Better (Tree) Homes & Gardens

Last summer, we were fortunate enough to get a great deal on a playset for the kids.  They immediately set to making it their own little place.  I love watching them work on it. 

Over the past few weeks, as the weather has warmed up, the tree house has been getting a sprucing up.  Natalie is creating her own "homestead" out there.  She has added a firewood pile, for the "fireplace" a raised bed flower garden, a place to keep her little chickens, a compost bin, a clothesline, and a flower box filled with pansies.  It's likely that I'm completely and utterly biased, but I think she's one of the most creative little people I have ever met.

Here's a peek inside.

Welcome!

Putting the finishing touches on her window box garden.

 

 

A closer look at the newest addition to her "homestead"
 

The animal quarters, notice they have an escape route behind the barn.

The fireplace

The Kitchen

 

 

 

Sinks and storage for clean & dirty dishes

We hope you enjoyed our treehouse tour!  Happy Sunday :)

Getting Ready

I wrote this on Sunday, thought I hit post, but apparently saved it as a draft. I'll share it anyway. 

So many thing have happened since my last post.  The idea of putting them all down is overwhelming. And it would be quite a long post.  So I'll start with where we are now. 

Life has been going by at a dizzying pace. I have been caught unprepared more than once recently.  So today, I'm getting prepared for the upcoming week. Hopefully having spent a day doing some cleaning, laundry and prep cooking will keep us from scurrying around at the last minute trying to find something quick to make for supper or school lunches.

This morning I took a bit of time and made a big batch of meatballs and a couple meals worth of chicken strips to put in the freezer.  I also put fresh cut up pineapple in individual containers and froze a pan of brownies. Our bases are now covered for keeping meal prep the rest of the week quick and simple.

Fruit to go.  Cut up pineapple and some cinnamon applesauce for school snacks.

The meatballs are just my standard semi-recipe. Most of the measurements are estimations, sorry, I'm one who eyeballs most things.

1 lb. Ground beef
1.5 lb Ground pork
2 eggs (the one I picked was a double yolker)
1/4 cup milk
2 Tbsp Worcestershire sauce
Dry minced onion
Garlic powder
Savory herb rub
Salt & pepper

Mix it all together with your hands.  Put golf ball size meatballs on a parchment lined baking sheet (with sides) and bake for about 30 minutes, turning halfway through.

The shape of the meatballs is almost as exact as the recipe ;)

The chicken strips are almost as complicated.

Boneless skinless chicken breasts, cut into strips
2 eggs
1/2 cup milk
1 cup flour
Salt & pepper
Savory herb rub
Paprika
Oil for frying

Mix milk & egg in one pie plate.  Mix flour and seasonings in another.  Roll the chicken strips in flour, then dredge through the egg mixture, then back through the flour.

Place in a heated skillet (the oil should already be in there and hot).

Fry til golden brown.  They don't need to be cooked through, since you'll be reheating them and they will finish cooking then.

Drain on paper towels.

The chicken strips are as uniform as the meatballs.  I like to think of them as "rustic" and "home style".

After the chicken strips and meatballs were done, drained and cooled, I put them in Ziploc bags. I popped them in the freezer and when I'm in a pinch for supper on the fly, I can pull them out and whip up a couple quick sides. And done. Onto spelling words or whatever comes my way.

I took a pan of brownies I made a few days ago and cut them into squares to go in the freezer as well.  They weren't disappearing as quickly as I thought  and I didn't want them to go to waste. I'll pull those out later on too.

The whole gang all set and ready to go.  There were 2 brownies that didn't fit.  I had no choice but to eat them.

The last thing I did before I threw everything in the dishwasher was to go through my little bin in the fridge where I keep single serve stuff for school lunches and tidy it up a bit.  I threw the little containers of pineapple and some applesauce in there so it's ready for the quick morning snack grab.

The fridge "snack bin".  Yogurt, cut veggies & fruit and cheese sticks live in here.  And sometimes, juice boxes & pudding cups.

Like I said, lots going on here lately as winter is finally releasing it's grip.  Here's hoping for a smooth week.

Happy Springtime Sunday!

Just Another Day

Today is Tuesday. Just an average day.

When I thought I'd write, I was planning to focus on how many different (figurative ) hats I wore today. But then I thought, no, this was not an average day. This was an exceptional day.

It was exceptional because we had an awesome morning. Like I didn't think MY kids were capable of getting out the door so peacefully and efficiently. 

Nobody cried, not even me. 

Everybody had all their stuff, including a slice of pumpkin bread and a cup of milk (coffee for mom) to eat on the way.

We were on time.

Nobody cut me off in the school drop off line. 

The guy behind me didn't even flip me off for stopping in the middle of the street to avoid a family of squirrels involved in a heated domestic dispute. Maybe he was watching them with a grin too.

I had time to run a few quick errands and take a short, but brisk walk around the block before starting my workday.

I figured out how to solve a problem that I've been dealing with for two days at work, with help from my boss, but we got it done.

We ate dinner before 8 pm. And it wasn't cold cereal.

Both kids got all their homework done.  Not the easiest task in the world. And they're only in elementary school, Lord help me when they get to high school!

One kid got a bath.

Backpacks are ready, the coffee pot is set to wake me up in the morning and the laundry is folded.

Kids are tucked into bed. Time for the Mister to take one of his 45 minute showers and wash off the grease and grit of the day. Time for this mama to put her feet up with a warm cup of apple cinnamon tea and a book.

Maybe I'll even finish this book so I can return it to the friend I borrowed it from. It has been a good read.  Different than I was expecting, but worth reading. 

I know I will sleep well tonight.

Here's to ordinary yet exceptional days. :)

This Is My Year! I Just Know It!

After months of careful planning and researching and seed propogating, the garden is in!  Not as early as I would have liked, but still, it is in.  Everything is planted.  Some things are even sprouting already.

Good Mother Stallard pole bean sprout.
I spent enough time in the garden to watch it
actually open and unfurl yesterday.

This year is something completely new for my veggie patch.  I built raised beds.  Nothing fancy. But, raised beds nonetheless.  Next year, I hope to add a few more so that everything is planted in beds.  I have four so far and plans for four more.  I have wanted to do raised beds for some time, but have always been talked out of it for one reason or another. 

 

There it is.
 Probably should have taken my dirty gloves out of the fence
before I snapped the picture.

Raised beds aren't for everybody.  For myself, I know that I don't have a reliable tiller.  And tilling is quite a procedure even when we have one to use.  The weather has to be just right.  Both of us need to be home.  Seriously, the stars have to align for us to get a decent till in.  Thus the desire for raised beds.  This year, I just decided to go for it.  Power tools and everything.  

Natalie and I built the plank rectangles.  Matt and our neighbor hauled in a trailer full of compost from our community pile.  All the kids (ours and the neighbors) hauled in sticks and leaves from the yard.  I hauled in countless wheelbarrows full of composted chicken manure/bedding.  We dug and picked weeds and sifted out rocks and filled the beds. 

Then the planting started.  Lettuce, spinach, carrots and zucchini in the first bed.  Sweet peppers and pie pumpkins in the second.  Peas and broccoli in the third.  Cucumbers, parsnips, and turnips in the fourth.  Potatoes were carefully tucked into haystacks.  In between all this, bean teepees were constructed and planted.  Marigold and zinnia seeds were sprinkled into the corners and between crops.  Tomatoes were the last to go in.  They were planted yesterday.

The garden from the other corner.
The green in the front corner there is
my little strawberry patch.
Lots of berries this year!

During all this steady, sweaty work on the garden, I read an article about another MN woman who constructed huge raised beds with a method called Hugelkultur.  I thought it sounded cool and like it would help our very heavy, clay soil.  I didn't know it was a thing.  Like hipster gardening.  I don't want to be a hipster.  I look terrible in skinny jeans.  Good thing I didn't know that when I started.  Anyway...

So I dug a small trench, hauled in some rotten board chunks (plain rough sawed pine leftover from a long ago project.), sticks and lots of old leaves.  

Trench with sticks and wood scraps.

Same trench from farther away to give an idea
of scale.

  

Toss some leaves on top.

Once I had a decent sized mound, I put the excavated dirt back on top.  In went my shrimpy little tomato plants.  Then went on a light layer of hay. (It was what was left from my little potato beds.  Time to hit up my neighbor with horses again.)   Once the plants are a bit taller, I will add some more compost & manure and another layer of hay, just to make the soil thicker.

Shovel the dirt back on.
Also make sure to pick out the unwanted green things that
may start growing again.

I  pinned it all in place with about 15 tomato cages.  Then applied a good amount of water mixed with fish fertilizer.  I put the fish emulsion fertilizer on everything.  Now my garden smells like somebody farted.  I'm told that goes away.

The tomato mound.
With our super fancy scarecrow watching over it.
Ok, not really, she's actually facing the other way.

All I can do now is cross my fingers, say my prayers and hope that these little plants have the decency to grow and be fruitful.  It would be rude of them not to.  

Sugar Pie pumpkins are coming up nicely.  So far, so good.

Every year, I think this is going to be my year.  Bumper crops.  Veggies coming up everywhere.  This year, I really hope I'm right.  Organic heirloom veggies will abound or I'm gonna die trying!

Homestead Happenings

It's officially Spring!  In Minnesota, we call this Mud Season.  This year's snowfall was far below average giving way to a mild, dry Spring.  When I say "dry" it's a relative term.  There's still mud.  But it's not deep mud.  It's not don't-slow-down-on-the-dirt-road-or-you'll-sink-to-your-axles mud.  It's still sloppy, but it has been worse.  Far, far worse.

Matt & Joey sawing up a little dry pole they found on the edge of the yard

Along with the mud comes the cleaning up of sticks that have blown loose in the winter and the season's first campfire.  And preparing the garden for the "last frost".  And ordering/starting seeds.  And this year, tapping maple trees.

Seeds, Glorious Seeds!

I ordered seeds from Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds this year.  I have never ordered seeds in the mail before.  Just gone to the fleet supply or Wal-Mart and picked up whatever looked fun.  This year, I did a bit of research and decided to go with heirloom varieties in the garden.  I already had some seed left from last year for peas, cucumbers and summer squash that happened to be heirloom varieties.  I purchased new varieties (for me anyway) of carrots, peppers, beans, tomatoes, and lettuce.  

One raised bed down, seven more to go.  Just add dirt.  And plants.

The other new thing in store for my garden this year is raised beds.  Tilling is really a hassle for us.  We don't have a reliable tiller, the weather has to be just right and we both have to be home to get the job done.  And it never fails that I manage to stir up some long extinct variety of weed seeds and single-handedly  bring them back to a thriving population.  So, I'm trying the raised bed method this year.  We have a pile of old pine boards leftover from when we ordered siding for the house a few years ago (This is plain untreated rough sawed pine).  The lumber is no longer in it's prime, but it will get the job done for now.  Natalie and I built the first one last weekend.  We have several more to go, but we've got a start.

Matt putting in the final tap.

Another First for our little homestead is the tapping of maple trees.  Matt and Natalie had been talking about it and he told her that his dad used to tap trees when he was a kid.  So, off to Grandpa's house they went for a hand drill and his homemade taps.  My job was to sort through the recycling and find enough empty milk jugs to put under the taps.  Once we had everything ready to go, they went out and got started.  The neighbors were coming over for the afternoon and soon enough, Matt had all five of the kids (our two plus the three neighbor girls) following him around like he had magic powers.  We have collected about three and a half gallons of sap in our first 24 hours.  I am saving it in my big stock pots in the shed until the weekend and we'll try cooking it down.  Frankly, I have no idea what I'm doing on this.  I'm just along for the ride.  But if the kids want to tap trees, then we'll follow the process to the finish.  We probably will get very little if any syrup, but the kids (and I) will learn another lesson in how to make something.  So, here goes nothing!  Wish us luck!  If you have any insight on this, please share in the comments section.

Random chicken shot.  They're happy to see bare ground too!

Happy Spring!

Winter Wrap-Up: Part Three

This is the last part of my little mini-series.  I'm so glad I can dream up random projects that I feel really urgently need to get done.  Otherwise I might lose my mind in the long dark winters.

This last project has actually been on my mind for a while.  I'm pretty sure everybody has at least one of those giveaway fleece throws with some company or another's logo on it.  We have one that is a really nice size for a picnic blanket and the kids like to curl up in it to watch TV at night.

The problem with these blankets is that they are magnetic.  I swear if there is a cat hair or piece of grass within a mile it will gravitate to these blankets.  So, I decided to cover it with woven cotton fabric.  Essentially, I used the original blanket as the stuffing for a small quilt.

I found some random fabrics in my stash.  About five yards worth.  All woven cotton.  I gave them a quick pre-wash and dry to eliminate any shrinkage.  Then I got out my scissors and started cutting.  I wanted to get this done quickly, so I cut big blocks.  For the front, I used 3 different patterns and cut them all into 1/4 yard blocks.  Approximately.  I do a lot of things by eyeballing.  So, I folded the fabric in half, cut on the fold, folded again, cut again.  Then I laid the pieces out over the original throw until I had enough pieces to cover it.

I sewed the front together in rows.  Each row has 3 pieces.  Two long and one short.  As it happened, I was about 3 inches short on the length.  So, I took some of the leftover orange fabric and pieced together a long strip to attach to the top.

For the back, I just cut two colors of cotton into big rectangles and did a nine patch pattern.  Pretty easy peasy.

Next, I sewed the front on to the fleece. 

Then attached the back by putting it wrong side out over the front of the blanket.  Once I got almost all the way around, I turned it right side out, closed up the seam and ran a simple top stitch around the edges.  Just to give it a little extra strength, I ran a line of stitches across the front about 1/3 and 2/3 of the way down the blanket.  I'll pretend it's my "quilting".

Now we have a nice little fluffy quilt with kitties on it.  The kids like that it's bright colored and cute, I like that it's not covered in cat hair.  Matt likes that the kids aren't stealing his blanket.  Everybody wins.

Now, on to Spring projects.  Just in time too because the weather is warming up.  Time to order seeds and get things going for the garden!

Oh and before I forget, I got featured on a blog that I dearly love called Little House Living!  Merissa has a new series called "Making the Most With What You Have".  I filled out her questionnaire a few months ago and she published my story last week!  I'm so excited!  Thank you Merissa for publishing my story!

Winter Wrap-Up: Part Two

The next thing I crossed off my list, finally (!) was to get all my recipes in one place.  I started a recipe binder about 13 or 14 years ago and it has been an ongoing process ever since.

My original binder was pretty simple. A one-inch binder with the cover that you can customize, each recipe on it's own page, a title page for each category.  Well, then I got more recipes.  Pretty soon they didn't all fit in a one-inch binder anymore.  So I got a bigger binder.  Then Pinterest was invented.  Now, my recipes don't fit in that binder anymore either.  Suddenly, I had recipes stuck to the fridge, inside the cabinet doors, in a file folder and stuffed inside the covers of the binder. So I started a second volume.

In case this sounds like a lot of work and you wonder why on earth I would do this, there are two reasons.  First off, I screw up every single thing I make off a standard recipe card.  I blame the tiny print and all the flipping back and forth.  Secondly.  I'm really OCD about organization.  I like to know where my stuff is at all times.

Here's my original binder.  

And my original dividers.  Not much dividing happening at a glance, but it was the best I could come up with at the time.  (Pretend there aren't tabs peeking out from behind.  I'll get to that in a minute.)

The new dividers. (I totally stole this idea from I Heart Organizing, an awesome blog for compulsive organizers like myself.) I kept the old ones too because I still like them.  This gives me an at-a-glance way to head to the right section of the book.  And these dividers have these neat pockets in them for my loose paper recipes.  

Volume Two.  I had lots more recipes for goodies than I thought.  Clearly, there are no diabetics in my house and we are not on any sort of low carb or paleo diet.   Give me Bread!  Lots of Bread! 

 This is how I set up the second volume.

Some of my favorite pages. Just to give you an idea of what the inside of the books look like.

Natalie likes to make pages now too.  

She brings her own stickers and ideas to the table and creates away!  This is one of her pages.

 I mentioned the cool pockets in these tabbed dividers earlier.  I like these because I have lots of recipes cut out from magazines or printed off of blogs.  I don't automatically put all of them permanently in the book.  I make them for the family.  Then I ask if it's a make again meal or a not so good meal.  If it gets a make again rating, then I make it it's own little scrapbook page in my book.  If not, then I toss it and pretend it never happened.  

The tabbed dividers are made by Avery and I got mine at Wal-Mart.  The pages inside the book are all inside regular old clear plastic page protectors of various brands.