Basil cubes

Rooting through the freezer to make the evening meal, I came across my bag of frozen basil. When I have excess basil, I puree it in oil and a little lemon juice. I even throw some of the stalk in there since it is pureed, it just increases the basil taste. I then freeze them in ice cube trays and keep them in a bag in the freezer. They are great for tossing into pasta, throwing in soup, making pesto. They add a fresh basil taste to anything you put them in. Dried basil just does not have the same taste or smell. So if you have an extra basil bounty this garden season, I can not recommend this enough. It is the best thing to fresh. Come winter you will be so glad you did.

What was I thinking?

Now that the weather is warm and there are bugs emerging, I let my fowl out to free range during the day. Being the good little birds that they are (hardy har har), after they get their bellies full they head  back to the coop. But I have noticed as they get close to the coop, they start to squawking and sending out the predator alarm. They scatter and head for cover. I look all around  but can not find the raptor who is stalking my birds. This happened a few times until the light bulb finally went off in my head. What did I learn?

Don't install your wind turbine next to the chicken coop.

If the wind is even blowing at a few miles an hour, it is enough to make the fins spin and scare the poop out of my birds. As far as they know there is a massive eagle looming about 30 feet over the coop.

Oops.

Passing on the pump

There is a great brouhaha going on now over the rising fuel prices at the pump. It is a very sad affair since so much of the current economy balances on crude prices. Not much in modern life is unaffected by fuel costs. But I have to say, that since we have decided to become as self sufficient as possible, fuel costs have less effect on our daily life. I do not need to drive to a job to make money to buy goods made with petroleum and shipped here using mass amounts of diesel. I know that there is no crude oil used in our home food production since we grow it all right here.  I do not use chemical fertilizers(petroleum) nor do I buy food that comes wrapped in plastic(petroleum) and is trucked, flown, or shipped in(petroleum). Growing our own food and producing our own electricity, heat, and hot water has released us from so many of the shackles that the oil industry has wrapped around our legs. My only non elective trip is to the feed store, which I am hoping to need to make less trips per year by growing more of our own animal feed.  I am finding that a tank of gas is lasting over two months for me this time of year. And that can be cut even further if I condense more trips and go without a few things.

Now that is not to say there are not a few downfalls to a self sufficient life. Meeting most of your needs from your own homestead requires that you, in fact, spend a lot of time on that homestead. And most of that time will be spent working very hard. Staying home can make you a little restless at times. Your interaction with humans can become limited and you don't look to outside sources for entertainment. So you can soon find that it is no fun to play poker with just the dogs since they always give away a good hand with a wagging tale. And the fowl try to eat the cards. And don't even get me started on the spirited conversations I have with the horses on politics and government protocol. Those horses can be as stubborn on their views as...well... mules! In case you were wondering, most horses do not stand with the right or left wing, but prefer the rear hoof approach to economics. 

All joking, and my cabin fever aside, each little step we can take to produce more for ourselves or supporting the small business and farms in your neighborhood can work wonders in freeing yourself from the grip of the gas pump.  We can not wait for the government or big oil, who is making billions a day on this, to offer us any relief. We have to reexamine our lives and see what we can produce ourselves or do without. True Independence starts at home.

Musical doors

I only have the one sibling, a brother, so growing up there were really no hand-me-downs. We wore different things and played with different things. But I am starting to get a feel of what it must have been like living with ten siblings and each item of clothing getting altered for the next kid down the ladder. Nothing going to waste. That is how I feel about all these doors. As you may remember I got a brand NEW front entry door for our house just a few weeks ago. We kept the OLD entry door and I needed to replace these doors.

So now our OLD house entry door is the NEW entry door to the pumphouse where I have my outdoor kitchen and do all our cooking on the wood cook stove. Of course it needs painted and the screen door hung yet. But we are progressing. These type of alterations take time, or so I am told by the homestead foreman - my Husband.

So now I have the OLD pumphouse doors that still appear to have some life left in them. Time to hand those doors down to the chicken coop. These doors are hanging on by a thread and closing them at the end of the day involves crossed fingers that they do not drop right off the hinges. I actually need a whole new coop, but that is a problem for another day. But the buck will stop here as these OLD doors are only going to be handed down to the burn pile. Hey, I am not a magician.

Speaking of the pumphouse remodel, we were able to find this tiny little show sample window on the right at a flea market. Isnt it cute? A real double pane window only made small scale for demonstration purposes. This is the window that I am going to install an exhaust fan into so in the winter we can blow warm air from our wood cook stove into the greenhouse to add a little heat to it. The area on the left is where the fan will go, but for now we have a piece of Plexiglas filling the hole until we size the right solar exhaust fan and duct work. This tiny window will still allow me to open it for even more ventilation in the summer. Summer + wood cook stove + tons of canning = needing the most ventilation you can get.

The only problem with hand-me-down recycling is that you create  even more projects for yourself. Unable to finish one before another rears up behind it.   Projects multiply like rabbits on a homestead. They are just far less cute.

Tomato soup

I have a fantastic tomato soup recipe that goes together in minutes. And no, Andy Warhol has never come by to take a picture of my soup jars, although I think canning jars are much prettier than the commercial, chemical filled brand he chose as a muse. (On a side note, my Father actually was friends with Andy Warhol's Brother who had a little farm of his own. The Brother got into art himself later in life, and I remember that once he took his chickens, dipped their feet in paint, and let them run across the canvas. Needless to say, he never had the appeal of his brother, but I would have loved the chicken foot painting much more)

So back to the soup.

I saute half of an onion in a little oil or butter in a soup pot. 

Then you will need:

1 quart of tomato juice

2 cups of milk ( I use only whole, non homogenized milk so it adds a lot of richness)

1 pint of fire roasted red peppers (I roast these on the grill before I pressure can them. They come in so handy throughout the year. Mental note, I must make many more this year.)

I puree the onions with the jar of peppers in a blender with:
2 TB of flour
1 tsp salt
dash of pepper

Add the pepper puree, tomato juice, and milk back to the soup pot and heat. You can add whatever herbs you like, but I keep it kinda plain to really let the roasted red pepper flavor come out.

Mmm-mmm-better!

What graces our coffee table.

I have had many questions about what publications we subscribe to and read here on the Homestead. This is our current list. Now you might see a theme here, and let me first say that I do not particularly have a great affinity of the Amish community. They have some beliefs and practices that I do not agree with. That being said, they are the closest community that lives a similar off grid life to what we do, compared to the rest of the Western world.  We learn a few helpful tips from these publications and they have advertising for many off grid products and Amish businesses  that can not be found anywhere else. They also do not have articles mentioning politics, pop culture, and most importantly, anything about a Kardashian! And that alone is worth the cover price. 

The first is a weekly paper called the Budget. It comes our of the largely Amish populated Holmes County Ohio.  The first section of the local edition paper is like every newspaper and covers current events, news stories , etc of both the Amish and English community. Then the rest of the paper is broken up to small segments that each Amish community throughout the  Country can publish what is going on in their neck of the woods. Who died, what the weather was like, etc. This paper serves us well since we live about 100 miles away. The classified list all the local auctions and the advertisements are all for stores and businesses that we know of and frequent when we make the trip over to that area. If you do not live close to this area, this paper may not be of interest. **On a side note, this newspaper uses very few color ads, so it makes a great bedding for my worm bin**

Contact info - Telephone 330-852-4634

 Plain Interests is a monthly publication that contains short stories, advice, recipes, and all around general reading material written by and for the plain community. Lots of ads for products in this little paper.
Contact info: Plain Interests, 420 Weaver Rd, Millersburg, PA 17061. $16 per year. No telephone as it is an Amish publication.

 Cooking & Such. Now this is a new magazine that claims to be for the plain community. There is nothing plain about it, which makes me wonder who really is publishing it. It has wonderful photos, high glossy pages, quaint stories, and lots of recipes. It is published quarterly, so a steep fee for 4 magazines.
Contact info-866-871-4377 $32 subscription for 1 year. Pinecraft Village Publishers, P.O. Box 50231, Sarasota, FL 34232

 The Connection is published monthly and a magazine full of stories and drawings from Amish writers. It showcases different Amish farms and business and even has a kids section. I do believe that any Plain person can submit a story for publication and it is printed. Some of the writing is...well...you know, but there are many great advertisements in this magazine.
Contact info -888-333-3999.  The Connection LLC, P.O. Box 603, Topeka, IN 46571. $45 per year.

 Poor Wholesome Gardening. This is the crudest publication I have ever seen. I think they just photocopy typed articles and bind them. If they have a typo, they white it out and write it in. BUT, it has great articles on gardening and doing so in a sustainable manner along with preserving, flowers, etc. Lots of information on heritage breed livestock and where to purchase it, soil amendments, seeds, and experiences with all aspects of growing your own food. Published 6 times a year
Contact- 569 Schoolhouse Rd, Genesee, PA 16923. 1 year $24.

And lastly, is the Farm and Dairy. This is a local publication for our tri-state area farming community. And it is also an example of everything that is wrong with modern day farming. I do not like this publication. Any publication that can defend why a sow should be strapped to the floor in a farrow crate or why GMO crops are a wonderful advancement for the Country is not worth the paper it is printed on. But my Husband gets it because it does list extensively the auctions and equipment for sale in our area. No other publication is this extensive in that aspect.
Contact- www.farmanddairy.com

So there you have it. Our homestead reading list. I quit watching the over sensationalized, over dramatic local TV "news" (I use that term loosely in this instance) since they recently stated they use Facebook and Twitter as reliable news sources. Social, unregulated media a news source? Come on! And  I even had to stop reading our local County newspaper because they have just lost all sense of integrity. Recently a local woman who was 9 months pregnant was tragically killed in a car accident. The local paper often will print photos of the deceased in the obituary, usually in their prime. But I really feel they went to far when they printing a picture OF the dead baby they removed from the dead Mothers uterus above the obituary. And to top it off, it was just a picture of the naked baby presumable on the gurney, not dressed and prepared for burial. Now granted the family must have submitted this gruesome photo, and I feel just awful for their loss,  but I think the paper MUST draw the line on printing death photos, especially of surgically removed infants.

So each day I find myself going a little more 'off grid' in several aspects, and out of this modern society, and the reading material in our home reflects that.  And you know what? I like it much better here.

What my calendar says

Since we live in an area with four very distinct seasons, I believe in the meteorological division of the seasons, and not the astrological. Therefore, March 1st is the first day of Spring for me. But I don't need a calendar to tell me what season it is. I just need to look around the homestead to get a good idea.

The sacrifice of some young oaks signals that it is time to expand the mushroom log operation. A spring task. I always hate to kill a live tree, but I call it forest management and try to feel better about it. Yep, I still feel bad.

The ladies of the farm like to remove all that dull winter complexion with a refreshing mud facial. Or body wrap in the case of Sparkle here. With that much mud she should look like a foals bottom when her spa treatment is over.

They don't call it "the starving time" for nothing. This is the time that was most difficult for pioneers and homesteaders of the olden days. The stored fresh crops are coming to a quick halt and the prospects of new ones are months away.  My fresh  potatoes, onions, and carrots are all but gone. Going to a store is not an option for us , so we just will make due with other starchy grains we have on hand. And don't worry, we still have plenty to eat. I find myself dumping whole 2010 home canned jars of vegetables on my Husbands lunch salad just to use them up. I don't care what anyone says, I do not like canned food more than two years old. Some food just gets too mushy after two years to be palatable. Plus I need the space for the upcoming canning season. 

 And after months of not having to water the greenhouse, I must start back to regular watering. Even though we grow food in the greenhouse all year, and it is our only source of fresh food in the winter, it is a very little maintenance operation during winter. No weeds grow, pests are less of a problem, and the plants receive enough water from just the condensation on the row covers to keep them alive yet not water logged. Now the row covers come off so the plants can receive the most sunlight, and that causes the dirt to dry out quickly.

 And while I have a freeze proof hydrant to water with, apparently they do not make freeze proof hoses. Sometimes you turn on the hydrant and an icicle comes out  the other end instead of water.

That is just a reminder that while spring may have sprung in my book, Old Man Winter still has full reign of the season. And he is just so reluctant to move on at times. But soon his scheduled date with the Southern Hemisphere will arrive, and these snow flakes and freeze ups will be a thing of the past.