Tuesday, March 20, 2018

Happy first day of spring!!!
WOW I cannot believe Easter is right around the corner I have to get busy making out special order items so I can get pics and post them.   I wanted to share a bit of farm life today and some baking I did yesterday.   I had a very stressful day Saturday and came home from work and sat in the sun in the pasture with my kids out there.  They all were around me including the alpacas which usually doesnt happen too often, they are usually off somewhere else.
Little Dennis the Menace curled up next to Curly and slept there while I sat on the ground looking at a magazine I bought.  Bella came and laid next to me, I love my Nannies they are just so sweet and compassionate unlike the boys who tend to be a bit obnoxious! LOL  Dennis is actually becoming sweeter.  






Heres little Bella and Dennis playing in the sun   

Little Harley came up to me but not  he still is a bit leary but getting more social I cant believe in May he will be a year old already.  

Mr. Sporty is so nosey he kept trying to get my magazine and pulling on the arm of my jacket.  But he is a sweetheart, Bailey is in the backround munching on hay. 

At work on Saturday for St Pattys day I made all the kids working some shamrock floats.   Lime sherbert, vanilla ice cream,  sprite and a touch of green whipped cream and they were pretty and yummy!!  Really nice and refreshing. 

I also played around with making a rainbow cake, it was fun I decided to do a bundt cake since those are my absolute favo to do.   I added naturally made icing coloring to each, and layered them in the pan.  Now I should have swirled them a bit or make another  color to add to it.  I am thinking of doing pastels for an Easter springy one.  Vanilla with a touch of orange essence and fresh orange zest was the glaze on top, and some farmgirl bling was the pastel colored sprinkles.  

And the finished cake sliced up.  People liked it a lot and it really did look pretty with all the colors. 

I also made one into a tye dye cake with maraschino cherry buttercream, and used the juice from the cherries to make a syrup that I brushed over the cake before frosting.   OH my goodness this was yummy!  I like the taste of this better than the bundt cake one. 



For St Patricks day lunch I made sausage and cabbage soup with some caraway seeds and fresh herbs that was nice and chunky and flavorful 



Our Tank!  Sleeping on my lap.  Such a love bug!!   LOve this kid!! 

  And of cource I had to do something different with the donuts so made a maple infused glaze and topped with crumbled crisp bacon pieces.  Yummy yummy!! 

I am off to work a bit outside hopefully it has warmed up with the sun out a little it was so cold this morning.  I have the day off and am planning on not leaving the house at all1! LOL we will see!!  There is so much clean up to do from this winter, the branches and limps from the high winds we had have made a mess in the yard and then of cource the mounds of dirt and gravel from plowing allo ver that need to be raked!!  Always something to be done and I want to start on making our raised beds boxes for planting. yikes!!  Market will be starting in a month and that is just craziness~
This was an experiment that actually I was impressed with.  Gluten Free lentil vegetable bake topped with 

this is steamed broccoli, carrots, red peppers, celery, onions, and spinach along with lentils and some fresh herbs and topped with mozzarella and cheddar cheeses.  I really never liked lentils at all, I think for me its a texture thing. but this was pretty yummy I would eat this with some fresh tomato slices.  
Have a great day and be back soon.


~~ ~~LIVE LIFE JOYFULLY~~and SIMPLY~~
~~LIVE LIFE JOYFULLY~~and SIMPLY~~

Tuesday, January 30, 2018

HEY YALL!! happy TUES!!~
This  is our sweet Curly one of our alpacas, the dad to Harley.  He is such a sweet timid gentle guy.  I want to have this pic blown up and on a canvas for our living room wall. 

This was Louise's first litter in sept and this pic was so sweet!  She had a terrible time with her delivery my boyfriend was with her the whole time while I was at work, she had 6 and lost 2. but they are so dang adorable and she was such a good little mommy.

I have been making these guys every weekend, people love them.  They are sautéed spinach in garlic infused oil, Dijon mustard sauce, mozzarella and parm cheese, and topped with a baked egg all ontop of my buttery soft brioche

We did a couple of craft/artisan markets last winter, I went thru my hoarding stash of silverware and made necklaces.  These were popular and so cute, I added scrapbook papers to the back and then painted the cat face on them and added wording.  

this was the most popular ones.  MOTHER CLUCKER!! lol each one had a different chicken or rooster on them

and got out my bin of old leather belts I have been buying for a couple years now and made a bunch of cuff bracelets.  This was the fist one to sell, I loved the color and almost kept it for myself, made one for me though that was a pink color band.  
More spoon necklaces

I have a bunch more ready to be made just haven't had the time to sit down and work on them for this year.  I love how they are turning out though.   
I have a day of running to do so better get my butt going.  Hope yall have a wonderful day be back soon!!  
~LIVE LIFE JOYFULLY~~and SIMPLY~~

Thursday, January 25, 2018

Hey yall!!!!  These are late in posting but I had some time and thought I would share some of the things I made for a couple holiday shows we attended.  Only a couple but it was so fun the be painting and making things again.  
 These are some of my hand painted snowmen signs which I just adore making them!
I keep thinking one day I am going to turn some of them into Christmas cards just haven't gotten around to that yet!  LOL not enough time!
My boyfriend cut these up using old pallets we got and then I painted them and added words.  I left a couple blank so people could have whatever they wanted on them, names, saying whatever.  

Using old metal jello cups I added a little snowman and a wire hanger to make these little ornies!  I love the joy paper banner they are holding onto.

this was taken at one of our winter shows.  I bought an old beat up ladder for a display piece which help my prim snowmen perfectly


These are my little snowmen spoon ornies.  My boyfriend cut the handles off of old spoons I have been hoarding!  I painted them and added some ribbon and ornaments! 

Here are some pics from what I have been making at work.  my spinach, egg topped brioche breakfast rolls are perfect for a quick bite and so flavorful I love them 

the face was a bit off on these first ones I did but they were for the holiday parade day in town which happens to be the Whooville parade.  The rest turned out better 

I make these little "uncommon" cheese pastries all the time and decided they could you some fruit.  Made a batch of blueberry filling and added it to these with the cream cheese filling!  I never met a cream cheese dessert I didn't like!!LOL 
I don't remember if I showed this before this was our first batch of babies born Louise is our sow and she had 6 but lost the last 2 poor girl it was her first pregnancy and she had a very difficult time.  These are such cuties and they are so precious, they are about 80 pounds now this pic was in September when they were born.  The little black one with white band looks exactly like mom the rest look like dad who is Arnold our boar.  

These are a few of Thelmas babies our other sown.  She had 12 and they were all so dang cute, my boyfriend and I were there helping her and it was an assembly line, every 3 plus minutes another came along, poor girl she slept for like a week after having all them.  
These were born in October and are probably around 40 pounds now.   little stinkers.
it sure was fun having babies.  They are all being sold we have a few left getting out of pigs, they are a lot of work but so cute!!
I hope yall are having a wonderful winter, out weather has been so up and down we have a blizzard for a few days and so very cold then its rainy and 50 degrees.  most of our snow is gone and its been pretty nice outside this week but I think we have a few days of cold and snow showers coming next week.  Crazy Michigan weather!!
Have a blessed day be back soon!!

~~LIVE LIFE JOYFULLY~~and SIMPLY~~

Friday, January 12, 2018

Hey yall!!!    Typical MI weather yesterday it was 54 degrees and raining and snow melting like crazy, then last night it started freezing and snowing and icy and its 32 outside right now but we have an actic blast of cold air coming tonight and for the weekend. 
Love MI though!!  So today I played around with a few new things at work.  I make my grandmother Rose's cinnamon roll dough which is pretty much like a challah recipe, for our cinnamon rolls but started doing savory things with it to try something different. 
So I made a bechemel sauce and added some parsley, garlic, onion powder, salt, pepper, grated parmesan cheese  and Dijon mustard
I rolled out the dough into a square and spread the sauce on it, then added some steamed garlic spinach and a slice of baked honey ham and cheddar cheese and folded the corners in to make a pocket, brushed with egg warsh and topped with some black sesame seeds and parley.  Baked for 20 minutes and oh boy did they smell yummy!!
And here they are!! 
I am wondering now if I could make these and freeze then take out and bake??  HMMM may have to try a few and see what happens.  
And heres a peach pecan coffee cake which I cannot wait to have a piece of.!!  I made cinnamon roasted pecans in the oven and added those for extra flavor.  

These are another of my Grandmother Rose's recipes it actually is her kolacky recipe that I have altered and turned it into our "uncommon" cheese pastry.  So you make a long rope with dough, roll it and cut and twist it up and then roll into a round shape and top with cream cheese filling.  I add some fruit to them also but today just did plain cheese ones.  Then after baking they get a vanilla glaze drizzled ontop.  These are so yummy I have to put them in the case or what is left in the kitchen doesn't have a chance!!LOL 
Hope yall have a great day!! 
I will be back soon to share more treats and lovelies when I get them made!!  






LIVE LIFE JOYFULLY~~and SIMPLY~~

Saturday, January 6, 2018

Happy 2018!!!

Here we are in another year already!!  I am really going to try and keep my blog updated better this year!!  LOL one of my new years resolutions!!  So life on the farm has been a bit difficult we have had some losses this month already with this super artic cold weather we have lost 4 of our baby pigs and our beloved Petunia our pot belly pig.  You know she loved Appy my horse that we lost in October and she hasn't been the same without him.  She would spend all day laying next to or under him in their barn, we moved her inside the pig house just before the snow started thinking it would be warmer in there and she would have a stall all to herself but she just hasn't done well, and she wasn't acting herself.  We rescued her from people that had her in a tiny dog kennel and really no idea of her age.  I know she was quite the happy gal when we brought her home and let her have run of the pasture. 
This was our second liter from Thelma, she had 12 and we have lost 4 of them.  They are the cutest and so sweet~!!  Love pigly wigglies!!


This is the memorial my wonderful boyfriend made for me for my dear best friend and first love Appy.  
I made a  gluten free salad  using fresh chopped kale, dried cranberries, red onion, apples, feta cheese, fresh herbs and also an orange vinaigrette.  Now keeping in mind I really really don't like kale much this salad was delish!!! It has been selling at the café so others must agree!

We had an extra bunch of roma tomatoes this week come in so I roasted them and made tomato parmesan soup and oh my goodness!! So yummy!! this actually would have been really good as a creamy pasta sauce!! hmmmm next time I will try that~~

We are having yet another winter storm!! 12 more inches came last night and its still coming down our there~  AHHHH Michigan winters, Love the snow!!  This is like the winters we had when I was a kid.  


this pretty much is what came last night!!
 Well I am going to go for now but will be back very soon to let you see other things I have been up to and there is a long list of things well, goals I have for this year for my creative side!!
 Have a great weekend yall!!!  
STAY WARM AND SAFE!!


LIVE LIFE JOYFULLY~~and SIMPLY~~

Saturday, March 4, 2017

~~LIVE LIFE JOYFULLY~~and SIMPLY~~