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Hi Everyone,
It is almost 8:00 Sunday night—which means I am a little late in starting my journal. Life happens though and you have to go with the flow. Yesterday we got a phone call from Mom’s sister informing us that their stepmother had passed away at noon. For the past year she has fought cancer, and when she conquered it, the chemo and a heart attack conquered her. Since the sisters cannot make it to Missouri on Thursday for the funeral, Mom and I will leave here on Thursday and make it to Tennessee where we will pick up her three sisters and we will all drive to Missouri on Friday to spend the weekend with their father—my grandpa. Mom’s health has not been the strongest this year, and her diet has become very restricted, and with only two days to prepare for a trip I had to start preparations tonight. Broth is something Mom is to have lots of—and it is very nourishing when stressed. Therefore, I put a big pot of chicken broth in one oven and a big pot of beef broth in another oven. The fun challenge of that was that it was raining outside—and of course our freezer is next door in the milk house. My first trip out in the rain was to get beef bones and chicken backs. I put the beef bones in the roaster to roast them for 45 minutes and then I assembled all the chicken backs and veggies in another pot. Then I remembered that since Mom is allergic to copper, I needed to get my water from the milk house—for all the water pipes in our house are made of copper. That was trip number two, along with a big bowl to get 16 cups of oatmeal so that I could make some granola so that Papa can have some easy breakfasts while we are gone—I won’t be surprised if he eats it for dinner some too. Poor man—all his cooks are leaving him for 6 days. Then I had to make one more trip in the rain—to the garden this time. As I was gathering the carrots and celery for the broth, I realized that the last few of our Vidalia onions were past using—very sprouted and soft. The only place that we had onions was in the garden, and while they are not big slicing onions they are great tasting green onions. So I grabbed my rain coat and ran out to the garden –did I say that not only was it raining, it was also very windy and dark! I had no problem harvesting the onions, and just as I was coming out of the garden Papa came up in the truck—he was doing the evening chores, but to my dismay I had left all the gates open and couldn’t catch a ride home. Once back in the house I assembled all the ingredients to soak the granola for 24 hours. Tomorrow night I will add the rest of the ingredients and then back in the oven at 150 F for a good 12 to 24 hours. Once the granola was done then I could finish assembling all the ingredients for the two broth pots. That was just the beginning of all the preparations that are needed to take a trip—the list is already growing of things to do and meals to prepare.
The best part of the whole thing is how God orchestrated the timing of this trip. When our milker left us last year for a different job we no longer had the ability for us to leave the farm for more than a day—and only half a day at that. Mom knew that sometime her stepmother would die and she wondered how she would ever make it to the funeral. We have thought of many options—but when it happened, God had the answer all figured out weeks in advance. A month ago our old milker Eli came for a visit and told us that he had two weeks off from work the end of the month and he wanted to come milk for us so that we could go off and do something. Mom was hoping to be able to go visit her sisters in Tennessee. Well, it looks like not only will Mom get to visit her sisters, but she will also get to visit with her dad.
Life on the farm was very diverse last week. I was a cook, seamstress, milk maid, ranch hand—manure picker upper, house keeper, friend, sales clerk, shopper, gardener, and farmer. Last Sunday night I found myself out of oatmeal in the house and it was too late so I couldn’t run next door to the freezer to fill up my container. Since Mom cannot eat any grain, her breakfast usually consists of eggs and banana. Wanting to do something special, I checked the internet to see if it was possible to make pancakes out of cassava flour. I found a recipe, printed it out, and set it on the kitchen counter and went to bed. The next morning I whisked up the batter and Mom cooked them---and they were a very, very yummy success. While the recipe uses Bob’s Red Mill Cassava four, we use Otto’s Cassava Flour. We have successfully made pancakes, pie crusts, gravy, and fried meat with the cassava four. I want to try some potato dumplings using white sweet potatoes and cassava flour.
We have been working at preparing the area beside the barn to grow some pumpkins there this spring. Two weeks ago we got the hay spread out on it. This week we got all three chicken houses cleaned out and spread all over the hay. Steve and I spent about 30 minutes on Monday filling the manure spreader with cow manure. Now that the area is being well watered we should be able to cover it with the tarp and let the composting begin. Hopefully three months will be enough time. Another composting project we have been working on is the gathering of as many leaves as we possibly can and piling them up to make leaf mold. On Monday Steve, Mom and I headed back up to the chestnut orchard to spend about 40 minutes gathering leaves. Once we had the trailer full and I had rolled around to smash it all down, Steve told me it was his turn. I told him that Papa had climbed up on the side of the trailer and “fell” into the pile of leaves. Steve wanted to give it a try too—but instead of falling in, he jumped in. I guess there is always a little kid inside of you that likes to jump in the pile of leaves.
I have been taking some time to sew lately, and this past week I had the joy of making our garden friend, Sue, two new aprons. I spent Tuesday morning shopping for material, and then I sewed one Tuesday night and the other Wednesday afternoon. On Thursday afternoon we went to visit Sue at her house and got to surprise her with her two knew aprons. We had a lovely time visiting with Sue and seeing her “neck of the woods”.
Friday afternoon I finally got around to making some more lotion bars. They were on my “Out of Stock” list, and my last bar was getting smaller and smaller. Getting them made was not simple this time though—for I had melted a whole block of beeswax into my pot when Mom and I were trying to figure out how to make beeswax candles. We abandoned the candle idea, but to my dismay my beeswax was no longer in a “brick”. When I make lotion bars I usually take a hammer and break up the beeswax brick, put it in the pot and add in the olive oil and coconut. Then I heat it all up in the oven. Well-my pot was full of an unmeasured amount of beeswax, and the only way to get it out was to melt it. Once the beeswax was melted I poured it into my two cup measuring cup—for I needed 2 cups of beeswax to make the lotion bars. To my dismay though, there was still more in the pot and I couldn’t figure out where to pour it to, for whatever container you use it will always have a beeswax finish after that. I finally settled on a paper bowl—and then it was full. The last little bit was poured into a little bowl to make a small batch of different lotion. With my big pot finally empty I could finally get started on making my lotion bars. I added the coconut oil and the olive oil into the pot, and thankfully not all of the beeswax had hardened so that I could dump most of the 2 cups of beeswax into the pot. I was able to scrape out some of the rest with a knife, but to get the last ¼ cup out I had to stick it back in the oven to melt. It was a many hour process, but in the end I had 20 bars of lotion made, the extra beeswax back into a “brick”, and ideas for a lotion workshop whirling in my head.
I hope that each and every one of you has a Merry Christmas. Take time to read about the birth of the Messiah—the One who came to save us from our sins. Remember that truly Wise Men seek the Lord and sit at His feet and learn of him. True Wisdom is from above, and the fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom: (Psalm 111:10). Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore get wisdom: (Proverbs 4:7) for happy is the man that findeth wisdom, (Proverbs 3:13).
Serving you with Gladness,
Tiare
