I guess I'm considered famous....

http://thedailynewsonline.com/articles/2009/11/08/lifestyles/6089758.txt

I am so psyched to be in the paper. Giddy even. I think it's really really really fun to be in the paper. Let me be more specific- I really like being in the lifestyles section of the paper, there are other sections that would not be as fun. Pamela is famous too.

So, because I need to, I have been sitting down a lot lately. And, while I sit, I crochet. I have made 4 hats and 2 scarves. Now, I am going to try some stuffed animals. Brilyn loves the things filled with corn that you can put in microwave and snuggle for warmth, do you know what things I mean? Anyway, we have a grey fleecey one that she calls "Kitty." I am going to make her a crochet kitty and fill it with corn.

And then I'm going to make Cade a doggy in a like manner.

And then? Who knows. I may be done sitting by then. Oh wait, I will be doing a lot of sitting as I nurse a newborn. We'll see if I can crochet and feed a baby at the same time. Who knows?

XOXO
Joce

And, while you are reading articles, you may want to check this one out over at Kara's.

And also, check out this link on the swine flu.

Okay, now I'm done, and that's because I have nothing more to say, and also because my applesauce is done taking its hot water bath. Sheesh. I need a hot water bath. Do I really treat my applesauce better than I treat myself? LOL

What I've been up to....

These are not necessarily in chronological order.

1. I am proud to announce that my white bread took 1st place, my strawberry preserves took 2nd place, and my molasses cookies took 3rd at the Genesee Country Village Agricultural Society Fair.

2. We butchered pig on Columbus Day- it was a successful endeavor.

3. Our party was great. Hanna won the apple recipe with her apple cake recipe which she should post in her comments here, and Kara came in second with a caramel apple pie, the recipe for which she should post on her blog and linky up here. They both received prize bags with a loaf of the aforementioned prizewinning white bread, a jar of the preserves, and a bottle each of strawberry and peach wine.

4. We bought a new-to-us mini van. A 2005 Toyota Sienna. This is a nice little story about trusting God and waiting on the Lord, so I will share it. Last year, we wanted a mini van. So we tried to sell our Jeep. No one wanted to buy the Jeep. We found a nice little Honda Odyssey in our price range- still no one wanted to buy our Jeep. Now, we could have erred on the side of excess and bought the van anyway. But, instead, we took it as God saying, "wait." And so we did. A couple of weeks ago, we thought that it might be time for us to have a van now that our family is about to expand. We put our Jeep on craigslist, sold it almost immediately, and found a mini on craigslist that we were able to buy the same day! And- they that wait upon Lord shall have power doors, leather interior, and heated seats.

5. MOPS convention. It was great, but I was grumpy from sitting on my butt for long periods of time and then walking like four miles to get from place to place INSIDE the resort. Yes, resort. That was cool. It was the Gaylord Opryland, and I would recommend it. Highly.
And, God had things to say to me even through my airplane induced swollenlegandfeet grump I had on.

6. Hats. I have crocheted two super cute earflap hats for my kids. Check out the links section here and go to the earflap hat pattern link and see the hat pattern I used. I will post pics of my own at a later date.

7. We started using our woodstove in the last week. I really love our woodstove. Oh! And remember all the smoke troubles we had last year? Well, we added about 8 feet of pipe to the roof and so far, so good. We ordered 7 cords of wood, and have seven more on the way.

8. Our first was this week- October 11th. I pulled all the onions and peppers and pumpkins that were left in the garden, and still have beets, parsnips, carrots, broccoli, and brussel sprouts out there. I'll let you know how those fair.

9. And last night, I did a cheesemaking workshop at the LeRoy Library- and it was awesome! We made lemon cheese and mozz.

10. I forgot my best friend's birthday- twice. How do you even do that? Well, her birthday was on Monday and I forgot that, so she said if it would make me feel better I could pretend that Friday was her birthday. Well, today's Thursday and I so have not sent out a card or gift yet. S0 I suck. So.....sorry Kara that I suck as a BFF.

Well, that's all I can think of for now, I may add to this post as I think of things of interest.

XOXO
Joce

PS I am looking for two things: local sweet potatoes, and a cast iron tea kettle to put on my woodstove to humidify my home.

Battling the overabundant zucchini...Part I

Zucchini. It's not all that delicious to me, but it is so easy to grow. And the Animal Vegetable Miracle lady made funny jokes about how much zucchini can grow in one person's garden. So I put in a few plants, and by a few, I think I mean five. That's not too many. Or so I thought. Luckily, Pig really enjoys some raw, gargantuan zucchini in the double digit poundage. And, I have also found a few ways to get people (and by that I mean me) to eat it.

No zucchini popover here.

And now for today's first use of zucchini.

This one sounds a little crazy, and I realize this. So, I am placing a rule on comments that you can't say how you think it would taste. If you want to comment on this recipe, you must try it.

Zucchini Crisp

I don't measure much, so keep that in mind.

Peel some zucchini and chop it the way you would chop apples for a crisp. I use 1/2 inch square pieces.

Keep chopping until you have filled your 8X8 Pyrex just over half way full.

Pour a 1/2 cup lemon juice over the zucchini. Sprinkle 1/2 cup sugar, 2 teaspoons cinnamon, and 1 teaspoon nutmeg over the zucchini. You have now convinced the zucchini that it is apples.

Now, you can use your favorite crisp topping. I used 1 cup flour, 1 cup oats, 1 cup brown sugar, sifted together, and cut in with 1 stick of butter.

Bake at 375 for a half an hour, and, voila!, you have zucchini-thinks-its-apples crisp.

Here it is:

And for tomorrow...come back to see what kind of identity confusion I can inflict on the poor zucchini as a main dish.

And, while I'm waiting for the pictures to upload...I have included a pic of one, ah, incident that occured while we were painting the floor of the playroom. I will show you pics of that as soon as we get the wall thingys back on. But anyway, this pic? Is a mix of a dad who wasn't thinking about the two year old who wasn't thinking either.

Baby boobs

I received this email one too many times this week. So now you all must pay.

This picture?

Makes me mad. Wanna know why? Because they focus on "cure" and by "cure" they mean extremely expensive ways to cut cancer off with sharp knives and burn it out with radiation and weird poisonous chemcials.

Why does that anger me so? What in the world do I want, if not a "cure?"

How about we "find" a responsible food industry that stops force-feeding her antibiotics, pathogens, free radicals, and articificial hormones all in the form of genetically altered and over-processed foods that her little body does not recognize and cannot digest or utilize properly so that her cells go haywire and are overcome by mutant cells in the form of cancer? How about that?

How about don't feed that precious little girl any of that crap so she doesn't grow boobs by the time she's eight and prevent cancer so we can forget about curing her?

How about that.

Tell her mom to plant a garden, buy local, and get a cow, so I can stop having one.

With love, as always,

Joce

Calazonia

AKA Calzone.
Local-ish style
Make a bread dough:
4 cups flour of choice (occident here)
2 T sweetness of choice (raw sugar here)
2 T fat of choice (olive oil here)
1 1/2 t salt of choice (plain old here)
2 t yeast
12 oz liquid of choice (6 oz yogurt, 6 oz warm water here)
Then, add layers of ricotta and mozz (Thanks Clara darling) and ham (nameless CAFO pig, sorry) and onion (a la Pamela's CSA rejects) and spices (fr0m the good Mennonites) and hot peppers (from, hold on walking to fridge....oh the poor things don't even have a birthplace, just a distributor). Seal it up Calazonia style and bake at 350 for 25 minutes.
Wondering about Calazonia? My dear sweet Brilyn baby calls it that. And I think it is just way too cute. So I call it that too.
OH! And serve the Calazonia with your own sweet tomato sauce that you canned yourself if available (mine is still available but in an alarmingly dwindling numbers of jars).

You should also know that Kara has a giveaway that totally goes along with my homecooking theme. You should go now.
XOXO
Joce

Waste not...

To begin, let me give you some background on my own upbringing, and subsequently, the raising of my children as well. Three important sayings to instill the value of conservation of resources:
1. Waste not, want not.
2. Take all you want, eat all you take.
3. Eat what you can, and what you can't eat- can.
And so, the other say I noticed that a number of pantry items had been nibbled by little rodents, namely, mice. And so I cleaned it all up and wrote a note to my hubby to set some traps ( and preferably empty them before I come downstairs in the morning. I am not fond of being greeted by squished little mousy faces before coffee.) The next day however, I made it downstairs just in time to hear this:
Brilyn: "What is that?"
Joe: "A mouse."
Brilyn: "What is it doing?"
Joe: "It's dead."
Brilyn: "Why is it dead?"
Joe: "It died in the trap."
Brilyn: "Did we kill it?"
Joe: "Yes."
Brilyn: "What are you DOING?"
Joe: "Putting it in the garbage."
Brilyn: "But if we killed it we have to EAT IT!"

LOL. This reminds me of the time last summer when we butchered some of our young roosters. We explained to Brilyn that since the roosters don't lay eggs, we kill them and eat them. Later that week, I heard her playing with Cade: "Cade hold still so I can kill you. You're a boy and you don't lay eggs, so we'll just have to eat you." Talk about radical feminism. LOL.

On to another topic. I read a great book, Chistmas with Anne and Other Stories, by L.M. Montgomery. I would just like to reiterate that if you want to become a better person, read the Anne books. Montgomery writes with such a tenderness toward humanity, it just makes you want to be nice to people. Even mean ones. She helps you remember that neurotic people probably have good cause to be that way, and a little kindness toward them just might make a difference in that person's life.

And now I am reading Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, by Barbara Kingsolver. I think I am going to like it quite a bit. It might even join the ranks of Rural Renaissance and See You in a Hundred Years, two of my favorite books. I'll let you know.

Christmas was a big success. We gave gift baskets which included things like venison jerky, Sweet Peach wine, cherry cordial, blackberry cordial, apple butter, hot pepper and cranberry jelly, blackberry peach preserves, corned venison, and venison breakfast sausage (all of which we made with our own little hands) and other things like popcorn and dark chocolate and beer, which we didn't make, but we didn't pay cash money for either. Those items were traded for milk. And everyone seemed to really enjoy their gifts.

Our little family Christmas was fun as well. Brilyn received her wished-for pink fishing pole from Santa Claus, and Cade got a Hess truck. Their stocking were also well stocked with socks and underwear, tooth brushing equipment, and bath toys. Joe gave me the gift of music- he found someone to come give my piano the once over which will include, but may not be limited to, tuning, fixing the sustain and damper pedals, replacing ivories, and unsticking those keys which are currently quite stuck. Happy. And Joe received from Cade a travel tea mug that brews loose leaf tea in one minute, from Brilyn a set of gutting knives, and from me the game The Settlers of Catan. If you are unfamiliar with this game, please click on that link. I bought it for him because he likes it, and because I can beat him at it.

I will download some pictures of our Christmas when I find the camera. I have a feeling it is in Joe's hunting bag which is currently out hunting geese with Joe.

And now, what you've all been waiting for: It's almost my birthday! YAYAYAY! (I really like my birthday.)

Well, I am sure I will talking to you soon enough- I am looking forward to a new year and new daily routine that will allow for suppertime and three blog posts a week. We'll see how that goes.

XOXO
Joce