Odds and Ends

 I'm sort of between major projects just now.  My grocery order arrives Thursday afternoon.  I have ordered nothing that needs to be processed except for frozen shredded hashbrowns to dehydrate.  Love having those on hand.  I just soak them for maybe 10 minutes,  drain and fry them up.  Taste just like fresh.

This time I am filling in the gaps in my storage.  More rice.  Instant dry milk.  Canned apricots because I sort of depleted my supply because I ate them.  And more peanut butter because I am a sucker for microwave peanut butter fudge.

Microwave 1 cup sugar, 2 Tbsp. butter and 1/3 cup milk for 3 minutes.  Stir to blend and then stir in 1 cup peanut butter.  Pour into a buttered 8 or 9 inch pan.  Chill until firm.  Easy to make when the sweet tooth is screaming to be satisfied.

I have been spending time working on getting my family tree ready for printing.  I keep hearing about threats on our electric grid as well as threats of internet problems.  I have spent more years than I care to think about gathering information on my ancestors.  It would break my heart to lose it all, especially since I hope someday my kids and grands may have an interest in where they come from.

And speaking of Grands, I have two in college.  And I worry about them.  I don't know if the insanity going on in many universities has hit the school of one of them, but I see where there are riots at the school where my other granddaughter is due to graduate within a couple of weeks.  How does this happen?  Why are students allowed to riot against those of the Jewish faith?  And didn't we have something similar happen in the late 1930's and early 1940's?  This isn't just "freedom of speech or freedom of assembly."  If this abomination isn't stopped, history may very well repeat itself.  

In talking with a friend, the topic came up about the lack of skills within the younger ones in our society.  They seem to have all sorts of smarts when it comes to anything electronic but tell them to bake a loaf of bread or change a car tire or have a cup of coffee that didn't come from Starbucks, and they are lost.  Don't suppose it is entirely their fault if nobody ever bothered to teach them the skills that are important for survival.  Sad, really.  When push comes to shove, they are mostly doomed.

I would prefer to keep a good attitude going, but lately I find that somewhat difficult to do.  Every day there is something else in the world surrounding us to be concerned about.  So I continue to do what I feel is important to me and my family.  Sometimes all I can do is order more canned apricots, so order them I do.  If nothing else, my family will have food.

Stack it and pray, my friends.  Stack it and pray.

Down Time Well Spent

 Apparently, Blogger decided I needed to spend a few days in "time out."  I couldn't post or comment.  Then after a couple of days, my comment telling you all what was happening, appeared, followed in another couple of days with full access to this blog.  Still have no clue as to why this happened.  But on the bright side, the time in blogger jail wasn't wasted!

I have found that the items in the grocery store sale ads are usually stuff I don't want or need.  But this past week I lucked out.

Pork, chicken and hamburger were all on sale.  I ordered them all.

Pork and chicken breast are now canned.  I have 32 more pints of meals in a jar and 24 more half pints of plain chicken breast.  16 rather large chicken leg quarters and 20 lbs. of hamburger are in the freezer.  Leftover onions, carrots and corn are in the dehydrators.

At the astonishing pace food prices are increasing, any time I can get a deal I take it.  

I saw from a couple of trusted sources that more egg laying chickens have been slaughtered with the excuse of "bird flu" as a reason.  We aren't talking hundreds or even thousands.  More like millions.  As a result, I fully expect the price of eggs to skyrocket.  Might be a good time to dehydrate more eggs while I can still afford to buy them.

I have to wonder just how long the general public is going to stand for the government crapping all over them on a daily basis.  When Congress can send billions to other countries but refuses to spend a dime on protecting our borders, perhaps a major change is in order.

Until that happens, we continue to do what we can to care for our families.  Pretty sure nobody who represents us in the halls of Congress is going to help.  I long since gave up on trusting any of them.  My trust lies with God.  May He watch over each and every one of you.

Back At It...

 I have spent time in the past couple of weeks working on sharing my genealogy research with my family.  I feel it is important for my kids and grands to know their heritage.  But if they have nothing to eat, it isn't going to matter where they came from.

My twice monthly grocery order goes in on Monday.  I find I really like the pint size chicken meals in a jar that I canned a short time ago.  Especially when I am really busy and just don't want to cook, by using a jar meal, I can have a relatively healthy supper in mere minutes.  

I already have lots of food combinations for soups and stews in quart jars.  And that is great when cooking for multiple people.  Just this week I made beef stew using my canned beef stew base in a quart jar and adding a pint of beef cubes.  It tasted really good, but there is just me here in this apartment and I really am not fond of eating the same food three days in a row.  I also don't like waste.  Yes, I could freeze the leftovers, but I tend to freeze and then forget. So, for me, (and my fading memory), the pint size jar meals work well. 

I have lots of hamburger in the freezer, so I'm thinking pints of chili.  And I am ordering a variety of fresh and frozen veggies to go with whatever meat is on sale next week.  

This is just something that I find works for me.  The point is that it really doesn't matter how we are stocking up on food, it is the stocking up part that is important.

High prices - border invasion - corrupt politicians on all levels.  That's where we are, and I don't see things changing for the better any time soon. 

Do what you can.  Full larder, dry powder, open Bible.  And pray.  

Tee Hee - Ha, Ha, Ha

 The sound of laughter.  Don't you miss it?

I grew up in an extended family of happy people.  My Dad was famous for telling "Dad" jokes that made everyone around him groan.  And his eight siblings all had the same, rather dry sense of humor.

Even the family of my very strait-laced mother knew how to laugh.  The giggles emanating from her siblings when they all got together was music to the ears.

My children inherited a well-developed sense of humor from both sides of their families.  I remember their Dad laughing so hard at some silly thing or other that his face turned beet red and he nearly lost his breath. 

My kids loved to try to make me laugh.  There was the time when our old farmhouse had about an inch of water on the basement floor from the snow melt leaking in.  One of my daughters descended the stairs from her bedroom, dressed in swimwear, complete with flippers on her feet.  Her remark:  "Will you please light the wood stove in the basement?  I invited my friends over for a pool party and I promised them the water would be warm."

Another daughter would call me from school on her lunch hour to tell me the joke of the day.

I still hear laughter generated by my kids.  My son loves to tell me about funny things his kids have said or done or about his dog being on high alert for mailmen, Amazon delivery drivers, neighbors out walking and especially about the presence of bunnies and squirrels.  All of which is guaranteed to bring a smile to my face.

Some of my best memories of my oldest son are those times he made me laugh.  Like walking into my kitchen, empty coffee mug in hand, saying, "Just give me coffee and nobody has to get hurt."

But I have to wonder what happened to most of the rest of the world around me.  

Granted, the world is a hot mess.  There is so much going on in our country alone that there isn't room to list all of it here.  But beyond that, so many are now "offended" at any reference to anything they don't like that I think they have forgotten how to laugh.  

We need to remember how to laugh at the silliness and especially at the absurdity of things we see and hear.  A good friend of this blog said that if we don't laugh, we will end up screaming!

True, that.

I find it funny...

that after all the dire warnings and hysterical hype over today's eclipse, the only folks who will actually be able to see anything are those in Maine.  The rest of the country is under cloud cover.

Don't ever try to tell me that God doesn't have a sense of humor!

She's Back...

 Yeah.  I know.  AWOL again.  I'm sorry.

Hasn't been a waste of time, however.  Dehydrated broccoli, green beans and onions.  Canned chicken legs and thighs.  Cut up and froze two spiral cut hams that were on sale.

As much as I am reluctant to admit it, age seems to be catching up to me.  My sister had the right idea when she told me she was simply counting the years backwards at each birthday.  I wasn't that smart.  And to top it off, unlike those who have the good grace to be aging like fine wine, I seem to be aging more like milk.  :)

As the result of all those birthdays, standing at the stove to cook a meal doesn't work all that well some days.  So, I decided to can some meals in a jar.  I've got lots of soups canned, but this is a bit different.  Into wide mouth pint jars I put a handful of chicken breast chunks.  Topped that with layers of chopped celery and onions, sliced carrots and either peas, green beans or corn.  Tossed two chicken bouillon cubes on top and added water to within an inch of the top of the jar.  Pressure canned the jars at 10 lbs. pressure (for my altitude) for 75 minutes.  Two canners full gave me 32 meals.

And they taste good.  Found I can eat as a soup or thicken for a stew or consume just as a chicken dinner.  Two minutes in the microwave and dinner is served.  I may do more using different meats - whatever is on sale.

In the meantime, I have been working on making access to my Family Trees a bit easier for my family who might be interested.  Being a grumpy old woman who is also a cheapskate, paying a monthly fee to put my family data online irritated me.

So, I figured out how to do it, using this blog.  Earlier I had made more blogs under the umbrella of Mom's Scribbles.  One held writings by ancestors and another I used for some old pictures.  This time I made a new blog for each branch of my Family Tree - five in all, including the ancestors of my kid's Dad.

Adding links is a pain in the posterior to accomplish.  I am not that computer savy.  So, I gave each person in my direct line a separate Family Group Sheet.  Each page has a label listed in the side bar.  The object is to choose a person you know to start with.  From there the labels can be used to move on to other ancestors.

To my kids...the Matheny Family Tree is complete except for photos.  Go to Mom's Scribbles.  On the right side, click on "View my complete profile" and then click on Matheny Family Tree.  I will add photos later.

My grocery order went in today and I ordered nothing that needs processing.  I am kind of on a roll with the ancestors and want to finish that project.  Personally, I believe it is important to know our heritage.  I want my kids and grands to realize they spring from some pretty good people.  Oh, we have our share of rogues and reprobates, but for the most part they were hard-working, God-fearing folks who make me proud to be counted among them.

And with that, I am off to wade in my gene pool.

Things around us don't appear to be getting better.  Keep stacking.  Keep praying.  Stay safe.