Making a comeback!

I have been out of the blogging world for a while.  I've missed it...sometimes.  

But now I have something that I can blog about constantly...which will probably bug the crap out of everyone...except my parents and my sister :)

There is something great about to happen to the two of us.  Can you guess what it is?....

Due January 29th, 2014.  

We couldn't be happier!

I'm Stuck

So, I'm just stuck when it comes to thinking of things to blog about.

We don't have kids.

I don't run a business of any sort.

Things around the farm are relatively the same every day.

I feel boring.

First batch of homemade soap!

So I've been doing a lot of research lately on making homemade soap.  Have you ever looked at the ingredients on your everyday soap?  Wether it be the soap you use in the shower or the stuff that sits at your kitchen sink.  It's some nasty stuff!!

For example, my husband uses Irish Spring in the shower.  I HATE the smell, but he likes it, so whatever.  But look at the ingredients list...

So I looked up some of the ingredients and if you read down the list you'll see Titanium Dioxide, check out this link...moderate risk of causing cancer and can be dangerous when inhaled...HELLO!! You use it in the shower...where there is a lot of steam...inhaling the fumes it's pretty much inevitable.  The last 6 ingredients on the list are all made in a lab.  And you do realize those are being absorbed into your body through your skin.  Sounds wonderful to me!  (Can you hear the sarcasm??)

This is the ingredients label to the liquid soap I use in the shower.  Not a huge fan of if but I got it for super cheap with a coupon...Olay

I can't even pronounce 98% of those ingredients.  Needless to say, I'm done using that stuff.

Now I'm not a total health freak and everything I eat doesn't have to be organic and all natural or whatever, however, I do pay a lot of attention to the ingredients of things that I put IN my body and ON my body.  And after doing some research about soaps...it just grosses me out, and frankly scares the bageebas out of me!

So...I decided I was going to start making my own soap.  Not only for us to use, but for me to sell.

I spent a couple of weeks researching recipes, techniques and watching a lot of you tube videos.  Finally bought some supplies off of ebay and ordered all my oils and got to work this past Wednesday.  I wasn't to sure how it was going to turn out, but it was a fun process.

To my surprise...so far so good.  I now have 44 bars of homemade soap that are sitting in our spare bedroom curing.  It will be about 3-4 more weeks before they are good to use, but I love they way they look & smell so far.

One batch (22 bars) is just plain/unscented soap.  And the other batch (the speckled one) is Lavender-Rosemary...it smells amazing!!  I can't wait to use that one. 

The unscented soap (right) has palm oil, coconut oil, castor oil & canola oil.  All the oils go through a chemical reaction called saponification when mixed with lye & a liquid.  That is what turns it into soap. If you do the calculations correctly, there will be no more lye left over after the chemical reaction and you should have a 5% overage of oils, which will really help hydrate your skin.  

The lavender-rosemary soap has olive oil, coconut oil, palm oil, lavender essential oil, rosemary essential oil & some ground up dried rosemary.  Then the same saponification process. 

Those ingredient lists are a lot more appealing to me that the ones off the body soaps that we have been using.

I've got some other recipes that I'm going to make and can't wait to see how those turn out too.  Our little town has a great farmers market in the summertime, so along with all the veggies that I'll be selling out of our garden...I'll also have soap for sale.

Welcome, Spring!

Today is the first day of Spring, isn't it?  I think that's right.  I love love love this time of year.  So much nice weather and it makes me want to spend all day outside working in the yard or in the garden or just cleaning up around here...wich is what I've been doing a lot of!

I miss blogging.  I've only kept up with a few of my regular bloggers, but I want to be back and see what you all are up to this time of year!

We are taking a break in our lambing right now, I think our youngest baby is about a month old.  They are all so stinkin' cute.  I just love to go out there and watch them run and jump around.  We still have 4 more ewes to go...well 3 for sure & we need to get one more ultra-sounded.  We are hoping she's just short bred.  Meaning, really early in her pregnancy.

The vines are starting to put on some green.  I love watching the progression of them.  Right now when I look out the back of our house at night I usually see a beautiful sunset and just a little bit of green on the vines...I love that.

The trees all over were in full bloom the past 3-4 weeks, but with the rain and all the wind these past couple of days, they are pretty much all done.  Sad.  I love when everything is all colorful and in bloom!  I spent about 10 minutes in an orchard down the road from us taking some cool blossom pictures.  I've been wanting some to put on canvases and hang in our laundry room.  It just amazes me that these lovely little flowers are going to produce almonds to help a farmer pay their bills for the year.

I'm starting to prepare the garden area for planting.  I started my first round of seeds last week and a lot of them are huge already, I can't believe how fast they grow.  When Chris was discing the garden area last weekend, we 'found'...or the disc found...a random water line that was capped off.  We have no idea where it had gone to or where it's coming from.  So that water line needs to get recapped before I can plant.  Just waiting for the giant mud puddle to go down.

Along with all the ranch stuff, I am watching the same 2 year old as always.  Cutest kid and surprisingly well behaved for being the dreaded 2 years old.  Along with him, I'm now watching a wonderful 5 month old that belongs to some sweet friends of ours.  I have Caylob 3 days a week and the sweet baby 2 days a week.  One day with them both and one day with neither.  My weeks are busy...especially my Mondays...but I do love it.  I'm able to make a little extra money and still stay at home.

That's all for now.  I'm off to bed.  Hope you all are doing well, and I'll make sure to check in more often!

Also, if you'd like to keep up more easily with what's going on around here you can follow me on instagram at farmerswife85

Way to go Dodge!!

I've been meaning to write this since last Sunday.  I have a quiet moment right now while I'm sitting at the desk in our office with a child sleeping on the floor behind me.  Evidently the turkey and apple lunch wore him out :)

But, as you know my grandfather passed away a week and a half ago.  The whole family was together for his funeral this past weekend, and it was so wonderful to be with all of them.  Saturday was a day of celebrating who he was.  Yes, there were lots of tears, but it was also a great time of rejoicing that he is not longer suffering.

We had already planned a big get together for Superbowl Sunday...just like every year.  Grandpa wouldn't have wanted it any other way.  There was the normal hoopin' and hollerin' during the entire game and many comments throughout the commercial breaks.  Now, for those of you who know my family, you know there is not a quiet one in the bunch.  There was about 20 adults & children gathered in my aunt and uncles living room.  When THIS commercial came on...all went silent.  Literally, you could hear a pin drop.  My grandpa was a farmer.  So you can only imagine the tears that were flowing as we all watched this commercial.

The impact this commercial has had on the agriculture industry has been huge.  It truly exemplifies what being a farmer is all about.  The hard work, long hours, difficult times & good times are all worth it to know that someone wants to follow in your footsteps.  I know almost every ag blog that I follow has done a post on this commercial, but it really is THAT important and meaningful to those of us that live that way of life.

I can only hope that our children, someday, will want to continue on with what we are doing.

Saying Goodbye

It has been a rough couple of weeks, that's for sure.  There have been some issue's with the company that my husband works for, but I'll expand on that when all is said and done.

and...

Two weeks ago today I received a text from my dad saying that my Grandpa (my mom's dad) was diagnosed with pneumonia.  At 85 years old, that's never a good prognosis.  He had been in a rest home for a couple years and has slowly been getting worse.  He was in the hospital and then soon moved to hospice care early last week.  I received a phone call Sunday evening saying he gone home to Heaven.

A very bittersweet moment.  We are happy that he is no longer suffering, but man, it just sucks to have to say goodbye.  To put it bluntly

Saturday will be a huge celebration of his life.  All of our family will be together.  His wife, his 4 children and their spouses, his 12 grandchildren, 5 of their spouses, 4 great grandchildren and one on the way. Each and every one of us loves the Lord all thanks to him who was the foundation of our incredible family.

Grandpa, we love you and you will forever be missed!!

Can I get an AMEN?

Hunting season is almost over and I will have my weekends back with my husband so maybe we can get some work done around here.

I can't do it all by myself.

One more weekend.

Distracted & Some Family Pictures

I have sat down several times in the past few weeks with an intention to blog, but there always seems to be a reason it just doesn't work out.  Either Caylob wakes up from his nap & wants to eat or play or go outside and see the 'mama seep" or another load of laundry needs to be moved along before I forget, someone calls...and now 15 minutes later I'm back.  Chris just called me to come outside and brainstorm with him as to how we are going to try and fix our [already falling apart] back fence that the dog has figured out how to escape out of.  See what I mean :)

--------------------------------------------------------------------

Our Christmas present to Chris's Grandma was a group picture of all her grandchildren, including their spouses and her great grandchildren.

So...there's 14 total and it's pretty hard to get 14 people & 5 different families together at the same time and same place.  The Sunday after Christmas seemed to work for everyone.  We met at a central location that was going to have a nice background.  To be honest, I didn't know how it was going to all work out, but we ended up having a pretty good time!

Here we all are...

This is the silly one...we did take a serious on too, but this one is more fun!

Just the cousins

The hubby & I

For Christmas I had asked my parents for Photoshop Elements.  I don't take a ton of pictures, but the ones that I do take, I don't want to have to send them to my sister for her to edit them and then send them back.  So I've been playing around with my new software for a few weeks now and it is amazing!  I haven't mastered it yet and there is a lot of "undo's", but it's fun to play around with.

The original picture from my Canon Rebel T2i of the silly cousin picture is this...

And after...

Just from a few experimental changes, the colors look more vibrant and not so dull and cloudy looking.

I have a lot more to figure out, but it's been fun learning and experimenting.

December Birthdays

For some reason, a lot of people we love were born in December.  My dad, our good friend's two kids, my wonderful cousin, Chris's dad, myself and of couse...Jesus! March was a popular month, evidently... ;)

So along with Christmas, we have a lot of other purchasing to do.

DJ & Shyanne belong to good friends of ours.  They call us aunt & uncle and we love them dearly.

Shyanne turned 1 on Dec. 10th.  I can't believe it has been a year already, considering I was in the delivery room with her mama late that night and into the early morning.  

She is just the sweetest little girl.  So easy to care for...except when she's tired...and just loves to do everything with her brother.

1st birthday parties are always fun to go to and hers was definitely all about girls!

Her brother's birthday was 11 days later, just 4 days before Christmas.  

Our December is full of parties, so it's a busy month for us...but we love it!