Homemaking on the Homestead

We heat with wood… it is our only option. We do not have other adequate means of heating our home unless we were to put in an entire heating system (furnace, ducts, etc..). So each year my guys begin the journey of bringing in about 6 cords of wood from our property. I have to say I am incredibly proud of my boys.. or young men I should say.. they both know how to put in a full day’s work and they enjoy it! Without their help it would be a long arduous process for my already over worked hubby.. we could not be more thankful for their cooperation and help! We are a little over half way there now! Unloading a tractor load of wood… Jacob bringing in another load of wood… he cuts the trees and cuts it into chunks, fills the tractor bucket and then brings it down for Tobin to split and stack… Lunch break! I keep the guys well fed while they are working…. Heading off for another load… A little over half way there.. It’s a good feeling to get a such a...

Today was a beautiful day! The sun was shining and we had NO rain.. first time in a week. Sierra and I left early and headed to town to do the grocery shopping. We returned home and unloaded all the food. Then the two of us got busy and cleaned up the house. She did an awesome job cleaning the bathroom right down to scrubbing the tile in the tub and giving the floor a real work out then she handled the living room. I focused on the kitchen, dining room and laundry room. Then it was time to move outside and get to my garden. I waited until later in the day because the garden was so wet I wanted it to dry out some before I got busy. I had corn plants that really needed to get in the ground. Tomorrow the rain will return so I knew this was my only chance for a few more days. Here are what my corn starts (and cucumber starts) looked liked… I spent 2 hours in the garden getting them all in the ground!! It was a great feeling to have it all done.. my muscles feel it...

  Last week seemed to be a crazy busy week for me (a reason for the spotty blogging as well).  I had kids moving in different directions, my girlfriend was giving her daughter a graduation party and asked me to help with the food planning and preps…  so it seemed we had quite a few nights that the kids put together sandwiches and thankfully I had meals for hubby to take to work (I freeze him individual serving sizes for nights such as these).. so several of last week’s meals did not get made.  They are on the menu again for this week… Monday Baked chicken legs , crockpot mac & cheese , watermelon Tuesday Beef & Rice Chile Relleno Casserole , salad, chips & salsa Wednesday Chili (from freezer ), cornbread, watermelon & cantaloupe Thursday Leftovers Friday Pineapple Ham over rice, salad Saturday Chicken n’ gravy over mashed potatoes, salad

My daughter Leanne received her diploma in the mail two days ago! It is now official.. she has earned her BA in English! I am sooo incredibly proud of her. Other than Leanne I am probably the only one who has seen the countless hours and dedication she put into earning this degree (in 2 years 10 months). To me she is just amazing! ~smile~ As for her next step in life… she has not let the dust settle much. She is now almost finished gaining certification from a program called: TEFAL - Teaching English as a Foreign Language . She should have her certification by August and already has an interview with a company from South Korea to teach English to grade school children. We will see where this goes, but she is excited about her future.  

Monday Crockpot beef stew , salad, french bread Tuesday Burritos (using chicken & rice burrito filling from freezer) .. with all the trimmings, tortilla chips & salsa Wednesday Split pea soup , ham & cheese bread (using the recipe for pepperoni bread found here: http://www.thefamilyhomestead.com/pepperonibread.htm   substituting ham  and cheddar cheese for the pepperoni and mozzarella cheese) , salad Thursday Leftovers Friday Chili (from freezer ), cornbread, salad Saturday Beef & Rice Chile Relleno Casserole , salad, chips & salsa Sunday Baked chicken legs , crockpot mac & cheese , salad

This afternoon was a wonderfully warm and sunny day. I spent about an hour weeding. I also took a few pics to share. These are my tomatoes. They are growing well. None have seemed to suffer from the transplanting or the incessant rain we have. I’m thinking they were loving the warmth and sun as much as I was today! It has been about 10 days since I planted the majority of my veggie seeds. Some of them are beginning to pop up now… I get so excited when I see my little plants make their appearance.. I must be a crazy gardening lady.. ha, ha, ha… Here is a little lettuce… My yellow wax beans… Green beans.. a whole long row of them, the picture does not show them that well… Near the beginning of May I planted some cabbage starts that I had bought from my food co-op (Azure Standard). They are doing well, at least most of them. I have a couple that don’t looks so hot. But I am happy with the ones that are growing strong. I just have not had luck with c...

I finally finished up my freezer cooking for the month. Due to having company last week and lots of other things to deal with I was not able to get back to it until today. Last week I did the hamburger meals ( http://homesteadinghomemaker.blogspot.com/2012/06/freezer-cooking-for-june-part-1.html ) and I made 5 chicken meals for the freezer. No new recipes… I made 2 batches of Cajun chicken http://www.thefamilyhomestead.com/cajunchickenforfreezer.htm , 2 batches worth of Ranch Chicken http://homesteadinghomemaker.blogspot.com/2012/03/ranch-chicken-for-freezer.html , and 1 batch of Honey Dijon Chicken http://www.thefamilyhomestead.com/crockpothoneydijonchickenfreezer.htm . Today my focus was on ham. I bought a 6.25 lb ham from Costco last week… From this I made: 2 Bbq Ham and Cornbread Casserole 2 Pineapple Ham 1 Creamed Ham I started by cutting my ham up into bite size pieces… And cooking 1 ½ batches of brown rice http://www.thefamilyhomestead.com/cooki...

Been a busy few days.. my niece from Chicago came and spent a week with us. We had such a great visit with her. She is back in Chicago now and we miss her already. My son Jacob has had a “Project Car” in the works. It started out as a damaged shell. My son in law Will (Hannah’s hubby) gave him the car and has helped him this last year to get the car up and running. It has been an incredible experience for Jacob. He has loved every minute of it and has learned so much. Will is a mechanic by trade so has been able to get Jake all the parts needed as well as the knowledge to take the shell of car and turn it into a car that Jacob is so proud of. He did body work along with putting in a new engine and redoing everything down to wiring harness and seals and everything else involved in putting a car together from virtually nothing. Did it save Jake money over buying a car?.. nope.. but he already had that (a car that is).. but it gave him sooo much more.. he learned a ton a...

    Monday Pizza casserole (from freezer) , strawberries, salad   Tuesday Crockpot chicken n gravy , brown rice, salad   Wednesday Hamburgers w/all the trimmings, watermelon   Thursday Sloppy joes (from the freezer) over french bread slices, watermelon, salad   Friday Ranch chicken (from freezer), garlic roasted potatoes , salad   Saturday Leftovers   Sunday Salmon patties , crockpot mac & cheese , salad  

I am so excited and happy to share this update. My daughter Emily and Brandon, the man in her life, are officially engaged!!! Wedding plans are in the working.. it's looking like a fall time wedding although they have not set a date yet.. they are still working on that. I will keep you posted! My husband and I are so thrilled with this news!! Our family absolutely loves Brandon! He is a fantastic man and honestly we could not have imagined a better match for our daughter. They are just perfect for each other.    

This month promises to be a busy month in the garden (if the weather cooperates). So once again I am getting food into the freezer to make busy days flow better. The first thing I started with today was my hamburger plan. I started with 6 pounds of hamburger. Here are the meals I made: Crockpot chili x2 Sloppy joes x1 Beef & bean burrito filling x1 Pizza casserole x2 First thing I did this morning (after making coffee of course ;) .. was to start cooking 8 cups of dried beans. The beans are needed for all the meals except the pizza casserole. You can use any type of beans you would like. I used a mixture of red & black beans… I combined 8 cups of dried beans, 2 gallons of water and 8t salt. I brought it to a boil, covered and reduced the heat and let it simmer for 2 ½ hours. After the beans were cooking and the kitchen cleaned up from breakfast I did a few other household chores and when the beans were almost done cooking I began the next step. Since ...