Homemade Country Butter

We used to call homemade butter "Country" Butter when I was a child.

We (my family) were wanderers and moved back and forth many times from the country in Va to the cities in Florida, Vero Beach, Kississimme and Orlando. Of course they weren't as big a cities as they are now but it wasn't much country butter being made there at that time either.

Who would have ever thought that my parents would settle back down in their hometown of Callaway Va????

When we lived in Fla we would visit Callaway and my dad had to stock up on country butter, buttermilk and eggs from a neighbor lady, Nannie. He just loved her butter because she would let her cream get sour before she made butter and it had that strong "country" butter taste. I did not like that taste and found that I really liked margarine!! Didn't know for years that you could actually buy sweet cream butter in the grocery store, I thought all butter was sour!! I still loved to go to her house to buy the butter anyway. It was usually the highlight of my trips back to Va. She had the shiniest wood floors in her house that I had ever seen!! If I was really lucky I would be able to catch her milking her cow. OMG!!! That was always a dream of mine, to have my own milk cow and milk her myself!! Then I visited a huge dairy farm in Fla on a school field trip and they milked about 200 cows. OMG!! That kicked my dreams up a few levels. I talked to the milker after he was finished milking and I told him I was going to own a dairy farm one day when I grew up!!!!!!!!

Well I never owned my own dairy farm til this one. Not 200 cows to milk twice a day but a few little ole goats will suffice!!

I spent years of my adult life. however, milking cows, or testing milk and working the fields on some big cow dairies. I sorta got my fill of the dairy farm bug.

I am very content right here on my 2 1/2 acres with my 9 little goats!!!

When my family purchased land and built a home right beside of Danny's family dairy farm.......(that's when the trouble really began, I couldn't keep my hands off him ;-))).............

my dad would go out and buy butter from Danny's mother, Carrie. Sometimes when I was a good girl and they would let me hook up my pony to the iron wheeled wagon and go out the dirt road to get eggs and butter, that usually ended up taking me the entire day too!!!!!!!!

(After Carrie passed away Danny's father Raymond carried on the tradition and made butter for many more years before selling all his cows. They both sold butter and eggs all over the place. Folks would drive for miles and miles to buy from them cause they knew how good their butter was!)

Now let me tell you she made "Country" butter that even this whimpy little ole gal could eat!!!

Took me years to find out why hers was so much better than our neighbors (Nannie) up the road. I mean Carrie's bull would sometimes jump the fence and breed Nannie's cow for her or vice versa!! I can't remember the whole story there. Anyway I knew that the cows were raised on almost the same grass as their fields were side by side, so what gives with sour verses sweet country butter???

Ah ha!! I finally understood it. Carrie's butter was made with sweet cream and it was sooooooo good! I thought it was just that she was such a good cook and could even make an eggplant taste good!! So I knew that I could make sweet country butter just like Carrie's with my goats milk cream and I did just that yesterday!! The only difference is that mine is snow white and hers was sunflower yellow!!! It has almost the same taste and just a little softer texture. The goats butter has a lower melting temperature than cows milk butter does.

I can say that we were very happy with a generous pat of this stuff slathered on a hot homemade cat head biscuit last evening!!

I think Carrie, Raymond, Nannie and my dad would all be proud to taste my butter!

Not to brag or anything like that, I am just saying!!!

(Yes I married that neighbor boy that I couldn't keep my hands off of.

I thought I was going to get to own my big dairy farm one day if I married him!! Hahaha)

around the farm house

My dear friend Terri sent me this gorgeous designer artisan goats milk soap a while back with thoughts of cheering me up from the doldrums of winter weather! It worked!! Terri, I just had to display this little heart bar in my little enamelware soap dish in my bathroom. It was the only soap dish I had that was worthy of such a nice bar of soap! Do you have an enamelware soap dish like this? Terri has all these great enamelware coffee pots and tea kettles and such in her sunroom. (she likes to show them off and rub it in too)She does not have an enamelware milk pail like I have though!! We are in a little competition it seems here ;-))))

Seriously Terri, I thank you from the bottom of my heart! All four bars of soap are just fabulous!! I feel so special when I wash with it. I can't wait to be able to wash the garden dirt from my hands with this lovely soap!! Kuddos to a job well done! I am sure if you guys would like to purchase some of Terri's artisan soap she will be happy to take care of your orders! Right Terri?

This little egg tray is from Joanne Fabrics! Can you believe they have almost the exact same tray that they have at Anthropologie for a fraction of the cost! I have already asked for this and this for Mother's Day from my children. Is it wrong to ask for a Mother's day gift? Nah I didn't think so either!! So Thanks ahead of time girls and grandpunks!! hint hint!! I will only need the one item now unless you can find it in your hearts to reward me for being such a great mother to you guys. I mean hey, I was only 14 when you were born (first child) so I think I did pretty good with you. Oh that's right it was all those great "morals and standards" that I passed on to you that I learned from my parents! I am sorry but I keep forgetting about that. (inside joke around here) hehehe

Those 9 eggs were gifts from my other girls yesterday! My girls who hang out in Le Poulet Hous. They have not been the best producers for some reason since their moult in the fall. I had to whisper in their ear some sweet nothings a while back and that got the eggs a rolling!
Rolling they did too. Yesterday when I went to gather the eggs.......they were all laid in the top of the three nests and of course they are the roll away nest boxes so all 9 were at the back of box in the egg shoot. Well 8 were there and one was up on the wall hanging on 2 nails. I did not take my new camera on the trek thru the snow, slush and ice for risk of breaking it....or guarding it if I fell and hurt myself worse in the process.........but it was really a Nikon moment!!! Good thing those 2 nails were there or I would have had scrambled eggs on the floor.

Other than snowing outside...IMAGINE THAT!!!! That is about it for life around sunny morning farm today. I better go check the egg shoots now before they roll out cause they may not be able to hit the target today! Maybe they need another whisper in their ears about how to share those 3 nest boxes!

Wash Day!

Monday is Wash Day? Huh? Really?

Well why is it raining out there? Huh?

Cause you all know that I like to hang my laundry out on the clothesline.

Emma likes me to hang clothes out on the line too.

See her running thru my laundry?

I can not and I mean I CAN NOT get to my clothesline without Patches

(the barn cat) helping me.

She will be gone for days and suddenly return when

she smells Downy!

She is all over wet laundry.

That's part of the beauty of my laundry hamper thingy

that I got at the yardsale last year and made over in toile.

She can't reach my wet laundry!! haha

Guineas like laundry on the line too.

Do you see how I use my vintage enamelware?

As a laundry basket and a laundry soak!

How about that Wringer Washer?

It was my dads aunts and it still runs beautifully.

I just need hot water outside somewhere so I can use it without having to carry enamelware buckets full of hot water ;-)

The enamelware buckets could make that task a little bit easier!

The laundry sinks I bought from a neighbor lady.

They were her mothers and I stayed with her mother when I worked for home health.

I had to give $10 for them!

Best $10 I ever spent!

I have had them for about 12 years now.

They have had many jobs around this farm.

They must be Timex...they have taken a lickin and they keep on tickin!!

The vintage aprons on the line are from ebay!

The clothes pegs are from ebay also.

The clothespin apron I made last year!

It sure does come in handy!

The crocheted pillowcases, basking in the sun drenched back porch, were my Grandma Goldie's that she made!

I also have an umbrella clothesline on my back deck in the summer and in an outbuilding during the winter. I have a folding plastic dryer that I use in my bedroom, or somewhere in my house year round.

Can you see that I love my clothesline?

I love laundry!

I love to iron laundry!

I just don't like rainy Mondays....or snowy Mondays!

I was inspired to do this after reading a post from The Canned Quilter

at Hickery Holler Farm today.

Go on over and read her post from today

if you have a clothesline,

if you have a daughter,

granddaughter,

or if you are a woman!

She had me in stitches!!!

Happy rainy wash day everyone!

Barn Stars

Sunny Morning Farm is just full of barn stars!

I just love stars!

I just love the fact that I have figured out this Picasa 3.6 too!!

sunny morning farm garden 2009

just so you don't forget that there was one......

and to show you that I can also make a collage of pictures using Picasa 3.6!!

I just haven't figured out how to save my text that I wrote on the picture yet.

I think I like photoshop!

Robin has photoshop and I need it too!!

Saphira cracks me up in this picture!!
I have always wanted to be able to do this...

and this!!!
I see a lot of new headers in my future!

Fish

I have had this fish bowl or what ever you want to call it over on my other blog and I would go over there periodically to feed the fish. So I decided to add it to this blog today! Just place your curser over the fish and click a couple times to drop them some food and watch them gobble it up!! Someone designed this with me in mind!! I love feeding our fish in both ponds here on the farm. We have a stocked pond with a couple hundred catfish, a few bream and bass. Supposedly a hundred crappie but we have yet to see one of them. We get so excited when our 3 white catfish finally decide by the end of summer that they will start coming up where we can see them!

I have about 25 goldfish in my garden pond that I can see from my living room window.......when it's not covered with ice!!!! I wish I could keep it heated so I could see my fishies year round!!

I can just sit for hours and watch them eat! Both online and in person. I really need a shot of summer here!!!! In case you haven't already been able to tell that!!

This is why I married him!!

Here is the RED tree! I am sorry to say that I wanted to cry everytime I looked at it. Look how bad it looked from outside the window.
See how bad it was having the RED tree and the normal lights in the rest of the house. Poor contrast I'm a telling ya!! Made my white dining room suite look yellow. This wasn't the camera playing tricks either.



You can click to enlarge any of the pictures but when you enlarge this one you can really see what it looked like from the road. Ugh!!

just had to throw this one in ;-)

I gathered all of this from the farm on Friday and hung it only to have it covered with almost 6" of snow yesterday. I like the effect!! It is made with hemlock branches, apple tree branches and running cedar!!

I had planned to dismantle my tree and put clear lights on it but I have been procrastinating doing it all weekend. Talked myself completely into forgeting about it and then while we were out tonight I saw so many beautifully decorated homes and some not so beautifully decorated homes and I decided that I did not want to be in the later category. I told my dearest honey that I had no choice but to redo it. He looked over at me and said "All you have to do is string the clear lights around the tree over the top of the ornaments and leave the red ones on there.".............OMG He is brilliant!!! Why hadn't I already thought of that? I guess it was my obsession with my tree making sure that every ornament is just so and every light is just so and every bow is just so and the color scheme is just so.....just so!!

SO...... we did just that tonight!! We laughed and said that we could have both the red and clear lights both burning together and it would go with my red and white candy cane theme of the tree....hahaha............so after putting the clear lights on I did plug up both sets and let me tell you I almost peed in my pants!!!!!!!!!!!! It is beautiful and it does look just like a candy cane. It is so subtle yet breathtaking!! I have to brag on it because as you know you can never capture the true beauty of the lights on film. I didn't get any outdoor pictures tonight....almost got frostbite out there last night.....but you can get an idea of how happy I am with the tree anyway!! Can't ya??

I am not saying that I don't like the red lights. I love them on other peoples trees and I wanted them so badly because it is my favorite color but it just wasn't working out here for me.

I have all sorts of ornaments that seem to look OK together. I always tuck poinsettas in the tree and I have red n white striped ribbon for the bows.

I also have a lot of various birds on my tree. Love the look!!

So anyway, I now know the real reason that I married him 33 years ago.....it's his brains!!! Oh yeah and the fact that he spoils me......he bought me the entire set of Townecraft Cookware Friday night!!!! Danny is now Peter's bestest friend forever!! The set could be here as early as Wednesday!! You better call my UPS guy and warn him......cause you know that sometimes I feel like hugging him when he brings me something really cool!!!!!

Saturday in SW Virginia....

"Ugh!! Ugh!! *#**@()**@### I hate this stuff!! My legs are too short!"

"I should be in the Caribbean on a farm."

My girlfriend can't even come out cause she's smaller than me!

Carolers singing "I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas!"

Whatever!

"Yeah right there. That's my best side.!"

"Now listen up. You are to do as I say"

" Onward march! Hut two, three, four...."

"She thinks she is some kinda goddess......

my nose is cold."

drip.....

What? Bamboo does not like snow....? Go figure!

Winter Wonderland!

(I think I like my camera!)

Got goat milk? Or a goat to milk?

Well I have the milker right here!

Too pretty you say to milk a goat??

Well yeah, we thought so too!

But what do ya know, she has proven us wrong yet again!!!!!!

She decided out of the blue that her and Colton were going to milk Saphira Saturday morning by themselves. I laughed!! I went with her so I could help tie her up. I know this sounds cruel but trust me it is for every ones good, Saphira's included, to have 3 of her legs tied during the milking or there would be no milk in the pail. I am sure you remember that story from way back when I first started milking her!!!!

So after she was tied Morgan just took off like she had done this all her life. I asked Colton to please hurry and get the camera cause this was surely a Kodak moment. I made the best video of her milking and I can't for the life of me get it to upload to blogger or youtube. I thought it was too big so on Sunday morning she milked again and I made a much shorter video and it still won't upload so you are stuck pictures.....they are not staged.....she was actually milking!!!!!

I am not surprised because Morgan can do anything. She coonhunts, carries her own gun and shoots the coon out, when Colton lets her ;-} that is. She goes squirrel hunting by herself, she can cook, play a mean guitar and violin. I think she is beautiful and she is getting ready to turn 15.......OMG she is making me an old granny!!!!! Oh yeah she has a blog too!!!!! Go on over and welcome her to blogland!!!! She has pictures of her yummy meatballs that she made to bring to our Thanksgiving dinner!!!!

I love you Morgan!!!!!

You are my favorite brown haired brown eyed grandaughter!!!!!

ps. Which picture do you like the best? Morgan in a dress or her Carhartt hunting attire?

There's a new guy down on the farm......

and his name is Thunder. He is a reg Nubian buck to replace our dear Durango. We lost Durango, his son Tango, and Tango's mother Violet all this year.

We had a bout with coccidia and it got both mother and son before we knew what was going on. Durango was lost in the horrible accident on the hillside right after we found out Violet was sick.
It was a tough year and I couldn't hardly bring myself to talk about it.
Saphira was really excited at first to see that we bought her a new teenage boyfriend. Now I think she could send him back to his previous home. He is loud and noisy, he stinks and he pees on his head. She didn't want any part of the pictures today!!


As I was getting this shot below the barn, he was above the barn and she had went out of his eyeshot but definately not earshot. He was hollering so loud, as Nubians are famous for, and she gave me a look as if to say "Can you shut him up? Puulleezzee. " Sorta like Danny does with the guineas!

That's Opal, our hateful old fainting doe in her new little pen all by herself. Well she is so mean to anyone else unless she spit them out of her womb. She tries to kill everyone else over food. This field is meant to be a buck pen and Danny and I built this little shed over the fence so we could have 2 new stalls for weather protection on either side of the fence. Aren't we smart? It was really my idea. Now he likes it too. He laughs that there is a fence running thru the barn!!!

You can never get enough places to stash a goat!

Horrible picture of a lovely goat. This is Ellie Mae. Saphira's and Durango's baby doe from July. I have high hopes for her next year....oh yeah .....her and Thunder!!

Got cookies? I love her stripes. She looks like a Gremlin!

It was naptime and they are still groggy. See the little stubby horn scurs on the little brown goat? I was watching and couldn't stand the thought's of Danny hurting him while dehorning him and made Danny stop too soon. The next one he did while I was gone! Smart man!

How many roosters do you count? I count too darn many! We have to have a chicken pluckin'

I love this view of the babies napping! All curled up together.

As promised ....the newest version of the rollaway nest boxes. This is what I see when I come into the coop. Actually on the outside wall of the coop. The eggs are to be layed in the box and then they are supposed to roll out into the PVC pipe and roll down to the end of the pipe where no longneck chicken can get to them and eat them.

Triple decker. A smaller perch that they don't roost on. YES!!!!

and what do you know? They work!!!!! Look at that pullet egg!!

Other than paying some bills, some office work, computer time, a little house work and getting out in the cold today for a few quick pictures thru the fence.........this is what I have been up to. It involves pinwheels my new sewing machine and a lot of Halloween candy!