Day 12 of 365 days of our lives on our small family farm in America

Today had a nice start, rooster calling in the morning from the back porch, baby finches’ chirruping away and the parakeets are talking up a storm, snugly baby bears crawl they way up into our bed and other than Isaiah not knowing if he should go to school or not it is fairly uneventful.  I sent him off to school by the way which is due to be canceled at 3pm when the storm should set its second event of snow upon us.  So far we have been very lucky and it is has just been rain, though very cold rain. The ducks and geese are ever so happy, they are playing in the pond that is now my yard…lol  I hope they start laying eggs soon , as we have many orders pending and it is money we need just to keep the farm above water(pun intended).  We have moved Moo cow into the barn as she seemed cold in the rain and once again did the goat shuffle…lol 

Our Cayuga’s are laying, shipping out the first good order of them for the season.  Cayuga ducks are great ducks to own, they are shinny crow black, and they lay about 200+ eggs a year on a good year.  Sometimes they lay black eggs, but often lay eggs that are gray to green in color and once in a great while even spotted, they are a dual purpose duck that are a grassing duck that do not need water to reproduce.  Duck eggs are the very best cooking eggs one could ever have and it is truly a joy to make cakes from them.

We should have baby peeps today; I am getting ready to buddle up and check out in the water house, I am sure they need water too.  Keeping a high humidity in the incubator is the very best way to have a great hatch.  On some of the harder to hatch eggs, I dip each egg once a day in incubator temp water for a few seconds. I helps to keep the inner membrane moist and pliable and easier for the chick to tear threw.

We are making Chile for dinner, so I am starting the beans now, we use the quick cook method and add tablespoon of backing soda to the beans before they boil.  I boil them for three minutes because they are white beans and very hard. Then they sit for one hour with the lid on , after that I cook them, I will add red wine vinegar, onions, beef, garlic, salt of course, some fresh ground pepper, cilantro and maybe some tomatoes or salsa if I can find some in the basement(found four jars we made like more than two years, I think it is add to pasta mix, it has tomatoes,peppers, onions and cilantro).  I also make the world’s greatest corn bread.  I am enclosing the recipe for you all.

Butter milk corn bread

Ingredients:

½ cup home churned butter (store bought if you must)

2/3 cup of white sugar

2 farm fresh eggs

1 cup of buttermilk (cultured butter milk, not what is left after making butter) or you can use old soured milk or even yogurt.

½ teaspoon baking soda

1 cup corn meal

1 cup all purpose flour

½ teaspoon of natural salt

Directions:

Preheat oven to 375 degrees f (175 c)

Grease your cast iron skillet; I do this by melting the butter in it.

Mix into the pan sugar after you have removed it from the heat.

Quickly add eggs and beat until well blended. Next add butter milk, or soured milk or yogurt, with baking soda and stir.  Then add cornmeal, flour and salt until well blended, but a few lumps remain.

Bake for 30 to 35 minutes, till top starts to brown and it springs back when touched with the back of a spoon.

I thinking of going and studying, watching a little telle with the hubbie and the kids and going to be early incase I have to go to school in the morning.  Have to make the rounds latter and check on the pregnant does and other animals, going to be a cold night and the kids have gone above and beyond to make sure all the animals have a nice warm place to sleep.

Now on to the hubbies part of the blog…

News From The Doghouse and the zoological garden of the coming ice age...

The freezing rain has hit us, and I got soaked on my left side while the right side stayed dry, because of the driving wind velocity. Gathered 4 quail eggs (dismal),

a greatly appreciated turkey egg, and another set of Cayuga duck eggs, 1 black again, and had the usual no-namer coop layers ect.

Yesterday got more branches cut down from that dead tree, cut up for firewood, and already put to good use. Have a nice toasty fire going on and we are doing fine. Let it snow. The wind today took down another branch off that same tree, better that, than having it whack me when I am up on the ladder up in that tree. When I took off the one large branch, it shook the whole tree, I thought the whole thing was going to go over. I don't think I will be making a totem pole out of it after all, although I can visualize a crane or heron on it, or maybe a woodpecker, I don't know at the moment.

Rebecca the Italian milk goat is so big that she looks like she is going to explode, her babies will probably come in the worst of the weather, and they usually and normally do. Got the back of the barn opened up for the horses to come in, if they decide to. They like it outside, except for thunder and lightning. The sheep seem to like the adverse weather as well. Goats and cows want to get out of it. In summer time, the goats don't like to get rained on then either. Cows like to get cooled off with a nature shower, doesn't do anything for their hair though lol

Wednesday chore duty will be a struggle for sure...low temps and wind chill...guess I will be the Abominable Snowman, maybe more abominable as in disagreeable...we shall see.

Now onto Dah’ veeds part of the blog.

The life and times of a rapper/farmer…

Yesterday Isaiah turned 20.

So we made him a mint chocolate cake…

 I made spaghetti and meat (Israel’s) for dinner yesterday; it was a little weird though, because it tasted like the spaghetti my dad used to make.

AND MOM FRIED THE LEFTOVER SPAGHETTI FOR BREAKFAST O.O

Tonight we are having chili.

I had to repair the babies clothes dresser today….again

My friend gave me a neat little thing the other day. It’s a Fidelity electric chess challenger. So I gave it some research and found out that it is from the 70’s, or course they make newer models of which this one is not.

This model is meant to be hard to beat and very user unfriendly, it didn’t come with the pieces or instructions but I did find some. As for the pieces, I temporarily improvised with pieces from a travel kit; they are magnetic so they stick to the board. When I get it new pieces I should make sure they are magnetic

But that’s all for now.

Shalom,

Dah’ veed

Be blessed and please be safe in this weather…

Shekhinah, Michael and all the kids and critters