Garden 2010

For those of you that are interested in our gardening adventure, here are some pictures from this year. Things have really gone well, even though we planted the whole garden about a month late.


Plowing up the area. We extended the length of the garden this year

Pictures of the blooms and fruit of the various plants.

We grew our beans, long beans, and some cucumbers on arches this year.

A "volunteer" sunflower that was really beautiful.

That's all for now, God Bless!

Rachel

So much happening....

Justin and Thea are married! And I don’t have a single picture to post of the wedding :(
I did take my camera, but because I was busy pretty much the whole day, I never got it out to take a picture. I can’t complain though, since I was busy fulfilling a dream of mine; doing the hair styling for a bride and her bridesmaids! Thank you Thea! I can say that the wedding was beautiful, everything went smoothly, everyone did great, and the only tears were those of joy (at least until J&T left). So, one wedding down, three (as of now :) more to go!

Well, the weather this week is making it really hard to hold off on planting the garden, but I keep reminding myself that if snowed last year on April 15th, so waiting a little longer is not going to hurt anything. I do have some radishes, spinach, and mustard greens going in a cold frame, and I started the tomato and pepper seeds yesterday. We are trying some new things this year and I am really excited to see how everything does.

Another new project here is heritage pigs. We wanted to try Gloucestershire Old Spots, but we weren’t able to find any in this area to get started with, so we went with Red Wattle Hogs instead.

There are several reasons we choose to go with a heritage breed instead of a commercial breed. The heritage hogs are hardier, better at raising their offspring without a lot of help, good scavengers, and their temperament is MUCH better. Our pigs are very calm, nonaggressive, and even like to have us scratch their backs. Compared to the pigs we did last year, these guys are saints. We did get a breeding pair, so sometime this fall we should have a litter of little squealers running around here!


Aren't they cute?

We have also acquired some New Zealand rabbits. These are a meat breed, which is why we have them.

In goat news, we have several things going on. We got a new doe last week. She is not a Kinder, but she is a small goat, so she fits in well here. Technically, Willow is a Mini Saanen (Saanen Nigerian Dwarf cross), but she is just a first generation so we got her for a good price. She, along with at least two of our Kinders, are due to have babies in the next 4 to 6 weeks. I am also suspicious of Maria. I think that she may have some “surprise” babies on the way, but all I can do is wait and see.

And finally, a random, funny story that I have been meaning to get up here, and keep forgetting about.
One day when we were coming home from my parents place, we came upon some cows (about 15 or so) that were wandering down the road right by our house. At least, that is what it looked like at first. On closer inspection, it was discovered that they were actually being driven along by......

.....a wild turkey.

The said turkey was not just walking along with the cows, or trying to go around them, he was moving them on down the road. He would turn them to one side or the other by moving to the opposite side, sticking his neck out, and gobbling at them. And it worked. It was just like watching a dog herd cows along. In order to prevent an accident, and not knowing who’s cows they were, we stopped, and with another neighbor got them to go into a pasture until the owners could be located. The turkey helped with this process.

After they were locked in we went on up the hill to our house. As we waited for the owners to come, we could see the turkey moving the cows across the pasture, towards the next farm. After awhile they disappeared over a hill and we thought that was the end of it. But I guess the turkey like to the grass on this side of the hill better, because in about twenty minutes, here he came again, driving them all back. Eventually someone came and got the cows (I don’t know if they took the turkey too), and that was the last that we saw of them. Needless to say it was one of the strangest things I have ever seen, and I am glad that I had the camera!

Well, that all for now!

God bless,

Rachel

Just a Note.....

......to say that our blog is not dead, and there will be a "good" post soon.

Lately my thoughts have been going in so many directions at once that I don't know which one to fallow through on and post about.

Also, it is very nearly springtime on a farm, meaning that things are very busy here. Our day starts a 5:30 (a.m.) and ends around 9:00 (p.m.) or so right now.

Project(s) report:

Living room~coming right along, slow and steady wins the race.

Goats~milking one right now and making yogurt and cheese. New babies will be arriving in April!

Chickens~we are getting between 11 and 14 eggs a day. Glad they slowed down for the winter! (ha ha)

Cows~ever growing, always eating, and good producers of "garden soil enhancer".

Dogs~I think Ollie has stopped growing taller, but he is still filling out. At the last vet visit he weighed in at 140lbs. His latest achievement was killing a skunk that has been hanging around. He smelled horrible, but we are proud of him. Dozer limps and coughs and tries to get in the house on cold days (or at least get some sympathy for his "aches and pains" :) Gracie just eats and sleeps, except at night when we are trying to sleep, then she barks.

New additions~Rabbits and pigs, both for meat purposes. More on them later.

Garden~I have started the early plants, and they are all up and doing well. We are planning a lot, so we will see what happens!

Well, thats all for now. I need to go start some cookies and then make supper.

God bless,

Rachel

As Usual......

It has been too long since I posted.

I have a million reasons for this, but not enough time to go through them all.

Our life is busy and full of interesting things, but now that I sit down to write about them, I can’t remember half of what I wanted to say.

Oh well, I will give it a go anyway.

Our summer was great. Colin was working part time, so we had a lot of time together, as well as time to get some things done around here. The garden did good, especially considering the tremendous amount of rain we had this year. Everything is done now, excepting a few fall crops, and even those will be finished soon.

In goat news, things have been kind of up and down. In the spring the goat that we were raising for meat died, and then in September our buck, Leeper, died as well. But in good news, we had the fist baby goat born here on October 5. Her name is Luka, and she is so much fun and really cute!!!

We have also added cows to our animal inventory. Cinnamon is a really sweet heifer that we are keeping to provide us with calves later down the road. The other one we call “dinner” and try not to become too friendly with him.

On the house we are still working on the living room, but it is coming along great. We are almost ready to put in the insulation and then the drywall can go up! I will put up a “beginning to end’ post with pictures when we are done.

Right after we started tearing the living room apart, Colin got a new, full time job at Webco in Springfield. This has been a blessing for us, and we are very thankful for the job. He has gone back to doing electrical stuff which is nice for him, and is also getting a chance to learn some new things. Please keep him in your prayers, as most of the guys he works with and around have very messed up lives. This gives him a chance to be a witness for Christ, but also makes the work environment hard to be in.

Well, that is all for now. I will get some pictures up as soon as I can.

Rachel

Goose-ber-ry, Ber-ry-goose, Jel-lo, Blue.

This title must be read to the rhythm of 1-&-a, 2-e-&, 3-&, 4, and will probably only be understood by those in orchestra, but it is stuck in my head and kind of goes with what I have been doing lately, so I will use it. Besides, it saves me sitting here for the next half hour trying to come up with a clever and witty title.

Well life moves on, and much faster than seems possible. My mind tells me that we are in the month of May, while the calendar proudly displays an arrangement of bright, hot colors, and letters forming the word “JULY”.

We did finally get the garden planted. Now it looks really good, and we are starting to enjoy to fresh produce that it supplies. Although it is not in “full swing” production, we have had broccoli, cabbage, lettuce, radishes, turnips, spinach, and some peppers. I confess that I am most eager for the tomatoes to be ready, but so far they are all still green.

The gooseberries (hence part of the post title*) and mulberries are also ripe right now, and we have been taking advantage of the many bushes and trees that are on this property. So far I have done some jam of each kind, and am working on a batch of Mul-Goose jelly. We’ll see how that one works out.......

We have also been doing some fishing in our river this year. Last time we went, Andrew caught two nice sized bass. Unfortunately, he also caught himself, so the trip was cut short as we hurried home to try and get two thirds of a treble hook out of his hand. It was quite the ordeal (both parts of the hook where in past the barb), and we were all very thankful when it was over. (There is no picture of this event because we were all upset to think about taking one, sorry)

On the house we are working on finishing up the laundry room floor, getting the well fixed, and some other things, and then it is one to the living room. We are both eager to have the whole house finished and looking nice, but there is only so much time in a day......

And before I close, the ever popular Ollie update.

Yes, he is huge. There is no trickery in this picture, he really is that big.

Well I think that is about it for this time. As usual I will try not to let it be so long between posts next time.

God bless,

Rachel

*An explanation on the rest of the title. We have been eating a lot of jello lately. It is very refreshing, and if you buy the plain kind you can put in what ever you want for flavoring and sweetening, then you know what you are eating. I don’t really have anything for the “blue” part, except that it is a cold color which is nice in the summer. It is also just what comes at the end of the pattern so I had to use it. I think ten years of orchestra is affecting my brain.

5-6-09

Well as usual life has been so crazy that I have not had time to sit down and blog, and when I finally find the time, there doesn't seem to be anything to blog about!

Basically things are normal for late spring/early summer on a farm. There are way too many things to get done, not enough time to do them, and it has rained so much that I can't remember what the sun looks like. No, wait, it just came out for about three seconds between cloud banks, I guess it really does exist! Anyway, with all of the rain the garden is one big mud puddle and I have no hope of planting anything without several days of hot, sunny weather to dry the ground out. I keep reminding myself that God's timing is perfect, so I don't need to worry about being so far behind in the planting season. If He wants me to have a garden, it will happen.

As most of you know, Colin lost his job at Muller a couple of weeks ago. While we had kind of been expecting this to happen, it was still a little hard to take. The enemy loves to use such times to double up on his attacks, and it is hard not to get fearful. Our God however, is greater than any attack or fear, and this was a time of learning to lean on Him more, and not rely on our own strength. Last week the Lord brought a job opportunity to us, and on Monday Colin started his new job. He gets to work with Owen, and gets to be outside more, and can still go part time when he needs to so that he can also continue working on our house. Question: Why do we ever doubt God?

I also wanted to update everyone on my grandpa in Ohio. His heart surgery has been postponed for a couple of weeks because he is sick right now. My mom has come home for now but will be returning to Ohio for the surgery. Sam is still there and will be until Grandpa is able to take over running the business again. Please continue to keep all of them in your prayers.

Signs of Spring

Spring is officially here! This happens to be one of my favorite times of the year. It is always amazing to me to watch things sprout and grow, and reminds me of what a wonderful God we have! Here are some pictures of Spring at our house this year.

The Daffodils are up and showing off their colors wonderfully





My yard is so full of violets that I have decided to move some of them to the flower beds rather than mow them down each week.












The broccoli and cabbage plants waiting for the rain to end so they can be planted outside.





Our newest arrivals, and a very sure sign of spring!





The only thing cuter than a fluffy baby chick........





.....is a duckling. Unfortunately this little guy belongs to my brother, not me. Maybe I could just go over and barrow him for a while......






This is "Buck" Leeper (think the Mitfford books :) Although he is small now, he will grow up to be the "Daddy" goat of our heard.

Isn't he cute?





Meet George, the (new) official mouser and bird defense system for our milking shed.

Last, but not least, what is a post without an Ollie update? Yes, he is big. Yes, he will get bigger. Yes, he does eat a lot. Yes, he is a great dog, and just keeps getting better!