Harley the horse

 Meet the newest member on our farm, Harley.

   

I'm not much of a horse person.  I've ridden on horses once maybe twice in my 

entire life.  I didn't hate it but I wasn't impressed either.

Hubby and the kids have been wanting a horse.  So about a month or so ago we 

finally got a horse.  Hubby had a horse growing up so he knows how to handle horses

and has been teaching the kids how to properly care for Harley and saddle him up etc.

Harley is a 14 year-old Tennessee Walker.  He is actually really mellow.  He likes

carrots and apples.

He is a good riding horse.  The whole family, including myself have ridden him.  

I like how he loves kids.  In the morning when we walk the kids out to the bus stop he 

would usually come up to the fence to say hi.  It's so cute.

In this picture, the ferrier is giving Harley a pedicure lol  And while he was getting

his pedi done, I decided to give him a Donald Trump hair-do.  lol  Doesn't he look so 

handsome?

Mr. ferrier said Harley's hooves look great.  He does have a crack on the bottom of

one of his hooves though.  The ferrier said it's nothing to worry about.   During the 

hot wet months here in Texas with all the rain and wet ground horses walk on the

wet ground and making their hooves wet and soft.  The ground usually dry faster 

than their hooves so when the ground dries up and the horses walking on the now 

dried-up hard ground with their soft hooves sometimes make the bottom of their 

hooves crack.  but I was told that the crack should get better during the winter 

months when it's more dry and not as wet.  I'm just slowly learning all these new 

things about horses.

Barbacoa

 So we just took our two steers in to get butchered about 2 weeks ago and we just got our meat back 2 days ago.  My little chica wanted to make barbacoa so we kept both of the heads.  This is both myself and my chica's first experience making barbacoa.  Let's just say this is an interesting experience and at times gross.

Doing barbacoa is a lot of work and it was really messy.  First thing we did was to soak the heads in water for a few hours.

Then we washed the heads super good (when I say we, that means chica, chica's hubby, and my hubby, I helped occasionally without really getting my hands dirty).  We scrubbed, sprayed, rinsed, and even pulled the brains out of the heads.  Afterward, we soaked the heads in salt water over night.

Next thing we did was rub seasoning on the heads/meat then put them in the pot and steam with some garlic and onions.  The heads were big enough to where we had to use 2 separate 32 qts pots to cook both of them at the same time.

After about 8 hours of steaming, the meat just fell off the bones.  Meat was nice and tender.

This is what 8 hours of steaming did to the cow head.

The eyeballs kind of melted too after being steamed for so long.  No one dared to eat the eyeballs so we just pulled them off the heads and tossed them.

   

I'm actually surprised at how much meat actually came off the two skulls.  It was enough to feed 2 fairly large families and we still got leftovers.  My chica cooked the tongues as well in a pressure cooker separate from the skulls.  The pan of meat has a mix of the meat from the skull, tongue and even the brain.  The meat in the top upper corner was the brain, the top left was the tongue and the rest was all from the rest of the head.  Interesting thing is that I didn't think the meat from the head would be so fatty.  The tongue meat actually tasted pretty good too.  I didn't try the brain...but those who tried it last night said it was really really fatty and greasy.  

In conclusion, this stuff tasted good.  But would I do it again?  No, a big heck no!  From start to finish it was so much work and messy.  If I ever crave for a barbacoa taco, I'll just go straight to a taco truck and get me some.

Texas BBQ

If you know Texas, you know we are famous for our BBQ.  For quite some time we have been wanting a smoker and learn how to smoke meat.  We had tried the "manual" smoker where you have to use firewood and have to constantly check the smoker for temperature to make sure the temperature stays where you want it etc.  It was just too labor intensive.  So finally, after doing a lot of research we decided to go with a Pit Boss smoker.  For half the price of a Traegger the Pit boss smoker performs really well.  Super easy to use.  We purchased the Pit Boss Austin XL from Walmart.  We can't be happier with it!  We already tried smoking ribs, pork butt, chicken, and pizza in the smoker but we were delaying our attempt at brisket because brisket is really the hardest and most intimidating to master, I think. 

 

But we finally decided it's time to give it a try.  The hubby did a little bit of research and we thought we got it figured out.  We had to trim off some of the fat because there was a lot of fat...but maybe next time we will try not trimming so much fat off.  We went with the tin foil wrap instead of the butcher paper.  Originally, we calculated the smoking time would be like 18 hours or something like that.  So we decided if that was the case we needed to start smoking the meat before we went to bed at around 10pm or so.  But after being in the smoker for like about an hour or an hour and a half or so the meat temperature was already much higher than we anticipated.  And so at this point we were like, well shoot, if the meat is cooking this fast we wouldn't need to start smoking so soon.  So we decided to take it out of the smoker and let it stay wrapped in the tin foil and left it on the counter over night.  (Now thinking back it was a big mistake!  Because the heat inside the tin foil still continued to cook the meat even though the meat was gradually cooling off during the night).

So the next morning we woke up, fired up the smoker and we put the brisket back in the smoker to smoke some more, and we didn't even try to open the tinfoil up to see how the brisket was looking.  But now thinking back, it was probably already partially cooked.  So we started the "normal" process with smoking the brisket again and everything until the temperature reached the desired temperature of doneness.  Next we pulled the brisket out of the smoker, did the towel wrap and cooler for an hour or so.

 

  So this is what the finished product looked like, it was a bit on the dry side/overcooked.  Taste was good and smoky but just dry.  We went with just the plain salt and pepper for our choice of seasoning.  We will try to smoke brisket again.  But next time we will probably try not to trim off so much fat and make sure we don't "double cook" our meat.  One day, one day we will be a Pit Boss!

The new and improved

 Back in March of this year our garage caught on fire.  It was completely burned to the ground.  Almost 3 months later, we finally have a garage again!  Yay!  Oh how I miss my garage!  And another thing I really missed is our tools.  Not having tools around when you need them is quite inconvenient.

The original concrete  pad was damaged enough so before putting another garage up we had to cap the old concrete pad.

 

                So another 3 1/2 inches of concrete was poured on top of the original concrete pad.

 

 

The last garage that we had our contractor built.  But this time we decided to go with the pre-fab metal building/garage.  The guys were able to put it up in just 1 day!  

 

 

                                            We are pretty happy with the results.  It looks great!

                                                    So happy we have a garage again!!!

Ground zero

Well, it's been 2 weeks since our garage was burned down. Things have calmed down a little but dealing with the after math is not any less overwhelming. I know we've dealt with similar situation a few years ago when we flooded, but it doesn't make it less stressful second time around. I want to think that I usually deal with stress pretty good for the most part, but it doesn't mean the stress isn't there, it doesn't mean it's fun to have to deal with situation. If I have to be honest with myself right now I'm actually feeling pretty overwhelmed! On top of having to deal with insurance (which to me hasn't been too terribly horrifying but it is nonetheless a hassle), we have been trying to get the garage rebuilt (getting estimate from people and talking to insurance etc), shopping for not one but two vehicles (we were not ready to go shop for new cars, I really loved my Ford Flex, and hubby loved his F150), family obligations (kids), and church obligations, and just life in general. I feel like my plate is so full I don't think I'll be needing seconds!  Last weekend we did go on a family camping trip some place nearby, which turned out to be a good stress relief.  At first I wanted to be selfish and just cancel the trip because we had so much going on but I quickly realized that I couldn't be so selfish and the kids needed it.  I'm so glad we went, but when we came home reality was waiting at the door *sigh.  I always try to stay positive, but it doesn't take the stress away, but it sure helps me get through difficult situations a little bit better. Dealing with insurance, rebuilding, and replacing all the equipment and tools will take awhile, but it will eventually happen. I will post pictures when we have our new garage done and we might even have a party to celebrate!

 

This is our "ground zero"

This is what our garage looks like now, pretty much just the cement slab

And still need to have the debris removed.

                                

I guess we made it on the headline news again

 Without trying to call the attention to ourselves, we somehow made it on the "headline news" again...

We feel so lucky to have so many friends, family, and church friends/family check on us and offering to help!  The outpouring of love is so overwhelming and I just don't know how to express my gratitude to all of y'all!  And a big shout out/thank you to the already exhausted fire fighters (we were told they already put out 6 fires prior to ours earlier throughout the day) who came to help put out the fire!

So last night around 10pm we got done playing some family games, and just got done saying family prayer and about to go get ready for bed.  Then all of a sudden we heard a roaring sound, like the sound that the furnace makes when it kicks on.  But it was 10 times louder and it appeared to be coming from outside.  Then all of a sudden we heard a big boom.  So immediately we went outside to look and see what happened.  When the hubby went outside he saw our detached garage engulfed in flames.  He immediately told me to call 911 while he went to grab the couple of propane cans away from in front of the garage so those wouldn't explode.  And then hubby quickly moved my in-laws (they're here to visit)

This is what we saw when we went outside to checkout what was happening last night.

There must have been like 5 fire engines here last night

 

 

So thankful for the firefighters!

 

motor home and car away from the garage so their motor home wouldn't be destroyed.  It was a really scary scene... I was kind of scared and panicked just a little (ok it was maybe more than just a little) but I had to try my best to stay calm because the kids were freaking out and crying.  We were super duper worried because we had 2 large propane tanks outside right next to the garage.  I'm talking like well over 100 gallons of propane.  We were so worried that the fire will get to those propane tanks and then they would explode and blow everything up.  But we kept praying and praying so hard for God to help protect those propane tanks.  I called 911 and luckily help was here very quickly.  We must have had like 5 fire engines came and a few ambulances here on stand-by and ready to rescue us, once again.  It took them awhile to put out all the fire but the firefighters got the job done!  We are so appreciative of our firefighters!  

 

 

 

These are our vehicles

That's what was left in our garage.

This is what's left of the 4-wheeler

      

Everything inside the garage and in the overhang area behind the garage are all gone, nothing is salvageable.  All of our tools, food in the freezers and fridge, all gone!  Both vehicles, gone!  We just recently butchered our cows too so all of that meat is gone!!!  

But we are grateful that no one was hurt and our cows were safe too!

We are counting our blessings, and witnessed so many miracles during this crazy incident.  First of all, the hubby was supposed to go back to work this past Wednesday but for some unforeseen reason he had to stay home for an extra few days.  So he was home to help when this all happened and I don't know how he can stay so calm and collected during all of it.  Kudos to him!

First little miracle was that the hubby was home when it all happened so he could be here to help.   And then looking at the aftermath, the corner of the garage where the large propane tanks are sitting right outside of the garage was untouched!  And inside that corner of the garage is where we store our gas cans!  Gas cans were untouched!  That's the hugest miracle, I think.  If those gas cans were to catch on fire it would burn through that corner of the garage quick and the large propane tanks would be a goner, and very possibly we would be goners too! 

We are so grateful our lives were spared once again, and our home didn't get destroyed.  Our water well didn't get destroyed (it sits next to the large propane tanks) and we still have running water (some minor damages to plumbing was sustained and will need repairs but at least we still have running water inside the house)

This corner of the garage was untouched.

 

 

Such a miracle that these propane tanks didn't blow up

Gas cans didn't blow up either.  Prayers answered!

Despite of all of this we are counting blessings, as always.  And so grateful for everyone who reached out and expressed their love and concerns!