Sandwich Week

Harvest ended a couple of weeks ago on our farm. You may or may not be surprised to learn that even when the actual removal of the grain from the fields ends, there is still field work to complete on some operations. This includes spreading fertilizers, natural and commercial, as well as tillage of the soil. This past week a great deal of both occurred on our farm.

Unlike grain harvest, the guys on our operation separate into different fields for this portion of the season. Seth is usually spreading manure in one field and the others are working ground in any given separate field. For this reason, when I take supper to the field during this time, I take individually packed meals in brown bags that I can just drop off and drive on to the next field.

Thus, last week was sandwich week. Here are the sandwiches I took:
Monday- Cheeseburgers
Tuesday- Bacon Sandwiches
Wednesday- Pioneer Woman Marlboro Man Sandwiches
Thursday- Thanksgiving
Friday- Bulk Sausage Sandwiches
Saturday- Pork Chops Cut Off the Bone Sandwiches

All of this meat came from our freezer. No shopping necessary!

Why am I telling you all of this, you might ask? The main reason is because I want you to know about my new favorite condiment. I have been enjoying this condiment for a while in a dip I like to make. The recipe for the dip is here:

Mix 8 oz of Jalapeño Raspberry Jam with a brick of cream cheese. Serve with pretzels.

This dip is good, but I do believe my new favorite way to use the hot pepper raspberry dip is to treat it like one would ketchup or mayo on the above pork sandwiches. I did receive some texts post delivery of these pork with raspberry sandwiches saying, “Awesome Sandwich!!!” Another way to use this is to marinate chicken, pork chops, or pork loin in it.

You can buy this jam and ones like it at speciality shops throughout the country. Some Kroger stores in Ohio sell it in smaller jars and you can get it at Java Nation in Celina, Ohio.

A little of the latest...

I am disappointed that I didn't get the pictures embedded in the post and that they are not in the right order, but a post is a post!

I have been enjoying the harvest time over the last several weeks. For my job, this means collecting data from our test plots and comparing hybrids and varieties of corn and soybeans as well as treatments to both crops. Believe it or not, in agriculture, many of the growers lock in their seed order for the coming year in the fall. Not all of the seed is sold before December, but a fair amount of it is and it is for many reasons. It helps secure the hybrids of the grower’s choice as really there is only so much seed to go around and once a seed company is out of a certain hybrid it may be unlikely that much more will show up. Many factors go into this, but the main point is there is only so much seed grown and it takes a whole year to get any more unless a seed company sends production to South America to grow more during our winter. So, I have been spending time finding out what seed growers want.

At home, during the harvest season, Seth is in the fields, of course. Their operation is a day or so away from being done with soybeans. Next they’ll move on to corn and this makes us sort of at a half way point through harvest. We might be a little past half, I need to ask. Anyway, when I realized we were this far along the other day, all of my get-done-during-harvest-goals passed through my mind. They are as follows:

1. Rearrange back room
2. Straighten up office and store or throw away items I do not need often
3. Upload to a printing service and print the summer’s worth of picture
4. Go to zumba
5. And, the list sort of goes on, but I don’t want to commit to anything in writing.


So, I have been working on some of this stuff. I would have ended up rearranging the back room anyway as Seth and I bought two five gallon buckets of Tide laundry soap and one five gallon bucket of Downy from his cousin who was selling it for a softball fundraiser. I am so excited to get these items and have been inspired to do as much laundry as possible to use up the jug I have so I can siphon off the first pump of Tide out of the bucket. Oh, that will be an exciting day when that happens!

I have been busy with paperwork and have spent my time in the office focusing on that. One of these days I will clean out my desk drawers, but it might be Christmas til that happens!

Oh the pictures! Well. It has always taken hours to upload pictures to the printing service I like to use. I got to thinking that we may have had an inferior internet connection. I called our provider and they said I did not have the best service they offered. I had room to actually go up two notches. I chose to go up one notch and see if it helped. IT DID! Right now, I have 910 photos from summer uploaded. I am not done uploading photos from my camera and I haven’t even started uploading cell phone pics. Of course, when it comes time to print them, I will have to shrink down my selection, but I can’t wait to get them in hard copy albums.

As for zumba, yes. I made it back. In August and September, I spend a lot of my evenings going to field days and meetings. Once harvest starts, the meetings stop, and when Seth is in the fields, I like going to Zumba since he isn’t going to be home.

I’ll try to let you know what else transpires as harvest wears on. I also want to tell you about our first niece (or nephew, for that matter), Sarah, born about 20 days ago. We are just in love with her and Seth even said Sunday morning, “If Sarah doesn’t come up here today, I want to go see her. I miss her.” We are so excited for Jaime, Kurt, and baby Sarah!

Flowers and Snow all in the same day.

This morning when I walked outside I thought, "It feels like it could rain out here." The air was cold and wet. It wasn't raining yet, but the air had a lot of humidity in it. The feeling wasn't friendly at all, but I truged forward thinking, "it wont be long."

About mid-morning I stopped at the local Kroger grocery store to get cookies and potato chips to go along with the pizza I would be delivering to one of my retailers for lunch. That is when I noticed this:







I thought, "Who in their right mind buys these flowers?" Seriously. First of all, I don't think these flowers are even that pretty. Second of all, how in the world would a person expect to keep them alive long? I mean, it is March. March, for crying out loud. I realize Kroger is not going after the green thumbs of the world here. I assume they want they figure people will buy them on a whim to "brighten the corner where they are," but I have to think that as soon as that flower goes across the mechanical belt at the check out, it will die without the new owner even knowing it. Maybe Kroger wants people to know they can always depend on them to have some flowers. That way, if want to take a live plant to your dentist, you can plan on swinging by Kroger on your way to the root canal.

I went on about my day and as I waited for the pizza while talking on the phone, I stopped the other rep I was talking to mid sentence to say, "Oh my word. It is snowing here." He was down by Cinncinati (two hours away) and he said things were covered in white. Then, facebook went nuts. People all over Ohio were writing about the snow. Pictures showed up of front yards covered in two inches of snow like it was the first snow of the winter. I guess it was equally as exciting because hopefully, it is the last. The thing was, the ground tempature was probably close to 40 degrees, so it was really odd that the snow stuck around like that.

During that time, I got this picture from Seth. I bet that when the driver of the corn planter walks out of the shop and sees this sight, it does not put him in the mood to plant corn.



Then, I drove North of Van Wert this afternoon and some of the farms up there were covered with snow, too. I drove back that way this evening and the snow had all already melted. All throughout these hours, I just couldn't help but think about those poor, little, unlikely-to-be-bought flowers at Kroger and wonder how long they'll last there and if anyone buys them, how long will they last at home?

These boots...

I bought my current pair of work boots at Rural King in Decatur, IN in the fall of 2008 and have worn the heck outta em’. They’re so comfortable and work perfect for what I do. When I first got them, I wore them for both work and out on the town. (Well, as far out on the town as Mercer county takes me.) I’ve had them for about 2.5 years now, and according to my calculations, I’ve paid about seven cents per day to have them. They’ve been worth way more than that.

Since they’re slip on, I put them on a lot when I need to run out to the car for something or take trash out or to dump food to the cats. I also wore them with shorts and high socks when I played the part of a ranger during last year’s bible school at church. I wear them with jeans to work on days when I am looking at fields in the summer and also when I am doing on farm visits with retailers in the winter. I certainly don’t want to forget about wearing them underneath my bridesmaid’s dress for most of the day of my sister’s wedding. That’s what’s nice about a good pair of boots, they keep a person warm and clear of the snow, but work equally well on hot summer days.

Just like my truck, these boots have been a lot of places with me. They’ve been with me to see friends and their families on normal weekend nights. They’ve been with me on a couple of bachelorette parties, which, by the way, is one of my favorite pastimes. They’ve been with me at work when I’ve had what I consider to be big accomplishments and when I have felt pretty discouraged. As often as I wear them, it would literally be safe to say that the right one has pushed the petal for over 60,000 miles of driving. If you look close you can see the difference between the driving shoe and the left boot. I’ve stared at them a time or two when I have tried to think about what to say next. Given that they were my first pair of work boots of my career, I hope they’ve seen some of my most trying days. You know, the days where you learn things that you will carry with you for the rest of your life.

Although these boots are still in good shape, and I plan to continue to use them for the dirty work, I know I need to wear a nicer looking boot for days I am not getting dirty, but need to portray the ability-to-work image. So, this weekend I went back to the same store in Decatur, IN to pick out a new model of these boots. I surveyed the options, although I am one to try new things, I just couldn’t find a pair I liked as well as my current model. So, what did I do? I went ahead and bought another pair of the same darn thing. Don’t they look nice? I think they’ll be worth the seven cents per day over the next couple of years.