Raise your hand if you will pretty much die if you don’t eat breakfast in the morning. That would be me. Some of my most difficult moments are in the morning before I’ve eaten, and the kids are bugging me for breakfast. It’s pretty much understood that mom needs some fuel in the tank before […]
It’s time for another garden update! Some quick background for new visitors: I garden in NE Minnesota where we have a very short Zone 3 growing season (this year’s last frost was June 8th). I use hugelkultur raised beds and apply permaculture methods throughout my garden. Nearly everything I grow are heirloom varieties and all […]
Quite possibly the greatest service that you can offer an animal that is to be eaten- outside of seeing to it that they are well-fed, watered, sheltered, and cared for- is to let as little of it as possible go to waste. That isn’t always easy, especially in modern society where the meat we find […]
In my neck of the woods, the garden season is really only just beginning. We are typically frost-free from June 1st- September 12th or so. This year, we had a frost on June 8th. And although this gives us a very short window in which to get the bulk of our garden planted, grown, and […]
Raising meat rabbits is a really easy way to provide healthy food for your family. And developing a breeding program that fits your family’s needs will enable you to do so on a consistent basis that takes the stress out of both over (and under) production. Today I’d like to show you my very simple […]
Do you ever have conversations with yourself…about yourself? Tell me I’m not the only one. Not that I’m so self-involved…or even that I’m crazy. I’m not. Really. But because we’re in the upswing of gardening season, when there is so much prep work to do, and every single naptime (in fact, every free moment) is […]
There is nothing more disheartening for the pickling enthusiast than a soft, sad pickle. I’ve been there. It kept me from attempting pickles again for a few years. Completely avoided even growing cucumbers at all for fear that someone might ask, “Oooh, are you going to make pickles with those?” Why? Do I look like […]
“You have too many animals.” I would venture to guess there are many of you who have heard this one. Am I right? Well, me too. And it’s no big deal. Can’t help but laugh at those t-shirts and memes that proclaim the proud crazy chicken lady with her 1, 5, 12, don’t-judge-me number of […]
Harvest. It has a much more pleasant ring to it than “kill”. But in truth, I feel much the same way about the harvesting of my meat animals as I do the vegetables in my garden or the berries in the woods. It is a gathering of a food source for my family. And there […]
There are many seasons that I look forward to…gardening season, canning season, hunting season…and of course, berry season. Wild blueberries are abundant in my corner of the world, especially in areas where forest fires have occurred. And every year, I get all-out anxious about the prospect of filling up gallon after gallon of this delicious […]
