Tomato Sauce Recipe!

Sorry - No tutorial today - Camera needs fresh batteries (fingers crossed that's all it is!)  Ill make a tutorial soon - We are JUST starting to get tomatoes so I am sure Ill have plenty of time.

Easy Tomato Sauce

yeld: 5 quarts

(feel free to divide in half (5 pints))

13 pounds Roma tomatoes (any kind will do in my opinion)

1 cup olive oil

1 1/2  cups chopped onion

15 cloves of crushed garlic

basil to taste (I start with 1/8 cup dried)

salt to taste

 

Bring a big pot of water to boil and add the tomatoes just for a couple of minutes until you notice the skins breaking.  I suggest doing a couple batches to make it easier.

cooking just a few minutes just until the skin breaks.

Drain and remove skins, core, and run the "meat" thru a food mill or food processor.

In a large sauce/soup pot, heat oil to medium, then add the garlic, onion & basil and cook 4-5 minutes.  You want them sweated to a light golden color!

Add in tomato sauce and simmer 30 minutes or until it reaches desired thickness stirring frequently!

Easy Peasy!


Fill your sterilized jars and leave 1/2 inch headspace.

wipe rim clean and put on your lid and screw down tight.

Can per your method/canners instructions or head over to Ball Canning Jars site.  Tons of recipes and info!

"official" 1st day of school for the year

We homeschool year round but we say June is our official start month.  One year down another creeps up!

Kids always say their official start date is in August when public school starts because thats when we start going back to the parks, library... so its not so busy!

Fall Planting

I've been looking for a simple guideline for planting date for out fall garden.  This one looks good.  AND you can print it off.

I'm waist deep in zucchini and am thinking that I would be glad to have a break from gardening but in the same moment know winter is just a breath a away and will have a break then!

What are you planting in your fall gardens???

Being thankful for what you have

 

 

 

~Looking out my back door~

Its hard to be thankful every day.  Its just how (most) of us are - Always wanting a better job, bigger house, more money, more farm land or what have you.

Taking time to sit back and realize most of us have what we need - Roof over our heads, food, clothes our health-

Some days we eat veggie pizza or rice or beans and a lot of homemade bread - It gets old but we have it.  We have deer when its in season and chicken when I go butcher some.  I cannot tell you the last time we bought meat at the store or had beef.

  99% of our clothes are hand me downs, thrift store finds or something of that nature. 

We have 7 kids in 2 bedrooms.  They are still little so it works - but I don't seeing us getting anything bigger ever so it will always work.  

Why shouldn't this all be enough?  Back in the day a woman could raise 10 children in a 2 room shanty with out air conditioning.  There was no stores or restaurants to grab something quick.


I am thankful I choose to be a stay at home mom.  I know it isn't something everyone can do or wants to do but its what I wanted and it took some talking into with my husband before the birth  first daughter. 

It has taken me 10 years to be at peace and thankful for what we have - Sure it would be nice to have cars that are not 26 and 15 years old - But you know what, they both run like a dream, are nice and clean and do what we need them to - get us from point A to point B safely.

Point is there are some things beyond our control but make the most of it and live each day to the fullest :)

Where am I going?

Sorry Im been MIA the last couple (4) months.  Ive been overwhelmed.  Planning homeschool, working on the garden, decided to sell our milk cow, farmers market,  Mr Homesteads car kicked the bucket and had to get a new one, trying to make a real go of my soap business, about to break out my sewing stuff, potty training, teething, blah, blah, blah....

And Ive been wondering what direction to take the blog - recipes & cooking -  off grid - prepping -- DIY- Craft tutorials-

Truth is Im all over the place.  I do a little of this and a little of that. 

I am making the commitment to post at LEAST 3 times a week. Don't know which 3 days but it will happen. 

So here is where I am at - We are raising rabbits again for food.  We have breeding quality Californians. 4 does and a buck and 3 Californian cross does.   Still have a couple of our dairy goats but they are dry.  Have several Buff laying hens and white Brahmas for replacements. 

Have about half my stuff together for the kids school this year.  Hoping this year will be hugely productive.  I only have 2 in diapers so YAY me!  I have figured it up.  In the last 9 years I have changed APPROXIMATLY 35,000 diapers.  I know it sounds like a lot but I have 7 kids and they have all but one been in diapers for 2.5 years.... That's the conservative #  I think its closer to 45,000.

So in essence I have taken about 61 days of my life changing dirty diapers...

I have taken 2 months off from working out.  Plan to start back Monday.  I think I had posted about it before but I lost 106 pounds in 10 months last year after having my last baby.  She just turned 1 year in June. 

I have a horribly wonderful addiction to making soap, hair bows and clothes. I rarely sleep more than 3 hours and my brain dosent shut off till I am so tired that I  cant hardly function.  As soon as the alarm goes off  (if I stay asleep that long) I jump up immediately and get to breakfast & chores.

The garden is doing ok - we are getting monsoon like rains here in mid Mo so you sink 3" every time you step off the porch. 

Ok now that you have a little window as to what is going on,  I need to get new batteries for my camera and get my next blog posts ready!