Our crazy month of January….

I believe that this month will go down in our history books as one of our craziest.  From being approached by a buyer (when our house wasn't even on the market), to selling, to going through inspections, to finding a rental, to packing, to birthdays, to packing, to swim practices, to packing, to swim meets, to the flu wreaking havoc on our house, to packing, and packing and more and more packing….we are going to need a serious vacation when we are done.  We have already moved one huge truck of stuff out to the farm (in a outbuilding) and believe that we have probably two more trucks to move to a rental.  We have to be out of our house by the end of next month.  And still there is SO much to do.  Crazy, huh?

But before I go off and….pack…..I'll leave you with some pictures from our son's birthday parties.  This month our smallest son turned 6 and our oldest turned 17.  I love my two boys.  They drive me crazy sometimes, but I adore them with all my heart.  Happy birthday you two crazy ones….

miracles in the quiet moments….

The text read, "call me asap for 3rd showing on friday".  It was late Thursday night and we had just gotten in from swimming practice.  Bags were dumped on the floor and everyone was in dire need of some dinner.

Seriously?  How could this be possible?  Maybe our realtor has us confused with another house.  You see, we took our house off the market.  Oh yes you read that right….way off the market.  We were tired of showing our house over and over.  The disruption, the continuous cleaning and having your house taken over at a moments notice.  We needed a break.  So we took it.  A month ago.

Now, I'm not even gonna begin to tell you how "lived in" my house was at the moment.  Because, well….it was.  The kids had built a fort around the dining room table and a lego city on the top.  A basketball hoop was near the kitchen and the ping pong table was out in the basement.

We were living in our house.  Having fun.  Being normal.  Without the worry and any disruptions.

I yelled out to my husband jokingly that I was gonna kid my realtor for getting us confused.  It was gonna be fun.  It. Was. Not. A. Joke.

Say what?  How is this possible?

I cleaned Friday morning and by that afternoon we had yet another buyer walking through our house.  By Saturday night, we had an offer.

Are you kidding me?  Seriously?  Not even on the market.

I cannot tell you what a blessing this is for our family.  An answer to prayer.  We can now move to a rental and continue to build our house.  And not have to worry about showing our house again.

Sometimes miracles happen in the quiet moments when you least expect it…..

Planning for our garden….already?

It's well below zero today and the ground is covered with a boatload of snow that we got last night.

I don't want to even think about that right now.  Nope.  Too cold.  Not going there.

So let's talk about gardening.  My garden to be exact.

The other evening my husband and I finalized what we will be growing this year and placed our seed order.  When we purchased the farm last September, our garden size increased by like a bazillion, but with that size comes a tremendous amount of planning.  And investing.

You invest in your land, treat it well and work with it…not against it.  For the garden we have invested in all heirloom seeds.  My plan is to save the seeds and never have to order seeds again.  Okay, that's at least the plan on paper.  I realize that seeds cost like 3 dollars for a packet and to some people that might not be that much.  But why would I pay that amount when I can save the seeds for FREE!  Winner, winner chicken dinner.  I love me some free stuff.

We also invested in 5 more apple trees…oh, you read that right.  From a farmer lady who already owns 62 apple trees we just bought 5 more.  Craziness abounds, here.

Stay with me.  You see, our orchard has been around a VERY long time from the looks of several of our trees.  We know good and well that apple trees, in theory, produce for a certain amount of time.  So we are investing in our future apple production.

For the gardens, we going with a variety of vegetables that suit our needs, but I decided to try a few unique items.  One is blue aztec corn.  We love the blue corn chips.  I'm going to try my hand at making some from what we grow.  It'll be interesting to see how that works.  Also, I'm looking into possibly growing some wheat.  I know, I know, why in the world would we do that?  Well, conventional methods spray wheat right before it is harvested.  I'd like to have my wheat without any chemicals, please...

Our overall goal for the farm is to become more self-sufficient.  A lot more.  To say we're going to grow all our own food might be a bit ambitious.  Or we could just call it what it is….crazy.  There's also the fact that I have yet to convince my husband that we need a dairy cow.  Even though we go through 12 - 14 gallons of milk….a week.  Oh yeah, think of the money we would save there alone.  But alas, he says with four kids, an orchard, a boatload of chickens, turkeys, a colony of bees and a crazy amount of garden space….our plate is gonna be full.

But I'm still working on that one…..

Hamburger buns in a flash….

I can make hamburger buns in less than a hour.  Start to finish.

Seriously.

I know, I know.  I was skeptical at first as well.  But I have tried the recipe several times and each time it has worked fantastic.  Woo-hoo for me!

You see, I rarely buy bread anymore.  Actually I try not to.  Because the reality is, you can make any kind of bread for just pennies on the dollar.  But sometimes I'm not always smart on planning ahead.  More likely than not, I go to start the burgers and fries for dinner and realize that I've got….ugh, no buns to go with them.  Well problem solved, if you've got 40 minutes….then you've got time.

Hence, the perfect recipe for me.

The original recipe I got from Taste of Home but I did alter it because we do not use any vegetable oil in our house, only coconut oil.

So let's do this.  Let's go bake us up some buns.

40-minute Hamburger Buns:

Ingredients:

2 Tablespoons active dry yeast (make sure your yeast isn't old)
1 cup warm water
1/3 cup coconut oil (I heat it so that it is in the liquid form)
1/4 cup sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon salt
3 - 3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

Directions:

1.  In a large bowl, dissolve the yeast in warm water. Add oil and sugar and let it stand for 5 minutes.  If it begins to foam then your yeast is good.  If it doesn't foam (even a little) then your yeast is bad and start the entire process over with fresh yeast.  After 5 minutes add the egg, salt and enough flour to form a soft dough.

2.  I use a large stand up mixer which makes this process a whole lot easier.  If you don't have a stand up mixer than just turn onto floured surface and knead until smooth and elastic.

3.  After the dough has formed, do not let it rise.  Immediately divide into 12 pieces and shape each into a ball.  Place 3 inches apart on greased baking sheets.  Cover and let the dough rest for 10 minutes.

4.  Bake at 425 degrees for 8 - 12 minutes or until golden brown.  Remove from pans to wire racks to cool.

Yield:  1 dozen

This dough could also be made into hot dog buns, but I must admit I haven't tried that yet.  We don't eat a lot of hot dogs here.

Enjoy!