180°

i know to most it seems such an awful waste but items one through twelve  on the above diagram are all ground meat. we still have steaks left over from the half beef that we got in the spring. it is the burger that goes quickly around here. spaghetti meat sauce, tacos, meat loaf, chili, burgers and many other tasty dishes all require ground meat and that is what those kids mostly like.

the meat processing went wonderfully. james has this three quarter horse commercial meat grinder. it chewed everything that we could throw at it--first time.  i also cubed twenty plus pounds of lean meat for tabitha to can. it made a pressure cooker load and dinner last night. the kids liked the stew from the butcher two days prior. another ridiculously-local meal from the omelay farm.

cancel the appointment with the slaughter plant..

i have already recovered from the mad-slaughter. i plan to do it again. those pigs will be next. seeing the stuff that we didn't add to the grinder and realizing that a processor would have just added it plus.. even though it took four shots to kill that steer i am sure that it was more gentle on him than riding to a slaughter plant and getting killed there. plus, meat tastes better from an animal that isn't stressed. yes i already ate some. it is good.

thank you everyone for your words of support. it was traumatic but, so was the first time we butchered chicken. now we have a system and it is just part of our lifestyle. butchering our other animals will likely become part of our deal too.

i really liked the home schooling opportunity when i was sawing up the bones for beef stock. explaining a ball and socket joint having a working example on hand is rather interesting--anatomy 101.

we played uno (card game) for several games this afternoon. toly joined in for the first time. amazingly he got it right away. i was totally blown away. tristan was really trying some strategy but didn't win until the very last game. it is difficult to understand, no matter how well you play uno is still mostly a game of luck.  it doesn't help having a really lucky sister that taunts you with her alleged mental powers of mind over matter. he was in tears before that the final win. furthermore he harbored a grudge toward her for quite a while. i was only a minor villain, even though i actually threw the game and tried to throw it on several earlier occasions only to have one of his siblings swoop in for the win.

jocelyn is back from her visit with her beau. we hope she is bred--fingers crossed. she is really upset that phoenix is gone and the place probably smells like blood.  it is raining tonight and hopefully it will wash away the rest of the kill smell. henry is feeling better, he is happy to have jocelyn back. but when we arranged a meeting between jocelyn and astrid, henry noticed that jocelyn was throwing her head toward astrid and threw a fit. he came rushing toward her with all his most aggressive force and suggested to jocelyn that the puppy was HIS.

i guess after he had to save the puppy from being mauled by the pigs he is a little defensive of her. oh yes, he saved that puppy's life. before that i was sure that he didn't like her. in fact when i heard henry making attack sounds from the upper yard, i was sure that he was killing astrid. joy, he was saving her from the pigs. what a good dog.

i take my certification test tomorrow. i should be studying instead of blogging...