Tuesday, 25 August 2009

• Currently Cashflow Quadrant: Rich Dad's Guide to Financial Freedom By Robert T. Kiyosaki, Sharon L. Lechter see related

  A Little of This and That and End of the Summer Soup

  I wondered for a few years, if a small electric coffee grinder would be useful for grinding whole grains in the small amounts that I need to bake a batch of pancakes,biscuits, bread, or cookies. I picked one up at a second hand store for $1.50 and have been grinding away since and adding a bit of whole wheat to this and soy to that without the loud racket of grinding with the blender!! Just a small bright spot in my homelife but it makes me smile every time I look at the little coffee grinder sitting on my kitchen counter!
  
  Today I hung up a small bird feeder I found on the back porch of the red house we are renovating. It's a really nice addition to the underside of the bird feeder I had already in the window. It's top is a small pop bottle and the bottom is a little red screw on dish. I hung it from the under sides of the other feeder with a bent up coat hanger.It put a stop to the bickering at the feeder. Now the bigger birds, mostly grossbeaks, are feeding on top and the smaller goldfinches and chicadees are perching underneath on the little feeder which is just right for them. Ta dah!! Birdie heaven!!
  
  Last night I was avakened by a lound squealing and whistling from the woods below and to the east of our house. It was making it's way towards our clearing. I knew from experience that it was a family of raccoons out foraging. They must have found something exciting at the neighbors home and then took it into the woods to chomp on it and celebrate. They were on the way to our henhouse to have some dessert I think. Hubby woke up and grabbed his gun when he heard me say raccoons and I snapped on the light but he went back to bed when I said they were in the woods not in the henhouse. I woke up Song and told her to come with me to shut the ducks up in the henhouse and to shut up the chickens more securely too!  Then after tromping around in the dark trailing curious cats and kittens we slipped back inside to sleep a couple of more hours till daylight. Now it's raining hard and the wind is blowing. It never fails to interest me that birds empty the feeder at a record fast rate and the raccoons come to feast all night just before a storm hits. God tells them  to stock up before the storm. I seen the human weather report be wrong a lot but I've never seen the birds and raccoons be wrong yet.
  
  I heard a good heartwarming side to the housing foreclosure epidemic recently. A family farm passed out of the family in the area a bit north of here. It was resold again and the farmhouse was somewhat messed up. Then the house and only 10 acres of the original farmland was being auctioned off in a foreclosure by a bank locally. A grandson of the last of the family to own the farmhouse heard about it. He bid on the place and the bank rejected his bid of $30,000 as too low. Then he  learned that they had decided not to take any of the offers and to reauction the place. He rebid and this time he lowered his bid a few thousand dollars. But this time the bank too it!! So the young fella has purchased the family farm at a reasonable price and the whole clan is rejoicing that the farm is back in the family again.
  
  Incidentally the gal that told me that joyous family story was sharing the story over a cup of hot choclate after having shared some of her excess garden produce. She offered the rest of her green beans to Song and I if we would come and pick them so we did. Then she threw in cucumbers, beets, red potatoes and summer squash for good measure. Song and I have been busily freezing beans since. We now have several quarts of beans in the freezer. Sunday we had my great grandmother's green bean soup for lunch.
  
  Here's the recipe:
  Green Bean Soup
  Snap a quart of beans into bite sized pieces and drop into three cups of boiling water
  Dice five potatoes and add to the boiling water
  Dice five strips of bacon
  Move the pan of potatoes and beans to the back of the stove and turn the heat to low under the pan. Cover and Let it simmer.
  Fry the bacon in a small frying pan over medium heat.
  Remove the bacon from the pan.
  Add six cups of whole milk to the pan of potatoes and beans.
  Stir occasionally as the mild heats on low to medium heat.
  Chop a handful of chives and add them to the top along with the bacon. Add salt and pepper to taste.
  Serve with crackers or bread and butter. Top each bowlful with a dab of butter if you wish.
  
  This was a soup my Dad always made this time of year. So when I was picking the beans I was telling Song about that and mentally getting ready to make a pot of it. My Dad was raised mostly, by his grandmother on her farm where he watched her make do with and stretch what she had to fill hungry stomachs!
  
  
  
  
  
  

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