Earlier in the week, I shared a couple of pictures of my canned goods pantry. Those were only a partial picture of the foods we've put up. The jars that didn't fit in the cupboards are now stacked all over the garage.
Where the exercise equipment is supposed to be.
But it's not, because it's canning season.
Ya. That's it.
Canning isn't the only thing that's been happening around here though.
After a chilly couple of nights, I decided to make a mini hoop-house to protect my pepper plants. How difficult could it be? After all, Pinterest makes it looks so easy. With some PVC pipe, painter's plastic, and clamps in hand, I was ready to go.
Note to self: When erecting a structure on a hill, make the necessary adjustments before putting the plastic on.
Better yet, make the adjustments before allowing the Mister to see it.
His to-do list just got longer.☺
We finished butchering the last half of our 57 meat chickens. My Mister wants you to know that he can remove the neck, and eviscerate an entire chicken in 1 minute, 34 seconds.
Because everything is a competition when there are 6 males in charge of the butchering.
Our birds averaged out around 7.5 lbs.
Which is about 1.5 lbs. more than the crock pot can handle.
I finished processing the feet for stock. Do you know how many feet come from 26 chickens?
Like, a million. Or 52. Somewhere around there. Honestly, I lost track after 3.
After hand-milking Tilly for a few days, the Mister and I decided that we weren't cut out for hand-milking. (Really, we're not cut out for getting slapped in the face every 20 seconds with a tail that has the ability to scalp someone who isn't paying attention.) So we scoured the country until we found a machine. Thankfully, we found it in the next county. You know, with gas prices being what they are and all.
Milk cows don't really care how they get milked, they're just in it for the grain.
Of course, we're only in it for the milk, so it's a fair trade.
It seems we're not the only ones who've been busy. After returning from her big adventures in the city, Ethel was ready to settle down and start a family.
We're still unsure if Bourbon Red Fred is the baby daddy though.
All Emily knows is that farming...
...is mighty hard work.☺
9 comments:
Aw...Wonderful pics with the last one being the best of all!!! (Nice weight on the birds BTW)
You very blessed to have the life you and your mister have create.
I'm getting ready to butcher some of my fryer chickens. Ummmm, do you travel? hehehehe. Love the milker! That could come in really handy!
Aww... Brings back such fond memories I have of our chicken processing day. :) Your mister made good time on the birds.
I've been thinking I need to put a cloche over my tomatoes to get them to ripen. Although we've enjoyed a gorgeous September (we got rain last night, by the way, did you?), the nights are growing cooler to be sure.
Our friends with a dairy cow usually milk with a mechanical milker, but their oldest daughter loves to milk by hand -- imagine that!
Such blessings you're enjoying there on your farm. Thanks for sharing, Kim!
~Lisa
Love that - one boot on, and one boot off. You HAVE been busy. And that is mighty fast 'gutting' that is. I want to know how fast the plucking went...
When we had our dairy goats, we never had a milking machine but I've since learned that a real advantage of a machine is that it keeps the milk so much cleaner (less "stuff" falling in the milk) that the keeping quality goes way up.
Those meat birds of yours are approaching turkey size! ;o}
I know what the tuckered out little gal in the last picture feels like. I sometimes have trouble making it all the way into bed after a hard day, too.
We've had sprinkles on and off all day, but it's still dusty dry outside. We really need a good soaking! (Just 1 though~I'm not ready for the continuous stuff!)
We just finished wrapping the chickens...our largest bird was just under 10 lbs. My girls wrote "Franken-chicken" on the packages...:)
You have been a busy farmgirl. And good fresh milk! How much are you getting now? I like to keep times on how many birds I can do in an hour, so I know how your hubby is. I'll have to see if I can beat his time.
Kris~We're getting just less than 2gallons a day, but we haven't separated Tilly and Maggie...yet. :)
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