October 13, 2012

forgot to post this on yesterdays blog.....while we were working

outside last night, I went over to the potato box where we planted

them on April 17... not expecting to find anything because of the hot dry summer...

the well where we get the water from is pretty far away...so the potatoes

only got water when God watered them (that is what our grandson

would say).....to my surprise.....all 3 kinds had grown...not really

that big.....but big enough to use in stews and  mashed tatars....

in the end we had 17lbs total of potatoes....

not bad for our first try at it....

worked at an event at church from 11am - 2pm

started canning the minute I got home....

Green Tomato Sweet Relish is one of our favorite recipes......we created this

 one last year out of necessity....just too many green tomatoes left over.

This tastes so much like cucumber/pickle sweet relish...we don't make

any relish during the cucumber season...we wait until the end of the garden

and use the tomatoes instead.

Green Tomato Sweet Relish : canning family recipe

20 cups of drained green tomatoes

10 cups drained onions

5 cups drained red bell peppers

5 cups drained green bell peppers

10 cups cider vinegar

15 cups sugar

1/2 cup celery seed

1/2 cup mustard seed

1 Tbsp canning salt

cut all of your veggies into pieces, run them through your food processor, and then

drain the excess juice off....the measurements we gave are after it is drained....

put all the ingredients together in a 15 quart stock pot and bring to a boil...

this takes about 20 - 30 minutes



this recipe yields 13 quarts

process 10 minutes in a boiling water canner....

All finished at 9 pm....25 quarts and 1 pint

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having lunch for 20 tomorrow after church....so now

the mad dash to clean the house and the office/garage

which is where we will serve lunch....

with the football game on the big screen.....Go Lions!!!

11:45pm.....Pleasant Dreams!!!

October 12, 2012

we both had a crazy busy day at Tri-State....

then off to work in the garden....

gotta love living in the country.....a neighbor dropped

off some pumpkins from their pumpkin patch......beautiful!!!

today I removed all of the tomato plants in the garden...the plants

along the house are still doing fine....we didn't have enough cloth

to cover all of the tomatoes in the garden...so the frost got them...

picked 89 lbs of green tomatoes....

these will be used in a couple of recipes.....check back tomorrow...

there were another 49 lbs of tomatoes scarred too bad by the frost....

I put them in buckets and leave them in the green house for a week or

so and the tomatoes start to turn red and soften....then they will be fed to

the chickens.

picked the rest of the watermelon as well....25 more lbs....this was

our best year for watermelon EVER!!!!

all the tomato cages are stacked.....the dead plants are ready to be wheeled

to the fire pit and I got caught taking a break.....

in this picture below...taken 3 months ago....I am standing in the same spot where I am

sitting in the picture above.... I cannot believe how quickly the time has gone....

we covered the pepper plants, lettuce, cabbage and tomatoes

by the house.....just 1 more night and then we have 7 days of warmer

temperatures at night...

and then because there was 45 minutes of daylight left, we mowed the front
part of the property...Ross on the zero turn and me doing the push mowing...
never a dull moment....hopefully this will be the last mow.

Pleasant Dreams!!!

October 11, 2012

we hit the 60's today.....and should get there a few more times in the next week

....it has been windy for the last couple of days...love seeing the leaves flying ...

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some pictures of my great-grandpa Elbert Austin Miller...

Born December 8, 1874

as a young man....in the 1890's...

in 1912 when my Grandpa was born...

and once he retired from teaching and took to farming full time....

pictured here with his lovely bride Alice....

sometime in the late 1930's or early 1940's



they both passed before I was born....so I only knew them through stories

and pictures......when I found the financial journals that he kept...that was the 

final piece to starting this 1912 - 2012 blog....having his daily life

spelled out by what they bought and sold....and written in his own hand...was

just incredible to me....the other amazing thing was the similarities....a good

portion of the MILLER family had occupations of....

Preachers, Teachers or Farmers...and in a lot of cases they were all 3...

gotta love how that has continued generation after generation....

OK...here is the teacher in me.... your homework assignment....

try and go back 3 branches in your family tree....do some research

now so you can pass it on to your kids.....the ONLY way that History

can be cool is if we keep talking about it!!!!  :)

Pleasant Dreams!!!

October 10, 2012

keeping an eye on the weather...still hoping for some mild temperatures

so my lettuce and cabbage will continue to grow......lots of green

tomatoes.....so we will be making relish soon...

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today is our grandson Jacob's 10th birthday....hope you

had a great day bud!!!

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some garden stats....

 2009 - 532 jars canned - 117 was fruit

2010 - 215 jars canned - 27 was fruit

2011 - 518 jars canned - 203 was fruit

2012 (so far) - 462 jars canned - 16 was fruit (strawberry jam)

none of the fruit trees produced anything this year....but the garden was bigger

and so that kept us quite busy...we will have a few more things to can and then

the garden can be closed for the 2012 season.

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Pleasant Dreams!!!

October 9, 2012

love how it is staying darker in the mornings now.....FALL is

my most favorite season of all....

the swelling in my hand from the cat bite this weekend is going down...

Thanks for the good thoughts and prayers!!!

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went to a customers to do some training this morning....and they have

Peacocks.....very cool....

they have already dropped their tail feathers (not sure if that is the proper

name) but they pick them up and put them in a vase to sell...

just amazing...the white feathers come from all white Peacocks.....not

albino...just all white.....couldn't find one of those walking around  today...

got back to the office ..... finished at 5 and then started canning...

we picked all of the those tomatoes the other day, the decision

was to turn them into juice....haven't made any of that yet this year....

Tomato Juice : canning

core the tomatoes and cut into quarters.....put in a stock pot and mash......run this mixture through your
food processor, put the juice back in your stock pot, bring it to a boil and you are ready to can....in Quart jars put 2 Tbsp of lemon juice and in Pint jars put 1 Tbsp of lemon juice.....we also put a spice in ours called Bloody Mary Mix....1 tsp for Quarts and 1/2 tsp for Pints....you can get this spice at Pepper Mill Spice Co in Alden Michigan.....process 40 minutes in a boiling water canner for Quarts and 30 minutes for pints....

we put up 14 quarts and 10 pints of Tomato Juice....

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while all that was going on I made a meatloaf...recipe on February 7....

I added green bell peppers to the recipe tonight....served it with a salad

and 1000 island salad dressing...

Pleasant Dreams!!!

October 8, 2012

they had forcasted a hard freeze for Saturday into Sunday, that

did not happen....however, it did happen last night...we covered everything

again..so hopefully the plants will be good in the garden....upper 30's

for the rest of the week.

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spent part of last night and early morning at the ER...our kitty Pouncer

on Saturday was climbing around the bench on the back porch that

has a lid.....we keep the recycling and his food under the lid...well...

the lid fell and instead of lifting the lid off the kitty, I tried to pull him

out and he bit me deep in 2 spots.....so on Saturday it hurt, but on Sunday

it had swollen up quite a bit....thinking that was normal....I did nothing

about it...then last night before I went to bed i googled for info and

decided to go to the ER....I now have these HORSE pill antibiotics to take,

but will be fine soon....

 they marked the area of the swelling at the hospital so i would

be able to see later today if it has gone down any...and it has!!!

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Today is our daughter Amy's Birthday....hope you had an AMAZING day!

my Sister-in-law Rhonda celebrates her birthday today too!!!

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the trees look beautiful.....here is a shot of the back yard....

I took this from the cupola...you can see the ball diamond...

the birds are back....100's of them all flocking together....

when the dogs were younger....they would chase after the birds when they

would land in the yard...now the dogs are just annoyed by all

the noise....lol



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Ross had venison steaks on the grill....I had leftovers ....

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and yes for dessert I made the batter for chocolate chip cookies

with no intentions of turning it into cookies....just eating the dough!!!

Pleasant Dreams!!!

October 7, 2012

had a wonderful day at church.....take a listen to Pastor Bob's

message at www.h-hcc.org

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My Great Grandpa Bert's financial diary for October 1912....

 

what they sold or earned for income:
30 lbs of butter = $9.68

50 dozen eggs = $18.09

30 bushel potatoes = $12.00

3 qts of milk = $1.70

44 lbs lard = $5.26

1 month salary  = $50.00

so $96.73 came in

what they purchased or paid:
groceries (not specific) = $7.91

  feed  = $5.63

baker = $1.45

corn cutting = $2.80

corn huskers = 7.33

1/2 bushel wheat = $.50

pliers  = $.50

twine = $.12

Northampton dues = $2.00

Institute week = $8.20

hat = $2.00

1600 lbs coal = $3.52

baby clothes = $3.93

pictures = $3.50

so $49.39 went out

 

so this is the super COOL part about this....on this day.. exactly 100 years

ago they took pictures of their family...which was Bert, Alice and Allen (my

grandpa)....if you follow the last couple months of his Financial Journal entries

you will see that they were buying a new dress and a new suit, shoes, belts, stockings,

 socks, hats and then this entry has baby clothes and the actual entry

for the photographer...

 

OK...this is the AMAZING part....here is the actual picture that was

taken on that day....gotta LOVE family history!!!

 

Pleasant Dreams!!!