Now, a great deal of my inspiration comes from my older sister, The Country Contessa, who is living the life I thought I would have when I was little. While my Mother pulled me and my other siblings to work hard on our acre so that it would look like no weed ever thought of growing the now Country Contessa stayed in the house listening to music, baking, and cleaning. The reason for this was two fold. 1) She was good at cleaning and my mother was more than happy to leave it to her and 2) She did not like to be dirty...more on this later. From my perspective my mother believed that our one acre in the country should be so well maintained that anyone who came to visit never even thought of the possibility that a weed would dare show its face or that a bush have any wayward branch stretching farther than the others on the bush. The result was a beautiful yard that visitors accepted without acknowledging the extraordinary effort of "Mother's Helpers", as she called us, the hours of weeding, hula hoeing, raking, trimming, mowing, planting, watering, etc. To give credit our mother was right there besides us, pushing us to give everything we had, teaching us to sing joyfully while we worked, instilling in us the luxury of a coveted rest under the shade of an orange tree, and trying unsuccessfully to keep me from shaking the dirt from my weeds onto my sisters and throwing worms at them to hear them squeal.
I spent my days playing at being an Indian or Cowboy, complete with staining my face and clothes with "dye" from green walnuts and pomegranates I had mushed by hand with rocks. I stole tools from my dad's shed to take into the acres of overgrown Christmas Trees behind our house so that I could build strategically placed and camouflaged forts. I endeavored to light fires by rubbing sticks together and trap wild animals I never saw but believed wholeheartedly surrounded me everywhere. In truth there were only feral cats and the occasional coyotes but I spent years laying in wait for the foxes, wild rabbits, and whatever else might enter my traps. I built a rabbit cage from chicken wire and pieces of old rotten lumber I found laying around after my mother refused my request to get rabbits. I figured even if she had said no having a cage would be one step closer to a yes. I suffered innumerable scratches and blisters on my youthful hands from sawing, hammering, working with wire, and ultimately building professional grade rabbit cages with j-clips, wire cutters, and appropriate wire for rabbit cages as my dad took an uncharacteristic and treasured interest in my stubborn project teaching me how to build cages. After I had three cages built my mother relented on the rabbit issue. I ended up with seven cages, including my crooked yet functional first attempt, and up to 13 rabbits at a time. In addition to this I gutted the old wooden shed on our property, directing my younger siblings, tore up a floor board to reveal the dirt beneath in order to provide a living space for the chickens we would have for years to come. All of this before the age of 13. Meanwhile my dear Country Contessa was cooking, baking, cleaning, looking mature and lovely, cutting out pictures of Mel Gibson and placing them under her mattress, and day dreaming of the man she would one day marry.
This all being the case, how is it then that I live in an apartment with my wonderful warrior ninja, in a suburb of Los Angeles, expecting a child and working while she has a beautiful house in the kern county, with a chicken coop, slaughtering her own chickens for dinner, cats, a producing garden, and plans for a rabbitry in the near future for breeding meat rabbits, while raising and homeschooling six children! She already has a plan on how to slaughter, skin, and breed them. All information which I had have been gathering since I was 11 she gets to practice. I still cannot believe that my older clean and tidy sister assisted in the slaughter of a chicken. At any rate she is the reason that I am now pursuing the idea of being a bit more self-sustaining even though I live in the city. I have always loved that sort of thing and although I may not be able to have a chicken coop I believe I can have a functioning rabbitry in the city and canning is also something I could do.
SO! Welcome to my adventure of pregnancy, motherhood, homemaker, working woman, self-sustainer! Yea...I might be in over my head...
This may be the first recipe I try with rabbit meat! Taken from the Homestead and Homekeeping blog listed in the right column. Thanks Kat!
Creamy Rabbit and Rice
1 rabbit cut into pieces
1 cup sour cream
1 can cream of mushroom soup
1 package of onion soup mix
Salt and pepper to taste. Place salt and peppered rabbit pieces in crockpot. Then mix the other ingredients in a bowl and dump on top of the rabbit making sure that all of the rabbit is covered. Cook on low for about 6 hours or on high for about 3 1/2 to 4 hours. When the rabbit is tender it is done. I served this over brown rice with a side of asparagus and sliced tomatoes. I also served with garlic bread. Super yummy and oh so easy.
Here are some of the websites I have been looking at for ideas in canning and rabbitry:
Right now I am going to focus on canning soup as I like soup and the process seems a little more simple than making jelly. Also don't particularly care for foods with vinegar.
http://pickyourown.org/canningsoups.htm
I like this video as it shows some nice nesting drop boxes and a variety of different cage set ups.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ufBWrSdlwTM&feature=related
Having looked at a lot of different sites and ideas on how to tan hides this seems like the most simple route to go as well as being able to accomplish without any electricity at all.
http://www.motherearthnews.com/Modern-Homesteading/1983-01-01/How-To-Tan-Rabbit-Hides.aspx
No comments:
Post a Comment