Thursday, February 7, 2013

Laura Ingalls Wilder's birthday :-)

In honor of today being Laura Ingalls Wilder's birthday,
I thought I'd share some pictures from when 
I got to visit Rocky Ridge Farm. :-)


Way back in April of 2006,
Mr. H. had a business trip to Missouri.
We were homeschooling at the time,
so the kids and I went along with him
as we often did. 
 On the way, we got to stop in Mansfield 
at Rocky Ridge Farm.
The farm was the home for many years of
Laura Ingalls Wilder, author of my beloved
"Little House" books. :-)


Here I am sitting on the stump of a tree that
Almanzo and Laura planted.  
It blew down during a storm and
I actually got a piece of it from the gift shop
while we were there.


We were able to tour inside the farm house
and I loved every minute of it.
It was so neat to walk through the home
where Laura had written the "Little House" books.
No pictures were allowed to be taken inside though.


Here we are on the front porch,


and on the back steps.


We also toured 
Rose Wilder Lane's
Rock House


and stopped by the cemetery in Mansfield
where the Wilder's were laid to rest.

It was a wonderful visit!

Saturday, January 19, 2013

Growing Piggies


Hank the Durco is growing.
He is very docile.
SO different from Willie the Yorkshire Cross
and Waylon the Hampshire Cross that my daughter raised last year!


He and LuLu get along very well and sleep side by side
under the heat lamp every night.


LuLu thinks he's her boyfriend. ;-)

Thursday, January 17, 2013

Look what came in the mail today! :-)


My original recipe for
is on page 197. :-)

My post has been repinned 93 THOUSAND times on 

Saturday, January 12, 2013

Homemade Dishwasher Detergent


I've been using my 
for almost two years now 
and couldn't be happier with it.
Love it.
I decided to take the plunge and mix up some
homemade dishwasher detergent.
The only thing I needed to buy was a bottle of
Lemi Shine.  I had everything else on hand at home.


The results weren't quite what I hoped.  
I used it for about a week, with vinegar as a rinse aide,
and my dishes seemed clean, but they had a film and just 
didn't look sparkly to me. 


I'm planning to do some more research 
and tweaking this summer.
If anyone has had great success 
with homemade dishwasher detergent
please feel free to leave me a comment with suggestions!

Laying Again


Around Thanksgiving each year my hens begin to molt and kind of "go on strike" for awhile.
Eggs are hard to come by for a few months.
But usually sometime around mid January,
egg production starts up again,
and we can have scrambled eggs for breakfast
whenever we'd like 
and I don't have to ration my eggs for baking.

As a side note, I have been raising chickens for almost three years now.
My original flock started laying in January of 2011,
and in two years of egg production I have needed to buy only three dozen eggs 
to supplement my supply.
And I had free coupons for 2 cartons of them!

Tuesday, January 1, 2013

Pasta

Sandwiches

Desserts

Beverages

Appetizers

Side Dishes

Canning


Main Dish - Chicken

Tropical Lime Chicken

*crock pot recipe

Muffins

Blueberries and Cream Muffins
Blueberry Muffins with Streusel Topping
Breakfast in a Muffin
Brown Sugar Oat Muffins
Busy Day Bacon Muffins
Cappuccino Muffins
Cheddar Sausage Muffins
Chocolate Chip Banana Muffins
Chocolate Chip Muffins
Coffee Cake Muffins
Country Cornbread Muffins
Cranberry Crumb Muffins
Cranberry Muffins
Cream Cheese Cranberry Muffins
Cream Cheese Pumpkin Muffins
Fresh Peaches and Cream Muffins
Harvest Morning Muffins
Healthy Blueberry Muffins
Healthy Carrot Muffins
Homestyle Cheese Muffins
Honey and Spice Banana Muffins
Lemon Streusel Muffins
Magic Muffins
Monkey Muffins
Morning Glory Muffins
Morning Maple Muffins
Orange Cranberry Nut Muffins
PB & J Muffins
Peaches and Cream Muffins
Poppy Seed Muffins
Pumpkin Oat Muffins
Raspberry Lemon Muffins
S'mores Muffins
Strawberry Banana Muffins
Strawberry Cheesecake Muffins
Strawberry Streusel Muffins
Touch of Spring of Muffins
Two Ingredient Pumpkin Muffins

Gifts from the Kitchen



Candies


Scones


Breakfast


Cookies, Brownies, and Bars


Happy New Year


Our traditional New Year's Day cinnamon rolls
started off 2013 at Heritage Schoolhouse.


Can you think of better way to start of a new year? :-)


We sure can't.

because it is simply the best.
This year I shared four pans with my neighbors
and my family of four took care of the other two pans without too much effort. ;-)

Happy New Year from my family to yours! :-)