Fall Projects and Misc Fun.

We had a great weekend. We went to our nearest 'big city' and got J his new glasses and some perscription swimming goggles. Of course we had to go try them out!! So we grabbed kids and headed to our favorite pool. Everybody had a great time. J could finally see in the pool and had a blast. He stared around a lot just looking at things and got a real kick out of the guy that was jumping off the diving boards.J also learned how to hold his breath and stick his head underwater then look around. A huge milestone for him. Little miss E and I had a blast in the kid pool. She would stand on my hands and then I would lift her way up in the air then DROP her suddenly into the water. Catching her just at the last minute. She loved it. (I tried this with J and L but J is scared of heights and would really rather NOT but L managed to get about 1/2 way up, giggling away.) She also loves 'jumping' off the side. Except she can't jump. So she walks off. J, L, and E got to go down the waterslide with Papa which is also a treat. Baby R has this round floaty thing that she sits in and she floated around contently the entire time. L really likes the hottub. And that makes me wonder if he is often too cold in the other part of the pool as he is very much his fathers son when it comes to being cold all the time. I got out of there without having to nurse Baby R in the pool area. That's a first for her. I normally nurse her once sitting in a quiet spot, if I can find one, or by the hottub.


Papa has a few days off again this week. Pretty normal around here for fall. Comes in very handy with all the fall chores and cleanup that always needs doing. We started the 'wall of firewood' yesterday which is great and hopefully we'll get more of it done today. The wall is stacked wood between the poles of our addition all the way down the 70 feet of trailer. One area between poles lasts us about a month. There are about 6 months worth of wood when we are done, as we have to leave some open areas for walking and getting the cow thru. We got 2 pretty much full yesterday. One of nice burning stuff (Dry pine and black spruce) and one of poorer burning stuff, poplar. The poplar is mostly from our clearing project this spring. So its cut into the right size and the side split down the middle with the chain saw to let the moisture out. This works well to season them and we have already burnt some and it actually isn't too bad. Good for warmer days. We have a LOT of this poplar, enough for several more years. All stacked up between trees in the back. So we are just moving it in. The pine and blackspruce are standing dead from the front 2 acres and Papa is cutting them down as we go. We have a little International pickup bed trailer that we pull behind our family rig, a 1972 International Travelall. We take this around and stack the trailer full before driving back to the house to unload. It took Papa and I about an hour yesterday to load, Papa mostly cut while I loaded, and unload (stack) the trailer full.


We had a big wind storm Saturday and now most of the leaves are down on the ground. We have often used leaves as bedding in the chicken barn for the winter. If we can get the lawn mower working we want to do it again this year. Our poor lawn mower has not been used all year. Between the cow, calves and chickens every blade is consumed. Hopefully Papa will have some time to fiddle with it. But then again it's suppose to snow... tomorrow or the next day. Need to get those hoses and toys put up. The snow normally does not stay until after the last day of October. Hopefully it will wait a while to stick so we can be ready. The year E was born, 2 years ago, we got 2 feet on the 27th. And it never did go away. The power went out for 3 days but we were toasty and warm with our wood stove and propane range. It pays to be prepared. Anyway the Baby needs nursing and I'd better get going on my day. Have a great one!!

A word about the Breadmaker.

We love homemade bread. In fact we very rarely buy bread of any kind. Very rarely. I enjoy making bread and buns for my family. But I like to do it FAST. We eat an amazing amount of buns around here. Papa takes bags and bags of them to work and I have to work very hard to keep up with his intake. LOL. He eats them all day long. They make up about 1/2 of his lunch and breakfast for work. Needless to say I bake a lot. A lot of buns anyway. Sometimes I get tired of buns and make bread for a while but it's all the same recipe. I just shape it differently or add more whole wheat flour. The way I do it is very simple. I let my breadmachine do all the work. Well most of the work. I spend very little time on it. I put my breadmaker on dough you see and just put everything in the breadmachine bucket and push a button. Then 2 hours later when the lid of my machine is lifting from the risen bread dough I grab it. Shape it and let it rise in a nice warm spot. Beside the wood stove, in the sunshine or on the working dryer. Then when it's more then double it's size I turn the oven on and bake it. One batch makes 4 small loaves or 24 buns or 2 loaves and 12 buns. My recipe is very simple.
2 cups warm water
1/3 cup sugar
1 tsp yeast
2 tsps salt
& about 1/2 cup butter, bacon fat or oil, depending on the day.
Then I let that sit for a few minutes while my yeast works, butter melts. When it's nice and puffy I add flour. Mostly I do 3 cups of white flour and 3 cups of whole wheat flour. Unless I'm making bread (2 white, 4 whole wheat) or hotdog/hamburger buns (4 white, 2 whole wheat). If I make cin. rolls with the dough I add more sugar. But I rarely add eggs, you could if you like, because I find that it moulds faster if I do. Not that there is much left to mould after Papa gets ahold of them. I bake the buns for about 15 minutes at 350F and the bread about 30 minutes. Cin. Rolls just until they brown nicely. About 20 minutes and then ice them while they are still a bit warm. We often make frybread on days that I've got a batch going. Fry bread is easy and my kids love it. Just take a ball of your risen in the breadmaker dough and pull gently at the sides until it is fairly flat. Then fry it in butter on a medium hot pan (if your using cast iron like I am watch it doesn't get too hot as it can very quickly) until it's browned on both sides. We eat these with jam and cheese and some times sausage. My sister in law introduced these to me years ago and for a while it almost became a staple in our diet.

Momma's Maids.

I love my maids. They work hard. They wash dishes, make bread, cook supper and keep our clothes nice and clean! One makes butter, another dry's fruit, yet another keeps the kids entertained while I milk the cow. Some days they all work together and other days none of them work. They all work hard to keep us tidy, well fed and looking nice. There was a time I would have had to pay them but these days it's a one shot deal. They eat very little and I rarely have to supervise them. I find them at yard sales or Walmart, 5 came with the trailer we live in. Live in Maids. Very cool. Some days I try and see if I can get them all working at once. They are quiet and normally well behaved. Every once and a while one quits or breaks down and we have to replace it. They never sleep and work even when I'm asleep. They are the only way I can keep up around the house. I love my maids. Just think there was a time when we did not have washers and dryers. Dishwashers and toasters. Breadmakers and electric butter churns. Stoves and fridges. Freezers and dehyrators. Mircowaves and computers. Furnaces and fans. Hot water tanks and electric fences. I'm very thankful for my wonderful maids. And I bet you are thankful for yours:) If your not you should be!!

Yogurt; How to make it the easy way.

I have a couple of hot/cold packs for a zippered pan traveling kit. Comes in very handy for housechurch potlucks. Anyway. I also have a small cooler. And the other day when I wanted to make yogurt agian I realized that the hot pack in the bottom of the cooler would keep them the perfect temp to make yogurt. And it does. I heat my hot pack in the mircowave for 4 minutes. While this is heating I take 4 quart jars and put about a tablespoon of yogurt starter (I buy yogurt that says 'live cultures' on it and use it as my starter) in the jars. Then fill with fresh milk that has not been cooled. Ididn't even have to stir it this way as the milk pouring in stirs it. Then I put the hot pack in the bottom of the cooler (heat rises), put my 4 quart jars of whole milk on top. I do put plastic wrap on the top of the jars. Then I pack towels in around and above the jars and close the lid. The next morning I take my cold pack which I keep in the freezer and I put it on top of the jars. That will cool the jars off enough that they will set. The nice thing about the cold pack (which I have to admit I did not think of. It was Papa) is that you don't have to move the jars at all which gives you a better consistancy of yogurt. Then I took the jars out that night, should have probably done it in the afternoon as the cold pack was barely cool, and put them in the fridge. YUMMMM. We add homemade jam to taste or strain it overnight to get a thicker greek style yogurt and then add jam or syrup to taste and dip fruit or what have you in it. Very good.

Bringing home the Bull

and other fall prep work.
Papa had two days off this week and we made our 'To do' list and went at it. The potatoes got dug up and are drying on the trampoline, the calves went visiting for the winter at a friends house, pretty much all the winter fencing is done, the feeding area is figured and fenced, both the pigs and chickens got moved to new areas (the chickens are cleaning up after the cow). And we brought home the neighbors bull. He's a beaut!! A smaller red bull that may have been Bobbies papa last year. Looking forward to seeing what the will calf look like. I'm kinda hoping for a heifer as we would love to raise our next milk cow from the ground up. The neighbor had him penned when we got there and it was no big deal to get him into our borrowed horse trailer and drive the 5 minutes to our house. But I'm a bit scared/leery of bulls and of course I was the one who had to keep Bindy close to the unloading spot so that our borrowed bull wouldn't head for the hills thinking he was all alone. Oh joy. We had strung up a two strand electric fence so we just pushed the insulators down and backed in the trailer over it. When the bull came out I was suppose to stay in there until he saw Bindy and she saw him. Which made me very nervous. Then I was suppose to hop out and run turn the fence on. Well for all my fears it happened just the way it was suppose to. Bindy took one look at him and rushed him. Which was fine because he was rushing her. They met in the middle and I was already over the fence, pushing up insulators then bolting for the fencer. Papa ran to move the trailer forward and push the insulators back up. Then we stood there and grinned at each other for a moment. LOL. Then we loaded up the calves that we had locked away in the milking area and headed out again. Well no. We stood there and watched the bull, whom so far we are calling Buddy, and made sure he was going to stay put. He does know electric fence a bit and he was very leery of it and is behaving himself nicely. He is people shy so he and I stay away from each other. Which suits us both just fine.


We have started to milk Bindy 2x a day, starting this weekend. Sunday Papa milked almost 8 gallons. I still can hardly believe it. Hopefully Papa will no longer be in camp so we can each milk once a day. Now with the calves gone I will have no backup milkers. This morning I got about 3 gallons. Which is more or less what we thought she would do. My hands must be getting stronger as I only had to stretch them out 3 times this morning. I enjoy having the extra milk as now I can make soft cheeses and yogurt when ever I want. I made yogurt Sunday night and finally found a great way to make it without a lot of hassle. We had yogurt and Basberry Jam this morning. Yum. Basberry, raspberry/blackberry jam is wonderful and I think the new favorite. Even Baby R had some and loved it. Thanks Grandma Griggs!! It's amazing we go thru about a quart per breakfast. The older kids drink it straight from their new cups: spiderman and princess that they got from M's birthday party. J wanted the princess one but E, being a girl got 1st dibs. We are giving any extra milk to the pigs and they love it. They are growing like crazy on milk and whole wheat. They also get garden/house leftovers and weeds. Lucky piggies. This morning I milked straight into a pig bucket as both fridges are full. This afternoon I'll have to go out and empty some jars and feed them as well.


The only big thing left on the list is firewood and that is more of a haul from here and there to bring to the house as we did a lot of that this sping when we cleared two acres. We do want to cut some more dead stuff, pine and spruce, down from the front 2 acres for a better burning wood but that won't take long and will hopefully get done in the next few weekends. Oh and we have to get hay but that we're going to do on Sundays when we housechurch at Millers. We'll just pull our little trailer with us, get loaded up, and unload it during the week. We only need 6 bales and we are at Millers every couple of weekends so it should work. Besides I have a feeling we'll be there more then just Sundays when B&B return:) 15 days to B&B. :):):)

Fridays.

Fridays are big days in the Griggs household in the summer/Fall time. Papa comes home on Fridays. The event we all count down to all week long. Papa has been in camp most of the summer now so we all know the drill. Mondays are hard. Everyone has to 'try' something. Tuesdays are better but also normally 'town' days so exhasting. Stuff starts getting done by Wedensday and we are back on track and well tuned. Thursday we seem to get tons done and have a great time doing it. Then comes Friday and we are super excited all day. Finishing weekday projects, making a big supper, getting ready to welcome him home. Saturday we spend together working as a family to get things ready for the next week. Firewood, Bindy's ration/hay, and this summer 5 weddings and a funeral. It's really no wonder we've gotten very little done on the house this summer. Sundays are a day off. We housechurch with 3 other families and potluck afterwards. Then we come home and nap; all 6 of us. Papa to get ready for a new week of working at 4am. We often have a family movie night/snack night Sunday as we are still full from potluck. Or we may go visiting. Then Monday comes and the count down starts again... Til Friday comes around again and the Griggs Family is whole once more. Soon it will be winter and then Papa will change jobs within his job and we will be together again.. even if it's only for a little while.

Sweet Words

Our daughter E is sick and we are had an early nap. The 3 oldest kids had a quick lunch and after I washed her I picked her up and held her for a minute. She looks at me very seriously and says "I". I'm blank. What? "I" she says again smiling. Then it hits me. Every day before bed I tell E to say "I" say "love" say "you". Waiting in between words so she can mimic me. I tell E "I" She looks at me and smiles. "Say I" she says again. "I" I say. "uve" says my almost 2 year old. "Love" says a very blessed Momma. "You" she finishes. "You" I say. Then she giggles and snuggles for a minute. Then it's off to bed. What a blessing children are.

Ice Cream

The kids and I made homemade ice cream tonight. A sweet dessert to use up the extra cream and give us all a treat. They all love it with chocolate and strawberry syrup. YUM. I always seem to get it a bit on the soft side so they finish it by drinking out of their bowls. E uses a straw and sucks the bowl dry. Now they are 'dancing' by turning in circles for as long as they can before they fall over. J is awesome at this and can do it for hours. Or at least I think he could if I let him. I do not. I get dizzy just watching him. He does not even walk funny after. E on the other hand goes around a few times and goes slower and slower until she's stopped. Then she either falls over giggling, stands still waiting for the world to right it's self, or walks sideways and staggers and giggles until she falls over. They have a blast. L does it a few times then gets bored and goes to find his trucks. Baby R of course loves to watch them from her spot on the floor. She sits there and laughs at them. I love it that my children can play together and enjoy eachothers company with out argueing or complaining. I wonder often if people who refuse to parent their children have moments like these or if their children are always as we see them. Hard to please. Always wanting more and more and more. Always taking but rarely giving. How sad for them if they do not. We are truly blessed to such wonderful children.

The Cow.

We love our cow. She is a Jersey/Holstein cross who looks like a short Holstein with a Jersey face. Her name is Bindy and she gives about 50lbs of milk per day... we think. LOL. Which is about 4.4 gallons if I remember correctly. Papa milked her out one morning and night and weighed the milk. I say we think because we have these two wonderful things called calves. The black one is Billy her calf from this spring and he's got those Holstein legs( you can barely see him in the picture. He's behind Bobby). The red one is Bobby a calf the neighbor gave us this spring. We think he was a twin as he found him in the field and all of his cows had a calf, but no one would take him. So he gave him to us. They are 11 days apart in age. And I like to say 11 inches in height but I've never actually measured. They only ever nurse like (with Billy close to Bindy) this as Bindy still does not like Bobby. She will let them both nurse while she's with them.. but again only like this.

So right now we only milk when we want to or have too:) So take this week. Papa is in camp (gone Mon thru Fri) so the cow is my job. Heck everything is my job. Normally the deal is I milk mornings and Papa milks evenings. I milk while Papa's gone and he milks whenever he's home. Which is great because I almost never have to milk on weekends. But when he's gone all week.. without the calves... I milk morning and night. Thank God for calves. These days I milk mornings because I have more time. Then I kick her out with the calves for the day and go get her at night to teather her at the neighbors patch of grass for the night so that I can milk the next morning.

This morning was a morning for 1sts. I went to get the cow and she was NASTY. So I tied her up to give her a good going over with the hose.. and the hose was froze. Now it was only 0C when I got up but it must have been much colder then that earlier. Fall is here. So I ended up washing her by hand 'shudder'-a 1st for this year. I also had to feed hay for the 1st time this morning. Normally hay is reserved for when there is no grass in a given area and while waiting for the next patch to be ready. (this only happened a few times this year) Or when Bindy was dropping weight in a attemt to keep her weight up. But today there is no more grass anywhere. We might be able to graze a couple of areas one more time, but it's pretty much done for the year. We may have another 1st yet today if it doesn't warm up I may have to make a daytime fire. I did have the oven on for a hour this morning so it's passible in here. With heaters in both bedrooms we keep nice and warm at night.

While getting hay I noticed that Patches, our momma cat, moved her kittens into the bales. Probably for warmth. Which is good because it is farther away from the house where the 2 male cats (Joey and Samson) roam.

Fall is here and it's time to start getting the critters, humans included, ready for winter. Burrr.. I think I may have to light that fire yet.
Gotta go, the Grigglets are up.

Fall Season!!

Well we are right in the middle of fall 'putting up'. We made a trip down south recently and came back with over 1,000 lbs of fruit/vegs. About 3/4 went to family and friends who had made orders and the rest is mine. SO I've been busy canning, drying and doing all the cleaning up that goes with it. So far I've put up 29 quarts of peaches, 1 gallon of dried peaches, 26 quarts of pears, 42 jars of salsa (about 1/3 are quarts) and 10 jars of peach pit jelly. Before we got this I had done raspberry jam, strawberry jam, cherry jam, and cherries. Oh and soup. I still have to finish the pears and peaches (drying the rest), beets, soup, potatoes, apples (sause), peas (shell and Freeze) cabbage and zucinni. Onions and green tomatoes as well. Then of course there is firewood (we are hoping to get it all off our place again this year) and hay hauling and getting the critters ready for winter. Most days I feel like a squirel trying to store enough to keep us fed for the winter.

Yesterday we had a surprise!! I went to the shed to get a tarp to cover the pig feed and I walked in on our cat feeding 2 kittens. They are really cute. About 5 weeks old (we have wondered) and wild. Though they got tamer even as we watched them. One looks just like it's mother (black and white) and the other is orange and white and black. VERY CUTE. Me and J (our oldest Grigglet) went and stood really still until the kittens came out to play. He wants to name the orange/b/w one "Hunter' or "Huntress" As he thinks it will be a great hunter. We are going to start feeding them catfood and milk and see if we can tame them a bit.