Sunday, October 31, 2010

These are a few of my favorite things...

Just had to share. My new favorite thing is my rice sock!

Yes, its great for a neck ache. Great for many aches and pains.

But did you know its good for other things?

Its a great solution to a cold bed and cold feet!!!!

I used to wait for an electric blanket to heat up. But I read a while back (maybe I should look it up again) that if you are pregnant you shouldn't use an electric blanket.

So, I came up with this cold feet solution. Because I CAN'T SLEEP WITH COLD FEET! I've tried. I've even been able to sleep. Only to wake up from a nap with STILL COLD FEET!

Do you have cold feet? You too can have a rice sock! Just grab an old clean non-holey tube sock, a rubber band and some cheap rice. 2 min in the microwave and your feet will be in heaven.

Wednesday, October 6, 2010

An announcement

Just wanted to share our exciting news!

Milton and I are expecting an addition to our family.

Thats right! We're buying more sheep!

Just kidding. Milton wouldn't let me buy any more unless I sold some.

Actually I'm pregnant. YAY!!! The due date is April 18, and I'm 12 weeks along right now.

We only just started telling close family this week. So if you're just now finding out, don't feel bad, so is everyone else!

Now one request. PLEASE DON'T TELL OUR KIDS!!! We haven't told them yet. We're thinking around Thanksgiving when we find out if its a girl or boy. It may change in the meantime, but as of right now, we're waiting.

We will probably start telling the general public around the same time. So if your great aunt Flo's next door neighbor doesn't know, no need to tell her! ;)

OK. Whew. Now on to the rest of our boring lives!

A is doing great in school. She has lots of friends, and a new best friend every day/week. She loves school and comes home every day happy (usually). She has started singing more and more, I think its because of all the singing in class and music. She loves all the playground equipment. Her writing is getting better all of the time. She just started piano and has written her own song.

C loves school for another year!! This makes me happy. One of these years she is going to decide she doesn't like it so much, and I don't look forward to that day.

She is starting up piano lessons again, and doing well. She has lots of friends at school and LOVES her teacher. YAY! She and A both beg for hot lunch. So I let them have it on their birthdays, if they want to buy it with tooth fairy money (the tooth fairy is more generous on those days) and if we are out of bread (hey, it happens!). I'm such a mean mom :)

Hubby is busy around the house. Seems like our home wants to fall apart this year. We managed to have the refrigerator fixed (which broke down after the freezer), but turns out it would take quite a lot of $$ to fix the freezer. So we are in the market for a new to us freezer (again) 20cu ft, upright. Milton's also been busy fixing the garage door handle which jammed and had to be replaced a couple of weeks ago. But I do have to say, now that anything closes funny or doesn't work quite perfectly, its got me worried. I'm just waiting for the next thing to break. I'm hoping we'll get a break!!

The garden is finishing up. We have tons of tomatoes, and green that I hope make it. I made a great fresh tomato soup for dinner yesterday. It was good, except for the fact that my submersible blender (wedding gift) decided that it was done for. Mom and Dad' weren't home to borrow from, so I had to pour the boiling contents of my pan into my blender. Anyway, it was really good. Ask Mom. I made too much so brought her a bowl this morning:)

The cows are growing. The chickens are laying. The sheep are getting fluffy. The turkeys are getting fat. The turkeys will be selling at $3.99/lb finished weight if you know anyone who has $$ and wants to spend it on an all naturally fed, pasture raised turkey.

The black walnuts are starting to fall. But I can't go pick them up until hubby moves the cows on saturday and we have a good rain storm. I don't think cow patties would add that much color to my wool...:) but I am looking forward to using what I learned last year when I process the black walnuts and use them to dye wool.

I turned 33 this past Monday. Mom, Jen, Jett, Laura, Alysa, and Aftyn and I all went out to lunch together. Hubby made dinner and a delicious strawberry trifle for me, and the girls both drew pictures for me. Over all it was a very nice day. Thank you Honey!!!

Wednesday, September 22, 2010

Kind of Annoyed

Have you ever found a book that you utterly enjoyed? What do you do next? Well of course, you check the library, etc. to see if the author has written anything else!

I did that today. I found a copy of "Summers at Castle Auburn" by Sharon Shinn. My younger sister introduced me to this book and when I found it at my local library I thought it would be fun to reread it. I also decided to check the catalog to see if the author had written anything else and if they had it.

Well, she did! and they did! So I got them off the shelf. It was a little bit of a shock to realize that they were quite science fiction. I like some SCI FI, usually in the YA section. For me, if it gets to weird, its just to weird.

Anyway, I rejected 1 book and checked out the other book skeptically. The book I checked out was "Jenna Starborn". It looked pretty sci fi, but I thought I would give it a whirl.

I've been quite pleased with it. That is, I was quite pleased with it until I started recognizing the plot. Yes, it is a rewrite of Jane Eyre. They have changed a few things. For instance, she is not the ward's tutor, but a generator technician who lives in the house- but the storyline is the same.

Now I don't mind a rewrite. I'm looking forward to reading "Pride and Predjudice and Zombies" if I can ever find it on tape/CD. - BUT - Don't you think they should warn you somehow on the cover or on the back of the book that its a 'enjoyable revision' 'interesting rewrite' through an old storyline?

I'm just bugged. I was expecting a fresh storyline. That's what is bugging me. I don't think I will really enjoy this book until I get over that. Maybe I should put it down for a week or so...

What would you do?

(btw, the book isn't heavy on the sci fi and is well written. I may have to check out the other book "Archangel". But I don't know. The cover looks really STRANGE and the back cover says nothing about the story.)

***Edited to add that after careful scrutiny of the cover, I found a reference to Jane Eyre. But in my defense, it was half covered by a library sticker.

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

forever!

It has been forever since I last blogged!

I won't lie. After my last blog entry I decided I hated my blog. Well, A redesign may happen. Or not. We'll see. Right now I'm feeling neutral about it.

Lets see.... A family update.

We recently spent a glorious week at the beach. It was wonderful. It was restful. It was hard to come home. At one point I begged hubby to let me stay. I joked that I could sleep on the beach at night. Of course that is impossible. But it was a sweet little daydream for about half a second.

In all we spent 8 nights at a house about a block from the beach. We spent a lot of time at the beach wading, digging, building, walking, etc. We spent a lot of time in Lincoln city, and visited both Depoe bay and Newport.

We visited so many beaches like Otter Creek (rock?), and Agate beach, gleneden beach, and Taft beach. We visited a lighthouse, the aquarium, the Hatfield marine science center, and saw a sandcastle building contest.

We also watched lots of Food Network and the History Channel. American Pickers is my new favorite show.

We also ate out every single day. Yes. We got tired of it. No. I don't think I would do it again.

The whole reason for it was hubby's love for seafood and my thought of keep it simple. We had cereal every morning for breakfast, went out for lunch, and then had peanut butter and jelly for dinner.

We sampled lots of clam chowder and ate lots of seafood. And I can tell you one thing for certain. Mo's is the WORST place to eat. There are so many other non-chain restaurants on the coast.

Leaving was hard. But we had to. Hubby had to get back for work.

Well, while we were gone to the beach, a breaker tripped in the garage and spoiled about $450 - $500 worth of meat and all sorts of other things. That is all I'm saying about that because if I focus on it I get depressed.

But we are moving on. Can't do anything about it. Just have to add that onto the vacation expenses.

I just hope we can get the grass back. the sprinklers were also on that breaker and the lawn is VERY patchy. It was very hot while we were gone.

The turkeys doubled in size while we were gone. That was amazing. We haven't lost any in a while. We started out with 22 turkeys and 4 silkies. We are down to 19 turkeys and 2 silkies. for some reason this group has been hard to raise. I just hope we don't lose any more.

A just found out who her kindergarten teacher is. She has been so excited to go to school. C asked me this morning if it was Friday. Friday is when she finds out who her teacher is.

They are both super excited. I'm not ready for summer to be over. Seems like we just started. It has been a busy summer.

Hubby's been busy with various projects in the yard. The only thing I seem to have done in the yard this year was to kill off all of the plants on my front step. I kind of forgot about them in July when we had so much family here.

So far this summer has been busy. Maybe it will slow down once school starts? And soccer starts. And piano lessons start....who am I kidding. Its just going to get worse. Oh well. :)

Saturday, June 26, 2010

arghhh!

The cochin is not broody yet! I'm so worried!

If she doesn't go broody soon (like, by TUESDAY) I will be raising 21 turkeys.

Not what I was planning to do with my summer.

Darn cochin.

Tuesday, June 1, 2010

State of the Property Address

So Here is a rundown of current projects/stuff going on at our house.

We recently purchased 3 Angus cows. All Steers. 2 black angus, 1 red angus. We bought them down at the livestock auction. If you are ever bored on a Saturday, go down there and sit in the front row. Its lots of fun!!!

The red Angus is blind in one eye. These boys have been given names like Hammy (short for Hamburger), Sir Loin, some other meat related name. I try not to remember names or get attached to these guys since they will be food in a bout a year.

they are currently over at Mom and Dad's pasture eating it down and getting fat.

In our pasture we have the sheep. They were sheared about 2 weeks ago. Imagine our surprise when after shearing we realized they were pot bellied. Last year I wasn't certain I was feeding them enough. But after shearing they looked ok. This year I fed them more just to make sure. I guess I went a little overboard because they are REALLY FAT. So I'll be cutting them back to the normal winter rations this winter.

The chickens are fun as always. We've got our normal hatching egg laying crew around. This consists of 6 hens and 1 rooster. When hatched out, their eggs lead to sex link chicks. This is my passion. Anyway, in the next pen we have the silkie and 10 chicks that I purchased from the feed store for A's preschool class to have as class pets. I promised them chicks and the ones the silkie sat on never hatched. So what was at the feed store was what I ended up with. 5 White Astra's and 5 black Austrolorp. Both breeds I've never owned and never really wanted to own. So I'm not sure what will happen with them. There are at least 3 roosters so far. Maybe more. With straight run chicks they aren't sexed before you buy them so you really never know.

In the other coop I have 2 Cochins. One is raising 12 chicks that I bought from the hatchery to replace my current laying chickens. Those chickens will be ready to retire by next spring and these chicks will be old enough to take their place at that time.

The other cochin in that coop is getting ready to go broody. I hope anyway. Silkies and cochins follow a pattern. They lay for about 2 months and then go broody (meaning they want to sit on eggs and raise some chicks) for a while and then they take a break for about 6-8 weeks.

This cochin should go broody soon. If everything works out right, she'll be able to raise the 21 turkey chicks I have coming in late June!

The garden is doing well. Most everything is planted and the greenhouse is nearly empty. I ordered 110 more strawberry plants and am in the process of cleaning out the beds that my strawberries use to be in. I sold about 175 plants this year. But still have at least that many left. So next year maybe we'll get enough strawberries to make jam.

Everything else is waking up slowly due to the rainy cold weather we've been having.

Saturday, May 1, 2010

interesting

so I learned something interesting today.

Hubby has been researching a bit for his cow project. Its time for us to buy some more cows to put in the pasture. He thought for a while about Waygu which are the type used for Cobi beef in Japan. That deal didn't come through so he decided that he would probably buy cattle at the Livestock auction.

Now if you know me at all, you know that I love a good auction. So of course I wanted to go. I went last week and found the smell pretty pungent. Now I'm not talking about some sissy barn smell. Nope. I'm talking at least 100 people in an room that is smaller than an elementary school cafeteria and in that small room is an open space as big as my family room. Lets call that open space the arena. the arena floor is covered in about 1/2 inch of sawdust. Well at least it started the day as sawdust.

The arena has several doors for animals to be let in and out. The cattle come in in the lots they are being sold. The larger animals are sold seperately. Their are mama cows and babies, their are babies alone, there were lots of sheep. Each time these animals come in the arena they do what they do. They poop, potty, and even have diarhea (also known as scours in the cattle world).


This ALL adds the wonderful aroma.

Well today I had a scratchy throat so I threw a few menthol cough drops in my pocket.

We were at the auction and the smell was really making my stomach turn. And then I remembered the cough drops. guess what! It totally covered the smell. Well, not totally, but mostly. It was wonderful.

So the next time you go to the livestock auction, take a few cough drops.

Monday, April 19, 2010

Matilda the broody chicken



I made this movie for my daughters preschool class. They decided that it would be fun to learn about chickens as a class project. More exciting that mealworms which was their other choice.

Saturday, April 17, 2010

oh the memories




I have fond memories of Marty Robbins. This song in particular.

We always joked that the iron must have been awfully big and heavy to lug around. Someone suggested that maybe it was a travel iron.

Wednesday, February 3, 2010

Reading

I'm so happy with our local library. Its very LDS reader friendly - even though its located in Idaho. I enjoy competing with other patrons to get on the waiting list of new books.

Don't get me wrong, I also love some YA fantasy like the Alanna series by Tamora Pierce, as well as the Pendragon series by D.J. MacHale.


But I love me some LDS fiction. Although, with some authors it tends to get repetitive. Girl is older, considered an old maid in the LDS world. She gets into trouble somehow (the law, on the run, someone wants to kill her, has to find a killer, etc) and a guy saves her, they fall in love. Most of the time, one or the other of them is inactive for some reason or another. But despite this inactivity they are able to get married in the temple a short while later. Uh huh.

That is why I really have been enjoying the new series by Josi Kilpack. Its a great mystery without feeling like it has to have LDS characters or theme. And its clean.

The series is about Sadie Hoffmiller, a lady who likes to cook and also likes to solve a mystery. Although she didn't really know this until a neighbor was killed in "Lemon Tart". I enjoyed this book. I enjoyed the recipes at the end of most chapters quite a bit. My family loves the recipe for Alfredo sauce.

Just a few weeks ago I finally read "English Trifle", the second book in this series. Life got the better of me and I got on the list rather late. It was quite a good read, and I would highly recommend it.

Now after the "English Trifle" debacle, I decided to get on the list for the next book in the series " Devils Food Cake" earlier. I filled out a request card at the same time I picked up "English Trifle" . I was surprised to find that I am going to be the first person!

If you are interested in reading some of the book, the first chapter can be found at Josi's website www.josiskilpack.com . If you want to buy it go here http://deseretbook.com/item/5033744/Devil_s_Food_Cake .

If you are interested in a good blog to read, go here http://josikilpack.blogspot.com/ .

And if you want a list of my favorite books, go here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZOU8GIRUd_g