Support Local Agriculture

Article from the News & Observer:
http://www.newsobserver.com/105/story/1349927.html

We have done a CSA in the past at our farm so if you are interested in participating with one in your area I can help you locate a farm or visit your local Farmer's Market.

Christmas traditions

I love that some families have traditions that they do every year for Christmas, birthday, etc. I read a few different blogs where they talk about "traditions." I tried to think of "traditions" that my family has for the holidays.

Growing up at some point we switched to opening all of our gifts on Christmas Eve and then we got to open our stockings on Christmas morning. We also would eat fresh seafood at Christmas rather then turkey or ham. Another Christmas Eve tradition was to read from the Bible the story of Joseph, Mary & the baby Jesus.

Now I have 2 little boys of my own and want to start my own Christmas traditions.

My first obstacle was Santa Claus. I was not going to introduce Rosty to Santa Claus (he has never visited Santa at the mall, etc.) but I guess I did not think about preschool having them color Santa pictures, read Santa books or sing songs about Santa. So, we somewhat have incorporated Santa into our "traditions." Although, when Santa would visit me as a child I would only receive the 3 things because the wise men brought baby Jesus 3 things. So we do have Santa visit but we don't glamorize him.

Another tradition for me is Christmas baking. The boys helped me make shortbread cookies this year. We had trees, stockings, stars, candy canes & a train. We also made candy snowflakes & Christmas tree lollipops from a Wilton candy kit that I had bought. We were not home for Christmas this year but we normally make a birthday cake for Jesus.

I always buy the boys matching Christmas pajamas but this year instead of giving them the wrapped package to open as an early Christmas gift Rudolph delivered them. When the boys came home from preschool on Tuesday there were 2 wrapped gifts laying on the steps complete with gold glitter down the steps and in the yard. There was a note from Rudolph saying he brought them an early present. Charlie is still too little to know anything that is going on but Rosty thought it was cool.

Another tradition is buying the boys a Christmas ornament each year. They each have a box that I put their ornaments in every year and my hopes is that when they move away from home and start their own life they will have a box of Christmas ornaments along with a lot of memories. We normally put an artificial tree in the playroom and they decorate that tree with their ornaments but this year we let the boys pick out the tree and they chose a smaller tree so I let them decorate the tree with their ornaments instead. Rosty enjoyed looking at his ornaments and me telling him who they came from.

I have a few decorations that I put out every year.

One is the nativity scene that my mom gave us for our first Christmas.

Another is a ceramic Christmas tree with Strawberry Shortcake standing beside it. My Popa gave me that tree when I was probably 8 or 9 years old. Another special decoration is a Christmas troll that my brother & best friend Wayne gave to me. It's just another one of those special things to me.

My favorite part of the Christmas gifts was always my stockings.

So I shop all year long and put away little gifts and trinkets that I find. I wrap most of the gifts that I put in their stockings (a special paper that is hidden and no other gifts are wrapped in this paper). This year I had stickers made with the boys names on them- they love stickers.

If I can think of anymore of my holiday traditions I'll update this blog. But please share with me your traditions too. I may incorporate them into my families traditions.

Christmas 2008

I don't even know where to start with all that we did during our Christmas vacation so here is a quick run-down:

Sunday (December 21st)

Rosty was a shepherd in the Christmas play at church. He had a few speaking parts and he did them well with a little bit of help. What I did not know about the Christmas play was that our adult choir was going to be singing in between scenes along with songs from the congregation. Our church likes songs with at least 4 verses and we sing them all. The children never practiced with the choir so we had no idea how long the program was going to be.

Oh, did I mention there were 12 songs.

It was just a long morning with all the kids.

Monday(December 22nd)

Let's kill Christmas turkeys today!!! With the wind chill it was 19 degrees. Need I say more! We were fortunate enough to have some help so the day went very smoothly.

The kids preschool was open today and tomorrow so they went to preschool.

Since we were going to be celebrating Christmas with my family we had Christmas with Lee's family on Monday night. Since Lee's sister and her family were down from Connecticut we had all of Lee's family at our house. We have a play room full of toys and with 4 boys under the age of 5 yrs. old it gets crazy!

Me and Lee prepared our local foods meal for Christmas. It consisted of baked ham and collards cooked with a pork shank. The pork was from our farm and the collards from KC Farms. I also had a beef stick that me and Lee had made from our beef & cheese from Ashe County & we had cranberry sauce that I made homemade from fresh cranberries our friends brought us from Massachusetts. The wine was from a vineyard in Mt. Airy, NC.

It's always fun to me to try and prepare our meals as local as possible.

We also had several desserts that I had made that afternoon.

Tuesday (December 23rd)

Yet another busy day.

We had to deliver some of the Christmas turkeys which included a trip to Chapel Hill. Then we went to Matkins to pick up a beef that we had processed and we delivered half of that and took the other half home to our freezer and were back at the farm by 2 o'clock for a turkey pick-up. We then had to go stock up on feed and run a few errands before picking the kids up at preschool.

Remember that we were leaving for Tennessee the next day and I still had not packed anything!!

After getting the kids and feeding at the farm we decided to go visit Lee's grandfather who is in the hospital. We went with Lee's mom, his sister and her family and after that we met Lee's dad and brother for Mexican food.

I finally got home and packed.

I packed my clothes, the kids clothes, the gifts, the Leapster, the DVD players, pillows, blankets and a cooler. I hope I didn't forget anything!!

After doing all of this we opened our gifts. I did take 4 gifts each for the boys to open on Christmas Eve though. My husband surprised me and bought me a new pressure canner! I am so excited!!! I have 2 water bath canners and always have to borrow my neighbors pressure canner. Everybody gets canned goods next year for Christmas.

My parents got to our house about 10 o'clock that night and we finally got to bed.

Wednesday (December 24th)

We are finally on our way to Tennessee.

We get to Pigeon Forge and our cabin is still being cleaned so we go and eat at The Old Mill Restaurant (a favorite of my daddy).

The cabin was about 15 miles outside of town. It was described as secluded and they did not lie about that. I prayed every time we turned into the drive that my van would make it up the steep incline. The cabin was great! It was decorated for Christmas complete with a decorated artificial tree. On the main floor was a kitchen, den and bedroom with full bathroom. There was a loft upstairs also with a full bathroom. Rosty loved the basement it had air hockey, Foosball and a pool table. There was also a hot tub on the deck.

We have always opened our gifts on Christmas Eve so we did that and finally got the kids to go to bed. I woke up at 2 o'clock Christmas morning from a dream. I dreamed that Santa didn't wake up and the kids had no gifts on Christmas morning.

Thursday (December 25th)

Happy Birthday Jesus.

Rosty slept upstairs with my parents and Charlie with us. Since the flooring was wood it creaked every time someone walked around upstairs. It was after 7 o'clock when I heard little feet creaking around and running down the steps. We woke Charlie up and they both reached the den at the same time.

Rosty's exact words were "Just what I wanted!"

Rosty got 2 Leapster games and the trains Stanley & Mavis.

Charlie got 3 of the Car's cars and a Car's sleeping bag.

They each also got a Mobi Little Tykes nightlight- these are really cool!

After getting up and getting dressed we went into Gatlinburg and went to the Ripley's Aquarium. It was a lot of fun. The kids enjoyed it!

We ate Christmas lunch at a BBQ place.

Later that evening we rode through Pigeon Forge and Gatlinburg to look at their Christmas light display.

Friday (December 26th)

I had wanted to go to Dixie Stampede because I thought the kids would really enjoy the show. When we got up on Friday it was such a pretty day we decided to do Dollywood. Let me rephrase that my parents took the kids to Dollywood and me and Lee had a day to ourselves. I would have liked to gone but I had such a wonderful day with my husband. Very rarely do we get a day to spend together and have nothing to do (see Monday- turkey killing).

We went to a couple of outlet malls. The second one we had to leave because there were too many people and I DO NOT do crowds. We went to a couple of book stores. We went to the Apple Barn for lunch which consisted of fried apple pies and hot apple cider.

The Apple Barn is what you would call agritourism.

There are 2 restaurants, a big gift shop, a candy shop, a creamery and a winery. They produce a lot of the products there at the farm/orchard. We purchased some apple cider and some apple wine.

We also went to an arts and crafts community.

There was pottery, limestone statues, wood carvings from tree stumps, etc.

That evening we met my parents and the boys in Pigeon Forge at the Apple Barn Grille (another favorite of my daddy's) for supper. I'll save the story of our waiter for another post!

Saturday (December 27th)

We got the 2 vehicles loaded up and it was time to start home.

We took the scenic route home we went on the Parkway and through Cherokee. We stopped in Black Mountain at the Farmer's Market store to get salmon from the Salmon Guy- yummy!!

We had a great Christmas- thanks moma & dadddy!

Jesus is the Reason for the Season

The following story I received via an email forward:

A woman was out Christmas shopping with her two children.After two hours of looking at row after row of toys and hearing them ask for everything they saw on those many shelves, she was feeling the overwhelming pressure that so many of us feel during the holiday season, and was relieved when she made it to the elevator.When the elevator doors opened, there was already a crowd in the car.Determined, she pushed her way into the car dragging her kids and packages. When the doors closed she couldn't take it anymore and stated, "Whoever started this whole Christmas thing should be found, strung up, and shot."

From the back of the elevator everyone heard a quiet calm voice respond, "Don't worry, we already crucified him."

For the rest of the trip down, the elevator was so quiet you could have heard a pin drop.Don't forget this year to keep the One who started this whole Christmas thing in your every thought, deed, purchase, and word. If we all did it, just think of how different this whole world would be.

Just last night I heard Lee talking to Rosty about Christmas and why we really celebrate Christmas. He then told him the Christmas Story which includes Joseph, Mary and the baby Jesus NOT Santa Claus, Rudolph and elves.

Don't get me wrong...my kids do get gifts at Christmas but they will grow up knowing that Christmas means a lot more than presents, trees, candy canes, etc.

Batman's coming to supper

This is just a funny story....

Me & Lee have a friend from college whose last name is Batman. In college he was always referred to as Batman.

Well, Batman and his wife were suppose to come to our house on Sunday. We were at the farm and Lee said, "I guess we better head home and see if Batman is there."

Rosty's eyes got big and he said "Batman is coming to our house?"

I looked at Lee and smiled and said "You didn't know mommy & daddy were friends with Batman did you?"

We fessed up and told him that we didn't really know Batman but for a few minutes we were the coolest parents ever!

Rosty's birthday party

Since Lee was out-of-town the week-end of Rosty's birthday we decided to have his party the next week-end. It was a cool day outside but that did not keep Rosty and his friends from playing outside on the swing set. Then they came inside and dumped every toy that he and Charlie own onto the floor. But as long as they had a good time it was fine with me.....

Rosty had invited several friends from school to his Diego birthday party. We grilled hot dogs and Wild Turkey Farm's brats. Then we had cupcakes. I had games planned but nobody wanted to play my games.

I am always so good at taking pictures at the kids parties. I take pictures of the food, the desserts, the kids, opening presents, etc. but for some reason this is all I have. I'm sorry Rosty! One day you'll look back and wonder why there are only 4 pictures of your 5th birthday party. Next birthday I will delegate a picture taker position to someone.

Rosty's 5th Birthday

Rosty's birthday was October 30th but I just have not had my camera handy to post pictures. So bear with me as I tell you all about Rosty's birthday. We actually celebrated for about a week. Lee was leaving to go to a conference in SC on October 30th so we did our celebrating a day earlier. We did the traditional go to Pancho Villas to eat & of course Rosty had to wear the sombrero.

After eating we headed over to Great-Grandma Menius's house so Rosty could open his gift from her. Lee's parents joined us and we brought our gifts over too. Rosty's big gift was a Leapster. This is a handheld game for kids and he absolutely loves it. It's great for long trips- my suggestion is to buy rechargeable batteries though!

Here is Rosty with the case for his Leapster

Here is the Leapster.

Rosty opening presents.

Petey & Freckles bought Rosty rechargeable batteries- what smart dogs

The next day me and the boys went to my parent's house to celebrate Halloween and Rosty's birthday. On Saturday it was Rosty day. We started the day with a quick trip to Chuckie Cheese. The boys had some tokens left over from a previous trip so we spent about an h our there playing games. We then went to Toy's R Us so Rosty could pick out his birthday presents. Of course, he had to get a new Leapster game & a Diego DVD. After eating lunch we went to Monkey Joe's. This is Rosty & Charlie's new favorite place. It is nothing but those big inflatible blow-up slides and climbers.



Here is Rosty and his birthday cake.

This is Monkey Joe's.

That little head you see at the bottom of the pictue is Rosty climbing up the ladder.

Here's the birthday boy!

In Sickness and in Health

Well, the Menius Household has been hit with the winter blues.

Charlie was sick over the Thanksgiving holiday and the following Monday. His fever finally broke and he was feeling good. Then Rosty had a well visit to the doctor. By Friday evening he was sick. Me & Rosty were in our pajamas all day on Saturday. He laid in my bed and watched movies most of the day.

On Sunday we were still not feeling real good so we decided not to share with our church family and we stayed home. That's when the razor blades in the back of my throat formed!!! When I say I had a sore throat, I'm not lying. It hurt to eat, drink and breathe (thru my mouth). I have been living on Gator-Ade.

Monday morning I got up and nobody had a fever so we got dressed and went to school. I still felt bad and decided that I would leave work at lunch so I could get some rest. Well, I got to leave earlier than that. Preschool called and Charlie was throwing up. She said it was so bad that he would not leave the toilet. So I left work at 10:30 am and tried to sneak into the building. But God bless little Makayla....she saw me and had to tell Rosty that his mommy was at school. This led to Rosty coming to Charlie's class and saying that he did not feel good either and then came then tears. Well, I knew he had not felt good all week-end... so I take them both home.

All the moms out there know how it is to be sick yourself and have to tend to one child much less two children and then let them be sick on top of that. I had Rosty lay on the couch and rest. I told him if he was sick then he did not need to be playing. So he laid on the couch all afternoon. He even napped for awhile. Charlie was laying in my bed with me. I wanted him close by in case he started throwing up again.

Lee had been to the Farmer's Market in Raleigh the week before and had brought me some collards. I thought this was the perfect time to cook them because I was going to be home all afternoon & I would be making my rounds from the bedroom to the den every so often anyway.

There's a point to all of this I promise... Both boys were napping and I was in the kitchen and I hear Charlie coughing so I walk back to check on him and he meets me in the hallway and he has thrown-up. It wasn't really bad but he had been laying on our bed and of course it was on the pillow, the sheet, the blanket and the quilt so it all had to be washed. Let me back up and say that I had just washed everything(mattress pad, blankets, quilts, pillows, etc) over the week-end because our dog had been sick and she is on the beds sometimes. So I strip the bed and wash it all again.

Well, a couple hours later I'm in the kitchen again checking on the collards and Charlie comes be-bopping in there and I'm thinking he's feeling better. Nope, you guessed it. He starts throwing up again. At least it was on the linoleum;-)

We had a rough Monday night. I turned my alarm off and decided I wasn't going to work on Tuesday. We get up on Tuesday (late) and nobody has a fever (except me). I started getting dressed and Lee said, "Go to bed." He took the kids to preschool and I went to bed.

I woke up when I hear him come home a little later and I hear another voice. Rosty had a fever again. Lee worked from home yesterday and kept Rosty while I slept and rested. By doing this I was able to go to the boys Christmas program last night. I apologize to all the parents there because I literally put my hair in a ponytail and had no make-up on. So I may have scared some kids (and adults). After the program we got our Christmas tree. So tonight's fun is decorating!!

While home on Monday and Tuesday I got to watch a couple of movies. I saw 27 Dresses & Hairspray. I also watched Diego Saves Christmas & Diego Ready, Set, Go.

So today is Wednesday. Charlie went to school, Domisty went to work and Rosty went on a farm visit with Lee. He's still not 100%

Happy Thanksgiving

All of my friends are so good about including pictures along with their blogs but not me... I'm going to try and get better. I still haven't posted the pictures from Rosty's birthday party.

We had a great Thanksgiving. We were with Lee's family this year. Grandpa B fell the Sunday before and broke his hip so he was not able to be with us. We were missing a few others due to sickness and having to work but we had a great meal.

Anyone who knows me & Lee knows that we are into "eat local." This year for Thanksgiving we raised turkeys. We processed a total of 22 and of that we kept 4 of them. We kept a bigger one for our family meal (30 lbs) but Lee's mom just cooked the breast and legs. I made a sweet potato pie with sweet potatoes from our garden and cooked collards (supplied by KC Farms- friends from the Farmer's Market) seasoned with smoked pork jowls (the pig was raised by us). Our neighbors went to Massachusetts in October and brought me back 4 pounds of cranberries so I canned all of that into cranberry sauce- if you need cranberry sauce let me know, we'll never eat 18 jars!! We also provided a summer sausage which me & Lee made from some of our beef. We had several other delicious dishes too. I also made a peanut butter pie (I got the recipe from a friend) and that was definitely a big hit with everybody!

So lets fast forward to the week-end.... Since we do have a garden and are blessed with lots of fresh vegetables I like to preserve them when I can. We still had some potatoes that we had dug so I decided that they needed to be canned. I have a waterbath canner so I borrowed my neighbors pressure canner and went to work. Potatoes are very time consuming to can. First, I had to pick through them, then wash them, then peel them, them chop them and then boil them for 10 minutes and then FINALLY I get to can them! Lee helped me chop them up- thank you honey! So we now have potatoes.

Well, our good friends the Correll's had given me a few pumpkin pie pumpkins. You guessed it I could not let them go to waste. If you thought potatoes were time consuming.... With the pumpkins you have to wash them, cut the tops off and scoop out all the seeds and membranes, get the rind off the best way you can, boil them and then FINALLY can them. And of course I could not let the pumpkin seeds go the waste.... I hope to make pumpkin pies for Christmas.

I'm not done yet- I've been busy! I bought a box of oranges from a local school. What can I do with oranges??? Let's make marmalade. I did. Another time consuming project. I had never made marmalade before so I was very careful to follow all 17 steps. But somewhere along the way I missed a somewhat important step.

First you wash the oranges (and lemons), then peel them in quarter sections, then you need to scrape about half of the white fleshy part off, then you should have cut the rind into small strips combine with water and baking soda and simmer for 30 minutes. I somehow missed the cut into strips and I got to end of the recipe and was like why do I have these big strips of orange and lemon peel..... So after doing all the other steps- I won't bore you with the details. I reread the directions and realized- 'Duh!" So I took my kitchen shears and started snipping away. So I may not have the prettiest looking marmalade but I did it!!!! I tried a little of it and it wasn't bad. I was hoping to give it as Christmas gifts but it will probably just go to my mom and granny since it isn't very pretty. They have to like it since I made it!

I have more oranges left so I need suggestions??