Just another Day on the Farm

Long Night but O, the sleep was sweet!

Posted on January 6, 2012 by Just another day on the farm

I knew that a evening flight would make for a very long day but I was hoping that just maybe that I would not have such a full plane, Ha! Wishful thinking, all the seats were full, which meant that the flight was not just long but a bit painful from my being a true one seat passanger, and I have the bruises on my knee to prove it!

The plane was an hour late and the roads snowy so it was after 3 am when we arrived home to the farm to a pack of hounds that were so happy to see that HD had finally found FG and brought her home again.. Took a good ten min of happy dances, sheiks and yips to get everyone calmed down enough to throw oursleves into bed, Wow, I had forgotten just how much I love my big wonderful sink into it King size bed, I had a few hounds glued to me, I guess they figured if they were touching me, I would still be there in the morning 🙂

So a few things happened while I was gone, some of the main ones being, our first lambs were born, and once I charge the camera, I will take some new photos, Marty Grew!!! and Grew!, Girl had another heat, going to try and breed her on the next one.. and my stove gave up the ghost! Add in the fact that my vehcile stopped starting(Dh has no idea why, something I will figure out later this coming week) and as I could CLEARLY hear on the drive home, the Dh’s truck needs to go in and get some brake work done!

On the other hand, my new Lucet Braiding Book, Variartions on a renaissance cord had arrived while I was gone and I am most excited to learn some new ways to work with it, I made headbands, braclets, long necklaces, short necklaces and even one 12 corded choker, plus a Dozen plus full 3/4/5 or 6 stranded braided loop scraf’s over the holidays for family and friends.

Gotta run, Farmer R’s boy is delivering big strawbales! Catch you all soon, its good to be home..

Posted in Life moves on daily | 4 Comments

Happy New Year 2012

Posted on January 1, 2012 by Just another day on the farm

Well, did you make your lists of goals for the coming year?

I had done so with great thought and care but a new family one has come in over the past two days, Mom, Dad, Big Brother, SIL C, Dh and Farmgal are all doing a bet on who can lose the largest body percentage of fat.. this was done to keep it fair for Dh who is much fitter and leaner then the rest, so its who can lose X amount but we also have to keep it off for at least a month before the final number is called. Everyone bid in at 50 per person, the winner takes the pool!

Personal Health Goals

Farmgal lose 50 pds, Dh lose 10 pds-Blog more often to be accountable
Continue regular health checks-Dental, Blood pressure, chiropractor etc
Off-Farm walks, min 3 per week, other then in the coldest part of winter-wii workouts- Got the Wii Walk it out game for winter walking indoors!
More strength training with weights-dumbells, and kettle bell-Got the Wii Camera and Shape up program to help make sure I am pushing myself!
Workout more with DH instead of alone.
Get more creative in eating different side dishes, instead of the standard, potato’s, rice or pasta.

House Goals 2012

Required Home Repairs as needed
Practise one area thought clean and go though weekly, it can be as small as a cupboard or as big as a small room but I MUST stay on top of keeping order in the house.
Build a small storage/walk in closet in our main bedroom
Re-Paint the bathroom-New floor boards
Re-Paint the living room-New floor boards

Farm Goals 2012

More Rasberries Canes planted-with different picking season
More fruit bushes planted-Different kinds
3 Cherry Tree’s planted
2 apple Tree’s Planted
2 nut tree’s planted
More Herbs planted out this year
Work the hugelbeets with hoop covers in spring to get a much extended start to the melon growing season.
Work to take out 3000 Pds worth of fruit/veggies in the garden
Can at least 1200 Jars but 1500 hundred would be better
Dry more fruit, veggies, herbs and meat
Fence the front yard
Fence the peaple yard
Fence the grapes
Dig and create a new grape row
Build a new set of outside bird pens attached to the small barn, ideally six pens
Repair the small red building roof and expand the attached pen, built to be bird proof
Repair as needed the roof or siding of the big barn.
Build two more full pens in the big barn-front half, along with a solid feed part in the front of the barn, complete with a solar light/small window for light.

I want to send a huge thank-you to all my readers, friends, and family that have followed the blog for the past year and I am looking forward to sharing the coming year with everyone!

Posted in farm | 9 Comments

Merry Christmas All

Posted on December 31, 2011 by Just another day on the farm

Wishing Everyone a very Merry Chirstmas season! Enjoy my family time out west and no time to write at the moment, or answer comments, I will be back home next week and you can watch for many reports and answer shortly there after.

On the farm news, the first set of twin lambs have been born, Woolie has done well! and now the sound of baby calf and lamb along with singing turkeys mingle in the barn for Dh’s to here as he does his twice daily chores.

Everyone have a great day!

Posted in Life moves on daily | 2 Comments

There is a first time for everything but sometimes you wish it was not so..

Posted on December 23, 2011 by Just another day on the farm

As most of my longer term readers know, I was born and raised in Alberta, and have spent my fair amount of time in bush country, and one of the first things I remember as a young girl was driving with my dad and being taught to spot game. I have done alot of driving in this province, I even worked for a pipeline company in my early twenties as a hotshot driver, what a gravy job, a truck, a needed part, a company credit card and just you and the road.

When we were up in NWT, Dh and I did alot of road trips and in the summer of 2000, we were taking a trip up to Fort Hope, it was a wild road (we ended up helping a gent who had flipped his truck and camper on the way back) but on the way up I had a full size adult male black bear come up and over a hill at a run and straight in front of the truck, it was a wild moment, I was able to just miss him, but as we liked to say, it was close enough that you could reach out and slap his rump as we went by.

Until yesterday it was the closest I have ever come to hitting a critter on the roads, it was a long and busy day with tons on mom’s list and we were heading out the red deer area to my dad’s down by drum and we have even said, gotta to be extra careful as it will be the right time of day for the deer to be on the move.

Thankfully I was going below the speed limit, back in ontario the roads are 80km and I have been having a bit of a hard time driving up to the 100km speeds on the secondary highways since I have arrived, so thankfully I was only going about 85 to 90 km as I was coming up and over a steep hill with deep ditches on both sides, I spotted the white tails deer on the left as I topped the high and could do little as the young yearling popped up out of the ditch on the right and straight in front of the truck.

I was able to move the truck to a slight angle so that it was not a straight on hit, and when it was all said and done, mom, and I along with her pack of 3 little hounds came thought it safe and sound, even the truck came though will bare a scratch on it, I’m sorry that I can’t say the same for the yearling.. Can’t help but think/wish that we had been just a few min earlier or later.

Once I got it all stopped and thank heavens mom had the gear/flashlights in the truck for me to be able to check the under side and make sure it was safe to drive the rest of the way, I was calm and steady during but let me tell you after it was all done, did I ever get the shakes, took a good while to try and tell my body to cool it on the fight or flight response.

There was lots else of interest yesterday but I will save it for another post..

So for all the folks out on this road over the holiday season, between the weather, the drunk drivers and the critters, please take it slow, drive careful and arrives safe and sound to where you are going!

Posted in Life moves on daily | 9 Comments

Ha-Ho Ha-Ho

Posted on December 22, 2011 by Just another day on the farm

Well, I finally had my first good sleep for three days, and it was lovely, I did get a chuckle out of my Dh’s morning phone call that found me still relaxing in bed, while he had already well started his day and was taking a break after the rounds of morning chores.. I guess in a way I am having both a family time and farm holiday.

Yesterday was another busy day, the morning was spent on housework, laundry (it does not matter where you live, you still have to keep things up) Our first round of company arrived in the morning, its my mom’s friend M, her and her family have been friends with my family for 27 years now, and its was great to see her as I had missed my visit with her in the spring, she came bringing a tray of homemade goodies, and she still makes the best! fruit cake..

It was a lovely visit and then off to get my treatment from my folks chiropractor and boy am I glad I went, felt so much better afterwards, really openned and or re-lined something because I came out with that light headed floaty feeling..

Then we headed into the city again, this time with mom and dad, and off to my baby brothers favorite place for chinese. They had amazing sushi, and lots of fresh veggie dishes, which I heaped up on, I had their version of tapioca, it was SO sweet, I swear they made it in sugar water, very different from anything I had before.. there was one other interesting thing of note.. No beef!

The ginger beef has been replaced with Ginger pork, the dry Beef salt and pepper had been replaced with dry pork salt and pepper, the eggrolls that normally are cabbage, carrot, onion and beef, replaced with veggie eggrolls, and the beef and broccoli.. good luck on finding any beef in it.. there were a few very tiny slivers.. Guess the cost of beef even in alberta is sky high..

Then some shopping for mom, she was after stocking stuffers, and I tagged along to push the carts and look at things.. the only thing I found of note was Wasbi lime Mustard, it was on sale and when I got to the till, they took an extra 30% off, awesome, its for big brother, he loves hot things, and its such a interesting flavor combo.

So the funny of the day is that I have forgotten how to make basted eggs in a non-stick pan, I cook eggs at home all the time, big fresh farm dippy eggs for me, and scrambled for honey.. so I went to make eggs, no cast iron, just the non-stick and got the ” we don’t do flipped in this house, we do basted” so fine, I don’t flip the egg, I put the water in and steam the top.. broke every single one of them trying to get them out and got some good teasing to go with..

It’s funny how you get used to your own way of cooking and then have a hard time adjusting back, its like the paper towels instead of cloth, or the paper coffee filters instead of a french press, throwing away egg shells instead of into the compost pile..

I had brought one outfit for christmas with me, and had gotten a new dress just a day or two ago, but this morning mom has had me try on an extra five outfits so that I can look pretty over the season for photos.. I bring dress pants and pretty tops, now I have three peices matching outfits plus tights, and matching jewerly/makeup to pack..a whole huge suitcase just for our “dress outfits” aw.. christmas at mom’s..

I drive poor Dear hubby crazy that I ask him to dress up for dinner, even I had forgot that at home its more like dress up for about ten days though the holidays.. can’t even remember the last time I wore tights, laughed and said to mom, I guess you expect me to shave my legs to boot huh?

She laughed and said if you don’t, Neice #2 will notice and let you know that she can help and do it for you if you can’t reach! She helps my mom shave her legs and paint her toenails, and put lotion on her feet since she had her hip replaced.. Keener!

That’s it for today folks.. and in case you can’t tell yet, these posts are going to be newy ones for keeping my hubby and friends up to date on how my trip is going!

Posted in Family | 4 Comments

Christmas Shopping.. O good heavens..

Posted on December 21, 2011 by Just another day on the farm

So yesterday, I was up bright and early to head to Red Deer to pick up my dad who had his truck in for some repairs while home from camp work in northern B.C. and off to breakfast we went afterwards, I had been told we had a few place’s to get to and do a little shopping..

14! stores later, I was ready to spit fire, first off, I still can’t believe how huge red deer has gotten, I remember living there when I was back in collage, granted that was 20 years ago but its a whole different city these days and it shows.. the growth is amazing!

While my dad honestly did the shop till you drop thing, I stayed much more true to my own roots, I picked up one of the last gift for my step-dad, a leather wheel cover on sale from Canadian tire for his car, mom sent me to look for a cream long sweater for a outfit and I found a 80 dollar dress orginally that fits and looks lovely on me for 11 dollars including tax.

I had thought that I had made enough of my knotted roped necklaces/scarf things, but was I wrong, everyone loves them and suddenly I need to make at least four more.. OK, so off to micheals, with a little digging, I was thrilled to find perfect wool patterns/weights and colors on a great sale, regular 9 per ball, on sale for 3.. so will get them made over the next while yet..

Last but not least was getting Dh’s short stories made into a spiral bound book for gifts for family, it was only his stories from 2010-2011 and it was just under 250 pages in length, for a total of 17 dollars per book, to be printed, and done with cover etc.. For sure my most costly store was staples who is doing the book for me, but I am hoping that it will be a unique and treasured gift, I am try as much as possable to have a handmade or personal gifts as possable this year.

As luck would have it my mom and my step-dad current have colds, I am trying hard to make sure that I won’t get it but really the odds are not in my favor on this one..

Woke up this morning to a winter wonderland with lots of fresh snow, and I signed and said to mom, I will throw on yesterday’s cloths and go shovel and then have my shower and put on clean cloths cause I will be working up a sweat.. she looks at me funny.. ah.. snowblower? LOL I am so used to doing things by hand on the farm, I forget that my family are the Kings and Queens of modern life out here.

My best part of the day was watching two hours of Chopped with my mom, we are both long time and big time cooks, and it was a hoot an half to get to figure out what we would cook with the different ingredants given to them, and to make smart mouth and to be honest nasty little comments on some of the choices and dishes.. You can tell that mom’s been off the farm for awhile, she could not come up with a dish on how to cook the goats brains that was one of the dishes, where I knew they needed to be soaked in milk first 😛

Same with how to make a main course out of fish heads, I think its because she has cooked now for such a long time with just the store bought foods, where I have now been spending a number of years working on learning how to cook with everything from nose to tail on the farm.

My laugh of the day was that I finally gave in an striped down the bed I was given and pulled the sheets, mom had gotten new flannel sheet’s for me but they are so rough and scratchy, I pulled them and put on old cotton sheets, that’s how you know that you shop way! to much at farm sales, I have gotton all my flannel sheets from them, and they are old and washed goodness know’s how many times an they are soft and smooth.. Clearly new ones need to washed a few times at min before they get that down home feel..

It does not help that my mom is keeping the house at 19 as the night low and higher for the daytime with a electic fireplace on in the living room when we are sitting, I didn’t even turn on the heat in my house till nov and its kept cold, so I am melting in this heat.. Now to be fair between the colds and that fact that my step-dad is alot older, he is almost 80 and he gets cold very easy so I will just need to suck it up but dang, when you are used to it being cool and layering, the heat is hard to get used to..

I will get a picture of this up on the next post or two but got to see the most amazing HUGE bull moose just hanging out on the side of dad’s hill, the rack was most impressive, would have liked to have put him in the freezer and the head on the wall.. but till not the season.. so photos instead.. Everyone have a wonderful day!

Posted in Life moves on daily | 1 Comment

Long Day..

Posted on December 20, 2011 by Just another day on the farm

First off, I know that I am behind on answering comments, I love each and every time my readers comment and I promise to find time over the next while to asnswer them, but with the chirstmas season on me, I am finding time in short supply..

Dh is taking some time off, along with his normal christmas time off from work and holding down the farm for me while I headed West and am having Christmas with my family for the first time in 11 years..

Needless to say the plane was crowded, I have never seen so many small dogs and small children on a plane before, It does not bother me that small critter can travel under the seat but I got a crying Jack one row up and about 15 little ones under the age of two, wow.. some folks and little ones were great, others not so much, one little one cried for at least a solid hour.. I have never been so glad for headphones in my life.. I watched just over five hours of cooking shows.. some good, some really bad and some just stupid but hey, its still a treat, given that I have no TV coverage at home.. thank goodness for CBC and their great coverage to listen to..

I was so glad to get out of that seat and I was a good girl and had not bought any of that overpriced stuff on the plane but they had claimed my water bottle at the airport (o and after I got swabbed down to check for explosives, fun, fun) and I was not going to pay for a new one on the other side that those crazy prices, paying for water is nuts anyway but paying airport prices is over the top!

Needless to say I came off the plane hunger enough to eat a bear, only to find my folks waiting for me, and off to lunch we went, then I went to Irivings, some of those saddles were so stunning, what a great shop in many ways, and picked up a present for Dh, who will no doubt be reading this so I will not share what they are, other then to say, on the farm use, and rated to minus 40, and I can borrow them 🙂

Then off to Dad’s farm by drum, and on the way, we stopped and picked up some bison, three pds of ground and lovely roast for me to make a dinner with, I unloaded the present box at dad’s, had a hot shower and changed cloths and a hot cuppa tea, wow does different water effect the way drinks can taste!

I was so ready for a nap, but they had held off putting up the tree for me to get there, so we put up the new tree dad had just bought, it was pre-lighted but as anyone who has done one of those tree’s for the first time knows, you get to spend a huge amount of time spreading the branches, well Dad was so funny, he helped but his would not stand up, so I ended going behind and fixing them, and mom rested, video taped and was in general laughing and smart mouth.. aw family.. gotta love them..

What I don’t love so far is my ma new truck, O its pretty to look at, but so far, sitting in the back has been aweful for me, the seat belt cuts right into my left hip, just nasty, I will need to do some of the driving and or spend some time in the front if we are really to be driving up and down to Fort Mac to see my older brother in it..

Then drove another hour an half up to my mom’s and put dinner on the table, I would love to say that I don’t have to drive today but point in fact, I need to wrap this up and drive in to red deer to pick up my dad who has put his truck in the shop for repairs, and then we are going for breakfast.. Mom’s got a list a mile long and I am burning daylight.. (not really, its still dark out, and she is sleeping LOL)

Posted in Family | 8 Comments

Odds and Ends..

Posted on December 17, 2011 by Just another day on the farm

So I finally got to some butchering done, the oldest laying hens are now finished, I have my year old layers and my up and coming 12 week old layers still doing well with us.. I also got all my extra roosters done. In another 4 to 6 weeks my meat birds will be ready to get butchered out, an I have lots of ducks that will be reaching the right age inbetween.. I am truly impressed with the amount of fat, I am getting for future use in regards to cooking/frying etc.

I have been able to make a number more of my sheep tallow candles for future use, I have figured out how to get rid of the tiny bit of sputtering, I take my twice cleaned fat, let it crumble out and then freeze it, let it dry out in the freezer for a couple days and then remelt and no more sputter.. I love it.. it burns really clean and really slow, I have put up a number of small 6 oz candles in the 8 oz jars.

This week has been awesome on the making of my lucet necklace/scarf designs, so far I have figured out how to make them double stranded, double colored and or in different patterns.. so awesome.. Some of them are three stranded, some are four and some are even five.. Going to just share one of them with you.. don’t laugh to hard but Dh is modeling for me..I stuck him a black turtleneck.. I will get the ladies in the family to model their’s and post them after xmas..

I think I have talked about the fact that locally this year, there is no straw available, now I have heard that you can get large straw bales brought in from outside our local area if you are willing to pay 85 a bale for it.. yikes.. most of the folks are using old hay as bedding, if they can track it down, Now I got a little leg up as my regular Farmer R had been saving me two large 900 pd straw bales in his storage for me since spring, he offered me the chance to buy what he had left from 2010, and I was so excited to find out that he in fact has four of them available for me, and at a much more reasonable 50 a bale. Normally our ducks have a straw bedding in their sleeping quarters, but lately they have had to make do with wood chips.. well today they got their straw back and Apple Duck was singing and dancing with happiness it was way to cute..

So how is your weekend going? How is your winter crafting going?

Posted in farm | 3 Comments

Food Storage Friday

Posted on December 16, 2011 by Just another day on the farm

Well, I opened my flyers this week with a screwed eye on them, typically this is the week you are going to see your best prices and I see that butter is very much on sale as is cheese, at my local No Frill’s they have ten pds of ontario, carrots, onions and potatos on for 1.75 and for the first time in the 3 months that I have been watching there is finally a sale on Caration evaporated milk for 1.25, which is not great as typically it had been going on sale for 1 a can, and I like to have a case or two of the canned milk in my pantry for use thoughout the year as while Sheep milk is good for a number of things, some things the cow’s canned or powdered milk works better..

The rest of the week has been good, typical on the eating out of the pantry, I made a big batch of homemade yogurt, as I like adding yogurt to my blended drinks for added protein. I have been using canned or frozen fruit in them and it really improved the green drinks in flavour.

I have added in cinnamon daily into my drinks and I am finding it causes me a upset tummy so far but its reported health benefits are great, and I want my system to get used to it, I was thinking about spices this week a fair amount, I have been trying to grow more and more of my own spices an seasonings over the past years, I was quite inspired by Andrea on her making of hot pepper sauce and dried/ground hot peppers, this is a area that I have not explored nearly as much as I should, I grow lots of peppers but because Dh is not keen on really hot foods, I have not tpically been growing a large amount for future use, instead growing and loving my horseradish for heat..

So I did a bit of reading and I do think it is a area that I can fairly easily grow, harvest and prepare to add to the pantry, I am also going to start learning even more in regards to what can be wild harvested in terms of items that can be uses to replace X in different recipes, I use some fairly regular, spruce tips for rosemary, stinging nettle seeds for celery seeds, diced dried dandlion flowers for saffon etc.

How was your week, did you find any amazing deal’s to add to the pantry? Did you grow herbs this year, and if so did you try and different ones? Did you find something that worked really well to replace something that comes from far away?

Posted in Food Storage | 5 Comments

Lucet gifts

Posted on December 15, 2011 by Just another day on the farm

The fluffy pretty little ones are going for stocking stuffers for my nieces to play with on their dress up, the pretty little grey and white cord is for a mesh bag for storage (thanks to lynn for that idea, I like it) and the bigger cord has had a clip added to the end and I have done a loop on the other end, and its become a new hound leash for a gift for a friend.

This one is my first heavy corded out new sheep rope for makinga instant halter, I like it, its strong, soft and flexable all in one.., I can see a number of these being made and at the ready for use, I have a very heavy red cord in waiting for a big one for girl and a dark blue one for marty.. Talk about frugal, these cord came in my big huge wool buying at a farm sale, given that I got over a thousand dollars worth of new wool/cord for eight dollars, I don’t think that the halter cords cost me even a penny to make in materal, vs 9 dollars plus tax for a braided rope halter to buy.. now that is a fair saving for a bit of my time.

I have figured out how to do a nice loose soft cord for necklaces or hair bands, and how to do a very tight hard cord for critter use or for as a hard working cord for different house uses..