This year my family decided that we wanted a local Christmas tree.  While Mom and I investigated placesPhoto courtesy of http://www.allthingschristmas.com/trees.php to chop down our tree Dad searched for his saw.  Having done this once before, Dad learned that you need to bring your own sharp saw.  Our barn was really cluttered so after Mom and I found a good place to cut the tree helped Dad find the saw.  After what seemed like days (but was only two hours) we found the saw.   So, we packed ourselves up to go to the Christmas tree farm.  Scippio too!  We took our red car (with the license plate EGG II) because a) it was larger and b) it has a nice flat roof.

At the Christmas tree farm we hunted for the perfect tree.  Dad really wanted one of those Charlie Brown Christmas Trees, but Mom and I wanted the biggest  tree possible!  But I like them bushy and mom likes space between the branches so the ornaments hang nicely.  The farm had a medium sized house by the parking lot that was a pale cream color, in addition to selling trees, the farm sold garland and wreathes.  The property was almost all wooded with Christmas trees.  Mom thought Scippio would have a fun time – and maybe prevent us from getting lost...  But, we still managed to get lost.  But we did find a great tree that we all could agree on.  And Dad and I some how were able to control the saw enough to use it to cut down the tree while Scippio pranced circles around us barking encouragement.

Mom and Dad alternated lugging the tree as I tried unsuccessfully to use a compass.  After about thirty minutes of doing this Scippio ran ahead.  I tried to catch up to him when I saw the cream colored house.  Once Mom and Dad caught up to me, Scippio came back, and Mom and Dad paid for our Christmas tree, tied it to the roof of the car and took us all home. And that’s how we got our Christmas tree this year.

Peace to ya, Farm Girl   

Hi people I’m back.  Sorry I haven’t written in a while.  I just got a break from school.  This Thanksgiving my family hosted a party so that many of our friends could get together.  A lot of work went into the meal.

Before we could even think about having a party we had to butcher some turkeys, two to be exact.  WeThree lucky turkeys left raised 13 turkeys from chicks and are really proud of our birds.  Cathy (who works for us) used a really big knife and unlike Mom who just chops off their heads Cathy slits their necks and lets the blood drain out, a more humane way to deal with them.  Cathy also plucks their feathers in the kitchen sink after scalding them in hot water.  It’s Mom that does the cooking. Mom cooked the turkeys two different ways—she roasted one in the oven and she smoked one on the grill.

For the party Mom and I baked a lot too.  The day before Thanksgiving Mom and I made pies.  One of the pies was an apple pie with a top crust.  The other was pumpkin.  I got to decorate the pumpkin pie.  I used really little cookie cutters to cut leaf and acorn shapes out of dough, and arranged them on the pie crust. I also baked some of the cutouts separately so I could place them on the pie when it was done otherwise the cutouts would sink into the pie!  All my hard work sort of went to waste  – we gave one pie to Silvia (our terrific housekeeper and friend – this wasn’t the waste part) -  it was Max, our seventy-six pound poodle, he saw pie and went to town.  He ate the center out of it when no one was looking!

Mom and I also baked a cake. We made a sour cream pumpkin cake with streusel in it.  That cake was Bad Maxone of the best cakes I could ever hope to try.  Mom and I whipped butter cream icing to go on the cake. I also put some candied ginger on it too. Then, I made one of my favorite things - whipped cream! – to add to everything!

At the party Patrizia, Dad’s Italian teacher, and her daughter Sofia brought Dad his favorite candy—red candy (or at least that’s what I call it) – from Italy.  Damien, Patrizia’s friend who is French, made French potato salad (Damien claims to be an expert in all things potato). I personally didn’t like the potato salad but the other people seemed to like it a lot. 

Mrs. Marshall, my godmother, brought in two of Mom’s corn puddings (we didn’t have enough room in our oven to cook everything so Mrs. Marshall cooked it for us). Corn pudding is one of our family’s favorite dishes.  Every summer we buy several bushels of corn at the height of the season and shuck it and scrape the kernels off the cob.  Then we pre-portion and freeze the corn for special meals.  We save the corn for holidays like Thanksgiving and Christmas to remind us of summer.  And Mrs. Marshall made a pumpkin pie to replace the one Max ate. 

Vincent, Mrs. Marshall’s friend, made some yummy Brussels sprouts that were cooked in chicken broth with butter and garlic.  Vincent said that you couldn’t use too much garlic that’s why I can smell it in my room upstairs. 

And last, but never least – our good friend -  Kate!  Kate brought her famous onion gratin.  One unlucky, yet delicious birdUnfortunately, she had to leave her husband, our carver of roasts and birds, home because he was sick.

The party was so much fun—most of my friends were there and all of my family was there.  And isn’t that what Thanksgiving is about—spending time with your friends and family and being thankful that they are with you.
  
Peace to ya, Farm Girl

In my last blog I discussed the butchery of pigs and Mom’s list of prime cuts. Today I’ll discuss the lambs.

We’re also sending in two lambs to be slaughtered and butchered. Now lambs are a lot of trouble. Dad says that they spend all night planning their doom.... They are pretty fragile. They get wet and are hard to dry... and sometimes certain internal organs pop out of their bodies, but enough about that. Fixing them after flies lay eggs on them because they’re damp is Moms job. Dad and I hate maggots.

I know what you’re thinking, ”If lambs are so hard to deal with why do you raise them?“ Well, my family raises lambs because they taste amazing!

My mom’s list of favorite cuts:

Two whole shoulders—can you believe it whole shoulders!

Two whole legs and they need to be frenched, what does frenched mean any way? Four half legs BRT (boned, rolled, and tied) and one shoulder BRT.

Ribs—of course, (Yummy!!!)

Loin chops,

Lamb kidneys, (ewwwwwww!!!)

And ground lamb.

My favorite lamb dish is a leg of lamb. What Mom and I do to the leg of lamb is we use a filet knife and jab it into the leg, making many holes. Next we put garlic and fresh rosemary into the holes so that once it’s cooked you can taste it.

Peace to ya

Farm Girl



Hi people. We’re sending the first of the pigs to the freezer and Mom wanted me to write about how she’s going to cut up the first two pigs that are going to be slaughtered. Mom learned how she wanted the pigs to be cut up when she went to Fleischers, a local butcher, for a pig-cutting seminar, where she learned the parts of pigs and how she wanted them to be cut up.

Here’s the list:

Two porkettas—a center cut loin almost 24”, skin attached, bones removed, and the belly should be attached.

One fresh ham with the skin on and it should be frenched.

Two Boston butts (part of the shoulder) —BRT (boned, rolled, and tied)

Two cottage butts (other part of the shoulder) BRT.

Three pig legs; the bones will be hollowed out and the leg stuffed with sausage for zampone.

There will be some loin chops that are 1 inch thick and some rib chops that are 1 inch thick too

Two slabs of bacon that will be double smoked, cut and wrapped, in two-pound packages.

With Dad at home we need a steady supply of ribs—so lots and lots of ribs.

Mom wants livers, (ewwwwwwwwww!!!) fat back, (double ewwwwww!!!) leaf lard, (triple ewwwwww!!) caul fat, (quadruple ewwwwwww!!!)

And breakfast sausage. (Uber yummy.)

What do you think of her list?

Peace to ya,

Farm Girl



Hi people!

My godmother’s the one who started it.

After swimming in her pool we’d sneak into her garden with a basket and pick her alpine strawberries. After a few years of doing this Mom decided that we must get an alpine strawberry plant so she looked online and found a place where they sold plants: the price was thirteen dollars for one plant. (How outrageous!)

Then she searched for alpine strawberry seeds. What ended up happening was that Dad paid thirty dollars for some seeds so small that if there were one on your hand you wouldn’t see it. From those seeds we eventually got about 50 plants. It took about three months for them to grow about half of an inch! And during that time Dad was fretting like no man had before (I think?).

After about forever Mom moved the plants into her garden where they flourished.  After a year HaHa (short for Holly), who is my aunt, had her great idea.

HaHa’s great idea was to bring the whipped cream to the strawberries. So I brought Pop Pop, my grandfather, to the garden while Haha made whipped cream and Mom and Dad picked the strawberries. HaHa filled a bowl with fresh-made whipped cream and brought spoons and bowls to the garden. I think we picked about a hundred little strawberries!

I personally put whipped cream on a spoon and placed strawberries on that. And guess what! We’re going to do it again tonight! Only with raspberries!

Peace to ya,

 Farm Girl



Did you ever wonder why my family doesn’t have trouble with mice? Well the answer is simple: Binde, my cat, is a born mouser. Binde stays with me till I fall asleep then he saunters out of my room, trots down the stairs, and yowls when he reaches the back door. (My dad’s a light sleeper.) Binde stalks his prey inside and out. Binde carefully pounces on his prey, for example a mouse or a vole, and leaves its entrails on the stone walkway for all to see.

When I first got Binde, and brought him home, the sun was shining and he was squirming and wrestling to try to get out of the car. Once we got into the house through an outside door leading directly to my parent’s bedroom, Binde immediately fled to the foyer to greet the dogs that he heard out there. I ran to keep up with him. As soon as I got there I saw Binde; his tail was erect, his fur was as puffed up as far as it could go. (Even though he was a tiny kitten, he now looked five times his normal size.) He was hissing and spitting like crazy! The dogs, on the other hand, were looking at Binde down their snouts as if he wasn’t worth their attention. For nearly a week, Mom only let him stay in my room and all he did was search for an exit. (Besides snuggling with me.)

One of the great things about Binde is that it’s easy to tick him off. One of the easiest ways is to pull his tail too hard. Binde, unlike most cats, likes his tail to be pulled, but only lightly. It makes him angry if you touch the hair between his toes. He scratched me once when I did it.

Other than that, Binde will let me do anything to him. I mean anything; I can put him on my shoulder, bring him down stairs, (he hates being near dogs) and I can drape him around my shoulders. Binde loves to stick his tongue out. It’s the only thing he does constantly (besides breathing) and it’s impossible to make him stop.

Binde doesn’t get along with the new dogs Scippio, Maxamus, and Fiji; they chase him at every opportunity so Binde wakes Dad up at 4:30 every morning. Dad always lets Binde out because he can make a lot of noise! And my dad likes his sleep. Binde is an all-around particular cat.

Peace to ya,

Farm Girl



Hi people!

Today Mom and I went to Terhune’s, a local farm stand, to buy corn. At the end of every summer Mom buys a lot of corn so we can have corn in the winter. How great is that! Then Mom and I, or Cathy and Silvia grind the corn kernels off the cob, measure them, put them in bags, and freeze them in the barn. It may seem easy but it’s really hard!

The other day we froze a lot of corn. Once we finished doing that it started to rain. I wanted to play in the rain with our dog, Max, but Mom wouldn’t let me, because it started thundering. Since Mom said I couldn’t, I automatically jumped off the porch to get the pink ball. As soon as I got off the porch Mom started yelling at me. “ Get back on the porch. I don’t want to be the one to tell Dad you got electrocuted!” she shouted.

I ran back to the porch and threw the ball in the air: Maxie caught it! Well not really, but he balanced it on his nose for a second then bounced it to me! We did this for about an hour, and then Mom made me come in and write this.

Isn’t Max the best? I certainly think he is!

Peace to ya,

Farm Girl


As I mentioned, on the farm I have several chores. One of my other many chores is to set up bread every other day.

Making bread isn’t very hard. Mom taught me how to make it when Kate, Mom’s friend, gave Mom the recipe. Kate’s recipe is really simple. All you have to do is have King Arthur Bread Flour, two medium sized bowls, water, salt, and yeast.

Here’s the recipe:

Mom’s Amazing Bread
(One loaf)
•    Three cups of King Arthur Bread Flour
•    One and a half cups of water
•    One fourth of a tea spoon of yeast
•    Salt (a circle the size of a silver dollar)

After everything is mixed in, rub olive oil on the bottom of the second bowl.

Put the dough in that bowl, cover it with plastic wrap, and leave it alone for twenty-four hours, at room temperature.

After twenty-four hours, fold the dough twice and wait for it to double in size.

Once that’s done preheat the oven to 450 degrees and put it on bake.

Bake it in a Dutch oven with the lid on for thirty minutes and for fifteen to twenty minutes with the lid off.

Let it cool for twenty minutes. Now you have fresh-baked bread!

Peace to ya,
                      Farm Girl


Hi people!

One of my many chores on the farm is to make laundry detergent. Two years ago Dad found out that people save money and help the environment by making your own laundry detergent. Dad searched online and found a recipe. To test the detergent he used it to wash the clothes that he used to shovel pig poop to make Mom’s pumpkin garden. Boy, did it work well! Soon we found out that it’s the only laundry detergent that gets pig poop out of clothes.

How great is that!

The laundry detergent even smells nice.

Here’s the recipe:

INGREDIENTS:

Home Made Laundry Soap
•    One third of a bar of Fels Naptha or another type of soap
•    One half of a cup of Arm and Hammer washing soda
•    One half of a cup of Borax powder
•    You will also need a bucket, about two-gallon size

METHOD:

Grate the Fels Naptha and put it in a saucepan.

Add six cups of water and heat it until the soap melts.

Add the washing soda and the borax and stir until it is dissolved.

Remove from heat.

Pour four cups of hot water into the bucket.

Now add the soap mixture and stir.

Next, add one gallon plus six cups of water and stir.

Let the soap sit for about twenty-four hours and it will gel. Use one half of a cup per load.

**A few things to note about the soap**
•    The finished soap will not be a solid gel. It will be more of a watery gel that some may describe more accurately as an “egg noodle soup” look.
•    The soap is a low sudsing soap. So if you don’t see suds, that is all right.

REFERENCES:

•    Dad
•    http://www.thefamilyhomestead.com/laundrysoap.htm

Peace to ya,

Farm Girl


Maximus, (otherwise known as Maxie-pants) a Standard Poodle, is my dad’s dog. Max has an awesome haircut—a mohawk that extends to his tail (we’re dying it purple for Halloween). He’s a giant compared to my sweet mini-Standard Poodle, Fiji.

The funniest thing was how he ate two entire hammocks to save us from being hurt by them. On a bright and sunny day I walked into the hammock.  I almost fell! Max saw this and decided that he must act, so within one hour there was a gaping hole in the hammock. Dad almost had a conniption, so he decided that he must go into the hot tub. While walking to the hot tub he tripped over a small stone and fell onto the hot tub, luckily Max wasn’t watching which is why we don’t have a hole in the hot tub.

Max, as protective as always, saw the mailman holding a package. He wasn’t sure what was in it, so he waited patiently for the mailman to walk past the electric fence line so he could take the package while Fiji licked him to death. Unluckily, the mailman didn’t let Max have the package.

Max bit him and the mailman yelped like a surprised baby and let go of the package. Max ran to tear open the package—inside it he found two pairs of white lacy underpants!  Poor Mom and mail man, all that for lacy undies?

Another funny Maxie-Pants story is how he tried to save us from the evil turkeys. Maxie knows that the turkeys are very annoying, so one day he decided that he might try to hunt them. Max patiently waited for a turkey to fly out of the pen—it took a lot of patience to wait, so in his spare time Maxie sat. When the first turkey flew out, Maxie neatly killed it. Mom was furious, but even that doesn’t describe how angry she was. Max on the other hand, looked very proud because he saved us from the annoying turkeys.

Peace to ya,
                  Farm Girl