Aleaha's Blog: January 2015

Saturday, January 31, 2015

Miri Says

Mommy: What do you think you will want to do when you grow up?

Miri: I want to be a teacher and a horse rider and work at HP.

Mommy: Ah, well then, you will need to go to college. What will you study there?

Miri: Um, cursive. Oh, and I think algebra. And other languages, like French.

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While walking back from the barn one night....

Miri: Hey, is The Big Saucer out tonight?

Mommy: Huh?

Miri: You know, that saucer thing in the sky. That you use to get water.

Mommy: You mean The Big Dipper?

Miri: Yeah, like I said, The Big Dipper.

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Overheard in the car, as the conversed about where they were going to live....

Miri: Aleaha, we have to get married on the same day! So that our kids will be born on the same day and be the same age!

Aleaha: What do you want to name your kids?

Miri: Tom. Or Tommy. Or Thomas. And Samuel. Yup. That's it!

Friday, January 23, 2015

Kitchen Projects

We just love to make homemade pasta. Here they are, whipping up a batch of spaghetti.

I never get an argument from them about this activity.

And we've been teapartying too! Here we made a little surprise for Daddy one Sunday, with a few savories and sweets. Aleaha feels it's just not a tea party if you don't serve cucumber sandwiches, so those are always on the menu.

A Craft with Holly

While Holly and I were doing the lard, the girls were entertained with a special project Holly brought for them to do -- glass ball ornaments. Ooooo, were they excited!

They used a funnel to put sand into the ball first, and then they arranged small seashells on top of the sand. Miri wondered if she might be able to hear the ocean.

They LOVED this project. Thank you, Holly!

Lard Almighty

Over the Christmas Break, we rendered the lard. I had decided to use a menagerie of smaller jars this year, because the quart jars last year were generally too much to handle at one time. I prefer the smaller ones.

We kept 2 hogs in 2014, but we rendered the lard from just one (gave the fat from the other away to a friend for use in his venison sausage). This was just over 21 pounds. It was a good sized batch to work with.

Holly managed all the grinding. We keep the fat in the freezer until it's time to render. But we must remember next time to let it thaw a bit more, as it's too hard to cut and grind if it's too frozen or too soft.

The outside method worked great. We were completely done and cleaned up in 2.5 hours, which was better than the 6 hour marathon of last year.

We ended up with 24 varied-sized jars of lovely lard and 3 quarts of cracklins. The lard is in the freezer, and the birdies -- cold from the freezing spell of that week -- enjoyed the cracklins.

Family Time

We took a walk in the woods and snapped a photo along the way.

And another day we took a drive, just to get out for a bit. The girls reveled in the play structure.

Cool tree. Hot Daddy.

Horseplay

While we were mucking the stall, we moved Jake and Arby into the other area of the paddock. It was a real rodeo for a little while. Arby, who had been separated from Quigly and Shorty by an electric fence, really wanted reach out and touch someone.

He got a little too personal.

So Quigly put an end to that! If you can't tell by the body language, Arby was quickly removing his face from a near-miss with Quigly's back foot. It would have been a well-deserved event, if Quigly had actually made contact. I don't think he fully intended to kick Arby, but he had to get pretty threatening in order to get he message across. Arby is just not one for subtle clues.

Cold Spell

Over Christmas Break, Aleaha and Mommy had been attempting to muck out one of the stalls at the barn, but with the mud so deep and soft, it was nearly impossible. But we were gifted with a cold snap, which was welcomed by us, as it we found it much easier to use the wheelbarrows and not sink in the mud.