A Project in Process

We have all been working hard around here to make the pool area safer, cleaner and function better.  One of the big projects involved turning an old, unworking, hot tub into a kids pool.  The next generation is coming up and I am tired of fishing kids out of the middle of the silly thing.  Also, cleaning it was a nightmare because of the different levels and little corners.

It started out looking like this (well, once we drained the swamp):

This mess got pressure washed and scraped with a wire brush, then rocks added to the middle:

Next came the big concrete job  :)  :)
                               (normally their concrete jobs look more like this)

First you gotta fire up the old mixer.  I think it is older than I am.  It is a good thing George keeps anything and everything.... and keeps it working :)

Add a little concrete and water, mix and dump.

Devise a high tech concrete delivery system.... 

Lots of advice on how to properly spread it around.

Looking for a nice, straight.... or kind of straight... board.

Yep, it works  :)

Floating it out with a little advice from the peanut gallery....

I'll help Papa!

You are never too young to figure out how to finish concrete around here.

.....or a little instruction from Dad...

It is all ready to be cured and painted.... The process will take a couple of weeks.

The baby obligingly slept through the process.

Then, time to move on to the next project..... the never ending fence fixing.

 

A semi-finished kids pool.  Somehow water got in there.  I have no idea how that happened.  Dad planned to put the final coat on with the sand mixed in so it is not slick.... all possible kids are frantically scooping water out.

Cindy

Today we were farmers

....and loved every minute of it.  The kids started at the raspberry patch...

Then we planted seeds - corn, sunflower, winter squash and my favorite squash which got forgotten in the regular rows, so I tucked them into a space in the cucumbers that did not germinate well.

Watering, weeding and mulching are ongoing.

Checking out the new Mama Hen and her chicks...

The "chicken salad" garden is working out well.

A long day of gardening and swimming leaves you pooped!

And a picture of the new baby from yesterday.... just for a treat!

Cindy

From Spring to Summer

Our seasons shift again as the garden is in, the pool is up and running and we move into maintenance on the farm.  Still a lot of work, but not as much.  That means I move into my other love.... swim lessons and my sister moves into her other love.... setting up classes for her school.  I am pretty sure the BT kids can look forward to their history classes this year.  She has been watching Glen Beck's Founder's Fridays and is reading like crazy and fully involved in teaching original document history in context to every kid she can get her hands on.  I am pretty sure our kids are getting a dose over the summer.

Sign up early this year.  I understand they are limiting enrollment.  :)  :)  :)

Thank you to my daughter and daughter in law who helped me shift back into "Teacher Cindy" mode.  I dipped my toe into swim lessons yesterday with just a couple of 2-3 year old sweethearts and a few older kids that know me well.  This session is not really for the kids, it is for me.  Every year it is important to reassess what and how to teach swimming - can the lessons be more effective - think outside the box - is there a different technique, make it more interesting, move them along better, introduce some new concept?  The next 2 weeks will help me develop that.  I probably should have been thinking about this for the past 6 weeks, but it just didn't work out that way this year.  I was busy developing a new appreciation for farmers and how hard they work.

Over at The Bee Hive, Mama Mock has documented the past few years of swim lessons.  I re-read them and smiled.  To be honest, I headed to her blog to lift a picture, but instead, was reminded all over again why I teach (well, OK, I did lift the picture from her blog :)  Baby Bee was with me yesterday and we just did a LITTLE work.   I start out every year full of compassion, then watch the news, hear of a bunch of unnecessary drownings and get a lot tougher.  :)  Anyway, enjoy the stories.

I Heart Sonora

Swimming Success

Round two minus one

I have always thought that doing a two week session, teaching M-W-F would be the best way to run lessons.  It almost never works out that way and I have never given it a fair shake.  I am taking notes on this mini-session to see if it works out better.  Usually the logistics of that don't work out for many parents, but I want to start out and see how effective it is.  It might be counterproductive - you never know until you try.

Thank you to the parents for hauling your kids there and letting me practice with them.

Why do I teach swim lessons?  When my daughter was two, her best friend fell into the pool reaching for a toy.  No one knew she was out there - she had opened the door at her Grammie's house on a Sunday afternoon and slipped out.  Our good friend, her father, was napping on the couch, woke up suddenly, saw the door cracked open and knew she was out there.   He yelled, ran out there and she was floating and blue.  He amazingly remembered enough CPR from high school to revive her.  A helicopter landed on the street and hauled her to ICU for a couple of days.  She recovered, but it made a vivid impression on me as a very young Mom.

Since then, it was always a priority in our life to get our kids swim lessons (and for me to keep updated on CPR).  If we couldn't afford lessons, I traded whatever I could.  Eventually I ended up trading swim lessons for lesson instruction.  My friend taught me how to teach swimming.  I used to go up where she runs swim lessons and work for two weeks.  She would teach my kids and train me - we would talk over how to do it this year..... and I taught little guys under her supervision.

I am always willing to share my progression list, ideas and techniques if you are interested in helping your own kids become "water proofed"  - Can a 2 year old actually swim?  I am expecting my grandson to be able to get from one short side of the pool to the other by the end of the season.  Baby Bee should be right there with him.  However, both have the advantage of being around pools and lakes all the time and parents that know how to teach them.  He did great yesterday and probably wondered why Grammie was being so easy on him.  (It was cold!)

The "Treasure Box" is making a reappearance this year - loaded up with Raw Revolution Bars, agave sweetened suckers, molasses sweetened candy - organic and non-GMO.  I just can't do the candy bars this year after studying health issues all winter.

I'm looking forward to seeing so many of you at the pool. 

Best of Health to you
Cindy

Quail Update - The house around the corner

Quail Update from Arleen:

Our quails are hatching, slowly but surely.   Her are a few pictures of our adventure so far.

The size of the eggs.

Very small. 

Don't use the chick feeder! 

We have a dozen chicks in the brooder.  We have Cortunix, California Valley Quail and Georgia Bobwhite.  I wonder who tastes better..........

The Great Quail Adventure

As of last night, six quail have hatched.  they are tiny, lively and cute.  The reason for raising quail is the feed to meat ratio.  I guess they convert grass and bugs into meat a lot quicker and more efficiently than chickens.  I am excited to see how this works out.  I think we butcher them in about a month.

Farm Life

The past several weeks have been really intense - good, but intense.  Here are a few pictures from throughout the planting season.  We are almost done planting and are now mulching.  We are up to 105 chickens and are ready to butcher.  That is next....  as soon as we get the details worked out.  There are 6 ducks in our menagerie and two pigs.  The green feed in the orchard is working out great and our "chicken salad" is giving our cooped chickens lots of greens in a steady way.

There are a bunch of quail in my sister's ever expanding incubator.  The first one is pipping out, probably tonight.  By tomorrow we will probably have a bunch of quail.  I don't even have a vague idea of how to take care of them, but will soon figure it out.

There are 60 chicken eggs in the incubator at this time.  Since we decided that 15 is the limit for one Mama Hen (otherwise the little ones get suffocated) we are trying to train a couple of other Mama's.  One is working out nicely and I'm looking for another little house and have the next Mama picked out.

We ended up with over a hundred tomato plants.  Thanks to all who took my extras.  They were overwhelming.   We also have in onions, garlic, potatoes, sweet and hot peppers, cucumbers, 27 varieties of melons, beans, peas, radish and lettuce and will be planting corn soon.

The raspberries are just ripening up and the kids have been on the strawberry hunt for days now.  I have little bunches of strawberries all over the place, and if you hunt, you can find some.  It is a lot of fun.

The guys have been working like madmen on a road realignment project and a big house foundation, but they have shoved a couple of things in around here.  Fence fixing is ongoing and we did a lot of work on our pool.  It is quite old and needs work - always.  We pressure washed, drained and painted the pool and shortly they will convert an old, non-working hot tub that was attached into a kids pool.  By the way, that was a royal we.... I really didn't help at all.  My sister is the ramrod of that project and boy am I glad it is almost done :)  It will be more efficient, safer and a lot cuter than anything I could come up with.

Hope everyone has their garden in.  We are working hard in ours.  Everything is popping up and growing like crazy.  I can't wait for tomatoes!

Showing off a beautiful granddaughter!

We love baby ducks!

There is always time for a bike race!

This is the "chicken salad"  Different seeds planted in these old raised beds and as they grow, the chickens can eat the greens, but the plants live.  It is working really well.

The house and run for our Mama Chicken...

Training up a second Mama Chicken in this house.

A little repair work on the step.

I am really not helping.... just checking it out.
Patching and painting are not my thing at all.
I really admire anyone who can do this type of work and I WISELY married someone who is great at it.  Twenty nine years and counting!

 Let the painting commence!  A little tile work and it is just like new  :)

This mess will become a neat kids pool with some gravel, some concrete, some paint and some tile.

We collected about 50 million polliwogs to feed to the ducks and worms in the pool cleaning out process.   We also collected several buckets of very nice leaves laced with lots of algae and used them to mulch the potatoes.  We begin refilling the pool Wednesday.  I can't wait!

Loving it!
Be healthy and well
Cindy

Baby Pictures

I wanted to show off our beautiful, sweet, new granddaughter. 

Everyone is healthy, happy and well.

Grammie is REALLY HAPPY!

Babies are a blessing from God  :)

Cindy

Baby is HERE!

The newest addition to our family is on her way.  They have induced our sweet daughter in law and we are praying for a safe, healthy, sweet delivery.  Our grandson is here sitting on Papa's lap having a little Julie's Organic blackberry ice cream.  We have sunshine on one side and rain over our head.

We enjoyed having our little grandson here and he had a full day of puppies, chicks, ducks, tractor rides, baseball, kitties, egg gathering and other fun stuff.  It is a sweet day!

This is the day that the Lord has made, let us rejoice and be glad in it!

A couple of additions to the farm

We have recently added a few animals around here:

Two new kittens

Some baby ducks......

To go with the duck pond

A little coop for Mama Hen "Aunt Bea" and the new chicks (sorry, no pics of the new chicks - they are totally cute)

A little coop for the roosters to be butchered soon

Two new piggies and...

A coop for the "old biddies" - 

when the new hens begin laying, these older ones will be butchered.

No pictures yet:

New puppy for son in law.... Odie... he is so great!

New baby for son and daughter in law soon!

Recipe for converting an unused playhouse into a chicken coop!

Take one old playhouse (cost - nothing)

 Add one creative sister (cost - priceless)

Mix in one handy brother in law (totally awesome)

Some old chicken wire and some screws (happen to have on hand)

Blend with one useless swing frame (and cut it to size to fit down garden rows)

With a hubby who knows how to use old stuff (and make it new)

Mix the house and frame together with a grin

 Ta-Da!  You now have one movable chicken coop...

 Great for fertilizing, worm eating and weed control 

while your little roosters get ready for the freezer!

Next little house - a house for mama hen and babies :)

Redirecting of energy

I just wanted to apologize for no new posts..... I forget every year how exhausting and intense this season is.  Our concrete construction swings into full gear at the same time that our garden swings into full gear.  I always say we go from 10 mph to 90 mph overnight  :)  It will probably be about two weeks before we can settle into our new summer routines with the bulk of the heavy work done..... then I'll be back (hopefully with pictures.  I was being faithful to take pictures but cannot find my camera right at this time)

Some of the topics I would like to cover over the summer:

• Phase 3 - Soaked grains and nuts - I don't know what I was thinking - this should have been done over the winter, but there you are :)  Hopefully this topic can be covered with some thoroughness over the next 6-8 weeks.

• Pregnancy diet - My daughter in law is about to deliver her second baby and my daughter is expecting in December.  We have found some really wonderful and helpful diet information for pregnancy.  Some of it is really important.  I actually want to cover it in 4-5 different posts.  Our local midwife will probably have to help me - when she explains things they make sense, then I cannot really repeat them very well.  Both girls have kidney issues, but we found a diet that is so helpful.  We took Dr. Brewer's recommendations and combined that with Sally Fallon's wisdom and came up with some good stuff.

•  If you want to try any of his recommendations, go grass fed, organic and local.  We have ramped up on the egg thing because of a wonderful enzyme that is in the egg white of a grass fed, fertilized chicken egg.   The only thing is that you have to eat it raw.  It is great in a smoothie.

• My sister came up with an amazing idea for a quick chicken coop.  Take an old kids playhouse (she had one) and screw chicken wire to the windows.  One window was left open, but we screwed a clasp to it so it can be opened and closed.  the door had a latch put on it.  They then took an old swing frame and wired chicken wire to it.  Ta-da:  Chicken coop with a little run that can be moved and the little run can be put down a garden row, which then also gave us a chicken tractor.

• My sister will need to do some guest posts.... she has been studying the chicken thing and is now the local expert.  She came up with the cool new chicken coop (I need about 5 more of those old houses.... if you have one locally you want to get rid of.).... also we made a "chicken salad" using some old frames.  We planted it and put chicken wire on top.  The chickens will be able to eat the green tops, but not the plants.  Stay tuned for this one.  The stuff is just sprouting........ we are getting quails next and every 3 weeks another bunch of chickens hatches.  We butcher our first bunch of chickens in about a month.

Anyway, be blessed today.

Cindy

Gazpacho

Gazpacho

In Andalusia, most gazpacho recipes typically include hard bread, tomato, cucumber, bell pepper, garlic, olive oil, vinegar or wine, onion and salt. The following is a typical method of preparing gazpacho:

1. The vegetables are washed and the tomatoes, garlic and onions are peeled.
2. All the vegetables and herbs are chopped and put into a large container (alternately, the tomatoes may be puréed in a blender or food processor.
3. The soaked bread is then added (optional)
4. Some of the contents of the container are then blended until liquid, depending on the desired consistency.
5. Chilled water, olive oil, vinegar and salt are then added to taste.
6. The remaining contents of the container are added to the liquid, then briefly puréed until there is some texture remaining for garnish. (optional)
7. Garnishes may be made with fresh bell pepper slices, diced tomatoes, or other fresh ingredients.

Traditionally, gazpacho is made by pounding the vegetables using a mortar and pestle.  This method is still sometimes favored as it helps keep the gazpacho cool and avoids the completely smooth consistency, and foam, created by blenders and food processors.

A recipe with measurements (for you control freaks :)

Gazpacho Recipe

Ingredients

6 ripe tomatoes, peeled and chopped
1 purple onion, finely chopped
1 cucumber, peeled, seeded, chopped
1 sweet red bell pepper (or green) seeded and chopped
2 stalks celery, chopped
1-2 Tbsp chopped fresh parsley
2 Tbsp chopped fresh chives
1 clove garlic, minced
1/4 cup red wine vinegar
1/4 cup olive oil
2 Tbsp freshly squeezed lemon juice
2 teaspoons sugar
Salt and fresh ground pepper to taste
6 or more drops of Tabasco sauce to taste
1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce (omit for vegetarian option)
4 cups tomato juice

Method

Combine all ingredients. Blend slightly, to desired consistency. Place in non-metal, non-reactive storage container, cover tightly and refrigerate overnight, allowing flavors to blend.
Serves 8.

Salsa

Salsa

Tomatoes in various colors (each color is a different acidity and gives your salsa a complex flavor) 

(you can blacken some of them for smoky flavor)

Sweet and Hot Peppers - seeded and blackened in a cast iron pan

Tomatillo

Onion

Garlic

Cilantro

Salt

Pepper

Cayenne

Cumin

Cucumber - with the peels on and I like to put the bitter end in for complex flavor

Lime juice and zest

Whey

I don't have amounts.  What I do is go and pick in the garden and throw everything into the food processor.  I blend it to chunky and season it to taste.  It tastes different every time.  It is a family favorite.

The whey cultures the tomato mixture and adds all kinds of wonderful health benefits.  This is an enzyme rich, antioxidant rich, nutrient dense food that packs a big health punch!

The Extra Step - Menu Planning

My personal Waterloo - Menu Planning

Phase 2 ends with menu planning.  Really, this is my biggest weak area in the entire realm of food preparation.  However, I know, know, KNOW that I must get it down on paper and follow it.  So, for me, if not for you... the bullet points:

• Eating for health requires you to incorporate some specific foods on a regular basis.  If you have no plan, you will probably miss some things you want to work in (the raw liver is still in my freezer... going to go on the menu!)
• When you are planning to plant and eat from your own garden, you should know lots of things to do with what you grow.  PLANNING helps.  You know what to grow and how to use it.  Also, your family won't get sick of the 10 things you are good at :(
• When you are attempting to reach a health goal, a plan is good.
• Time, money, effort and energy is freed up.  No more trying to figure out what is for dinner.... and it is 6:00 at night.
• If you plan to soak your grains (Phase 3 - been trying to get to Phase 3 for a month now) you have to plan ahead.  Flying by the seat of your pants just does NOT work (trust me on this one).
• Make it a part of your routine and you are more likely to be successful.  Make it work for YOU. 
• Check out what they say at the Weston Price Foundation to help you incorporate great principals.

Find someone to help you get started or to keep you going.  A couple of friends are so good on their menu planning.  You might look at Jabez Farms.  She is so faithful with her Menu Planning Monday.  As a bonus, she has been so encouraging for me on Facebook to get on with the program :)  Thanks Kim.  You are the best.  

Personally, I am planning to go with a seasonal menu.  I have begun the process using some of the ideas from Passionate Homemaking and Keeper of the Home.

This is an important step in our household as we get more and more busy.  Our work season just swung into full gear, the gardening is intense and everyone needs to stay healthy, busy, productive and well.  A seasonal menu seems to be what will work for us.  This will help me in planting the garden as well (see, everyone has priorities - I have charts, diagrams, lists, orders - everything in order for the garden... hmmmmm, just apply it to the kitchen!)

So, the final step in Phase 2.  Get a menu figured out.  What do YOU need to eat to be healthy.  Do you have a plan?  What does your family need.  Is this a short term or long term need?  It is important to figure it out.

Pray that I can get this are organized!

Cindy

Beet Kvass

Over at Evelyn Fields place she made Beet Kvass.  Apparently I missed this step completely  :(  She did a great post on it and I would encourage everyone to go look at it.

Beet kvass is what I do when I need a detox at the cellular level.  Personally, I add some cayenne pepper to mine (my sister hates that) and drink it by the glass.  I do not recommend this - it is just what I do when I have to do major detox, especially when we choose relationship over healthy habits.  Sometimes those two things conflict and we almost always opt for relationship..... this puts the brakes on legalism.  But a good detox helps :)

Go take a look and enjoy!  The day is gorgeous and I am headed out to weed eat a bunch more grass for the pigs (they are loving it) and for the chickens (ditto).

Our egg production is up, our feed bill is down, our hens are happy, our meat birds are growing.  The day is promising  :)

Cindy