Cookbook Give-Away!!

I just added some great new cookbooks to the shop and website. I am giving away one of the Quick Desserts pictured above. All you need to do to enter is leave a comment with your email addy or simply send me an email with ENTER ME TO WIN in the subject line. My email address is cyndiuh@aol.com

Winner will be drawn on July 1st. Cookbook will be shipped to the winner for free! One entry only please.


Thinking Ahead to Christmas I have stitched up this little Christmas mouse. I had to come up with something for the Oct./Nov. issue of Country Sampler so I choose this little guy.

We have been really....really....busy lately. My neighbor gave me her two sheep.......and to both our surprise two days after I brought the mama sheep home she had twins! They are the cutest things you ever seen. I will post some pics soon.

We have been working in the garden and planting field corn for the critters and filling the barn with hay. We cut and bale our own hay and it's a lot of work! But very rewarding. When the snow is flying the critters will have plenty to eat............and that makes me Happy ( :0)

So send in your entry for the cookbook before it's too late. And if you have time run on over to the website and check out the other great cookbooks just added.

http://www.keeperofthepast.com

Blessings!

Cyndi

SPRING BLESSINGS!

I have been blessed with lots of new little Spring Blessings lately. Saturday to my surprise I discovered that my one and only little hen hatched out eleven little chicks! Now I have a dozen plus one rooster. I love to watch them crowd under the mother hen for protection.

In the photo's below you will see my other new little blessing given to me by critter-lovin neighbor a few weeks ago. He is a baby goose.........I named Dooney. He is such a joy and follows my every step. He has grown like a weed and is beginning to get feathers. I am hoping the ducks will kindly accept him and let him join the flock when he is older.

I hope you all have had a few Spring Blessings of your own.......I'd love to hear about them!

Happy Spring

Cyndi

www.keeperofthepast.com

Dooney at a few days old.

THE INCREDIBLE EGG

Today has been a beautiful sunny day and I took in as much as I could outdoors. Early this morning after feeding the animals I gathered the six white duck eggs shown in pic below.

I thought I would blow them and color them. I had blown brown country hen eggs years ago and still have them displayed in a yelloware bowl in the kitchen.

I started off by washing and drying the eggs and by drilling a small hole in one end of each egg. I then took a small stiff wire and swished it around inside the egg to break the yolk. Then I found a small pipette (disposable oil dropper) and filled it with water and squirted it inside the egg and the inside slowly slipped out. I continued to do this until the egg was completely empty. Once I had done this to all six eggs. I rinsed them inside and out with bleach water and set them upright to drain and dry.

When all that was done......I prepared my dye bath and dipped each egg until I was satisfied with the color. I wanted the blue of a robins egg so I mixed blue and a little green dye in hot (boiled) water and added some vinegar to dye the eggs. Once the eggs again were dry and completely drained........I took them outside and with an old brush and some burnt umber paint I speckled the eggs.

I was very pleased with the outcome! I am so happy my little ducks provided me with such wonderful gifts! This is a great Spring/Easter project that will last for years n years!

Spring Blessings!
Cyndi
http://www.keeperofthepast.com

Spring Sights, Sounds & Tastes!

Happy Spring!

I welcomed Spring this week by taking in all the sights, sounds and tastes it had to offer.

My dad and I tapped a sugar maple for the first time. For those of you who may be wondering what the heck I'm talking about......Tree tapping is the process of extracting sap from a sugar maple to later be processed into Maple Syrup!

You start off by selecting a good size sugar maple tree that you may have in your back yard as we did. You then gently drill a hole into the tree and insert a spile or spout(homemade or commercial) we used a sanitized pvc pipe. Immediately after we drilled the hole.......the sap came dripping out of the tree! A very good sign the time is right for tappin! Next we made a small hole in the top of a sanitized plastic water jug and placed the pipe in the hole and secured the jug to the tree. As you can see in the last photo.....the sap is clear just like water. Well actually.....it is 98% water. The other 2% is sugar.

Tree tappin can only be done from Janurary until April. You must have freezing nights followed by sunny 40-50 degree days for the sap to come up. If you would like to try this for yourself you might want to read this article from Mother Earth News: http://www.motherearthnews.com/Real-Food/1981-01-01/Its-Tree-Tappin-Time-Most-Everywhere.aspx

I bet your wondering where's the syrup???? Well, we are still waiting on that. We are trying to collect enough sap to make a good little batch of syrup. It takes 40 gal. of sap to make 1 gal. of maple syrup! Our goal is to get maybe a half a pint....lol. Anyway, I'll be sure to let you know how it turns out! To be continued..........

Ice Storm hits Kentucky!

Well it's been a hard week for all or most of us Kentuckians! We were hit hard here in Ky with a major ice storm. The power outages broke records for our state.



We went without electricity for nearly four days. We were fortunate compared to some, there is still people in our county without power.

How did we survive??? Well, we actually did just fine. One night we ate fried chicken and all the fixins dad prepared on the old wood cook stove. Another night we had chicken and dumplings. We ate gravy and biscuits, you name it! Needless to say....we did not starve. lol.

We had heat and oil lamps for light, water, food and most important of all we had each other. It was amazing to step out on the front porch, everything was so dark and quite. All you could hear were trees cracking and falling to the ground. That was a lit-tle scary! Most nights we ventured over to Mom & Dad's and sat around the buck stove and chat. It was very calming; a slow down to our normal hectic lives.

My prayers go out to everyone affected by this storm. May God see you through.

Many Blessings,
Cyndi

Working the Day Away!

Not much going on here right now.......just trying to get the creative juices flowing again. I designed and finished up a few new things today. These have been added to my website. If you care to stop by the link is http://keeperofthepast.com/

It's really cold here and expected to get colder so there's not much else to do other than work. I hope you all are staying warm! Blessings, Cyndi

An Old Beginning to a New Year!

It's New Years Day and my family and I started off the new year with an Old Fashion home cooked breakfast.

My dad bought an old wood cook stove last year and he had the best idea of preparing breakfast on it New Year's Day!

Dad started off by heating up the stove with split pieces of oak wood while mom prepared the cured ham meat for frying. Once the stove was ready and the ham hot and frying............the aroma was a mixture of burning oak and cured ham. It brought back memories for Dad, he told us about how grandma would cook for them when he was a child. My niece who is 11 was a bit amazed. I tried to explain to her how the stove worked without electric. I think it was very educational for her and I hope she will always remember it and request we do it more often.

Our meal consisted of: Buttermilk biscuits, cured ham, gravy, red eyed sop, eggs, garlic potatoes, fried apples and homemade grape jelly. I felt so blessed to be gathered around the table with good food, the best family anyone could ask for and the love of God in my heart. I end my new Year's Day with a joyful heart. I hope everyone had a blessed New Year's Day. I'd love to hear how you celebrated the day!

Blessings,
Cyndi

Cured Ham frying in a iron skillet.

Buttermilk biscuits ready to bake!

Baked to perfection! Hubby sneaks one out to give em a try!

After one bite...............he's all smiles :)

Two eggs sunny side up frying on an iron griddle.