The Road Not Taken



                                           Two roads diverged in a yellow wood
                                           And sorry I could not travel both,
                                           And be one traveler, long I stood
                                           And looked down one as far as I could
                                           To where it bent in the undergrowth.

                                           Then took the other, as just as fair,
                                           And having perhaps the better claim
                                           Because it was grassy and wanted wear,
                                           Though as for that the passing there
                                           Had worn them really about the same,

                                           And both that morning equally lay
                                           In leaves no step had trodden black.
                                           Oh, I marked the first for another day!
                                           Yet knowing how way leads on to way
                                            I doubted if I should ever come back.

                                            I shall be telling this with a sigh
                                           Somewhere ages and ages hence:
                                           Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,
                                            I took the one less traveled by,
                                           And that has made all the difference.

                                                                               Robert Frost

Old Barns and What You Find in Them

     Moshe and I love old barns.  We take pictures of them all the time.  One day we drove around for the sole purpose of photographing  barns in various states of disrepair.  There are many, many such barns up here in the North Georgia mountains.  I find them very beautiful, and, like everything else in my life, I have a tendency to name them.  This one is "Cinderella's Castle".

    

      Old buildings have such stories to tell . Surely they have seen good times and bad.  Surely they have known good people and bad.  Ahhh, if only they could speak...

        

     What all would this picture say?  What IS all this stuff? Why was it delegated to the barn?  Why wasn't it thrown away? Did someone think they would use it again someday?    Save it for parts?   Did it belong to "Grandma" or "Aunt Sally" and, somehow, it would be sacriligious to throw it away? Or, was the barn owner just lazy, and put the items in the barn, like Scarlett O'Hara, "I'll think about that tomorrow"?

(My vote goes for the latter... human nature being what it is.)

     I love old barns.  Part of me wishes we had one on our property.  But, like I said,  human nature being what it is, our barn would quickly be full of stuff.  And, someday, someone would see its contents and wonder, "What WERE they thinking???"

                                     Shalom y'all,     Twyla

    

Organic Eggs vs Storebought

This  is from a  CNN news story I read last night on the Internet:


A law firm specializing in food poisoning cases has filed a suit related to the tainted eggs

The CDC estimates hundreds of Americans have been rendered ill by contaminated eggs

Iowa's Wright County Egg has recalled 380 million eggs due to salmonella concerns

The U.S. egg industry produced about 6.5 billion eggs in April

The Egg Safety Center has a complete list of recalled eggs, their expiration dates, and brands.

(CNN) -- Hundreds of Americans have likely become ill from tainted eggs, according to estimates from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, CDC spokeswoman Lola Russell said Thursday.

The Food and Drug Administration, which investigates food contamination, said the CDC received reports of approximately 200 salmonella cases every week during late June and early July. Normally, the CDC has received an average of some 50 reports of salmonella illness each week for the past five years. Many states have also reported increases of this pattern since May 2010, the FDA said.

A few of our organic eggs.

    

  












 WOW! I'm so glad we have our 11 hens  - we get between 8 and 13 eggs per day... Nice, pretty, brown, organic SAFE eggs.  Thanks to "Pretty Face", "Runt",  "Miss Congeniality", "Big Mouth", et al. Various shades of brown, various sizes... invariably delicious and healthy. All praise be to God.

Applesauce Magic

       Today we went apple-picking. Free apples, just pick 'em yourself. It only took us a few minutes to fill the two boxes we brought in the Jeep. I'm guessing we picked 100 or so apples.

      Now, that would be a daunting
chore if it weren't for my handy kitchen gadgets! I remember making applesauce about 30 years ago, and it was an all-day process... peeling, coring, slicing, cooking, pushing everything through a special  sieve, then, finally, canning it all. But, today I made applesauce "like Granda used to make", only much more speedily. Moshe and I worked together on getting the apples ready to cook; Moshe manned our newest gadget - the Apple Peeler-Corer-Slicer. Then, I chopped them a bit more, and discarded any brown spots. We processed 40 apples within 15 minutes!

After cooking them, I removed about 1/3 of them and mashed them with an old-fashioned potato masher.  The remaining 2/3's were quickly blended in the blender. I combined it all, stirred
it up, and started the canning process.

    
       Here is the result of our labor. Eight quarts of
wonderful applesauce, ready to be stored away and opened on some snowy day.
      
     My Recipe for Old-TImey Applesauce:
                                      (makes 8 Quarts)
40 Apples, peeled, cored, and sliced
  6 Cups Water
  2 Cups Sugar
  2 Teaspoons Cinnamon

     Combine all ingredients in LARGE pot; bring to boil, then, simmer for 20 minutes. For chunky applesauce, remove approximately one-third of the apples and chop them coarsely; set aside.  Blend the remaining apple mixture (in batches) with a blender or food processor until smooth; combine both mixtures and stir.  Have your hot canning jars, tops, and rings ready; also, have your water boiling for a canning bath.
(***Optional: Place a few pieces of orange and a few whole cloves in each jar as you fill it with applesauce.)
Place into canning bath for 20 minutes. Remove, and listen for the wonderful "ping" of the jars sealing!  Music to  the ears of a country cook!

Pencil Art

It is not often that I receive an email as impressive as this one. Somebody was really creative both with their art and their words. Hope you will enjoy!

A PENCIL MAKER TOLD THE PENCIL 5 IMPORTANT LESSONS JUST BEFORE PUTTING IT IN THE BOX :

1.) EVERYTHING YOU DO WILL ALWAYS LEAVE A MARK

2.) YOU CAN ALWAYS CORRECT THE MISTAKES YOU MAKE. 3.) WHAT IS IMPORTANT IS WHAT IS INSIDE OF YOU.

4.) IN LIFE, YOU WILL UNDERGO PAINFUL SHARPENINGS, WHICH WILL ONLY MAKE YOU BETTER.

5.) TO BE THE BEST PENCIL, YOU MUST ALLOW YOURSELF TO BE HELD AND GUIDED BY THE HAND THAT HOLDS YOU.

We all need to be constantly sharpened. This parable may encourage you to know that you are a special person, with unique God-given talents and abilities. Only you can fulfill the purpose which you were born to accomplish. Never allow yourself to get discouraged and think that your life is insignificant and cannot be changed and, like the pencil, always remember that the most important part of who you are, is what's inside of you.

Shalom to all, Twyla

Is this near La-La Land?

My Hubby got my account to come back up, so I'm posting again... I'm good at a few things, but, computer is not one of them. If something isn't working, I'm at a complete loss.

We went down the mountain this past Sunday for a family birthday celebration. My oldest brother, his son, and my son-in-law all have birthdays in August, so we had a combo birthday party. Great fun, and way too much food!
"Going down the mountain" requires planning when you have animals and plants depending on you. The chickens must be fed and watered, eggs gathered, crops harvested, and everything secured against predators. We have bears, deer, rabbits, and mountain lions, all desiring to eat our chickens or our garden. So far, we've been extremely blessed and have only lost a couple tomatoes and a few ears of corn. No animal casualties. Praise Adonai.

So, we went down the mountain, ate way too much. laughed alot, talked alot, and headed back up the mountain to get home before dark. We always carry at least one camera with us, so we stopped to take a few pictures along the way. This photo is of an actual business about an hour's drive from home. I laugh every time I drive by. My first trip up the mountain, when I was looking for a house to buy, I was with my friend Pat. When we saw this sign, we laughed 'til we cried. Hope y'all can appreciate this little store being "smack dab in the middle of nowhere".

Back In The Saddle

This is actually Twyla's happy hubby. I needed to figure out how to get Twyla back into her blog and get her to posting again. I'm going to try to motivate her to post more often. Check back in the near future to see what she has to share.

Shalom, Moshe