Grandkids learned something new today.

[RoninPA]

The grandkids (14 yr girl, 11 yr old boy) are staying with us for a week. Both have been working hard helping me split and stack wood (and I paid them for the help - honest pay for honest work). I just didn't want them sitting around in the house with their phones, iPads.

Well today, after lunch I showed them how to make butter. Divided up a quart of heavy cream into two 2 qt mason jars, capped them and had them start shaking. I showed them the process through runny heavy cream, to thicker liquid, then to very thick whipped cream. Told them to keep shaking until they felt a different sensation and tell me when they saw a runny liquid in the jars. 10 minutes later, they came running with the jars and I showed them the butter bouncing around in the milk. Drained the milk (buttermilk of course) and emptied the butter into a bowl of cold water to rinse it and to shape it. They took pictures during the process to show their mom and dad and friends. Put the buttermilk back in the container to use tomorrow for buttermilk pancakes for breakfast. Butter was formed and into the frig to get a bit more solid.

They learned something new and probably something their friends have never done.

I like teaching them things like that (life experiences). It seems many people just don't have the time (or maybe the knowledge) to teach their kids how to do things that might help make them think in different ways to maybe help them solve their own problems, no matter how big or small.

 

[Taterman]

Good on you for getting them off their phones and teaching them life skills.

 

[Jeepnik]

Now if they'll just remember it and pass it on to their kids. So much knowledge has been lost in the last couple of generations that it's really very sad.

 

[Mike J]

I like your idea. I am going to tell my wife about it. She may want to do it with the kids.

 

[blume357]

That's really cool Ron..... I doubt there are too many children or adults that know how to do that.

 

[gramps]

Excellent! If we lost power due to an EMP, how many could/would survive?
gramps

 

[Rick Courtright]

Well today, after lunch I showed them how to make butter. Divided up a quart of heavy cream into two 2 qt mason jars, capped them and had them start shaking. I showed them the process through runny heavy cream, to thicker liquid, then to very thick whipped cream. Told them to keep shaking until they felt a different sensation and tell me when they saw a runny liquid in the jars. 10 minutes later, they came running with the jars and I showed them the butter bouncing around in the milk.

Hi,

It would be great if you could find a real churn, to help teach them how our technological advances aren't always to come up with something "new" but to create a progression where the same job that used to be harder is made easier. Then reward them with some home made ice cream, from the ice cream maker with the handle, not the electric one! My cousin had one of them, and I'm pretty sure it made better ice cream than anything else! Probably cuz of the "investment" (sweat equity?) we kids had in the final product... ;)

Rick C

 

[RoninPA]

Rick, you are right, my cousins and I had the "chore" of cranking the ice cream machine every Sunday in the summer when we had our family picnics. I think the ice cream probably did taste better. We always had several big watermelons cooling in the "crick" for several hours and the got cut up in early evening after everyone was relaxing after the day's activities.

I try to do/teach them something new/different when they visit, be it for the day or for a week. They are at the age that maybe they'll retain some of it.

 

[Badger Matt]

Ron,
Man, you just brought back a kindergarten memory (54 YOA now) and I swear I can taste the homemade butter as I type this. I'm going to have to recreate that memory this weekend.
Thanks,
Matt

 

[dougader]

Mmmmmmmmmm, butter. Dad used to chuck a beater from an electric mixer into his drill motor and speed up the process a little.

 

[DPris]

The one time I made butter as a kid was in a Mason jar with a crank paddle-cap on it.
Wore my arm off before it turned from milk to butter.

Did the non-electric ice-cream thing at a Scout get-together, took turns cranking with other kids & damn near killed us all. :)
Denis

 

[nvbirdman]

Butter doesn't come from the store? Next you'll probably have them thinking meat doesn't come from the store.

 

[Bear Paw Jack]

Ron, I was reading an article today somewhere, that said that depending on our phones, and electronics so much, results in our own memory, not being as functional as it was. Good job keeping the kids off of the phone.

Bob Wright has talked about having kids memorize the books of the bible, I have worked with college kids memorizing scriptures. Navigators have a wonderful pack of verses that are handy for life. I think (if I ever have grandkids) I will challenge them to memorize those scriptures, and they have to be able to quote them and the "address" with each one and they will get something they have been wanting. Have to figure that out exactly, and maybe it's not your thing, but it's a good challenge for them. A week is kind of a short time, but maybe they can do it at home and when they come back for the next visit, there could be a treat of some sort.

If they can do that, I think you will see their grades go up as it also helps them remember and learn. FWIW

What a great job you've done with them. I'll bet they are having fun.

 

[RSIno1]

Excellent! If we lost power due to an EMP, how many could/would survive?
gramps

As long as I had gas for the generator....... My dad was the first in our family not to grow up on a farm. He spent a lot of time on his aunts farm though so he was able to teach my sister and I a lot of "survival" skills. He was 12 when the depression hit so he learned a lot of critical thinking and how to figure out a different way to get the result you needed with what you had. On our summer vacations we'd go back to MI and visit. Even in the late sixties his aunt and uncle were getting their house water from a hand pump in the yard or the one by the sink in the kitchen. I have their yard one proudly displayed in our garden. What I really wanted though was the Fordson tractor they had in the barn.

 

[RoninPA]

RSIno1 wrote "learned a lot of critical thinking and how to figure out a different way to get the result you needed with what you had."

That is the problem nowadays, the majority of kids are not taught that anywhere, even at home. It is critical that they learn to think on their feet and not rely on some machine or someone else to give them the answer(s). It is sad that independent thought is not espoused any more, especially from the liberals. (Enough politics, getting off subject sort of).

Today is shooting day, going to take them out to shoot the iron sighted Henry .22 and the Single Six. No semi autos, no scopes, no red dots.

 

[WendyZXZ]

That is the type of lesson I would find fun to learn!

 

[rugerguy211]

That's great! I remember doing that in kindergarten. A jar was passed in turn to each class mate to shake until we had butter. Mrs. Kaplan let us eat the butter on saltines. Almost 60 years later I remember that like it was yesterday. I guess it left a positive mark on me.

 

[exavid]

Me too, My grandparents had two cows and I got the "pleasure" of pumping her old wooden churn's dasher up and down until I thought my arms would fall off. Cranking the cream separator wasn't a lot of fun either but we enjoyed the results.

 

[Selena]

One of my fondest memories of IVH is the day that I took freshly baked bread to one of my TOB's and my grandmother insisted I take cream and her hand crank butter churn. It was amazing to me how much enjoyment my old guys got from what I had always considered a rather distasteful chore.

While they didn't teach me how to make butter, they did teach me the value of the chore.

 

[Mobuck]

I still remember as a child(a looonng time back) sitting in the porch rocking chair slowly sloshing a gallon jar of cream until it was transformed into a blob of butter and "blue john"(watery skimmed milk). Then Grandmother would strain the butter through cheese cloth, put it in the little square butter dish and press it with the wooden thingie with the flower design, and then she'd drink the nearly tasteless "blue john" as nothing was wasted.