Homemaking on the Homestead

  This week is flying by. Today we are celebrating my FIL’s birthday. His actual birthday is on Valentines day, but that won’t work for our schedule so we are doing it today. The dinner menu consists of Shrimp Scampi, Green Salad, French Bread with Strawberry Cheesecake for dessert.   Emily made the cheesecake yesterday and I had a big bread baking afternoon and got a loaf of French bread made and I think one loaf will be enough. If not, I can always decide later this afternoon to make up a batch of dinner rolls.   Tobin has an ear infection so he is headed to the doctors this morning. I will go along on the trip and pick up a few last minute food items while he is seeing the doctor.    The kids are applying themselves to their school assignments at the moment and when we get home it will be house cleaning and cooking time.   I mentioned my bread baking afternoon.. so I thought I would share a picture of it. I...

  I have new lotions scents stocked in my store !        Vanilla Crème, Awaphui Seaberry and Sweet Pea -  

  Sunday Crockpot Meatballs Mashed potatoes Salad   Monday Nachos for a Crowd Salad   Tuesday Delicious Italian Casserole Salad   Wednesday Teriyaki Chicken over brown rice Coleslaw   Thursday Father in Law’s Birthday Dinner Shrimp Scampi over pasta Garlic Cheese Dinner Rolls Cooked veggies of some sort Salad Cherry Cheesecake for Dessert   Friday Black Bean Chicken Chili Cornbread Salad   Saturday Sausage Potato Chowder Dinner rolls Carrot sticks   Sunday Spaghetti French bread Salad

  I am home now after a nice little mini vacation to the Oregon coast. Tobin and I left on Monday and returned yesterday afternoon. We had a great time away and the kids “held down the fort” and did a super job of it all..   In fact when we arrived home yesterday Leanne had made dinner: chili bean soup, salad, served with tortillas and salsa with peach cobbler and ice cream for dessert…  plus the house was beautifully clean and my favorite Kenny G CD was play and a couple candles were lit.. it was such a nice homecoming!   I am happy to say that the weather is warming up! When we left on Monday there was still a lot of snow everywhere but by the time we came home most of it had melted and our driveway was clear. Tobin had to put chains on the car just to get up the driveway last weekend.. what a difference a few days make.   I still have a lot of details to work on this weekend.. products to make for my...

I have had a few requests for this recipe.. it turned out really yummy..  It lasted us 2 nights, so be aware that it makes a LOT of lasagna, so if you don’t have a big crowd to feed it to, you can serve it a couple of nights in a row like I did or freeze the leftovers for another meal in future or cut the recipe in half.   Crockpot Lasagna Crystal Miller   3 cups cottage cheese 2 eggs 2 t dried parsley 8 to 10 lasagna noodles, uncooked Spaghetti sauce, see recipe below 3 to 4 cups mozzarella cheese   Spray a large 5 or 6 quart crockpot with a non stick spray such as Pam. In a small bowl combine cottage cheese, eggs and parsley, set aside. Put a layer of lasagna noodles on the bottom of the crockpot, breaking them if needed to fit. Spoon 1/3 of the sauce over the noodles. Then spoon 1/3 of the cottage cheese and 1/3 of the mozzarella cheese over this. Repeat layers 2 more times. Cook on low for 5 to 6 hours. Before serving, tu...

  This last week we battled snow storms and power outages. On Sunday another snow storm moved in and gave us a bit of snow and ice. We lost power for most of the day. Tobin had to hook up a battery and inverter to keep our circulation pump moving water through our wood stove. He hooked the inverter up to the battery on his tractor to try and run the freezers, but the inverter was not large enough for that job. So now he has a bigger inverter on his list of “winter preparedness” supplies.    The ice and snow were also more than some of our trees could handle and I kept hearing cracking and thudding sounds as tree limbs came down around our property. It looks like we will have some clean up to do once the weather clears and a good start on next years wood supply.    Thankfully the weather is changing now and most of the snow has melted. They do say on Sunday we might get some more snow and I am hoping that will be all...

  I had purchased a couple of organic chickens from Costco not long ago. I wanted to make the most of them when I served them, considering what I paid for them! Here was my menu plan for using one of the chickens to feed the 7 us for two different meals.   On Monday I put a chicken in the crockpot to slowly cook all day. The recipe was very simple, I called it Hawaiian Chicken:   Crockpot Hawaiian Chicken 1 whole chicken, about 4 lbs. 1- 20oz can crushed pineapple 2T Sucanat 2T soy sauce 1T minced garlic 4 or 5 chopped mini peppers (you could use ½ of a green or red pepper) 3T cornstarch ¼ c water   Place chicken in crockpot. Mix remaining ingredients and pour over chicken. Let cook on low for 6 or 7 hours.    I served this meal with brown rice and spooned the sauce from the chicken over the rice. I also added a nice big green salad with homemade ranch dressing.    When the meal was over I removed the rest of the meat...