Much Needed Snuggles

Sienna, 3

I REALLY needed a snuggle with this cutie.  Sometimes you can't even share the details of how miserable you feel and those are the days these kind of snuggles go a long way.  Just a brief moment in time can cover some of the deepest sorrows and get you through to the next moment.  I am so thankful for these little moments in time.  

The Birthday Boy is 8

Caden... This little guy is EIGHT years old already. I can hardly believe it.  

We had a very busy day for his big day.  His Daddy took off work to spend the day with him and we started our day with donuts for breakfasts followed by dressing for the day and some schooling.  We had an early lunch combined with Caden's birthday party and headed out the door right after noon to pick up friends for our first homeschool choir performance of the year.  The four oldest children performed with the homeschool choir at a local nursing home which is always a wonderful time and then. We headed out spend some time at Chuck E. Cheese followed by CiCi's Pizza.  That wasn't full enough for one day so we did a little birthday shopping for Legos.... because it is all about the Legos these days.  The last stop of the night was The Dollar Tree and then, we headed home to CRASH OUT!  

Purple Haired Cutie

Just a little cuteness to brighten your day... and mine.   

Sienna, 3

Getting Twisted: Pretzel Time

I have not made pretzels in a long time... a VERY long time.  In fact, I am certain it has been so long that my kids have no memory of it.  So, when a dear friend made pretzels recently I started feeling a little guilty that my kids have not gotten to enjoy the experience when they love soft pretzels so much.  

Savannah, 13

I wanted to use my own freshly ground wheat so this would be something I could eat for my MTHFR dietary restrictions.  Knowing that the Heavenly Homemaker blog would be a good place to start for a tried and true recipe I went straight to her blog under recipes.  She quickly won me over by introducing the recipe noting that she used to actually sell these pretzels.  I mixed up the recipe and left the dough to rise. I came back later and punched down the dough and got busy with my older two girls rolling out some yumminess.  Sahara joined us (not pictured unfortunately) and was a pro at rolling out the dough and she loved it. 

Sierra, 10

Not long after, we were enjoying salted butter pretzels and buttered cinnamon sugar pretzels... And they tasted just like the ones at the pretzel shops.  

Fields of Sunshine!

This is what it looks in the field around our house right now.  It is like fields of sunshine on bloom.  

Cottage Style Container Gardening

It certainly does not look like much right now but I am starting a little cottage style container garden.  So far I have placed a few containers in a good sunny location in the field near the house.  There is a really extreme ant problem here so I have to solve that issue before planting much. Today I planted some Sugar Snap Peas, spinach, and broccoli.  

I plan to put a ground covering down to control weeds and grass in the area, but I am undecided about all that, yet.  I welcome any suggestions for this little garden area.  

Who Rules The Roost?

Chicco does!  Chicco is the ruler of the roost around here.  I like to think he is a little Mexican guy.  He is the tiny little guy with feathers on his feet and a little fluff on his head and he always has his chest puffed way out. We named him Chicco because he reminds me of the colors of a Chicco candy stick.  And, Chicco just sounds like a little Mexican dude.  He fights off the much larger Buff Orpington rooster and keeps his ladies safe.  When we moved him over to our new house and let him out in the run for the first time he walked around stomping his little feathered feet and guarding his ladies.  He is the true picture if chivalry.  

Temporary Chicken Housing

Under the circumstances of our move we did not have to move everything right away since we own both houses.  Since my husband drives near the other house everyday we made the decision to leave the turkeys, chickens, and dogs until we could get their housing worked out at the new place.  The only thing we brought with us was the momma cat and her six kittens because they needed constant care.  Everyday my husband would just go by the other house and tend to the animals and we were also there throughout the weekends working on getting our stuff moved out a little at a time.  

So, we have been in our new house for over two months now.  We had much work to do to settle in here.  A friend was selling her small portable chicken coop so I was able to get that for $75.  I thought this would be a great option to keep us from having build a coop.  So, the thinking is that we would build a removable chicken tractor as a chicken run but it is going to be a while before we can get that done.  Instead we decided to temporarily use the dog kennel.  We added some chicken wire and a couple of boards across the top for security.  Little by little we began to move the hens and roosters over.  Now, they are all settled in.  

And now, my ladies have rewarded me with a few eggs!  

We have much more work to do in the coming months to get everything the way we want it but this will do for now.  The next step is to get our turkeys over here. I am not sure this temporary housing will work for them, so we may have to build the new chicken run beforehand.  We will just keep figuring it out as we go.  

Jumping Back In... Hi Y'all !!!

There seem to be those of you that are capable of blogging through the trials and busy times of life.  I totally fail at this.  Part of it is good because I know that blogging comes second to my family but part of it is not so good because I often am holding back.  That is not something I intend to do but it really takes a lot of inner strength to keep going with all the emotions going through one's head.

Well, at any rate... here I am again trying to jump back into this.  It gives me an outlet and a place to connect other than Facebook, Instagram, and the real world while chronically some of the craziness of my days.  I enjoy journaling and writing and so this is a nice way to do just that.  Life has been going a thousand miles an hour for me these days so I will try to do a little run down of some happenings in the past several months....

We lost a baby to a very traumatic miscarriage at the beginning of 2014 shortly after purchasing our exciting new 12 passenger van.  We turned inward amongst our little household with our little family of seven and in doing so we disrupted the apple cart so to speak.  Many in our lives did not take this well but at the same time we were showered with care by those that showed us the love of God.  We took simple a simple vacation of camping in the Spring which is not really like us but it was a time away with just our little family in total seclusion.  We decided to get serious about selling our house and listed with an agent.  I had no idea what craziness that causes in one's life with random showings and needing your house to look presentable all the time... which it really never did... lol.  We found about 6 houses that we thought were where we were supposed to be and suddenly there were roadblocks in the way.... until.... we found a little country home that was nothing like we were looking for that was being sold on foreclosure for less than half the original listing.  We dismissed all that business after taking a peek at it and carried on looking at other dreaming homes.  We kept pondering this foreclosure house and found out it was going to auction.  After much contemplation we decided that we might want to look at that possibility a little closer because we could totally transform our way of living and truly simplify leaving room for more true living.  Before you know it we were bidding on an auction and WON it for less that 1/3 of what it had sold for two years ago!!  Our Summer was spent with making this house liveable (previous owner had purposed to make it unlivable so it could not be sold, since no one could get it financed).  In two weeks we spent $10K getting it to where we could move in and in early August we started moving our stuff over and just finished moving all our stuff over about three weeks ago.  It has been insane.  I truly don't know how people move all the time.  That is not the life for me but it was good for me and I learned a lot and had a lot of growth through the process.  So, now we are to the point of searching for a new church and settling in.... and still unpacking boxes and organizing.  Something tells me this sort of things takes a while to truly get settled.  Next up is a moving sale for the remaining things at the other house and some repairs and then, really pushing selling (since our realtor has not even shown it once).  So the goal will be to do some weekend Open House times and see if that helps.  Other than all that it is day to day living here and I will try to blog about some of that.  Homesteading type things have taken a back burner.... of course, all the moving and work we have done is part of the homesteading journey but it has not been much to journal about... or maybe it has but I fall in bed really spent at the end of each day and journaling has not been on the agenda.  It has been total survival mode here and we are happy if people are fed and mostly clean and such.  lol.