Long time no post! lol

I've taken a long vacation from blogging.  July of 2012 being my last post, pretty sure some people who were reading might be wondering if I croaked. lol  I decided to come back from the dead though and start over.  Life has been busy with our 7 crazy kids and now that our youngest are 4,3, and 2 it's slowing down a bit to where I think I can blog consistantly again.  So lets do this, the new blog address is

www.oneblessedhomeontherange.blogspot.com

See ya soon! 

BUSY, with pictures

 So yeah, this blog has been really neglected. This is just a few pics and not even close to all I've been harvesting.  Blanching, freezing, picking, pickling, canning, shucking.  Harvested so much and it's only the beginning of July.  Tonight I'm working on my first of Pumpkin Puree.  Good times. lol  God is so good!

Our new baby

 

So kind of a spur of the moment deal but we adopted a baby Mustang this week.  She is gorgeous, no?   We just got her so no name yet but we're thinking Willow.   Echo is 5 now and has been in desperate need of a friend.  Horses are such social animals and need a friend to keep them occupied.  Well this little girl came up for adoption and how could we say no to her.  Especially because she looks so much like Echo did as a baby!  A little backround, Echo is actually a Pinto/Quarter cross.  Her owners were hoping she'd come out a paint but she came out with just a few tiny white spots.  You can tell their mouths are just about the same, they have the same blaze, same personality.  She was supposedly wild but in the last 24 hours we have had her, she was led into the pen with a halter on, has let everyone snuggle, comes up to the fence when she sees us, let me kiss her on the nose a few hundred times, and I've been brushing her because she still has her winter coat.  I was told since she was wild and weaned early that this is their body's defense to keep them safe.  You can see Echo has lost her coat like a month ago.  Echo loves her and this has brought on a mothering role for her.  I can totally see she'd be a great mom now if we ever do breed her.  ;)  I will keep posting progress with her so you can see how much she has changed.  I'm hoping we can have her lead broke in the next few weeks since she's taken so well in 24 hours with a hair brush. lol 

Bunnies!

We've had a steady flow of baby bunnies arriving at our house the past month or so. Our kids are so very excited to take them to the County Fair and State Fair this year, lets just hope they don't end up last summer, we had 4 get heatstroke and die. :( So far we are up to 8 that look showable, 1 looks to be a pet because of a lack of markings, and we have 1 more litter will be born the beginning of May. It's been alot of fun around here cuddling with all these sweet little ones. We've had several friends bringing kids by to pet and another friend of mine even used our rabbits for her Photography Easter sessions.

Gianna is also in love with the babes. She just admires them as they jump all around. They are so fragile you really have to watch kids as they can crush them easily. She loves the bunnies, hates our horse. lol

Since Gianna is getting a bit older, I'm finding it easier to run away to my sewing machine or to workout FINALLY. I'm still breastfeeding her at 14 1/2 months but I'm hoping, HOPING someday soon I'll get her weaned. She likes bottles but loves mommy's chest too. lol

About two weeks ago, I was on my Google reader checking out blogs I frequent and stumbled upon this. I thought this was a gorgeous retro creation that I just HAD to make for my girls Easter baskets. I have a knack of reusing things so I found some of Gi's receiving blankets and decided to use them. I got started sewing, I'd sew so much, take a break, come back. All was going great till I came back after lunch to start again. One inch in my needle froze. It was knotted so I checked everything out, started again and it stopped exact same spot knotted underneath AGAIN. After having this happen another 10-15 times I gave up. I would try again each day as Easter approached I realized I was not going to get these pretty bunnies done for my girls baskets and was so sad. Easter came and went then hubby decided to take a look since I was requesting a new machine. Come to find out there was a monster who snuck down to my cool cockpit of knobs and buttons and turned the thread tension too low making it knot like crazy. Pretty sure we can say it was Rocco. ;) After that was discovered I was able to get 1 bunny done. :)

I should have figured. I mean there isn't a thing in this house the kids haven't tried destroying or played with. Somedays they drive me bonkers because with 4 at home during the day, they've all got different agendas, plus I have my own with housework.

All has been going well here. We had Middle School Orientation the other day for our oldest. How did that happen???

Chickens!

Well this mama has decided to finally get some chickens so we can have meat we can trust. lol! All this pink slime hoopla has made me not trust the food chain at all. I had to get hubby to OK it but after I showed him the costs and all (which will be little since they will be free range), cost of slaughter and processing and the fact we would have fresh eggs all the time he decided we should give it a try. So meat, I mean meet our first 5 chickens now 2 weeks old. Nugget, Smoke, Cordon Blu, Hotwing, and Popcorn. I bought these guys early as some fun Easter eye candy for my kids. I have to place an order for the others, we are going to start with about 40-50 and slaughter about half. I made sure to pick out a butcher before hand because after reading up on it, slaughtering chickens is not for us. lol I'm excited and the butcher says we will never buy store chicken ever again that there is that big of a difference in taste. We'll see in about 2 months. :)

St. Patricks Day!

The kids woke up Saturday morning to some surprises from a little leprechaun named Lachlan. First they found a note from Lachlan on the stove with a pile of gold coins and some Lucky Charms. They were so excited and giggling. I told them they'd better go to the bathroom so they could eat their Lucky Charms he brought them. We don't normally buy sugary cereals so that would be why such excitement. So they all trotted to the bathroom.....where an eruption of giggles and laughter filled the whole house. I said "what's going on??" Then Dominic, 9, came out and said "The leprechaun peed green pee in our toilet!!!!" Sure enough! I went in to examine and there it was green pee in the toilet.

We had a fun day and celebrated having all kinds of green goodies. Green Jello, Green Shamrock cookies, Shamrock pretzels, small shamrock m&m's on pretzels, green milk, rainbow candy, green cupcakes, green grapes and green milk!
Here's my 7 lucky charms after our day of fun.