Life

Sometimes what we have to do gets in the way of what we want to do, and sometimes that's a good thing.  Sometimes we're waiting for the perfect set of circumstances to start this or do that, when we realize that the circumstances will never be perfect and we need to make the most of the moments we're given.

This is very easy to type, but putting it into practice is challenging for me.  I've long held this notion that if everyone would just stop for a couple of days, I could get my act together and then things would run more smoothly and we'd enjoy life more.  Of course we all know that we can't snap our fingers and cease time while we do this, so what's a wife and mom to do?

I'm still working on it.  I do notice that we go through seasons, not just the 4 on our yearly calendar, but phases in which some activities are easier to accomplish than others.  As Solomon wrote in Ecclesiastes chapter 3, there is a time for just about everything.  As I seem to get one set of circumstances or a situation under control, a new series appears.

That would explain my long absence from writing here.  Nearly a year and a half!  It would take me that long to write it all out, so I will simply summarize.

1. Finalization of the adoption of our two youngest children.
2. Crazy summers in which we try to continue lessons in our homeschool AND enjoy all the activities offered in our community (summer reading programs with awesome field trips, vacation Bible schools, Jr ranger camp and an assortment of other fun things).
3. A brief period in which I felt we were settling into a new normal.
4. A good upheaval when we welcomed another foster child into our family, and the adjustment period that goes along with that (such as figuring out how 6 people were going to fit into the space that a couple of years ago was seemingly inadequate for just 3 of us).
5. The holiday season-rehearsals for the church Christmas program, preparing for Thanksgiving and Tony's birthday, days away cutting firewood for the winter, furniture rearranging so that a Christmas tree can be put up and decorated, and the celebration of TWO birthdays right after the new year starts.
6. Another new normal that includes 4 children and Tony working out of town (and sometimes even out of state!) for days at a time.
7. A not so good upheaval when said foster child was relocated.
8. Spring on the farm and the anticipation of new baby farm animals!  We missed the births of all of them, lost a couple during labor & delivery, and had to bottle feed one.
9. With spring comes little league baseball, which rolls right into summer vacation and another crazy fun summer similar to number 2.
10. Which brings us to the period we're in now-a new first for all of us-youth football and cheer leading, with practice 3 nights a week and games on Saturdays.

In my attempts to bring order from chaos, I've decided I need several things, and one is a creative outlet, so here I am again.  The ideas swirling in my head may now have a chance at making their way out, and that, I believe, enriches the brain, exercises it, making it stronger for those things that need to be done.  When those things get done, there is more time for intentional, authentic living, and that has been my aim for quite some time.  Thank you for taking the time to read and I hope to 'see' you again.

Our First Steer

WARNING!  If you're sensitive to what happens to animals raised for dinner, you probably shouldn't read this.





Jasper was born January 24th, 2010 to the first heifer we've ever owned.

Wasn't he cute?  And look at that gorgeous rusty coat! 

Here he is at about 6 months.

This one is middle of summer 2011.  I think this is the last picture I have of him.  He's the one on the left.  His coat isn't as rusty as when he was born, but more so than what this picture shows.  He's been rapidly growing on a mix of grasses on our pasture, free to roam and do as he pleases.  We thought he'd get to about 1050 pounds and were surprised yesterday at butcher time when the 1300 pound rated wench could barely lift him.  Our guesstimate is he was about 1275.

My husband is gallant enough to do the hard work and not require my presence.  Goober Gus and I arrived in time to see this:

We're very grateful to these friends from church for helping out!  None of us have ever done this and I'm happy to report that despite it taking longer than they thought, no one got hurt and things went quite well.  I was there to gather parts that won't be aged and start prepping the hide.

As much as I felt I had researched and learned what to do when this day came, I was still woefully unprepared.  I knew which organs I wanted for human consumption and the parts I wanted for the pig and chickens.  I thought we had enough buckets.  If you've never done this-take more than you think you need!  Take plenty of everything.  I saved the tongue, liver and heart for us.  I kept the brain because one of the tanning methods I read about uses the brain.  We needed a bucket for the scraps of meat that were being trimmed during hide removal and quartering.  I was going to take my rubber gloves and don't know why I chose not to at the last moment.  I wanted to keep the kidneys, but to our untrained eyes, we couldn't find them.  There was a bucket for the fat that I plan to render into tallow.

I had it in my brain that there wasn't much for me to do on butcher day, that all the work I'd be doing would be on processing day after the meat ages.  Wrong.  All those decisions to make about what to keep and how to package/store it were up to me. 

The guys told me the wench pulling him up is rated for 1300 pounds and it struggled to get him off the ground.  When the hide was removed, it took 2 of them to carry it outside for me to clean.  When they gutted it, again they were amazed at the weight of all the internal organs.  Once the quartering was done it was a little easier to estimate weight.  Even the smaller sections were at least 150 pounds.  Tony can usually lift that alone, but it took 2 to get each hindquarter to the truck to transport to the meat locker.  The front sections required a 2 wheeled cart.  When there was just one left hanging on the hook, Timothy (the one in the red shirt) tried to counter balance it by hanging on the other arm.  He couldn't do it-he was raised off the ground!  Even the guy that owns the meat locker said the pieces looked big.  Our conservative estimate is 800 pounds dressed.  Using national averages, we'll get 500 pounds of meat.  Since we plan to use the bones for stock and the fat for tallow, our total yield will probably be greater.  So you really can raise a hefty steer on nothing but grass!

My goal yesterday was to get the hide skinned and salted.  That part didn't even start until about 530PM!  Tony worked with me and at 8 there was still about half the hide needing to be skinned.  5 hours of manpower and we were only halfway done!  We stopped at that point (Goober Gus was getting hungry and we still needed to get parts for the hot water handle in the shower that broke the night before-good timing huh?) and decided to go ahead and salt it down and see what happens.  We're hoping the salt will dry the remaining fat well enough to make it easier to remove.  My hands were so cramped from gripping slippery fat in one and trying to trim it with the other!  My back was stiff and for some reason so was the rest of me.  Prior to the skinning tasks, it doesn't seem that I did that much, so being so sore afterwards was confusing.  I understand now why professional tanners get $500 per hide!

The irony of the whole day was eating at McDonald's at 9PM on the day we'd been working toward for 2 years-the processing of our own homegrown, grass fed steer, so that we didn't have to eat industrially raised beef anymore.  Another reason to be better prepared with a meal plan!  I think the plan from now on will include yummy, healthy beef several times a week-at a fraction of the cost!  My best estimate (if we yield 500 pounds) is about $1.70/pound.  The inexpensive cuts from the local ranchers are over $4 per pound.  The savings are worth the crazy day we had yesterday.  Even if I am still sore and tired!

Summer School

I was thinking the other day...this would be a good time to get intentional about homeschooling.  "Is summer really a good time to start?" I asked myself.  Immediately I replied, "why not?"  We seem to be on the counter cultural side anyway, so why not start school when hordes of people have just stopped?  I even signed up for classes.

Last week I filled out some lists I'd won from ListPlanIt.  I made goals for what we'd like to accomplish by the end of August.  I took inventory of educational items we already have.  I made a schedule of activities for this week, I just didn't assign times to most of it.  Goober Gus is registered for VBS this week, so that is a set time, then I made a short list of items to discuss during lunch.  The rest I will need to be intentional about, but it doesn't need to happen all at once or at a certain time.  I may even post our goals and plans on his blog, but that might not be a good use of time.  We'll see.

I, on the other hand, will be taking advantage of the time he's at VBS to work through as many classes at GNOWFGLINS as I can.  First on the list is sourdough bread.  I reactivated my starter last week and it's in the fridge waiting.  I'm going to try completing the video portions of all the sourdough classes this week.  I may not get to try all the recipes, but I'm aiming for one per day.  That ought to give me a good foundation for working with sourdough-or at least that's my hope!

Welcome to Wellness Wednesday

I've decided to dedicate Wednesdays to posting about our wellness adventure.  This week will be about my mental health and what I've done recently to improve it.

As a quick background, I love to learn.  I don't necesarrily like a traditional school setting, but I love to learn.  A couple of years ago I spied a book title at the library that intrigued me called, The Way They Learn, by Cynthia Tobias.  I thought it might prepare me for helping Goober Gus learn his ABC's and numbers.  Instead, I learned a lot about myself and Tony.  According to this book there are 4 approaches to learning called the Gregorc Mind Styles.  The styles are:

1. Concrete
2. Abstract
3. Random
4. Sequential

Each chapter opened with 5 questions/statements that define the major characteristics of that style.  I answered 5/5 in one style and 4/5 in the other 3!  I thought to myself at the time, "No wonder I like to make a filing system, but I hate to use it!"  I love setting things up, making the plan, getting the details down, but I'm horrible at the follow through.  You can imagine the chaos that creates in my head, each style trying to dominate when they're all fairly powerful!

So lately I've been trying to settle into a routine, thinking that will satisfy me in more areas.  The detail is there, but doesn't have to be on a strict schedule.  I also want to shift my focus from what "I" need to do, to what I can do to enrich the lives of my family.  I can feel the Concrete-Sequential style freaking out because that means giving up some control.  December was a perfect time to let go of any patterns or routines we did have to see what would happen naturally, without any type of plan.  One word.  DISASTER.  Finishing homemade Christmas gifts on Christmas Eve.  Not even starting those gifts until the weekend before.  Wrapping presents into the wee morning hours.  Yes, I hear that's the way many people do it, but there's no enjoyment in it for me that way, and what's the point of making gift giving into a chore?  No menu plan, so we ate more junk and felt it.  No activity plan, so we didn't get to experience as much as we could have.  No well thought out Christmas photo to share with family and friends.  Need I go on?

As most others do, I like to make new plans for the new year.  Tweak things.  Fine tune them.  Or throw it all out and start over from scratch.  There are too many responsibilities for that, but the idea of running away to Italy for a year sure sounds exciting!  It took me the first week of 2011 to even get back into a groove that would free my brain up enough to come up with a plan to appease all 4 styles within, enrich my family, and reduce chaos-something that is desperately needed around here!

As I stood at the sink washing a few pots and my milk pail (this has been totally overlooked for a long time and as I prepare to go out to milk our goats, I realize I have to wash the pail first-major energy drain just in the realization!), I realized that I thoroughly cleaned my desk on Saturday, and it's still clean!  I sketched out a rough plan or routine to see how it all looks on paper, while allowing enough unplanned blocks of time for things I can't forsee and down time.  I've taken out scrap paper, scissors and paper punches two days in a row for Goober Gus to play with. I made him put all of his toys away before watching a movie this evening.  I've kept the dining table mostly cleared.  I took things out of the office supply cabinet-and put them back on the same day!  I've kept up with laundry-well almost on that one.  I'm terrible at folding the clean clothes and putting them away.  I've remebered my supplements more often, and Goobers.  We've eaten good food-even started using the juicer my parents got us for Christmas.  Made soup from the pulp and everything!

I point this all out to say that just this little bit has helped to clear the fog that settled into my head a while back.  I can think more clearly.  If I can think clearly, I can plan ahead and free up more time.  With a clear head I can be proactive with our days and we enjoy life more.  Sounds like steps toward wellness to me!

My clean desk.  Isn't it inviting?!

Taking Stock

I've been in the kitchen this morning taking inventory of what food I have.  At the same time, I'm eliminating anything with artificial color or preservatives.  We think our son is affected by them, so we're trying a couple of weeks of focused effort on not letting him have any to verify the suspicion.

It's a testament to our almost two year old journey towards real food.  There's not much to toss or give away, and what's there just might be two years old or more.  [sigh]  Some chocolate graham crackers, old cereal bars, rancid macadamia nuts (the travesty!) and an assortment of cookie/cupckake sprinkles. 

Our original goal in this journey was real milk, healthy fats and homegrown eggs.  Then came the removal of all HFCS and any hydrogenated oils.  Seems that taking those out took out a lot of the dyes and chemicals too.  We're also trying to follow EWG's list of the most pesticide laden produce.  Living in a small town whose population doesn't care too much about that (or simply can't afford it) the options are very limited. 

Since the list has 49 items on it, we determined that the top 25 cleanest we would buy conventional and the rest had to be pesticide free.  Potatoes are in the lower 24, so now that the farmers markets are closed, we don't have access to organic potatoes.  I feel very restricted by this one alone, and there are 23 other items on that list!  It makes me question-do we go without fresh produce or do we eat the pesticides?

I'm almost done with the inventory.  I still need to go thru the fridge and freezer (mostly to list what we have for meal planning purposes) and one cabinet in my son's room that holds bulk items.  Then it'll be time to create healthy meals using these items.  Oh, and I want to plan carefully so that Monday's leftovers get used in Wednesday's soup (or whatever, you get the idea).

What's your feeling on chemicals in our food?  Whether they be pesticide residues on produce or added to boxed items-how do you handle it?

Real Food vs Vacation With Extended Family

Our real food journey began over a year ago as I investigated the cause of my adrenal fatigue. We started with chickens for fresh eggs, added goats for raw milk and started eliminating processed foods. I can’t say that we’ve “arrived” but after a few days of camping with extended family I can say that we’ve ventured far off the beaten path of convenience and food-like stuff. Actually, it was noticeable as soon as we boarded the airplane to fly to Boise. I’d already decided that since we’d be on vacation and I was basically just along for the ride (not involved in the planning and not wanting to be difficult) I’d graciously eat whatever was offered and lovingly prepared.


Less than 24 hours after leaving home we’d broken just about every food rule we’d been following. Including:

High fructose corn syrup*hydrogenated or partially hydrogenated oils*cottonseed oil*pasteurized milk*artificial colors*processed eggs*white bread*extruded grains*microwave*chemical laden produce

I’ve consumed popular sodas, spreadable margarine, white bread, miracle whip, potato chips, red vines, white bread, fruity flake cereal, Crisco, way too much candy, and probably things I’ve already forgotten! We used paper plates, paper napkins, paper towels, plastic cups, plastic utensils, individual plastic water bottles, and soda cans. I haven’t had any probiotic foods or drinks, coconut oil, fish oil, whole wheat bread, fresh eggs or raw dairy. We won’t be home until the 11th, so it’ll be a few more days before I get any of that at home. I might be able to get some of those things before then, but what I’ve realized is that my journey hasn’t reached the point of being able to travel and keep eating real food. My tinnitus seems a little worse and therefore the accompanying headache is too. I feel fat, out of shape and fatigued. We were camping and I couldn’t really relax. Not sure why-just sitting around not doing anything, so I should have been relaxed.

This blog is part of Fight Back Fridays at The Food Renegade.

I won, I won!

I forgot I had even entered, but I won a set of reusable produce bags from Chico Bag.  You can see what I won here.  I went to the blog site to see the list of winners and it said "Kelly" and that if there was a message on the page after logging in, you were a winner.  I didn't know there could be email messages to me on someone elses blog, but I looked in the list of followers and it said I had a message.  So exciting!

My next sewing lesson is Tuesday and I'm making bread bags from tea towels and such.  I plan to have a give-away for one of them when they are done.  Stay tuned!

Menu Plan Monday

I do more than plan the weeks' menu on Monday, but it has a nice ring to it.  I stole it from Jennifer at PJ Academy blog.  I also fill my son's snack drawers-1 in the fridge with fruit, cheese, boiled eggs, and small cans of V8; and another in the drawer where his cups, plates and bowls go with mixed nuts, dried fruit, and bunny crackers.  We also have a basket on the counter with fruit in it (he and I prefer it room temp).  He can choose snacks from any of these throughout the day, giving him independence and a bit of responsibility.
I also make more yogurt, buttermilk, cheese and any other dairy product I can come up with to reduce the qty of milk in the fridge.  Even after two weeks of having other avenues for milk consumption I have three and a half gallons of milk.  Two and a half qts of yogurt, a pint of buttermilk, and another half pint incubating along with another batch of chevre and ice cream round out the variety of our dairy products.  I write milk on our menu plan at each dinner, but that doesn't always translate into drinking it every night.  I also have smoothies down each morning, but the same thing applies.

I know that if I were drinking more of the milk I'd be better nourished and thus less fatigued.  It's hard to overcome 30 years of non milk drinking though.  I am getting better though.

Polly-we tried the chevre warmed and it was more creamy.  I took it to a BBQ and the hosts loved  it, so I'm making a batch for them.  I tell everyone that tries any of our dairy made concoctions that they won't hurt my feelings if they don't like it.  I think most have been honest, as I get a variety of responses.

Today for MPM I even cleaned out the fridge and made an inventory of contents.  Then I planned meals around what I could make from those ingredients.  We bought a large bag of organic carrots a while back and I need to get them used up.  I used two for carrot raisin muffins this morning and will put a bunch in the crock pot tomorrow for pot roast.

Milestones

Over the weekend I noticed that I had made 100 posts.  I think that's a milestone.  I was also thinking of writing of my life now vs one year ago and that's another milestone.  Choosing to buy a buck is another one, but I already told you about that.  My son's first year of preschool came to an end last week, we could call that a milestone too.

On Saturday, I made buttermilk biscuits, with buttermilk that I made myself, from goats that I hand milked.  We ate it with sausage made from a goat we raised.  I'd say lovingly, but my attitide towards him wasn't so warm for the last few months.  Not that anything in his care changed, just my attitude toward this kid that was drinking my milk and ramming me in the legs.  I also baked brownies from scratch, made a peach pie from scratch, made homemade ice cream.  I finished off a second batch of chevre that I shaped into a pretty ball for a BBQ we went to on Sunday.  I made bread dough in the machine and used it to make chicken in a bread loaf for dinner.  I kept the kicthen relatively clean all day too.

In addition to those kitchen duties, I washed all of our bed sheets and made fresh beds, folded and put away 2 loads of my sons clothes, and took care of the daily animal needs.  For some of you, this may sound like any typical day.  For me, it caused me to realize how far I've come in a year or so.  Brownies came out of a box, biscuits from a can (though from time to time I would make a batch from scratch), cheese was something I'd never even contemplated making, and ice cream wasn't something I really enjoyed enough to keep in the freezer.  Dinner was eaten out more often than home and the dishwasher was only needed about once a week.  While I cook at home a lot now, we still don't use enough dishes to run the machine daily, but getting close!

I've started using cut up old wash cloths to clean my goats' udders instead of paper towels.  I made a few cloth napkins at my first sewing lesson, and I use cloth pads instead of disposable ones now.  This will be a nice accounting of where we are at this point in our journey and some day I might read it and say-that's all  I did??  For now, I'm pleased with the progress and hope to keep taking steps in the direction that brings us health.

Food and Faith Challenge

Tony and I have recently committed to being part of the solution to this country's food problems by NOT participating in the problem!  It's not something we can complete overnight, so it's a work in progress.  Maybe because that's our focus, or maybe because it's the focus of a lot of people right now, there are a lot of blogs dealing with leaving the mainstream food market.  This post looks like a good way to keep the issues forefront for us and I want to share it with you.  Let me know if you choose to participate!

Learning to Sew

I just heard from a friend of mine that she is willing to teach me to sew!  YAY!  Progress toward reaching one goal!  Our date is Tuesday, April 13th.  I'm not sure what we'll be doing, but I'll be sure and post of that experience.  Thanks to Amy at Homestead Revival for her cloth napkin tutorial as the impetus for making contact with this friend.

What's Your Story?

I found this blog thru a blog of a blog that I found thru another blog.  Confused yet?  I am!  I am discovering soooo many blogs I want to read and keep up with, but there are only so many hours in a day.  KWIM? 

Anyway, I do want to share this particular story with you and encourage you to really think about your story.
Inspired to Action

Then there's this one that just relaunched that I also found thru a blog of a blog...oh you get the picture!
Ladies Against Feminism
They are trying to get the word out about their new look/site and are offering a free MP3 dowload of "A Wise Woman's Guide to Blessing Her Husband's Vision".  Since I think feminism is a big fat lie, I'm more than happy to help spread the word!  Hope you are blessed by it!

Food, Inc

We just finished watching it and it has renewed our desire to grow/raise as much of our own food as possible!  God did not create livestock to be crammed into space barely larger than its body, eating food engineered to maximize growth and ignore basic health!  The consequences of these actions are being played out in each and every life of the persons eating these animals, and it wasn't even our direct choice to let this happen.

We do vote with our dollars though and we are going to focus our votes on healthy food.  It's not going to be easy though.  Or cheap.  I just agreed to buy half a pig at a cost of twice (maybe even more) of what we pay on average for pork at the grocery store.  One segment in this documentary dealt with Wal-Mart buyers and they stated they purchase what the consumer is willing to buy-and they're getting a large demand for organic food and hormone free milk.  The producer of the documentaty said that because of WM's size they can have a large, POSITIVE impact on what dairy producers do with their cattle. 

I also learned that the calf our cow just had in January won't be ready for the freezer for at least 18 months when feeding on grass.  That's longer than I thought, so we may be looking for grass fed beef to purchase too.  We've got a lot of work to do, but renewed intent and desire.  May God lead us to the best way to reduce and/or eliminate the industrialized stream of food entering our bodies!

Here are links to the resources we've learned the most from. 
Future of Food
Food, Inc
Eat Fat, Lose Fat
The Untold Story of Milk
Most of them link to amazon.com to show the image of the movie or book cover.  I'm not an affiliate though.

On a silly, unrelated note-I was thinking of organizing a group of seamstresses to make pj's and sell them online.  I'd call it pajamason.com.  What do you think?  ;-)

Day Two of My New Plan

Yesterday I started a new approach to my many and varied tasks.  Mondays are focused on food-meal planning, grocery shopping, food prep.  I had a longish list yesterday and rather than feel bad for not completing it, I readjusted my expectations to a more realistic level and had a full day.

Tuesdays are for paperwork.  Personal financial stuff, the never ending "To Do" things, support for Tony's business, foster care requirements-anything like that.  Today's list was even more unrealistic, but I did accomplish two very mundane, time intensive, tasks.  I think if I stick with it I will chip away at the mound of stuff to be done.

Wednesdays are child focused.  He goes to preschool in the morning and then we'll probably have lunch at the park, play for a while and go to the library.  I'll spend the day focusing mostly on my son.

Thursdays are housecleaning day.  Ugh.  It's a small house though, so I should be able to clean it all in a few hours.  That means I can have some unplanned time too!

Friday is for outdoors-either hiking, enjoying the weather, or working on projects.  Another one of those seemingly unending lists, but the time spent working outside will be fun, right?

Now I just pray for perseverance!

The Marvelous Multitasker

Several things have happened recently to cause me to look at a few things from a different perspective.  One of the online groups I belong to had a post recently about various approaches to housecleaning. My reply to that post stated that I've tried various approaches and just can't seem to make any of them stick/work for me. I've tried cleaning the whole house in one day, I've tried breaking it into smaller chunks to do on a daily basis. Neither keeps my home clean!

A series of events last week led me to the conclusion that I am not the marvelous multitasker that I thought. I've always kinda known that when I get busy doing something, I forget about the other things that need to be done.  My most notable issue is spending too much time at the computer.  Not all of it is for fun, there are work/business/family tasks that need to be completed here too, but it's with the fun stuff that I lose track of the day. 

About 10 days ago my hard drive gave out completely.  While waiting for HP to send a new one, I used Tony's computer, but it's not the same as using my own.  It's not "mine" and it's S.L.O.W.!  So I did the bare necessities and walked away.  During those few days, my son and I were getting along marvelously.  I associated that with the fact that he doesn't have to see his bio parents anymore and hadn't seen them since the end of January, something I had predicted would happen.  Tony noticed that I was more relaxed, not so high strung, and able to roll with things better.  Again, I attributed that to son and I getting along better as a result of severance.  The next day, a Family Support Specialist was here visiting and made almost identical comments.  We agreed that it was likely a result of him not seeing bio parents anymore.

About the same time these comments were being made, my new hard drive arrived and I installed it.  The next day I spent hours installing all the programs I have and personalizing everything, so my focus was on getting that done.  Guess what?  My son started irritating me again.  Uh-oh.  Is the cause my lack of attention to him?  Were we getting along so well because I spent more time (click to read about another mom's solution) with him?  Ugh!  Not easy to contemplate. 

As I look back I see that I was enjoying our time together too, so why not continue that way?  Because that was more like a vacation and this is more like real life.  Can't there be some middle ground though?  I already feel overwhelemed with the quantity and variety of tasks that I need to do on a regular basis, how can I carve out more time to spend with my son, so that we are both happier (and possibly healthier)?  Here's what I've come up with, noting that I am not the Marvelous Multitasker:

I can do several things within the SAME category at once, but my focus stays on that category. For instance-I love to chat with my friends at said group, but while I'm doing that I'm updating posts, researching something on another site, checking email, stuff like that. All those tasks are centered around the computer. What I'm NOT doing while chatting is housework, outside chores, or playing with my son. So with this new(er) revelation I've decided to give each day a major focus. What I can't decide is if each day should also have a minor focus. That might look like this: Monday is grocery shopping/meal planning/basic food prep day-Major Focus. Should it also have a Minor Focus of tidying our weekend mess? (or whatever) The reason I can't make up my mind is that each day also has to have its Daily Tasks. Those things that have to get done every day, regardless of whether they fit the Major Focus. Like eating, meal prep, feeding animals, milking animals, collecting eggs; and the fun things like checking up on my online friends. Is having a Minor Focus defeating the point of having a separate goal each day?  I might just need to try both ways and see how it works out.

Thoughts?

Kelly vs Elsie part 2

It's been over two weeks since I shared that Elsie and I were doing battle.  We tried some new approaches, including Tony taking the brunt of her discontent.  He's tough and the seemingly little swipes that hurt me don't generally affect him.  Don't get me wrong, he got clobbered a few times too, it just doesn't affect him the way it does me!  So, he ties her up, cleans her and starts milking.  I've had more experience milking so I usually take over at that point and can get her milked out a bit faster than he can.  However, he has to take time off work to do this, so I decided today that I'd try it all on my own again.

We were doing fairly well, with just a few attempted swipes by her, but then she got tired of cooperating.  I wasn't in a hurry, so I thought I'd try an idea I had for restraining her leg.  It didn't really work, and might have made her mad, because when I went back to milking (having basically decided that I just needed to get her emptied, w/o regard to collection) she kicked the top of my left hand.  Twice.  I must have had it hanging loosely from my left knee and felt that I was out of her way, but I was wrong.  With just two connections, she managed to break blood vessels in 6 different spots!  It's not very swollen, and will hopefully not swell, but it kinda hurts to bend the hand back towards my forearm.  I didn't stop working her though.  I grabbed her by the horns (easy to do when she's securely tied up!) and told her I AM IN CHARGE HERE!  I finished milking her, cleaned and balmed her, but only got a pint of usable milk.

Anyone know where I can get a good used freezer? 

2010 Goals

I added a list in the right hand side bar of the things I want to learn to do or accomplish in 2010. As I complete an item I'll put the date in (parenthesis). It should be an evolving list, and I'll probably make a few posts explaining how I plan to do some of these things.

Like sewing-I want to learn by someone showing me, not by reading a book. That works for some things, but I just can't see myself figuring out the fine art of stitching by reading about it. I tried my local community college, no sewing classes. I posted an ad at craiglist and got 2 replies, but it was more expnesive than I anticipated.

Finally, I mentioned it to a friend and she reminded me that her sister in law is a fabulous seamstress and quilt maker and would probably be thrilled to teach me. Yay! Someone I already know that would not see it as drudgery to teach total novice to sew. I have yet to call her, as the idea came just days before the birth of our calf and the flooding rain and snow storms that passed thru last week. After catching up on what didn't get done last week, I'll call her.

So that's my plan for now-even though my to do list seems to be overflowing and at times overwhelming, if I don't have some sort of agenda, it just won't happen. The next two "out of the ordinary" priority tasks are to establish a milking routine with Elsie and then get my baby chicks ordered/build their outdoor run. Maybe I could clone myself...