Non Electric Homestead McMinn County (Knoxville: home inspection, pit bull, deposits)

[1967hammer]

Originally Posted by CA Sweet Pea

Great pictures! Thanks for sharing....

I don't mean to show my ignorance, but exactly what is "leather britches" ???

Those plates - oh my word........ what memories they bring back... My mother had a set of dishes in that pattern that she got buying groceries at the local market - probably 45 years ago!

Don't feel bad about the leather britches question Sweet Pea. We all had to ask as well.

Forest Breath explained that they are green beans that are strung up and dried. A few of us thought she was talking about leather pants

Forest, your pictures are wonderful. I am so happy for you and Chris. I pray that everything will work out for you.

[CA Sweet Pea]

Originally Posted by 1967hammer

Don't feel bad about the leather britches question Sweet Pea. We all had to ask as well.

Forest Breath explained that they are green beans that are strung up and dried. A few of us thought she was talking about leather pants

Forest, your pictures are wonderful. I am so happy for you and Chris. I pray that everything will work out for you.

Thanks for the quick response. I must have missed that explanation. I have read every post in this thread - but somehow that one slipped through the cracks in my mind....

[Forest Breath]

Thanks so much.

The plates have a story, but not one that would be expected. IT would be nice to say they came form my Mam-maw or something LOL but, I had an expensive set of matching dishes. They were OK, but they just did not feel right for me. So one day, Chris and I boxed them all up and gave them to my daughter. We then proceeded to go to Goodwill and picked out new plates. The goal was, none could cost more than a buck apiece and they could not match. I found one of the wheat plates and put it in my stack of about 4 plates. Chris had picked out 3 or so. All were old and some not so pretty, but we ended up with some neat plates. When we got home, we discovered he had bought the only other wheat plate there. Mam-maw had a set long ago, but I have no clue who has hers now. None of our dishes match and we love it like that.

We are having driveway problems. With all this rain, the driveway is a sloppy mess and I expect it will stay that way through winter. I have not had gravel hauled in because of Hazel telling us we will have to move the driveway later. BUT....I am going to have to break down and get some gravel hauled in for the drive. We are starting to slide up and down it and my daughter is not too thrilled about dropping Perrin off every morning because of my driveway. So, I think we will have to get some gravel brought in regardless, if we plan to get home on rainy days.

Leather Britches are dried green beans. Somewhere in a past post I talked about them. You just string them up to dry, hang them from the rafters and they dry completely. I stored mine in gallon jars. You just grab a handful and throw it in some water with salt pork, fat back or hamhocks or something and let them cook all day, or for days as I have. Last night they were perfect tasting. Chris liked them the night before, a little undone. They give the potatoes an excellent flavor. I think, from what I have heard, you either love them or not. My mother always told me she loved them. Most of her sisters say they hated them.

Things I have learned the past 24 hours:

The back porch gets wet from the roof and freezes over at night, which makes for a slippery trip to the outhouse. So we are going to add a back porch roof to our to-do list.

Never try to match the color of yarn with the light of oil lamps. Your shade of purple on a blanket might look the same, but trust me, when it gets daylight, it is WAY off.

Men have a tendency to leave their tools laying around everywhere

Front porches are amazingly wonderful things that can be one of the most important parts of a home

You smell different when you use wood heat and you become paranoid about other people noticing it. LOL

Cletus is....spoiled

[Pam& Bill]

Forest Breath,
You may smell different using wood heat, but I'd rather smell wood then someone who heats with a propane heater. Propane heaters have a smell that gets in your clothes and it is too close to diesal fuel for my senses.
I enjoyed your update and can still feel your peace and contentment .
Pam

[Forest Breath]

We had yet another great weekend, but oh my dear Goddess it was a cold one! Friday when I got off work, I headed to Amanda’s to pick up Chris and Perrin. Amanda arrived and we all went to Cleveland to shop. We spent a LOT of time at Hobby Lobby. Chris got things I cannot mention here because Lakota reads this. After spending forever there, Perrin was so tired and we decided to have dinner at Chili’s. We got home rather late. The house was cold because Chris was gone all day and there was no fire. It was so nice when it finally warmed up and we could snuggle in bed.

Saturday morning we got up, got chores done and headed out to do Yule shopping. Once again we found ourselves at Hobby Lobby. I managed to find a gift for someone there and lots of yard that was on sale. We left there and went to Burke’s Outlet to get more gifts and I found myself a nice sweater and a super cool skirt for really cheap! Both were just 17 bucks! At that point I told Chris to keep reminding me that we were shopping for other people. We had lunch and watched a little boy from Canada spill his milk all over his grandmother. We keep coupons with us at all times for free ice cream, milk, juice, apple dippers and such and hand them out to kids randomly in public. I gave the child two coupons for milk at McD’s, two in case he spills his first one! Then a little girl beside us was turning 11 and was having lunch with her Mom and 2 sisters. I gave her one for free ice cream and before she left she gave me a hug and told me thank you. We then went to another store and I bought more yarn, actually it is not my fault this time. Chris bought the yarn for me. He encouraged me to pick out 20 skeins and he bought them, along with 9 stockings to hang for all the cats and Cletus. I figured since I was not accomplishing much in the way of gifts for others, we should just go to Lowe’s and buy our tree. So we headed there and picked out a beautiful tree. This nice man wrapped it for us and then helped us tie it to the top of the car. When we got home, we got it up in the stand, gave it a drink of water and I even put the lights on it. Mind you the lights run off of batteries and we cannot leave them on. We are saving the juice for picture taking for Yule cards next year and then we will turn them all on Yule and leave them on until the batteries die. We got a few decorations on the tree. We strung gum drops, marshmallows, beads and candy and put that on the tree. Chris found my Mam-maws red ball ornaments and the dove I got from her funeral flowers. I put those out every year, even when I had no tree, I hung them up in the house. We still have a lot of decorating to do, as we are making the ornaments, but I snapped a pic anyway. I finished the evening knitting a scarf and spending time with Vickey and Norm, as they were leaving Sunday for Florida.

Sunday morning arrived and we were almost out of lamp oil. We headed into town and picked up a gallon of oil and had breakfast. We told Vickey and Norm bye and they left out about 10am or so for Florida. They are spending 2 weeks with Chris’ brother and Vickey’s sister. We went on home and cleaned house, I finished the scarf and then crocheted a hat to match it. I then started another scarf and worked on that in between cleaning, moving things and decorating the tree more. We had a great day yesterday. When it got dark we went down to check on things at Vickey and Norm’s house and I knitted more. The fire was still going when we got home, but it was cold. The good thing is, Chris emits a tremendous amount of body heat for him to be so scrawny! I am so anxious for him to get in bed at night because I can utilize every bent part of his body to stick one of my body parts into and get them warm. Behind his knees is the perfect place for my super cold feet. LOL Last night we somehow ended up with a bed full of cats. I could not figure out who all was where so I grabbed my cell phone and used it as a light to discover, Cutie at my head, Flat Cat at my butt, Tree Cat at my feet, Azrael on top of me and Butter on the corner of the bed. So last night was spent listening to various purrs, sneezes, licking, growling (Cutie is not fond of her outside neighbors sometimes) and at times throughout the night I heard lots of crunching by the food bowl.

I would have loved to stay in bed and cuddle this morning. It remained cold all weekend and on Saturday, the ice in the driveway never melted. But I had my oatmeal with Perrin in my lap, it was good to get hugs from him this morning. Then I headed out to work. In other news, Tim left for Wisconsin last night on the company jet and Lakota did not take it too well. She don’t like the thought if her Daddy leaving for a week. He will be home before you know it though. Vickey and Norm were in Warner Robbins, GA for the night and seemed pleased with their trip so far. We are ready for the reporter to show up tomorrow for the story. I am a little nervous about it, but everyone says it will be fun…guess we will see. Have a great Monday everyone!


Getting the tree wrapped


Strapping it to the car


Ready to go


Starting the decoration

This week we plan to get more of the ceiling done and cut a few more cedars for the porch railing.

[Kyrsyan]

It looks like a wonderful tree. I hope you all have a very merry christmas.

[Rach1966]

how did the DPA interview go?

[JEANNE61]

My mother too ..i think in boxes of 'duz' or oxygon laundry detergent . Wheat pattern . . Love them . .and that 'dinner ' pic .. Om g... Just lovely .. F/b , you are a true art ist . ..
Your writing, the descriptions of how you live , and work . . Esp wor k .
its such a breath of sweet air whenever i read your posts .. Keep them coming .. .
God bless you . .
Btw .. May i ask why you refer to christmas as yule' . .of course, i've heard the term before .. But i just noticed you've used it several times in place of christmas . .do you n ot celebrate christmas in the traditional sense .. .??

Just curious .. .
have a great week . .good luck with that reporter . .
I had an interview once many many yrs ago . . And i made notes for myself the nite before .. Turned out , i needed them . The guy hardly asked me any questions and i had to practically interview myself .. . Grateful for those notes .. .

Take care .. .jeanne

[Forest Breath]

Thanks for the replies.

Interview: I think it went OK. I know when you do those things, sometimes your words get twisted somewhere between coming form your mouth and going into the paper. LOL I am nervous about it but I guess I will find out this week. It is supposed to be out in the paper this week. She took a lot of pics and stuff, some around the house and outside, of us, Perrin and Cletus.

Attorney: They are meeting the first of this week to go over the survery and discuss options. I am anxious for it to be settled. Meanwhile, we continue to visit and take care of Hazel. We are taking her to Marietta, GA to spend a week with her for the holiday.

Yule: I am actually Druid, however the locals call me a "Hedgewitch" .... fondly of course. I have a very diverse group of spiritual people in my family. I raised my children to make their spiritual choice themselves as well and we raise the grandchildren that way. It makes for interesting holidays (we have more of them to celebrate than most families because we repsect each individual choice enough to celebrate the holidays of their belief systems as well. It is educational for the kids and we adults as well.

Update: Man this rain is endless! We are still enjoying the walks back and forth to the car. We have plenty of water for laundry, dishes, baths and everything. The temperature has been up a bit so we have not had to have a fire for a few days. We got lots more wood hauled up to the house that we had cut down this summer. Now we need to get that cut and stacked and such. I am looking forward to being off foe a few weeks coming up soon, so we can get a bunch of work done on the house. Before you know it I will be doing seed inventories and getting ready to plant the garden.

Life is good, continues to amaze me and we are blessed a million times over.

[kygman]

Originally Posted by Forest Breath

Thanks for the replies.

Interview: I think it went OK. I know when you do those things, sometimes your words get twisted somewhere between coming form your mouth and going into the paper. LOL I am nervous about it but I guess I will find out this week. It is supposed to be out in the paper this week. She took a lot of pics and stuff, some around the house and outside, of us, Perrin and Cletus.

Could you check to see if the newspaper has a web site so we could see the article? Would be interesting to see it.