Country Girl in the Village: Life in the Village

Mine would be the painted faced kid

Life in my corner of the Village has been busy this week. It was Homecoming for our school district. My boys both play football so they were involved in the parade that went through town. Of course, after the parade, even in the freezing cold, we had to attend the football game. Our team won, but they played my old alma matter so it was a weirdly bitter sweet moment, to be on the opposite side of the town that I grew up in. It was nice though to see my boys so involved in the town that they are growing up in. This is their home town. This is where they will make lifelong friendships and memories. It will be the place they one day bring home wives and maybe even want to settle down to raise families…Close to mom…a girl can home right?

My youngest played a hard won football game on Saturday. It poured rain for the entire game. Those boys were soaked to the bone and cold but they played with heart and determination. In the end, they won against a team that has been undefeated for the whole season. It was a nail biter too, the score was 0-0 until the last 2 minutes of the game when our boys scored a touchdown and the 2 extra points. Whew.

Something about rainy days makes me want to craft things. My Pinterest boards are over flowing with things that I have plans to make and try. This weekend I made the boys each a bulletin board for pictures. I added hooks to the bottom so that they can hang up their baseball award medals. The oldest boy’s was made with red foam board inside of a wooden frame that I picked up at Hobby Lobby. My youngest boy’s was a cork board that I found at Michaels. I embellished them with scrap book stickers. They both liked the way they turned out. I think they mostly like having pictures up in their rooms of their friends and them. They are reaching that age when their rooms are their own little piece of the world. Where they display what is important to them, much like I do throughout my house.

I have pretty recently joined the Twitter craze. I am so late to the party, but people have been awesome to me anyways. There is this concept that goes on with Foodies on Twitter, it’s called Sunday Supper. I was excited to join up and tweet about what my family was doing for Sunday Supper. It reminds me of when I was younger and all my aunts, uncles and cousins met up at my grandparents’ house to have Sunday Supper together. My Sunday Suppers are much smaller now, they consist of my boys, husband and me for the most part but the memories and just being together will hopefully be just as great.

In keeping with my Unprocessed October pledge, today, for Sunday Supper, I roasted a small turkey. I slathered up the outside in olive oil and sprinkled the traditional herbs of rosemary, sage and thyme on the bird. I also added a nice helping of minced garlic. Who doesn’t love garlic? I layered the bottom of the roast pan with large chunks of onions and celery and topped them with a bit of chicken stock. To go with our turkey, I mashed potatoes and made carrots with a light drizzle of honey to glaze them. Gravy was made from the drippings in the roasting pan. This all was topped off with my favorite part of the meal…Cranberry sauce. I love cranberry sauce. I do not know why I only make it during the fall and early winter months. It is one of my absolute favorite condiments. I take whole cranberries, pour a cup of sugar over the top and heat them together. The berries open and the juice combine with the sugar to make a delicious goo. I use a cinnamon stick to stir the cranberries. It adds just enough cinnamon to compliment the berries tartness but not enough to take over the flavor profile.

All cuddled in together

After dinner, I drove over of my favorite farm. My chickens, not too long ago suffered from an over eager dog attack and we lost 3 birds. I would like to point out it was not my dogs that attacked my birds, but a neighbors from around the block who had gotten a new puppy Black Lab and were not aware he could scale fences. They were properly upset by it all but I was so sad to lose some of my ladies. Tina Turner was one of my favorite hens and she is missed. However, my dear friends at Iron Oak Farm in Fenton, Michigan were generous enough to let me shop at their farm for some of their farm bred chickens. I picked out 2 Blue Wyandottes. I stayed to drive the tractor and pet baby goats. Is there really anything more fun? I would be hard pressed to think of something at the moment.

I even took time to drive around on our back country roads and peep out the Fall colors. Michigan has some beautiful foliage this time of year. I love finding the bright trees and weather barns. People must think I am crazy when I stop to snap pictures. The plus side is that at least the roads are deserted when I do it.