monday confessions

Another week has come and gone.
 I think we had one warm day. I went to my moms and sat in the swing in the sunshine ALL day. It was wonderful. I didn't DO anything. No wait, I helped my sister make biscuits. Started out as a humdinger of a day too. Took my husband to work, he's helping to remodel a house, outta town, then was gonna swing by the store to get the kiddos and I a quick breakfast because we had to get up and go. Course if I had my act together I would have had something on hand... but didn't. Get to the store and realized I left my purse at home. Fantastic. No breakfast and nothing to take to my moms to help out with lunch. My sisters, and aunt with her grand kids were coming too. A pot luck kinda thing. So I went empty handed and mom fed us some breakfast. Thank goodness for Pioneer Woman's cinnamon rolls that freeze and reheat well!!! Thanks mom for feeding us. Gosh.
Well my mom loves pinterest, and she found a recipe for homemade bubbles! What kid doesn't love to blow bubbles. Well my aunt and her son made some huge bubble sticks with bamboo sticks and rope. They were amazing!!! No pics because I forgot my camera too. But the bubbles were huge!! Had fun. Managed to burn half of my face in the sun too. Looked like a total freak, I had on sun glasses, and I have side bangs, are you getting a visual now? So cute. hahaha, then it peels and hurts and ugh it looks even worse with peeling. I didn't want to show my face in public either. But now it's OK...
The weather still has that winter air chill to it. It looks nice but you step outside and the wind or air hits you. Burrrrr cold. Have had ice on the water buckets in the morning too. And the cold stays all day. We are finally getting some green grass and the buds are starting to think about coming out. Just seems like it's real slow to spring this spring. Winter just won't go.
The hens have been out in the gardens spreading the manure we put on it. I like to watch them out there scratching and picking. They seem real happy out there. I'm glad they are doing the work of spreading the poo and eating bugs!
I need to get out and check on my garlic! I hope it's coming up! I was excited last fall to actually plant some.
I have some cooing posts I'll try to get on here and share!
Gotta get lunch for the kiddos.
Have a great day all!

monday confessions

Having a humdinger of a Monday morning. So that inspired me to blog about some life that has happened of late! Feel free to laugh too.

I made a pumpkin pie a while back. I bought the canned pumpkin at the store, and when I went to make the pie it was the mix kind. Oops grabbed the wrong can. But my baby wanted pumpkin pie and I was gonna make it for her. As I was making the pie I was in the middle of home school too. The kiddos were at the table working and I was at the counter. Well to say the least I do get distracted at times with the questions. I popped the pie in the oven and cooked it. That night  I found myself alone for some odd reason. I don't know where my husband was and I think the kiddos were in bed or at a sleepover. We never had pie. I cut a nice big piece and took a bite, as I walked to the fridge to get the whipping cream. I gagged and spit it in the fridge. There was no sweetness to it at all. After rinsing out my mouth I dug the can out of the recycling, yes I recycle, and looked at the can. What I found was no sugar gets added to the can. It's a can of sweetened condensed milk. Oops. Well lesson learned and the chickens had pie for part of their breakfast!

I've taken a week off from working out. Which really stinks. My knee has been bothering me, so I decided to give it a rest. Feels better now. Not that I'm one to complain about pain, I just deal with it. I'm going somewhere with this, so hang on. And while I was taking it easy on my knee I managed to slam my left hand in the car door. It was instant nausea for me. I laid my head on the steering wheel and groaned. My kiddos in the car asked what was wrong. I managed to squeak out a "I slammed my hand in the door. I'm ok." Now I have no idea how I managed to do this. Other then I'm awesome. (hardy har har har) My seat belt was in the door and I went to grab it is all I can remember. I looked at my hand it was my middle finger and index finger that received the blunt force of it was already black and blue. Fantastic I thought. I kept it in my lap and drove home with my right hand. I couldn't hang on to the wheel with my left. Not a huge big deal right?! Once I was home the kiddos and I brought in the groceries. My husband got home a few minutes after we did. I was starting to cook a late supper, but I couldn't open the can of kidney beans (I was making chili) I couldn't smoosh up the hamburg. I'm a lefty. I'm right hand stupid. No really. OK, go ahead and laugh. I'll wait...
I had my husband open the can and my oldest daughter finish cooking. The swelling in my left knuckle down at the base of my left had started on the ride home. I couldn't make a fist. Fantastic. I was really hoping I didn't break the bone. I decided to see how it felt in the morning.
 Morning came, and it was still discolored and swollen. I showed my husband and told him what happened. He suggested I go get it checked out. I don't have time to sit in the ER all day. I have things to do. I think to myself. I shrug if off and head down to the bathroom. I was determined to bend my hand and not go to the ER. It hurt, but I managed to bend my hand and make a fist. It hurt but I was feeling triumphant! No trip to the ER. It's not broken!!! I showed my husband and he agreed it wasn't broken because I'd never be able to make a fist it it was. Phew. I put ice on it. It's still a little sore, but I didn't have to get an x-ray and waste a day in the ER to have them tell me something I already knew!
Morel of the post?
Keep your hands outta the doors folks!!
Have a great day all!!

random things I've been up to...

Well believe it or not I'm not really doing all that much farming, yet. Just daily chores. Not a whole lot going on.
Cleaned out the chicken coop and put some fresh hay in the nesting boxes. Thats always a fun chore...ah the glamorous lifestyle I live!
Sap season is over for us, and I can't complain we had a good year and sold lots.
 We are trying to get things ready for some broilers and new laying hens. Just gotta get some things done before we can get them. Our laying hens are pretty much spent. And I'm looking forward to having some broilers in the freezer this year!
Maggie is doing well. Getting wider, and is her usual cranky self. We had Dandie AI'd the other day. Now we pray she settles and stays bred...we shall see.
I got to hang some clothes on the line the other day, it was beautiful. The next two days it rained and was cold, so I had the fire going. Now they are calling for snow! Fantastic (insert sarcasm) just what I don't want more of.
I've been working on a baby blanket, and keep messing up the pattern, so I'm going to pick a new one..I hope to get it done before she has the baby...
Home school is winding down. Still have some more to go, but we can see the light at the end of the tunnel!
Been trying out some new recipes! That's always fun.
I bought some new cowboy boots, but then sold them to my sister because they were too big for me. Now I need to go get some more! Guess I'll try a little harder to find some that fit me this time!!
Well my kiddos are hungry, so I guess I better go feed 'em!
Have a great day all!

whats cooking in my kitchen

So not as exciting as my last post, but it's good.
I made some homemade Samoa cookies.
Time consuming? Yes.
Hard to do? No.
Worth it? Yes.
Delish? Yes!
Did I find the recipe on Pinterest? Yes!

So there you have it!
Have a great weekend all!

black bears..oh my

Yes please may we have some black bears!!! I just love bears. I find them wonderful and amazing creatures. I've had one right across the street from my house. I gotta say I'm glad he wasn't hungry for horse that night. My horse was going crazy one night, this was years ago when my husband and I were first married, and I was NOT a country girl at that time and creepers the things that went bump in the night out here! Yikes. Gives a girl chills! Not any more though. I love the back roads, no lines in the roads, the pot hole you swerve to miss and cringe when you hit a new one, no street lights, and the quietness you get in the country and the sounds of the night critters. Ah I love it, and am anxiously waiting for spring peepers...Anyways the bear across the street wanted my neighbors corn, not my beloved Abby.
But that is not what this post is about, that was a um, well, a little rabbit trail for you reading pleasure, and for you to get to know me a little better...
Any who..
My husband, son and father in law got to go on a once in a life time trip with the Boy Scouts. Gotta say I really wish I could have gone, but couldn't. Only 12 people were allowed on this trip, and I didn't make the cut. Hehehe. Now you are probably wondering what it was well it was this...

They were offered to go to a bear den with the biologist!! Every year they (biologists) go out and check on the bears. They are tracking some of them to see how the bear population is doing overall. They tranquilize them, weigh them, change the batteries in their tracking device, and check the overall health and well being of the bears. One of the biologists has been doing this for 31 years. And the bear den they went to was the den of a mother bear who he has been tracking since she was a cub! She is now 11, and they don't have cubs until they are 3-4 years old! How cool is that. Now he's got her cubs to track. What happened was she had only one cub. Then another bear had one cub and she rejected it (don't ask me how this happens since they are in hibernation when all this happens) and they put the cub with this other mother, and she is fine with it, and when she wakes up she'll have 2 babies. They called it a forced adoption. I find it all very fascinating. And slightly confusing, but all are doing well.

Here is mama bear weighing in at a healthy 200 pounds. She's soft and beautiful, and in a nice sleep for the safety of all concerned.

Here are the two handsome men in my life. Gosh I love them so much! Oh and don't over look the two wiggly, fuzzy bear cubs they are holding. I was told they were about 7-8lbs, soft, warm, healthy, wiggly and made funny bear sounds.  What an amazing experience for them!  They had to hike in about a mile on snow shoes to get to the den too. There was lots of snow! (The red tags in the ears is the tracking device).

Here is the den they live in. It's trees and brush with about 2 feet of snow on top of it. My son was way impressed with it too.
I had my son write a paper on what all they did that day and hope he always remembers this amazing experience. How often would something like this happen?! I'm so happy they got to go and do this together.
Have a great day all!!!

so this is my life...

So as I sit here and stare at the blinking cursor,  and try to think of something witty and fun to say I'm drawing a blank. I haven't even been on the computer for about 3 days now. I guess I'm still unplugged. Gotta say, it's been nice too. I've had days that I'm running from the time my feet hit the floor to the time I drop into bed and pass out. And then the flip side of all that is nothing. No fun blog posts.
Our maple syrup season is coming to an end and I gotta say it's been a fairly good run too.
 Maggie is doing well and getting bigger everyday it seems! She is drying off well. And we've had no bad side affects from it either, or rather she has not had any bad side affects. We'll be having a new little calf in May!!! Can't wait! With the time change and drying her off it knocked me off me feet. It would be close to 7 before we would sit down and eat, and then it seemed to be in shifts. Not together. And I hate that. I love to eat supper together as a family. The kiddos miss it too. It's not the norm around here. Family time is most important around here. I guess we have fallen into a new routine, that will only last a while, then life will shift again and we'll work it out again. Guess that's my life. Don't get too comfortable with one routine, before we get a new one! But I like it that way.
Sad to day that Dandie aborted her calf. She was about 2ish months along. She is doing fine and suffered no ill affects either. Not sure what the cause was. A bummer for sure, but I'm glad she's ok, and we'll try again!
We should be getting things ready to start some seedling soon!!!! Round here it's still too cold. Buurrrr I thought it was spring, but we got a foot of snow on the first day of spring and it's not been warm. At all.
We bought a disc mower!! Very excited about that too. Will make haying that much faster! Next up is a rake...still need a better one, but in time. We also bought a hay conveyor. That will make putting up the hay that much faster, and not to mention help the helpers that do it too! So thankful for those two pieces of equipment. Got them from an old timer farmer who was selling all his farm stuff. Retiring from the farm life I guess. But here the are!

The disc mower and the hay conveyor.  As you can see it's wet here too. Pardon the sad swing set. It's waiting to be thrown...this winter finished it off!

And a quart of our maple syrup! Gotta say it's gotten better over the years! I love the stuff. Looks good too! I'm thinking pancakes, waffles, ice cream, french toast...
Have a great day all!!!

i'm back..sorta

So you may or may not have noticed I've been MIA for a while. I have been unplugged! Hahaa

No blogging for me. I didn't have much of anything to say, well let me reword that, because if you know me I usually can find something to talk about, I didn't have anything I was going to blog about. I've been using my time otherwise. I'll let you know what I've been up too. Don't worry it gets better!

For starters I've been knitting the two baby blankets. One is done, the other is coming along nicely. I'm trying out a new pattern. I'll post a pic later.

 I've actually read two books too. Really good ones.  True stories at that! I love to read, but I'm the kinda reader that won't put it down until I'm done the book. I can read fast so that is good! Also the book has to grab my attention real fast and hold it. Oh and neither book was about farming! 

No I have not been successful at finishing all the laundry either, try as I may. Nor getting all the house work done, which I'm neglecting by sitting here typing!
My sister came over and we created something wonderful! I'll tease you with that and show you a pic later! But I'll tell you it was something sweet and pastry like!
And the kiddos and I have been banging out the home school days. I finally feel like we are almost to the home stretch! 

But something fun we have been up to farm wise is tapping, collecting, boiling, and finishing off maple syrup! It's a time consuming and sticky business, but we love it! The weather has been ok. Had some snowy days that were just a dusting, down pours of rain, and some really great days of sunny warm and cold nights. Which is what you want. Above freezing during the day and freezing at night. I've got some maple syrup finishing off as I type this. My husband is in the sap house boiling down some more! 

So here are a few pics to see of the maple syrup stuff we do!

Takes a little time to get this picture. The sap dripping off the end of the spicket! But I do love that!

 Some of my loved ones collecting sap! It started to snow while we were collecting.

 Some cows of a neighbors. Nice looking herd I think!  They were watching us with interest. Wondering what we were doing.

A shot of down the road. I liked the way it looked so here I show you. Nice quiet country road dontcha think?
Well I'll be back sometime soon! Have a great day all!