Merry Christmas

and a Happy New Year 
from our house to yours!

He Is Finally Here!!!

On Thanksgiving Day!!!     Meet (insert baby donkey's name here!)      He doesn't have a name yet but he's here!!

First I had Dimple, then I searched high and low for 10 months for a black jennet and finally found Sarah.

I feel like I have waited a lifetime for this little guy.
 
But it was worth the wait! Any name suggestions?

Trail Cams

We have several different trail cams up on our farm.  Just a few of the bucks running around here. We had 4 different boys working this scrape but this was the biggest one.  

Day shot of a big boy.

And a night shot of the same big boy.

These little guys need to learn to get along!  We have numerous pictures of them fighting.

Another big boy at the feeder.  Rack is taller but not as wide.

This is what you get when you mess with the big boys. 

Blaze Orange and Camo Time

It's that time of year again!  Guess what we've been doing?  

This is Jake's second year of hunting.  He got his button buck last year and he killed a doe Tuesday evening.  He's let several bucks walk right on by.  He says he's waiting for "THE BIG ONE!"
He's so serious about his hunting.

Most of the time anyway!  You have to have a little fun while you're out there waiting!!

 

HAPPY HUNTING to all you fellow hunters!

My Lil' Smokie Sauce

I am the Lil' Smokie Queen!  Ay least my family thinks so.  I'm always expected to bring the Lil' Smokies to any and all family get-togethers.  There's an awful fuss if I don't!   There's a quite a bit of mixing for the sauce so I decided to can some tonight.  I always make 4 pounds (actually it's not quite 4 pounds now since the packages are 13 ounces instead of 16 ounces like they used to be!

Anyway, a quart of sauce makes 4 pounds packages of Lil' Smokies.

I prefer the Hillshire Farm Beef Lil' Smokies, but any of them will work.  I always make the recipe x 4 for my crock-pot of Smokies.

This is the basic recipe for 1 package of Smokies.

Sauce
1 cup ketchup
1/4 cup brown sugar
2 tsp soy sauce
2 tsp Dijon mustard
2 tbsp white vinegar
1/8 tsp garlic powder
1 package Lil' Smokies  Mix ingredients, add Smokies and cook in Crock-pot until Lil' Smokies are plump and tender.

For canning, I did the recipe x 16 just because that's how much ketchup I had stored in the pantry. I use Heinz, I'm picky about my ketchup!  Mine made 5 quarts of sauce.

Sauce for Canning (makes 5 quarts)
16 cups ketchup
4 cups brown sugar
32 tsp soy sauce (2/3 cup)
32 tsp Dijon mustard (2/3 cup)
16 tbsp white vinegar (1 cup)
2 tsp garlic powder

Slowly bring to a slow bubbling boil, stirring occasionally.  Once boiling, have hot jar, lids and bands waiting.  Pour sauce into hot jars, adjust lids and bands and process in boiling water bath (canner) for 20 minutes.  Remove jars of sauce from canner and let cool.  Check seals on top of lids after cooling.  Just add this sauce to your Smokies in the Crock-Pot when you're ready to cook them and turn it on!  All the work is done for you.  This sauce can be used for lots of different recipes or as a barbeque sauce for grilling, etc.  Hope you enjoy it!