August 2012
35 posts
Preparation for a Sweetlove Farm Sabbatical
Today I thought I’d share some news. You have read and seen our posts about the drought so it should come as no surprise that we have decided to take a year “sabbatical” here at Sweetlove Farm beginning at the end of Market season. We simply do not have enough grass to feed our animals. So, to make lemonade out of lemons, we will sell the sheep and the truck and change our focus...
Burke got new Archery toys
How exciting! Burke started participating in 4H Archery in June and has fallen in love with it. So for his birthday last week, we surprised him with his own bow, arrows, and gear (thanks to his Grandma, Grandpa, Aunts and Uncles who pitched in too!). I thought I’d share his fantastic reaction.
Sweetlove Chicken Salad
I had the leftover chicken breasts from my Crockpot Poached Chicken this week (see post from a couple days ago) so I threw together this chicken salad. This was literally made from stuff I had around the house and it turned out great - that doesn’t always work well for me. I thought I’d share it because for once it’s a made-up recipe worth repeating.
Homemade ice cream
Last weekend we had some extra half-n-half on hand so we decided to crank up some homemade ice cream in our Stone Mountain Ice Cream Maker. The kids jumped in to help crank so it made it a whole family affair. In this batch, we threw in some crumbled oatmeal cranberry cookies Phil has baked up earlier in the day. YUM!
Here’s our recipe:
3 quarts half-n-half 2 cups sugar 2 T vanilla...
Pool days almost over
With school started and (thankfully) the extreme heat waning, we think our visits to the pool are almost done for the season. We had some great pool time this summer. Lots of jumping off the board time, lots of practicing how to swim time, lots of “guess the color game” time (ask us about it sometime!), lots of gutter ball time, lots of new goggles time, and even some learning real...
Crockpot poached chicken
We do crockpot chicken often. It is a simple way to take a whole broiler chicken and cook it up to use in any number of recipes, including chicken noodle soup, chicken tacos, chicken enchiladas, and so much more. See the recipe on our website here. From crockpot to boned chicken in about 8-10 hours with little to no effort at all. Give it a try!
Note: we recently stopped putting carrots in ours....
A mini quilt
I made this teeny tiny quilt last week as a contribution to a larger quilt we made at work for a co-worker who is retiring (she’s worked for Callahan Creek for 30 years - amazing!). I loved having a little taste of making a quilt but not having the pressure of a large-sized (or even a baby-sized) one! It was so much fun to make.
You've got a friend in me
There is nothing more precious than a sleeping baby. Except when your baby has a pal sleeping with him. In this case, my sleeping baby has recently struck up a friendship with Burke’s old Woody doll. They really are best pals these days, and it is so sweet to watch.
And poor Woody needs a bath big time, but Solomon doesn’t care one bit!
Pasta pomodoro
I LOVE to make pomodoro (fresh tomato) sauce this time of year because of the boatloads of fresh-picked tomatoes we have from the garden. It’s super simple and super quick and super fresh. It’s taken a little convincing to get my family to like it, but success last night when Finley ate 3 helpings! She told me she’d never had it before and couldn’t believe how much she...
The Jefferson County Fair
Burke is in 4H this year, and as a result, we attended the Jefferson County Fair for the first time. In fact, I can’t remember ever attending any Fair ever. It was truly a sight to behold. And for me, it was the pigs that caught my attention. I had no idea pigs could get this huge. Fascinating. To the point where I couldn’t stop looking at them and taking photos. Kind of like a...
Will sleep come?
I recently went to Boston to the HOW Design Conference and was given this authentic letterpress piece by a guy named Jason Wedekind a.k.a Genghis Kern (Thank you, Jason!). It is so absolutely perfect. I love it. It now hangs by my desk at work and is a daily reminder that This Too Shall Pass.
Keep Phil in your thoughts. He loses sleep nightly over what is to come and the important decisions that...
Finley and the animals
Finley has a way with our farm animals. She always has. Something about her spirit and her aura is calming to them, allowing her to approach them with ease. It is beautiful to watch. Ever since she was tiny (see the video blog post of her with our first ram, Duke, when she was 2 years old - scroll to the middle of the page), she’s considered them her companions. While she’s pretty...
