sunday is cooking day

sunday's are my day to play catch up in the kitchen. i like to cook for the week on sundays when i can. many times what i prepare only lasts for a day or two and not a week, like a dessert or roast, but at least there is something in the frig for us to grab in a hurry when we are hungry. i've already made eggs salad, pudding and cookies. i plan to make a big pot of leek and potato soup this afternoon. i should can sweet potatoes and more yukon gold potatoes from our garden today. the last of the pears are dangling off the tree, waiting for us to gather them. i'm planning on making more pear butter this week too since it was so yummy and i need more christmas gifts.

i'm off to get something done here today. after my road trip to rome, georgia on friday, i'm finally back on schedule and ready to get something done.

get ready for the MMMEEEAAATTTT!!!

yes, it's almost time to start our winter meat csa. we are very excited about it. the first beef and the chickens are in the freezers. man do they look great! two hogs go in for processing Monday morning. the first two lambs go in mid-November. i'll be both sad and happy to see the lambs and the pigs go. the lambs are cute and fuzzy. but they are starting to be obnious. the pigs have been obnioius for 2 months now, but lulu the lipstick pig has been my friend. shep our sheep dog loves the pigs. actually he's now a pig dog. he accidentally got himself locked up in the pig pen the other night for about 6 hours. he wasn't any worse for the wear and i bet he really didn't mind.

although i have butched lambs before, i'm glad we aren't doing large animal butchering at this time. the hardest part is loading the animals and getting them to the processor. our primary processor is in cardington, just 5 miles away. it's nice and easy with the lambs.

i made more noodles today for saturday's share drop. hope you enjoy!

still canning...

i'm still busy canning and putting up food for the winter. yes, i'm a squirrel. over the past few weeks i canned up tomato sauce, crushed tomatoes, beef soup stock, chickens and chicken stock. i made noodles yesterday. i took some frozen spinach from our garden, pureed it and made spinach noodles, along with thick egg noodles and tomato noodles too. i've still got sweet potatoes to can. moles have taken bites out of several sweet potatoes, and i hate feeding them to the pigs, so i'm cutting out the bad spots and canning the rest for us. farming organic can be troublesome at times.

the frost sunday morning took all the rest of our fair weather crops. we still have some lettuces and spinach left in the garden. now the chickens and pigs get all the frosted left overs. they just love the produce! just because there was a frost doesn't mean we are done with the gardens. we need to plant a cover crop on the garden, this year it's ryegrass. cameron is planting garlic this week. we are adding a soft neck garlic this fall for harvest next year. i love those garlic braids and want to do some up for our csa.

been one of those weeks....

this pretty much sums it up, it's been one of those weeks. last week, a wisdom tooth i should have had pulled 20 years ago was giving me fits. i have no dental insurance and called around for pricing on dental procedures. i finally found a dentist i could afford and made an appointment for last monday. we canceled our farm day on the 14th 'cause peter was sick and the pain in my tooth was almost unbearable.

good thing we canceled farm day, since the greatest windstorm in ohio history decided to strike that day. windstorm ike paid us a visit and assisted in the pruning of several trees in our yard, along with taking out power to over 2 million ohio residents.

we lost part of our mullberry tree, several large branches from our hard and silver maple trees and the rest of the largest weeping willow trees in our ditch. the rear door on our barn also blew off it's hinges. we knew it was going to cause problems sooner or later. i just wished it was later.

clean up started on monday. school was canceled due to no electricity (and so was my dentist appointment!), so cameron and peter got busy with the chain saws. cameron figures that we have about a cord of firewood as a result of the storm. the pear tree made it through, but lost many of it's pears.we were able to salvage a bunch for pear cider.

of course, we had no power after the storm like 2 million plus other ohio residents. we have a well as our water source. with no electric, no water. fortunately, this old house comes through for us again. our well was hand dug in the 1830's, so it's nice and wide. we were able to pull up water the old fashion way to water our animals, do the dishes and flush the toilet.

monday i rotated the sheep pasture and was leading the sheep to their new pasture when fiona-sheep jumped on my foot and broke my left pinkie toe. damn sheep!
i hate that ewe. her saving grace is that she's big, throws twins, nice wool and good milker. ding dong sheep. she's such a brat. now i'm walking with a cane at times. i've taped up the toe to the next toe to keep it somewhat stabilized. time for steel-toed work boots.

our power came back on tuesday morning at 6:15 am. i was grateful. fortunately i didn't loose any meat. we kept the freezers closed and ate what we had thawed. we got the board games out in the evenings and i was the big looser both nights! we coped well without electric. although i want to get a cooking grate for the fireplace....

with no power, i didn't can last week. but the tomatoes are ready again, so i'm off to pick and can tomatoes this evening.