Yes, that's two n's.

We may not pronounce our last name in the old world fashion - but it does end in two n's. Many of our family branches trace back to Germans from Russia - complete with multiple Ellis Island landings near the turn of the previous century. One of the traditions the Sackmann family continues to honor is making sausage. We must admit we are not as dedicated as our ancestors. We don't begin by spending days processing dozens of animals (thank you McCary Meats) and the guys happily use a digital, remote thermometer to watch the temperature in the 100+ year old smokehouse (while they play cards). We use our own beef and this year we did buy pork (thanks http://www.purecountrypork.com/ and Paul) since we didn't have any market hogs at the time. We make a smoked german sausage, summer sausage, and pepper stick. Each family makes their own batch to season as they wish.

The process starts by mixing fresh ground beef & pork in specific proportions and then adding spices. Mix it all up and fry up a sample. Re-season as necessary or stuff. Here's Jeff putting the sausage into the stuffer - being overseen by Molly & Sid.

Not sure how the child labor fits into the health stardards - but they were good helpers!

Or Molly standing on the table. It used to be you had to work your way up the table as you got older and more experienced. But apparently the rules are getting lax since Trevor was "helping" with the top dog job at his first sausage making experience (with help from Nana & Papa).

Trevor is inspecting the summer sausage as it awaits its turn in the smoker.

Tractor in hand of course!

German sausage hangs prior to hitting the smoke house. This is Jeff's sandwich meat for the summer. It's also great in a melted cheese sandwich or as a snack.

And a little fun . . . .

Uncle Paul's days of building floats may be over - but he still has a left over Jack-in-the-box so he and papa Sid climbed up to turn in on for the kids and examine how it worked. Molly hadn't been to sausage making for three years - but she still remembered the Jack-in-the-box. Better keep that baby around!

And Lila is driving Uncle Paul's big red tractor. Before we were out Travis said "oh, I forgot I hooked the horn back up". Oops!

Happy New Year!

Here I am a month behind again!

I promise we've kept "busy" even though some days I don't know what I've done. We made sausage, celebrated lots of Christmas, celebrated an "East coast New Year's", went to the American Farm Bureau Annual Meeting (including a SHUT down Atlanta) and the National Western Stock Show in Denver. And of course fed cows everyday, worked fall pairs, bred & implanted embryos in fall cows and complained about the winter. Why has Moses Lake been the coldest spot in the STATE many times the last two months?

Trying to take pics of kids with cows in the background. Trev prefers to watch the "tows". They are awfully cute even if they won't all look at me to take a simple picture!

More to come!