by Jessica | Last Updated: Mar 23, 2018 | Rabbits
I find it appropriate to start this blog as winter gives way to spring, a new chance, a new start. As roving bands of turkeys strut through my yard in all their gaudy glory, I realize winter truly is over. Our end of winter in rural Eastern Oregon usually ends...
by Jessica | Last Updated: Nov 15, 2024 | Canning & Pickling, Our Kitchen, Recipes
Pressure canning is a method used to preserve low acid foods such as vegetables and meat, beans and broth. Low acid foods need to be heated to at least 240° F in order to kill any Clostridium botulinum spores, what is commonly known as botulism, that thrive in a low...
by Jessica | Last Updated: Nov 15, 2024 | Fermenting & Cheesemaking, Food Preservation, Our Kitchen, Recipes
Kombucha is everywhere you turn, from high-end restaurants and grocery stores to quick in and out gas stations. If you are not familiar with kombucha, it is a probiotic-rich, fermented tea drink with a fizzy vinegary tang. It is largely classified as a...
by Jessica | Last Updated: Mar 5, 2018 | Rabbits
My sister April, first started talking about purchasing meat rabbits a few years ago but was having difficulty finding good breeding stock in Alaska. She always visits Oregon in the summer so I thought I would look for a few rabbits of breeding age where I live, and...
by Jessica | Last Updated: Jul 1, 2020 | Chickens, Poultry
If I could only pick one animal to have on my homestead, it would be chickens. Hands down, no contest! I know I am not alone in my thinking, I recently read a study that claims chickens are kept in every major city in the United States! In the last 3 years, an...
by Jessica | Last Updated: Mar 5, 2018 | Gardening
The very first vegetable (or fruit) I grew was a cherry tomato plant, a hybrid sweet 100, that I came across while was perusing the end-of-spring garden tables at our local hardware store. I planted it against a sunny south side wall of our house in Portland, Oregon....
