Rhubarb Dessert

This is probably one of my favorite desserts. It has an almost sour taste that I love. My chickens have been digging through freshly plowed fields and garden which accounts for the bright yellow, almost orange filling.

Crust
3/4 cup butter
2 cups flour
1/4 cup sugar

Crumble, put in 9" x 13" pan and bake 10 minutes at 350 degrees.

Filling
5 cups rhubarb
5 eggs yolks
2 cups sugar
4 tbsp. flour
1/4 tsp. salt
1 cup milk

Mix and pour onto crust. Bake 45 minutes at 350 degrees.

Topping
5 egg whites
12 tsbp. sugar

Beat egg whites, add sugar and spread on top of baked mixture. Bake 15 minutes or until gold brown. (My topping should be higher but I only have a hand mixer so get bored standing there beating my egg whites...still tastes good.)  :)

Lisa

Farm Animals

It's always nice to know that your farm animals can co-exist! This is what I found when I walked into the barn this morning...a hen nesting in the calves hay bin!

Lisa

Baby Chicks

It never fails. I order chicks and it completely leaves my mind when they are supposed to arrive. Until usually the day before when I open my email and find a shipping notification. Then we're scrambling in the barn at 10 pm after the kiddlings are in bed cleaning and setting up brooder boxes.

It also never fails that I get to the post office for my one box and think, "Oh they didn't ship all my birds, no way they are all in there!"

And they always are!

Ducks and geese in one compartment.

Turkeys in another.

Jumbo Cornish Cross take up the other two compartments.

Stretching and running, exploring their "temporary" home.

These are the two that were born a couple weeks ago. The flash scared the creepers outta this one and he/she went straight up into the air. I laughed at the chicken and I'm pretty sure I hurt its feelings.

Let the summer fun begin!

Lisa

Fish Tacos

When I read food blogs, I often wonder how they take pictures of the food. One blogger recently mentioned that she typically does her photo shoots outside. Huh!?! I like food, I like to cook and experiment. But I don't have the patience to set up a photo shoot, I just want to taste! Maybe if I did set up a photo shoot when I took pictures of my food, I wouldn't have had the need to join Weight Watchers? :)

Since joining Weight Watchers, I've taken a renewed interest in cooking healthier. Know what I've learned? Eating whole foods and Weight Watchers is hard! WW promotes the use of low-fat, low-calorie food. Sauteing using cooking spray instead of butter or oil. Me, I like homemade bread slauthered in butter and jam and real food.

So it's been quite a journey. One good thing is that it has upped my intake of vegetables. The other nite, the farmer and I had Fish Tacos. YUMMY!

Fish Tacos - My Way

Flour Tortillas

Grilled Ahi Tuna

Thinly Sliced red and green cabbage

Fresh salsa made with cilantro, tomatoes, red onions, jalapeno, salt and pepper.

Spicy cajun sauce made with plain yogurt and cayenne seasoning.

Fresh lime.

I think the only difference is that next time I'll ever so lightly pickle the cabbages. Just slightly to give it a little tang and soften is slightly.

Lisa

New Do

I love long hair...at least in my head. But really I like it better on other people. I was growing my hair out but gave in and cut it the other day.

SO. MUCH. BETTER.

Lisa

Dress A Girl Around the World

Hopeful Threads is a blog I've been following for quite a few months. Each month, Kristy picks a project and asks for donations. It's really quite incredible what she does. Earlier this month, I found two vintage pillowcases and finally got around to finishing them. You know, nothing like waiting until the last minute or anything!

They have the sweetest pale brown flowers on them so to add some color, I used light purple bias tape. A pillowcase dress is one of the simpliest things to make. If it wasn't for distractions (children), a person could whip up 10 in about two hours. I did two in two hours.

Lisa

Bees and a bear warning

The bees arrived and where installed on Sunday. We're adding three hives and replacing one that we lost last year to swarm so we'll have a total of six hives! Bees being installed is fascinating...I like to watch from a distance! Ha! There have only been two years that I've had to really work with the bees and that was while the Farmer was traveling. One of those years I was pregnant. So yes, beekeeping can be very safe when you're safe about it!

Way over on the right hand side of the picture is the electric fencer. Ours runs off a battery. Two years ago, we have two hives destroyed by a bear so now we take precautions. Installing new bee hives is not an inexpensive hobby to have so we like to protect our investment as much as possible.

It wasn't even 30 minutes after we had the new bees installed when we saw a bear walking up our property line on the backside of the barn. Luckily the bees are on the other side of the property. The Farmer followed behind the bear to see where he went but lost track of him (from like a distance of half a mile!). Fortunately, we haven't seen the bear since. And being the good blogger that I am, I scolded the Farmer for not taking the camera. He gave me the "you're nuts" look. So I gave him the same look because hey, I'm not the one that was following a bear! :)

Lisa