Homemade Laundry Soap

Good morning! As Mondays are my scheduled wash day I thought this would be a good post for today.

I got this laundry soap recipe from Sue at Peartree Lane Farmhouse. I could not find her post on it when it came time to make mine up so I emailed her and she graciously sent me the recipe. Thanks, Sue!

My ingredients boxes look a little shabby (...ok, aLOT shabby) but thats because my jug of distilled water for my iron had a pinhole leak and it caused dampness in the sodas.

Anyway, I grated up my 3 bars of Fels Naphta soap and then...

ran it through my blender on the pulse/grate speed.

In the bucket I carefully mixed (being careful not to breathe it in as it creates quite a fine dust as you stir) 4# box of Arm and Hammer soda, 3# 7oz box of Washing soda and 4# borax. After that is combined, I added the blender grated soap and mixed it in.

I keep mine in a 2-gal bucket.

2 of these scoops = 1/4 cup.

I put the soap into a 2-cup measure and run hot water into it to disolve (mostly) and add it to the washer, then pile in my laundry. I have had very good results with this and it saves at about of what commercial laundry soap would cost, of course depending on the brand you buy.

This recipe made 24 cups of soap powder. I use about 1/4 cup for a large load, which means I can wash 96 loads of laundry.and at an average of 4 loads per week, it will last me 24 weeks or half a year.

A Delema or A Blessing??

I am about to do something either very exciting (to me) or something very stupid. Please help me out with your imput.

I have been aware for sonmetime that I cannot drink/use cow milk even from a raw dairy without some stomach upset. Ice cream has also been making me sick as well (I CAN do without the ice cream though). I can do ok with yogurt.

I have just found I can purchase 2 goats (wow! honest-to-goodness dairy goats .... in KY... amazing!! ...... ) (we have raised goats previously for 20+ years in PA) and have fresh goats milk again... YUMMMM! These goats will be fresh early in the spring.

Question.... do I want to go this route again? The 2 x's a day milking?

1.Would probably mean no trips to PA unless the goats were dried off (where my kids and grands live) but then have only been once in 7 yrs anyway...

2. Would be a poss thing for me to look forward to each day. Loved my goats!! plus the milk !! Goats milk is good for you!!

How does one choose what to do??

Just in time for St Patrick's Day!

From this...



to this, in a couple days!



and, BTW, looking at that empty garden plot and that green grass, reminds me ....

This came in the mail a few days ago...



They sure have me pegged!



Wish it were that easy...



but there are some good ideas in this book. I think I will get it from the library and save my $39.95 + shpg and hndlg charges :)

Food Preservation at Our House - part 1

I use many methods of preserving food from our gardens to keep us through the winter months and beyond. I freeze corn, broccoli, melon chunks or balls, grapes; can or freeze green beans; can peaches, pears and applesauce; pickle beets; make saurkraut in the jars; cool-store winter squash and sweet potatoes; and the list goes on .....
This year I am especially enjoying my pepper garden ...... just look at all the colors!


I cut these in strips for fajitas, mixed them with cut up onion, and tossed into freezer bags. Do you know how much this stuff costs in the stores in off season?? Peppers are so easy to freeze.
But they do take up room needed for other things, so ....



I also dehydrated some. This little bag-full came from a good-sized 3-gal pail of peppers!
My oldest daughter now has the dehydrator her grandmother had, an ExCalibur, so last year I bought a new one, same brand, both have 9 trays with a temp control and timer. Great dehydrator!




This morning I was up at 4;45, could not sleep , so I cut up some yellow squash ( great for adding to veg. soups) about 7 small ones, and started them drying.





I also added a sliced roma tomato on one shelf to see how it would turn out.




and there is the finished product. My hubby has also made a mean beef jerky using this dehydrator. That stuff is expensive to buy..... The thing is making sure to get the food dry enough, so mold and bacteria cannot grow.


We did not always have a dehydrator. Years ago I dried my onions, garlic and dry beans on old window screens and covered with cheese-cloth in the sun in the back yard. I hung my herbs from the rafters in the barn loft. Fruit leathers were dried in the oven. As for canning, I had a three burner hot-plate on a home-made stand on the front porch (way out in the country) and made my tomato sauce in a double boiler, one that covered at least 2 burners. One year I canned 700 hundred qts of produce, Well, gracious.... I had 5 children to feed! (#6 came along later) But I never canned that amount after....

We have also canned chicken, rabbit and venison. I may be canning hamburger this year to be able to shut down a freezer and save the utilities. As far as other meat we have also "salt-cured" hams from our home-grown pork... but thats another story ..........

and now I am off to work for a hour on the border of my Grandmother's Flower Garden quilt. A restful end to a busy day!

Processing Chickens (not for the squeamish...)

We like our chickens and they have a good life while they are here, but the time comes for some of them to serve their purpose.... on our dinner-table.

Here in a nut-shell is how we process them. Hubby takes a sharp axe and with a swift blow cuts the head off, immediately rendering the chicken dead. The nerves of the body still cause it to move some for a couple minutes, but no pain is felt as the brain is seperate from the body. This procedure also allows the carcass to bleed out.

We immediately remove the feathers, skin and inerds, and remove the feet and legs to the first joint, then plunge the bird into a 5 gal. bucket filled with cold, cold water. The bucket will hold about 3 good sized birds, and we change the water frequently. After the chickens are butchered we cut them up into pieces; legs, thighs, breast, backs necks and wings, and put on the stove in large pots to cook until the meat starts to fall off the bone.

While it is still hot, we pick the meat off the bones, pack the jars, and pour broth over them.

Processing takes 1 hr and 15 mins for quarts, and 1 hr for pints, even though it has already been thoroughly cooked.

This makes for a wonderful meal that can be gotten ready in short order. It can be used for chicken and noodles, chicken and biscuits, chicken noodle soup, baked chicken cassarole, chicken sandwiches, and the list goes on and on....

We processed 14 quarts from 12 chickens, one did not seal and went to the fridge, and one went in the freezer. But doesn't this look absolutely yummy? We had chicken and noodles for the first meal with a side dish of fresh green beans from the garden. Another side dish of fried apples compliments it well.

D-Day

Today is D-Day for the roasters, er.... roosters, red and black both.

We will be keeping several black hens for layers.

Hubby will do the butchering and I will be cooking, cleaning meat off the bones and canning it up . I wonder how many quarts of chicken meat I will get from 12 chickens??

A Sweet Deal!

Last winter, when we lost our freezer due to power surge during the ice storm, we were able to replace it with this......

It is an "either-or" 13.5 cubic ft freezer/refrigerator. We also got $50 off b/c of being the last one in stock. This means , once we use up most of the food it holds ( right now the last butchered cow) we can move the rest into our regular freezer and use this as a refridgerator at garden time when produce comes in faster than can be processed.

We are looking forward to watermelons, cantalopes, corn, green beans, tomatoes, corn, squash, cabbage, swiss chard, and did I mention corn?? all from our own garden.

On another note ...... I am also looking to go to a harbor freight store and get one of those 3-burner hot plates and hook up to a 20# propane bottle and do my summer canning outside in the carport, instead of heating up my kitchen. Oh, yumm! I could slow cook my spaghetti sauce and pizza sauce all day and still be cool! not to mention vegetable soup to be canned!

No, the power surge did not blow my mind, this is the "real me" talking.

Rain, rain, go away......

I find it hard to believe that here it is the middle of May and the only thing growing in my garden is last fall's garlic sets and weeds! It just has been inpossible with all the rain to be able to plant, and my neighbor tells me her plants have about drowned anyway. The way it is going, the scare-crow may be in the garden before the plants are :/

Meanwhile here are a couple pictures of our garden last year, just to keep me encouraged ......

I had ordered sweet potato plants this year because I like the compact bush variety, which I hope to save some over winter and grow my own slips next spring ..... but I am getting way ahead of myself. The plants came on Monday and the ground was barely dry enough last night to get them in the ground. We had heavy thunderstorm rains this morning so I hope they will survive. So now there are 3 things in my garden

Plans are to plant when possible, and I am hoping for another shot at cool weather crops in the fall. The areas that don't get planted will be broadcast with buckwheat seed to grow and be tilled in to feed the soil.

We humans like to think we are in control of our lives, and until a little thing like rain lets us know better. We may as well choose to be happy :) and just do the best we can. I am going to!

I choose to be happy with whatever I can get in my garden and not worry about the rest.

Flower Art

Last Saturday's creations......

These look a little drab to me against the block wall, so I will be adding something to "spruce it up" a bit.

This week-end's project

Can you guess what these are for?

I really like using what is at hand, or what I can get for "cheap".

Have a great week-end everyone!

And may all your gardening efforts flourish!

Power Restored

Late Sunday afternoon they arrived; Four trucks in all, three electric service trucks and one flat-bed carrying poles.

Electric service trucks had come from the great state of Tennessee to Kentucky to help restore service to thousands of homes whose power had been been out from the ice storm. Our area was one of the fortunate ones who had been without power only 6 days. Others may be without til the first of March, we are being told.We are grateful for the restoration of electric power........for our neighbors. For us it was kind of a let-down, another "great adventure" that had ended too quickly.

Thawing Out.... (Pictures added)

Little icicles have been falling all day, slowly at first , then as the day wore on, like cascades of shimmering swords! Still, the sounds of breaking branches and limbs are being heard, and the sight is not so pretty in places. The once elegant trees around our beautiful farm now look tattered and worn, broken by the weight of the frozen liquid that feeds them in other seasons of the year.

Still, I am content knowing that spring is just around the next corner and with it, new growth that will cover the ugly brokeness. and as the sun comes out and melts the ice, the trees once again will lift their branches toward their Maker, free of the icyness that held them bound.

Hummmm....... kind of like us when the Son gets ahold of our hearts, softening them: making them warm, tender and clean again, we are free to praise and magnify our wonderful Lord and Saviour, Jesus!

Ice-Age update

The Southern States truck made it in this morning, over down wires on the lane, to deliver our rabbit feed. We had to go out last night to get a new freezer as our 20-yr-old one quit due to starting and stopping so much. The ice on the trees was an amazing sight in the headlights, looking like diamonds big as golf balls! Where the road winds down a long hill, huge tree branches were hanging down in the middle of the road. It was like running an obstacle course for about 2 mles, dodging and turning from one side of the road to the other. We are supposed to warm up to near 40 today and a little more the next, so we may get some thawing , but we hear more winter weather is on its way. This is such fun!

Dear hubby rigged up a power inverter unit that he used to have in the semi, to the battery out of the car, to run power to the laptop and the Hughes-Net so business can go on in the office as usual...... ALL day. Yep , back to work! You all have a great day. Stay warm, Kathleen in TX, Amy in OH, and of course my daughters,in PA.

The Ice Age!!! (Pictures added)

I woke about 4am yesterday to snapping and cracking sounds, some loud enough to sound like firecrackers, others like gunshots. The ice storm had hit with brutal force! No electric, no internet, no dishwasher (yeah!!!) but we did have water b/c its county fed, needs no electric; and wood stove to heat and cook on, kerosene lantern for light, flash lights, candles, and plenty of food. And .... the generator we had bought in preparation of Y2K.... Here we are, almost 40 hrs after power outage, staying warm, cozy, well-fed and content!
We took showers early as the hot water was not going to last, then we checked the rabbit barn and found them just fine. Chickens doing okay too. I grabbed my camera and started taking pictures while hubby got to work and fired up the generator to keep our freezer and fridge going. The scenery was absolutely beautiful......

...........except, my little trees where my bird-feeding station is next to the house are all bowed and bent over, heavy with ice.

The little pin-oak tree in the front yard is laden down so heavy the branches almost touch the ground. Ice covers every thing! The barb-wire fence looks like pipes!

The gigantic trees about 50' from the house on the edge of the ravine are bowed down towards the house. There is snapping and cracking ocassionally down through the woods where trees branches are breaking off due to the weight of the ice.
Day 2
As of last night the power lines are down( as in "on the ground" down...), in the pastures on both sides of the driveway, across the neighbors driveway and ours. The electric pole at the end of our driveway had snapped off about 20' up, from the weight of ice on the lines. Michelle's electric pole is lifted out of the ground and balancing very precariously, held in place by 1 wire. It is that way all over our area for miles!
Day 3This morning was even worse as we got an added 2-3"snow to add to the weight of the ice on the trees. I wanted to take more pictures but thought twice about going near the heavy trees in my side yard! .
We will have internet about 4 hrs /day while the generator runs. But I can't post any pics (only write as I can only use lap-top now) as ...... guess what...... my new computer spewed its innerds b/c of power surge when generator first went on. We also lost 3 phones, DVD/VCR player, and battery rechargers for power tools. Those things can be replaced. I am glad of the way of life we have chosen to live, and that all the years leading up to now have us well equipped to deal with this weather. We are so blessed to work out of our own home. We can hunker down and wait out the storm.
In this neighborhood, we all have an eye out for each other.We can shower at Tracy's, and they are using our camping stove to cook on. Mike and Rita were out early cutting trees off the roads. They were given some kindling wood for their fireplace by Rodney who works installing hardwood floors. DH offered them a load of tree wood also for their fireplace. I am glad for the neighbors we have, and thankful to God for bringing us here to live. More later......