Slaters' Funny Farm

Well, there is a lot of camping preparations going on in our household right now. We have borrowed a new horse trailer from a friend to see if we like it better than ours and so it was delivered here yesterday. He mentioned that it might need a little cleaning and how right he was. I guess it is not really dirty, but it has been sitting all winter and it is in need of a spring clean. I will be washing down walls and counter tops as well as cleaning the floor and vacumming the bench seat covers today. I hope to mop the floor as well as it is a tile floor in the living quarters of it. I also have to pack the food that we will be taking and I will also have to be packing clothes that we intend to wear. I normally have all our stuff as far as cooking supplies and other needed items in our trailer as we use it often in the summer. I keep a lot of ours in totes so it should be easy to move over into this one once it is cleaned. I think that since the inside of this one is much larger than ou...

As many of you know, my youngest daughter is signed up for several 4-H projects this year and one of them is a foods project. She had to take cake mix or some kind of mix and make something else out of it. She decided upon advice from her sister's boyfriend to make a Mountain Dew cake. This was the first time she had ever made this type of cake as well as the first bundt cake that she had ever made. For the most part, I will say she did well. It is a little darker on top than I would prefer and it is not quite even on the top,but for her first time I am quite proud of her. The other projects are going well and we do have ideas for how the posters will look when we are finished with them. For the most part she is doing all of the work on her own as I will just be doing a few photos of her and her dog. She is a busy girl as she is doing 6 projects for her first year. I am anxious to share with all of you how she does. We hope for at least one blue ribbon!

As I was writing on another site today, I wrote something without giving much thought to what i was saying and then proofreading it, I realize how important what I had said was. It was a discussion about television remotes and how no one gets up to change the channels anymore and yet, we can get irritated if we have to change the channel with the remote to see something else. I had commented that I grew up without a remote television and that I get irritated as my husband is constantly changing the channels or going to the guide to see what else is on as it is so convient with that remote. I also noted that I grew up without a washer and dryer so that I knew the hardship of doing laundry by hand and that I tried to always be thankful that I no longer have to do that and try not to complain about the laundry. Wow! Being thankful for laundry, I would never have thought that I would say that. I personally really do not like doing the laundry as it is one of those chores that is required t...

Another week has whizzed by on the farm and I really do not know where so many hours go. Although, I know that we do a lot in the time we are awake, it seems that there are just not enough hours in the day. We have gotten many things accomplished this week that really needed to be done. The barn that we have on a friends' property really needed to be cleaned up after we moved several horses from there this week and I am proud to say that Bridget and I have managed to get one stall cleaned out. We have put lime down and we will finish working in there this next week. That was a feat all on it's own. Plus, we cleaned all of the water troughs this week as well. Vanilla, our colt from last spring, is learning quickly that we expect certain behavior out of her and she is slowly beginning to respect us and trust us. I believe that we will be putting a blanket on her several times next week and then I will be putting a saddle on her before much longer to see how she is going to act wi...

My husband loves french onion soup, which amazes me as he is a very picky eater. He also loves french onion dip with his Ruffles. Recently, we were at a small Amish grocery store and found a powdered french onion dip mix that you add to one 8 ounce container of sour cream to make chip dip with. On the front of the package, was a suggestion to add 1/2 cup of the powder to meatloaf. Deciding that I would try it, I mixed up my meatloaf with 1 1/2 pounds of ground round with 3 eggs, some breadcrumbs, and about 1/2 cup of chopped onions along with my tomato sauce. Once this was mixed together, I decided to add the french onion powder to the mix as it suggested. The result was a very moist and tasty meatloaf. The French Onion meatloaf was an excellent new recipe for us and something we will certainly be eating more of. It adds so much flavoring to the meatloaf and my husband said that it was like eating a bowl of soup. I was also thinking that I might try the Hidden Valley Ranch dip mix next...

I have been thinking about the writing that I do online and I have decided that I need to make some new changes and set some new goals for myself. It seems as though I neglect this blog and so I am going to add it to my list of everyday goals. It is not hard to come on here and at least post something to this blog and I am hoping to add some recipes, like I suggested several times. My new goal for here is to be here daily and to add at least two recipes a week. I must say that the farm is doing well and we enjoy the time with the animals. We have been downsizing horses as it seemed that we were ending up with too many. We now have two colts and although one is almost a year old, it is still taking up time to train. I hope that all of you who read this will leave me a comment as to what I can do to stay motivated and how you motivate yourself to meet goals.

Just an update on the Lauren Spierer case in Bloomington, Indiana. friends and family are still concerned about the whereabouts of this special young lady. She has been missing since early the morning of June 3,2011 and someone needs to come forward and tell where she is. Her family, friends, and multitudes of searchers have combed the streets, woods, and places throughout the town that she could be,but to no avail. Her mother and father are heartbroken and deserve to know where their daughter is. Police have video surveilllance now of a vehicle that they are considering could have something to do with the case, whether the person was involved or just thought that they seen something. They announced today that they were enhancing the video in hopes that someone might recognize the car or cars. It is sad to think that in a college town students are not safe to walk alone, but with the way the world is these days, it is not ever safe to be alone. I would recommend that any parent that ha...

For a week now, many people have been searching the town of Bloomington, Indiana for missing Indiana University student , Lauren Spierer. Spierer was last seen early on the morning of June 3 with a male acquaintance near her apartment near the IU campus. Lauren is a fashion design student who was fun and full of life according to family and friends. She is from New York and just completed her sophomore year at the college. Her parents arrived in Indiana on Saturday June 4, 2011 to search for their daughter. Friends, college students, police, and volunteers from all over have been searching the Bloomington area as well as expanding searches out into other parts of the state near the IU campus for any signs of Lauren. Lauren is 4'11" tall and weighs about 90 pounds. She is blonde haired as well. She was last seen wearing black leggings and a white top. Anyone with any information should contant America's Most Wanted or the Bloomington Police Department. Searches are being do...