processing wild game - tutorial

Moose!  It's what's for dinner...

So if you have wild game meat to process, here is one way to preserve it.

Bottle it!

Sunset, Sunrise

Idaho is having lots of fires and even though there aren't any really close to us, the smoke has made it's way over to our little valley. And it has settled in.

Makes for some beautiful sunsets and sunrises.

Not that Idaho needs smokey hazey air to have beautiful skies...

Vintage Treasure

So when we moved to our "ranch", there were a few vintage treasures here for us.

One of them is this ladder...

Finally, today I texted from the other room asked Braylan our ranch hand to go fetch it from the shed and after I broomed it off, vacuumed it off and hosed it off, it is ready to be part of our vintage inspired ranch decor.

The wall it is leaning on is still a work in progress, but everything right now really is.

Thankfully, there are two more ladders out there for any more decorating, and you know, in case we

need to climb up one.

  

beets bloggin' --homemade pickled beets

Gardening in Swan Valley is turning out to be more challenging than either me or the hubs thought. BUT, the beets are doing GREAT!

Meanwhile, back at the Ranch...

As we were reading scriptures as a family tonight I saw the most beautiful lighting of our view from the setting sun. I wanted to abandon scripture reading and go take photo's but didn't.

I withstood the temptation and figured that God would make it even more beautiful or I would capture something just as great another time.

magnetic storm

Ok, so in our new place, double wide haven--yes, I'm queen of my double wide trailer, we have a small kitchen. When I say small, I mean small. Really small.

So I've been all over the internet trying to come up with ideas to make it all work. I mean, we're kitchen people! Have you seen my blog?! I have canning equipment up the wazoo, Dutch Ovens and cast iron pans galore. Two slow cookers, an electric griddle and frying pan. Mixers and blenders and choppers oh my!  I have three boxes of spices people. And I'm talking full size boxes. Full size. Did I tell you that I have five (5) different kinds of choppers? Those are the ones I can think of off the top of my head! I might have more somewhere. In a box that hasn't been unpacked yet--BECAUSE THERE IS NO ROOM TO PUT THEM IN MY KITCHEN.

So. In my realization that I have five different kinds of choppers, I thought to myself, "ya know, all I really need is a knife and a cutting board." "I don't have the room for five different kinds of choppers." "Well, at least not four." "Downsizing is GOOD."

Enter, fridge knife magnet. Excellent idea! Free up counter space from my knife crock AND cupboard space from my three choppers!

Where does my mind go always? DIY. Do-it-yourself. Always.

*sigh*

Pretty good idea in theory, but in my naivete, this is what happened...

And then this happened...

dining room built in

 Our dining room makeover posed some challenges as I talked about in my last post, but one of the biggest challenges was this "Built In".

I have an idea why they call it a Built In.  I think they put those glass shelves up and then built the rest around it.  When I tried to take out those glass shelves to paint the inside of the hutch, I found that they weren't removable.  Nope, no way, no how.  I tried every way and angle possible and without breaking something those shelves were NOT coming out.

dining room before and after

So the home on our property is a 1976 Mobile Home.  In the spirit of "Come what may and LOVE it", we are putting up our plastic pink flamingos and flying our trailer park flag high! Loud and proud baby! Loud. And. Proud.

Dis'l Dew Ranch

My hubby and I want to name our place. DeAna of Green Gables is out ( I DON'T know why!) and Green Acres might make people think we have lots of money *snort*, so one of  my hubby's ideas is Dis'l Dew Ranch.

I think it fits. We'll see...

Bus Stop In the Mist

Walking my boy to the bus the other morning this is what I got to see...