Homemaking on the Homestead

I'm excited to have been able to plant my cabbages and get a little bit of lettuce started in my garden. Of course the day after I planted the weather report says a hail storm is coming. My hubby and I ran down to the garden as things were looking bad and put some gutter pieces over the cabbages to try and save them. As it turned out the hail never came and all was fine. They are doing great now. Oh how we loved the dry warm sunny days! Hubby got lots of property work done and even took the first swim of the season.. And as I mentioned the cabbages were planted... I have a little box that hubby made me in his shop to start my seeds. It is small and limited but I've made it work and was thankful for a place to start seeds. I recently asked if there was a way to expand what I had just a little to allow more room when I transplant my seeds. Just like that he made a few quick adjustments and doubled my space. I'm so excited. I now can fit 4 tray...

It is one of those weeks where I seem to be out or running out of everything. Grocery shopping is high on my list! I've been making a list for the last several days writing down everything I've either run out of or am about to run out of. Funny how that works sometimes. My menu for the week is fairly basic. I have family coming to visit by the end of the week so I'm planning an extra meal to make sure I have all I need. Tonight we are having leftover bbq chicken legs, coleslaw and macaroni salad that I made yesterday. The rest of the week is looking like this: Pot Roast Dinner I have a beef pot roast in my freezer that I want to use up (oh the things I find when I reorganize my freezer! Ha, ha). I'll serve this with carrots and potatoes of course and either green beans or a salad. Honey Garlic Chicken This is a recipe I found on the internet. I'll check it out first and see what I think and share it if we happy with it. It sounds pretty go...

 My son was sick on Sunday. He felt horrible. Running a fever, achy muscles, stuffed nose, cough.. all clear signs of the flu. I jumped into action :). I got some bone broth out that I had in the fridge, peeled a few large cloves of garlic and cut up some of the chicken I had from making the broth. I chopped up the garlic, heated some water up and poured that over the garlic to let is soften up. Then added some bone broth (it's pretty concentrated so it needs the extra water added). I added the chicken and at last minute threw in a big scoop of my homemade cream cheese (for the probiotics). He drank that down and said he was feeling a bit better. His nose and head were cleared up a bit more. On Monday he stayed home from work because he still did not feel great. That afternoon I made him another big cup of the same mix. After that he slept for about 3 hours and woke up and said he had sweated up a storm and felt so much better. Yesterday was day 3 of th...

We are having some beautiful weather here in the PNW and that makes my Monday even better. I have a walk and garden work in my plans for today. It will be raining again in a couple of days and I figure it would be better to do my grocery shopping then. Tonight's dinner will reflect the fact that I'll be outside most of the day! :) I have some orange chicken and egg rolls in the freezer (thanks to Costco) and either some fruit or a salad will go with this.. I'll figure that part out when I get there. Last week I tried something new to me. I made cream cheese. It turned out good but not quite what I wanted so I'll be tweaking it and trying again soon. In the mean time I had a huge amount of cream cheese to use up. So instead of one of my planned meals I made alfredo sauce with meatballs, it turned out yummy. This week I plan to share my cream cheese making with you.   For now here is the plan for the rest of the week.. Ham & Cheese Bread, ...

In today's society the thought of a woman without children or whose children are grown and gone, staying home to care for the home is almost unheard of. I remember meeting a lady at a gathering that I had known several years ago. She asked me about my family and when she found out my youngest son was done with his homeschooling her first question was, “Are you working now?”, followed by, “What are you doing with your time?”. It was clearly a concept that was not familiar to her. Being a stay at home wife is not a new concept. My grandmothers did not work outside the home, even after their children were raised. They continued to take care of their husbands and home. I do admit to feeling a little lost when I realized that my job of raising and homeschooling children was done. I did reflect on my life and direction. Some women have aspirations to go to school or learn a trade and work outside the home when the children are gone. Some women need to for fina...

Happy Monday! It's menu day here on the blog. This week my week is looking pretty mellow and I hope to get not only my meals made but a batch of chicken stock and feta cheese started. And maybe a new batch of fermented veggies. With the upcoming rainy forecast for the week I'm thinking I'll be spending my time inside. Now for the meals I have planned for the week.. Chicken tacos Chicken breasts, salsa, cream cheese all tossed into a crockpot and cooked until the chicken shreds. Fill up taco shells or tortillas and all the trimmings. Yum! Meatloaf Meatloaf is a favorite around here. I think I'll serve this with some potato salad and green beans. I think of this combo as delicious comfort food. Fried cabbage and onions with sausage Or I could use kielbasa or chicken with this. Depends on what I end up finding on sale when I shop for the week. Dinner rolls or biscuits and a salad will be go along with this meal. Ham & Cheese Bread, to...

I have never viewed myself as a physically active person. As a child I detested P.E., I never enjoyed softball, soccer, or any other type of sport. I loved to read, go camping with my family, swim a bit and ride my bike. As I got older my dad started running and I would join him occasionally, but usually because he was asking me to. I did find I did not mind running but it was not something I was really drawn to at the time. As a young mom of 2 kids I took up running again. My dad, in an effort to encourage me, would come over to my house several times a week and watch the kids so I could run. I enjoyed that. As the years went by and I had more children the opportunities to get out and run were no more and I felt raising children was activity enough. I still never saw myself as a person who enjoyed getting out and being physical. I would make efforts now and again to try and get some exercise. I would take a class, or pop in a workout VHS tape off and on. But it was...

We've had some beautiful weather lately, finally! Last week I took full advantage of it. I spent as much time outside as possible. After a very wet and gray winter the sunshine and warmth was so motivating. I took several long walks, walks with my grandkids, and spent time cleaning up my garden. Last fall my garden ended and we were busy and by the time I had time to go and get it all cleaned up the rainy season had started. So there it sat all winter. Last week I spent about 4 hours just pulling up stuff and clearing it out in preparation for rototilling. My hubby did a lot of mowing and has started cutting up the trees that fell during one of our winter storms. After a few days of dry weather the ground was dry enough to do the first run through with the rototiller. This was the mess I was dealing with... After a lot of elbow grease here is what I have now.. My seed order arrived a couple weeks ago and that always gets me excited as well... I...

Time for the weekly menu! I had to do some rearranging in my freezer which was good as it gave me time to reevaluate what I have and do a little menu planning around that. I started over the weekend by making a batch of chicken broth with one of the whole chickens I had in the freezer. I'll be using the meat from this and some of the broth as well this week. For the meals I have planned I intend to make double batches so we can eat on these meals for a couple days at least. With the upcoming beautiful weather I'm looking to spend as much time outside as I can and not worry about about meals each night. Here is my plan for the week.. Crockpot chicken bacon chowder This is a yummy soup! I'm making a big batch today and will be serving it with a nice big salad and crackers.   Kalua pork I found a pork roast in the freezer that I had bought on sale a couple weeks ago and decided this was the best use for it. I'll serve a macaroni salad and a gr...

Whether I talk to people, read articles, watch TV, or see magazine covers I see someone's version of healthy eating. But they can often be so different. Some say low fat is the way to go, or carb free, high fat, count calories, take lots of supplements, low protein, high protein. So what exactly is the healthy thing to do? I've come up with a view on healthy eating that works for me. I've also seen that the drive to eat healthy can lead to obsession and be out of balance at times,  at least that is my opinion. After reading a lot over the years, trying many different things I came to the conclusion that while food and what we eat does need our attention and thought, it should not be what rules our lives. We need balance. I strive to eat a well rounded healthy diet. But last week hubs and I went away for a few days and we enjoyed a lot of different foods that would not normally be on my list. The week before my daughter and I took the kids to the science ...