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Oh man... I was sitting here eating a very hot-spicy piece of homemade candied ginger, when I had to sneeze suddenly and without thinking of anything other than not spraying pieces of ginger all over the keyboard, closed my mouth and nose so as to withhold the sneeze. Well of course you know...

So I'm sitting here at the computer. The bed is right behind me. All four cats are asleep on the bed. One is snoring. Suddenly, commotion. Dog trying to wedge himself under the bed. Excited dog noises. Etcetera. You know what he did? He caught a vole. In the house. Under the bed with four cats...

The questions are academic now, as the job is as done as it's gettin' and gonna have to be "good enough"... but I'm rather puzzled by a couple things and would like to know what was going on. I was attaching a ledger board for a deck onto a concrete-block foundation wall. Never done that...

The living room and hallway ceilings in our house are that rough-textured finish, you know, very pointy and rough? (Not the 'i made swirls and curves with my trowel tool' type textured) The house is old enough that it's not entirely impossible there may be asbestos content in the texturing...

A year or two ago, someone had a thread like this and I found that if I publicly posted the list of things I intended to get done during the day, I often got MUCH more done than when the list was just in my head or stuck to the fridge door. Well, right now I need to get a whoooole lotta stuff...

This is only "self sufficient" in the sense of I am trying to fix it myself and I know some of you out there Know Things about this type subject so I would love to hear any advice. I am Not An Athlete, to put it mildly (digging postholes, yes; running, no!) and could stand to lose another 15...

I had a new-in-box electric fence charger sitting around waiting to be installed for a long while, I know it was in the garage 5-6 weeks ago, but now it is gone, and I mean like "I have torn apart every room of every building on the property three times now" gone. (Had to replace it with one...

Ok so it's not really "self sufficient".... uh.... both ewes had unattended homebirths, does that count? LOL I'm just in an excited sheepy mood this morning, as our second-ever lambie arrived last night around midnight, so I thought I would post a few pics for those who are not on BYH and want...

I've never eaten rutabagas aka winter turnips aka swedes before except in small amounts in vegetable soups. But, my first-grader was for some reason seized by curiousity about them in the store, so we bought one and I made mashed turnip last night. He did not like it; I was...

I posted some actual questions over on BYH, but thought I'd post here too, mainly just to work off nervous excitement :P I rather-belatedly (last two weeks' weather was *awful* except when husband not available to help) caught up all five sheep today, wormed and boostered and separated the...

Thought about starting this thread from related comments in other current threads. Longtime food gardeners probably already do all this, but there seem to be a lot of people on the forum relatively new to it, also I'm always interested in hearing others' suggestions. IMO you should plan your...

You know what I'm talking about, the little sort of house-roof-shaped metal thingy that sits on your furnace or fireplace flue atop your chimney and keeps rain and birds out? One of ours blew off in the really high winds earlier this week (so THAT's what the thump at 3:07 a.m. was!) and due to...

I make this whenever I've got pulled pork (or leftover roast pork) around and I am short of time or energy to cook. It is really pretty good with a big salad alongside. Quantities totally negotiable :P (e.t.a. - I use 'plain' pulled pork in this, the kind that is more or less without a sauce...

I could of course do a whole buncha research myself but youse guys probably already HAVE so I will just ask you: Are there any supermarket-type coconut products to AVOID, on the basis of the coconut oil being fully or partially hydrogenated. I don't mean things like commercially-baked cookies...

Just a thought to those "enjoying" a cold January: If you have an ice cream maker, either the salt-and-crank type or the freeze-the-gel-jacket kind, this is the time of year to make ice cream without using any electricity. Make yer icecubes outside, or on those really cold nights chill the gel...

We eat lamb probably every week or two but only the cheap cuts. But, the supermarket today had a mysterious package of really good-looking lamb loin chops that was packaged differently from the others, marked at half the price-per-kg, AND 30% off because last-date-for-sale. So I currently have...

I know I should be asking this on TEG but am having account problems and can't log in there right now, but y'all probably have just as good answers to this one anyhow :) Rodents camped out under my bush beans last year and ate much of my green bean crop and ALL of my lima beans, grrrr. This...

It is looking more and more like I may need to take the real BIG plunge into self-sufficiency... self and kids, that is :/ There is absolutely no one around, no relatives or friends, who could possibly do any kind of child care or afterschool care. Please don't argue that it's surely not the...

Subject line more or less says it all. Been doing "thaw chores" all day, had a little cheese-tasting party with the kids as a new years eve thing, I am hittin' the hay. Everyone have fun, see ya next year :) Pat

I tried this last night and it worked really well so I thought I'd pass it along. You know how there's a bunch of cookie or cookie-bar recipes that use jam, as a topping or filling or in a 'thumbprint'? Well, it turns out that homemade cranberry sauce (a fairly thick cooked-down well-gelled...