Chop Rite Two #12 Meat Grinder - Made in USA

For my birthday this year Danielle got me a meat grinder to grind up the old laying hens once their replacements start laying.  We found a company that makes cast-iron meat grinders here in the USA with US iron.  This meat grinder was designed in the late 1800s and manufactured under the Enterprise brand until the 1990s when the company changed hands and was renamed Chop-Rite.  I was a bit hesitant because it is not tinned like the old models but now has a Xylon coating on the cast iron.  We'll have to see how it holds up over time.

I love the warning sticker.  "DO NOT PUT HANDS OR FINGERS IN CYLINDER MOUTH OF GRINDER.  MAY RESULT IN SERIOUS INJURY OR AMPUTATION" One has to love idiot labels!  

New Shoes - Made in USA

My tennis shoes have finally degraded to a point that I can't wear them off of the homestead without embarrassing the wife.  Something about being able to see my feet when they're on......  So it was time to get some new shoes.  In keeping with the "try and find American made things" i gave a half-hearted search on google for american made running shoes.  Surprisingly enough, they actually exist.  I had heard of New Balance a few years ago but thought they just made walking shoes for senior citizens.  Turns out they make a whole line of shoes, both within the USA and overseas.  Before buying you need to check and find out what models are made here.  These are NewBalance model MR990v3 (Men's Running 990 version 3).   Yup, look like shoes.  We'll see how they hold up.

Carrot Harvest

Logan and I dug up the carrot bed this weekend.  Typical with every new bed we start here in Georgia they were tiny.  Hopefully the bed will be better next year after we mix in some compost.  So what does one do with a lot of tiny carrots.... I'm thinking chicken stock for the bigger pieces and feed the rest to the chickens.