Christmas links

If only I had more time or if I'd have started earlier!
this would have been fun, as would these of these. Awe well...there's always next year I guess

Five Gallons of Salsa!

Yesterday, I finally decided to "do something" with the almost bushel of tomatoes the kids picked. My husband decided to "do something with" the half bushel of peppers he'd picked. The result: 20 quarts of salsa. It's sort of unbelievable. We had run out of pints so we just bottled it in quarts. I realized this morning that 20 quarts is five GALLONS of salsa! That's a LOTTA SALSA!

But that's the stuff that gets finished around here...at least in previous years. Hopefully the kids won't be burnt out on salsa this year.

All the peaches are gone!

We had the absolute *best* peaches this year. My husband canned some of them, but most of them we just ate. Ate as in right off the tree half the time. They were nothing like the peaches you get from the store..they were juicy & sweet and yum. We ate the last two yesterday. We only have one little peach tree, and we only planted it like 3 yrs ago, but this first year of harvest was so bountiful I'd wished we'd have planted way more of them! They sure *were* :::Sob::: good!

We have tomatoes!

Those are two half bushels! Yikes...we're squeezing them into juice as I type. We're like the ants getting ready for winter!

My oldest is 18 today

I can't believe it. It was just yesterday that we brought her home from the hospital. Time stops for no one. Incredible. I am so very proud of her :)

Crazy Busy

That's what it's been around here. My Mother-in-law, sister-in-law, and her husband came to visit this past weekend. I've started merchandising & doing electronics demos. Yikes...that's intimidating! But it's a little money.

We've also had overflowing strawberries! I wish you were here so I could give you some berries!

Other than that, I don't know where the time goes in the summer. Here I had to make a few phone calls & it's too late. (on the list tomorrow).

Other than that...have a great day!

New Life...

Sunday; it was cold & rainy around here. My husband had gone to see his Mother for the weekend & I had to feed the animals. I was cranky...in a mood...when I went out to the barn to find that the momma mallard had hatched her eggs! She ended up with 15ducklings! ...but they're all pretty nervous around people & snuggle under momma to stay warm. I got this pic of her and one baby, the others were too shy for the camera & I didn't want to upset her further. The whole discovering that she'd hatched her babes made for a more uplifting day to be sure! We've had chickens "set" on their eggs around here before, but the chickens have never been very successful.
The mallards--on the other hand--more so. Fun stuff...

A little windy around here....

We woke up to seeing this outside our bedroom window. Literally half the tree blew off! This is technically the second time we've lost a major limb on this tree; the first time was the December ice storm of '08. Needless to say the clean up is easier when you are not trying to drag branches through the snow & ice.

Lawnmower AGAIN!!!

My poor husband...he has been trying to get the lawnmower fixed. He finally got it back together and started cutting and the blade broke. He thinks there's another blade at the lake...2.5 hrs away.

In the meantime, he cut the dandelion forest with the rough cut mower...really an attachment to the mini Ford tractor...which is meant for cutting field grass. Hey...it looks a WHOLE LOT BETTER! Maybe it means I should drive north to the lakehouse to pick up the lawnmower blade and mow the forest of grass there, eh? Yes...a drive north to Michigan might be just the ticket!

Baby Mallards

We have a couple mallards & a peking duck in our barn. The mallard lady duck laid a bunch of eggs. Our neighbor does a thing where he hatches eggs in an incubator & now we have baby mallards! We bought the first mallards from Murray McMurray for like $4.79 each. (yes you can buy mallards!).

These wild little things are SO CUTE! They hatched this past Thursday so they're 3 days old in this photo. They don't like humans even at 3 days old. They were scurrying around wildly after I held one with this "INTRUDER! INTRUDER! ALERT" kind of run!

It wasn't all a bummer today...

I finished a basket! I'd bought the pattern more than a year ago! I just about gasped when I
realized how much I'd paid for the handle..$4.80!!! Yikes, I should have bought that second
box of basket supplies at that garage sale! Live and learn!

Anyway, this is the mini Cherokee Cross Tote. It's not stained yet, but I like it lots. I love
making baskets!!! I need to make more...my hands are blue from dying the reed! Well, my nails are at least. And...about the photo--the basket is symmetrical; the camera angle was funny & I've only got GIMP on this computer...which I'm not all that familiar with. You get the idea!

My husband is off to the neighbors to pick up the ducks they hatched for us from their duck eggs.
Photos of that coming soon...maybe on his blog; view from bippus

Always something!!!

The riding lawnmower broke. The mowing deck just dropped down on the left side. We have a push mower, but we have way too much land to push mow. My husband tried to cut the grass with the Ford mini tractor with the belly mount mower, but the thingy broke on that as well...the rubber strap that makes the blades go! Sheese...I don't know what it is! My husband called the John Deere dealer & they had him buy a new automatic clutch thingy...but now it's still making a goofy noise & we have to replace the belts. (not sure why he didn't just buy the belts while he was there--the neighbor had given him one & maybe he thought that would work?)...anyway. Our grass looks AWFUL! ...lots of dandelion heads sticking up all over. Hope this mower thing gets fixed on Monday!!!

The good thing is that my husband & son are fixing it themselves. In the old days (before unemployment), we'd probably just have taken it into the lawn repair shop & paid about $400 to get it repaired. It's great that my almost 16 yr old son gets the opportunity to see how things work. He sees the frustration as well, but it's a life skill!

a water miracle...

We live in the country. We have a well. Our hot water has become "stinky". It smelled like sulfur. My brother came for a visit, remarked on it, researched it for us and advised us to try adding hydrogen peroxide to our hot water heater to sanitize it. We had been researching it and had replaced the "stink rod" in the water heater--a metal rod that's supposed to collect minerals--and were considering "bleaching" our well...a much larger project.

My husband added a few quarts of hydrogen peroxide to the hot water tank and this morning's shower was not STINKY! A VICTORY over the water! And a cheap & easy solution as well! If the smell comes back we'll probably end up replacing our 30 + yr old hot water tank...but for now it worked!

More adult trick or treating

So my children and I went back to the South Whitley Garage sales. It wasn't as much fun today as I had to drive around (vs my husband driving me) and it rained. Not the entire day, but it put a major damper on things. I got some scrap yarn...in skeins and all...just none 2 alike. I've got some projects that perhaps I'll do and sell at a craft show. I've never done a craft show...but maybe? At least I only spent $5.50 for about 10 skeins.

I also bought a box of basket making supplies along with a ton of pattern books. I counted 19 handles (which are typically $3-4 each and up from there! So it was a good deal considering I only paid $10 for the box! They had another box for $10 which I almost bought...but we walked down the street so I could think about it. It was gone when we got back. Guess it wasn't meant to be. That box had a plastic divided relish tray & base in it--so someone had the idea of making a relish tray basket/liner. The thing that was pulling me back to buy it was that there were two larger handles which are typically about $5 each. I've now got A LOT of basket stuff! That will be some work! But it's better than buying it all from the local lady. Not that I won't be buying some stuff from the local lady--but when you're unemployed--the funds are limited! Other than that we didn't get much! My 17 yr old bought some jewelery and my 9 yr old bought a couple little things. My 15 yr old son didn't find a thing. He was a good sport about it all.

Awe well, it was fun. I'm bushed. I'm starting to learn that the way I'm garage sale-ing is becoming more work!

Garage Sale-ing in South Whitley

For the first time since we've lived in Indiana; my husband and I went to the annual South Whitley City Wide Garage Sale. Some of my friends describe it as trick or treating for adults. The actual sale is tomorrow, but lots of people get started today. We bought a $5.00 dresser, 2 pair levi's for my husband, a whole BUNCH of basket supplies (I make baskets as a hobby), a grinder, some tools, a couple of books, and more. It truly was like trick or treating! I even offered less for some of the things and everyone said "okay"!

I may go back in the morning with my kids as my husband got burned out on it. I'm not sure if I'm game. When we stopped at a restaurant to get some lunch, the waitress said tomorrow will be a zoo! It supposed to rain though so that may put a damper on things.

The only bad thing is that the dresser needs to be refinished and the basket stuff equals work! But it was so much fun!

If I do make it back tomorrow, I'll for sure bring my camera!

I signed up for Social Spark!

This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of IZEA. All opinions are 100% mine.

I just signed up for SocialSpark, a word of mouth review organization. They pay bloggers for reviewing products, but they are big on honesty, integrity and good word of mouth advertising. The folks at Social Spark pay you to review materials that you like, they they pay you for reviewing them!

The sign up process was really easy & only took me a couple minutes to fill it out and verify my blog. I will always disclose when I am writing a blogpost for Social Spark! The good news is that they adhere to a Code of Ethics

If this is something that interests you, I invite you also to Sign up for SocialSpark.

As I said, it's really easy to sign up for this. SocialSpark

I'm really hoping that this inspiration will get me to update my blog more often. There are so many beautiful things around this area that I need to share with all of you. I live in the country so there are lots of OLD barns, lots of fields, lots of farmers plowing fields, baby animals--the neighbors cow just had a calf yesterday and we got to see it when it was just a couple hours old! Oh how I wished I'd have brought my camera! Neighbors around here can be a half mile away!!! Social Spark should be a lot of fun. If you're interested, click on the links & read all about it!

Haiti by Hand

One of my favorite Scrapbook Artists (among other things)...Rebecca Sower...went on a missionary trip to Haiti this past December. (before the earthquake)

It sounds as though I know her so well, but I only have her books and look at her blog and drool over her talent.

Anyway, she's organized another fundraiser for Haiti. Her friends are *very* talented as well...but she's also accepting stuff from people like little old me.

The link is here That'll get you to the website & the rest is up to you to follow the linky's.

It's incredibly generous of Rebecca and other to donate their time to this.

The Ugly Green Sweater

After a couple of years, this sweater is finally done! I've gained weight since I started it in 2007! Yikes! But in my defense, it is a heavy weight sweater which is bulky. It's alpaca yarn though and feels yummy. It was time consuming to be sure. The title is due to the fact that many males that I know that have seen me working on this project have dubbed it my "ugly green sweater". Aw well...can't take that to heart...everyone has an opinion!