Boston Baked Beans from Scratch

I am SO obsessed with cooking from scratch. I have no canned foods in my pantry....CRAZY right?   I had recently made my sisters famous white bean and chicken chili (delish) and soaked more beans than I needed. What to do, what to do.....For dinner I had a roast in the crock pot, potatoes boiling for some mashed potatoes and what should we have as a side dish?  Baked beans sounded good....hmmm....I wonder.....so I turned to my favorite place to search out recipes ...allrecipes.com, and wouldn't you know it?  I found a recipe for Boston Baked Beans from SCRATCH and it have a 4 and a half star rating!  Well I was out of bacon, but had everything else and my beans were already soaked, so I tossed everyting into my small crock pot and let them cook away the rest of the afternoon.  The smell was a amazing, but they tasted even better.  I am hooked. I will never buy canned beans again.  ENJOY!http://allrecipes.com/recipe/boston-baked-beans/detail.aspx

The Hillbilly House

All of my life I have wanted a small piece of property in the country to have an enormous garden, fruit trees and chickens.  With limited finances and my husbands and my shared desire to stay out of debt we knew this would not be an easy thing to find.  However, we also know that the Lord wants to give us the desires of our hearts and knew that someday we would find our small piece of heaven here on earth.  I would occasionally look at craigslist and real estate listings, but everything was WAY out of our price range.  Then one day as I was checking out online listings I found a small piece of property was only 3 miles from our home and backed up to a timber!!  Not surrounded by corn fields!! In Illinois?  Was this even possible?  To top it off, it was something we could afford to pay cash for!  I couldn't wait to call the realtor to see it.  We drove out to find it immediately and OH MY, WHAT A MESS!  On this lovely 0.65 acres facing the lovely timber and privacy all around, was THE MOST horrible house you can imagine!  It looked as if they just kept adding on a few feet as they found the lumber. Built on top of dirt, the floors were caving in, the ceiling was falling down, critters had definitely made their homes in the walls and attic, and the wiring had been done with lots and lots and lots of electrical tape. DREADFUL!  But, as we looked at it we knew that the value was in the property and NOT in the house!  We made a low offer right away, he countered with a reasonable counter offer and the property was ours!  We immediately cut down the 3 plus foot tall grass inch by inche with our small riding lawn mower, put in a HUGE garden and starting planting blueberries, blackberries, raspberries, and apple tree and a plum tree.  We got chickens and moved the rabbit production there as well.  It is still a huge mess though.  Transformation will take us several years and we will turn the horrible hillbilly house into a cozy cabin.  I am blessed to have a husband who can do anything.  I know it will be ALOT of hard work, but I am certain it will be worth it. I Praise God for that hard work and for giving us the desires of our hearts.  God is good........

Sharing my knowledge with others OR Why I Am Cheap.

I was approached yesterday about writing a cookbook or a How To book about all that goes on in my kitchen. This is not the first time I have been asked.  Actually, I get asked ALOT!  This is when I found out I was not "normal" or maybe typical is a better word.  I was raised in a household that clung to its traditional roots of cooking from scratch and making things last." Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without." is my motto.  I realize that isn't a common or acceptable idea these days, but it is practical as well as good stewardship.  Not only does making good use of everything you have pleasing to God, ( who so benevolently provided these thing to us) it is also good for our world.  Here are a few examples.  We have a friend who makes fun of me (good humored of course) because I can make use of nearly everything that most people throw away.  I save drier lint!  YES, DRIER LINT!  I stuff in in toilet paper tubes and use it as fire starter when we have bon fires.
       I save citrus peels (orange, lemon) and add that to distilled white vinegar, let it sit a few days, then dilute to make a fabulous smelling, grease cutting all-purpose NATURAL cleaner with NO CHEMICALS!  These are just TWO of the many things I do in my household to be a good steward.  In the future posts I promise to share more about how we budget our money biblically,  how we plan meals,  give to others and still have money to save on just my husbands part-time teaching job and our odd jobs.  We are debt free and own two properties and God ALWAYS gives us more than we deserve. Praise God daily for all that you have.
 Until next time......
God Bless, 
Michelle

Habanero Jelly

It is that time of year again!  The peppers are coming in like gangbusters and this is my FAVORITE jelly to make!  I found the recipe last harvest season at allrecipes.com. Here is the link:   http://allrecipes.com/recipe/habanero-pepper-jelly/detail.aspx

This jelly is super easy to make but BE WARNED!  I wear goggles and latex gloves when I make this. The first time I started chopping the peppers without this safety gear and I was in PAIN!!  The fumes burned my eyes so bad I could not see and if you have even the SMALLEST of cuts  on your hands or around your nails you will experience great burning pain! P.S. Don't touch your face!!

With that said, we enjoy the finished product with pretzels, cream cheese and crackers or as a glaze for pork roast.  If you are thinking....Habaneros are too hot!!, well I think you would have to try it to decide for yourself. We LOVE hot things in our house, but this is NOT burn your face off hot. It has a great flavor with a mild heat. Try it!  I think you will love it.

Welcome to my Blog! I started this blog to share our love for Jesus, recipes, inspiration, and our simple living philosophy with others.

When I met my husband in 2011 we both knew we were "weird". The funny thing was, we were both totally  comfortable with our "weirdness". So of course when you find someone as equally as "weird" as you are, you hang on and don't let go because you know you are in for a crazy and fun ride.

Over the past two years we have had quite an adventure!  In our first few months of marriage we experienced my husband gratuating top of his class from Bible College, a new job and the loss of that job, and 2 moves.  Add to that the start of a brand new ministry, a teen changing schools, adjusting to a new town, new friends and the loss of old friends AND starting a new business and total lifestyle change. SHEW!!  Yes, it has been overwhelming at times, but with our complete faith in God knowing what is best for us, giving it all up to HIM, and repeating "God's got this!", we have endured and come out much stronger than we ever thought possible. So, please join us in our "weirdness" as we explore Faith, Holistic living, simplicity, back to basics lifestyle.  We would love for you to share your wisdom as well. Let this be a forum for all those interested in THE SIMPLE LIFE with God as the head, and we as the hands and feet. God Bless and until next time. Michelle