Eighty-one degrees on the 29th of July?

      That may not be odd where you live but for here in the Heart of Dixie, that's extremely odd! It has been the nicest day since May! Cooler temps with low humidity makes for one happy girl! Tomorrow should bring more of the same! I hope to get in the garden tomorrow and put down manure and bags over the weeds around the winter squash plants and pumpkins. The weeds are taking over the pumpkins and butternut squash. Some of the leaves are turning yellow. They might need a little drink since it hasn't rained since last week. The days have been in the nineties until late yesterday. Then the weather just changed suddenly! It was so nice to be out in the evening gathering squash without sweat rolling in my eyes! I hope these cooler temps last the rest of the summer! Even the animals are happy and jumping around! The new babies, that is.

      We've really been enjoying the green beans harvested from our garden! The rattlesnake beans have produced phenomenally! And I didn't even plant them! They came up voluntarily from last year's seeds. That's really amazing! The Blue Lake green bean is just about done, although I did get a few yesterday. I will plant those again along with the rattlesnake and wax beans. The tomatoes haven't produced much. Something eats on them before I can bring them inside. I think there's a rabbit hiding out in the tomato garden. Something eats on the cucumbers as well. I bought another box of tomatoes to can and will get started on the sauce tomorrow. I also got a basket of peaches that are not ripe enough to eat yet. I don't think they will be as good as the Chilton County peaches. Those are the best peaches! But I have a peach pie recipe I am going to try with them. If it's not good, I can always make peach cobblers!

      With the rising cost of meat and other items, I've been trying to find ways to spend less on some things to cover the cost of other things. An example of this is switching to Magic Jack for the home phone and a Trac phone for my cell. Together, these will cost approximately $10 a month. A savings of $20 dollars a month by switching from Straight Talk. Of course this means I still won't get a Smart phone, but I've lived without one this long; it doesn't even phase me! I use the laptop for everything anyway since I'm always home. What little I'm away from the house, the Trac phone will suffice. Since I don't work to bring in money for the homestead, this is the least I can do. If I worked outside the home, things would be different. In about 3-4 months, these will pay for themselves. Plus, I want to invest in a good cordless phone. I will have to put the base upstairs, so it will have to have good range. I saw an At&t phone at Walmart for about $50 I'm going to save up for. Too bad we got rid of ours a few years ago! I don't talk on the phone much anyway so the only thing I'll miss is texting. Sometimes that's a good thing to have. Oh well, talking takes up less time, usually.

      I had two precious girls here this past weekend! Riley and Winterlynn! It was so good to see them after going several weeks without seeing them! I miss my two in Morocco! They should be home next week! Yay! We'll be celebrating a birthday as soon as they get back, Layla! She wants a princess party! That should be a fun party!

      I hope ya'll enjoyed this post! I love reading your comments and hope to see more of you leaving them. You keep me inspired! Let me know what's going on on your homestead in the comments. Have a great week! Blessings from Bama!

These are the six peach cobblers from last time. They were put in the freezer.

Another box of tomatoes.

Another bushel of corn. I like the size of this corn. It's not sweet but still tasty. I cut the corn off and after microwaving and cooling it, put it into bags for the freezer.

Squash from our garden. So yummy!

I got eight quarts from this sauce.

Winterlynn and Riley playing in the pool.

They play well together.

She has such a personality!

Riley loves to swing! Her left foot turns in pretty bad and causes her to fall a lot. She fell and hit her head on our table and it left her with a bruise on her eye. I felt so bad!

Randy has put another puzzle together! It is adorable! It took as long as the other, even though it has less pieces. There's a lot of dark pieces that were difficult to piece together.

I hope to put most of these tomatoes into the sauce pot tomorrow! Peaches will be ripe in a few more days.

The bucklings surprised me by getting on the dog houses already! They are so small!

They play sweetly together.

Such a nice day! I hope it lasts!

October is a Great Month to Celebrate Birthdays!

      First we celebrated April's. Today is Oma's; tomorrow is Skylar's! Amber's is the 30th. Wow! So hard to believe my baby is 18! These years have passed by way to quick! And most of the years, I've been home! I am keeping Win and Riley for a few days since April is in the hospital. She has some kind of bacteria in her stomach and inflammation. She is very sick and we thought it was her pancreatitis. I don't know who would keep the kids if I worked! Send up prayers for her if you would!

      We had a great time this past Saturday! We went to a craft festival called Homestead Hollow in Springville, AL. You would not believe the traffic! The festival is about five miles from the interstate where we got off and it took us an hour to get there! Maybe longer; I tried not to watch the clock. But it was fun once we got there! Lots of food vendors and LOTS of crafts! Mostly monogrammed things for kids and Fall decorations. Lots of jewelry booths! I got Amber a blank for her birthday! I can't tell you what it is cause she reads this blog!

      I just pulled some homemade bread out of the oven! It's the Trim Healthy Mama one but it's way too salty! I wondered about that when I put in the three tablespoons of salt it called for. I'll stick to my Jim Lahey's bread, thank you! They were selling those yummy cinnamon nuts at the festival, but they are very costly! So, you know me, I came home and found a recipe and made some! They are not exactly like those, but delicious anyway! I love when recipes turn out as well as something you'd buy or taste even better! I also made brownies this weekend for Skylar's lunch, and they are the best yet! Hershey's recipe! See what I mean, me stick to a diet? I don't think so! But I haven't told you about all the good stuff I ate. Beans and greens, green juice, no rice at the Mexican restaurant we took Skylar to Saturday. Moderation! And exercise! I hope to walk and workout today, but I'm not sure how I'll pull that off since I don't have a double stroller! I can work out, but I won't be able to walk unless my Mom comes over! Would you like to stop by and watch them for me?

      The weather is supposed to start cooling down a few degrees this week and rain by the weekend! It may only be in the sixties by then! Wow! That will feel so good! I'm ready for weather changes, are you? I'm also hoping to get that garden cleared out soon! Randy said he'd weed eat it for me, but he's been busy working on the house and it gets dark out soon after he gets home. That's what I don't like about Fall and winter! Short days! Oh well, learn to live with it and do the best we can. Ya'll have a great week! Who knows? I may be back with another post soon! Blessings from Bama!

The entrance to the festival.

Love this old buggy, just glad I don't have to ride in it!

Aren't these mums gorgeous?

Skylar won't look at the camera so I can get his picture.

My Mom and Dad.

Me and Randy.

Lots of folks here.

I'm glad it was shady in most of the park!

I love the bridge that crosses over to the cabin! And I love the cabin!

Guess what these guys have set up!

My Dad asked him to take a drink.

He said he had to keep things on the up and up. I smelled it and it smells like vinegar. It's moonshine!

We left before I go to see them dance! Reminds me of Linda!

Traffic on the way in as we were leaving!

Skylar at Superior Grill, a Mexican restaurant.

Randy waiting patiently on me to take a photo of this sign I got at the Almanac Store in Leeds.

She had a bad virus Thursday and Friday! She still looks pekid under her eyes.

She's doing a good job on the pumpkin!

Riley is so cute reaching up! Like my five-year-old cell phone? It's older than the girls!

I love the concept of this bread, just not the way it tastes!

Have you been to Trader Joe's?

      I keep reading on different blogs about items purchased from Trader Joe's. I finally did some research and found a Trader Joe's about two hours from here. That would be like driving to Atlanta, not a bad trip, so we went this past weekend. It is a much smaller store than the Whole Foods store I've been to. I don't know if all the Trader Joe's is that small, but this one was. They probably are, since there were several within a few miles. I like the items that I've tried, the Trader Joe's brand. They are good quality, and reasonably priced, maybe even cheaper than Whole Foods. I'm hoping we can make a Whole Foods run this coming weekend while the experience is still fresh. Would I make that drive again, just to go to Trader Joe's? Probably not. Unless we want to eat at Johnny's New York style Pizza! And go to Best Buy and Michaels. We don't have any of those stores here. They are in Birmingham; except for the pizza place, so it would be much closer for us to drive there. But, it was a very nice trip!

      I had no comments on the recipe I posted in the previous post, so recipes may not be my thing. If I post one again, I'll just type it in. I was really bummed out about not being able to use Ziplist! That is such an easy way to save or print out recipes! I don't plan on ever changing from Blogger, but if I do, Ziplist will be the first thing I add!

      I had Layla this past week for a few days while her sister had her tonsils removed. Then, her Momma was so sick, she had to go to the doctor and found out she had bronchitis! So I kept Layla and Yasmine Friday night! They were both good, and even though Yasmine was in a sickly state, she acted well. After their Momma got a shot and some medicine, she felt a lot better and they went home Saturday evening. I also got to see Riley, the now two month old! They grow up too fast! She's still little, though. 

      We have received a lot of rain over the past few days, which has helped to get us out of the drought. The temps have gone from the seventies to the forties! That's a big change! Just when I would love to get in the dirt! I know better than to plant anything now! Maybe Valentine's Day! Hope ya'll have a nice week! Blessings from Bama!

Sausage gravy, but where's the biscuits?

I have to cook enough sausage every week so Skylar can eat a sausage biscuit every morning for breakfast. I now know how to make a decent biscuit.

Layla pushing her baby in the swing. Love that little smirk! Can you keep a house clean with children around?

First cinnamon-raisin bread. Very thick and crusty.

Look Aunt FeFe, I'm wearing your blogs! The dog dug up that little brown bottle.

We had tuna salad. I put apples in it and it was good!

The new cinnamon-raisin bread is light and not so crusty. It tastes delicious!

Don't let Rubi get us!

Daisey and Delilah are growing!

She smiled at the camera! She was trying to take it away from me!

Yasmine riding the Jeep.

Riley about to smile.

You can see the effects of the medicine on Yasmine.

I want my passy!

This is the actual size of the store.

A beautiful church in Marietta, Georgia.

Some of the items we purchased at Trader Joe's. They gave us that bag since it was our first time there.

I love this lentil soup!

Oatmeal bread to go with the soup.

Got to have some chocolate chip cookies to go with everything!