4 Sweet Sisters

You know you're famous when...... You're in the shower. School is supposed to be done for the day and isn't. The phone rings, you hear children making a mad dash to try out their phone manners. At the same moment hear strange squawking coming from the backyard. Is a chicken down? Has hawk snatched her? Ahhhh . Fame and motherhood. Next your beautifully mannered offspring are screaming through the bedroom and bathroom doors, " Mister Jemanybbbdko Camp dell is on the phone." Your screaming, "WHAT?", back through the shower walls. Finally one of your children creeps in and repeats the garbled name. You say, "please take a message. I'm in the shower right now!" You hear the patter (trampling) of 7 and 11 year old feet leaving. Only to be replaced by 17 1/2 year olds easy glide. "Mom, Jeremy Campbell from Fox 13 News is on the phone and would like to do an interview with you this evening. It's about our chickens and how the city is a...

After a busy week of school, soccer games, dehydrating and canning; I'm a bit tired. Fall through early spring is truly the busy season for garden harvesting, pumpkin bread business and holidays here. For some reason every year it takes me by surprise! We've gotten most of the gardens in, had plenty of rain and are now fighting the varmints and the chickens. Don't those chickens realize a third of the garden is for them? If they eat it now they'll never get to taste those big lovely collard leaves! On the subject of chickens this is the first time that we've had almost our who crew molt at the same time. That means we have been getting less than 3 eggs a day from 12 girls in the past month or so. It's been a bit disappointing. We really use a lot of eggs here. I usually keep 4 dozen at all times in my refrigerator. Right now I' have about 8 eggs. I really don't want to buy eggs. Hopefully we are coming to the end. We have a lot of featherless hens out th...

We've been making water kefir soda (WKS) for a couple of months now and I've learned a lot. 1. Make a fermenting container . Really important if you plan on making WKS! check this out 2.Play with the types of natural sugars out there: a) Sucanat - It was our sugar of choice because of the being rich in minerals. We found that it has to pungent of a flavor for making WKS. It actually ends up tasting more like a beer. We even tried adding more fruit syrup but it became over carbonated and we would ended up with exploded bottles! ** We do use it whenever we think our kefir needs a little extra feeding.** b) Sucanat with Honey - Much lighter flavor but it does have honey in it which can kill your Kefir and it's price is well to pricey now. c) Turbinado or Raw Sugar - This seems to have just the right amount for daily use. We tend to taste more of the flavor of the fruit syrup and less molasses. WKS taste like a sparkling fruit cider with this sugar. 3. Leave a good 3 inch head ...

My good friend Angela over at Loving Legacy was cleaning out her fabric stash a couple of months ago. Whenever she does this my 4 sweeties seem to come to her mind. It seems someone is always creating something around here. In this batch of odds and ends there was some very country looking patchwork fabric that the Little Chef just fell in love with. Not her usual style or colors but she really liked it! She even said it would be sooooo nice to have a skirt made out of it. I ended up having a free evening and this is what was created. She was so surprised. It's very simple. I was in no mood for a pattern. I doubled her waist size and tripled it (waist size) for the ruffle. I used and inch and a half more elastic than her waist. I wanted her to have at least 2 years out of the skirt. The Little Chef really likes it. We went out shopping last night and she wanted to wear it. She said it just somehow makes her feel different then when she wears it, even more so than a dress or skorts...

Yes, I do occasionally ponder things (okay usually way to much). So much so that I can miss the big picture because I'm stuck on a small blemish. If you feel I'm talking in code I may be (and do I even understand it?). This past weekend I squeezed in a fluffy novel about a newspaper owner who was being forced out of town by a set of Good O'l Boys. This newspaper woman loved to serve others because of her love of the Lord. Not from compulsion or legalism but for the shear joy of trying to ease someone elses burden. She was by no means a perfect herself. I needed this story. It reminded that love comes in many different ways, from a kind word and quick pray to feeding the homeless. Forward to yesterday. I have been struggling with some decisions we are going to need to make. Small blemishes compared to the Lord's big picture. I have been concentrating on myself so much and how it was all going to work out! While I was on the tread mill it hit me. Have I really learned...

I'm not sure if I should show you the picture or not. I tweaked a recipe from Tammy's Recipes and it is quite tasty. BUT (and it's kind of a big BUT) the color is just not right. So the pepperoni looks a little grey (gross) but again taste SUPER! So here goes nothing.... nitrate free pepperoni See how gray it looks? That's because I used Real Salt (sea salt) instead of curring salts which have all the nitrates and fake pink color (they do this so people won't mistake it for table salt). That pink dye also gives sausages of all types that nice color we are all so used too. All the flavor was still in there and I figured if I'm making this homemade I want it to be as healthy as possible for my family. So why would I add the nitrates? Because I didn't use the pink salt I can't just leave this out in my pantry like you could with some of the store bought stuff. If you do to try this recipe and decide to go "all natural" please make sure that you ...

That's right no excuses anymore for why I'm not blogging more frequently ( I'm secretly itching to make excuses but I won't). It's just our life right now. We have been super busy. While everyone elses summer gardens are winding down we are gearing up for our 1st big planting of the season. Fall/ winter here at our home usually starts out our growing season, followed by winter/ spring planting. Next summer I'm hoping to plant our beds full of sweet potatoes as our ground cover. This summer we added a large 3 1/2 x 24 foot bed to the front of our house behind the white picket fence we installed this summer. Lots of little yummy veggies are starting to poke their heads up :) We had intended to use a old work table to make a salad table, but I think it is way past it's prime and would take to much shoring up. So we've decided to either make a new raised bed out of pallets (if we can get our hands on some) or small round swimming pools ($7 a piece). I need m...

For some reason I've been thinking there is sunflower seeds in 7 grain mix. Anyhow I finally looked it up and here is what is really in 7 grain mix. Hard wheat, soft wheat, oats, triticale, barley, rye and spelt. I like using this mix for granola/cereal bars. Here's my recipe. 1 1/2 sticks butter (melted or softened) 2 teaspoons vanilla 1 teaspoon sea salt 1 cup honey 1/2 raw sugar, sucanat etc. 2 eggs 1 cup of re hydrated coconut (very wet) 6 cups 7 grain rolled cereal mix or rolled oats 1 cup raisins 1 cup sunflower seeds 1 (scant) cup chocolate chips 1 cup (approximately) oat flour (grind up oats quickly in blender) You can add or exchange all these ingredients. When I'm going Gluten Free I just use oats and seeds. The mixture should be wet. Pat into a large cookie sheet. Bake at 350 degrees for 30 to 40 minutes. Cut bars, let cool in pan. Wrap individually or box up. I love them out of the freezer! Enjoy, Julie

I know I'm getting behind in updates again, but the Great Room Swap of 2011 has wiped me out. I've almost condensed 3 room into 2! I'll show pics once I finish getting this next school year wrapped and ready to go. That being said I wanted to share with you what happened this Sunday. As you know from my last post we have been testing and taste testing kefir soda and water. Friday night Superman and I put together a batch of each. Tinkering with the flavor of the soda. He was excited to have a taste on Sunday after church. As you can see from the first photo things did not go as planned! Sunday after church we opened the front door to the the stinky smell of sweet, cherry cheese. My first thought was, "wow that kefir is really fermenting strong this time". Until I reached our kitchen and found this..... Praise the Lord no one was in the kitchen when it happened. The bottle as you can see was shattered with shards strewn into the dining area. What a stinky me...

Take a look at the results of our first try at making Kefir Cream Soda. So simple and only to 2 days to go from kefir water to soda. Have you ever made Kefir Soda and do have a favorite recipe? Julie

I've used coupons here and there ever since we've had children. As I mentioned before we do most of our shopping through co-ops and warehouse stores, but there are some things I just can't get there or I have to buy to much of said item. That's were coupons come into play. With coupons, sale prices and BOGOs sometimes its a better deal at my neighborhood grocery store. Last week I had the privilege of attending a free True Couponing seminar. It was wonderful timing with our buying club taking a break for the whole summer! Basically I learned that I need to be getting more papers so that I have more coupons to work with. I don't have the time or inclination to go dumpster hunting for extra coupons, so having extra papers delivered to my door step at 50 cents a piece is a much better option for me. I also learned a super easy way to store these piles of paper. I had all the needed supplies to make my storage unit an immediate success ! That's one of the things ...

Does anyone remember my lovely craft room that Superman created for my birthday a couple of years ago? Click here , if you need a reminder. Well today my lovely room that has been continually abused and misused is changing. It's becoming the School Room. Superman still isn't sure about all of this...the house is torn apart and quite frankly I'm a bit nervous myself. I'll post the finish projects (there are 3 intertwind) next week or so. My goal is to have the two and 1/2 basics done by Saturday! See you Soon. Julie

I've deciced to link up with the Shabby Nest for this post. Read here and fly over and enjoy all the frugality there ! I started thinking about this post months ago and have just not gotten around to it. Back in winter sometime our 2nd microwave went on the fritz (we've had 2 in 7 years-different models). Maybe it was due to poor quality or maybe it was because of all the rice bag wraps we were heating up before bed. I tend to think it was the first though. Our first thought when this happened was google it up and check the best deal on a microwaves. We did and found one for about $160 new from one of the box store. We would have to take the money out of our emergency fund and we were okay with that. I mean not having a microwave is an emergency in the biggest way! Right? Uh, no. I'll admit for about 5 minutes or so it was (ya know when we were googling). But then I decided to try and live without a micro. for a week and see how we did. The week turned into two and I star...

I was reading over at Heavenly Homemakers yesterday about using coconut flour in place of whole wheat. Hmmm . I am wheat grinder from way back and the thought of trying new lower carb flour substitutes wasn't very appealing to me until about a year ago. (I mean why fix what isn't broken right?) Then some close friends of ours had some of there children diagnosed with wheat gluten intolerance and now I've been thinking of ways to make healthy treats for them. I'm a baker at heart. Anyway, Laura at HH was discussing how much she loves Coconut Flour. (She's a wheat grinder also) So I was wandering if I could take my unsweetened coconut shreds and grind them into flour? I googled it and found some amazingly looonnng process. Not for me! So I went for it ( because I really didn't want to go and clean the school room out). Here's what I did: -I place about 1 cup of shreds into my blender and blended and blended. *I had thought about my wheat grinder because...

Ugh! Can I just say it gain? Uuuugghhhh . This what our garden looked like last fall. If you look at the top of the picture you can see the girlies swing set. The "ladies" coop used to be there. We moved it to the back of our garden now that we have more room. (We bought a section that didn't come with our original lot.) To be fair the area above is so barren because that is where the swimming pool sits. It's back up now but the "ladies" did almost the same thing to the rest of the garden over the winter and spring. Any ideas on what we should do with this site in the fall? I had planned a fire ring, but I really don't think it will be used much. Still thinking this idea through. We purchased this fence almost 2 years ago when one of the do-it-yourself stores had them on sale. The ladies love going onto our neighbors property but they also liked to wander up the next street. We had a long term plan for this fence. We knew eventually our neighbors-to-...

Today over at Smockity Frocks she's asked the question of what mistakes we've learned from in our gardens this year. After you're finished here jump over there and read all the link ups! ( I wish I knew how to put her cute garden picture up.) The biggest lesson I've learned is that our tomatoes need acid! See look at how gorgeous and green these plants are but there are no blossoms or fruit. I think the problem is this from all the research I've done and the soil testing. I mean we did add about 2500 lbs of composted horse manure last fall. We've large tomato plants and out of the 10 plants we have gotten 2 tomatoes. Ugh! Very frustrating..... We plan on adding lime in the next month or so before fall planting in September. Which is like spring planting for those of you who live up north. Are seasons are fall/winter and winter/spring. The other thing I noticed today were the blue jays landing in the tomato bushes. I need to find out if they may be eating the ...

I really enjoy how the English use the English language. My favorite right now is the use of the word garden. It sounds so much prettier than backyard, although I do like a good back yard b-b- q ! If any of you have chickens and live in the city or suburbs you know that they pretty much take up all of your garden space. They love to hunt frogs and lizards , scratch for bugs, worms and dig holes. Oh no one told you of the holes they dig? That's so they can lounge in a refreshing dirt bath. Yah . Know one prepared me for that part. Consider yourself warned if thinking cute fuzzy chicks. In all seriousness we love our girls (the hens and the girlies that live in the house). I just have gotten soooo tired of walking out onto the back deck or anywhere else in the garden and stepping in slimmy poo. So this will be the first installment of taking the garden back. Superman (remember the guy and his shirt from yesterday?) built and put this screened room up for me two Mother's Day...

First off I rarely say much about this handsome man. He is an extrovert living in an introvert's body. If that makes any sense. He is the one who keeps me sane, picks me up when I'm down and breaks things into bite size pieces when I all I can see is the huge snowball ready to plough me over! Ah, snow... sounds nice about now. Anyway this man is the perfect for me. (He can be pretty romantic too.) But this post is not about him. It's about one of his favorite shirts. Please Read Here's a close up in case you missed it. Our two oldest girlies bought this for him on our Tennessee trip two years ago. He brings it out when he feels like making a statement. Sometimes at youth group meetings, the beach, trips to Costco and most recently to the Florida Homeschool Convention. Anywhere there may be many young men around and our daughters are about. ( Yep, he loves them a lot :) Here's a close up Well everywhere he went at the convention he got stares, people asking hi...

It's time to get crafting! I find that my younger girlies really like to craft almost anything. My older girlies do it with more purpose. They need to be motivated. Hopefully they'll have clutter free homes. We decided that every Friday would be Craft Day here at our home. Opening the house to friends and practicing a bit of hospitality. This is a very laid back event. Other than the fancy punch bowl and dessert. What we've made so far: rosettes, rings, headbands and pin cushions. Here's a few pictures of our pin cushions. Very simple project: Scraps of fabric, elastic, pillow stuffing, needle and thread. Cut 2 rounds of fabric. One the size of a bowl and the other the size of a drinking glass. Stitch around each circle on the outer 1/4 inch edge. Make sure you're smiling it makes it more fun! Stuff larger circle with pillow fluff and pull ends of thread together tying it off. At this point I sewed more stitches to make sure it would stay. It doesn't have to ...

Whew! What a day. I've haven't been doing much baking lately. I've just needed a break. I've made the occasional batch of cookies and granola bars but nothing like today. Yup, my family has been eating bread from the bakery store. I've been able to get the $4.50 loaves of good bread for a dollar per loaf. So I took a much needed break. But alas the prices are going up and my Husband has really needed some home baking. His favorite, whole wheat chocolate chip cookies. He really likes the with dark chocolate. I used to make up 14 dozen raw cookie dough balls and freeze them, but I found that we(I) like to eat frozen raw cookie dough. hmmm A small batch of whole wheat banana chocolate chip muffins. I want to get some millet ones done and coconut. Bread rising in the background and breakfast biscuits. Here's a list of everything I accomplished: 7 dozen chocolate chip cookies 1 1/2 dozen banana chip muffins 6 loaves of whole wheat bread ( about a 50 cents per l...

Here's my curriculum plan for this up coming school. My goal is to get everyone organized and planned in the next 2 weeks so that I can have 6 weeks to play and have fun. We will be starting back to school on August 1st. Yippee! 12th garde: Alpha Omega Consumer Math- 1 credit Notgrass Economics - .5 credit Notgrass American Gov't - .5 credit Movies as Literature - 1 credit Body by Design, The Reproductive System & Children's Apologia Anatomy -she is surveying this course and teaching it to her younger sisters. she doesn't need the credit. Rosetta Stone French year 2 - 1 credit 8th grade: Tapestry of Grace year 3 (literature, Bible and history) Alpha Omega Consumer Science - 1 credit Artistic Pursuits - 1 credit Rod and Staff English Rod and Staff Reading Apologia Physical Science - 1 credit Teaching Textbooks Pre Algebra Rosetta Stone French or Sign Language (class) - 1 credit 5th grade: Tapestry of Grace year 3 Rod and Staff English Rod and Staff Reading Rod and St...

Warning~ There are a lot of pictures in this post. Look at your own risk. This year we splurged and went to the Florida Parent Educator Association's Homeschooling Convention. We haven't been in about 5 years. Reasons:1) We needed to put more of our money to curriculum use in years past. 2) We didn't have a vehicle that we felt could make it there and back. 3) It was no longer being held at our favorite hotel. 4)I knew what curriculum I liked and have stuck with. This still holds true and I felt a bit guilty going for nothing? Not so. So here's what we did to stay at the 5 star luxury Gaylord Palms Hotel. We saved moo la every month for a number of months. We saved money out for gas, dinners, and brought everything else from home. Breakfast , lunch, and snacks. I printed out all my curriculum needs and wants with Internet prices for comparison. We also reminded the girls frequently to save their pennies for the trip. Lots of fun goodies for children to buy. It was so ni...