Saturday BlogRoll call

My fellow Homesteaders Part 2

Deliberate life is a wonderful resource guide to self sufficiency and living a green life.

Howling Hill is written by Nio. Occasional updates about how she is managing her homestead of only 1 acre.

My Green Dream is a wonderfully written blog, Sheph makes homesteading almost a romantic idea.

Pocket Farm is a very popular one. Liz is great at expressing herself. Not only does this blog include her life on the homestead, but many opinions on the world at large.

Hope you enjoy exploring my fellow homesteaders blogs. They hold a wealth of different information. I am off to buy some feed and raid the pumpkin patch. Tomorrow's guest blogger is a special one, and I will see you all on Monday.

I have been babbling for 200 posts

As the title states, this is my 200 post. I didn't celebrate my 100 post, didn't think it was that big of a deal. Not even sure about celebrating this one.

so to recap my firsts, I have butchered a rooster, made homemade noodles. Butchered ducks, cooked roast duck. I used a pressure cooker, made jams. planned an underground home, bought goats. dealt with a female deprived turkey, lost chicks in a storm. tried to hatch out eggs, brood chicks, successfully grew sweet potatoes. Lost my favorite hen and discovered the egg development process. Found an apple and peach hook up, and discovered new ways to preserve apples.

My future firsts, building our underground home. Making a wattle fence, getting sheep and llamas, getting a dairy cow. Making goat cheese. Using lye to make soap. Sheep shearing, butchering. Digging a well, building a wind mill. Successfully hatching out eggs. Butchering a turkey. Stringing a barbed wire fence. making wire baskets. And many more things that I will soon discover that I need to do.

Being so new to all of this has had its ups and downs. Some wonderful and scary moments. The more old school things that I accomplish, the more new ones I want to try. I am limited because of the small plot of land we do have, and one day we hope to have more acreage. But until that time, we will do what we can on our 5 acres and enjoy every moment of it, no matter how sick of apples I get.

Thanks for reading and commenting over the last few months. I truly appreciate it.

Not about the Homestead

But this will affect my blogging. Or I should say, it has been affecting my posts. My wonderful friends seem to be spreading the word, so I thought you should hear it from me before the rumor gets to you, from others.

Yes, it's true. I am involved in a ebook challenge. Paperbackwriter issued a challenge about a month ago. Her readers are to write an ebook and have it available for free download on their websites on or before October 31st. Now you know the truth. Ali from Farley Heath has created a wonderful book cover, and I can't wait to show it to every one. I'm more excited about the cover than the contents. but hey, I am one for self punishment, other wise why would I old school homestead as much as I do? ha! If you are interested in the genre, it will be horror as I am a nut for the cheesy B flick style horror.

While I am at it, let's do one more confession. As of November 1st I will be participating in NANOWRIMO, again. I am a glutton for punishment. Those of you that don’t know what National, Novel Writing Month is about. . . I have to write 50,000 words in 30 days. Why? Because I feel the need to push myself. I did this last year, unfortunately my computer caught a virus and crashed half way through. And I was unable to get to the word count.


Now you know it all. So if you check in over the next month and a half and the only post is a DUH. . . you'll know that I have finally cracked and have no more words to use.

oh, and I made 3 apple pies last night, 12 more pounds down.

Only 5 left

I don't know what Livejournal's problem is. It re-posted a ton of old posts last night, and I didn't mess with the feed here. Anyone else have problems with their feed?


Apples: 1 full bushel down

I made apple butter. I will not share this recipe because it isn't a very good one. It will be scrapped and I will do it again. The recipe called for many {and I mean many} apples and instead of pureeing them, it said to use a food mill. I was unable to get enough pulp in this manner, and the apple butter is more like an apple syrup.
Last night I gave in. I broke down. I ate apples. I know, but your sick of them! Yet I made a wonderful potato and cabbage croquettes and just needed something sweet to go with it. Hence making baked apples. Very easy and tasty.
You need one apple per diner. 1 Cup water, 1 cup sugar, 1/4 tsp cinnamon. boil the water, sugar and cinnamon on the stove for 5 minutes while you peel and core apples. Stir the sugar/water occasionally so it doesn't burn. Place apples in a baking dish, pour sugar/water over them. Place in a 350F {176c} oven for 45-60 minutes {Until soft} make sure you check them once in awhile, flipping them over to make sure they are evenly flavored by the sugar/water and cooked. Yes, this is served with the main course and not a dessert.

The All Foods Natural newsletter is out. I have a article on Harvest foods. It does have my traditional apple butter recipe included, guess I should have stuck with that one.

And for those that have asked, you don't need to bake your apple dumplings before freezing them. Separate them with wax paper. Or you can under cook them slightly before freezing.


Apple trivia to amaze {annoy} your friends with: When the first colonists migrated to North America, they brought apple seeds with them. The first recorded planting was in 1629 by the Massachusetts Bay Colony

The Sweet Potato Harvest

Autumn has finally arrived in Kansas. Yesterday the temperature was in the mid 60's F {15c}. I was concerned about how cold it was going to get at night, and the news informed me that the overnight lows would be in the 30's {-1c}. As they called for rain over the next couple of days, I chose last night to dig up my sweet potatoes. They need to be dug up while still dry. My husband stayed inside to clean and light the furnace, my children giggled and screamed while playing on the trampoline, and I took my potato fork and dug a foot down and in a twenty foot row to dig up my beloved sweet potatoes.

I tired to get them all in one shot, they weren't keen on posing for me, so I had to take several pictures. {And with one of the feeds all screwy I condensed it into one} I pulled up 79 tubers. Not counting my first test batch.

I somehow managed to pull up a few of them that are bigger than my hand.
Now they need to sit out and cure before eating or storing. The bruised ones will have to be cooked up right away.

I am looking forward to eating them. Sweet potatoes are one of my favorites. If you missed my article on sweet potatoes and why one could live off of them, you can find it here; Sweet Potatoes are the Perfect Food.

Speaking of articles, recently I had one published with World Food & Wine. It's a cheesy little thing about Halloween and foods. Which also reminds me, This weekend we have to go and get pumpkins, not only for jack-o'-lanterns, but for food preservation.

Don't ask about the apples. I am apparently making enough apple butter to feed the state of Kansas.

Another Form Letter Morning

I have come to the conclusion that the author of this form letter was drunk, that or a little ticked off about repeating himself.

Dear Mrs. Phelan
Thanks for your comment regarding a national animal identification system. I appreciate your taking the time to write on this important topic.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) have taken steps to prevent the spread of animal borne diseases. Among the initiatives announced by Secretary of Agriculture is the establishment of a national animal identification system (NAIS) The system is constructed of three parts: registering the premises within the state, identification for groups of animals in a lot, and animal tracking. The purpose of this regulation is to track animals facing contagious disease back to their original herd. This allows the USDA to minimize the effect quickly and quarantine the animal. USDA officials have indicated that the system is currently voluntary, but will be mandatory in the future.

The USDA recognizes that it may not be feasible or cost effective for a producer to identify each animal. Therefore, current guidelines allow for group/lot identification for both large- and small- scale producers, whose animals move as a group through the production chain. In addition, the USDA does not recommend or endorse any particular method of identification, such as microchip, leg band or ear tag. Instead, the USDA will defer to producers to decide which method of identification is the best and most cost efficient for their animals.

I have long states that any national animal identification program should be based upon he recommendations of producers and not a top-down mandate issued by the Congress of some federal agency. The Current NAIS voluntary participation period is aimed at cooperatively developing the most efficient system possible. To this end, the USDA is soliciting comments and suggestions from producers. Additionally, the Senate Agriculture Committee has held several oversight hearings on animal identification issues.

Again, thank you for writing. You may rest assured, I will keep your comment handy as the committee continues oversight on this important issue.

If you would like more information on issues before the Senate, please visit my website at http://robert.senate.gov You may also sign up on my home page for a monthly electronic newsletter that will provide additional update on my work for Kansas.

With every best wish,
Sincerely,
Pat

Pat Roberts
* * *
Question, what animal is not facing a disease? According to this letter, if an animal might, someday, have a disease, they will be tracked back to the original herd, and quarantined. Does that mean every animal that will be introduced to our food chain will be quarantined before slaughter?

I hadn't heard that the USDA is willing to allow us to use which ever tag we want to. Why then is this even necessary when producers already use ear tags and leg bands? Oh, wait, homesteaders don't always use them. Their animals aren't moved off land. Unless you want to count their freezers as off land. Some do sell or trade, and even gift to their family. But if that's the reason to tag, they need to tag all hunted animals as well. They end up in our food supply.

Call me dense, but I am unsure what this even means: I will keep your comment handy as the committee continues oversight on this important issue. They have a committee that its only job is to continue an unintentional failure to notice or do something?

How about instead of NAIS we inspect slaughter houses more often? Make tighter regulations on how cattle in feed lots are treated. Oh and I don't know, maybe stop feeding vegetarian animals leftover slaughter house scraps? We could always stop buying from Cargill and Walmart who are big supporters of this. I wonder what's in it for them if the family farm ends up unable to afford NAIS?

any thoughts?

and HAPPY THANKSGIVING to all my Canadian friends!

The Evolution of a card maker Part 2

Continued


I always favour equipment that can be used again and again to create things rather than a bag of goodies that’ll be used up quickly. Punches, for example, are very cost effective. I can make an unlimited number of paper embellishments from an initial investment of roughly £3 ($5?) and in all the colours of the rainbow. You don’t even have to buy paper if you like the
colour of your junk mail! Oh, and don't forget the humble office hole-punch - it makes great circles for flower centres, eyes or just simple geometric patterns.



I often buy the blank card from a kid’s art section at a toy store. I make two cards from one A4 sheet. It works out a lot cheaper than the packs bought from arts and crafts shops. E-bay is also a good source of equipment and supplies for those times when you don't want to trail into the nearest town. There are an awful lot of card-makers out there so there are the equivalent numbers of online cardcraft supply shops. It’s wonderful, but browsing can soon eat up most of your day!

I like to personalise cards if I can, with names or dates. To do this I learnt calligraphy, as we didn't own a printer in those days. It’s still one of my favourite hobbies and is a bit like riding a bike. You never really lose the knack once you've learnt it, you just get neater! As I say, this
was before my household entered the age of technology and nowadays I will enlist the help of my printer but if it’s an extra special card you can still find me happily sprawled across the floor getting covered in ink for an hour.



A couple of years ago I decided that it would be great to create an online shop for these cards and try to make a bit of money for more punches and card! With no computer experience I knew that it would be a steep learning curve so I did a very small local community starter course in website design just to get me going. I was so nervous going back to school after 16 years away! With the help of a couple of super-knowledgeable Bookcrossing friends I was able to finish the site early this year (I know, I know it took me forever to complete but it had to come second to everything else in life!) I had a lot of fun designing it and to keep costs to a minimum I use a free webspace. This is the result:

Card making can be as creative as you like or have the time for. I find it very therapeutic to disappear into the spare room for a while and think about design, colour and texture. I just hope I can keep thinking of new ideas for the future.

To Phelan, thank you for allowing me such a long ramble. After I'd got over my gut reaction of feeling terrified, I did enjoy writing!

~Jenny

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Thank you Jenny. You have some amazing looking cards. When I try to make cards, they turn out looking like a toddler made them. ~Phelan

Want to teach me your hobby, or have a neophyte story to tell? Go to my profile and e-mail me.

I am not sure what is wrong with blogger, it will not allow me to fix the font or font size.

The Evolution of a card maker Part 1

Because of some feed problems, today's guest blogger post will be in two parts.

One day I bought a magazine which had a nice looking free gift taped to the front. It was a set of three sponge stamps. They all had a Christmas theme – a holly leaf, a crown and a star. The instructions in the magazine looked fairly simple so that year I made half a dozen cards for my immediate family using some gold and silver paint and coloured card. I'd never had the urge
to create cards before and it was more than likely inspired purely by boredom but those few cards were to be the start of an enduring hobby!

For the first few years of making cards I concentrated on Christmas cards. I love Christmas and all its sparkly decorations so it wasn't difficult to find inspiration. The colours are easy if you stick with red and green! I bought a bag of corrugated green Christmas trees, found a scrap of Christmas material to use as a background square and just stuck it all together with a
spot of PVA glue! At that stage I had limited time after work and at weekends so it seemed like a good hobby to start as each card can take as long as you like. An easy card can take 20 minutes whereas a more complicated design can take hours.

Further down the line I attempted wedding cards as we'd been invited to one! A few squares of lilac mulberry paper decorated with satin flowers from the dressmaking shop and it was soon finished. After that I tried to make a card for each occasion that cropped up on my calendar – birthdays, Christenings, anniversaries, congratulations, etc. I ended up with an almost complete repertoire of different types of cards. I'd take a photo or scan of each one
to help remind me of what I'd already done and to give me inspiration in the future in case I ran out of ideas.

Nowadays one thing I consider carefully is the budget. Being a full-time mum makes me think twice about buying the latest super-duper craft tool that'll sit gathering dust under the bed after a couple of attempts. I like to keep it simple: a few punches and a straight slide cutter will suffice for most cards. You can do without the slide cutter if you've a steady hand with the
scissors (I haven't!).

Double-sided sticky tape has to be best card-making discovery I made. It saves a lot of mess and hassle getting your fingers glued together and you don't have to wait for it to dry. There are many types of double-sided tape and some are stickier than others! It’s a case of trial and error. The less sticky type can be used for sticking things down such as pieces of card or paper that might end up a little crooked and need repositioning. The stickier ones, such as double-sided Sellotape are good for fabrics. Another good find was a glue pen which works like a Biro. It’s great for tiny bits of paper or very detailed gluing. My 6yr old daughter found that you can write with it and sprinkle with glitter for a lovely effect!

Continued>>>>>>