Missie Makes Good Stuff

07/13/2024

Just before putting the top brine on, these babies are gorgeous. The next 7 days are always the longest, waiting for these fridge pickles to be ready to eat! 🥒

07/13/2024

Processed 5 flats of strawberries 🍓 today with one of my best friends. I love the conversations that happen around a table when you're making food together.

Then, like any middle aged women would, we wandered around my garden and picked veggies, then made fridge pickles.

I love this little life. ♥️

07/11/2024

Social media tends to be the highlight reel, right?

I promised when sharing my journey that I'd be real with you all.

And sometimes that looks like a hot bath with your kid's lunch box ice packs on your chest, trying to get some vasodilation going to bring down this 4-day migraine you have that's knocked you on your backside.

It's been 4 straight days of nausea without throwing up (because then I'd feel better, right?) and a migraine with ringing ears.

My usual meds, treatments, and IV fluids aren't helping.

I know a lot of my friends are in the same boat.

I'm sitting here, angry, because I have so much to do this week - I have a website to build, pasta sauce to can, bees to check on, and a marketing plan to create for a client. Heck, I have 5 flats of strawberries that I felt good enough to buy but now can't process.

This is what having a chronic illness looks like. Some weeks, you're held hostage in your own body; your mind ready to run, and your body immobile in bed.

This flare sucks.

07/11/2024

I'm telling you, if you can jams or eat food in general, don't sleep on .

I scored all this - 5 flats - of strawberries 🍓 today from my local Meijer - for under $20!

Regularly priced, these would be $100 more. Picked fresh, I'd have spent $80 plus my time, gas and labor - and this week, I'm in a flare, and there's no way I'd get out to pick anything.

Are they gorgeous? No. But they aren't bad, and they're not moldy. They don't need to be pretty to make delicious jam.

These will all be cleaned, processed, and bagged up to go in the freezer until I'm ready to transform them into whatever I decide.

Happy dance! 💃

07/06/2024

Today me is happy that yesterday me made chili for when we got home from fishing. 😍

I'm a "a little chili with my cornbread, cheese and sour cream" kind of a girl. How about you?

07/03/2024

My youngest said to me this week "Mom, you're always looking at people like you're trying to figure them out."

He's not wrong! I have a running joke with some friends that "that's just her face" because I'm always wondering about and in awe of people.

07/02/2024

One thing that will bring my kids to the table in a summer morning is homemade buttermilk biscuits.

One teen comes up from his basement cave, one tween woke up from a dead sleep and our screen obsessed 9 year old put down his Duolingo.

They come out of the woodwork, mumbling and rubbing their eyes. After a few bites, they start having actual conversations. Inevitably, one will say "Mom, you make the best biscuits, jam and even honey," which makes all the butter shaving, folding, and whatnot worth every second.

06/27/2024

Got to hang out with my bees this morning! 🐝 🍯

My bees are about 2 1/2 hours from where I live. Our good friend started the hive, and a few years ago, allowed me to buy in on them. 😍

Beekeeping is one of the most rewarding and frustrating things I've ever done. It's been a learning curve where if you do it wrong, you get stung by angry little a-holes. And sometimes, even if you do it right, you get stung.

I'm constantly learning and reading and watching videos on Beekeeping and still feel like they surprise me.

This year, one hive split 3 times, and we now have 4 at my friend's farm and one at another farm.

But our hives are doing well now, and we'll have a lot of honey in the fall.

06/19/2024

Generations of brown sugar, flour, and who knows what else are tucked into the creases of this cookbook; handed down to me from my mom. She's no longer here and these cooking and baking stains are a tangible link, a reminder that she existed in this world, not just in my head and heart.

This is my go-to cookie recipe, and I love that they taste the same as the ones she made me.

06/13/2024

First canning of the year! Triple Berry Jam. 😍

I used 4 cups each of raspberries and blueberries and 10 cups of strawberries - all from the freezer. 14 cups of sugar and 1/4 cup of lemon juice. 2 boxes of Sure Jell.

It's so dang good. This batch made 10 pints, one 1/2 pint and one 1/4 pint.

I probably could have gotten another 1/4 pint out of it, but I was already putting a pint and a half in the fridge, so I just left it.

Water bath for 10 minutes and then let sit with heat off for 5 more.

Even with adding butter, I still had so much foam. I got as much as I could, but some of these will be foamy. Not a whole lot I could do about it. 🤷‍♀️ Doesn't affect the taste at all! 🍓

I'm not sure how much I'll sell this year, I might just can for my family and friends. I have accepted a part-time dream job, and I want to make sure I'm pacing myself. ❤️ I do love any excuse to can, though, so we'll see!

Next up is pasta sauce and strawberry rhubarb jam. My friend Jeni has been patiently waiting for me to can up the sauce, so that's next in line. 🍝

06/09/2024

This is so interesting! ❤️

In 1910, Marie Samuella Cromer, a dedicated rural schoolteacher in South Carolina, launched a transformative initiative known as the girls' tomato club. Her vision was ambitious: to empower young females aged 9 to 20, not only by teaching them how to cultivate superior tomatoes but also by fostering their development into better and more accomplished women. Cromer’s innovative idea quickly gained traction, leading to the formation of similar clubs across various states.

The concept behind these tomato clubs was elegantly simple yet profoundly impactful. Rural girls were taught the entire process of tomato cultivation—from planting seeds to harvesting ripe tomatoes, followed by canning the produce and finally selling it for a profit. The only task they didn’t handle was plowing their individual 1/10th-acre plots, which required more labor-intensive work. This hands-on approach provided practical agricultural education and instilled valuable life skills such as entrepreneurship, responsibility, and financial management.

One particularly remarkable example from the tomato clubs illustrates the program's success. A young girl managed to harvest an impressive 2,000 pounds of tomatoes from her plot. After selling her produce, she earned a profit of $78, equivalent to about $2,470 today. This amount was significant, especially for girls coming from economically challenging backgrounds, offering them a sense of financial independence and accomplishment.

The impact of these tomato clubs extended beyond immediate financial gains. In 1915, a tomato club member reflected on her experience, stating that although the work was “long and sometimes tiresome,” it provided her with personal spending money, covered her expenses at the Farm Camp, and allowed her to save $60 in a bank account (about $1,881 today). Such testimonies highlight how the initiative not only taught agricultural skills but also promoted financial literacy and self-reliance among young women.

The girls' tomato clubs also played a critical role in the broader context of social and educational reforms of the early 20th century. By engaging girls in meaningful, productive activities, these clubs challenged traditional gender roles and expectations. They provided a platform for young women to showcase their abilities and potential, contributing to a gradual shift in societal perceptions about women's capabilities and roles in both the family and the economy.