On Baking Something New & The 4H Box Supper

We are often told.."Never try a new recipe to take somewhere else".  Well, I didn't mind.  I did it, I baked a new recipe and took it...even had it auctioned off for 4H! Youngest Kid's camo box had M & M cookies, Chocolate Oatmeal cookies, Blonde Brownies and regular Brownies.  Chelsea S. purchased it on behalf of the Bank of The Wichitas, So Thank You Chelsea, you're a blessing!   The recipe was for M & M cookies and it was a good one, so I'm sharing!

M & M Cookies

2 cups ap flour

1 1/4 teasp baking soda

1/4 teasp salt

3/4 cup butter (the real deal--no fakey business) (that'll be 1 1/2 sticks)

2/3 sugar

2/3 brown sugar

1 large egg

1 1/2 teasp vanilla

milllions of M & M's

Cream the butter & sugars, then add the egg.  Mix the dry ingredients together.  Then combine all.  Roll into balls, place on parchment, flatten with a floured glass bottom then poke the left-over M & M's on top.  Bake for ~9 minutes @350 degrees....watch 'em.  Not too sweet, just right. 

Baby Sitters

Cows use the baby sitting system.  One is appointed and the rest go off to graze.  This usually works perfectly...until the feed pick up arrives on scene.  

Pleasures of an Old Dog

Speck  here doesn't get to go to the pasture much, mostly because she is too fat to jump up onto the feed bed without help.  But when the opportunity for a cow feeding trip arises....she makes up for lost time!  No mangy, disrespectful thieving cow dare graze on the back of her feed bed!  So, now at 10:30 pm after a full day of "cow correction" Speck is sleeping peacefully in her hay filled insulated dog house, covered with cats and dreaming of biting a cow who ventures too close for comfort. 

*Bovine Coziness

Youngest kid here has suffered many scratches, scrapes and perforations to the face.  Once his older cousin hit him right between the eye brows with a baseball bat...."but I told him to move"...she said through tears.  Another time his brother shot him with an arrow.  Friend called and said "Don't worry but....".  Yet another brotherly ailment occured when he was hit with a cap gun on the top lip...no doubt they were fighting over it and pookems wound up on the bloody end of things.  To add insult to injury Youngest has yet another...the show stick tube fell and nailed him on the cheek bone.  Thank goodness that Wheatie was available to be cozy with.   

Ruts

Imagine this is your yard.....imagine managing your mower around such?  These ruts are on one of our leases, but it is the same across countless miles of Oklahoma pastures and wheat ground.  In many cases the pole trucks had to be pulled by dozers to get from one pole wreck to the next. We're sure glad to have electricity! 

Powerline Cleanup

I missed a great picture opportunity with this set of poles, they cut them off approximately four feet off the ground, but of course I left the camera at home and when I returned the bull dozer had already pushed them out. 

This picture was taken in town where tree limbs outnumbered people, pets and cans of green beans.

Many contractors are working to clean up the debis now, there are piles of broken poles every quarter mile.  Lots of poles, line and metal bracing is waiting to be hauled off.   It is looking much better around here.Tomorrow.....RUTS

Stock Show Wrecks

Syd here has entered the sorority of girls (some girls being a bit long in the tooth now days) who have experienced the humiliation of a stock show wreck.  I mean, in front of God and everybody.  Her new Angus heifer, Agnes, hadn't been to town much and it was a bit too much...she wanted to go home immediately and at a rapid pace!  Thanks to a nice FFA advisor Syd was spared being drug...across town and all they way home.  So hang in there little stock show girls....we've all "wrecked"!  I once knew a Suffolk wether named Rocky....whose high school girl owner was working him hard during the Local International Stock Show....and choked him down, he flopped straight down onto his side.  High school girl was mortified...especially when it was suggested loudly through the crowd that "starvation" was the problem.....it was not! It was my Daddy entertaining the crowd and that high school girl was me.     

*Late Bloomers & Quicken

Tax season is upon us...actually for farmers it has passed.....I was and am a late bloomer....thus knowth our tax man, bless his heart ....but on a cheerier note, I have entered ALL of the '09 checks----and it is not even August yet!  They say things get better with age...hope my "secreterial skills" fall into that category.  Happy tax prep!

*Chewing The Fat

Stock shows provide the opportunity to visit a bit...well really a lot of visiting occurs. 

Last year it was sweatshirt weather...not the case this time, coveralls and coats were plentiful!

  Hubby and boys are getting the "girls" ready to show tomorrow.  Oldest kid is having a fit beacause his "girl" has hair issues...lice actually....not to worry they only like cattle, not boys.  Hubby doctored them for their little varmit infestation. 

Jerry's Hair Care & Cowlick Repair

My Momma gave me spit baths of which I did not appreciate not one little bit....but she never combed my hair with a calf comb!  Little Yoo-Hoo's hair has a mind of its own, with two cow licks it is always sticking up.

Hello Valentine

Since visitors to our home are very few and far between, thought I'd share my Valentine with you.  They are pretty and smell great!  I have a good honey.  We spent yesterday at Church, our new church had it's Grand Opening.  They started building in 2008 and now we have a very nice church with an attendance of 183 for the first day.  Hubby did his puppet thing and oldest was an usher.  Youngest and I were attendees.  It was a good day. 

*Our Newest Herd Sire

 

Isn't this just pretty?  Talk about muscles, whew can you imagine being the cow trying to calve after "visiting" with this big daddy??  Way back in Class 6 of the OALP our class went to Europe on it's International Tour, we saw cattle of this breed and the cows had scars where they had calved via c-secton.  Too much baby for them!  OUCH'!!  Think I'll tell Mr. Hubby of mine that we need to buy a bull like this!!!  (joking of course)

Yum, yum they were good!  Mother In Law and I made a bunch of them, slathered on a bit of pink icing & leftover Christmas sprinkles then called it good!  All homemade...no fakey business here. 

Valentine's Day Party

Since our youngest Valentine is in the fouth grade we'll be sending an assortment of cards...all leftovers from past years. Some will get "Cars", others will get "The Penguins of Madasgascar" and then some will enjoy a nice card from "Shreck".  Then....we'll give the remaining cards to little cousins.  It'll be a sad day for the resident Moma...a day replaced with buying THINGS FOR SPECIAL GIRLS ON DDAY,,,I MEAN Valentine's Day.  Growing up is hard on me.....

The Welder Channel

This darling little jewel is a welder....which will produce electricity to power a souls home.  That power will help keep (your sanity) your bacon frozen, clean socks for your family or will allow you to watch the "Welder Channel". Watching the "Welder Channel" was nice...but it cost a lot of $$$$ to see just how much weight You-Who lost last week on the Biggest Loser.  While they were working away at losing weight, we were packing it on, eating out and neglecting any vegetable or protein of any nutritional value.   

*The Power Hath Returned

Our electricity is now back on and we are thankful!  The header picture was taken on day one of the storm, Thursday Jan. 28 @ 10:30 am to be exact.  We had power lines and poles down everywhere, even the big transmission lines were snapped into.  The ice pack on the lines was larger in diameter than my hand could grasp...that amount of ice turned into lots of weight. But thankfully with the help of guys from Gracemont, Ok., Houston, North Ft.Worth and Louisiana (and a bunch more) we have poles up and most of our county is back on line...my friend Lynn Ann is still in the dark..pray for her...living in a darkened non-electrified world is depressing!