No frost yet!

In our neck of the woods we still have not had a killing frost. On the mountains they have had a few light frost. We still have raspberries blooming an producing, peppers still hanging on. Not like I need any more but will give them to someone if they will come get em. Rodger mowed the field of purple hull peas down about a month or so ago an they are coming back up from the stubble and look pretty. We wont likely pick any more of them but the deer sure do like em. They are in there most every evening just at dark. I kinda see that as an investment in our meat supply. I am still in the process of drying herbs for cooking and medicinal herbs as well. Never know when those might come in handy. I like finding our about the wild plants that grow here on the farm and learning which ones are edible. Last evening when Rodger and I went to look about the pears on the big pear tree I saw a vine growing nearby that I identified as "groundnut". They are not peanuts as peanuts are sometimes called. They are indigenous to the area and when the country was first settled the colonist used the groundnuts as a protein source. They are very common near old Indian digs. The Indians dug the nuts an replanted the small ones to ensure another crop and food source. You can read more about the groundnut here and here. So if a person were lost or stranded in the mountains of east Kentucky and starved it might be their own fault. Because there is food to be had growing wild.

We finally got our new grapevines planted this week as well. We now have a total of 36 grapevines in the new vineyard. So hopefully someday in the near future we will have lots of grapes an I can make a good bit of homemade wine to enjoy. The raspberries are still producing and soon they need to be weeded an some small runners transplanted off them to make a new row of berry plants. The variety my friend gave me produce all summer but if we mow them down this fall they will come up in spring an only produce a good fall crop next year. Not sure if I want one big crop or pick smaller amounts over the whole summer. I think it easier to pick an put up small amounts than to be overwhelmed with tons of berries at one time that need picked. And if I have something more pressing I might not get the berries before they are a lose. I need to get in gear an pick the pears to let them ripen so I can get some canned up. I do like my canned pears as a snack. But my idea of a snack is to eat a whole quart of canned peaches or pears.

Our meet up last weekend in central Kentucky was a hit. We all had a great time, good food, new friends made and a relaxing event. I did a demo of chicken butchering and processing and the ladies that were interested I think came away with enough skill to be able to butcher their own birds if they choose. On Saturday evening I did a soap making demo and a bachelor learned to make his own citronella soap for summer time use to keep the bugs off him. He swears by the soap. A friend of his had given him a bar and he said he never had a tick, chigger or mosquito bite all summer as long as he had the soap to shower with. So now he can make his very own soap from the skills he learned in the demo. I do enjoy showing someone a new self sufficiency skill because I know that is one less thing they must depend on someone else to do for them.  At the meet up our friend Rosie showed us how to make tinctures and infusions with medicinal herbs. We walked around here place and she showed us several plants that grow in most every ones yard that can be eaten or used for medicine. One plant that I always thought was some type of clover is actually Oxalis or pickle plant. You can see pics an read about it here. Heck I pull these lil things out of my herb bed as weeds till Rosie showed us the lil "pickles" on the plants. If you can safely identify them have a taste of the lil pickles. Tart lil things they are. Back at home the other day I found a sassafras tree that Rodger had pushed over an there is a root exposed. I want to chop the root up for tea. I have always liked sassafras tea since I remember dad digging the roots when I was a child an mom boiled them in spring to make a spring tonic.Anyone on blood thinners must use caution when drinking sassafras tea as it is a blood thinner as well. Mostly used to purify the blood. Another thing that was common when I was growing up was picking wild greens in early spring. Some of the women that lived out on the hill an mom would go up the road an in the edge of the field an pick greens. I remember them picking round leaf or mouse ear plantain, young poke leaves, dandelion greens and others I can not remember at this minute. I have since learned that dandelion is a great plant to consume to cleanse the liver and kidneys. You can also dig the dandelion root to make tea in winter for the same purpose. My friend Rosie is a wealth of knowledge when it comes to edible plants an herbal uses of those plants. I just wish I knew half of what she knew.

So I had my lil mini vacation and back at home it was back to work. I am still working on canning some things out of the freezer to make room for deer meat when the guys go hunting. I guess thas kinda like counting your chicks before they hatch. I got the raspberries out and made raspberry jam last evening. Ended up with 14 an 1/2 pints. Now if I can just remember to thaw the stuff I have frozen for gumbo an get that made an canned up I should have a good bit of room in the big freezer. We are suppose to get rain this week so that will be a good project for a rainy day. I did find some clear gel when I was in central Kentucky last weekend so I may take some of the strawberries out of the freezer an make an can some strawberry pie filling.I sure don't need any more strawberry jam at this time. We have too many jars as it is. I have sliced an dried 2 half gallon jars of onion flakes in the past week as well. I use a lot of those things in cooking. I still have about 15 lb left that I might dry as well if they start to deteriorate. Our onion crop was a bust this year. Not sure it is worth all the work and expense to get sets an plant, weed and care for onions to still have to buy onions to supply our needs. Seems to me we might need to skip the work an just purchase a 50 lb bag in the fall to use an be done with it. But work is work, my body don't tolerate doing much of it these days. Even tho I have taken a B-12 shot for the past couple months I still battle fatigue, and some nights insomnia, not to mention pain all the time, the more I do the worse the pain gets. But I keep plugging along and doing all the things I love just less of those things now days. I am actually looking forward to winter and the long days of rest and not having to worry about being out in the garden and all those things. I still have my chickens to care for but thas a minor detail. I am not sure what the hell I was thinking but I have too many chickens right now. I have 15 laying hens and a rooster. Plus 8 very young chicks and another hen setting on a nest of eggs. I think when the smaller chicks are ready to butcher off I will cull out a few of the older layers to cut the feed bill a bit. I probably could cut the feed bill now if I shelled some corn to feed the hens. With the cooler weather they like corn more than laying pellets. I saw the young chicks out today and they were gorging themselves on the grass seed in the yard. I am sure they will make wonderful stock when they are grown. I just hate the thought of butchering chickens in cold weather but seems thas what I will be doing this year.
Not much else happening here on the homestead. So till next time, blessings from the McGuire homestead.

Stella

Its getting closer.....

...really right around the corner. Fall is here and the spooky thing that is right around the corner is winter. Our weather here in Ky is going to turn colder this weekend. Something tells me we have but very few more nice warm days left this fall. Knowing this we have been trying to get little things done an loose ends tied up so to speak. I have most all the peppers picked off an taken care of now, I hope. This is what I faced last weekend. We picked 3 bushels total of ripe an green bell peppers.

So with Rodgers help I cut the peppers and took out the seeds and he ran them thru the food processor with the slicing blade in place and put the sliced peppers in the dehydrator. That batch was done by Monday evening and we did more on Monday and  reloaded the dehydrators. Those finished on Tuesday and I quit! I am done with peppers.We took care of 1 1/2 bushels of bells. The jalapenos were deseeded and put in the freezer for poppers later on. I had nearly 1 1/2 bushels of peppers left an Rodgers sister and a friend of ours took those. IF we don't get frost soon there will still be more peppers as the plants have many really small ones on and still blooming. I have totally stopped messing with cayenne peppers because I have 2 gallon dried an that is enough to do me  5 years or more.
On Sunday as I was cleaning the peppers Rodger cleaned out the hen house. It was not bad in need of cleaning it was just time to clean it out before cold weather comes. Besides we want to use the manure to mix in with the soil to get the grapevines off to a good start. Those need to be in the ground asap so they can get established before frost knocks em back.
With the frost warnings an cold weather headed our way its a race to get the sweet potatoes dug before the cold gets here. They will still have to cure so at night they will need to be covered with a tarp or something to prevent them from freezing. Hay or straw will also work if it is removed during the warm part of the day so the taters dry well and the skins toughen up. Then they can be stored away for winter in a dry cool place about 50 degrees. Sweet taters do not keep in a root cellar due to high humidity.
We used most of the straw we had for bedding in the chicken house after Rodger got it cleaned out. He put all the manure in the tractor bucket to take it to the garden and pile it so it can compost and some be used in planting grapevines and probably making another raspberry patch.

I like having my chicken house in the backyard for several reasons. One is the chickens can be close and have some protection from predators. Luna keeps a close eye on them here. It is easier for me to see to their feed and water in bad weather as well. Not to mention caring for the little ones. The momma hens do a good job of teaching the lil ones how to scratch for food. AND I get to enjoy the lil fellers as they grow up.

The little one above is ducking back under his momma where it is nice an toasty on this cool evening.

The one chick in the back is under his momma sleeping and he is a good size fellow too. The dorkin in the front has 2 babies, one of which is the white one standing, an she has also adopted one that was weaned already. She just took up with this hen an her lil ones.
They didn't know what to think of a house with a naked floor. They got busy moving the straw around after I got it put on the floor all neat like. I keep a pitchfork handy to fluff the straw daily so they have a fresh layer. Next spring when we take this manure an straw out of the chicken house it will be very fine and perfect to go in the garden as the chickens have pecked all the seeds from it.
I spent most of today making a big batch of chili to can up. That got some of the peppers out of the freezer. I ended up with 13 quarts of chili ready to heat an eat. How convenient , huh?
I will be going to a get together this weekend in central KY for homesteaders and folks that want to become more self sufficient. I am taking a couple quarts of chili with me to have out there for lunch among other goodies to eat.  I will be doing a chicken butchering demo and a soap making demo on Saturday. I think we are also butchering a goat for the family who is hosting the event. Several folks are interested in learning how to do butchering. So hopefully some new folks can go home satisfied that they learned a new skill.  Rosie will also be showing us how to make salves and tinctures using native herbs. Also she is going to show us how to make paint. Now how cool is that? It is always nice to meet other folks who raise all their food an homestead like we do here. I will also be going to an Amish surplus store nearby there. It is really a neat place to shop. It is kinda like a scratch an dent grocery store. They also stock bulk items like wheat, buttermilk powder, powdered cheese an gallon buckets of coconut oil that is very inexpensive as compared to what we pay near here. I will likely post some photos of the event when I get home. But this is my one weekend this year to go have fun and visit with some friends I have made online thru BHM magazine forum. 
So till next time, blessings from the McGuire homestead.

Stella

Its realllly late.......

I bet you wonder as of late why my post are written so late at night, well really early in the wee hours? Well cause some days I am busy with other stuff till late, other times the brain fog is so bad I just cant concentrate long enough to write a post. Believe me it can be frustrating to say the least. And thas not cause my life is a mess but it really is a mess about now. As most of you know I have RA and fibromyalgia. Along with the RA comes pain, sore stiff joints and such, like ya granny use to have. With the fibro comes more pain all over the place, the fatigue most days is as bad if not worse than the pain. Then it seems just when ya think ya gonna have a good day, bam! ya belly gets upset with ya. I have never been a morning person in my adult years but with fibro ya don't want to start tryin to be one either. It takes a few hours in the morning to get up and get moving, by then if you MUST go out for some reason, you take a shower. After all this you are so tired you are thinking of another nap instead of what you need to go do. You are exhausted, then you get irritated because your body has failed, then ya force you body to go do what you needed to do out of the house. The fatigue gets worse to the point you avoid doing things because it requires so dang much effort. I have always been a people person, but its not that I don't like people its just that I have a hard time interacting with them now  mostly due to the brain fog of fibro. It is a hard illness or disease to understand because I don't look "sick". People assume if ya look OK ya must be OK. With fibro you are constantly on a mission to find something to help you maintain a balance so you can function normally. But really it steals you life away because you never get back to normal. You just get to the new normal for you each day. The point of these late night , or early morning post, depends on how you see the time is because it is quiet in the house, no one up, no need to think of what to eat or cook, its dark outside so cant see what needs doing out there, and at these times I seem to have a lil more mental clarity than during the day when there are things that need my attention. I guess at night I have less thing to distract me than during the day. I am not a multi-tasker any more for sure. But such is life with fibro.

Anyway not much goin on here on the homestead this past week. Although I did get out last weekend and picked a bunch of the lil Mexican cukes and Rodger helped me make them into dill pickles. We ended up with about 10 pints. And not a damn one of em sealed. Don't know whats up with that. Really made me mad cause it was painful to pick all those tine lil cukes and wash em and then for them to not seal. DAMMIT!
But on the upside I got some lil baby chicks from some of the hens that were sitting on eggs. One hen has 2 lil babies and of all things she takes them out side and a single blade of grass is an obstacle for them. They are so cute. The hen that was sitting in the corner of the chicken house on heaven knows how many eggs has hatched off 5 lil ones and she is smart enough to keep hers inside so they don't trip and fall over a blade of grass. The hen that was sitting on one egg an egg gourd nest egg in the middle of the chicken house floor has moved to the abandoned nest in the corner and is on the eggs the hen left. So I am sure in a few days she will have a lil chick or 2 because the other hens had been laying in that nest while the first hen was setting on it. I have yet another hen sitting on about 6 eggs in the bottom corner nest box. She will hatch in a week or so. I have several hens that have brooded more babies this summer than they have laid I think. I know the 2 brown hens and the white hen are on about hatch number 4 for the year. And they are all good mommies. I do have some young roosters from their past hatches that need to be butchered off as they are starting to bother the hens and fight among themselves.

We have had a shower of rain this past week that probably made my beans grow again. I am still trying to get the ones dry for shuck beans that we picked a week ago. But with clouds and humidity it is hard to dry them outside. Maybe they can go in the dehydrator tomorrow to finish up. If we don't get rain, which the weather man says we are supposed to get, we will need to pick the green beans again. I will probably make more shuck beans with them as we have more than enough canned already and it will be less work for me. Probably need to pick more ripe peppers too and okra. After the lil bit of rain we had I am sure the raspberries are getting ripe and will need picked too. I need to make another batch of jelly to get the berries out of the freezer. I still have the makings for a huge batch of gumbo in the freezer and that also needs to be canned up. Maybe if it does rain tomorrow I can enlist Rodgers help and do that. I will sure need help with making the gumbo. Would sure be nice if my friend Deb could come up and help. We had such a great week when she was here. And dang it, I may not get to see her at all this year. She has a son getting married in Tennessee the same weekend we are having our Backwoods Home get together in central Ky. So she cant be 2 places at one time. I am really looking forward to the get together to meet old friend and new ones too from  the BHM forum we all visit. All the folks I have met from there are just wonderful. Now I got to figure out how to manage a 3 hour drive alone. I hate driving anymore cause I am so easily distracted and cant do more than a very few things at one time. Hard to think about you turns, watch other traffic and stay awake all at the same time. Sounds easy an it is until fibro bites ya.

Not much else happening here on the farm right now, so till next time, blessings from the McGuire homestead.

Stella

Homesteaders convention, first egg

At the request of some friends I will share with you all some of the pictures from the homesteaders convention or meet-up last weekend.
 

Above left to right: Deb Todd, Tony (whtdrgn), Tonys wife Karen, Rick(KyHome), Randy(rwwoodcock).

 Deb and Mark in the chicken plucking competition. Great job to all participants. Now Rosie has some chickens in the freezer and hopefully some folks learned a few tips on butchering and cutting up birds.

Randy and I decapitating chickens getting ready for the chicken plucking competition.

Rosie and Sam plucking their chicken while I coach and Sheryl (dachsmom) looks on.

Rick holding a dead nekkid bird. Not sure if he is happy about this task or not. But he did a great job.

Not sure if Randy is going up or coming down. lol Actually he is demonstrating how to set snares for catching small game .

Above left to right: Sheryl (dachsmom), Don (12v), Mark and the back side of Rosie.

Above left to right: Mark Todd, Deb Todd (hippiechick), Sam and Rosie, the host for the homesteader get together. 

Randy, myself and Danny (dgr's hubby) looking for the handle to the iron skillet we had burned out in the bonfire the night before. One skillet cracked and lost a handle, the other 2 came out fine. They are in the process of being re seasoned.

 Back on the farm. Rodger took feed out to the chicken house for me this evening and found this in the chicken house. This is the first egg from my young pullets. So I know I have at least 1 Easter egger out there. The other pullets should follow suit shortly as they are all about the same age.

Not much else happening here on the farm. So till next time, blessings from the McGuire homestead.

Stella