Writer's Block

Ugh! I’ve had such a case of writer’s block when it comes to this blog!
Grampa and I are currently exercising our immune systems. Seems we picked up some horrible flu bug. I can’t do much of anything so I thought I’d better at least post!

We’ve been getting some frost here. My parsley really loves this weather and the cilantro is coming back nicely. If we were still going to the farmer’s markets I could sell some of it, but that’s about all we’d have to sell and even with the drop in gas prices it wouldn’t be enough to make it worth it.

My October was spent finishing up my assessing job. Grampa spent it cleaning up around here waiting for it to stop raining so he could get in the fields. Normally, they are done with the harvest around here by now, but it’s been to wet! Oh well, he’s gotten a lot done around here. One thing I really like about him working at home is that our place gets a lot more of his attention!

Then the first week in November we went to the small farm conference in Columbia, MO. We’ve gone down there for a day every year for a while now, but this year we decided to go for the full 3 days. We learned all about marketing, chicken breeds, sheep, honey, etc … as well as getting to meet so many people like ourselves. We may be crazy, but we’re not the only ones!

Since then I’ve been putting up apples. We had a wonderful apple crop this year! A lot of it went to the sheep and chickens because I was to busy with the assessing, but I’ve made about 4 gal. of apple juice and 40 quarts of applesauce. I was planning to put most of it into apple juice but the juicer I snatched out of the garage sale gave up on me. I’ve got 7 more 5 gal. buckets to go. They will all be applesauce. That’s way too much applesauce for us, but my bees will like it.

The standard practice in the honey industry is to harvest all the honey and feed the bees corn syrup over the winter, but we’re not real crazy about that. We decided to leave the honey this year and supplement only if we needed to. Then I was reading that bees liked rotting fruit. Then I saw a bunch of them on some apples on the ground. I decided to see if they’d like apple juice and they loved it. Since my juicer quit, I think I’ll put ½ applesauce and ½ water in the jars. They ought to like that. The chickens will love the treat when the bees get done with it too!



God Bless You All!

September

HA! I bet some of you thought I was never going to post again! September was one booger of a month. We were busy enough with the garden, chicken’s and farmer’s markets. Then in August, we finally got the stuff we needed to finish up the assessing job for this year so I was trying to find some time to stuff that in my schedule. Just as I was about to ask to be cut down to 1 day a week with my sleeping around job so I could get the assessing finished, one of the other girls announced she would be gone for most of the month. So, instead of only one day a week at Maxine’s, I wound up working 3. Around the middle of the month, we found out that an old friend, who had come out to my MIL’s when she was sick before, was wanting to come out again but was afraid to ask. So, I offered to stay with her while Mom was at Maxine’s. I really thought she would wait till the first of the month when Kathy was back. Instead, she came out right away. So, it’s been 3 days at Maxine’s and 4 days at Mom’s. Whew! My life has been a little bit crazy! Kathy is back now and I’ve been on the premises for almost a week now (for those of you who don’t know, Tom’s parents live on the same property as us). Things ought to be slowing down a bit – I hope!

Grampa Tom says he’s done with farmer’s markets for the year. He’ll soon be in the fields helping Lane get the crop out. He’s trying to get things cleaned up a little. We have a huge bon fire going tonight. I’m so thankful that we have markets for our eggs for the winter!

I’m working on a chicken page for our egg business. I’ll be using a mini-blog service called Squiddo. Will give the link when I’ve got it somewhat completed.

RECIPIE

Did another experiment the other day that worked. I browned strips of chicken breasts along with onions, garlic and mushrooms in olive oil. Then I added ranch dressing and broccoli and simmered for about 30 minutes. Mmmmm …. Good!

God Bless You All!

History According to Grama Sue

Lately my experiences have led me to what I believe are some interesting historical revelations.

The first has to do with golf. Most sports have some basis in skills needed for hunting and/or farming. I had no problem seeing where the long drives came from in golf. Being able to hit or throw a rock long distances is a basic hunting skill – but what about putting? Today it suddenly occurred to me that I was becoming quite a good putter. I’ve been practicing nearly every day! There’s this one really dumb chicken who insists on laying her eggs under the roosts. In order to avoid crawling behind it, I get a stick and gently move the egg forward with a putting stroke. Who knew???

The other two have to do with green beans.

The other day I was sitting at Maxine’s working up some buggy beans. These are beans that have a lot of good in them but have brown spots that need to be taken out. One of Maxine’s friends walked in and asked if I was frenching them. I wasn’t too concerned about how they looked, but honestly it would have only taken a few more strokes of the knife to make them into French style beans. I’ll bet some woman had a bunch of buggy beans that she wanted to serve at some social event. To disguise the fact that they were buggy, she sliced them up and told everyone they were the latest rage in France. Of course all the women at the affair knew the truth since their beans were all buggy too, but instead of giving her a hard time, they thought, “Oh what a great idea!” and proceeded to do the same.

My other “bean” revelation came tonight as I was snapping beans while sitting in a straight chair. Just for a change in position, I sat up straight for awhile without the support of the back. It wasn’t long before my back began to ache. I remember reading in more than one book that 18th and 19th century “ladies” were expected to sit straight without using the chair back for support for hours at a time as they did needle work. The pain in my back caused me to wonder how in the world they did it - something I’ve wondered about before. Then it hit me! Duh! They all wore corsets! They wore their own chair back all the time.

Yes, I think about weird things. Nothing new – Ask my kids. You think my waking thoughts are strange – You should hear some of my night time dreams!

God Bless You All!

The New Chicken House

THE NEW CHICKEN HOUSE

This is the 8 x 14 chicken house we bought a couple of weeks ago. It came with roosts, a glass window, nests and several feeders. It is even wired for electricity!

We think it is quite a buy for $150! ‘Course, we had to spend another $150 for chicks to put in it but we really need them too. Not only do we have a huge market at Hy Vee in Macomb, the other day we picked up a market at a large office building in Burlington. The new chicks will bring us up to about 250 hens when they start producing next spring. We figure we need about 400 to meet the market we have right now and that will surely grow.

Spent last Saturday up at the highway. Did double the amount of business I would have done here at home, but it still wasn’t enough to warrant all the work it will take to get stuff up there and back every time. Sure would like to have that camper I saw advertised in the Gate City ... but the chickens are priority right now. We do see potential in it though. It will just take a while for people to realize we are there and by the time that happens this season will be over. We are planning to give it a try again next spring when we have more time to promote it.

Oh! Did I tell you all? A couple of weeks ago I drummed up every ounce of courage I have and worked the bees! I didn’t even get stung. Should’ve had Grampa Tom take some pictures. We’ll have to do that next time.

God Bless You All!

More Changes

More Changes

Happy Labor Day everyone! And boy oh boy, that’s what we’ve been doing! Sorry I missed posting last week! We are still in the midst of big changes so this will be short.

I’m planning to set up at the highway about ½ mi. straight west of my house this week on Saturday. I’ll have a blue pop up tent and some make shift sawhorse tables. Hope to be up there by 9 am. I’ll have some produce, eggs, and crafts as well as a smattering of stuff out of my garage sale. Repainted some of my garage sale signs – they are the same green and white with sparkly fringe you are familiar with so please come see me if you can!

Whooo Hoooo! We got word yesterday that Hy-Vee in Macomb wants to carry our eggs! I spent the morning reworking our label to fit their needs. Gotta order more chickens and some date stamps this afternoon. Slowly but surely, we’re getting there!


God Bless You All!

CHANGES

:) Good news! Sack sale this weekend, Friday and Saturday Aug. 15 and 16! Bring any size bag and fill for $1. Almost all the garage sale type stuff will be included in this.

Bad news :( We had decided the garage sale was just not getting enough business to warrant the time and the space it was taking (Thus the sack sale). This weekend was to be the last of it. However …

:) Good news! As I was working out there last weekend, I was telling God how much I enjoyed it and that if He wanted me to continue with it, I needed a sign. Our location seems to be a problem this year so I had given up until we could get a better location.

Saturday, I shut down and went to the women’s conference in Keokuk that I go to every year. At the end, the minister invited people to come up for prayer. This prophetess told me I had my eye on a piece of property, but I had been afraid to ask for it. She told me to go ask and they would give it to me.

When I turned on my phone, there was a message from a neighbor of mine asking me to call. She has a lot with a barn and a grain bin on the highway that she thought would be a good place for me to set up a tent! It’s about ½ mile straight west of here as the crow flies. I’ve been thinking this property would be wonderful for a store all year!

Maybe someday we’ll buy it, but for now we’ll be setting up a tent up there on Saturdays. I’ll try to get up there by 10 am and run till 2 or 3. Later, when the farmer’s markets shut down we may add a day or two.


THE FARMER’S MARKET

We bought 75 more chickens. They are a bit stressed right now from the move, but hopefully they’ll get up to full production soon. Grampa Tom is back to doing 4 farmer’s markets a week.


ON THE CRAFT TABLE

Seems I’m getting nothing done craft wise. To busy with the garden and taking care of old people. Oh well! Winter is coming.

THE GARDEN

The beans and tomatoes are really coming on strong right now. We also have cucumbers, oregano, basil, lemon balm, and onions.


God Bless You All!