Harvest Time Pear greanbeans

Dolly was heading our way we thought the other day so I went outside to pick the pears from the fruit orchard before it knocked them down and my husband helped. We were pleasantly surprised to get so many for second season. Last season we had just planted the tree, so I am hoping my next season it will be even more pears.

Not sure what I am going to do with them, but I better hurry before they rot or husband eats them all hehe I also picked a lot of green beans that day and we ate the whole lot of it that night yum.

Well the turkeys are doing ok still thank goodness I am praying the worst is over now. We havent had any more attacks on the sheep lately but we have been keeping them in the orchard. Took my husband on a date to go see the “Darknight” it was pretty gloomy I wouldn’t take my own kids to go see it which is why we left Randy here with Tommy today. My dad and sister were right next door.

Tomorrow is our co-op meeting for my homeschool group. I hope she takes my suggestion on making it a 3 hour day for classes per day instead of 4 hours and giving the kids and moms more lunch hour play time.

I just used the last of my pecans from last year on some pumpkin bread I can’t wait till next seasons pecans I already have a trade going for some syrup.

Well that’s it for tonight.

The Ant Massacre of 2008

So we got our turkey chicks a few days ago and everything went ok as we put all 41 into the brooder. The brooder was build by my husband 7 years ago so it was getting on in age and falling apart a bit, but we really didn’t know how much till the other night I was going to the back yard to go check on them and I saw both of the dogs under the trailer playing with something.

It was a turkey chick. I was in shock, how did it get there? Nooooooo I cried as I tried to get it away I had to crawl under the trailer to grab it, finally I did and they had another one they were playing with, I grabbed that one only to see another and another roaming around. My son and his cousin were out in the back yard I yelled to them, "Tommy go get your Daddy! Hurry!

So my son ran in, "Mommy needs you daddy it’s the turkeys" What had happen was the bottom back board was rotting and they were just rolling out into the grass area. Well after we fixed that little problem two of the chicks had died and ants were on them. I thought maybe it was trauma from the dogs? I took the dead ones out and then an hour later saw 2 more dead with ants of them. It hit me, it’s not the trauma it’s the ants killing my chicks they are attacking them.

We put them in a box for the night in our house; we lost another chick to being smushed. The next day we had to clean out the whole brooder, move it, spray it with this orange natural biodegradable oil plus something else my husband put in there and cover it back up. They are happy now but we lost a total of 7 chicks. That’s a lot of chicks to lose the first few days. 10 of those chicks were supposed to be ours. At least we are blessed that we didn’t have to feed them that long but we lost out on the cost of buying them.

I pray now the others will survive for their rest of their journey.

A bird ate two of my tomatoes today, they were almost ready to pick sigh….at least it left me one. Tomorrow I need to try to cover them up. I found someone to buy my goats milk a nice lady from my milk/egg group I am so happy to find someone who likes goat milk I am glad to be able to share with her Barrels milk. It will be enough for me and some for her and later when I wean the babys from her I will get even more for my cheese making. The money will help pay for Barrels feed, it has gone up so much. Today I attempted to make Feta cheese and I followed the directions wrong so I have to start all over. I am short two quarts of milk and right now I am saving up for my new customer so I will have to wait till Wed milking to finish up.

Thursday is payday it can’t come soon enough so much to get for the house.

Sam

Buying Curriculmn online

This is listed in my website but thought I would add it here too.
http://www.frugalcountrymom.com/frugalhomeschool.html

Enjoy

Curriculum When buying curriculum for the year find out which one you want first by asking other homeschoolers, checking out a book fairs, looking online or ordering a catalog from the vendor. Once you find the ones you want look around at the used book swap sites online and the used book fairs that homeschool groups usually have each year.

Check out my San Antonio Home schoolers page above for ideas on the yearly Curriculum fairs for my area or at least get some ideas.

If you would like a "Card Pack" from "The Home School Connection" they will send you it via snail mail to your home address for free. In it you will find tons of homeschool related products. "Click Here" to fill out the form. To look at vedors on line go to their website at
http://www.nrm-inc.com/homeschool/homeschool.htm

If you buy it new plan to use it for your other younger kids someday that would make a good investment or plan to sell it to get some of your money back. When buying from auctions make sure you know the orginal price before you start bidding, this way you wont over pay for used books. Start early looking for these to get ahead of the Aug/Sept school rush.

Tips:
Buy it used from friends, book swaps, flea markets, thrift stores, library book sales
Have a book swap day with your homeschool group
Share with another mom that has the same age children as yourself
Form a coop or at least just a class and pitch in and buy the book/subject
Do you have connections with a public school teacher. Each year they get sample books to go over to see if they want to buy it for their class. If they don't then ask them for it.
Try finding your stuff on ebay: Just keep in mind how much it orginally cost so you wont get into a bidding war with another mom-have a set amount you will spend on it, bid at the last few min of the sale to grab it, keep in mind the cost of shipping, If you dont win ebay will email you other items similar to the one you lost, or look at the persons other items listed he/she might have the same item again up for bid at another day!

Yahoo groups used book- Join these to help you find used books
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/homeschoolingonashoestring_usedbooks/
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HOMESCHL-USED-BOOKS/
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/UsedHomeSchoolBooks/
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HomeschoolBookSource/

Main websites for book exchanges and used books
Veggie group Love it! –Look under swap- http://www.vegsource.com/homeschool/
Home School Classifieds- http://homeschoolclassifieds.com/
The Swap-small fee to insert - http://theswap.com/
Homeschool Bid -Just like Ebay- http://www.homeschoolbid.com/
This little Piggy stas home online auction https://www.thislittlepiggystayshome.com/
Well trained mind forum http://www.welltrainedmind.com/forums/index.php

Regular sites for clearance sales
Christine book love their catalog http://www.christianbook.com/

If your in the San Antonio area try
San Antonio online garage http://groups.yahoo.com/group/sanantonioonlinegaragesale/
San Antonio free cycle http://groups.yahoo.com/group/sanantoniofreecycle/
San Antonio freely given http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SAHFG/
San Antonio Educational Book Swap http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SAEducationalBookSwap

If your looking for something specific in a subject like history, math, English you can try my Haven Homeschool group link pages where I will be adding on through time. You don’t have to join the group to access the links
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/havenhomeschoolgroup/links

Create your own curriculum that can be down with help from the library and other resources on line check out my unit studies and printable pages.

Sam

Another long day

This cloud was a while back and our last hint of rain...sigh....
We picked up the girls today from camp, the mother of my daughters friend and I went in her car to pick them up and boy was it hot.

Recently I bought a thermos from Walgreens. I love it, I bought it for $12 its thin and keeps water cold for hours even when left in the car in the sun. I have decided to buy 3 more slowly when I have the money.

Speaking of money I have been really depressed lately with not having enough to buy the stuff I need. I am blessed we bought the corn while we did at $7 for 50lb bag because in two weeks it went to $8.90. I am worried about the feed for the turkeys that are coming in early in the morning tomorrow. We calculated the price of turkeys based on feed, but if it goes up we will get a loss.

We just don't have the money right now to buy excess like we did with the corn...worry ,,...worry. I need to rebudget my own budget for my household account to see where I can cut or sale something. I did to really hit the coupons. The only thing is selling right now is my eggs and my husband wants me to raise my prices sigh.....I am scared I will lose my customers. I tried so hard to keep it low the price for eggs but the feed keeps going up.

We also need to redo our whole budget as a whole. I need more for grocerys it keeps going up on food.

Well enough worry for tonight need to sleep another long day tomorrow. Tommy takes his test "Crosses fingers" I hope he passes.

Sam

Crawdads

Dad with the crawdad

Its hard to see but I was walking to my car one day and saw this crawdad staring back at me and boy was he mad kept trying to pinch me. It was too cute. My dad the expert of course picked him up put him in that thing above then dropped him off at the canal. Too bad a few more of these we could have had a nice meal hahaha

There has been teenage boys the last few days at the canal I imagine that is what they are trying to find in those muddy water. Well just a few more days left for my sons swimming class, and tomorrow I go pick up my daughter from camp. I know she wished it would have been a bit longer. I hope she had a good time.

I pulled some cucumbers from my garden I am finding out a lot of things hide from me lol I didnt even know they were done. Its been really hot over here but not that hot where I am hating it already. I am going to advertise for our lamb in our homeschool group newsletter in San Antonio but I missed the deadline for this month. I need to sell 13more sheep, I am sure the older customers might want some more. I am at loss where to sell them now. I love the advertising side of this I did this really well in College when I took a class in it I made a "A"

There was always a waiting time for the lambs but now this year we had more then are current customers needed so we need to find a way to reach the newer ones. Our turkeys are on there way too. So far I have only sold 4 out of 30. Feed keeps going up I hate that because then the cost of our product has to go up.

Well its late I need to sleep

First Strawberry Jams

I made my first jams today, it was pretty easy I opened one up the next day pretty tasty I was worried about putting in too much honey that it would overwhelm the strawberrys but as I cooked it the taste of honey went away more. I had 4 basket full of strawberrys about 9 cups. I added fresh apples from our own apple tree, and our own honey. I also added some lemon juice.

I figured with not the cost of the jars it was $1.00 a jar to make. I will try it with toast tomorrow to see how well it came out and most important to see how my Tommy likes it. I made it for him mostly. Tired of the jellys at the stores that has so many perservatives in it.

The book up top is the cookbook I used. Hubby actually got it for us, it has small recipes in it for small amount of canning, I like it a lot so far.

Well today was a good day, we got an another inch of rain which means total in the last three days we got 1 1/2 inches of rain yah! The chicks of course got wet the ones that ventured outside but they were ok. I had a heck of a time getting them into the coop tonight they were so lost. I hope the hawks stay away.

Earlier we took Tommy to his swim lesson, Tom went with us I was very pleased to see him take part of our daily routine. I got a hold of a riding instructor in a town near us. Not sure on the ride up there but she is offering english riding lesson. I would like my daughter to take it again, she really loves horses.

We will see on the lessons she heads off to camp next week, so we have to get her stuff ready for it plus buy her a new bathing suit amoung other stuff...money money...

Hubby goes back to work tomorrow he had a nice 5 day vacation. He's big boss CEO is asking maybe because of the gas prices of people willing to work from home. We are excited about this, it will be adjustment hahaha but it will be good on gas. Tom is going to hint again that he would volunteer for the new project on working from home. "Cross fingers"

We had gotten a booster for our attenena and it works great for our computer now the speed is really fast, of course my computer is the same but we are trying to figure out a way to hook mine up during the day when Tom is not using it. I will miss my dining room though this is where I currently have it. I guess I like it cause its the hub of the house smack in the middle I can see and know all :)

Well I have to wash dishes and take a shower still, tomorrow is egg/milk run so it wil be busy. Dad is taking Tommy to his swimming lesson so he wont miss it while Randy and I deliver eggs. I am debating on making Randy go with them to help.

Got to run

Sam

Garden update July 6

Ok so if you really look from the last time I posted my green beans have gotten thicker. Lots of flowering on them but no green beans yet. I am not sure when to pick the cucumbers the last time I did it was too early.

No more rain today but it kept pretty cool outside. I put the last of my chicks with my chickens today I had a total of 73 chicks, Somehow I am missing 8 of them. One of them heads was bleeding I guess he was getting picked on so I put him in one of the rabbit cages and put some no pick lotion on him. I will give him a few days to let it scab over then put him back with the others.

I will have to keep watch over them they don't want to leave the big coop just yet.

We went to dairyqueen today my family and my dad to go get some icecream after dinner then we picked up some videos it was a nice outing out with the family. Love dairyqueen. The HEB here is trying to buy them out so they can build a super HEB. I hope they don't buy them out because I will miss Dairy Queen.

I take my son back to swimming lessons again starting tomorrow I hope he learns even more on how to swim he is taking to it a lot more then my daughter did he's age. Not much more going on I am hoping to make some strawberry jam tomorrow. Hubby is home again tomorrow its a 5 day vacation for him he sure does need it.

Sam

Salsa time

So what do you do when you get a deal on a box of tomotoes? Well I could have freezed them but instead we got my mothers recipe out and made some salsa. Of course I had to go get some more jalapenos I didnt have enough and I had to buy some more jar seals.

It came out really, really hot. My husband must have been mad at me hahaha. There is a saying in my family when my mother would make some salsa and if it came out really hot she was really mad at my dad. So when it did we would say, "Gosh mom you must have been mad at dad when you were making this hahaha"

My husband has my moms recipe sort of.....she made it with him once and he wrote it down. My husband said I could never divorse him because he has all my mothers recipes :)

Well I hope everyone had a happy 4th of July. We worked our rears off today but most holidays we do.

Farm Life I moved 20 chicks into the main coop today. We will see how they survive with the older chicks. Tomorrow night we put in more till they are all out there. This is where I might lose half my chicks to predators sigh...

Time to Cull the Sheep

It was that time of year again where we culled our sheep, tagging and putting the rubberbands around ummm lets say private parts of the male :)

Dad and Tom are above in picture with one of our rams. For two days they just lay down as much as possible, poor things. We do it so they can't mate and also it gives a better taste to the meat.

My dad took a fall that day but luckily the sheep broke his fall so he fell on a fluffy sheep then rolled off of him. It was sort of funny watching it I wished I had a video camera at the time it sort of happened slow motion and I keptt saying, "Dad let go!" but my dad still on the ground said, No I got it!, I got it! holding on to the lamb hehe ---No animal or father was hurt making this scene :)

Not much going on its been cool here the last two days with storms trying to come in but they wont even spit at us. Another sheep died out in the field, something is getting them at night. We put them in the orchard for now. Hopefully that will help.

Tom spent a few nights all night outside but what ever it was never came to attack. My neighbors are having trouble too and got some of theirs killed. I am thinking its a cougar or big bob cat or even a big wild dog. There is no wholes in our fence so its jumping a 4ft fence.

Well got to go take shower and get ready for bed.

Sam