Gardening

It arrived today.  Husband's birthday present is here.  Now he no longer has to break his back to break the ground for the new garden.  The tiller is a beast.  I think I'll call it the Black Beast.  It is black, I thought it was green.  It is heavy and has big wheels.

What do you think happened after we picked it up?  If you guessed breaking the ground, then yes you are right.  I took some pictures to share.

Here is the black beast.  It really tears up the ground.  A good thing when one is putting in a bigger garden in a new spot.

The new garden.  Much bigger than our old one.  Old one will still be used, but only for cuccumbers I think.  That long brown thing is where we planted the radishes and onions last year.  It worked really well.

That is our old garden.  Not very big, eh?  The cuccumbers and pumpkin took over it.  Strange thing about the pumpkin, we didn't plant it.  Husband threw the one in there from the previous fall.  The seeds got washed down into the soil.  We ended up with three pumpkins.  The cuccumbers climbed the fence at the back.

Our rhubarb plant is coming up nicely.  I look forward to making some jam with it this year.

And lastly, look at how nice the celery is growing.  It seems to get bigger every day!

This is all for now folks.  Enjoy the rest of your day.





 

Butter Making

I have seen posts on homesteading blogs about butter making.  Pretty much everyone was using cream from fresh cow's milk.  Either from their own cow or a friend's.  I do not have a cow.  There are no cows where I live.  The next best thing is from the store. 

I decided to try my hand at butter making.  I thought what a great experiment for the girls and I to do.  I had table cream in the fridge.  I quickly discovered that 18% table cream was not going to work.  Off to the store we went, for the second time today.  I picked up two containers of whipping cream, the heaviest cream I could buy.  One of the containers was 50% off, so bonus! 

All I needed was the whipping cream and my mixer.  I did add a bit of salt, not much though.

See the final product?  It is a lot harder than what I was expecting it to be.  I think that it was cheaper to make it then to buy a pound of butter.  A pound of butter here costs around $6.

The girls really enjoyed watching the change in the cream.  Now they know how to make butter...at least one way of making it.

What adventures will tomorrow bring???????

Good Morning!

It has been a drearing couple of days here.  I am happy for the rain because we need it, but the dark skies put a damper on my spirits.  The cure ? Spend time in prayer and bake bread! 

I woke up at 5:30 am (est.) to start my bread.  I have a lovely expensive mixer with a dough hook.  However, I have found that the best way to make my bread is by hand.  I can feel the dough with my hands and by doing so I can tell whether or not I have enough flour.  Having the right amount of flour is crucial.  Anyway....I find bread making refreshing to my soul.  I know what is in the bread that I am making for one.  There is also a sense of satisfaction that I am able to produce food for my family.  Nothing tastes better than home-baked fresh bread!

I have a little project going on.  I am attempting to grow my own celery.  A friend of mine told me about starting your celery in the house in a bowl of water.  I had already seen this on another blog.  I have cut all of my ribs off (I used them up), leaving three inches.  I set that in a bowl with warm water.  Change the water every couple of days.  Although I saw pictures online of new growth, I wondered if it would actually work.  It does!  I have new leaves sprouting up from the middle.  I took a picture so that you can see:

  
See the new growth?  It's amazing.  The outer stalks will die off.  After several weeks I will plant it outside.  It is too early here yet to start planting our garden.

Okay, as promised, I took a picture of my new dinning room set.  It was dark, but the flash did it's job and the picture actually turned out better than in daylight.

The chairs are a little wobbly, but my husband can fix them.  The table is really heavy, thank goodness it is on wheels!  We have now enjoyed two family meals at this table.  I find myself looking forward to setting it for supper.  I also got a hutch with it:

I do not have many "pretty" things to put in it.  What few I do have is now inside.  My dinning room is not that big.  This set fits nicely.  It brings a homeliness to my house.

Thanks for stopping by!  My bread is rising in the oven and in about twenty minutes the girlies will be up and getting ready for the day.

May you have a blessed day!

Welcome to my Blog

Welcome to my blog! 

This is the place where I write about various things going on in my life.  I have read several homesteading blogs.  I thought, hey I can do this too!  So here I am.

I do not live on what you would call a "normal" or "typical" homstead.  I once read somewhere that homesteading doesn't require one to live on a farm.  You could live in the city and be a homesteader.  I live in a small town.  I have a decent sized yard.  I have a very small house. 

My husband and I have been feeling that longing, the calling, to become homesteaders.  We want to become more self-sufficient.  With the cost of living going up, we feel that this is what we should be doing.  Relying less on stores, and more on ourselves to provide things.

We started last year with a small garden.  We had success, although our harvest was small.  We bought a pressure canner in the fall.  We started canning.  It was time that we spent together, precious time, and we enjoyed it.  Husband and I can work very well together.  Isn't that what a wife and husband are supposed to do? 

This year we will be expanding our garden.  The small original garden will stay, but will be for the cuccumbers.  There will be a huge (well huge to us at least, and for the size of our yard) one added.  I bought my husband a tiller for his birthday.  It arrives next week.  I look forward to the day that we can start planting!

For the last couple of years husband has wanted chickens.  His dream is now becoming reality.  At first I didn't want chickens.  They bring more responsibility and chores.  With three children I thought I had enough on my plate.  My attitude slowly began to change though.  I now look forward to the day we will go pick them up.  In two weeks we will bring home our day old chicks.

I have been wanting a new dinning room set.  I have been bugging husband to buy me a new one.  I didn't care if it was used.  We have a round one with only three chairs...see the problem?  All of us can't fit at the table.  If we have company, well just forget that.  Last night I saw a post on our town's barter group.  A lady was selling her dinning room set with a hutch.  Pefect!  Husband gave his approval for me to purchase it.  It is old, but I love it.  What a difference a new dinning room set had made to our house.  I know it hasn't been a full day yet, but the change is great.  I spent some time rearranging things.  It is raining today, so I will wait for a nice sunny day to take a picture to share.

I hope you have enjoyed this first post.