Read and Write Friday: I just might be a Heirloom Girl!

I got the best early Christmas present today.  I got a response from Mrs. Emilee Gettle who runs Heirloomgirl.com. She is interested in having me guest blog!  I am super excited!  I really love her site and the other projects she and her husband Jere have their hands in.

The Gettles are the owners of Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds and have authored a cookbook and gardening book as well as publishing Heirloom Gardener magazine.  I gave my husband a collection of their seeds for Christmas last year and it was such fun to watch the bounty roll in this summer.

I hope this will be the first step in obtaining bylines/clips/credit that will give me some ummph to back up queries to other magazines.  But, more than anything, I'm just excited to be a part of this family based, agrarian minded business.

If you haven't ever gotten a copy of their seed catalog you are missing out. Flipping through it and planning my spring garden is one of my favorite winter activities!

Homeschooling through the sickness...

I find having to school with even one sick child challenging.  Today I got three children through all their subjects and one partially through and the sick kid... she spent a lot of time on the couch.  It was clear that the sicky would not be able to concentrate on bookwork.

I thought perhaps that I could turn on the TV and find a history or animal documentary but those things don't exist anymore.  It seems these days everything on channels that used to be somewhat educating are now swamped with "reality" shows that offer little besides a lot of bleeped out words or cheap entertainment.

So tomorrow the snow is supposed to let up some and I am heading to the library.  I am picking up arm loads of documentaries and non-text books to keep her busy on the couch and yet still learning at the same time.

Any other homeschoolers out there have any tips on how to have a "sickie" learning under the radar?  I'd love to hear some ideas on this!

Cookie Cheer Up!

Well, we have a snow blower that works but unfortunately I don't have a snow blow operator!

Yesterday after plowing the drive and my wonderful path to the barn, Farmer John started to complain about his wrist hurting. He was in so much pain before work this morning I told him to go get it checked out.

Diagnosis... Tendonitis! Yah... so no nice plowed path to the barn.  We aren't quite ready to give that responsibility to our son with anything more than a shovel at this point in time.

Had another surprise diagnosis today... strep throat for my nine year old!  Keep the good times coming!

So what can you do when it is cold, snowy and you have "patients" to keep happy?  Make Christmas cookies!

Who doesn't feel better after a frosted Christmas sugar cookie? 

Usually we have a traditional recipe we follow but I found a new recipe that includes sour cream in it and it seemed like a good day to give it a try.

We didn't mess with Christmas shapes today since it was just a "test" run.  We stuck with easy-peasy circles.  Plain white frosting and simple sprinkles.

The verdict... Yum! I think this may be my new traditional recipe!  I will definitely need to make lots so that my son has fuel to snow shovel my path to the barn.

You can find the recipe for  Cut-Out Sour Cream Cookies and frosting here!

They certainly boosted spirits at Creek Cottage Homestead.  Happy baking, frosting and eating!!

Snowing and Blowing

It's that time of year again.  The time when the tractor stops being a mower and starts being a blower.

Last year we couldn't use the tractor for blowing because it was broken down. But it was a light snow year and we made do.

This year Farmer John was chomping at the bit to test it out so yesterday he got it out (even though we only had an inch or so and began to plow our drive. Five minutes into it and the blades stopped rotating. Ugghhh!

 

If I had $$ for every time I've seen Farmer John in this position with our beast we could own our own tropical island.  We bought it used.  Hey, buy used and save the difference is the motto the Duggars use.  It seems to work great for them.  Not so much for us.  With all the time and $ we've spent getting this thing to work, it would have been worth it to purchase the shiny green tractor that comes with yellow words. Alas, this was the one we could afford and, really, having a tractor payment is kind of silly no matter how shiny and new.

 

Lucky for us, this time, the problem was an old stretched out belt.  Easy to fix and not too pricey.

 

Today we got a few more inches of "Lake Effect" snow. (Not a storm, just something Lake Michigan whips up for us.)  Farmer John had our drive cleared in no time at all.  And as we are supposed to get more tomorrow, he'll get to do it again.

 

He was even nice enough to plow me a path from the back garage door to the barn!

 

Of course he could have just been trying to make up for nearly backing the beast over me in the barn.  Lucky for me I was by the chicken enclosure so he didn't knock me down.  I just got a face full of chicken wire mesh. Good times indeed!

 

How do you all handle winter weather?

 

 

Let Frozen Egg Season Commence!

 

Yum! Found this little beauty yesterday morning by the pecking block on the barn floor.  My first frozen egg.  I'm wondering if it was because it wasn't in a nesting box which are probably more insulated. 

 

Good thing I have lots of kids to send out to collect eggs all through the day!  Love me the warmth of a fresh laid egg.  Hand warmers the natural way!

God's Plan For Us

 

 

"The truly Significant took on insignificance so that the truly insignificant could find true significance in Him."

 

-Dr. Rich McCarrell

It Doesn't Look Like Fall Anymore

Hideeho blog people!  I am back after an unannounced break.  Sickness, school and NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) took over my life.  Also spent a lot of time chauffeuring my children to and from activities. But now that I'm feeling rested and less overwhelmed I am back to blogging.

When last I left you the homestead looked like this....

Now the homestead looks like this...

 

And this...

 

 

The chickens are less than impressed...

They will occasionally venture out but they prefer me to throw them their "crack" (cracked corn) inside.

We have moved all the chickens (Barred Rocks and R.I. Reds) into the barn together.  We added extra roosts, two heat lamps, a light, a heated water dish, pecking block and the nesting boxes from the chicken tractor.  They seem to like it quite well.

I have to laugh at my hens.  They are sooo... picky as to which nesting boxes they lay their eggs in.  There are plenty available but they only like to use certain ones and if that box is full and the other hen won't share then they just plop the egg out wherever rather then use a different/open box.  Will there ever come a time when I am not surprised by these ladies?

Well, I'm off to the local library for their craft sale. I'm half way done with my shopping so hopefully there will be some good things at the sale and I can support some local micro-businesses! Stay warm!