2024 - JANUARY - What Did You Do To Prep This Week?Month?

Holidays are over! Hope you all enjoyed the festivities.

We enjoyed having family here for a week, got to meet some little grand-nieces and nephew I'd not met yet. They were a joy to be with.

I spent a few days after Christmas finishing a quilt. It is now on it's way to the recipient. I'm working on another - requested from a dear family member (never realized she wanted one. OOPS!).

Walmart had the 10 pound bags of chicken on sale again for $3 each! I bought two bags, baked them, shredded, and froze them for future meals.

We started the wood stove on the 2nd day of the new year - if finally chilled down enough to do so.

Husband has been making smoked things in his smoker-the latest-some seriously good Canadian bacon. It is yummy. We sent the guests home with smoked jerky and bacon. He also canned spaghetti sauce, and we restocked the freezer with chicken stew, more smoked homemade sausage, and hamburger soup. We've also been stocking up on canned meats lately.

We've been busy. I am making 2 more quilts (sigh).

Husband has been canning. He's canned 14 quarts of hamburger soup and 7 quarts of chili.

We have burned through half of last year's wood. I didn't buy any wood for this year because we barely burned any last year. Whatever isn't burned this year will go for the fire pit this summer. It'll be too dry to burn next year.

The big news is...we have another dog. Someone was giving him away for free. Husband and I took one look and our hearts melted, he looked so much like one of our previous dogs. He's an amazing dog, we love him. He fits right in with our two other dogs, and they're all having fun together.

I cleaned out my kitchen pantry cabinets and I found some stuff that was closing in on expiration. I made two double batches of dog treats with the tuna, the oatmeal, and the rice flour. The dogs adore them. They love them so much, that I will now make the homemade treats instead of buying commercial treats.