***Warning*** Political Rant

I don’t care what your opinions on vaccinations are.  You know why?  Because it’s your (or your child’s body) and you should have the final say.  Period.  But that’s not what I’m ticked about.  California just passed a law which states that your children will be making the decision about which vaccinations they receive.  A twelve-year old girl will be allowed to make this “choice”.  Twelve.  Years.  Old.

This is from the state that just recently passed a law stating that a 17 year old isn’t mature enough to responsibly weigh the risks of using a tanning bed (it is now illegal for anyone under 18 to use a tanning bed w/out parental consent), but in almost the same breath say that a twelve year old is mature enough to decide (with much “input” from teachers & school nurses, I’m sure) if s/he wants a chemical cocktail injected into their still-growing bodies. 

Oh, it gets even better.  You, yes you, the parent will not be able to access the outcome of that decision because it would be violating the child’s (yes your child) right to privacy.  The state, however, has every right to dig into those juicy records.  The one that gave birth to, or cares for the child, not so much. 

Although I don’t have a dog in this fight as we don’t live in California (I don’t care how frekking wonderful the weather is there), it still disturbs me as it is just another blatant violation of parental, and Constitutional, rights.  And it just keeps happening, and will continue to happen until one of two things occur;  enough people finally get up off their asses and say “Enough!” or the people give up all responsibility for the “Easy” way and become nothing more than government chattel.

I don’t know which I’m more upset about.  The fact that our pretentious and arrogant elected officials actually feel they have a right to impose such tyrannical laws upon citizens, or the fact that the citizens are too lazy to do anything about it.  I mean, do people really want this type of intrusion and intervention in their personal lives? 

Really? 

I often think that nobody in their right mind would want to be ruled over by a million often insane laws, regulations, codes and restrictions.  But then I see the same morons being elected, again & again.  The same type of ignorant and self-serving bills pass through legislation and become law.   And the only way that can happen is if there ARE people out there like that, voting them in.  But why?  I’m confused and distraught. 

I can only hope that there are enough people out there that do believe in personal responsibility and will one day be able to fight back the ever-encroaching attack on our lives, on our families and our futures.

No Cash Required, Part 1

I love bartering for stuff.  Not only is it fun, but a good way to stick it to the taxman! 

Although we don't do as much bartering as I wish we could, we did manage to do a little bit of it this year.

• We've bartered milk for fish, goat feed and a bale of hay.
• We gave whey and got fresh salad greens. 
• We swapped home-canned pears for home-canned figs.
• We got seeds and gave butternut squash & eggplant. 
• We exchanged eggs for cucumbers. 
• We traded zucchini for tomatoes.

Bartering doesn't even have to be obvious.  It's not like we say to everyone we see, "I got some nice fresh goat milk here, what you got?"  Just getting together with friends and neighbors can start the bartering process......it's called Sharing!

So you may be nonchalantly bartering and not even know it.  Now imagine how many more opportunities you could have if you actively looked for bartering opportunities!  You don't have to have a farm, produce and dairy products to swap in order to barter for stuff.  I have a lady that comes for my goat milk once a week and she just mentioned that she had a lot of dental work to be done.  Her husband is a carpenter and when they were both in the dentist office, he noticed they were doing some remodeling.  After talking with the dentist, they are going to work out a trade; the dentist will do x amount of dental work for x hours of carpentry work.

Get out there and network with your existing friends!  They may not have what you're looking for, but I'm assuming your friends have friends (unless they are hermits like Paul dreams of being) and all it takes is a casual conversation for that "something" that you need to be paired with that "something" you have.

Although I don't utilize it as often as I probably should, there is always Cragislist, your local online paper and FreeCycle to check out and use as a way to advertise what items you have available for barter.

Sooooo......I've got this gawd-awful-stinky buck goat.  Anybody want to trade me something....ANYthing for him????

Nut Picker Upper Thingy

Just in case you were all up the entire night wondering what kind of contraption the Nut Picker Upper Thingy was, I found it!

http://www.nutwizard.com/prod01.htm

It's official name is the Nut Wizard.

Just though you'd like to know.  Now I've got to work on finding a place to buy the Hickory Nut cracker.

You may all sleep soundly now.

Eating the Trees - Hickory

Rhiannon, Grandma and I went to the local park last week.  While Grandma chased Rhiannon around the jungle gym, I went Hickory nut harvesting!

Basket of Hickory nuts along with what I hope are White Oak acorns.

Our area is full of Black Walnut Oak and Hickory trees.  During the first part of fall, when the Walnut trees start losing their leaves and we've had several consecutive nights of cool weather, a yearly natural migration can be observed.  The seniors come out from the bingo halls and knitting circles in droves, armed with large sacks and walnut-picker-upper-roller-things (I don't know what they are called, sorry) and descend upon the local forest preserves like locusts out of The Old Testament. 

While I applaud anyone for utilizing this free source of wild food (although most of them just sell the walnuts to a traveling walnut-broker-of-sorts), I also feel sorry for them as they walk right over and pass up what I feel is a much more tasty wild nut.

The Hickory nuts fall at the same time and are just as abundant as the Black Walnuts, the husks are easy to come off, they don't stain your hands black for a week, and they are a much sweeter nut in my opinion.  The only problem with them is that they are notoriously difficult to crack.  But then again, so are Black Walnuts. 

I'm at a loss as to why I seem to be the only one bothering with them.   

More nuts for me I guess!

PS- If anyone can suggest a brand of Black Walnut Cracker (or any other piece of equipment other than a vice and ten pound hammer to crack tough/hard nuts) please let me know!  I need one like right now!

PPS - Don't forget to enter my Blog Birthday Giveaway!

I'm One Year Old Today!

To celebrate my One-Year Anniversary of blogging, I’m going to share with you one of my favorite cool-weather drinks.

I’ve had my first pot of hot tea for the season over a month ago.  I love being able to enjoy a cup (or three or six) of tea first thing in the morning.  And when the winter turns bitter cold, there’s nothing I like better than a hot cuppa after trudging through snow and chipping ice out of water buckets.

Actually, there are a bunch of things I like better, or as much as tea, but they wouldn't do well in shipping.  Cats, for example.  Cute, fuzzy, wonderful little creatures they are.  But imagine the crazed, hissing & spitting ball of fury that would launch it’s razor-sharp claws at your face upon opening the parcel at your home.  Not going to be a pretty sight.  And a lawsuit wouldn't be out of the question I suppose.  So I opted for something more seasonal and less lethal.

Now where was I?

Oh yeah, the giveaway.  Up for grabs is one festive-looking teapot and a variety of teas to make six pots of delicious tea:

One new teapot and two each of the following Bigelow teas: Spiced Chai, Orange & Spice, Vanilla Caramel, Peppermint, Chinese Oolong and English Teatime.

You get two chances to win; one entry for a plain ol’ comment saying you’d like to enter and one entry if you link to this page on your blog & let me know.  To be fair to those who don’t have a blog, just make a separate comment saying something nice about cats.  Open to US addresses only.  I’ll pick a winner in a week (or whenever I get to it….it’s my blog, so I can do whatever I want).

Oh, and look at what else I did to celebrate my One-Year:

Made a cake!  Thanks for the inspiration Mooberry Farm!  That lady makes a cake for every conceivable event.

Good luck!  Sorry I couldn’t share the cake with you.  Well, I suppose I could ship a slice with the teapot, but couldn't guarantee how well it would hold up.  Especially with the cat.

Evil x 2

Don't know why I didn't post THIS picture of the Cinnamon Roll:

Go ahead, lick  the screen.  Just don't drool too much and short out your laptop.

Oh, make sure to check in tomorrow 'cause there's going to be more yummies........and maybe even something for YOU!

Convenience Foods - Freezer

Homemade convenience foods, that is.

Although I cannot say that a box of Mac & Cheese or Ramen Noodles have never graced my pantry shelves, we do try to stay away from those types of foods.  But there's a reason those types of foods are so popular.  Because they are convenient, duh!

Cooking from scratch is one of the best things you can do for your family.  But it is also a very time consuming activity; planning out your meal, grocery shopping, finding recipes that everyone will like, making the menu, cleaning up from making the stuff on the menu, frying / baking / broiling / smoking / or otherwise cooking the meal, serving the meal, cleaning up from serving the meal and then more cleaning up.  And Paul thought it was a chore to just "Get Hay".  Ha!  Try making something as "simple" as a chicken dinner with all the fixings and then tell me what's easier.

There are only three of us here, one being under the age of three.  But I still cook for a family of six (don't believe me? take a look at my thighs.).  I just can't make small meals.  But that's ok, becuase not only do we actually eat leftovers (can you believe some people just can't fathom the idea of leftovers?  How weird.)  but because I'll pack one container for Paul to take for lunch the next day and one container to freeze.

Stack o' frozen dinners ready to heat 'n eat!

I also try to bake items like bread and cookies in duplicate.  I can bake all the cookies at once, then freeze them, or just freeze the dough in little "logs" to use when we want hot-ott'a-the-oven cookies.  Sunday I made enough Cinnamon Rolls to feed the entire county.  Of course, we each had one right out of the oven, and I put four more out on a plate for the week (as if they'd last 'till Wednesday), but the rest went into the freezer:

Breads also freeze very well.  I just took one out of the freezer a few days ago and when I was munching on the last piece, I actually had to think about where it came from because I knew I didn't make any lately. 

"Fresh" frozen bread, ready to defrost & slice!

Next time you're making bread, or cookies, or just about anything that freezes well, try making a double batch.  And soon enough you'll have your freezer stocked with REAL convenience foods.

But if you have no willpower like I do, make sure you freeze those extra cookies right away or they'll be gone before they can become convenient for next time!