• Christmas reads.

    Yesterday was December 1st, just in case you didn’t know.

    Even though we had a very crappy (putting it nicely) day here yesterday (you’d have to be on the facebook page to hear about that because honestly, I don’t want to rehash it, SO not worth it!) I decided that I was NOT going to let it ruin our December.

    First off, it doesn’t matter what happened yesterday, because this is Christmas time, AND we WILL be together as a family this year! Now it’s December, and we only have a short time before the 25th! I WANT to be in the ‘season’ this year. Not just in this survival mode we’ve been living these past months and months, but to really ENJOY this Christmas season.

    No matter what.

    So last night, when I realized it was December 1st, even though I really just wanted to send the kids off to bed and go to bed myself, I decided, “No, we were going to enjoy some Christmas cheer anyways!”

    So I started what I’d been planning to do for a couple of weeks now, start off December with a Christmas story every single night before bed.

    My original plan has been to find my boxes of books packed in our workshop, and unpack until I find the Christmas books. However, between several house showings, yesterday’s fiasco and all the time it consumed, and then regular daily life around here, I have yet to find the box. I did however, find two of my Christmas books on my shelves, and Elsa had one from the library, so the December Christmas Stories plan was able to begin anyways.

    I really do enjoy reading to the kids. I need to stick with it more often!

    And maybe sometime soon, before I run out of stories in these books, I can get into the shop to do some searching and unpacking. The poor girls need their winter coats, and clothing.
    Actually, so do I.

  • It’s beginning to… get close to Christmas!

    I was browsing through some photos from last Christmas and found this one.

    If someone had told me 10 years ago that I would own a dog less then 40 pounds one day, I would have LAUGHED OUT LOUD at them.

    I would have LAUGHED and LAUGHED.

    I did not like little dogs.

    And now, here I sit with my tiny Teagan, 2.5 pounds of pure joy. The equivalent of 2.5 pounds of butter, only he feels much lighter.

    Life changes. Attitudes change. Likes & dislikes change.

    But one thing remains the same. If you know how to love, you’ll just never know what you could love one day! You may just surprise yourself!

    One day, you could end up loving an ugly, bug eyed, little rat of a… dog?

    And find that you actually think he’s pretty darn cute afterall!

     

  • Turkey Croquetten, our way.

    Originally Posted on November 11, 2010 .

    I figured today was a great day to repost this recipe!

    TURKEY CROQUETTEN

    This is a great recipe for using up left over turkey and if you make a big batch, you can freeze the croquetten and use for quick dinners in the future! This is a Dutch dish that my mother made often when I was growing up.

    Like most of my recipes, there are not too many ‘real’ measurements as most things are thrown together but this is pretty simple and straight forward. If you have any questions that I don’t answer, feel free to ask!

    First off, the simple list of ingredients:

    • finely chopped cooked left over turkey meat
    • butter
    • flour
    • chicken broth
    • salt
    • pepper
    • 1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
    • egg
    • dry bread crumbs
    • oil for frying

    Melt a few tablespoons of butter in a saucepan over low heat.

    Stir in enough flour to soak up the butter and stir it until smooth.

    Gradually stir in chicken broth to make a smooth thick sauce.

    Add the cooked finely chopped turkey, and season with the salt, pepper, and Worcestershire sauce to your own taste.

    This is what your mixture will look like:

    Stir to blend well. Remove from heat, spread out in a large baking pan, and set aside to cool to room temperature.

    When the meat mixture is cooled and slightly firm, shape into ’logs’ 3 to 4 inches long, and 1 1 /2 inches wide.

    Beat the eggs in a shallow bowl that is large enough for dipping your croquetten.

    Place bread crumbs on a plate.

    Coat croquettes with breadcrumbs, dip in the beaten egg mixture, then roll the croquettes in the crumbs again to coat.

    Heat oil in a deep fryer.

    When oil is hot, fry croquettes until golden brown on all sides.

    Remove to paper towels to drain, and serve hot.

    Lay the croquetten on a slice of bread, slice open through the center and spread your choice of mustard over it all.

    Yummy!

    If you want to make lots, and freeze the extra, simply lay them on a cookie sheet in the freezer until firm, then slip them into a container or freezer bags to keep them fresh until you’re ready to use them. I freeze mine into family size servings. For our family of 7, I put 14 in each bag and that usually leaves a few extras for a couple of people the next day.

    For a recipe that I found that is somewhat similar, but has actual ingredient amounts, you can check out this one here on the foodnetwork site:

    http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/cooking-live/turkey-croquettes-recipe/index.html

  • I feel like I should delete my previous post!

    Since now… Graydon (dh) IS coming home for Christmas!

    It’s times like this that I try to remind myself that the NEXT time I’m feeling completely hope”less”, I should stop, and remind myself that things can change.

    Things can change… in an instant.

    I spent about 3 days moping around, fighting tears 24/7 (this is so NOT me, really, you have to know me to know how UNlike me that is lol) and feeling totally hopeless.

    I mean this path we’ve chosen, to have Graydon go on ahead of us to the prairies for work, we knew it wasn’t going to be easy! But… to have him gone for three full months before he was able to come back for a short visit last month, then to find out he wouldn’t be able to get back at Christmas? It was just a bit too much.

    No, it was much too much.

    I had reached my breaking point.

    But, today is a new day! Graydon IS going to be with the family here for Christmas and I am SOOOO glad about that! So very very glad! I’m very thankful for family and friends who have made this possible!

    I’m also thankful that our children were so willing to give up Christmas gifts, so Daddy could be home. We all KNOW that’s what Christmas is TRULY about, but when it comes down to it, our children PROVED that’s what Christmas really IS all about for them.

    Christmas is about being together, and together, we shall be!

    So in the meantime, I’ve got one month to come up with some totally awesome gifts for each of my children (and most everyone else on my list) that I can make with my own two hands, and my humongous fabric stash. That’s not hard really! I’m always printing finding cool ideas online of things I want to make. When Christmas comes around, I finally force myself to get creative not just for business, but for US!

    And speaking of which, I was over at http://www.lilblueboo.com/ checking out her stocking stuffer idea posts (she’s got some really great ones!) and found a few I think I may just add to my very long list of things to make.

    For those of you making doll clothing this year, how about adding a diaper, or 2, or 3, or 12?

    http://www.happytogethercreates.com/2011/08/felt-baby-doll-diaper-pattern.html

    I thought this “first sewing kit” idea was fabulous!

    http://www.instructables.com/id/Sewing-Kit-in-a-Jar-1/

    Then there was this!


    http://www.marthastewart.com/269911/canvas-checkerboard?czone=crafts/kids-crafts-cnt/favorite-kids-crafts

    How cute is that?

    Needless to say, I’ve got more then enough to keep my busy while I wait for these four weeks to pass before we see Graydon again!

    I won’t even begin to mention the baking we’ll be doing… that’ll have to wait for another post!

  • Christmas this year

    It’s looking as though Christmas this year in our home is going to be like no other Christmas we’ve ever had before.

    Christmas at my sister’s.

    While we were hoping Christmas 2011 would mark our first Christmas as a family in our new home on a larger farm in the Prairies, it now looks like Graydon (hubby) will be spending Christmas on the Prairies without us, while we spend Christmas here on the Island, without him.

    It really sucks. There’s just no nice way to say it. It just does.

    What bothers me even more about it is that knowing our eldest kids are getting older (Alesia is 20 now) you just know that Christmas as a family unit, as we’ve known it for the last 20 years, IS going to change at some point. Children grow up, get married, and have their own busy lives and I’ve been cherishing these last few Christmases more then ever, knowing that it won’t be too long before all that WILL change.

    That’s life! It happens.


    The kids opening the family movie night gift last year.

    So to have this now come up, spending Christmas apart, already, NOW?!
    Before the kids are even grown up and married, our family is being split?
    It just makes no sense to me and I am finding it quite frustrating.

    As a woman of faith, I actually find this entire situation quite frustrating, and more and more so with each passing day, week, and especially month. No matter how hard my husband and I both work lately, it’s just never enough. EVERY TIME we feel like we’re about to get “ahead”, something breaks down.

    The funds we just spent on fixing our appliances, which we went without for as long as we could, but since we are trying to SELL our home, we had to fix, COULD have gone towards flying my husband home.

    Instead, we had to scrimp and save to fix appliances, in HOPES of selling our home soon.
    Yet, here we still are. Still both of us, ALL of us, working many hours, all of us being successful at what we do, yet STILL not getting ahead. It’s really kind of crazy. We feel like we’re on a never ending treadmill.

    As a woman of faith, I know God provides. Yet, our family is struggling in a way we’ve never struggled before. We’ve had hard financial times before, believe me! We can get through hard financial times. We’ve eaten macaroni with no cheese. Gone many many times without milk money. Spent MANY Christmases making all our gifts. We KNOW hard times. Just about every Christmas our finances get tight. My husband’s former business would dry up for the month of December (people don’t do home reno’s at Christmas time), pad sales slow down in December (I get a few people who buy pads as Christmas gifts, but let’s face it, it’s not first on most people’s Christmas shopping lists!), so Christmas is always a ‘rough’ patch. However, we’ve never had hard times, APART.

    This is different.

    Christmas is ALWAYS Christmas when you’re together. The gifts don’t matter. The amount of baked goods being less because you didn’t have quite enough funds to really blow the budget on butter and flour and all kinds of chocolate, don’t really matter. Having to stay home because you can’t afford to drive elsewhere for Christmas, doesn’t really matter.

    Being TOGETHER is what matters at Christmas. For our family, this is what has ALWAYS mattered most. And this year, for the very first time in 21 years of marriage, it’s not happening.

    THAT sucks.

    BUT. I also know we are not the ONLY family who’s having to spend Christmas apart. I know there’s military families out there who’s loved ones are away. I’m sure there are other’s like us, with loved ones working away from home, who will be apart on Christmas.

    If they can do it, I guess we can too.

    A few mentioned ‘skype’ as a way for us to sort of be ‘together’. Unfortunately, we can’t do skype. My husband’s internet connection isn’t fast enough for him to do anything other then load websites that aren’t graphic heavy, and chat on msn, which has been our saving grace. We chat every.single.day on msn messanger. Yes, skype for Christmas would be nice, but it’s not possible.

    In the meantime, since he can’t come home, and has 6 days off over Christmas, he’s thinking of ‘volunteering’ to work for anyone who does want Christmas off. It could give him a few extra hours of work, and bless another family to be able to have THEIR husband/dad home.

    As for the rest of us, we’ll think of something ‘special’ to do for Christmas that takes our minds off our ‘problems’ and focuses on someone else.

    I just have to pull myself out of my current ‘sad’ slump, and wipe my tears so I can see the needs of others instead of worrying about ours. At this moment, I don’t even want to think about Christmas, or a tree, or decorating.

    I just want to be together.

  • We’re on a roll!

    We’re on a roll this week!

    I shared on facebook that my eldest daughter, Alesia, has decided to come back to work for me! No one can know how happy this has made me AND what a relief it is.

    Alesia used to work for Homestead Emporium quite a bit. She did 90% of the fabric cutting for the inner absorbent layers, and the backing layers, of all our pads. Then she also was in charge of adding listings to our etsy shop. Another job she had was to help with packaging, and send out emails to customers once orders had shipped.

    Once she began getting more hours at her “out of the home” job, I could see it was becoming too much, so I decided to start doing all the cutting again. This was “doable”, but barely. She was no longer overwhelmed, but I sure was! I also started doing a lot of the other work she helped with and I was constantly feeling pulled in WAY too many directions.

    If this business was all I had to do with my time, that’d be one thing. But feeling guilt over children not having quality time with their mom, school not being finished properly, and meals being thrown together in a rush, is NOT the way I enjoy living my life!

    Add to that, my husband moving 1000 miles away for work and now listing our hobby farm for sale on our own (re: me doing the showings, emails, phone calls etc…) and it all adds up to more then one person can truly handle.

    I was doing it, and doing it to the very best of my abilities, but when the best of my abilities is no longer good enough, SOMETHING needs to change. And FAST!

    So I’m truly doing a happy dance that although it seemed like a negative that Alesia’s hours were being cut a little at her job, it’s become a huge blessing for me AND, I hope for her as well. When she works for me, she gets to choose her own hours and her own pace. She’s got set things she needs to get done, with a time frame of when it needs to be done. If she wants to work in the evenings and spend her days riding or writing, she can do that. If she wants to work during the early part of the day, and go out with friends in the evening, she can do that. On top of it all, I pay her the same as her ‘other’ job, so really, what could be better for us both?! It’s the best of both worlds!

    Not to mention, this is one of the big pushing factors behind this business. To provide an income not just for me, but for my girls too. If they so desire!

    I’m so glad that right now, she so desires, and I know you all will be too!

    This is what she’s helped me get done so far this week:

    And that, my dear friends, is just the beginning!

    Yesterday we finished stuffing last Friday’s pillows. I love these things and it seems many of you do as well! I’m very glad! 🙂

    Poor photo, bad lighting choice, but a truly fluffy stack non-the-less!

    But now, it’s time to get back to work before I take the youngest three girls to spend 2 nights at my sister’s house! She’s taking them to see Puss-n-boots 3D tonight! They are pretty darn excited!!

     

  • Update on the home front.

    I thought I’d post an update here on the blog. If you’re on our facebook page, most of this isn’t new to you.

    On October 31st our listing expired with our realtor. It had been mentioned several times that price is what sells right now in this economy, so we decided that if we went on our own, listing the house For sale by Owner, we could lower the price, yet again. We’ve dropped close to 90 grand since first listing in April with the realtor. Selling an acreage in a tough economy is NOT easy. Especially if you have a small home on said acreage.

    HouseFront2

    So we’ve decided to go on our own, and last Friday I listed our ad on as many sites as I could think of. Used.com, kijiji, craigslist. http://www.usednanaimo.com/classified-ad/5-acre-Nanoose-Bay-Property-PRICED-6200000-BELOW-2011-Property-Assessment_16112185

    If you feel so led, please, share the link! We are 62 grand below assessed value, and WAY over 111 grand (yes, you read that right) below appraised value! Share on Facebook, twitter, anything will help! Spread the word and help us try and get this place sold and our family under one roof again!

    Speaking of which.

    My poor husband is still in the 5th wheel trailer, now in snow. He had to winterize the whole thing before all the pipes etc. froze, so now he is living without running water. At a tune of $700.00 per month! I honestly can not believe we are paying out that kind of money for him to live without water, in a trailer. Yet at this time, it’s still our cheapest option. Much cheaper then a motel.

    VERY frustrating.

    We keep pushing doors for other options and so far each one has closed in our face. There are no rentals available so now we’re hoping maybe someone will have a room to rent, or something?! This is becoming very tough financially, and just as much so, mentally.

    Something, has GOT to give.

    Hopefully, SOON! Hopefully, it will be this place selling!

  • Shipping

    Shipping. One of the most time consuming parts of my week at ‘work’ here at Homestead Emporium.

    If I could hire out any work around here, it’d be packaging and shipping.

    It’s not that I don’t “like” it, it’s just that as I do it, I can’t help but think of all the things I could be creating in the same amount of time it takes me to put together all the packages. I’m not an ‘office’ person. I am a creator.

    Speaking of ‘office’ work, one other person I’d hire? A book keeper. Oh how I would absolutely LOVE to simply hand over my receipts, orders in, orders out, and paperwork to someone each week. I keep telling myself that when our family is finally ‘stable’ again one day (meaning when we sell this property and live under one roof again!) I am going to search out a book keeper!

    Maybe the book keeper would enjoy packaging and shipping too?

    Yep, packaging and shipping. It’s one of those things I do,  because I know my customers love it when they receive their shipping notices, and that’s truly what’s MOST important!

    I only wish I could do it a lot quicker!

  • Thanksgiving at our home this year.

    Thanksgiving comes a lot earlier in Canada then it does in the US so although this post is late for fellow Canadians, it’s nice and early for my US readers!

    We actually had two thanksgiving dinners this year. One at my parents house, in which I forgot my camera at home (tsk tsk). My mom had to work Thanksgiving so we had that one the Wednesday beforehand. Then another at our home with some family friends.

    Our home is quite small but I always figure as long as you’ve got a home, you can host a ‘party’.

    So I moved the furniture around, added the leaf to the table, added a side table, and we had seating for eleven. It would normally be TWELVE but since my husband is not here, we were short one attendee.

    Alesia wanted to do the Thanksgiving meal this year, but had to work 7-3, so that was kind of out of the question. She did however, do most everything she could!

    She also brought home a turkey from work that her co-worker dressed up for us. She works in a grocery store and this is what the meat cutter did to our turkey!

    Our dinner table has never before seen such a beautiful turkey! Stuffed with homemade dressing even! Have you ever seen such a FAT bird?!

    One day we’ll raise our own.


    *I forgot to snap a photo before I began carving! Oops!

    Our guests were impressed, as was I!

    Thanksgiving. yum! Can’t wait until next year. Hopefully it will be spent WITH my husband next time!

    Actually at the rate that showings are happening right now, I have high hopes we’ll all be under one roof again by Christmas!

  • I’m feeling rather naked.

    I’ve been sharing some of my weightloss/life style changes here on the blog so I thought I’d give a little update.

    Let me start by saying, this week, I’m feeling a little ‘naked’. I had to remove my rings. They were literally falling off my fingers.

    I bought some ring ‘snuggies’, which were not worth the 7.00 I paid. One just disappeared off my ring. I thought to myself, “lovely, next my ring will just disappear off my finger!”

    This, of course, is probably nothing I should really complain about.

    Last spring I began with cutting out 2/3’rds of my coffee intake. Not really for the coffee, I actually don’t consider coffee unhealthy. It was the cream and sugar I added to each coffee that was slowly ‘killing’ me.

    Since then, I lost 10 pounds quite easily, just from that step.

    Now, I’m onto a much more ‘harsh’ program. I’ve had to cut out all fats, sugars, and starches from my diet. It’s only temporarily, but it’s strict, and really not so fun.

    However, I’ve lost another 14 pounds and I will happily (although very embarrassingly) admit that I’ve now gone from ‘mildly obese’ to just ‘overweight’.

    I’m getting there.

    So I guess I’ll suck it up and put up with my fingers feeling naked.

    And yes, I do realize I have very large hands for a woman. I have my father’s hands. Not tiny little hands, but working hands, and I’m actually quite proud of them. However, they used to be slender hands, even if large. I’ll get those slender hands back yet. And when I do, I’ll get my rings re-sized because they’ll be staying that way!