It’s a miracle!

It’s hard to believe but my bees survived their first winter here!  A few weeks back I made “bee candy” to hold them over until there is a plentiful supply of pollen & nectar.  I’m guessing their food stores are running low even though I did not take any honey from them last year.  The bee candy I made up consisted of a cooked mixture of corn syrup, sugar, water, and vanilla.  Apparently it was so tasty Flower Girl was seen sneaking off with chunks of it.  I have found the longer I have the bees the more stupid brave I get around them.  Like messing with the hive without my gear on and without my smoker.  I got away with it a couple times but this last time I went out to feed them let’s just say I ran faster then I had in quite some time.  I also utilized the outhouse as a hideout.  Lesson learned!  Next visit with my bees I will be appropriately protected.  More pictures to come!

First Greens of the Season!

 

The first greens of the season were devoured by Maine Man this past Friday the 13th. If I remember correctly, last year we ate our first greenhouse greens on April 12th. Tomorrow night I plan to make up a tasty salad with with some homemade dressing after being inspired by this post. I will make it with “Artison” extra virgin olive oil and aged balsamic vinegar I recently purchased from a local market. Maybe I’ll post a recipe if I come up with a good one.

I’ll end this post with a few things I am thankful for this weekend…

• warm weather
• long hikes
• neighbors that are like family
• my bee suit
• spring peepers
• kids that care
• my hard working man
• chores that provide me with time to reflect on all I should be grateful for

Confessions of a Bad Blogger

My two worst critics, Maine Man & my brother have both mentioned I’ve been slacking on my blog as of lately. My response….PRIORITIES! All though I love sharing our mad life with others when things get crazy some things must give. I make every effort to post here at least once a week give or take except for my most recent break. We are still farming as usual with many changes on the horizon. I will share some day, just not today. The kids our working on finishing up our first successful year of homeschooling. The goal is to complete as much book work as possible. Then we have some field trips planned. The kids still have no desire to ever return to public school. We are pleased with the results we are seeing so if all works out we will continue. At this point Country Boy is considering becoming a game warden or a biologist and Flower Girl would like to go to school to become a nurse. It will be interesting to see what becomes of their dreams.

Moving on…..a few weeks back it went from Winter to Spring in a weeks time. A couple days it reached temps in the 80′s. In the same day I had packed away the kids cross- country skis, skates, hats & mittens I pulled out their summer clothes. CRAZY weather but it didn’t last for long. It is back to cool, windy, over cast days. SO Looking forward to some much needed sunshine!

It was not the best of years for harvesting maple syrup. We were able to obtain a few gallons which will get us through until next season, so I am thankful for that. We had been boiling it down on the wood cook stove with the outside door open during the day. As the temperatures warmed up MM took our old wood stove we had in the barn and converted it into an outdoor cooker. It ran nicely converting the sap to syrup at a much faster rate then cooking it on the wood cook stove.

MM & CB have the greenhouse mostly planted, it won’t be long before we will me eating fresh greens!

I will end this post with a link back in my archives to a recipe I recently retrieved and made a few times, crustless Quiche. How I have been making lately for a quick fix is mixing it all together the night before in a 1/2 gallon canning jar. Come morning I give it a few shakes, pour it into a greased casserole dish cook at 350 degrees for approx. 30 minutes. Quick & Easy! Hoping you all had a blessed Easter!

Blogcation

I hate to do it but something has to give.  I will be stepping back and taking a little break from my blog.  We have lots going on at the homestead that I will someday write about.  It’s all good.  Check back in a bit!  Peace!

Homemade Smoker by Maine Man

After studying and looking at several different homemade smokers I finally built one this past fall.  The 2 things I was looking for was a design that was inexpensive and simple to operate.  An old electric oven, a tray full of charcoal brickets and hickory wood chips was the perfect combination I was looking for!  It provides consistent, regulated heat source much like a commercially built model.  All I needed to do was wire up a  220 volt extension cord.  That same day we were smoking up a storm.

Our local butcher shop charges 45 to 50 cents per pound for smoking. Pictured above are some of the bacon and hams from our last pig.  I love to save a buck, plus it’s just gratifying when you take food from the field and put it on the table.

My mother had an old slicer at her house that hadn’t been used in quite some time.  It needed a little tinkering but it was well worth it. I wish I had bought one years ago.  It worked slick for making consistent cuts of meat.  Above is some of the finished delicious bacon.  Thanks Mom!

Below are a few Lakers that Country Boy caught on Moosehead Lake.  They smoked up great, much of the greasiness dripped away.  Hands down the best Lake Trout I have ever eaten.

Got SAP?

We were blessed with an unseasonably warm February with very little snow. Pretty sure this is the earliest we have ever tapped but I begged and pleaded with Maine Man to place some taps…..and he did!  Last week they all ventured out to fulfill my wishes while I was at work.  MM was even sweet enough to take a few pictures for me.  He’s a keeper I tell you!

This year they put out a total of 12 taps.  Last year we put up a little over 5 gallons of maple syrup and to date we have 3 quarts left.  Much of it we consumed ourselves but we did give some away to friends & family.

This is our 4th year harvesting sap.  If you care to read back on our previous experiences just click here on the years….2009, 2010, 2011.

Flower Girl much prefers real maple syrup over the store bought nastiness high fructose syrup. Country Boy will go first for the store bought if it is available.  Fortunately, the supermarket hasn’t been stocking it as of lately .  So there is only one option and I’ve yet to hear him complain.

Unfortunately, the wonderful warm weather we had been experiencing has changed and we are back to winter.  With that said, sap is not running.  It is the warm days and cool nights that keep the sap flowing.  We’ve only boiled down 3-4 gallons of sap on the wood cook stove which was unintentionally overcooked which means it turned to sugar…..OOPS!  No worries, it was not wasted.  Maple sugar + vanilla creamer = the BEST coffee ever!

P.S. For those of you that did not know this,  40 gallons of sap = 1 gallon of maple syrup

New Life