Warm Bread on a Cold Day

We recently became the proud owners of a new bread maker.  We actually wore out our old one. 

I love the smell of freshly baked bread in the house.  In the same way that using our Kitchen Aid food processor reminds me of my Grandpa Ed (it was his wedding gift to us), making bread reminds me of Ian's dearly departed Grandpa Al.

Grandpa Al and baby Liam

I am not sure if he actually made a lot of homemade bread (his homemade waffles were excellent!), but on a trip to Thunder Bay to introduce him to his first great grandchild (Liam), he gifted me with this bread book off his kitchen shelf.  Making recipes out of it makes me think of him. 

We are currently out of skim milk powder, so this week I tried the Breakfast Bread.

I substituted wheat flour for the spelt flour (we did not have that either).  After measuring carefully on the kitchen scale and making no other substitutions, it ended up like this. Too runny. 

I added an extra cup of flour. Better. 

The finished product was good. It could have used more cinnamon. Seamus had no problem getting it down the hatch once it was smeared with butter.

There is nothing better than fresh, warm bread on a cold day to bring back memories of loved ones.

Mama's Little Helper

With an unexpected morning free, Seamus and I scooped the poop.  He was unstoppable, motoring along with his kid-sized wheelbarrow right alongside mine.

We fed the chickens some old pumpkins. Yum - if you are a chicken...

Seamus got stuck playing in the hayloft of the Charlie's barn.  Luckily I was there to help him out!

It turns out that Seamus can yield a pitchfork like nobody's business.  Mama's little helper, indeed.

We got everything clean and dry just in time for the rain to come!

Left Out in the Cold (by Choice)

My chickens are usually really good about heading inside the coop when it gets dark.  I never have to chase them in.  However, this morning when I went back to let them out, there were already two chickens frolicking in the chicken run. 

The rogue chickens hiding behind the apple tree.  I can still see you!

The only explanation is that these two birds went rogue last night and hid outside to avoid bed time.  Goodness, it sounds like I am talking about the boys!  The two avian rascals are the chicks our broody hen raised this summer.

Mama hen and her three chicks in August.

I will be careful to take a better look around the yard tonight before shutting the birds in.  Not only is there a risk of foxes and raccoons for hens that brave the night, but it is cold!  It went down to minus seven degrees Celsius last night. It will be much safer and toastier inside the coop.  Silly chickens.

A Last Hurrah...for Now.

With a household of sick kiddos - Liam has a doctor's appointment at 2pm for an ear ache - we are a bit of a mess.  At least the boys sleep more when they are ill.

Despite the frozen ground, this morning I tackled our rhubarb patches during nap time.  These patches were newly planted this year as replacements for our old rhubarb patch that suffered from root rot.  I raked up some leaves and weeded as best I could.  Hopefully, something comes back in the spring.  Rhubarb is supposed to be resilient, isn't it?

I also figured that there is no time like the present to tackle my last flower garden - the pond garden.  You never know when something else will come up that inhibits me from gardening duty.  I better do it now, while I still can!

Ugh.

I trimmed and weeded and....voila!

A bit better.

In the middle of my garden work, I received a dreaded bing-bong on my phone as my final dissertation comments landed in my inbox.  That signals the end of my farm-cation.  For now.  Back to the computer and the brain work instead of the yard work.  Sigh.

Some Love for Charlie P.

Our miniature donkey Charlie P. is a very special personality on the farm. 

 Seamus adores her and she is the lucky recipient of his hugs and cuddles.

There is nothing cuter than a toddler who loves his donkey.

A Hive Body Scrape Down

Ian is extraordinarily helpful in keeping my bee equipment in tip top shape.  I do most of the hands on work with the bees.  Ian helps me keep everything clean, organized, and properly stored.  This weekend he washed out all our feeder pails in preparation for storage.

He also used a hive tool to scrape down all the supers, frames, and inner covers I brought in from the bee yard on Thursday.  The beeswax and propolis (bee glue) is much easier to scrape off when it is cold - it just flakes off.  In hot weather it is all sticky and gooey.

Before

During

After. All clean.

Now everything is ready to be stored for winter.

All I have left to do is wash my bee suit.  A job for another day.

A Tidy Fish Habitat

With the boys on holiday with Grandma and Grandpa at the cottage, it was time for Ian and I to get some of the less kid-friendly chores out of the way.  In comparison to skinning the deer and taking her to the butcher (one of Ian's jobs for today), cleaning the fish tank might seem like a good chore to do with kids.  It is not.  Allowing them to help usually results in water all over both the kitchen and living room floors and fish suffering from PTSD.

First I scooped all the goldfish out of the tank.  They each got their own temporary residence in a mixing bowl.  Without boys terrorizing them by sticking their fingers in the bowls, this was a relatively peaceful relocation.

I then emptied out two-thirds of the water, cleaned lots of fish poop out of the gravel, and scraped algae off the inside of the tank walls.  I cleaned out the filter with an old toothbrush.

I refilled the tank with fresh, clean water - half hard water from our well and half reverse osmosis water.  I added some liquid aquarium plant minerals and a new branch decoration.  We still need to replace the fluorescent light with a new one - the hardware store was out of stock.  So far so good.  The tank looks much improved and the fish seem happy with their tidy habitat.

All clean.  Good as new.