This blog has been up and down over the last month, You are unable to comment, I have been unable to update. Because of this, I have moved my primary blog back over to http://shmoopywood.blogspot.com so if you want to link to me or follow me in a reader, this may not be the best address as it is just a mirror at this point.
thanks
Importante
Counting Chickens as they hatch
Interestingly enough, today is hatch day and I am proud to announce that eggs actually hatched! Imagine my surprise when something that I have attempted actually worked!
We set 12 *cough* 14 *cough* eggs in the evening of 1/15/2010 which put us all the way on 2/5/2010 for a hatch date. Yesterday we were excited to see that by bed time, 5 eggs had pipped. Pipped means they are starting to crack the egg a bit to come out.
I kind of knew that when I got up in the morning, I would have 1 baby.
I did not realize that when I woke up, I would get to see the 4th chick zip out of his/her shell! It was fantastic and so cool. I even got one picture but before I get you there, I want to state that these eggs are mutt eggs from our boy Ted + NH’s, Buff rocks and black stars. So they are going to be shmoopywood barnyard mix mutt chickies. One of them even has a yellow head and a black body …
Move over Martha
I guess I never stopped to think about how much we rely on pre-packaged foods in our every day life. I didn’t realize it until I decided to make Sunday dinner with fresh ingredients from scratch! Now keep in mind, I dont have a farm so I don’t have fresh milk or beef and I did used store bought flour and mozzarella. But still making today’s menu from scratch STILL proved to be a challenge for me!
The menu:
Sausage and Cheese Lasagna
Bread
Blackberry Turnovers made from our blackberry bush jam we canned in September.
The Specifics:
The Lasagna
I made the spaghetti sauce from scratch over christmas and stored the sauce and some meatballs in the freezer, so i used this for the lasagna. The rest is easy, I am Italian so I can do those in my sleep.
The bread:
Bread is becoming easier for me to bake. Its easier but still not very pretty. I guess its the taste that counts.
The Turnovers:
Turnovers are …
Bread, the Conclusion
The great bread show down has been completed!
The rules were simple, Blog vs Book bread. Each contestant had to choose their bread from either blog or book, and they had one chance to bake a loaf.
It started as early as 8am Sunday Morning when Lisa (thats me) could not sleep and decided to bake her loaf of bread. She gathered her supplies, rubbed the sleep from her eyes and began to create a masterpiece using a blogger’s long tested recipe (one of you guys!). She slaved, and worked, and then set it aside to rise while she ate her Kashi Go Lean crunch cereal.
It may not be pretty but here it is, Lisa’s submission of French Bread:
A few hours later, Dave awakens and discovers he is missing a key ingredient for his book bread and runs out to the market. After a few calls back to Lisa (who graciously decided to help him rather than leave him scrambling) …
Show DOwn!
Step on up!
Dave and I have decided that we need to have a contest. We are the contestants and the kids are the judges. Since we have decided to make more things from fresh ingredients we have been searching for the perfect loaf of bread. I keep raving about how wonderful my blog friends recipes are, and he thinks that the book bread is going to be the best of the best.
You can probably see where this is going right?
Tomorrow we are having a contest to search for the best bread
blog bread vs. book bread
Of course I will not say publicly which blog I got the recipe from just in case we lose 
BUT if we win, I may be persuaded!
Wait for it tomorrow as I will post a full coverage of the bake off!
thanks!
T is for Trouble, S is for solution
In an effort to try to gain back my full flock after this winter’s troubles, Dave and I have decided to set some eggs for hatching. We have easy access to fertilized eggs so we are totally cool with hatching little mutts for our own personal flock. I mean if this goes well maybe I will buy some cochin eggs or wyandottes for the future of SWood flock but for now as an experiment we are just hatching our own eggs.
I learned first how to tell if an egg was fertile by cracking open 4 of our eggs (we ate them) and carefully examining them, running back to google and then examining them again. Turns out 3 of the 4 were fertile. Thats 75%. We agreed to set 12 eggs on Friday evening so we fired up the incubator on Thursday night. Here is a picture of our incubator downstairs in our pantry. 
You can see our freezer, this one is just for dog food (raw fed), and you can see our cans and …
the one where she admits its not that easy
As I sat at my desk yesterday, I hear the familiar “bing” of new email received. It was about 4, and my day was over at 4:30. It was from hubby telling me about a chicken rescue. My heart just sank because I found myself back in the same spot I had been in many times over the last few weeks. I was once again faced with losing a chicken.
Let me back track a bit so you can understand. Our flock was solid at 12 hens and a Rooster. We spent the summer learning how to care for them. They were easy really. We use the deep litter method so the whole thing takes about 10 minutes a day to feed and water the girls and maybe an additional 20 minutes maintenance per week. They were free-ranging too so it was fairly inexpensive as they were not eating as much as their feed as they would be if they were confined. All of those bugs and fresh greens were filling their crops with vitamins and they …
Happy new Year
Image via Wikipedia
I have to thank those of you who have hung on and kept shmoopywood on your blogroll, reading list whatever you have kept us on. We have been on a brief hiatus. I have had to deal with some personal issues, not the least of which was losing my father. We are back though and I promise to start updating more regularly!
There are a lot of things planned for 2010, we have already started discussions about the garden. We learned a TON last year. We really did make it very hard for ourselves. We created our first garden ever, made it organic and used heirloom seeds! No wonder our yield was less than desirable! Good news is that I have learned a lot about placement within our own space, companion planting, and natural pesticides (I hate slugs). Also we had a rainy May/June which delayed our progress. We actually had peppers …
So Eggciting!
I’ve been a bad blogger. Like so many others I read, the late summer beauty and weather has taken me captive and kept me away from my computer keyboard. My outdoor hobby’s have rendered me completely blog blocked! I am here now though with a few updates and announcements.
First… I am extremely giddy with excitement over our newest addition to our family. In 2 weeks, I will be picking up our new…. Silver Laced Cochin henS. Thats right, I said 2. Its nicer to introduce both at the same time. I will be sure to show you pictures!
Image by keltickelton via Flickr
Also, we are very excited to have had found some time to get back into our hiking hobby. We have in fact updated our gear and begun an extensive training regimen preparing us to do the Davis Path and to hike the Franconia Ridge. We will be spending night(s) out there and enjoying the air. I have been a rather large …
The Brady’s Go to the Mine
Recently Dave and I have gotten back into a outdoor activity that we have always enjoyed, we have started hiking together. We are planning some big hikes up a few mountains this month so we have been training for it by walking as much as possible. I really think hiking is the only form of exercise that I can do without getting bored. Before I know it, an hour or 2 have gone by.
When we first purchased the land at Shmoopywood, some of the neighbors had told us about the abandoned mica mine at the top of our mountain. I have always wanted to go up there but I was afraid to go alone. There is an old abandoned road on the other side of the river and today we decided to walk up that road and see if it leads us to the mica mine!
The road was fairly steep for the entire trip. It was great though as there was not too much overgrowth. We did not have to blaze a new path …