~~Davis' in the Kitchen

We've been busy in the kitchen. We have some friends that have blessed us very much with lots of goodies from there abundant garden. They have shared so much with us this season and we are so grateful. THANK YOU SMITH FAMILY!! :) Apples, peaches, basil, oregano, squash, carrots, pears, peppers and tomatoes.
Made applesauce

Canned pears

Made Pesto

Froze Squash

Blanched Corn & then froze.

Drying basil.

Gran~thank you for passing down your awesome dehydrator, we use it all the time!

I received an early birthday gift from my brother in law and sister in law. I received a gift certificate to the Solar Institute! This is one of the things I purchased with the certificate. I've been wanting to learn to cook with Cast Iron. Soooo, I purchased a cast iron skillet!! Here's a picture of it being seasoned with bacon grease.

Canned the applesauce

Cut, blanched and froze carrots.

Basil Cubes for winter. I've been told you can add these to any soup during the winter and have fresh basil.

Road Trip!

Here's a few pics from a last minute trip to Nor Cal last week. We visited with Dusty's family for a few days. We hadn't seen them in 10 months so it was a long over due trip. Since we only had Kaianah with us we were able to take the Toyota Yaris. We averaged 38 mpg on the way there and 40mpg on the way back. AC on the whole drive. Not to bad. :)
These are just a few pic from the Solar Institute in Hopland, Ca.

Long car drive, Kaianah was a trooper.

Our very sweet niece, Cora. So cute!

Kaianah playing at the Solar institute.

~~COUSINS~~
Kaianah, Cora & Adia

CASH FOR CLUNKERS?!

Dave Ramsey's Thoughts on "Cash for Clunkers"

With all the buzz about Cash for Clunkers, it’s easy to think that it was a great way for people to get a better set of wheels. But was it really? No way! Cash for Clunkers was simply a way for broke people to buy cars that they really couldn't afford. It was a bad idea on multiple levels. But before digging into that, let’s take a little history lesson.

About a decade ago, a fair housing program was started, called a sub-prime lending market. The idea behind it was that everyone “needed” to own a home—including broke people. The government decided to start a program to reinvest in communities, which allowed pretty much anyone to borrow money to buy a house. Lending companies charged high interest rates, causing already struggling families to go even further into debt.

Basically, this was a program designed to encourage broke people to buy houses. Most people didn’t even know it existed until it unraveled and became the number-one cause of our recent recession. The government took those stupid loans back and securitized them, which created the financial mess last fall. Helping broke people buy houses didn’t turn out to be a great government program. Guess what? Helping broke people buy brand-new cars—and now home appliances—will turn out just as bad.

The Cash for Clunkers program was designed exactly for people who should not take advantage of the program. You trade your $2,000 clunker in for a brand-new, shiny $20,000 car, and the only way you can afford it is with a high-interest payment. That just means you really couldn’t afford it to begin with. Doesn’t this sound like the sub-prime mortgage problem all over again?

When you drive that new car off the lot, you’re immediately going to lose $4,500. The worst car accidents happen on the showroom floor. New cars go down in value like a rock. The government thinks it’s going to save the American auto industry by putting broke people into cars they can’t pay for. It’s going to come back to bite them—and the rest of us—in the form of taxes galore.

Another bad thing about this program is that we, the taxpayers, are paying for the new cars! It’s morally wrong of the government to take money away from us—against our will—in the form of taxes and give that money to someone else to buy a stupid car they can’t afford in the first place! This is theft, plain and simple.

Cash for Clunkers is a program that redistributes wealth in the name of the environment, and it’s going to be a curse on the car dealer and the manufacturer that carries the paper. It’s going to hurt the broke person who bought a car he couldn’t afford. And it’s already a problem for our country, because it’s adding dollars to the national debt.

There’s always a twist with government programs like this. They try to think of creative ways to help people, but the situation usually ends up worse than it did before they “helped.” In the end, I should decide what to do with my own money. If I want to buy you a car, I will! And if you can’t buy a car without actually paying for the whole thing, then you’re better off keeping your “clunker.”

So good riddance to a really bad program that has done more damage than good.

The Last 4 Days

We've been busy! 4 outta the 5 kiddos went to California with Grandpa & Grandma Fitzpatrick for 2-3 weeks! Leaving us with just the baby, Kaianah. The day they left Kaianah spiked a fever. We ended the day with a temp of 104.2 YIKES! A tad bit toasty, poor baby. Turns out she's had Roseola. (According to Leia Davis, MD)
This was her first smile in 4 days!

We are still working on the COB structure...

I'm digging the floor. I know that sounds weird but you have to remove the top layer of soil to get all the organic matter off.

Still working on our wood supply for winter. 2 cords down 2 to go.

2 Tons (plus a little extra) of straw, off of Craigslist for $40 (good deal!) We will use the straw for a few of the walls in the COB structure, then the rest for mixing the COB.

When the deals come you've gotta act fast or they pass you by. Our cows are grass feed but during the winter that grass is covered in snow, so we have to buy feed for them. We got all of this organic alfalfa for $76. It's almost 2 1/2 TONS. Great deal!

We were blessed with yummy veggies from a friends garden, here's some salsa that I made with her jalapenos and tomatoes.

They gave us a ton of tomatoes, so I made 2 large batches of marinara sauce for the freezer. We'll use it up this winter.

It's a little easier with a Vita-Mix. I just put carrot, olive oil, onion, tomatoes, oregano, basil and pepper in the Vita-Mix and mix it up. This is a raw marinara, I don't cook out all the enzymes. Once I'm ready to use it I simmer the marinara just enough to be warm and serve it over the hot pasta.

We've been doing much more than this over the last few days...Dusty slaughtered our Thanksgiving Turkey. I'll post pics of that on the next entry. We've been shredding zucchini, cutting squash and using our food saver to be able to use these veggies this winter.

~~COB UPDATE~~(Earthen Structure)

Alanah has turned into a big helper. She's been joining Dusty in the last few trips of gathering urbanite for the COB structure.

Here's another Cobbers Companion...Kaianah decided to go for a little swim in the kiddy pool just prior to joining Dad in his COB building endeavours.

This looks like a good seat!

Gathering, gathering, gathering. That pretty much sums up the last few weeks of foundation building.

Here comes another load...

Now this needs to be unloaded and placed.

Your looking at layers and layers of rock and urbanite.

It's coming along, it won't be long til we can start on the walls.