
1bar Fels Naptha laundry bar( grated)
1 Cup Washing Soda
½ Cup Borax
Grate bar of soap into the pan you will use. Add hot tap water, soda and borax.
Stir continually over medium-low heat until soap dissolves( is melted) and the liquid becomes thicker.
Pour this mixture into a 5 gallon bucket, add 2 qts. hot tap water and stir well. Now fill bucket with cold water.
Stir, cover and let sit overnight to thicken.

I use 1/2 c. per regular sized load.

This laundry soap recipe can be doubled or even tripled.

Here is a cost break down:
Fels Naptha Soap- $1.25
Washing Soda .50
Borax .40
Total 2.05 for 80 cups or 5 gallons or .027 cents per load

Added point; graciously pointed out by a friend that this formula is "low suds" so works well for HE washing machines.



Homemade Bread( whole wheat) is another area to save and provide a more nutritious food.
Here is one of our family favorites;

Whole Wheat Bread

3c. very warm water( I use filtered)

1/3c. oil or melted lard

1/4 c. sugar

3 tsp. salt

1 egg( beaten)

3 c. whole wheat flour

1-1/2 tblsp active dry yeast

4-5 c. unbleached flour

Stir together water, oil, sugar, salt and egg into a large bowl. Mix yeast with 2.c. whole wheat flour and 2c. unbleached flour. Then add to liquid. Stir vigorously for a minute. Add remaining 1 c. whole wheat flour and enough unbleached( 3-4c.), one cup at a time, to make a soft dough. Fold out onto a well floured board or countertop. Knead for 8 minutes( yes the whole entire time if you want good texture) Place kneaded dough into a well greased( large) bowl. Let rise until double in size. Puch down and flip over, now let rise a second hour until double in size. Punch down and form into loaves( this recipe makes 3 large loaves), buns, breadsticks, etc..... Let rise again until double and bake in a moderate 325-350F oven until golden brown and sounds hollow when tapped on. I typically brush with olive oil or butter to soften the top crust. If making into bread sticks brush with oil or butter and add seeds( sesame, sunflower, flax, etc....) and or cheese( cheddar, romano, even feta)before baking. Just be sure to watch items with seeds or cheese as the burn easily.

Enjoy!

I'll add a few more favorite bread recipes, such as sourdough( starter recipe included) and Birdseed Bread( a whole grain recipe)

Birdseed Bread

This recipe may be doubled or tripled if necessary( it would be a lot of dough to work with, so I just do batches)
Oven setting: 375F
Yield: 3 large or 4 medium loaves
4 c. warm water
2Tblsp. Yeast ( or two packages)
½ c. brown sugar or molasses ( I prefer molasses)
½ c. honey
½ cup oil ( canola is what I use)
4 tsp. salt( otherwise bread has a flat taste)
About 12 c. flour ( usually use unbleached white and whole wheat with a 4:1, white/wheat ratio
1/2c. Of any or each of the following wheat, spaelt, oats, sesame seeds, sunflower seeds, barley, course ground corn meal, millet and any other grains you may have.
Boil the hard grains ( do not boil the sesame or sunflower seeds) in more water than needed until they are soft and chewy.
When draining the water from the boiled grains measure the water toward the 4cups needed for the recipe. This contain vitamins, minerals and gluten for the elastic power of the dough.
Cool grains and water before adding the following mixture:
Dissolve yeast in warm water, add molasses, honey, oil and salt. Stir well and add cooled grains and sesame and sunflower seeds. Measure flour into separate bowl. Add flour mixture to wet mixture, holding back about 2cups You’ll have to get in there with your hands and mix it well( messy part). Now flour counter or board heavily and knead dough until smooth and satiny with grains( about 8-10 minutes). Place in a large, well greased bowl. Cover with a damp cloth and let rise in a warm area until double. Punch down and repeat a second rise( this rise is not necessary, but helps give a finer texture to the bread) Punch down again and form into loaves, placing in greased and floured pans. (Dough can be frozen at this stage. When frozen place in pan, cover lightly and let thaw and then rise.) Let rise about 20 minutes. Bake for 10 minutes @375, then reduce heat to 350 for 30 more minutes. Bread will be a beautiful chestnut brown, and will sound hollow when “thumped” on the top. I butter the tops and place on a cooling rack for about an hour (Well, we may sneak some while it’s still hot ) Freeze cooled bread and when thawed it will be as moist and nice as fresh baked bread. ENJOY!!!!!!

Today we rested, well somewhat. Mike worked on some year end inventory sheets for the Coop and measured a couple of cylinders he's repairing so he can order parts needed this week. Cortney attended church services with our neighbor's. I made Cinnamon Raisin Biscuits, washed breakfast dishes, helped with morning chores and took a long hot bath( my low back has been giving me fits the past two days) I also took the time to read a few articles in magazine I received in the mail early last week. Usually magazines stack up for times when I'm not feeling well or my back is bothering me. While outdoors enjoying the weather and playing with the dogs Mike and I watched a mated pair of Bald Eagles and their last yrs., young Bald Eagle, fishing along the river. These birds are so majestic and beautiful, no wonder they were chosen to be our nations bird. Soon they'll begin mating rituals and then nesting. We had a pair nest across the river from our property last Spring. It's probably the same pair returning to nest again. Our weather has been amazing, well into the 50's during the day and mid to high 30's at night. We've only been starting a fire in the wood stove in the mornings to take off the chill and again in the early evening. The wood, sure goes further in the wood box out by the backdoor, but we now require kindling for each new fire. Mike teases me as we walk our property and anywhere, because I pick up branches and twigs. Hey! they make wonderful kindling. I collect these and once I get a good pile I break them into the desired length and tie together with twine. These are then stacked to dry over the summer. Grabbing one of these bundles, even Mike has to admit, is a blessing and we don't loose valuable firewood being chopped down for kindling. Our Ds, Jon was here last week and finally went through his room and cleaned out things and kept some things in the closet, now that the room is clean, it's slated for a paint job. This will be our spare/ craft room. Cortney and I plan to use this room for crafts, sewing and such.. plus we have a twin bed in there for a guest, or Cortney will sleep in there if we have a couple guests and give up her double bed. This week my plans are to clean the house( deep, deep down cleaning), because with all this warm weather the dogs are beginning to blow their coats, get laundry done in one day, not all week as happened last week :o( Then if weather is still warm enough I have mudding and taping to finish in our mudroom/ back porch. I'm hoping to get out pots for starting our seedlings and get a mixture of compost( if thawed in the composter), soil and manure mixed in a big tub and ready ourselves for planting. Before we know it the end of Feb, will be here and this is the time to start some of our seeds( long germination times, mostly herbs), the remainder we'll finish planting in early to mid March. We also have enough pork fat in the frig. to render for about a gallon jar of lard, the rest of the fat is in the freezer and will be rendered as needed. There is nothing like pie crust or pastries made with lard. I'm hoping that some of the fat will be rendered, along with beef tallow for making soap. This is one task I've not gotten around to, but plan to try my hand at it this summer. We enjoyed our first package of bacon and was it wonderful. We trim our side pork so there is more meat than fat, the opposite of store bought bacon. The ham, well..... we'll have to plan on having friends over for a potluck supper, it weighs 12lbs. It's almost chore time and I want to enjoy more time outdoors. Blessings to all and may your week may be productive too. :o)

Cortney, and our dogs; Casino( red aussie) and Tuffy( bordercollie) and heifer calf, Daisy!

Cortney hauling water to her chickens and turkeys

Mike mucking stalls

Bessie, our 18 yr old Jersey dairy cow

Life is NEVER dull here. There is ALWAYS something to do. We simply take it one day at a time, even sometimes one minute at a time. We are so very blessed to have every moment here that we have.

More pictures to come....

Today was a windy, gray day. Personally I function better when the sun is shining. Made another trip into the city with my Mom for a Dr. appointment and we were home again by noon. The morning chores were left for when we returned, so a quick change of clothes and off I was to clean stalls, fill water troughs and put our horse out for his few hours of grazing time. Back to the house I started a fire in the wood cook stove to take off the chill. I've been working on getting laundry finished and hung out on the line, with this wind they dry quickly. Tonight we're having a buffet night, that is what we call cleaning up leftovers. Several days ago I began sorting through our garden seeds to see if we were in need of ordering anything. Conclusion, the only things I need to order is a replacement Cherry tree, for one that didn't make it last yr and another "Wealthy" apple tree to replace one we lost when building a home for my parents on our property. I needed time to actually plan out where to put these replacement trees. Last season we added two plum trees, two pear trees and two cherry trees( one of which didn't make it). Off to bring in the last load of laundry and start evening chores. Good day!