Jam and Beans

HUH? Well, yeah, here's some pics... I've been busy. We went to a U-pick place and got us a mess of strawberries. I made jam and froze a bunch. I had some rhubarb so I made some strawberry-rhubarb jam too. And can you gess what's in the three jars in front? Any guess at all? The pic isn't the best. Sorry 'bout that.

Carrot Jam! Yes, and it's wonderful! My kids love it and my wife said it reminded her of carrot cake, her favorite. It was in the Blue Book (the canner's Bible) and it sounded good... and it was.

Furthermore, I've used my canner for the first time. Remember this winter I went and bought a 23 quart canner? I finally got to use it. We got green beans in our CSA box two weeks in a row and the kids and I picked a whole mess too. Wife and kids snapped and washed 'em for me (wife capped and washed the berries too, bless her!). I got 7 quarts. I'm so happy about that. I'm hoping for more. God is good!

I Love Hymns

Recently, my wife and I have been feeling like something's been missing. We attend a rather large church and for the most part, hymns have been laid aside for contemporary worship songs. Once in awhile we'll get a remake of a hymn, and that's nice. But we feel an emptiness there. Maybe we're getting old?

Don't get me wrong, we like the new choruses, etc. That's one reason we chose to attend our church, we enjoyed the worship style. But still...

A few weeks ago, my wife was talking about this, and went and got one of the several hymnbooks I keep on hand. I was sitting at the counter reading and she stood opposite me thumbing through the songs. I looked up and her eyes were filled with tears as she read the words that had, unbeknown to us, grown so dear to us. Recently, we've been in a few situations where we've heard or been able to sing some hymns, and I find myself choking up as well.

You see, we both grew up on hymns. As children, we sang them because that's what you do in church. But now, as adults, we understand and value the messages, theology, encouragement, and truth these old songs embody. These are characteristics often missing from newer worship choruses. Oh the choruses are encouraging at times, but really, do any of them hold a candle to "Oh Worship the King"?

To combat this dearth of hymns in our lives, I purchased two CD's of hymn music. I'm quite pleased with my choices. My kids even seem to like them. My son, Eric, now 6, said today, "I like this music, it's calm and smoothing". Yes, 'smoothing'.

I do prefer the true hymns over the gospel songs or testimony songs, but they're all good. Some of my favorites? Immortal, Invisible; Come Thou Fount; This is My Father's World; Praise, My Soul, the King of Heaven; Sing Praise to God Who Reigns Above; Oh God, Our Help in Ages Past; A Mighty Fortress; To God Be the Glory; Praise to the Lord, the Almighty.... to name but a few.

Hymns offer words that can bring peace and comfort, strength and encouragement. I mentioned to my wife the other day that it took us years of singing them to begin to understand them and learn them by heart. We've got some catching up to do with our kids if they're to learn and appreciate them someday.

So what are your favorites?

It's Maple Sugarin' Time!

This past Saturday, our "Keepers of the Faith" homeschool group visited the home of one of our members. They live in a rural area surrounded by woods, with quite a few sugar maples. Just perfect for making some homemade maple syrup.

So Brad, the owner, and another homeschool dad who helps him, took us through the woods. Here you see my two sons, or the back of them anyway, as Eric drills a hole for the spile, as it's called. Like his camo hat? I made that.

After that, a spile is driven into the hole, and the bucket is hung on it. In this picture, you can't really see it, but the sap is really dripping into the bucket from the spile. Warm days and cold nights really make the sap run. A lid is put on top of the bucket to keep rain/snow/bugs/debris out.

Each day the buckets are checked to gather sap. Sometimes you get lucky and there's ice on the top of the sap. That's pure water and you can throw that out without wasting any of the sugar. That also cuts down on your boiling time because you're getting rid of excess water. After the sap has been collected, it's all dumped into something like this to await the boiling process...

If you look, you can see the line where the sap is. That's about a 200 gallon container. There's about 100 gallons of sap in there. It takes approximately 40 to 50 gallons of water-clear sap to make one gallon of dark brown syrup.

From there, the sap is taken to a homemade boiler that Brad made. The largest part of the boiler is the firebox. There are baffles attached to the ceiling of the firebox which really gets the sap boiling. Above the box is the boiling pan. It's about 8 inches deep and covers the entire top of the firebox. Above that is the sap 'bucket' (for lack of a better word). Sap is poured into the sap bucket after being drawn off the holding tank. A copper pipe with a valve attached controls a constant, small flow of sap into the boiler pan. This is done to eliminate a quick cooling in the boiling pan by adding a large amount of cold sap all at once. A little at a time and it all stays hot and bubbly. Then the sap boils, and boils, and boils. It takes a lot of wood to do this.

After a long while, Brad draws the sap off the boiler pan, through a filter and into a turkey fryer. Yes a turkey fryer. You could use a stock pot or something, I'm sure, but he uses a turkey fryer. The fryer goes onto a propane burner where the sap is finished off and that last bit of moisture is steamed away. What's left is nothing but pure maple syrup. He offered four bottles for a fund raiser here recently. They brought $100.

Each family was sent home with a half-pint of the dark amber stuff. I had some on waffles this morning. If you've never had true maple syrup, you're in for a surprise when you try it. It's a little runnier than store bought syrup because there's no corn syrup added. It also tastes a little, ummm, woody maybe. But it's sweet. And there are no harmful additives or anything else. You should check the label on the bottle anytime you go to buy maple syrup. Unless it says 100% Maple Syrup, you may be getting something that's mostly corn syrup with a little maple thrown in for flavor. Also, real maple syrup can be pricey. Hey, it's only harvestable for a few weeks a year, and it takes a lot of time to produce. But wow is it worth it.

Updates on Life

Well, first a couple of updates. I got a call from the auto dealership this morning. The manager of the shop had been out of town when I took the van back in earlier this week but was back today and had been told of my situation. One of his employees called to tell me that all I needed to do was bring the van back in, they would look at it again and fix it for me - no cost to me! Praise the Lord! For serious! I can't tell you what a relief that is.

Second, last evening, my computer began doing some funny stuff. I'd go to log into my gmail account, or even my blogger account, and all I would get was "Internet Explorer is unable to open the webpage". YIKES! Called Dell, explained. Virus. Gonna have to reboot the whole shebang. Fortunately, I have an external hard drive so I saved everything I could against this impending doom. But today - for now anyway - everything is ok. I'm crossing my fingers, and hoping like crazy. Of course, I did breathe a prayer last night about it. I was just preparing to go through our "favorites" list and copy down all the links so I could find the pages again. Maybe that won't be necessary. As a note, I do have virus protection and ran a full scan, which showed nothing. So, we'll see. Pray for me.

Further, I'm reading other blogs and realizing that I'm not alone in my dire misery with winter. As the old saying goes, misery loves company. But this kind of company doesn't make me feel better. Here's a totally honest assessment of my condition. I'm miserable. I have a seriously shortened temper. I can feel my frustration and anxiety go up (consequently, so does my blood pressure). I haven't got the patience to finish reading lesson with my son. I'm a mess. I'm taking vitamin D-3, but nothing beats good ol' sunshine. It's snowing here now.

To combat the rising frustration level, I listen to my MP3 player. There's a CD I bought recently on Amazon called "Praise 22". It originally came out on cassette tape in the late '80's. My college roommate and I, as odd as it may sound, would often fall asleep at night listening to this calming instrumental collection of what are now considered 'old school' praise and worship songs. (Remember "This is the Day"?) So I listen to that. I also listen to some of my favorite Irish music. It isn't all calming, per se, but it makes me happy, so that's just as good. Also, I have some very strong mental connections in my head where music is concerned. I don't know if everyone does this, but I can actually see and feel and almost smell certain days or seasons when I hear certain music. Sometimes these impressions are so strong. Yes, it's an escape. I don't deny it.

I also knit to relax. If I get a rhythm going, it's very relaxing, almost mind-numbing. Reading sometimes helps too, but I'm all out of motivation to read right now. Been doing a lot of it lately. And finally, I've pulled my guitar out again here recently and been playing it. I have a beautiful Martin that I bought several years ago, used, for quite a bit less than it was probably worth. Someone else's vanity afforded me the opportunity (that's another story). I was taking lessons at the time. I'm not good. As a matter of fact, I can't play very well at all, but I enjoy what I can do, and I try. Perhaps I should try harder. Thing is, I'm so right brained that using both hands is kind of difficult - about like playing piano. Trumpet, I can do. Mouth and one hand. Got it. Done it. Two hands... eeeh, not so easy for me. But I try.

Anyway, that's what's going on with me. My daughter is having her first real sleepover tomorrow night. I'll be making snacks and cleaning for that. She's got plans to decorate with balloons and streamers. It'll be fun for her. I have to take the boys out for awhile just to get them out of the way. Let me tell you, they're not taking this well. They get so bent out of shape if Anna gets to do something and they don't. Sheesh.

Lessons from a Farm

This is my most recent 'finished reading' book. The author is Jerry Apps, published by Voyageur Press, 2005. I read this on recommendation of The Deliberate Agrarian, Herrick Kimball, and I'm glad I did.

Mr. Apps recounts his life growing up on the family farm in the little community of Chain O' Lakes, Wisconsin (Near the village of Wild Rose), back in the 1930's through 50's. He recounts many of the daily and yearly chores that marked life and made it good. On several occasions, he laments the purchase of 'new' technology that made life easier, like an automatic milking machine, a television set, a corn binder/thresher. He laments these things because they heralded the end of a way of life, one where people came together, shared their lives, knew each other, and had real community. Each chapter is prefaced with an excerpt from his mother's money ledger, the excerpts introducing the subject of the chapter.

In this wonderful little 223 page book, we look back into the real life of an early American farm family. We share the joys of getting electricity in the house, of a good grain harvest, we get a small taste of sweat and toil of everyday life, and we hear some of the heartbreak that was as much a part of life then as it is today.

But I want this to be more than a book report (sorry if it's gotten boring). In the chapter called 'Windstorm', we're told of the spring of 1950 when a windstorm like no other blew through and literally took the barn off it's foundations. The milk cows had to be moved to a neighboring farm for several weeks while the barn was repaired. Unfortunately, the cows acquired brucellosis, or Bang's disease, while there and had to be sent to slaughter. These two calamities made life very difficult for the Apps family for some time after. The strawberry and cucumber patches were expanded to help provide a little more income until the new cow herd was up to full size and production. What struck me most profoundly out of all the book was what Mr. Apps says next:

"There was little complaining about the hard work or reduced income. Without saying anything, Pa convinced me and my brothers, through his actions, that the family had to work together as a team if we were to survive these hard times. Each of us, without bragging or talking about it, was proud to help; each of us knew our contribution was important to the farm's survival. Those years brought our family as close together as it had ever been." (p. 200-201)

Ok, some lessons... First of all, most families today aren't playing as a team, shucks, the members aren't even playing the same game. Second, it's the onus of the father to show the way. That's how it is with most things... faith, work, family.

I've often wondered recently, with economics being what they are, if things got worse, would people be as resourceful as they were back during the Great Depression? I'm not so sure. First, things would have to get so much worse than they are before people seriously start thinking about alternative means of survival (gardening, chickens, doing without, etc.). But I'm just not sure that many of today's families have the basic fabric fabric necessary to hold together and pull through. I think we're too soft, too accustomed to creature comforts that we'd just about die without our cable or internet (when was the last time you actually wrote a letter - you know, with paper- and mailed it to someone? I know I can't remember when. It's a lost art). This is just a side comment though. But I'd be interested in knowing what you think.

The big lesson to me is the responsibility that is mine. Oh, I've known about it, but this little book just kinda brings it home again. If my kids are going to learn the intrinsic value of contributing to the family economy with their work and effort, I'll have to lead the way and teach them. Not an easy task when the human nature desires to avoid work and difficulty, if you call hoeing a garden a difficulty -which it certainly can be.

The other lesson is more about the work part. Hard work. Some things aren't so hard, like hoeing the garden. That's just monotonous. But there are days when work has to be done whether you want to do it or not. A lot of folks don't know hard work. I wonder if I do. Will I/do I have what it takes to tackle hard work? I've worked hard before, but will I pass that on to my kids?

Here's the really personal part. I can take this little challenge one of two ways. I can look at it as a positive encouragement and run with it, and/or I can see it as 'one more thing' that I'll probably not do to well with and give up. I can be quite pessimistic at times, but I'm not as bad as I used to be. So I'll likely take both approaches, depending on the day and my mood. Being a father is a never ending job. The good thing is that I don't have any crazy notions of being the perfect dad - I screwed that up LONG ago. I'll settle for being as good as I can be, and if that earns me a 'great dad' once in awhile, all the better.

Winter Finally Came

Ok, well, winter's been here for awhile, but not like this. Over the past two days, we've gotten around nine inches of snow.

Now I realize that some people living in the great frozen north - where driving a car onto a lake in order to go ice fishing isn't uncommon - would laugh mockingly at our measly nine inches. But you must understand that here in my part of Indiana, well, snow just doesn't come in nine inch depths all the time. We usually have one, maybe two good snows a winter in which six inches or so is 'deep'. Other than that, it's flurries, an inch here, some sleet there. But today....










Folks are having trouble getting around today. Our street hasn't been cleaned off yet and my wife has to get to work tonight. Hmmm. Maybe I should go out and shovel some more.

I played Tooth Fairy

Well finally! Yesterday afternoon, after a good 15 minutes in the bathroom staring in the mirror and fiddling, his brother and sister looking on, Eric lost his first tooth. The adult tooth has been coming in for several months now behind the baby tooth. Eric, like his sister, is afraid of pain and hasn't been too diligent about working it out. Anna can take forever to lose a tooth. Eric seems to be on the same path.

Anyway, there was the tooth, ever so small for feeling so big in your mouth. Some blood (no crying or screaming).

So last night, the tooth tucked into a plastic bag and slipped under a pillow, Eric went to sleep eager for morning and the surprise he knew he'd find.

Sometime around midnight, just before I went to bed, I slipped in, took the bag out and replaced the tooth with four quarters. Some would say a dollar for a tooth is quite generous. These comments usually come from older folks who were lucky to get a dime or a quarter. Others would call me a cheapskate. These are the people who's grandparents made sure their college educations were funded by the tooth fairy. My kids... they get a buck.



Well, besides a bit of whining from Grant wishing he had a loose tooth, all has been joyous this morning. That was this morning. Now's another story, but this morning... joy over money for a tooth.

What is my problem?

Crimony Pete! It must be part of my "Jack-of-all-trades-master-of-none" (JOATMON?) nature. I start things and don't finish. It seems that I'm rather notorious about it at present.

As you can see from the above picture, I've got several books, all in a different state of un-read (like un-dress). Two movies I've been watching off and on for days, two knitting projects... and I picked up some double pointed knitting needles yesterday to try my hand at that! I've also got two other books on the shelf that I haven't begun yet, but are awaiting my perusal at some point.

In my own defense, it's not uncommon for a knitter to have several projects going at once. Also in my defense, I did just finish a book yesterday called, "Watch For a Cloud of Dust." It's a fun, memoir type book containing the musings and recollections of a southern veterinarian. Fun reading and some good laughs.

I think, as I sit here, that perhaps my habit of going from one thing to another may have something to do with the season. It's winter, and as I've said in previous posts, I hate winter. I soooo need spring to come. All in good time, my pretty, all in good time. But what I mean is, that I'm restless and anxious for warmer weather. Ergo, I am restless in my activities, not settling for long on any one thing.

Alas. I remember back in college once. Of all things, I decided I wanted to go and reread a rather lengthy book I had in a class once. It's a wonderful book called, "Witness" by Whittaker Chambers (thank you Dr. Alan Snyder, wherever you are!). But I had other classwork to do, a social calendar to keep, my public to address... er, well, ok, maybe not that. But I had other things to do as well. I found myself feeling all uptight and bent out of shape and couldn't figure out why. Now, hang with me, there's a point to all this. I decided to visit my psychology prof., Dr. Judy Huffman. Those of you in Marion and know her, give her a shout for me. Anyway, I unloaded on her and told her what was going on and asked for help. As I'm talking to her, she takes a pad of paper, a red pen and draws a red flag on the paper and waves it at me. In a nutshell, I was overdoing it. Giving myself too much to do and expecting things that weren't necessary. She gave me the ability to allow myself to put the big ol' book away and not finish it, AND not feel guilty about it.

Well, I don't feel very pressured to finish any of those things in my picture. I started them for pleasure and I'll finish them for pleasure, not pressure. So I don't really feel badly about having so many unfinished tasks, but it did strike me today that I've really got a lot of things wanting my attention. Things that just aren't all that important.

I may just put one or two of those books away for awhile.

Christmas Crisis

HELP! I CAN'T FIND IT! Time is slipping away and I can't find my fruitcake recipe. No, this is serious. I can't find it. I know I had to have taken it out to make the shopping list, but now I don't know what I did with it. I'll cook just about anything on the stove, mix things together, create my own thing... but baking, NO WAY! There's just too much to screw up. Somebody please say a prayer that this empty headed lilly-muggins finds his stupid fruitcake recipe.

Melora says that if I don't find it, it'll just be a chance for me to make my own cake and make it better. No, huh-uh, can't do it. If I don't find it this morning, I'm gonna have to... (dum, dum, duuuuummmmm) Call my mother and ask her if she remembers it all. Oh help.

Twas the Week before Christmas

Well, here it is a week before Christmas. Not a lot going on around here but I thought I'd write something anyway.

We've broken into several jars now of the homemade applesauce. It's really good and the kids devour it.

I have a little bit more shopping to do for my wife and a friend, but otherwise, we're done. Yeah! I used to enjoy getting out in the crowd and mess and shopping for presents, but I guess I'm getting older and now I just think it's ridiculous. I don't have much patience anymore as well. I suppose my kids take all I have, so when I do go shopping, be it for groceries or gifts, and the line is a mile long and there are only three lanes open and another 24 closed - at 6:00 p.m. - I get a little testy. Most of the time these days, I try to psych myself up and remind myself not to get in too big of a hurry.

This weekend I'll be making "The Fruitcake". Yes, a real bonafide fruitcake. No rum flavor. It's full of dates, pecans, and candied pineapple and cherries. It has a boatload of sugar and just enough liquid and flour to hold it all together. Truly, it's more fruit than cake and it's very good. "WHY on Earth," you ask, "would I make fruitcake?" Well, it's my mom's recipe. She used to make it especially for my grandfather. But after he passed away some 10 years ago, she decided she couldn't do it. Didn't even want to look at the tin she put it in. Well, my sisters weren't going to do it and I wanted to. So she handed the recipe to me - the original piece of paper! She no longer has the recipe in her possession, it's mine. It really is good and does a fair job of redeeming the bad rap that fruitcake gets. I'll probably also make Santa's Thumbprint cookies. No, not peanut butter cookies with a kiss on top. These are the real thing, too. A sort-of oatmeal cookie with almond flavoring, melted chocolate on top and a pecan half. My personal holiday favorite.

I'll be singing next Wednesday evening as part of the worship team at our Christmas eve service at church. Check out my church at www.mccth.org. Melora and I attend the Exchange service on Sunday evenings. To get an idea of what we 'put up with' sometimes in our pastors... check out http://reson8.org/stuff/video/. Here, you'll see a selection of some really fine acting and general goofiness. Really funny stuff, especially if you know the people in the videos. But I think even without that familiarity, you'll find them pretty humorous.

Hope all is well with you and yours. Take some time and enjoy the season. Watch some of those favorite Christmas movies, listen to some old Christmas music (or some new), eat unhealthy stuff - and enjoy it.

Merry Christmas to all!

My Neck of the Woods

In my memory and way of thinking, this has been an unusually cold late fall/early winter here in mid-western Indiana. Usually the bottom doesn't fall out of the weather bucket until January. But this year, after a late autumn (I still don't have all the leaves raked in my yard because the trees took so long to disrobe), winter seems to have come early. Ok, maybe the bottom hasn't completely dropped out, but at this time of year, we're used to high temps in the upper 30's most days. For a few weeks now, it's been averaging ten degrees lower. AND we've had snow. The most we could normally expect is a light dusting before Christmas. But here in the past few weeks, we've had probably two or three inches. Yes, it falls, melts some, then falls again, but still... Now I know some of you up in the great frozen north are laughing at me now because you're already sitting on eight or ten inches of the white stuff. But for us here, it's kind of unusual, this early in the season.

The other day, my daughter had a friend over, and despite my feelings about cold weather, I took the four kids (my three plus one) into the woods behind our house. I caught some of it on 'film'...

Sadly, this small woods is slowly being overtaken by Chinese Honeysuckle. That's it above with the green leaves and red berries...

It was pretty chilly... about 25 degrees or so.

This is my water garden - well, what's left after the flood this past summer. It's frozen on top. Notice the impression of the oak leaf in the ice after one of the kids took it off the top? And the little blob of orange in the lower right corner... that's the head of one of the goldfish, very much in a state of torpor.

NOT for the Squeemish!

Today, thanks to some home school friends, Audrey and Eric Beachy, I had the awesome experience of learning how to butcher a chicken! So be warned, this isn't gonna be pretty!

I got to their house at around 8:20 a.m. and accompanied Eric to the hen house. After looking over the flock, he and his kids caught the few birds they were going to keep. The others, we took by the legs and carried to the edge of the garden... where waited a board with two nails sticking up about an inch apart. Each bird, in turn, was held by the legs and wings and their head placed between the nails. Then the axe. Quick. Done. I even used the axe quite deftly. Below is what is left, after the birds bleed out, which was done while we held them, so they wouldn't run all over in their 'death throws'. I warned you, it isn't pretty!
Next came the part that most people really hate. The scalding and plucking. For the 'farm challenged' among my small readership, scalding a bird in hot water helps relax the skin so that the feathers come out nice and easy. Usually there are some small, almost hairlike, feathers left that you burn off by passing the bird over a small flame. Unfortunately, these birds are in the process of molting and had numerous pin-feathers that we had to scrape off with the back of a knife. Grossed out yet? Here's a pic of Eric dipping a bird in the water before plucking.

After that, it gets messy. Yes, chicken butchery is as smelly as you've been told. I almost lost it once, but I bucked up and just backed away from 'the bucket' a bit. This was the tricky part. Eric had to show me how he wanted the birds cut up and how to gut them. I've cut up a chicken before, but I've never gutted one. So that was a really new experience. Let me tell you, not pretty. Put simply... gall bladder bile is very green indeed, and the gizzard is an incredibly tough, muscular organ - it's amazing. I also saw undeveloped eggs, which was pretty cool.

In all, we butchered 7 birds: 2 roosters and 5 hens. Below is a photo of the chickens we left to cluck and scratch another day. The rooster in front is an Austrolorp/Phoenix cross, five hens, and one itty-bitty little peep. See it there behind the brown Buff Orpington? The little whitish spot....

So... would I ever do this again? Yes, I would. Why on Earth would a person do all of that? Well, there's something to be said for knowing where your food came from. Knowing that it lived a healthy, happy life, full of sunshine, fresh grass, lots of juicy bugs... for a chicken, that's a good life. No antibiotics or hormones either.

Before I went over today, I had had little interaction with Eric, who is a doctor. But through the course of the day, I found a man who is something of a kindred spirit. He gardens, raises chickens, is thinking about goats, just planted a bunch of fruit trees yesterday... He's a homesteader. On top of that, he's a father of four, a husband, and a committed Christian. We had a very good day working together and talking about life, homeschooling, parenting, animals, gardening, bees, property... oh, just everything that came to mind. It was really a blessing to me to be able to spend a large part of the day there. So I'm thankful.

Oh, and about a half hour before I left, Ethan, the 8 year old son, shot and killed a squirrel with his dad's .22. That was his second squirrel. I understand it takes about two to make a good pot pie. But, since I was there, and it had to be done anyway, I got to watch as Eric cleaned the squirrel, so I learned that too. Melora about gagged when I mentioned the thought of hunting squirrel. She says they're rodents and she just can't do it. Sigh. Oh well.

And now for something different...

Well, the past week or so, there were two days where, if one were to look closely, one would see a man, in a house, washing windows. Yes, in fact, it does happen. I even remember my dad doing it from time to time.

My own experience is a matter of necessity. You see, about half of the windows in our house are newer, tilt-in, double-hung windows. I clean them once a year (yeah, ok, so I should do it twice a year, but like you do it that often!!!) in the fall to clean off all the crud from the year so I can see out them during the winter. Why in the fall? Well, I have a touch of Seasonal Affective Disorder and winter is a real downer for me. So I need all the sunlight and clear view I can get.

The other windows in the house are old. I have to remove screens and put in storm windows. The job was made more difficult this year by the fact that the storm windows had about 13 inches of dried mud on them from where they sat in the garage during our flood this past June. So I had to get the hose out, in the cold weather, and wash them off. BUT, after several hours of diligent work on Saturday, all the storm windows are in and we're closed up for the winter. Only our large picture window needs cleaning inside and out to finally be done.

As an aside, I happened to break one of the storm windows in the process. I had kept the old storm window from the bathroom window that we'd replaced several years ago, and I got to thinking... long story short, I replaced the broken pane with the old window, and only had to cut a strip of glass off one end to make it fit right. I was quite proud of myself!





And now for something different....

I knit! Yes, it's true. I've joined the growing number of men in the world that take up the sticks and work em like magic. Actually men have been knitters for eons and even had guilds in England back in the day. I picked up the hobby last winter with hopes of one day making myself some sweaters and socks. Those items are a little tricky to start out with, so I'm taking it easy for my first effort. Last winter, I basically just made a couple of pot holders as I learned the garter stitch, stockinette stitch, and purl stitch. I started out trying my hand at some of those stitches again this year and decided finally to quit putzing around and actually make something....

So here it is. An afghan I found on the Lion Brand Yarn website (http://learntoknit.lionbrand.com/). I went to JoAnne's and bought my yarn and appropriately sized knitting needles, rushed home, and cast on.
It's not going to be a huge blanket or anything, but it'll be cozy. The yarn I have is actually called 'Claret'. Pictured is the color 'Cilantro'. I'll be sure and take pictures to share later on. Here's hoping I don't get screwed up and really mess it up. But at least it's a project and it thrusts me into the world of 'real knitters'. Yee-haw!

Special thanks to Joel B. for showing me how to peel an orange using a spoon, way back in college. It just came in handy with the kids.

Honeybees

Today I went to a free, public seminar at the West Terre Haute branch of the Vigo County Public Library. This diminutive building was the setting for the kitzchy (how DO you spell that word?), monthly meetings they call "Coffee Thursday", complete with coffee and cookies. The wife and kids tagged along, because they thought they might do some school whilst I was in my meeting. However, never having been to that particular branch, we didn't realize that this would be near impossible. The meeting took place right out in the open and there isn't any other space or rooms... so there was talking and noise. Remember, I used the word "diminutive". Not much school got done there.

The seminar was on beekeeping. The speakers were an older couple that have been beekeepers for two years. They had 12 hives, but this past summer, a flock of barn swallows ate the bees of 6 1/2 of their hives as they left the hive to forage. Bummer.

I can't say that I learned a whole lot more than I already knew about bees. Oh, some little tidbits and facts I learned, but not too much more that was useful and helpful. One or two bits of info, is all. But it was still fun and entertaining, sitting there with a group of old women and one mom with her infant and young daughter.

I went to this "Coffee Thursday" because I do want to try my hand at beekeeping some day. Papaw did it when I was a kid, and I use honey in my bread baking, and in sweetening tea, etc. We also put it on cereal, etc.

It's very healthy for you you, honey is. If you buy honey produced within 50 miles of where you live, it'll help your allergies a lot. It's a natural antiseptic and can help heal wounds. It's just an amazing thing. Honeybees weren't native to North America and had to be imported to pollinate fruit trees brought from Europe. The first captive hives came to America in 1640.

A bee may travel as far as 3 miles from home to collect nectar and pollen. Each bee only produces 1/12 teaspoon of honey in it's short 40 (or so) day life. And, a bee could fly around the world on two tablespoons of honey! Isn't that just amazing?! The average hive, at the height of the honey season, may contain 60 to 80 thousand bees, with upwards of 100,000 not being impossible. A hive usually loses some members during the winter and starts the nectar season with somewhere in the neighborhood of only 40,000 bees. A queen can lay up to 1,500 eggs a day, lives for up to five years, mates with up to 8 males, on one nuptial flight, and, because of her size and job of egg laying, does absolutely nothing for herself. She is fed, cleaned, cared for, and her waste removed by attendant nurse bees.

Anyway, I may try to find a mentor next Spring to show me the ropes and give me the ins and outs of beekeeping, first-hand.

As a point of interest, I usually buy a 5# jar of unpasteurized honey for $14.

Bread Baking

You may or may not know, depending on what posts you've read of mine, that I make all our bread. Well, ok, on those very rare occasions when we have hot dogs (gaaack) I might buy buns. But otherwise, since last winter, I decided to save some money, get healthier and make our bread. I use a recipe given to me by my mom-in-law. It's a whole wheat recipe that you can put together and use your bread machine to knead and do the first rise. That's great 'cause I don't have to do the kneading!

I have a friend that's very into healthy eating. She makes all her family's bread, to the tune of five loaves a week, though she usually gives one away. She also makes tortillas, waffles, pasta... all that stuff. And she uses her own fresh ground wheat. She heads up a shopping group that orders wheat berries (that's what you call the grains) from a company and has them shipped bulk to save money. There are quite a few people in this group. They order hard and soft white and red wheat, spelt, kamut, and I'm sure several other grains. These usually come in 50# bags or 45# plastic tubs. Now, you have to have a grinder in order to use this stuff. My friend has a grinder. It's niiiiicccee! Expensive, but nice.

Let me pause here and answer a question you may have.... One loaf of bread takes about three-and-a-half cups of flour. The grinder grinds about 8 cups of berries at a time, which yields about 12 cups of flour.... That's a lot of flour! Doesn't it all go bad before you use it up? (There, right there, that was the question. Did you catch it?) First of all, you typically don't grind it all at once, because it would lose much of its vitamin content due to time. However, you can prevent this by freezing the flour. More on that later. But no, the wheat and grain berries don't go bad as long as you keep them dry and pest free (no bugs please). When archaeologists uncovered the tombs of the Pharaohs in Egypt, there were some tombs that contained pots with wheat berries in them. Much to the scientists' surprise, these berries were STILL viable and sprouted when planted, after centuries in a tomb! Some of the folks in the ordering group went a little overboard with the Y2K scare and ordered a BUNCH of wheat berries. I guess some of them are still using the last of that supply with continued good results. Now, didn't God just know what He was doing?

Anyway, this friend of mine, Tomi is her name... she called the other day and said that there was an extra 50# bag of hard white wheat left and wondered if I'd want it. She said she'd grind it for me if I could put it in my freezer. Um, let's see... fresh, whole wheat flour.... 50# of berries for $27..... Yeah, I'll take it. So I went yesterday and she let me use her machine to grind the last little bit of berries so I could have the experience using the machine (it's a Nutrimill if you want to know...http://www.pleasanthillgrain.com/nutrimill.asp). She also gave me about 12 cups of soft white wheat flour for use in no-yeast baking, like for cookies or pastries. So now I have a ton of whole wheat flour in my deep freeze which should last me well through the winter.

I've been using store bought whole wheat flour for my baking up to this point, but even the 'whole wheat' from the store isn't really whole wheat. It doesn't contain the bran or the germ, which is where most of the nutrients are. So I've been adding wheat germ when I bake. NO MORE! I was so excited about this flour that I came home and baked a new loaf last night, even though we still have part of a loaf left. This loaf baked up so high and nice, it's amazing! I think I'm ruined when this flour runs out. Maybe I can be like the widow that fed Elijah during the famine and it'll never run out......

A Good Fall Harvest

Well, it's been a long couple of days. I put up four more pints of pickled beets, froze about five quarts of green beans (don't have a canner yet), froze about three quarts of broccoli, cut up and froze ten or twelve Corno di Toro peppers, and now... Applesauce! Above, you see the apples, all cut up and cored, cooking in a pot, skin still on - need the pectin, you know. I have one of those corer/cutter things that you push down on the apple. But a year or two ago, a friend gave my wife one of those nifty things that have a handle you turn. The apple is pushed through a blade or two and it cores and slices it into uniform pieces. There's even an arm with a blade to peel it if you want to use it. It's a wonderful little tool. Highly recommend it.
After the apples are good and soft, you run 'em through a food mill. I got mine from Rural King for about $20. It's an invaluable tool and it's a whole lot easier than pushing it all through a strainer/sieve.
This, then, is what you get. Add some cinnamon to taste and put it into hot jars with hot lids and stick it in the hot water bath.
Process them babies for twenty minutes......
And voila! Applesauce! If you're curious (and more for my own information as much as anyone else), 3 pecks of apples -or 3/4 bushel - will produce 10 quarts and one pint of applesauce, give or take. I had a small tragedy during the hot water bath. One of my quart jars cracked along the bottom. I heard it happen but didn't know which jar it was. So I had to take them all out at the end. I found the broken one. Unfortunately, all the applesauce in it ended up in the water as I pulled it out of the pot. Well, live and learn. It could have happened because I didn't have the jar hot enough for the water, or maybe there was an inherent flaw in the jar during manufacture. Oh well.

Today, I'm making apple butter (sorry, no pics - it took forever just to upload these pics). I'm using one peck of apples (the left over from the bushel I bought). So far, 5 pounds or so of apples have produced 5 1/2 pints of the yummy dark brown delight. I've got another 6 pounds or so of apples in the crock pot cooking right now. By the end of the day, I'll probably have another 5 or 6 pints. Boy, is it yummy... sugar, cinnamon, cloves, and allspice. I love this stuff!!!

Popcorn - the old fashioned way

I remember Friday nights at home as a kid. Dinner, clean up, wait.... Then.... "Dukes of Hazzard", then "Dallas" (ooooh, that JR), then "Falcon Crest". All of this craziness was usually accompanied by bowls full of popcorn.

My wife and I were doing some shopping yesterday while my mom had the kids. We were picking up a few odds and ends that we needed in the pantry and around the house. As we went down the snack aisle of the store, my wife asked me if we had microwave popcorn. I said I didn't know, because I usually don't eat the stuff much. She thought we were out, so she began looking at boxes in order to see if she could find a brand that didn't' have partially hydrogenated vegetable oil in it....

As an aside, I challenge you to do your grocery shopping without buying anything that contains either partially hydrogenated veggie oil, or high-fructose corn syrup. It can't be done! You'll come home with one, maybe two items! And neither of those ingredients are good for you - at all! But they're in absolutely everything!

Anyway, she could only find one kind of Orville Redenbocker's that didn't have it. It was packaged as organic or some such and cost more. Pshaw.

Now here's the thing about microwave popcorn... Until I was in High School back in the late 80's, such a thing was pretty well unheard of. But by the time I got into college, the smell of prepackaged/prebuttered popcorn could be smelled wafting from the snack room microwave nearly every night of the week. It's all about convenience, I guess.

Now, later on last night, I got to thinking about all the bags of microwave popcorn ever made in the world and I'm sure the number would be staggering. But at what cost? I burn more than I successfully make. And the partially hydro... oh sheesh, that's a lot to spell out.... the PHVO's are killing us. Then I thought, "Well here's something interesting to note..." People my age and older still refer to it as "Microwave Popcorn", contrasted to just 'popcorn'. See, to me, there is a vaaaast difference between the stuff in the bag, and real popcorn. So the fact that a lot of us still make a differentiation, in my opinion, is significant.

I still remember the black handled, silver metal pot that we used when I was a kid. Pour in the oil. Heat it up. Add the corn. Shake it a bit. Put the lid on and let it pop away. Once it's done, pour it out and then melt your butter in the still-hot pot.

So there we were, standing there there looking at the popcorn. In my effort to become more self-sufficient, I made a decision. We bought a bag of loose popcorn. It was about a buck-fifty and will make several servings of popcorn. Compare that with the boxes of 'the other stuff', which was more costly, not as good for you, and less exciting to make. I think I made a better choice.

Now here's the real biggie. My kids have never, NEVER seen popcorn made the 'old fashioned way' at home. This will blow their minds. They'll be amazed. So, I'm increasing their life experiences and doing something better for myself and my family too. How's that?