themartianchick

Great job, Cat! The announcement at the end was hilarious!!! <snort!>

I've really been enjoying your blog, Stephanie! Writing can be quite demanding on your time and on your focus. My head always seems to be in the clouds. Fortunately, the kids are grown and the writing came at a time when hubby and I were the only ones in the house full-time. There were plenty of nights where dinner was a sandwich or something else that was hastily thrown together, but hubby was always supportive because he knew that it made me a happier person.

I've been melting..MELTING and our temperatures have only been in the 90's! Congrats on the new "granddaughter"!

Thanks, Jeepers! We are recording some interviews this week and hope to have the show debut in the next week or so. Working on the intro was a lot of fun. All three of the participants were in 3 different states. It was a purely online collaboration! I do love technology...

I will be visiting the local cemetery briefly and spending the remainder of the day at home in the garden. I did spend a little time writing this blog post this morning, though: http://www.bystanderbooks.com/in-memoriam/

I'm so glad that you are safe, but definitely sorry for the loss of your outbuildings and memories.

What wonderful news! I think I'd try to carry the garden with me, too!

Congratulations on the new job!

Crazy Lightning Eater...That's me!

Lindals- If you don't can, you could probably buy some canned meats at the grocery store. I don't can meat very often, but I do have some store-bought cans of corned beef hash, chicken, tuna, salmon, etc... We don't eat ham or I'd probably have some of that in the pantry, too. As much as I hate them, I also buy Ramen noodles for my daughters/grandkids, etc... They are dirt cheap and are viewed as a comfort food. Although I make homemade mac and cheese, I also keep a few boxes of the kind with the velveeta-like cheese in it. They are another comfort food. For determining how long the food in my pantry will last, I use some of the pantry and freezer inventory sheets from the foodstorage made easy site. It also serves as a visual reminder when something runs out. I have had times when there is a gap on a pantry shelf and I can't seem to remember what used to go there. The pantry sheets help. Sometimes it is just something that was a one-time lucky purchase. other times it might be that I'm out of a staple item! I try to take a quarterly inventory. I am probably overdue right now, since I can't remember the last time that I did one. I figure my number of stored meals a bit differently. I add up the number of servings of everything (meat, dairy, veggies, fruits, starches, etc) and divide by 4. Four items makes a meal (in my mind) for one person. Then I divide that number by the anticipated number of people I expect to have to share with. and divide that number by 3 (for three meals per day). Usually, that number is enough to send me out to the store to stock up on some more stuff!

Good advice, Darlene! There was one summer (several years ago) when I only saw 3 honeybees. It was kind of scary. I remember looking into buying bumble bee boxes for the following year if things didn't improve.I don't worry about hubby getting stung by bumble bees as much because they don't really bother people. Things did improve the following year, so the bee situation was off my radar a bit. We don't store a lot of honey, but we do buy it locally from a beekeeper at the farmers market. Until I move to a farm (and maybe not even then!), I can't have beehives. However, I might be able to find a class to learn how to do it as a "just in case" type of scenario.

Thank you! I will check it out.

At least no permanent damage was done! Lol!

I love that frying pan smiley! Of course this one is pretty good, too!

I am so impressed by the fact that you are still here offering valuable information to all of us when you are going through so much at home. You truly are a blessing to this forum, Drummrunner. I would be interested in receiving your cd and will send an email to you today. Thank you and may God bless you (and your feisty wife, too!)

Is it one of the P-Touch labelers? If so, they are great and the batteries last a long time. I use mine for just about everything. However, be careful about using them in the garden, the labels fade in the sunshine. Maybe the company makes a fade resistant type of label?

Hubby was hit with what we believe was the flu last week. He missed a day and a half from work. (For him, this is the equivalent of missing 2 weeks since he never gets sick!) He was really achy on Sunday and his stomach was off kilter Sunday night. By Monday morning, he dragged himself to work, though he'd really had no sleep. By 10-something am, he was shivering at the door looking as though he was going to fall over. I drugged him up with Excedrin PM so that he could sleep through the worst of the symptoms. By 7pm, I coaxed him to eat a little something (toast) and then he was out again. The next day, he called in. He returned to work on Wednesday , but he still wasn't over it. He was really dehydrated, still achy and tired. Luckily, he had Friday off so that he could take a long weekend to rest. Unfortunately, he is a stubborn man and he spent the weekend moving firewood, mowing lawns and generally getting underfoot. Those are sure signs that he was starting to feel better!

I must still be tired... I misread your post and thought that you were planning to put 10 cuties in the frying pan with some water. Maybe I should go back to bed...

I did something like this a couple of weeks ago, except I went to the store and forgot that I had been making bread dough in the machine. The next morning, the bread smelled like BOOZE! In fact, my entire kitchen smelled that way. My husband made several jokes, but I kneaded it again and let rise before popping it back in the oven. After it had baked, the bread still smelled like a distillery. I ate a small piece an gave the rest to the poultry over the next few days. I left the bag that it was in open to try to allow the alcohol to evaporate because I didn't want drunken critters and it still smelled strongly a few days later.

I had no intention of dehydrating anything today until I saw this thread... Looks like I'll be doing onions in the dehydrator. I have a few extra that I don'[t want to go bad and I already have some frozen in the freezer.

We buy our honey from a local beekeeper at the the farmer's market. Hubby is allergic, so I don't think we could have bees on this property. It is just too small. It would be nice to be able to shake hands with the bees, though!

That is sweet!

I finally got some lettuce and salad greens in the ground. I don't think that I'm going to have any peas this year. I am renovating my raised beds, so it will be a miracle if I ever get any in the ground. Odd weather...

Good advice, Arby! We had the buckets of rain for the past two days. Today... we have rain and more doom and gloom! The high temperature was around 35.

It looks as though the crazy weather will skip us. We are just experiencing rain and gloom. Yesterday's temps were in the 50's. Right now, it is 47 degrees. So glad that you're safe Mt. Rider!