A different kind of breakfast

Ok, so the hubby has been bugging me to cook sweet things. :) Now that we are in the mobile and not just the cabin, I have room to do so!

After talking with my sister in law the other day about a pineapple upside down cake she baked, I thought that it sounded pretty good. Pineapple upside down cake sounded like a dessert though, and I wanted to make it for breakfast. So I did PEACH upside down cake. Here's my recipe.

2 Tbsp. butter (melted)
1/3 cup brown sugar
1 can (11 ounces) peach slices, drained, reserve juice

Melt the butter in your pan (I used a 8 inch round cake pan) in the oven at 150 degrees. Watch so it doesn't brown or burn though. Mix in your brown sugar (since it wasn't enough to liquify my brown sugar I also added a little of the peach juice). And then dump in your drained peaches.

Set this pan aside.

in a bowl mix together:

1 1/3 cups all purpose flour
3/4 cup sugar
2 tsp. baking powder
2/3 cup milk
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla

Mix all of these together well. I admit I didn't really measure the milk, I used evaporated milk and just added it from the can until it reached the right consistancy for cake batter.

Pour this mix over the top of your peaches in your cake pan.

Cook at 350 degrees F until set and cakey.. About 30 - 35 minutes at my 4900 feet altitude.

While it's cooking stir the rest of the can of milk into the peach juice and add about 1/3 cup of brown sugar.

Take the cake out of the oven, let sit for about 5 - 10 minutes (or until you can't stand to smell it anymore). then cut like a pizza (I cut mine in 8 pieces and it turned out just about right!) and serve on a plate. As you get ready to serve it, drizzle alittle of the milk/juice/brown sugar sauce over the top of it.

Hubby ate 2 pieces for breakfast this morning, and will eat some more after dinner tonight... Which is loaded baked potatoes, that are currently heating away in the oven as I type. Sour cream, shredded cheese, bacon, mushrooms, and butter.

I looked in my food stuffs and have found that I am down to only 3 jars of butter! Crud. This means that when we go to the big city tomorrow, I'll have to pick up some more butter. Last time we were in town I saw that they have their store brand butter for $1.58 a pound, so I am hoping it still close to that price. If it is then I'll pick up 5 or 6 lbs. and put up some more jars of butter. Wouldn't do to run out. I still have a lot of shortening, and lard. And I also have 2 #10 cans of butter powder for cooking. Can't wait until I get those goats! then I can make butter from the goats milk.

We are still moving some stuff in from the cabin to the mobile, but we are down to just a few things. Some more food, a few books, and this and that. hubby will be moving in the power stuff in the upcoming days. Everything will be put on hold of course for tomorrow, while we are in the big city. So Friday we'll start in again. I have so much room now that it's pretty odd to try to find places for everything. I'll put something in a drawer and decide I don't like that and move it.. then I'll move it again, then again and again... It's nuts. lol. My china cabinet right now is filled with my cookbooks, our tea collection (we love tea, I would love to get some from all over the world!) our plates and bowls, and my survival/preparedness books. The survival/Preparedness books will be moved to the living room once we get a few shelves up. Especially as I unpack the boxes from the tent/garage because there are more books in those boxes. :D

And, once we get all the stuff from storage in Eugene, I'll have even MORE books. Hubby and I are both big book fiends. When we aren't watching movies, working on the property, playing computer games, crocheting or whatever, then we are reading. I think hubby has read 9 books so far this month and I am working on #13. He's currently working his way through the star trek books that columbia are putting out of course. Trek junkie that he is. lol.

Anyway, the dishes are dry that I washed earlier, so I have to put them away and check the taters. Maybe I'll warm up some soup or something to go with them too... Or maybe that'll be overkill. We'll see.

hugs!

Sewing and stuffeseses

Well, we are moving into the mobile today, and tomorrow and the next day and the next... you get the picture. Until that is done, there isn't much more going on. lol. Because hubby's income has changed to once a month, and this is a very, very short check to last us until the END of MAY we'll be eating a lot at home (whoot!) and going pretty much no where. Which is nice. kind of boring sometimes, but nice. hehe...

Maybe I'll be able to complete the move in quickly then I'll have time for crocheting, and some sewing. I need some new pants, and a few new shirts. Not to mention that we both need new sleep clothes. I had a cute pair of black, cargo, sleep pants, but the drawstring came out and the elastic has given up... and here I've only had them for about 5 years. So now that leaves me with 2 pair of sleep pants. Granted, that is 2 more pair than some people have, but I like my sleep pants. lol. and of those 2 pair, I think one is about 7 years old (gotta find that brand again!) and the other pair is about 5 years old. Both are getting thin and a bit on the mended side. And I only have 1 sleep shirt with long sleeves. And in this climate, I need more of those. So does hubby. he has 2 pair of sweats, and one I have mended the inseam on 3 times already, and the pocket has been mended twice. The other pair is still holding out but who knows when it's going to give up the ghost too. all of these items are store bought. I patch and sew and patch and sew everything we wear.

Here's a few tips to help keep things going longer.

Resew on all buttons when you first buy a shirt. they do the buttons at the factory by machine, so if there is a loose thread that gets caught on them then the button simply unravels off. Sewing them on by hand saves that stitching from coming unraveled. Nothing irritates more than having to replace every single button simply because I can't find one that matches!

Sew an extra seam in the crotch of all pants. This is one of the first places to go on mens pants. And if you wear pants, sew up the rump seam! I have had so many pants give way there. And it's not just me! I have talked to women of all sizes who seem to have the same problem. So, if you sew a few extra seams maybe it will keep them from giving way. Sew on the outside of the factory seam so that you aren't taking up the garment in size any. Armpit seams, and shoulder seams are also popular places for seams to go. know what seams you stress most and give them just a quick stitch on the machine.

Stitch all loose/extra buttons in an inconspicuous spot. Such as extra buttons on the hem of men's shirts that get tucked in, or on the back of fold down collars or some such. hunting for those free replacement buttons is almost as agrevating as having to replace every one of them.

Redye your own clothes! I love this one. Hubby used to wear a lot of black stuff for work. Black slacks, black socks, and the like. he would wear Docker pants, nice, heavy, long wearing fabric! Whoooo... It made my work a lot easier than him wearing suits. Anyway, I would wash all the black stuff together. As anyone who wears black knows, it bleeds almost everytime you wash it. Doesn't matter if it's the first time you wash it or the fiftieth. So long as there is black dye, it bleeds. So I would wash all his black stuff together and nothing else with it. Well, here's a trick I used and his blacks ALWAYS looked great! Every third or fourth black load of clothes, I would REDYE the black. It's super simple. Just fill your washer up with water on the HOT cycle, put in your clothes and dump in a packet or two of black RIT dye. Let it sit for about 20 or 30 minutes. then spin it out, and start the whole thing over with your cold or warm water and wash everything as you normally would. It's super simple and I loved it. Do a load of whites for your next cycle and use bleach. lol. It would bleach the dye back out of the washer so there wasn't any free black dye running around in there. I don't care if the drum was white or not. It's not like people are coming to my house to judge who white the drum in my washer was. :D Anyway, not only did this preserve the "black" of hubby's black work clothes, but it made all his black clothes MATCH! As anyone knows, it's very hard to match one black to another, especially if it were different brand names. he had a very polished look to his wardrobe because it all matched in color. Black socks went with black slacks went with black ties went with black shirts (not all worn at once of course. lol. I do dress him better than that.) and so on. I even dyed some cotton muslin some very nice reds and blues too. I love to use RIT dye on things.

What else? Oh, wear slippers or shoes over socks so that you aren't wearing holes in your socks. If you don't like to wear shoes in the house either go barefoot, or wear slippers over your socks.


Someday, I'll learn to knit or crochet my own socks. It's on my list of stuff to learn. there just isn't time in my day!

Ok, I'm off to get into more boxes of trouble. Treasure hunt anyone?

Swine Flu (long post!)

Warning, this is a long post!

Ok, swine flu is alive and well in Mexico and has been found in New York and other US states too... I am not thinking that it will develop into the pandemic/epidemic that it did back in 1918-1919. Back then it infected more than 50 million people (the total of the world's population was only 500 million at that time) and 675,000 Americans died in the US alone. I thought I would write out some pointers to help in case it does come to your neck of the woods.

Read where there is no doctor by the hesperian organization. I think the website for the books is http://www.hesperian.org and they have other titles such as: Where There Is No Doctor, Where Women Have No Doctor, A Book for Midwives, Helping Children Who Are Blind, Helping Children Who Are Deaf, Helping Health Workers Learn, Where There Is No Dentist, HIV, Health, and Your Community, A Health Manual for Women with Disabilities, and Disabled Village Children.

Reading this book will help you understand some things you can do to keep from getting sick.

Anyway, here is some pointers.

#1. DON'T PANIC. When we panic, we stop thinking. A therapist I knew once told me that the reason we panic is a primitive reaction. It engages that flight or fight behavior and we start REACTING instead of ACTING. And we certainly want to act during a crisis, not react.

#2. Don't plastic your house up. Good gravy, there is no way we can live like that. Duct taping plastic over your windows, doors and everything else will only end up with you being tired, sore, and eventually short on oxygen... That is if you actually manage to duct tape every opening. Houses are so full of air holes you will NEVER get everyone of them. So it's a futile effort that wastes your energy when you could be doing something more productive to help yourself out. Don't live in a tent in the middle of your house over the swine flu.

#3. Wear a MASK when going out in public. I am not talking halloween masks here. Get a good mask that filters out down to .01 microns. They are for dust and fumes. Learn to use it to block everything properly. My problem is usually as I breathe, I am feeling air come out the top of the mask and into my eyeballs. Not good! If it comes out that way, then it can go IN that way. And that means that germs are bypassing the mask and coming in directly around the mask. This means that the mask is doing no good to keep the flu germs out. May as well take it off. Neither do you need a full on gas mask. Most people don't wear them right anyway. And it's kind of overkill.

#4a. wash your hands! I know your mom told you this, your grandma told you this, your teacher told you this... But do you DO it? If you weren't doing it before, do it now. If you can't remember to wash your hands then carry around one of those bottles of hand sanitizer. they work! and you can buy it anywhere now. I even bought three small bottles of it at the dollar store for the lovely price of 3/$1.00! I bought a huge bottle of the stuff at Fred's and I refill the small bottles. It's much cheaper this way. And remember to USE it. After you shake hands with someone, use it. After you touch a shopping cart, use it. After you open a door, use it. Be obsessive. Offer it to other people.

#4b. Shower or bathe a lot. Showering is better than bathing. Why? Bath water is warm, and it steams, the germs come of you into the water, which you just allowed into your body via the warm water opening your pores as well as in the steam that comes off the water is now germy. I don't know if there is science behind this thought or not. It just seems gross to be sitting in a slurry of germs. Showering washes it all down the drain. Anyway, it takes the germs off your body and down the drain and away from you. This is the whole objective, get the germs off of you and out of your home.

#4c. Lysol spray, I use it in the air, and on all surfaces. Chairs, counters, toilet seats, sinks, door handles, phones, bed, floors and on my shoes and coat. It will kill the flu germ as well as a lot of other. This is not to say I live in a 100% sterile environment. I only use it when I go out or after I have visitors. So about once every 2 - 3 days. This is just to get whatever germs I, or someone else, bring into the house back gone. I don't like to do it all the time because I am chemically sensitive and room fresheners, lysol, bleach, most soaps and more all send me into an allergic reaction. Not bad, but mostly centered in my sinus cavities and just enough to make me miserable. I spend most of my life blowing my nose, especially when I go out. The civilized world is going to be the death of me with all it's chemical crap.

#5. Don't eat out. who knows if the person prepping your food has been washing their hands? Who knows if your server just exchanged money at the cash register with someone who was sick? Flu and Cold germs can live for longer than 12 hours on inanimate objects. And it only has to be on your skin for 15 minutes in order to infect you.

#6. Be smart. Avoid people who are visibly sick. If they look tired, are coughing, sneezing or whatever, avoid them like they have the plague. (or pandemic in this case.) If you have a co-worker who is sick and still comes into work, talk with your boss/supervisor about it and see if they can intervene and send the person home. (It's your bosses place to protect the workplace and they should ALREADY be doing this, but some people in a supervisory positition aren't as good at this as others and may need the prompting to know that they have to do this to protect you and your co-workers as well as the financial instability of the work place. 1 person sick is an inconvienence. Then entire staff sick is a shut down and a whole lot of money lost.)

#7. If you ARE a supervisor at work or a boss, check on your employees! Make sure that if someone is sick they are getting treatment, or are at HOME and not at work infecting everyone else. It doesn't matter if it's a cold or the swine flu. Working sick is non-productive in anycase. It's better to be home for 3 or 4 days and be sick than at work making mistakes and other people sick.

#8. Take your Vitamins, Get some rest, Do some excersize, drink lots of water (or other beverages, new findings have now said that ANY fluid is good for us so long as most of it is water or clear fluid. Kidneys still filter water so it doesn't matter), get some sun so you can produce some vitamin D, eat healthy food and stop eating junk food. Stop eating out! Most of the food we eat out is not healthy for us, it's too high in salt, sugar, fat and too low in vitamins, protein and minerals. Even if you are eating at a sit down resteraunt and not at McDonalds, Burker King, A&W or whatever, don't fool yourself, it's still not as good for you as what you can make at home. And you can have "fast food" at home anyway. Last night dinner was stew and bisquits. Dinner prep was 7 minutes and then cook time was 8 minutes. Open cans of , carrots, green beans, potatoes, corn, garbonzo beans, beef broth and 2 cans of beef with gravy. dump 1/2 the liquid off the veggies, and then dump all cans in a huge pan. Set to boil. Mix up the bisquits and cut them out (I used a house shaped cutter to celebrate our new mobile home) and bake at 450 F for about 8 minutes. The stew boiled the entire time I was mixing the dough and baking the bisquits. Turn off the stew when the bisquits come out and TADA! Stew and bisquits, all in only 15 minutes. If you don't have time in your life for a 15 minute meal prep then 30 minutes to eat, you need to cut back on activities in your life as these activities are going to help make you sick.

#9. If you ARE feeling sick, know the symptoms of what you have. See if they match with a cold, allergies, or the flu. Our Doctors are going to be overloaded with people right now who all think they have the Swine Flu. Some will have colds, some will be allergies, some will be the flu. Call your local health department, or check the CDC website for the Swine Flu symptoms (moderators, anyone want to get the symptoms and post them here?) as well as the symptoms for other similar illnesses. Know the difference between a cold and the flu.

#10. If you don't HAVE to leave your residence, and I mean HAVE to leave not want to leave... then don't leave home. Period. If you don't have to go to work, or the store, or the gas station then don't go. Stay home, and be a recluse. Hubby and I are going to town today to get water, propane and gas. If we didn't HAVE to go, then we wouldn't. We are going to town on Thursday (4-30) for his next Dr. apt. If we could change it we would. After that we aren't leaving home for another week or two. We will definitely be limiting our time out. We'll stay on the property and live like hermits. Anyone who comes to see us will be closely eyeballed until we know they don't have anything.

#11. Bear in mind that if this DOES turn into a pandemic/epidemic that some public services may suffer. If you are getting water from a public supply or electricty or whatever, it could stop. These things are pumped by machines and these machines need human intervention or they will simply stop working. Make sure you store water, food, fill all vehicles with gas, have alternate means to keep warm/cool, (this is where that tent in the middle of the living room/bedroom can come in handy), and be prepared as you can be.

#12. Medical equipment: Nyquil, Dayquil, Pedialyte, Rubbing alcohol (for cooling a body with a high temp), blankets, water (for cleaning and drinking), clear broths, high protien shakes, vitamins, thermometer, ibuprofin for aches and aspirin for fever. These are all small items that you can provide for you and your family that will make getting through an illness easier. Antibiotics won't help with a cold or the flu. These two illnesses are ones that you just have to let the body fight through. I have heard people say that they don't take these drugs because they "just cover up the illness and don't get rid of it". I have heard this many, many times in my 37 years of life and I will say this now... This statement is just macho bull. Get over the testosterone people (men and women alike!), take the darn meds and deal with it. It is a lot better to take the meds and feel only like almost roadkill, than to take the meds and feel like you are 100% roadkill. If taking the nyquil makes it so you can rest, or keeps you from popping blood vessels in your lungs or throat from coughing, or helps to keep the fever down then it's a major help in your getting better. And yes, I have coughed so hard and often in the past that I was coughing blood from popped capilaries in my lungs and throat. It's not a fun thing.

#13. If the pandemic/epidemic comes to your neck of the woods, keep your kids home! Call the teacher, let them know you will be keeping your kid home from school until it passes and ask them what school work they are working on so they don't fall behind. Since you are of course a decent parent you know this already it shouldn't be a problem to continue with their lessons. If the pandemic/epidemic is in your area they probably aren't going to have many kids anyway. More than likely the schools will shut down pretty quickly if they find out that the pandemic/epidemic is in their area.

#14. If you can, leave the area or batten down the hatches and stay where you are. This is actually one of those strange things that leaving the area may actually SPREAD the disease more than stopping it. If you don't know you have been exposed (flu virus can live up to 14 days in a person before the infection breaks out, during this time you can and are infecting others before you even know you are sick!) and you go to the rural area to stay with family or friends, then you have the possiblity of making them sick as well. On the flip side, if the pandemic/epidemic comes to your area and you stay where you are then you definitely raise the possiblity of your getting it or your family getting it. So remember to ACT and not REACT and think about which is better for your family, friends, neighbors.

Ok, any one have anything else to add? What did I miss?

Earth Day Celebrations

Yesterday (4-22) we celebrated Earth Day by burning about 5 gallons of Deisel fuel and moving around a 3 ton bull dozer which in turn moved around our mobile home! We now have 2 bedrooms, 1 and 1/2 baths, huge living room, and a nice sized kitchen. Whew. I'll be able to cook again! and hubby will not have to move his computer for me to do said cooking either. :D This of course thrills both of us. We are looking at moving the bed into the living room of the mobile, and sealing off the two bedrooms (one is in each end of the mobile) and the 1/2 bath. Then just living in the smaller area while we wait for it to warm up and for us to get a woodstove. Once we get the woodstove installed, and the front bedroom painted, then we'll move the bed and bedroom stuff into the front bedroom. Thus opening up to living in a real "house" again.

It has a much bigger footprint on the land than what we want, but for now it will do. In the coming future, we'll build a house with a smaller foot print on the property that will still give us about 900 SF for us and the dogs and the greenhouse we'll build off of it. I want a footprint no larger than about 20 x 25 or 25 x 30 or so. This means that we'll build the house 2 story, which is fine for around here, and we'll put the bedroom and a greenhouse area upstairs (heat rises of course) and the bathroom/kitchen/livingroom will be downstairs along with storage.
I know this still sounds like a lot of house still, but with the potential of being snowed in for several weeks you don't want to run out of anything. Our neighbor was snowed in for 3 and 1/2 weeks in the winter of 2007 / 2008. And another person we have met since moving here was snowed in the winter of 2006/2007 for almost 5 weeks and they almost starved since they weren't expecting that snowstorm to be that bad.
But for now this mobile will be what we live in and it's a GREAT thing for us. It's in very nice condition, and with very little work we'll have it where we want it to be for living. :D We are going to use the extra bedroom for our food storage, of which we have about 3 - 4 months of right now. Expanding that is my goal for the moment. (only have about 2 months of toilet paper! One of the great necessities after food!)

Ok, I'm off for a bit. Later gaters!

Critters & Benches

Things are progressing here... I now have bunny cages, and will be getting bunnies either the end of this month or the end of next month. that will be a great relief. you can use rabbit meat in any recipe that calls for chicken. And since rabbits produce so much faster it will be a grand amount of meat. I'll can up the meat and then it'll be ready for use no matter what I want to do with it. It will also be able to be used for dog food as well, so the furcoated inhabitants of Treehaven will have food put away for them too. :D I always make sure I have several months of food on hand for them, but you can never have too much I say.

Bees will be next I think. That will give the MMG (Mad Mountain Geek for those of you who are newer readers. AKA: "hubby") something to do that isn't computer related. He's pretty excited about that. I am excited to get the beeswax coming in! You can use it for so much, and when you live without electricity, candles are a prime commodity. :D I made candles one year for everyone for Christmas and they were well received so I am sure I can do that again too. It is a great barter item, honey, beeswax, candles and all that are great to trade for food, supplies and the like. This is another great reason to do this.

Chickens are on line for next spring. I want Dorkings and Aracunas. Both are nice dual purpose breeds. Dorkings are an ancient breed, and have been around since Ceasar was trying to take over Brittania and before. They lay white/slightly tinted eggs... I like to call them Ecru or Old Lace in color. Dorkings come in tons of colors. Aracunas lay blue, green, even brownish eggs at times. They are the "Easter egg" layers. I love the colors of the eggs as each one is a surpise in color. They are a nice large bird, that readily will go broody and set their eggs and are easy, undemanding layers. I played with the idea for a while of bantams, since there is only 2 humans here on the farm.... but with there being 4 dogs too, the full size bird will be welcome for the meat. Larger birds also stay warm better than bantams. And, as I have mentioned, we can get temperatures down to about -30 in the Winter, staying warm is extremely important for the birds.

We'll build a shed that will house both the rabbits AND the chickens (and probably the bees too) for winter, so that we can keep it from getting too cold in the winter. I thought, briefly about doing seperate sheds for each, but then, if it gets really cold, we would have to heat each shed seperately. That could be costly, time consuming and a waste of fuel. So, one shed it is! It's not like I'm getting 50 of each animal. I'll probably have about 4 bunnies at a time (not including babies that are growing up to become dinner) and about 8 chickens or so and 2 or 3 goats. I don't know how many bee hives hubby is planning on having, but since they are mostly closed in the winter anyway, maybe you can just stack them like boxes? I don't have a clue. lol. If you can't close them all the way, then they will need their own shed. I don't want our bee investment to be gobbled up by the chickens, or the goats being driven nuts.

Hubby built me a bench! It's not much in the way of fancy. He cut two legs from our victim tree (see the pics for chainsaw massacre on our picasa website) and then cut a section in 1/2 and used that as a bench. It's then screwed together and out there for my sitting pleasure. there are 2 shorter sections that are also cut in 1/2 and awaiting legs that will be placed stratigically around our backyard here, and then it'll be all ready for company. It'll be a pleasant place to sit come nicer weather.

Speaking of weather, it looks like we are getting some for the next several days. It's supposed to be into the 80's by Monday and we are REALLY happy to see it. not like this winter was bad, the most snow we had at one time was about 18 inches... But, being cramped into 200 sf, while I enjoyed it, had hubby ready to climb the walls. With nicer weather, now we can go out and about on the property and get a few things done! Whoot!

OK, speaking of nicer weather, I am off to go an enjoy some! have a great day!

Lady of Lovely Skies!

Unemployment woes

Good morning campers! So much has happened here at the farm that it makes my head boggle!

I applied for unemployment, since I moved and quit my job to follow my hubby. I started receiving it, only to find out that someone at the unemployment office had entered the information incorrectly. They entered that I said I was layed off from work. Very incorrect of course, as there was and is still work to do at my place of employment. This of course kicked off an investigation into what the discrepency was. When they called my place of work, my ex-supervisor gave them a whole bunch of very incorrect information and so they have now denied my unemployment. So, we have lost any of that income, and I am sure that if they have their way I'll have to pay back the $820.00 they already paid me. I am of course appealing this decision and will see where this goes. I am also looking into the legality of some of the information that my ex-employer shared with the Unemployment office as if it were illegal or not to do so. To my knowledge you can only share if they worked at your place of employment (or still work there) and if they are asked back or why they left. Apparently what was shared was the entire saga of my life, even to the fact that we bought the property from Craig's list (Treehaven proper) which is of course incorrect, since we found the property on eBay. The investigator for unemployment I am sure found the inconsistencies between my employer and when she called me back (the investigator was VERY rude to begin with) extremely upsetting and I am postitive that because my information was different that she then thought I was lying to get money not owed me. What a pain in the rump this is.

I can understand where unemployment wants to deny as many people as they can. Unemployment in Oregon is over 13% officially, and is thought to be over 15% and perhaps over 16% in the county I live in!

We are also moving! Well, not from Treehaven of course. lol. We have stumbled onto the opportunity to put a mobile home on Treehaven property that will more than tripple our living space. It's a 1984 Model, single wide. 2 bedrooms, 1 1/2 baths and a very large living room, and kitchen. It's about 970 SF if you go with the outside dimensions (of course minus for walls, and insulation, cupboards, and fixtures) so it will give us a lot more room then our cozy 200 sf cabin. We'll use the cabin and reinvent it into the power shed. We'll move the generator, and such in here, that way it'll be out of the weather completely. We can open the windows here in the shed for airing and cooling the generator. Don't worry, there is enough room here in the cabin to keep the generator at least 3 feet from all walls. :D Don't want to overheat the generator and cause it to breakdown.

The best news is that hubby is progressing in his treatment for his myriad of difficulties! His Dr. had deemed that he will need about another year still, but that will be overcome I am sure with dilligent work. So the Mad Mountain Geek will continue to roam the mountain and heal, and then we'll see where he is in a year. We have applied for SSD and we'll see what happens with that. As you all know, everyone is denied the first time around, so we'll have to work with a lawyer of course after we receive the denial. It's a small inconvienence, but his Dr. is hopeful.

I've thrown out the invitation to a friend that she and her adult son and their 9 cats can move onto the property with us. She was evicted around the same time we moved to Treehaven. currently she hasn't taken us up on this opportunity, she just filed for Medicaid, and for some reason says she can't leave the county she's in. I thought Medicaid was a State program and you couldn't leave the STATE you filed in, and it didn't matter where in the state you moved after filed? I couldn't see anything about leaving the county after you file. I was curious, as it's something we may have to file for so hubby will have some health coverage.

April 10th, the company hubby works for informed us that they were cancelling his insurance coverage. What a pain in the rump that is. This means that if we keep his insurance that we will have to pay for it via cobra. I mean, come on! How do you expect someone to get better if they can't afford to continue going to the Dr, Chiropractor, Therapist, Neurosugion, Chemotherapy or whatever because you cut off their benefits? Hubby is still an employee there, so it's not like he LEFT his job, or they FIRED him. Maybe OHP or something will work for him. Me? I'm Native American so I can get in to the local NA clinic to be seen for just about anything. And my own Tribe, Eastern Shawnee Tribe of Oklahoma, does have a reimbursal program for most medical with a limit of up to $1,200.00 paid. I know that's not a lot, but if I can get into the clinic it should cover almost everything.

Ok, that's it, I gotta jog as we have to go paint today!

love and hugs
Exhausted Mistress Treehaven

Book list

I have so many people asking me what we read out here that I thought I would do up a list...

Anything Star Trek
Any good cookbook (I love cookbooks)
Anything from Storey Publishing
How to- and do it yourself books are right up there too
Anything that has to do with preparedness, survival, and primitive living have always been welcome by both hubby and I.

As for Authors...
SM Stirling
Beverly Lewis
Laura Ingalls
Larry Niven
Laurell K. Hamilton
Kim Harrison
Jacquline Carey
Jerry Pournell
James Wesley Rawles
Robert Heinlein
Michael Morecock
Piers Anthony
John Norman
Marion Zimmer Bradley
Anne McCaffey
Glenn Beck

I am sure there are others, but those are the ones I can think of off the top of my head.

Egads! I suck!

Ok, so it's been WAY to long since I posted. So much has been going on that I haven't had a chance to update anything! Beat me with a noodle and call me antipasti... ok so that was a weird sentence but you get the drift. lol.

We have gotten snow, then sun, then rain, then snow as for weather. As a matter of fact, just two days ago we got between 7 and 7 1/2 inches of snow on the ground. It was so wet and heavy that it collapsed our poor garage! Yup, the green tent of storage is no more. It's currently propped up to keep any extra "wet" off our storage stuff, but as soon as I have a place to put what little storage we have with us, then it'll have to go the way of all 15 year old tent garages and head for the pearly gates of rest. :( I'll miss that tent! I got it the first year that hubby and I started going to SCA events. Oh well, we are on the ultimate SCA campout now! Whoot!

I have bunny cages now, and am on schedule to get bunnies either the end of this month or the end of next month. I am looking forward to that a lot. you can use rabbit meat in any recipe that calls for chicken.. and you get the bonus of fur for market.

We have good news though! While we love our little 200 SF cabin, it's just not feasible for us without a bit of work done in it. Hubby works on the kitchen table, and if I need/want to cook or do anything of my own that requires a table I have to move him... Which then leaves him with no workspace! As you can imagine it's quite the toss up.

To remedy this we now have a MOBILE HOME! It's approximately 980 SF, not taking in account for walls, and insulation and all that. It's 14 feet wide by about 70 feet long on the outside. There is 2 bedrooms, 1 and 1/2 bathrooms, a HUGE living room (it's about the same size as our cabin!) and a good size country kitchen. That has me a bit on the excited side. I am so happy to be getting this wonderful addition to our homestead. Of course this means I'll have the cabin for our power station stuff, and an additional bedroom for storage in the mobile. Now, I'll just have to come up with about $1,500.00 dollars or so to get our stuff up here from Eugene. (We do take donations!)

Since the ground is softening up, hubby has started cutting trees for us to use to build the garden beds. We'll use whatever wood he doesn't use for that for other things around the homesite or cut up so it can season for firewood for next year. I'll have a wood stove by then and not the propane stove. It's just too expensive.

After we get the rabbits going, then we'll do chickens, then bees, then goats. Whew... and build a greenhouse and tons of other stuff at the homesite. I am so excited, and so very, very tired just thinking about it. hehe.