This little piggy goes to market…or should I say BIG piggy!  274 lbs!  Tony and I picked up our pig tonight from a local farmer here in South Dakota at the Jesse James gas station.  (Trust me when I say very small town!)  The whole process was very exciting and enlightening for us from the first conversation with the farmer to deciding how we wanted our cuts of meat.  I got a kick out of the slaughtering charge from the meat locker of $12.50.  Also our meat grinding cost came to a whopping $2.50.

Opening the boxes was like Christmas!

Oh boy, the thick cut bacon looks scrumptious!

Hams cut custom size for our small family to enjoy.

I’m thinking we are well stocked for the year.  If you know of any good pork recipes let me know!!!

Usually Tony is able to harvest us a deer to provide our meat for the year, but sadly that did not happen this fall, so hence the pig.  Hopefully this coming fall will bring us some fresh venison.

It’s getting close to that time of year again–deer season!  Tony and I depend on him shooting a deer for our “beef” supply all year round.  By this time of year I am usually running low on ground meat, but still have plenty of roasts.  The easiest way we have found to cook them is to throw them in the crock-pot.  Typically we can’t eat an entire roast in one meal, so I am getting pretty creative at making leftover meals with it.  Yesterday we shredded some of it and made tacos…tonight I made stroganoff…tomorrow, I’ll be sick of it whatever it is!  (Kind of a gross picture, but it sure beats having to buy beef all year.  Plus, after 6 years, I almost like it better than beef.  Free range meat!)

This is a project that I started probably 3 years ago but just recently finished.  It’s a small wall hanging of what I call my Modern Flowers.  I love the pop of the colors against the brown background.

I used bias tape for the blue spiral.  I used a decorative stitch on my sewing machine so that I was sure all the edges were tacked down.  I’ve learned that with spirals you can’t let the puckers bother you–they just add texture! 

Have a fabulous weekend!!!