Home grown Pear Pie

I believe I have mentioned occasionally that we have a few (14) very old, very large, super productive pear trees at our place...I know...Joy, Rapture and all those fun noises...Well the trouble is everyone of them are "cooking pears"...not the kind you could just pick off the tree and nosh on...So what does one do with so many cooking pears??

This was one of 4 box we took to Miracles Happen Ranch a few weeks ago

Well many of them go to a friend for her goats and horses to enjoy....I send some home with my MIL...I actually enjoy watching the squirrels and birds devour them....and many get run over with the lawnmower and/or get composed...My chickens do try very hard to make a dent but alas, we still have hundreds of pears EVERYWHERE....

Well this afternoon I took some advice I was given to "treat them like apples" and made a Easy "pear" Pie....I simply followed the recipe here
http://www.tablespoon.com/recipes/easy-apple-pie-recipe/3/
but substituded pears for apples....

The perfect way to end the evening...
Delish pie from home grown fruit and a glass of milk...

Blessings Kelsie

Sharing this post at:
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Fall Farm Friends Friday @ http://www.verdefarm.com
Show and Tell Friday @ http://romantichome.blogspot.com/

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Shopping Spree...

I know I have been rather neglectful of Blogland this past week (Posting, Visiting and Replying to comments)...The only excuse I have is "busy" and exhausted...This entire last week has felt like everything from the the past month has caught up with me...

The surgery and recovery period, preparing for hubby to go out of state, followed by hubby going...adjusting to Sara's new daycare routine...and of course the return home of my beautiful daughter Michaela...Trying to get the fall garden prepped and the fencing and shelter for the goats...

My house is a mess, the gardens are neglected and we are no-where near where I hoped we would be on the goat stuff by now...If we are lucky some of the corn seedlings will survive the cats sleeping in the seedling trays by the time we get around to planting them into the garden...Our fall garden might just turn into a winter garden at this rate....Good think I have all those windows to use for cold frames if need be this year.

So despite all this, today I threw up my arms and said, who cares if the dishes are done...I need a little girlie bonding time with my "big girl" while the lil girl and/or life is not interrupting us...and Mic was in desperate need of some job interview clothes, since she lost her jeans and other various pieces to a "bathroom flooded and were unable to wash the wet laundry until it was beyond saving" accident. ...As young ppl living away from home for the first time are apt to have....

Mic in her new job hunting attire..

Soooooooooo today we headed into Cato Fashions and picked her out a cute, cute dress and these great jeans and shirt...Shoes and necklace were shopped for in mummy's closet and on sale for the price of a hug :)

We had a quiet lunch at Taco Bell and then walked around Walmart killing time until it was time to pick up Sara from Daycare....

It was a fun and easy day, but now I really need to get some cleaning done so I can cook dinner tonight

Blessings Kelsie

Basket of Nuts

The nut collecting has begun.
I was a little worried we would get no pecans of off the tree in the front yard this year because of the number of branches that have come off during the afternoon thunderstorms this month....

I shouldn't have worried...20minutes in the front yard and Lil Sara and myself half filled the basket...We did not get to the driveway yet or under the larger pecan tree...I just hope they have a good amount of "meat" in them when I start shelling them for the freezer.

Would be very cool to be able to make our Thanksgiving Day sweet potato casserole from not just our own sweet potatoes but our own nuts too..

Blessings Kelsie

Sharing at:
Farm Girl Friday @ http://www.deborahjeansdandelionhouse.blogspot.com/
Farm Photo Friday @ http://farmchickskitchen.blogspot.com/
Potpourri Friday @ http://twenty-eight-0-five.blogspot.com/
Fall Farm Friends Friday @ http://www.verdefarm.com

Fall Garden

What a pleasant surprise these marigolds are blooming again...Planted back in spring they have survives the summer heat and a couple of transplantings.

My Mexican Petunias have been giving a wonderful display too...Each morning I am delighted to find even more blooms than the ones dropped the evening before
.

One year this month since I started this garden bed...I think it is filling our nicely...May even need to move a few bushes to new locations.

Also under the pecan tree is starting to give the appearance of an established bed...I hope next year the lilies I transplanted from in the woods will actually bloom (They came from the foot print of house #2 on the property circa-1940/50's)

And the ever lovely and faithful daisy bush...No cottage garden should be without a least a couple ( I have 5 lol )

Blessings Kelsie

Sharing today:
Cottage Flora Thursday @ http://fishtailcottage.blogspot.com/
Fertilizer Friday @ http://www.tootsietime.com/

Goat Pen - Step A COMPLETE

The game plan is to have the goats moved onto our property by next Thursday...Why then? Because that is when we will have the time to go pick them up....

So between now and then we have to...

A: Build a predator proof night pen - CHECK

B: Cut down cherry laurel trees close to the fenced area and make sure no stray saplings are sprouting where the goats can get to them...(hubby is working on this now)


C: Put up 200ft of goat/sheep fence to create a daytime grazing pasture area....(hopefully we can start digging fence post holes tomorrow morning)

D: Make a shelter inside night pen to keep the wind and rain off of the goats

E: Drive to Fort White and pick up Boots and Deenie

All this sounds pretty straight forward, but I want to remind you we work slowly and it is still HOT here....Plus we have a work schedule dictated by the mood swings of Princess Lil Sara..lol....Talking of whom...Time to get her from Daycare.

Blessings Kelsie

Windows for the future...

Lookie what I got...Hubby was nice enough to include these on the truck full of car "stuff" from North Carolina...I might get my greenhouse sooner than I had dared to even dream...At the very least we can use them for cold frames for the fall garden this yr.

Blessings Kelsie

Sharing at:
Tuesday Garden Party @ http://www.anoregoncottage.com/
Blooming Tuesday @ http://msgreenthumbjean.blogspot.com/
Outdoor Wednesday @ http://www.asoutherndaydreamer.blogspot.com/

Blessed by our neighbors...

I have the best neighbors in the world....They just brought over their tractor and deep tilled the ground for our new veggie garden...David will be so surprised when he gets home from NC and finds he does not have to do it with his small walk behind tiller.

Can't have a post without pictures, so in lieu of a photo of my neighbors tractor,

we had to improvise and take a photo of what we do have...

They told me to wet down the dirt good for the next couple of days and he will come back and go over it again...I am so excited to have a real veggie garden again, one we have control over...Planting on the melon rows was ok, but when the melons were done and our veggies plants were still producing...to bad for us, they quit watering the crop...

Blessings Kelsie

Serendipity Tea...

For the longest time I have been wanted to add a pretty, delicate, with a touch of pink tea-cup to my small collection...But alas this humble farm girl can just not justify paying $25 for a tea-cup...Pink or otherwise...

How fortunate for me that in order to avoid an "unhappy accident" we had a very "happy accident" indeed...

Lil Sara, as 3yr olds are apt'd to do, requested a potty break while we were in a store with no bathroom...Fortunately right next door is one of our (my) favorite thrift stores...My eldest daughter was a volunteer there for a short time also....

So we leave daddy to choose his own cell phone and we pop next door to use the facilities...

Once business was taken care of, we of course must check the kitchenware section for any treasures that might have been donated...this is a RULE...and can not be broken...

Oh rapture...Oh joy...Hear the heavenly music ring...3 little delicate tea-cups and matching saucers, with just a tiny touch of pink on the flowers sat waiting for me...What a truly serendipitous moment...

My heart was just pounding as I reached out to turn over the delicate corset shaped cup and saucer to check the price...I just knew I would be walking out empty handed, because there is NO WAY, I can afford them...Oh! But this could not be...$1 each...yup...I walked out of there with all 3 tea-cups and matching saucers for a mere $3.21...

The other thing I found under the saucer was a red and gold sticker that says, Metasco - Japan.

Blessings Kelsie

PS: I think I had a little too much fun taking photos of this cups....Must be love


Sharing today for:
Show and Tell Friday @ http://romantichome.blogspot.com/

Pink Saturday @ http://howsweetthesound.typepad.com

Rose Chintz Cottage & Inspirations @ Tea Time Tuesday

Lady Katherine Tea Parlor @ Tea Time Tuesday

Wander Lee and Pam's @ Tea Pot and Tea Things Tuesday

Terri, Artful Affirmations @ Tea Cup Tuesday

Big Daughters Room

I am sharing photo's from the archives tonight. They were taken back in Feb, of my eldest daughters black and white room...
I will be doing a little tweaking in there over the next couple of days, and getting it ready for her when she comes home for awhile (longer if I have my way hehehe)

Am I a little excited??....You bet I am....Have missed her much??....Like I would miss breathing.

Just 3 more nights and her head will be sleeping on these pillows....

Blessings Kelsie

Sharing for
Show and Tell Friday @ http://romantichome.blogspot.com/

New Feathers

Lucy and Ethel are looking lovely with their new bright white clean feathers, now the end of summer molting is complete...Sadly the their tail feathers are not looking so pretty...

Ethel in front, Lucy in back.

It has been a busy few days around here getting hubby ready to head to NC until Sunday night...I am not looking forward to picking lil Sara up from daycare today and have to explain why her Grandparents and her Daddy are not here...I think we will go visit the neighbors on the way home to distract her...Please pray for me alone on the farm with a 3yr old for 4 days....

Sunday sure does seem along way-a-way right now...Not just because hubby is gone, but that is the day my other baby moves home for awhile...I feel like a kid waiting for Christmas morning to come around but without the help of Advent chocolate to easy the waiting.

Blessings Kelsie

Sharing for:
Farm Girl Friday @ http://www.deborahjeansdandelionhouse.blogspot.com/
Farm Photo Friday @ http://farmchickskitchen.blogspot.com/
Potpourri Friday @ http://twenty-eight-0-five.blogspot.com/
Fall Farm Friends Friday @ http://www.verdefarm.com

The face that broke my camera....

RIP My pretty pink Kodak EasyShare C813...You served me well..
Look at my sweet little princess...You think I am kidding about the camera...Just seconds after taking this image my camera became broken beyond repair...

You see the scowl and the click were followed by the words...
"Let me see...Let me see..."

and before I knew it my camera had come loose from my hand and was smashing into the floor lens first...The lens casing cracked, the shudder door is now stuck at half open and the lens zoomie bit is now at a very odd angel...I don't think I can fix it this time...Last time the body casing came apart and I simply unscrewed it, shuffled the insides back into place and screwed it shut again....This time when I jiggled the lens to see if I could straighten it, a itty bitty screw fell out...oops.

Thank goodness for my Nikon 990 Coolpix (I *heart* my Nikon)...I was able to still snap a couple of cute pix before we left for school...Lil Miss Sara is sporting her "Fancy Nancy" outfit she picked out all by herself from Walmart yesterday...It is a little toned down for school...she would have loved the wear all 6 new bows in her hair and some pretty plastic sparkly jewels as well lol.

Blessings Kelsie

9/11

Psalm 91

¹ Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High
will rest in the shadow of the Almighty.
² I will say of the LORD, “He is my refuge and my fortress,
my God, in whom I trust.”

³ Surely he will save you
from the fowler’s snare
and from the deadly pestilence.
⁴ He will cover you with his feathers,
and under his wings you will find refuge;
his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart.
⁵ You will not fear the terror of night,
nor the arrow that flies by day,
⁶ nor the pestilence that stalks in the darkness,
nor the plague that destroys at midday.
⁷ A thousand may fall at your side,
ten thousand at your right hand,
but it will not come near you.
⁸ You will only observe with your eyes
and see the punishment of the wicked.

⁹ If you say, “The LORD is my refuge,”
and you make the Most High your dwelling,
¹⁰ no harm will overtake you,
no disaster will come near your tent.
¹¹ For he will command his angels concerning you
to guard you in all your ways;
¹² they will lift you up in their hands,
so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.
¹³ You will tread on the lion and the cobra;
you will trample the great lion and the serpent.

¹⁴ “Because he loves me,” says the LORD, “I will rescue him;
I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name.
¹⁵ He will call on me, and I will answer him;
I will be with him in trouble,
I will deliver him and honor him.
¹⁶ With long life I will satisfy him
and show him my salvation.”

Playing Dress-ups

Had a little fun playing dress-up with lil Sara today...I think I had more fun than she did...Especially editing these fun photos..

Blessings Kelsie

Sharing for
PINK SATURDAY
with Beverly @ http://howsweetthesound.typepad.com
and
Mosaic Monday @ http://dearlittleredhouse.blogspot.com

Changing Seasons.

There is change in the air at Our Country Home...The evenings are getting a little cooler and the tad shorter...The mornings have a crispness to them that requires wearing a jacket on the way to drop Lil Sara off to Head Start....The pears are turning a more pronounced shade of yellow and if only I could reach them I could be busy canning...

Or maybe I should be busy weeding the garden by the looks of the shagginess around the suitcase...Look how much the rose has grown since late spring...big difference between this photo and that in the header I think.

I am excited that the rescued pink cone flower is blooming...I thought I might have to wait for next year to see it's beauty...After all it was just a mess of almost complete browned leaves and spent flowers when I grabbed it for 50cents from the clearance rack at Walmart.

But there are other changes on the way besides those in the garden...My eldest daughter will be moving home next weekend...Can I contain my excitement? NO!!!...I have missed her so much and though I know her return might only be for a little while, does not stop me from being UBER UBER excited about it.

I am also excited to see my lovely in-laws this week as they will be arriving from out of state on Wed and spending the night with us, my only wish is that they could stay longer and would not be taking my hubby with them when they leave again Thursday...He will be making a journey to North Carolina to gather more car stuff (because apparently you can never have enough)..He will return Sunday with a U-haul and as much of the "stuff" as he can fit in it...I am not so secretly wishing for some old window frames to make their way here also *wink*

Lil Sara is doing great since her surgery, she is sleeping better and quieter...have not heard her snore like an old man (or at all) since the surgery...Her tantrums are most definitely milder than they were...I guess that is a sign she is not overtired all the time now...Now the fun part of training her with a proper bedtime routine begins.

The other exciting news is we have gather enough funds to purchase the materials required to build a secure predator proof goat pen with shelter for at night as well as fencing for their grazing pasture...So just as soon as hubby gets back from NC we can work on getting our goats home at last.

Hope everyone is having a great weekend too.
Blessings Kelsie

Sharing for PINK SATURDAY
with Beverly @ http://howsweetthesound.typepad.com

Farm Photos

With the evenings getting cooler Lil Sara and I can get out walking after dinner again....The other evening it was to check out the big "sprinkler" across the road in the peanut field...Of course I took my camera along...

I had a little fun playing with my editing of these ones also...

Told you it was big a big sprinkler...You need click and enlarge this one to full appreciate how far back it goes into the field...

Am I the only one that loves photos of fence posts?
Maybe it is a sign I desperately wish we had our own fences already..

I love the sight of the Beauty Berry's...
Not just because they are so pretty, but they are a sure sign Autumn is on the way...

Blessings Kelsie

Sharing for:
Farm Girl Friday @ http://www.deborahjeansdandelionhouse.blogspot.com/
Farm Photo Friday @ http://farmchickskitchen.blogspot.com/
Potpourri Friday @ http://twenty-eight-0-five.blogspot.com

More thunderstorms and damages

I am sure many of you remember our $30 Gate Arbor Project...I totally adore how this turned out and it really set the feel for the entire front garden and house...We have had so many lovely comments both on the blog and in real life about this recycled piece of garden "art"

And some of you may remember me mentioning how many pecan branches have come down so far this summer, between the afternoon thunderstorms, that are a way of life here in Florida and the fact the trees are just LOADED with heavy nuts...

The other day we got some very high winds and heavy rains, even for around here...When I heard a crash from the master bedroom...On inspection nothing INSIDE the room was a-miss, but outside the window I saw this...Yup another pecan branch came down...
(side note...check the cheeky male Cardinal peeking thru the window at me taking photos)

There has been for the longest time a rather large branch caught up in the crook of the tree, well it seems that with the wind and rain it grew to heavy and brought down the branches it was caught in...(another side note...Notice how much the grass has come in over the past few months..yay)

Alas it tore the decorative top from my arbor...Hubby assures me he can fix it no problem, thank goodness...

Though I am sad about the arbor not looking so pretty right now, I am just grateful it did not do any damage to the house...

Even my angel statue was spared...

My hanging basket with the almost dead petunia was an unfortunate casualty..

But this is nothing but an inconvenience that is easily fixed....Please send up a little prayer for our friends who are getting more rains and flooding from the TS LEE in Mississippi

Blessings Kelsie

Sharing today for:
Tuesday Garden Party @ http://www.anoregoncottage.com/
Blooming Tuesday @ http://msgreenthumbjean.blogspot.com/
Outdoor Wednesday @ http://www.asoutherndaydreamer.blogspot.com/
Cottage Flora Thursday @ http://fishtailcottage.blogspot.com/
Fertilizer Friday @ http://www.tootsietime.com/

New visitor at Our Country Home

As someone born and raised on the only continent in the world that does not have wild squirrels (other than those that have escaped zoos) I have a special fascination with these cute little tree rodents ever since moving to the USA...In fact during my first visit to the USA almost 35% of the photographs I took home were of the squirrel playing in the front yard of the house in Charlotte NC...I was totally enchanted.

Since moving to FL 7yrs ago I have always felt a special delight each time I see the big Eastern Fox Squirrel (that is what the "locals" tell me they are called...or cat squirrels) ....These guys are huge compared to the small grey and red squirrels I had grown so fond of in NC....The first time one darted across the road in front of me I was sure it was a cat because of it's size....I slammed on my breaks and then watch it dart half way up a tree on the other side of the road, spin around to twitch it's tail and tell me "what for" as only a squirrel can...

Alas we have never been graced with one of these guys on our property...at least not that I had seen...that was until today....Me thinks he might be after some of those pears since that is what brings in the small Eastern Grays (and lots of birds) to the trees just 30ft from our backdoor.

Isn't he/she just gorgeous...and since we have more than enough pears to share...I hope our new visitor decides to stay for awhile so we can enjoy watching his/her squirrel antics.

Blessings Kelsie

Sharing for:
Show and Tell Friday @ http://romantichome.blogspot.com
Farm Girl Friday @ http://www.deborahjeansdandelionhouse.blogspot.com/
Farm Photo Friday @ http://farmchickskitchen.blogspot.com/

THE WINNER IS......

Jane@Cottage at the Crossroads said...

Hi Kelsie,

Thanks for entering our giveaway. Please enter me in yours. I would love that apron because I'm sitting here in a shirt stained with spaghetti sauce from dinner! Hehe! I'm a little messy!

Jane has won a homemade pot holder, a lovely little "Cup of Friendship" book and some sparkly fairy bait....

And most importantly the One Of A Kind, Handmade apron to keep the spaghetti sauce at bay.

Thank you so much to those that entered and I hope the new followers are glad they came along for the ride and will stay for a little while more.

Blessings Kelsie