The ol' homestead

Good evening to you.

Well things here are starting to settle down from all the pre and post graduate stuff. We were at the college yesterday admitting Big Miss into the Sign Language Interpretation classes. We were able to block all her classes into 2 days to help with the traveling and time it will take from driving from home. The college takes a good hour and a half to get to. She is so excited and was able to talk to some of the people from that department and is relieved to know that it seems like it will be everything she was hoping for. She is so looking forward to the Fall now!

The homeplace seems to have made it ok this last week or two. I have not had as much time for chores and upkeep but I don't see anything that has missed me too much. The garden is doing well with lots of cucumbers, tomatoes, beans, peppers, okra, and watermelon. The basil, garlic, cilantro, oregano, parsley and strawberries are just growing away. The berries on the blackberry bush are just turning red but there won't be many this year anyway. We had a nice rain and it seemed to perk everything up the way that rain always does.

We have a hen setting again. The last one made it to her full time but the eggs were brittle and they all had broke on her. I am going to have to start giving them some oyster shell I guess. I have never had this problem before , especially since they free range. Anyway, the hen that is sitting now, I exchanged her eggs out for 24 guinea eggs so we will see what happens.

Little Miss has been so happy that her pool finally got full and has been enjoying it everyday. I bought test strips as it is looking a little cloudy and found that the ph is really high and so will have to purchase something to bring it down. UHHH..... guess I can add pool maintenance to my list of things now....

10 years ago when I moved here -well not exactly here, we lived down the road a piece for the first 4 or so years, but here on this same road anyway. When we walked, as we do now, we sometimes pass an old home place that has had the same dead tree up on a hill for 10 years. The tree, I have always thought, was just cool looking.... like you'd expect to see in an old scary movie with crows on it. I thought I would share our scary tree view with you.

We did manage our weenie roast here on Monday night. The kids really enjoyed it.... okayyy, the adults really enjoyed it too. It is always nice to get together with friends and drop burnt weenies into the fire and sling flaming marshmallows together. We look forward to "entertaining" again real soon !

We are starting our vacation annual river plans and figuering in the added gas costs. Just crazy to see what it will be up to by July. We are planning the trip for mid July and look forward to seeing Frontier Man's daddy -whom I dearly love and his sister "Sunshine" ( her smile, her sweet way just reminds me of pure sunshine ) It seems too long apart as we missed our Thanksgiving visit with them and maybe, just maybe, Parachuting Penguins have been wondering where I am!

The next pictures are on here for one purpose only... to make your mouth water and wish to gobble up a sample. I made up a few pans for youth and they did they gobbling.

Before frosting...

After...

Here is what I do once a week with our daily bread. Of course I grind the wheat into flour, then mix and knead it and then let it rise and bake it. Once it has cooled a couple hours I put it into the guide and slice it. I then bag it and all goes into the freezer. This 4 loaves usually lasts a week to a week and a half. Frozen fresh wheat bread is nothing like store bought bread. Store bought bread if you freeze it is usually yucky, but because fresh wheat is baked and frozen right away and has a heavier texture and weight, it is perfect to freeze and once thawed you cannot tell if set side by side with a loaf that has not been frozen. Too cool, huh?

Well, I will be posting a couple new recipes this week since we will be back on schedule for our New Recipe Thursday again. It is one you will want to try!

Have a great week-end!