One of our ladies has left us for the big chicken coop in the sky

Sadly, when Justin went to close up the chickens yesterday evening and found one of our old ladies had died. It looks like she laid down her head and peacefully closed her eyes for good. I’m pretty sure it was the chicken we had living in our house when she was sick. Good bye chicky, thank you for all the eggs you gave us.

You Brew Your Own Beer? Pretzel beer?

I am taking a break from brewing starting January so I can prepare for my Professional Engineer exam in April. I have some backstock ingredients so I have been working them down. Today I brewed an experimental beer that I hope reminds me of pretzels.

Here is the recipe for 1.5 gallons:
10.00 g Sea Salt (Mash 60.0 mins) Water Agent 1 –
1 lbs 10.4 oz White Wheat Malt (2.4 SRM) Grain 2 69.5 %
4.0 oz Acid Malt (3.0 SRM) Grain 3 10.5 %
4.0 oz White Wheat Malt-toasted (2.4 SRM) Grain 4 10.5 %
2.0 oz Oats, Flaked (1.0 SRM) Grain 5 5.3 %
0.30 oz Goldings, East Kent [5.00 %] – Boil 90.0 min Hop 6 23.1 IBUs
1.6 oz Cane (Beet) Sugar (0.0 SRM) Sugar 7 4.2 % post krausen

I did a step mash, biab, stovetop. The first rest was 122F for 30 minutes. The second rest was 152F for 60 minutes. I did a 90 minute boil. I didn’t have any beer yeast, so I used a packet of Montrachet. Hopefully it rips through the sugars, I’m not looking for yeast character on this one anyways. Hopefully the acid malt gives the hint of sourdough, the salt, well salt, and the toasted wheat that toasty outer crust of a pretzel. The wort tasted pretty good going into the fermenter.

I used a 5 gallon paint strainer for this BIAB on my stovetop

The mash, really light with the white wheat

Sleeping bag wrap for the rests

Almost the scale of steeping grains in extract brewing…

Back to the kitchen sink cooling

While I was brewing, some other things were going on at Little House on the Sandpit…

Panels for gingerbread houses were made

I tried some pine needle and spruce tip tea

and our sick chicken started to feel better, she can stand without falling over now.

Mahmahmallow Potty Time!

My 3 year old son loves marshmallow (mahmahmellos). Did I say love? He LOVES them. He doesn’t like going potty on the toilet yet. Got me thinking… marshmallows and potty have got to be a good thing. It works!

We go on the potty.
We flush the toilet.
We wash our hands.
We get mini-mahmahmallows for #1 and a big mahmahmallow for #2.
He actually asks to go potty most times now.
Sometimes you just have to roll with the punches with children.
Last diaper days soon?

Bad News

My son has ADHD-bad. My little brother had it bad too so it isn’t surprising. Many people don’t believe in ADHD. I agree that there is probably over-diagnosis with many children who don’t have ADHD being diagnosed with it. But believe me, my son has it. The difference when he is on his medicine and when he is not is night and day with him. You want to throttle him when he is off.
One thing that has bothered me is that his medicine is Adderall which is an amphetamine. They put young children on this. My brother was on Ritalin and my parents fought to move him onto lesser medication when he got older. We started that battle too. Our Dr. suggested Strattera. One issue with Strattera is that is can affect the length between heartbeats, called QT length. So before children go on it, they run an EKG at the pediatrician’s office. My son did his. BAD NEWS.
The Dr was concerned with the QT length he had already so immediately contacted a Children’s Hosptial branch for an appointment with a children’s heart specialist. Scared.
At Children’s they were really concerned about his QT length and said he had Long QT Syndrome. Looked it up. SCARED. They want to put him on a 24 hour heart monitor. Ordered him to immediately be taken off all medication. And ordered him to go to Boston Children’s Hospital.
So off his meds, we want to both throttle him and hug him at the same time. It will be a trying week until he goes to Children’s. If I could take his place I would. Cross your fingers for him, and if you pray, we’d appreciate the thoughts. Hopefully his medications did this and taking him off will reverse it all and he is a normal, healthy boy.

I did some garden work today and that reminded me of a funny story Sarah told me the other day. Sarah took Emilyann to Red Robin (yummmm) to spend her free burger for her birthday coupon. Being the big meat eater like her mom, Emilyann got the kids burger. At one point during the meal she picked the seeds off the bun and told Sarah that she needed to save them so daddy could plant them in the garden and grow yummy hamburgers.
We’ll have to can them…

Well, gotta go…I’m collecting beer caps….just in case.