New Years Resolution

I still haven't gotten good about blogging away my life but I am making it a new years resolution.

Our Christmas party was fantastic and I am very happy with how well it went off.
I butchered the Mallard Drake that I had bought for $5 two days before the dinner and had it curing is a dry salt rub. I was very happy with the flavor of the meat but unhappy with the skin. It was way to salty for my tastes PLUS it did not crisp up like I hoped it would. The meat was very dark and one of the guest said that it tasted like steak. I was thrilled with that opinion.

All of our meat was humanly raised this year. We had Ham that we purchased from the 4h auction. We even had the chance to meet the pig before it was sent to the butcher. The lamp that was served was raised with my daughters lambs so we cared for it and watched it grow. The rabbit was from my back yard as was the duck.

A perfect feast for my hopes to be organic and self sustaining this next year.

Trading my bunnies

I just recently traded a breeding pair of bunnies with another urban farmer (Esperanza Pallana)in the area. She has already developed a wonderful urban farm that included tasty fruits and vegetables, chickens, bees and now wanted to start rabbit raising.
She gave me a delicious assortment of fruits and homemade items. Figs, lemons, squash, persimmons, jelly's and a warm spicy wine that was great. I ate the figs immediately and turned the lemons into lemonade. The squash will be for tonight's dinner and the persimmons I hope to make into cookies and bread this afternoon. I received another bag of persimmons from a friend so now I have plenty for jam too.
Here is Esperanza's Blog. You can find recipes for the wine and jams on her site.
Pluck and Feather

Animal, Vegetable, Miracle

I just finished reading Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver. It was an inspirational book that has me thinking and planning for the summer months. I have many different projects planned for my little home.

The garden is a must do this year. I have a few sights in the front and back yard that will work wonderfully for a garden this next year. The problem is I have killed just about everything I have tried to grow. I am amazed that I can keep children and a whole zoo full of animals happy and healthy but give me a green thing and it will be dead in weeks. Of course plants don't say "I'm hungry!!" in that whinny voice when your stuck in bumper to bumper traffic and it will take at least 15 minutes to get to the next off ramp. So that could be my problem. Maybe if the plants said something before shriveling up into unrecognizable dried material I would remember to water them.

I am still growing 3 healthy tomatoes. We have not had really cold weather yet and I am hoping that I will get a few more tomatoes before frost hits. The other option is to make my own cold frame and attempt some winter gardening. Seems like a lot of work to fight nature and my inability to garden at the same time but I am never one to back down from a good fight.

I am very happy with my guinea pig project. We are slowly moving to feeding our piggies 100% fresh and organic foods. No more processed pet store stuff for us. I am watching their weight as I make this transition. They have seemed to love all green leaves like lettuce, carrot tops, and really love root crops and stems. Broccoli stems are a favorite but not the florets. Carrots, squash, and zucchini are big yes. They do not like peanuts, or anything spicy like onions or garlic. By the end of this month they will be completely processed food free. One small step in become self sufficient. It's just a little step but if i can do that with the animals foods first while changing our families eating habits at the same time we should be totally self sufficient with our food in a year or two except for things like sugar, wheat, beef and wine. We will be only getting organic and local which is a new thing since reading the Kingsolver book.

Racoons

Though most people think these masked animals are top on the cute and cuddly list I am here to tell you that they are the most evil and beastly of animals. Over the last few weeks I have had the pleasure of multiple nighttime encounters. Can you imagine being woken up in the middle of the night by the most terrible of sounds. The sound of an innocent animal being hunted and eaten in the middle of the night. In my bed clothes I grab a flash light running out into the yard, barefoot and sleepy. I found not just one evil Raccoon making a midnight snack of my chickens but 4 yes 4 of these things as large as a dog feasting in my backyard.

Do you think they ran for the hills when caught in their despicable act. NO. They looked at me and hissed asking "What are you going to do about"

The best I could do barefoot and in my skimpys was grab the hose and spray them with a good blast, but we are not talking firehose power here. They ran away but just out of reach from the hose. There was no saving my poor chickens and the back yard looked like an early snow had fallen in the moonlight.

It is all out war here at Blue Rivers Urban Farm and I have to admit that the Raccoons are winning. Though I do kill and process my chickens and rabbits to eat, I have a hard time killing a wild animal for no other reason than wanting it dead. So to count:

Raccoons 2 chickens, 4 rabbits

Me 0.

I have done nothing but teach them that when the light comes on in the bed room window they should take their dinner out. I also believe that they are secretly planning a full take over of the house by crushing it with a large Walnut tree but that will be my next blog.

Chicken and Dumplings

I made a wonderfully delicious dinner Monday night. What made it fantastic was the fact that the chicken was from my own back yard.
At the end of the school year I was gifted 10 chicks from a local kindergarten class. They had hatched them in incubators during the school year and watched as they turned from cute little fluff balls to ugly pullets. Well I was hoping that we would have a 50/50 chance of males to females. I really wanted a few more laying chickens. We have 2 little silky bantams that lay about an egg a day but not enough to feed my family. I just want enough to completely fill my families needs and then be able to give a dozen away to my parents when they come into town. So i am guessing 5 chickens would be great.

Saturday morning I woke up to a rooster call outside my window. Four of the chickens decided that it was their day to crow. My husband and I caught all of them and quickly got them into the freezer. We had already had 3 crowing earlier in the week and had a small roasted bird for each of us for dinner.

I am really disappointed that I don't have more hens. We now have the 2 bantams, one red chicken that really looks like a hen and two more black and white that I am expecting to crow any morning.

The chicken and dumplings turned out delicious the little roosters don't have a lot of meat on them and the flavor is really light. If you like a lot of chicken flavor you need to wait until they are older but our neighbors would be a little upset with us if we had a rooster for very long.

I have 2 in the freezer still and haven't decided what to do with them yet. I need to get the cookbook.

Homeschooling!!!

I am very happy to announce that Sarah is going to be home schooled this year. I was getting her signed up for public school and realized that I kept procrastinating day after day on the paper work. It didn't take me long to realize that I was not at all interested in Sarah attending public school.
She has been in a private school for the last two years. That school Redwood christian school was good school for her except they didn't teach science to college standards. The teachers were wonderful and the expectations of children's behavior was high. Unfortunately we are having to pay for my husbands and my student loans now and just can't afford private school any more.
I am so glad that Jason agreed that we should be able to pull off homeschooling this year. I have almost total freedom when it come to my job and believe that I can find some great classes for Sarah to participate in for socialization.
I have already started her getting ready for school by working on The Rosetta stone for Spanish and starting to learn the piano.
I was surprised to realize how relaxed i had gotten with her education once I was no longer directly responsible for it.
I am glad to be back and glad to be focusing on what is important again. my child and her development into the best young woman that she can be.

Last day with Melanie : (

For the last 3 years my family has been accepting exchange students from all over the world into our little home. We have had visitors from Japan, Korea, China, France and Austria. Everyone has taught us something new and interesting about the world. We love showing them the beauty and diversity of San Francisco.
Today we are taking Melanie to the airport to meet her parents in LA. Melanie is from France and has stayed with us for the last 2 weeks. We have had wonderful adventures with her. Starting with the Golden Gate Bridge a must see even when it's covered with fog. China town was next on our list. We all ate chicken feet fried in a sweet and sour sauce, they were very good except having to eat around the little bones. Fried mini crabs were on the list next fried with the shell and all. I personally didn't like them. I don't like sesame seed and they were fried in a sesame seed batter. Melanie loved the crabs much more than the chicken feet. There are so many sights to see in China town, from the live dragon dancers to the chickens in cages ready to be taken home for fresh supper.
We went on many other adventures in our city and we look forward to bringing others with us to see many many more.
I hope that Melanie and all of our students have had a wonderful experience with us that opened their eyes to the diversity that is San Francisco.
We will miss Melanie very much. She has been a sweet and friendly addition to our family.