Cheese Day and a surprise

Hey everyone! I've been busy making some cheese again. I made a batch of Colby cheese yesterday since it was raining here all day. It's drying a rind on the cutting board right now. I whipped up a batch of bread dough and set the oven to preheat this morning and went out to do the morning chores. When I came back in and went to put the bread in, I got a big surprise. Apparently, the element on my oven has burned out. That figures! It's not quite a year old but I guess I use the heck out of it and now I am on the hunt for an element. Depending on how much a replacement costs, I might be out of an oven for a couple weeks. That is very depressing to me since I did not get the brick oven built this summer. All those projects you just can't do without a few extra dollars just didn't get done. The brick oven is one of those projects. Just can't salvage fire brick and heat resistant mortar.....

This morning was cold! The Farmers Almanac says this winter is going to be cold and wet. That's going to be a bummer, I hate it when it's sloppy around the farm. It makes feeding the critters so much harder and kind of miserable. With the chicken house still not finished, the birds are staying roosted on the rafters in the pole barn which is okay but they poop and it's all over the barn floor. It will also he kind of hard to give them any kind of heat source when the temps turn really cold. It's so frustrating to me to see that project so close to being finished and me just not able to finish it. For the lack of 3 pieces of plywood! A lousy $45 is all that stands between a cold, drafty barn and a warm and dry chicken house. Maybe next pay......

Time is running out for getting plants started if you want to have a window garden over the winter. The seeds are sensitive to drafts and cool temps and as the weather gets colder, the seeds will mold before they germinate. So, get your peat pellets and your ziploc bags going now! Keep them in a sunny window and when your seedlings sprout, use your cut off pop bottles to get them going good. Tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers and herbs all go great in sunny windows thru the winter. You can even grow radishes, carrots, lettuce and chives, they go well in those long rectangle flower planters and can be direct planted instead of peat pelllet started.

Oh Julie, thanks so much for sharing the chicken picture, would you send it again tho, the cell phone is so touchy with those tiny buttons and I mistakenly deleted the email while I was trying to open the picture!

Hubby went back to work last night, boy was it quiet in the house last night! I forgot how quiet it can get around the farm. Surprisingly, he came home in pretty good shape this morning and is in a pretty good mood. I'm glad he had a good night.

You know, I really love it when you guys share with me via email. I'm always available via email at mmpaints@yahoo.com.