And the Soap Goes to . . . .

The winner of this month's giveaway is . . .

Carrianne!

Congratulations!  You've won yourself a bar of Peppermint Shampoo Soap! 

I want to thank those who offered suggestions for how to enjoy our deer meat.  I intend to try out Amy's soup recipe (which sounds very chili-esque, which was Carrianne's suggestion) with the ground beef and use one of the recipes from the cookbook I have on loan from Jessica H. for the roast.  Check back in to see how the deer goes over here.  :)

Carrianne, be looking for your soap in the mail.  (Unless, of course, you'd like to come pick it up in person.  There's a standing invitation, you know, for your family to come visit whenever you'd like.;) 

If anyone else is sulking over not winning, message me, and we'll see if we can't work something out.  ;)

Warning: PG-13 Post!

A couple weeks back, this poor Aracauna was trying so hard to lay her egg.  She just sat in the nesting box and worked on it . . . all . . day . . .long.  Poor gal.  She was really huffing, and I was pretty worried about her, so we did some reading that evening and learned that she may be "egg bound."  A condition more common in pullets, it basically means that for whatever reason she just can't seem to get her egg out.  She's definitely our smallest chicken, and we've had some really large eggs lately, so I was concerned that she wasn't going to be able to get it out . . . without help.

That's when we read that it sometimes helps to apply some KY jelly to her "vent" (the opening where it all comes out down there) and feel for an egg with your finger.  That's when we decided to give her another 30 minutes to try to work things out on her own.   And then another 30 minutes. 

And, then . . . yep, I donned those gloves and took care of business.  John was very impressed.

We gave her another hour or so, and she still seemed to be in distress, in fact, maybe more distressed than she'd been before the whole "procedure."  (Can you blame her?)

So, we decided it was time to give her a bath, which is supposed to help her relax so that things can progress.  So, we held her in a warm bubble bath for 30 minutes.  Actually, "we" is not exactly accurate.  Those are actually John's hands in those purple gloves, holding the chicken still for 30 very-long minutes.  He even let me take his picture as he was doing it.  It was my turn to be impressed.  I was there for moral encouragement, of course.  In fact, MeeMee (John's grandmother) popped in and kept us company on the backporch, too.  As I was walking her to the porch, I said, "MeeMee, you've had chickens.  Did you ever have to give one a bath?"  She just stopped walking, looked at me with dismay and exclaimed, "Heavens, no!"  I decided not to tell her about the KY.  ;)

It seems that bubble-bathing chickens is not exactly common practice.  But, we were down to 4 laying hens at the time, and I was determined not to lose this one.  Desperate times called for desperate measures.

Is it just me, or does she look pretty much the opposite of relaxed? 

This all took place a couple of weeks ago.  She never did lay that egg.  In fact, she took a break.  Until yesterday.  And, she laid again today, so she may be back in business.  According to our go-to chicken book, there are myriad reasons she may have taken her little laying hiatus. 

Anyway, it seems she's recovered from whatever was ailing her and the shock of being so horribly violated. 

In hindsight, we may have jumped the gun with the KY and bubbles, but it all turned out alright. We are, of course, novice farmers, just figuring this stuff out as we go.  But, the journey is lots of fun, and this episode has provided us with lots of laughs already!

Playing God

"Playing God" -- I've never been very comfortable with the phrase, let alone the concept.  Yet, it seems we now find ourselves faced with a decision that feels an awful lot like "playing God."

Here's the deal.  The gals in the "meat tractor" are now basically adults.  That means that it's time to move the layers into the laying tractor with our other four layers and slaughter the rest. 

The black and white Dominques were always destined to be layers.  Meanwhile, we'd planned on the yellow Buff Orpingtons being meat birds.  But, over the course of the summer, we lost a few hens from the laying tractor and would like to fill it back up.  That means that besides the five Dominiques, we have room for 3 or 4 Buffs.  Yep.  We're faced with the decision of which yellow hens will live to feed us and which will die to feed us. 

How to choose? 

According to Storey's Guide to Raising Chickens, the best indicators of a good layer are a large, moist vent and wide-spread, flexible pelvic bones.  For those unfamiliar with the term "vent," it is the hole where the egg comes out.  Interestingly (to me, anyway), it's actually the only hole where anything comes out down there.  And, yes, Storey's Guide has illustrations to show us the difference between the vent of a good layer and the vent of a poor layer.  Thanks for that, Storey's Guide.

So, we are either going to have to just go with our guts on this one or do the more responsible, "farmer-y" thing and give the gals a thorough gynocological exam.  Stay tuned!  Something tells me I'll be donning my gloves.

Oh, and don't forget , you have until tomorrow to comment on Sunday's post and be entered to win the Peppermint Shampoo Soap.

Southwestern Stuffed Peppers

Let's not beat around the bush here.  Go ahead and copy and paste the ingredients and directions below right into Microsoft Word.  Then, add those ingredients to your shopping list because you want to add this to next week's menu.  Heck, you may even want to forego Thursday night's meatloaf and just make this.  Yes, it's that yummy!

Just in case you're wondering, no, I do not always pile up all my ingredients before I begin cooking dinner.  I do that especially for you.  Do you feel special?  Because you should.  I love my readers!  :)

Ingredients:
1/2 c. long-grain white rice
1/2 Tbs. olive oil
3 scallions, thinly sliced, white and green parts separated
1-2 c. cooked, shredded chicken
1 ear's-worth of corn kernels
1/2 of a 4.5 oz. can of chopped green chilies
1/2 tsp. cumin
1 c. grated Monterrey Jack
Kosher salt and pepper
2 large bell peppers, halved lengthwise, ribs and seeds removed
1/4 c. yogurt
1/4 c. salsa

Directions:
1. Heat oven to 375 degrees.  Cook rice according to package directions, or, better yet, the way Mamaw taught you. 
2. In a large bowl, mix together the oil, scallion whites, chicken, corn, chilies, cumin, cooked rice, 1/4 c. Monterrey Jack, 1/2 tsp. salt, 1/4 tsp. pepper.
3. Arrangew the bell peppers, cut-side up, in a 9x13-inch baking dish.  Divide the chicken mixture among the bell peppers, add 1/2 c. water to the dish, tightly cover the dish with foil, and bake until the bell peppers are soft, 30-40 minutes.
4. Uncover, sprinkle with the remainings 1/4 c. cheese, and bake until browned, 5-7n minutes.
If you're using regular yogurt, you're probably good to go. If you're using Greek yogurt, mix it with a little water until it's easily spreadable.  Drizzle it over the peppers and top with the salsa and scallion greens.
5.  Enjoy!

This recipe was (heavily) adapted from Real Simple's Stuffed Pepper recipe.

Hazards of Local Running

Recently, a friend and I were discussing how much we enjoy time spent in nature on our respective farms when she remarked to me, "It's hard to imagine living anywhere else, huh?"  That got me thinking.  I do love my life here, and my little backyard farm.  But, the truth is that John and I are very adaptable people.  We lived in New Orleans when we were first married and dove headfirst into a culture that allowed us to walk to the grocery store and celebrate Mardi Gras.  We lost all of our earthly belongings to Hurricane Katrina and decided to start over in small town Arkansas (which is much different from the NWA that I grew up in) and have found our niche here as well.  My guess is that we could find ourselves just about anywhere, and as long as we had each other, make a fun go of it.

That said, there are still some parts of our local culture that I haven't come around to.  And, I came face to face with one of them last night.  Here's the story . . .

I was out for an evening run through town when I passed a house where two middle-school-aged boys were out in the sideyard.  One of them had some type of gun in his hands and was aiming at something on or near the ground in front of him.  I ran on past them, then wondered whether I'd be able to see what they were aiming at, if I turned to look back.  That's when I saw that the gun was now pointed at me.  In distress, I kept running, but yelled and pointed at them:  "NOT FUNNY!"  He didn't lower the gun.  I yelled it again, louder, and kept running.    "You're funny!"  the gunman yelled back as he lowered the gun.  At this point, I was more mad than scared, so I stopped running, turned toward them, marching myself up to the front door:  "You're not going to think I'm funny for long!  Do you have a parent home with you?"

As it turned out, the gunman didn't live there and the boy who did stood sobbing in the background as his mother agreed with me that it was unacceptable behavior and that the guest (who she "didn't really know")  would be shooed away.  Once I'd stuck around long enough to see that the boys were being adequately reprimanded, I high-tailed it on home, running at a pretty good clip. ;)

Now, of course, one of the first questions John asked me when I relayed the story to him was what type of gun it was.  Pellet?  BB?  Air soft?  Actual rifle?  I have no knowledge of guns whatsoever, so I had, of course, no idea. 

Guns.   Ahhh.  Guns.  They are very much a part of this culture that surrounds me.  But, I haven't bought into that part of it.  My dad didn't hunt.  John doesn't hunt.  I am completely uncomfortable around guns.  Honestly, they terrify me. 

I won't get on my soapbox here.  But, as I've replayed what happened last night, I keep asking myself whether I should've done something differently.  What if I'd been able to identify the gun?

Let's say I'd been able to tell the gun was a toy of some sort, should I have just kept on running, "boys will be boys" and all that?  Or, had I been able to identify that they were shooting actual bullets, should I have notified the police? 

Why didn't I get their names?  Why didn't I find out what type of gun it was?  Should I have followed the gunman home and knocked on his door?  If I had a gunsafe full of guns and a deer head mounted in my living room, would I have reacted differently to those boys' antics?

I'm left with lots of questions.  But, here's what I know. 

1.  Guns scare me.  I don't like them.   I don't want them around my children.  I don't want one pointed at me. 

2.  I will not be running that route again anytime soon!

School Is Back in Session!

Take a look at these little hams!

Aren't they cute in their back-to-school gear?

Yep, today began a new school year for us.  Girls 1 & 2 are now in Grades 3 and 1, respectively.  You know, as a teacher, I can't remember a time in my life when the passage of time wasn't measured by a school calendar.  In that sense, today is like New Year's.  Everything starts fresh today.  It's all so very exciting!  It makes me want to go sharpen all my pencils.  :)

While I have loved having the whole gang home this summer, it has definitely made keeping up with this blog difficult.  As explanation, my three kiddos are very different.  It seemed no one activity could entertain them all.  So, while I would be trying to concentrate for a few minutes and churn out a quick blog post on, say, tomato canning, Girl 1 would be asking me if we can work on her sewing project together, Girl 2 would like a snack, and Little Boy couldn't decide whether he wants to be wrestling with Girl 2 in the floor or squirming around on my lap.  

I figured out pretty early on in the summer that swimming was the common denominator.  They are all three little fish.  But, poolside is not a good place to churn out a blog post.  

While I did manage to publish a post per day throughout the summer, I felt a bit like I was treading water.  It just felt like there was not much new going on around here.  But, things are looking up.  The quieter pace now that the girls are off to school should provide some time (during Little Boy's naptime) when I can write.  And, upcoming goat breeding season, fall gardening, and new recipes that I hope to try out promise some new blog-ground to cover.   

Here's to the New Year!

For  more pics from the First Day, check out our family blog at www.thebellerbrood.blogspot.com

:)

This Month's Giveaway: Peppermint Shampoo Soap

Yep, it's giveaway time again! 

This month's winner will receive a bar of all-natural, homemade Peppermint Shampoo Soap. 

This soap would make a great gift for that man in your life (maybe even for his Christmas stocking). 

Why shouldn't you keep it for yourself? 

1.  It's best for short-hair because you can scrub it directly on your hair to work it into a lather (longer hair would tangle terribly if you tried this). 

2.  It's a bit harsh for color-treated hair.  I used it, and I think it stripped my color (oh, don't act surprised, you aleady knew I color my hair!)

3.  The peppermint scent is great for men as well as women.

That said, if you have short, non-color-treated hair, go for it!  It's a great soap -- you won't be disappointed!

So, how do you get entered to win?  Comment on this post by Friday in answer to this:

We've recently been given some venison, specifically a roast and some ground meat.  Since John doesn't hunt, venison has never before found its way to my kitchen, but I am eager to try it (as it was free to us and, in its way, local).  Help!  Recommendations?  Do you have a good recipe for either the roast or the hamburger?

 (Oh, and since I love my CrockPot, if you can give me a recipe for the deer meat that uses the CrockPot, I'll put your name in the drawing twice!)

Thanks in advance for your responses!  I'll plan to post the winner Saturday.  :)