And so it begins....a week of cake making!!!

    Every April for 1 week , Im a cake maker :) Not a very good one but its a tradition that started when I had my daughter, Jenavieve. I don't like store bought cake, so I vowed to always make my kids a homemade cake.  Her first birthday she had just a simple carrot cake, pretty easy.   For her 2nd birthday  I made was a Backyardigans cake, nothing too spectacular but she sure did love it!

For my daughter's 3rd birthday I was 9 months pregnant with my son, and I didn't have the energy to make her a birthday cake :(   She had a store bought cake .... 5 days after my daughter's birthday I gave birth to my son, Jacob.  From there on, the tradition continued.....
    Jenavieves 4th birthday and Jacob's 1st was a princess and the frog theme ( This was before the movie came out ) . I made a castle cake, a frog prince cake, and basic princess cupcakes :)

The next year was my daughter's 5th birthday, the year she would get her first horse :) She had been asking for a horse since she was 1 1/2 yrs old, I always told her if she still wanted one when she was 5 I would get her one, and I did.  So that year her birthday cake was also a horse and my sons was a tractor!

     The tractor had a few issues, it originally came out really good. The wheels are chocolate donuts, the hay bales are rice krispie treats, the smoke stack is an oreo stick.  Originally I had a nice windshield done, and a stearing wheel but my kids decided they wanted to try the cake before the party and ran their fingers through it :(   So I had to cut off the front part of where the windshield was, use what I had left for green frosting, then I wrote my sons name on the front to try and cover up the mess....Oh well, it was about as good as I could fix it right before people starting showing up for the party...
    The following year my daughter decided she was too old, ( 6...lol ) to have a themed  birthday party with her brother..For her I made a Unicorn cake, and Jacob I made a dragon, dinosaur type cake...?

 

    Did I mention my husband's birthday is the day after my daughter's birthday, 4 days before my son's and so I make him a German chocolate cake every year as well.
    This year I have even more cakes to make, today I will be making tye dyed cupcakes to send into school tomorrow for my daughter's birthday. Then Thursday I will be making my husbands cake. I am having a big family birthday party this weekend to celebrate my kids birthdays, my niece's birthday, her boyfriend's birthday, and my nephews birthday.  For Saturday I need to make a cake for my daughter, she has requested a hello kitty cake. I will be making a cake for my son, he has requested, a scooby doo cake.  For my niece and her boyfriend I will be making a LOST cake.  Then for my nephew, I really don't know, perhaps some cup cakes of some sort.....I will post all the pics as I make them through out the week.
 It's going to be a busy week......I am a cake maker for a week :)

   

How to crochet a soap saver

   A good friend of  mine recently taught me how to make these soap saver bags. She left me the pattern and Im going to share it with you. They are incredible easy to make and they are amazing.  If you want to get the most out of your soap, you will need one of these bags. Save all your small pieces of soap and put them into one of these bags and enjoy the amazing lather they make in the shower. You can also put an entire bar of soap in one if that is what you prefer.  When you are all done washing, just make sure you hang the soap saver up to dry.

For materials you will need medium weight yarn and a crochet hook K (6.5mm)

Pattern:
Start : Chain 8
Round 1 : Chain 2, half double crochet in third chain from the hook and in each chain across, working on the remaining loops on opposite side of chain, half double crochet in each chain across, slip stitch in the top of the beginning, chain 2,  16 hdc.
Round 2 -10 : Chain 2, hdc in each hdc around, slip stitch in the top of the beginning, chain 2, 16 hdc.
Round 11 : Chain 2, hdc in the next hdc, chain 1, skip 1 hdc, then repeat. Slip stitch in the top of the beginning, chain 2, finish off: 8 hdc

Drawstring : Chain 70, then weave your string in and out of the chain spaces that you created in round 11. knot the ends of the drawstring together forming a loop. YOUR DONE!!

Note : You can adjust pattern to whatever size soap saver bag you want

Learning to spin

   I just got down from the hay loft, searching for my spinning wheel.  My golly, I found it!  About 5 years ago while I was working at the Norlands Living History center I started to learn how to spin, using a walking wheel. I thought it was the neatest thing in the world and decided I had to own my own spinning wheel, only I got a more modern smaller wheel.  Oh and lets not forget I thought I had to have my own sheep as well for fiber. It just so happens that the Norlands was getting ready to send all their male lambs to auction, I decided to save them the trouble and I bought them for their wool.  I had a small pasture behind my house that wasnt being used and it was perfect for my new friends. Oh and lets not forget Jacova, the lama I decided I needed as well to protect my herd :)  My friend Ray came over sheared them all when it was time..I was so excited, couldn't wait to get on my journey of learning to spin.

Not to long after having them sheared, I learned I was pregnant with my son and decided to put the whole thing on hold.  So the bags of wool and my spinning wheel went up into the hay loft....Oh and there they stayed...Until Now, its finally time for me to learn how to spin..I recently adopted a beautiful angora bunny and I also bought some angora wool that's ready to be spun..









Now if only I could remember or had a clue how to spin..Time to dust off the old wheel and figure it out!! Please join me on this journey of learning how to spin!

Making Goats Milk Soap

The cold process soap making recipe consists of water, lye and oils. Combined together the chemical process is called saponification. The final product has no lye in it and is super-fatted with skin nourishing oils. 

How to make cold process soap

 The first thing your going to want to do is gather your materials and equipment.

You will need:

Equipment

1.Digital scale for measuring everything, accuracy is a must for success of soap

 2. Safety goggles & rubber gloves to protect your hands and eyes from the lye and caustic soap

3. Large pot , will be used to melt down the oils. This is what will be known as your soap pot

4. A pitcher or a smaller pot for the lye solution

5. Two stainless steel spoons, one for oils and the other for the lye solution

6. Two accurate Thermometers, one for each pot

7. Stick blender, this will be used to blend the oil and lye mixture together to begin the saponification process

8. Soap mold to pour your soap into, anything that is leak proof.

9. A few extra spoons, rubber spatulas, whisks

10. measuring cups to measure and weigh out oils

11. freezer paper to line your mold unless its a silicone mold

12. Blankets to insulate

I will share with you a basic soap recipe that is easy to make:

Materials
Olive oil                    17 oz

Coconut oil - 76      17 oz

Palm oil                    8 oz

Lye                           6.5 oz

Goats milk (slushy/frozen)      16 oz

Grapefruit seed extract     1 oz

Essential oil/fragrance oil    2 oz

First prepare your oils weighing them out on your scale and put them into your soap pot on the stove.  Then take your slushy goats milk out of the freezer and put it in the lye pitcher/pot.  I like to  use a pot so I can set it in my sink in an ice bath, that way it doesn't over heat and scald the milk.  For the next part you want to make sure you have your gloves on and your safety glasses.  Weigh out the lye, then slowly add a little bit at a time to your slushy goats milk. Stirring constantly.  The lye mixture will start to turn a light yellowish color and look creamy.

You want to make sure the lye is all dissolved.   In the mean time have your oils melting on low on the stove.  Watch the temperature of the oils and the lye mixture closely.   The goal is to bring the temp of the oils up to 100 while bringing the temp of the lye mixture down to 100.  I like to combine my oils and lye at  a little bit higher of a temp but you don't need to.  The temps have to be with in 5 degrees of each other in order for them to combine.  Once the temps are close, you can slowly add your lye mixture into your oils.  Use your stick blender to combine the two mixtures, and now the saponification process begins.

 Continue mixing until it starts to come to a light trace. Light trace is when a small amount of the the soap is drizzled across the top of the main  surface leaving a faint pattern before sinking back into the mixture.  

At this point you want to add your grapefruit seed extract, essential/fragrance oil, and any other additives you might want.  Once it is all blended thoroughly, pour the soap into your chosen mold.  Then cover it ( I use freezer paper ) and wrap it in blankets to insulate it.  Leave it for 24 hrs and when you go back you can take the soap out of the mold, cut it and let it cure for about 4 weeks.  

Just made this one yesterday, it is a goats milk soap with  a Blend of Patchouli, Cinnamon, and Cedarwood 

Note : You can make this recipe with water if you don't have goats milk. Make sure the water is distilled , there is no need to have it slushy, you wont need the grapefruit seed extract.     

This Olde Farm: Welcome!

This Olde Farm: Welcome!: Welcome!      Ive decided to start this blog to share my family's journey  into a simpler life. My goal is to be as self sufficient as poss...

Incubating & hatching chicks

There is something about creating life through incubating that appeals to me.  It really is a truly amazing feeling when the chicks start to hatch.  I would like to share with you the story of how we made out first incubator.
   The first time I incubated chicken eggs was almost 3 years ago in a homemade incubator.  My daughter and I thought it would be fun to make our own incubator rather than buying one.  First thing we did is got on the computer and researched as much as possible so we would have the best chance at success.  We uses a plastic tote, lined it with Styrofoam insulation to help hold the heat in. Then we cut out a viewing window in the front of the tote. We used an 8x12 piece of glass that we took out of a picture frame and we duct taped it on the front. Then we took apart 2 different lamps that we no longer used and cut 1 hole in the top of the tote and another in the back. We installed the lamp fixtures, the one on top we used a 60 watt bulb, and the one in the back we used a 40 watt bulb on a dimmer switch so we could adjust temp as needed.  I put a sponge in the bottom to hold water to control humidity.  . Finally it was time to plug it in to see if it would work, we got it to the temp and humidity we needed and watched it for 24 hrs to make sure it was stabilized. . We used 2 different thermometers in it to make sure we were spot on.  We had been gathering our eggs for a few days, storing them big end up and turning the eggs or tilting the egg carton an odd amount of times every day. Day 1 was here, we put about a dozen eggs in.  We made sure to turn them 3 times a day until day 18 and I watched the temp and humidity very close.  Temp stayed at 100 the whole time, humidity was at 45% til day 18 then we raised it to 65%.  Waiting the last few days was like torture, it was so tempting to want to open the incubator even though I knew if I did I would be taking the chance of shrink wrapping...As we were waiting to see if any were going to hatch I started looking for day old chicks just in case we failed, I didn't want my daughter to get upset.  Luckily by day 20 they started hatching and I didn't need to find day old chicks.  It was the most amazing feeling to know we brought life into our eggs :) We had about 50% hatch rate, which I think is pretty good for out first time and with a homemade incubator. We hatched out a few more batches after that.
 

Pictures from my very first time incubating!

  The next hatching season we decided to get a little giant still air incubator, Ive got to say I think our hatch rate was better with the homemade incubator than with that one.  This year we got a hova bator with a fan and an egg turner. I am starting to feel spoiled not having to turn the eggs myself anymore. I really hope that this season ends up being our best hatch season yet. Wish us luck!! We will wish you luck, happy incubating!!

 

    

  The basics of incubating

21 days for chicks

1. Collect your eggs for incubating, make sure they are clean. Do not wash them or you will remove the protective liner. Do not use heavily soiled eggs.

2. Store eggs with the pointed end down in an old egg carton. Make sure you are turning them or tilting the box at a different angle 3 times a day so they don't stick.  Store eggs in a room that is cool and not too dry.  I like to store mine in an area that's around 50 degrees.  You can store eggs up to 7 days, after that the hatch ability starts to decline.

3. Set up your incubator and regulate the temp. If it is a still air, 100 is a good temp and if its a forced air, 99.5 is good. You want the temp to always stay above 99 and never let it get above 102.  Make sure the incubator is set up in a room that the temp doesn't change to much.  Make sure you run the incubator for at least 24 hours, if not more before adding eggs to it.

4. Humidity is very important. Lots of people have different opinions on what works best.  In my experience 40-50 % the first 18 days and 65% in the last 3 days has worked the best for me.  To increase humidity add more water or a wet sponge to decrease open vent plugs, remove sponge if using one.

5. Ventilation is important as well. If you make an incubator make sure you put a couple of vent holes in it and use scotch tape to cover them. If you buy an incubator it will already come with vent holes. Usually the front vent plug is used to regulate humidity and the back one is used only when there is way too much humidity.  Make sure you remove the front vent plug the day chicks start to hatch. 

6. Turning eggs the first 18 days is very important. You should put an X on one side of the egg and an O on the other side, then you know which ones you have turned. Make sure eggs get turned an odd number of times, 3 times is good.  Make sure you stop turning on day 18.

7. Candling is a good way to make sure the chicks are growing and that the eggs are fertile. Candling needs to be done in a dark room, using a flashlight. Use the light to see what is going on in the egg.  If the egg is clear you know that it is infertile.  The embryo has died if you see a blood ring, or if you see a dark spot that appears to be stuck to one side.  The embryo is fertile and growing when you see a air cell in the bigger end, there's a dark spot in the egg and sometimes you can see the veins.  I like to candle my eggs on day 7  then again on day 14 and sometimes on day 18.  the dark spot should be bigger with each candling.

8. Hatching time!! Make sure you stop turning on day 18.  Do not open the incubator for any reason until they have all hatched. This can kill them, it can shrink wrap them. It is very hard and very tempting to open but don't! Make sure the vent is open when they start hatching. Remove chicks after they are all dried off and put them into a brooder. Chicks can stay in the incubator for 24 hrs after hatching, so please wait until they are all dried and fluffy. Good luck :)

Incubating periods for other poultry and game birds .

	Days
Chicken	21
Most ducks	28
Muscovy ducks	33-35
Turkey	28
Most geese	29-31
Ringneck pheasant	23-24
Japanese quail	17-18
Bobwhite quail	23
Chuckar partridge	22-23
Guinea	26-28
Peafowl	28