Sorry I haven't been able to post lately!  We have been super busy!  We are in the process of taking down, moving and putting up my new....GREENHOUSE!!!!  As you can tell I am so excited :)  We hope to have it up and the wood stove in by the end of the weekend (expect a post all about this soon!) 

I said in the last post that I would be posting about our BIG process of rendering lard soon and to everyone's delight today is the day!!!  Try to contain your excitement!  Alot of people don't understand the purpose behind this but I find it to be very rewarding!  I will mainly use it to make my goat's milk soap.  But I also use it for curing my cast iron pots and skillets.  The only skillet I use is my cast iron one so I keep a tub of lard in my refridgerator just for that.  Although I have not cooked with lard as of yet, I have been told and have read that you can use it in anything that calls for shortening.  I use shortening in all of my pie crusts and biscuits so I am anxious to try this.  Alot of people frown upon the use of cooking with lard because they say it is bad for you...however have you looked at all the chemically processing that goes on in a tub of shortening or a jug of oil???  There is nothing hydrogenated in my lard :)

Now for the process of rendering the lard...hopefully with pictures...go ahead and poke fun but I really do not understand computers, just know that I am trying!  We started with two tubs of this size of pig fat and skin from 12 hogs.  We had to cut all of this up into smaller more manageable pieces as shown above.

We then put them in a 25 gallon cast iron kettle.  The kettle set on top of a 55 gallon barrel with a propane burner under it.  We probably put enough fat in it to fill it a quarter of the way full.  Then you just have to stir and stir and probably stir some more until it cooks down and all rinds and cracklins are golden brown and float to the top.  As shown.

Next we covered a metal collander with a Merkley Hot Dog sack, cheesecloth would work as well.  The hot dog sack was just the perfect size to slip the collander into and not have to worry about it slipping.  We used a metal quart size pot to dip all the cracklins and lard out of the kettle to run through the collander.  Next we put the the cracklins into a lard press/sausage stuffer and squeezed all the lard we could from them.  This step is not necessary.  As the night wore on and we became more tired we skipped this step.  After we had strained the cracklins from the lard we put the lard in large stock pots to cool.  We did the same for the cracklins.

We then waited for the lard to cool a bit.  This probably took about an hour to an hour and a half to cool to the point when we could transfer it to plastic containers.  Once it was transferred to the plastic containers we let it sit overnight and harden.  The lard will turn white and any of the small bits of cracklins that made it past the hot dog sack and collander will settle to the bottom.  We then froze all the containers.  As for the cracklins, once they have cooled enough to handle we bagged them in gallon size freezer bags.  From there you can do whatever you like.  My husband's uncle helped us that day  and he loved the cracklins.  We sent him home with 2 bags!!  As for our family we are not big fans of them but our dogs sure love them!!! 

We had to repeat this process several times and it took us about 4 1/2 to 5 hours to get all of our lard rendered.  Well worth the time and effort considering I was able to freeze 110 pounds of fresh lard!!
 

The Flu times 6

What a week!  Everyone has been so very sick...not necessarily the flu but definitely a very bad stomach bug :(  I was so excited about last weekend, Friday I was going to a friend's house for a "Mom" card night.  So much fun!  And Saturday night I was going out with my best friend from high school.  Sunday was my future sister-in-law's bridal shower!  What a weekend for me...two nights in a row with no kids, doing what I want, when I want, with NO KIDS! Go Me! 

Five minutes before I was ready to walk out the door Friday night, my son starts puking, my heart dropped I had been looking so forward to this night!  So I unpacked the cooler and helped my husband clean everything up and get everything and everyone situated.  I got out the nasty puke buckets, got him all tucked in on the couch and was ready to spend the evening "on duty".  But my WONDERFUL husband told me to go ahead that he could handle it.  If it got worse or someone else got sick he would call...I SO love my husband!  My Friday night with the "Moms" was saved!!  We had an awesome time, playing cards and gossiping!  Eventually I did get a text, my son had gotten sick 12 times and my baby was sick too!  It was a late night.  As I got home my third child took into puking as well :(  So I was back on duty!  I got to bed about 5:00 am.

Saturday morning went about the same way!  It is amazing how dirty your house can get when you have 3 kids that are sick.  Saturday afternoon went a little better.  The vomiting had subdued to one child and the other two were just clingy and very achy.  So I was ready to give up my evening out again.  But, my WONDERFUL husband came to the rescue once again!  So I did get to catch up with my friend over an evening of Mexican Food and grocery shopping (love it when two moms get together with no kids).  We really know how to tear it up on a Saturday night :)  I received a good report when I got home of no one puking and everyone asleep!

We got a good night's sleep but awoke to my oldest daughter running a 101 fever...the only one who had not seemed to be getting it, seemed to be getting it!  Good news is she never did vomit but was just achy and super tired.  So we had to miss the Bridal Shower regretfully.  My WONDEFUL husband had already covered for me two nights and we had the fat from 12 hogs that were butchered on Friday and Saturday to render into lard (sounds yummy and fun I know).  I will post about this another time.

Turns out rendering 110 pounds of lard is quite a process and will dirty every dish in your house!  So Sunday was spent cleaning and disinfecting EVERYTHING!  This had been the first day that no one had puked at our house.  We thought we had beat this...turns out we were wrong!  Monday night it hit me.  It was a horrible night to say the least!  By morning I was no better so once again that WONDERFUL husband I keep mentioning took off work and stayed home with the kids!!!  I was so greatful!  I was done with the vomiting early but OH MY did I hurt all over!  By Tuesday evening I was feeling well enough to drink and move around a little.  Which is a good thing because it soon hit my husband too!  I hated it for him he had been so good to us through the whole thing and he was the last one to get it :(  So once again he had to miss work on Wednesday!

I guess it takes a while to move through a family of 6 but oh my!!  This has been a long, long week!  Today was a regular day for us, my husband went back to work and I was able to take and pick up our son from preschool.  But now I have to start washing all those clothes!!

Which leads me to my DIY.  I was washing all the blankets, sheets and towels we went through plus trying to catch up on our daily laundry, when I ran out of my Resolve Stain Remover.  I had found a sweatshirt that my son got for Christmas in the sand box!  It was full of stains that were now sure to be set in from sitting in the weather for a month!  To say the least I was a little upset!  I thought the brand new bright yellow sweatshirt was sure to become a rag!  But I went to my "go to" place for anything DIY...PINTERST!!  I found the easiest and best stain remover ever!  And it was stuff that I already had at home.  It was two ingredients...peroxide and blue Dawn dish soap!!  To check out the recipe visit http://moderndaymoms.com/homemade-miracle-cleaner/.  I rarely buy  anything name brand so I had Great Value brand blue Dawn dish detergent and was still very impressed with how well it worked!

I sprayed practically the whole sweathshirt with this and washed it.  All but a few of the stubborn stains came out.  I sprayed them again and scrubbed them.  I let it sit out a load and washed it again only to have it come out looking brand new!  One happy Mama!!!!

Am I Really Doing A Blog??

Am I really doing a blog?  What in the world am I going to "blog" about?  Who is going to want to read about anything I do?  Just a few of the questions that I have been running over and over in my mind the past couple of weeks, trying to decide if I should take the advice of others to do this.  This is a very big step for me as I am usually a pretty private person who is not technologically savy and who has a hard time putting my thoughts into words.  I am a stay at home mom who really never leaves the house...at the end of my dead end road...in the middle of nowhere.  Except for the 3 days a week that I take my 2 oldest children to and from their preschool.  I really have no special talents and I do not think that I do anything "extraodinary" persay. 

What I am is a devoted wife to my high school sweetheart.  We have been together since I was a freshman in high school which will be 13 years next week!!  He is a wonderful man who teaches Building Trades at a local high school.  He lets me stay home and be a mom to our 4 beautiful children;  Wick who is 5, Rory who is 4, Jeri Beth who is 3 and Kali Belle who will be 1 in three short weeks.  And I am lucky enough to also get my 15 month old neice everyday of the work week!  So to say the least I am a VERY blessed person!

Besides my family there is only one other thing that I feel I may have enough knowledge of to really  talk about on a day to day basis, and that is how we are raising our family.  As you can imagine money gets very tight at our house with only one income and 6 mouths to feed.  So we "live off the land" if you will.  My husband and son are HUGE into hunting and I cook and we eat everything that they bring home!  I make everything that I can, we grow a huge garden and I can, freeze or preserve everything!  We have also started a small orchard with peach, apple and plum trees.  We have a grape arbor and this spring we hope to add strawberries, blueberries, blackberries and rasberries.  We raise and butcher all of our own meat including beef, pork and chicken.  And we try to raise enough of our own corn to make the feed for our meat.  In addition to the cows & chickens we also have some horses, dairy goats and if our 3 daughters have anything to do with it some sheep and rabbits come spring!! 

As I am starting this blog tonight there are now a thousand ideas of things to blog about.  All of which will be somehow tied to my crazy, simple life!