Birds and Biscuits

Indian Runner looking for dog food and a hand out.

When you clean the glass all the girls come out to inspect your work.

One of four roosters I raised that are filling in a need. All my roosters got eaten last year. My game hen hatched these guys- all boys. I gave 2 away and have 4 left. Two are worth keeping and the last tow need to be re-homed or eaten.

When it snows and is very cold it is time for biscuits. Made from scratch and very tasty. This is the Southern Living recipe. I never have buttermilk, so I add 2 tbl. lemon juice to the milk to make it curdle (about 15 min at room temp) I use salted real butter. After 10 min I broil the tops to brown them and brush on melted butter on the tops. Melt in your mouth tasty.

King Cake Season

Even though I live in the Ozarks I still miss king cakes from Louisiana. Even though I have an older brother living there, it is too expensive to ship these here. So I buckled down and searched my recipes. I found the best one to be from King Arthur Flour. I always have flour, milk and eggs on hand.

I added dry malt and dough enhancer to give it more lift and fullness. My yeast did the job but sometimes you need fluffy. It is a basic brioche recipe with filling. I only had green sugar on hand. So using sugar and food coloring I made gold and purple. Not a bad braid as it has been over 20 years since I worked in a bakery. Thanks to Mary Lee donuts and Albertson's bakery I learned a ton of baking skills while going to college.

Icing while hot.

Final product. It was fluffy, soft and very tasty. King Cake made from scratch in the Ozarks because that is how we roll on the farm.

Snow and Best light bulbs ever

Fixing a Kenmore and keeping warm by the woodstove.

It is snowing again for us here in the Ozarks.

This is a game changer for dark rooms, basements and garages the LED garage bulbs. They have an extender and screw right into those hot old canister ceiling sockets we all have. And no tools just a ladder. You will have daylight in an instant. I got one and then got more for the shop, my studio and for friends. And you save money as LEDs use less electricity. You will not be disappointed. They are cool color and not warm color. And they are adjustable but I like them open like a flower. Very cool sleek design.

Winter Work

Horses are hay burners. They wasted a bale a week last winter. We have not replaced the crumbling marine board on the lean too- but makes a good net holder. They pulled out all the good forage from the round bales and soiled the rest. So this winter we decided to use hay nets. This means unwrapping a bale and stuffing nets every morning and night. I was able to make a bale last 4 weeks instead of 4 days. I get a workout everyday. Last summer no one was selling hay as second cuttings were not expected. Wet springs and wet summer means hay can't dry and is turned and sold into silage. We bought barn kept cow quality 6 foot bales at $50 each. We usually by about 45 bales but this year only got 25. The plan is working. We do not have a barn big enough for bale storage. So we bought black bale wraps. They are open on the ends and keep snow and rain off the tops/bottoms. Only have about 3% spoilage over 2 years of outside storage. This means on lean years we have back up hay when it can't be bought. Our herd had pasture rotation during the rest of the year.

It was 10 degrees a few weeks ago. I was warm but my fingers were not. Very painful to have frozen  wet hands. My hunt for the best farm waterproof gloves continues. I have neoprene one but they failed me this year. They are over 8 years old so I guess time to get new ones. The parka/coat I am wearing is a Lands End mens 3x parka. I bought it used on ebay 10 years ago. I am much smaller now but the coat is still great. Waterproof and very warm, I love Lands End coats. I replaced the  original plastic zipper last year with a sturdy metal one. Good for another 10 years. I can move around in the coat, carry tools and am cushioned if I fall. It has held kittens, chicks, eggs and a hummingbird in its pockets over the years. And the parka is machine washable. Everyone who works with the land in winter needs one of these coats. 

Our mud room is actually my studio. Boots, mud mats, coats and gloves and a warm older dog.

One of the neat things about living in the Ozarks plenty of wildlife. Over 25 head came out of the woods on this cold morning.

Reliquary Restoration

I received this reliquary and was asked to fix it if possible. It had been dropped and not repaired for 40 years.  It sat in storage in not the best conditions. After cleaning and polishing the brass.

taking apart the reliquary all original parts were cleaned, repaired and set back.

Restored reliquary for St. John Vianney.

Our wood stove feels so much nicer than any other kind of heat. So nice to have in the basement to keep my studio cozy and dry.

Sewing Machine Army

This is an antique Singer hand crank I am retro fitting for leather work. It is quite good at sewing leather. 

This is a Kenmore I put a new belt on for a friend who sews jeans for her farm family. I have repaired this machine 2 other times in the 10 years I have lived here in the Ozarks. It is a good little machine. This is my studio and farm mud room/ foster kitten HQ. And yes, that is a real wood stove. It is how we heat our home in the cold months. We chop, split and burn from our own woods.

And then I had to get a made in China cobbler leather. It needs to be put together, is a greasy mess at the moment and needs to be filed and cleaned. It is rough and not ready. Tiny bobbins, roughly made and needs a lot of work. But thanks to youtube I have teachers for free in this realm.

But I have a quilt to work on so this will stay in a pile until I have time.

I use a lot of machine and I repair a lot of sewing machines. It is part of restoration and the tools you need to get the job done. 

New Year, New Crafting

We went to a leather shop and they had a Glowforge on display. It lasered rock, leather, paper, metal and wood. After a long talk we got one and are learning something new.

Using the glowforge pattern and my own logo design we made this the first night.

 We have moved on to slate and cedar scraps. We are learning inkscape and going from there. It is very fast and very easy to deal with. We did have to hook up venting from a window and all that, But it is so worth it. Looking forward to all kinds of new crafting and restorations.

Advent this

At our small Ozark church I put up the advent wreath bulletin board for the season of Advent. I used the marbled card stock and glitter from our local walmart. 

Advent is a Catholic event before Christmas to prepare for the birth of Christ and the second coming of Christ. So each Sunday in December before Christmas we light up a certain candle for peace, hope, joy and love. No other secular decorations are allowed until Dec 22nd. So no trees, no santa, no reindeer- nothing but the Advent wreath. It is a nice calming tradition in the chaos of the secular holiday. It is a good time to reflect, reconcile and renew with Christ in your life. We are so blessed in this country to have the freedom to worship and honor our Creator openly.  

Hope you have a Merry Christmas and a great new year.

Moving Forward

We have no answers on my husbands test. CBC, Hep, Stool panels are all normal. Frustrated with how slow the medical process goes, we took advice from a friend- apple cider vinegar to drink each morning- to straighten out his gut bacteria. It seems to have helped. His hunger is back but he is not healthy. Will wait and see how it goes. There is a colonoscopy coming soon. All has to wait until the new year and medical insurance.

On a good note my friend got married. She and her fiance have each lost a spouse. She cleaned his house one day and he was smitten. After a year of courtship they married. Two very kind people who fell in love. I am so blessed to see them together as husband and wife. And she will be moving closer to our farm. I will be very fortunate to have Alfreda and Gene nearby.

I have been busy sewing memorial pillows for a friend who faces her first Christmas without her husband. I sewed each of his shirts into 8 pillows for her adult children and grandchildren.

Tough Time

So this December has been gutting. My husband who is not yet 50 years of age is ill. We have had test done for pancreas, liver and blood infections. His lower belly is swelling and he is losing weight. His liver is two times as large as it should be. He is not getting any nutrients from the food he eats.

He does not drink, do drugs nor smoke and is very active. But this is where we are with no answers.

We have had X-ray, ultrasound and blood work. Waiting on a Hep panel to see if it is that.

We have no answers and no idea the cause.  

Praying for answers.

Snowy Halloween

I don't know what this means but we had snow on Halloween. A first for us living out here. Might be a tough winter ahead.

Went to let the chickens out and saw snow.

Blackberry patch covered in snow.

My truck with ice and snow.

My girls did not mind the snow.

buffalo grass 

sugar maple

Splitting wood

With the colder days we can get wood split for winter. We use our own fallen trees and we sometimes buy logs from locals. We heat by wood stove using logs and pellets. This pile of logs was from a felled tree on our pond. The tree fell into the pond and had to be pulled out with a tractor. After a year of sitting in the lean to it is ready to be split and stacked.

We started in the afternoon and it is now nightfall. We got the log pile and a truck load split and stacked. This is one of two splits we make to get through winter. Wood heat is cheap and warms you twice. Once when you cut it and once when you burn it.

 This wood stack becomes a winter home for chipmunks.

Our lean to keeps the firewood dry. The metal cans with lids keep our trash from the bears.

Fixing the fences

My studio in the winter. Wood stove for heat, all supplies on wheels to move around for animal emergencies, boots at the ready, old shepherd warm inside, and sewing machines at the ready. My studio is the real room of requirement on our farm.

Swing to watch the ducks.

This time of the yard gardening is done and canned. So now I can work on firewood and winter chores on the farm.

sugar maples

Splicing barb wire and fixing hot tape fences.

our woods as we walk and fix fences

poison ivy in its fall glory

rocks arranged by someone along our fence line.

deer busted though the electric tape

tree branches always falling in bad spots

There is always something to do on the farm.