24 Days of Thanksgiving: Day 4

Today I am thankful for the deliciously cool weather that blew in this week. In our part of the country, summer heat often extends into October and occasionally November. Cool weather brings so many wonderful things. Here a few of my favorite things cold weather brings:

•  I'm so happy to pull out all of my cute cool-weather clothes--sweaters and jackets and boots. I love wearing boots and my favorite pair are a pair of cowgirl boots Jacob bought for me on our honeymoon. I wear them all the time, they are so comfortable.

•  When I lived in the country, usually the first good cool night we would build a fire outside and drink hot chocolate and roast marshmallows. Since I'm in the city now, I'm content just let my coffee cup warm my hands :)

•   Cold weather brings out the soup and stew lover in me so big batches of soups and stews are in our future.

   When the cool weather blows in, all of the men in my family get itchy trigger fingers and are ready to get in a deer stand. Camouflage is the color of choice during this time of year for many people I know.
   Last year Daddy, my brothers, and Jacob harvested several deer and combined the meat and we made a couple hundred pounds of smoked venison sausage. It was so good! We don't put cure or any preservatives in the seasoning mix. The recipe was given to us by one of our dear old neighbors who used to own a meat packing plant.
  It is something we do every year and I can't remember a time when we haven't done it. It is one my favorite times of the year. Over the years we've had various "uncles and aunts" -- close friends of the family-- help us and it is always a fun time of visiting.
  Here are a few pictures from last year.

 Our manly men cutting up all the meat. We girls got in on it too, but there is no photographic evidence.

 Yours truly weighing and packaging some of the fry meat and backstrap that we didn't turn into sausage. That we some of the meat we use in stews and shish-kebobs.

 Wendi and Jacob  moving meat to Daddy to be ground. In the pans in the back are meat that was just ground, ready for stuffing.

 Stuffing the sausage into casings, with little peoples looking on.

 Ready to go in the smokehouse.

 Smoked sausage on top, jerky on bottom. Every year my brothers try to make jerky--we're still learning. It gets better every year ;)

Yummy! Daddy and Josh packaging the smoked sausage for the freezer.

Hurray for cool weather!