Carrots, Stew and Snow?

Carrots (left) and Venison Stew (right)

 We've been busy out here on the prairie.  PH worked on the house roof, and is a hair away from being finished with the plywood portion.  I'll take a picture when it is done.  I am so excited!  Every little baby step means that much closer to our own Little House on the Prairie.  PH noticed a couple checking out the property twenty acres over.  If anyone remembers we had neighbors before, but I hoped they would leave..they did.. Now others are back (sigh).  I hope they don't buy it.  I like being alone out here.  I know that sounds selfish, but I don't care.  Every time someone moves near by they cause problems for us.

Today I was busy with getting the laundry caught up, didn't happen, but I made a tiny dent.  Hung out three loads of laundry, and need to put a fourth in tonight before bed (which means a 500 foot trip to the wash house).  I need to head out and close it all up, since we are expecting temps of 31 in town (it's normally 5 degrees colder here) and possible SNOW FLURRIES! Can you believe it?

I made Venison Stew last night and processed 4 pints this morning.  I also spent a couple of hours last night washing, peeling and dicing carrots to pack into pints today.  I've discovered I like pints better than quarts, which is a huge change for me.  I've been processing everything in quarts for years, but pints work better, smaller portions and less waste. I was able to fill 10 pints with diced carrots, and have the first four in the pressure canner now.  They are cooling down, so I'll have two more canner loads (one with four, and one with two).  As an afterthought, I should have used my new canner, I could have probably done it all at once (sigh).  Live and learn.

I am going to make a confession.  Our cold temps caught me by surprise.  I try to have kerosene on hand for our kerosene heater, but after using our last gallon a couple of weeks ago, I put off re-filling them.  I didn't have the extra money to spend BUT with the temperature dropping so rapidly, and unexpectedly tonight, I had to reallcoate funds to go towards kerosene.  This means I ended up spending twice the amount of money for the same amount of fuel.  At the fuel depot the cost is $4.00 a gallon, I paid $10.49 for a gallon this afternoon, because the fuel depot is closed on the weekend.  An expensive lesson.  We will be filling the kerosene containers on Monday, so we will be ready for the next cold spell.  We heat the main part of the house with the wood stove, but the back bedroom is too far from the stove, and is ICE cold.  When you can see your breath inside, it's time for another heat source to help out.  The living room is nice and toasty.  I love sitting by the wood stove at night.


After watching the "Doomsday Prepper" show the other evening, I have resolved to can something at least once a week.  The people on the show spend 6-8 hours EVERY day preserving food.  I was shocked.  Since I was given a lot of produce the past several weeks, I needed to do something with it before it went bad, we just can't eat it fast enough.  Some I gave to the pigs today, the carrots I canned.  I have dehydrating peppers on the list for tomorrow after church, as well as, making pie filling and canning. 

So my count for this weekend is:

4 pints of stew
10 pints of carrots

Our chickens are laying LOTS all of a sudden.  The girls collected 20 eggs this morning!  I was so happy!  That makes 5 dozen eggs this week.  I'll be taking the surplus to church tomorrow morning.  This next week we will load up the incubator to hatch our some chicks, then preserve some with mineral oil.

A few of our eggs earlier in the week

This is what REAL free ranged egg yolks look like, not those anemic looking store bought eggs.

Corn Dog Muffins

Have a great Sabbath!