Wednesday, August 31, 2011

Rain? No Thank You ... Return To Sender

It's Wednesday, the middle of the second week since my children returned to school. I had such big plans for my garden bed renovation. I just knew it would be easier to get things done once the kids had returned to school and stopped fighting amongst themselves. I had all these ideas I wanted to try , beds I wanted to move, trees I wanted to transplant and what do you think happened .... Rain! Not a constant rain, but rain in the morning , rain in the afternoon and rain in the evening. You just can't get out there and get started when the weather man is telling you in another 30 minutes or so your going to have to pack it in because another fast moving storm in barreling in your direction carrying thunder and lightning and sporting a bad attitude.

There doesn't seem to be any end to this infernal rain so I'm going to start researching different ways to trellis peas and beans. As well as new vegetable possibilities for next years garden. I think this year I may order some more interesting seeds out of a catalog and see how I do with them.  So far there wasn't really anything that did not grow. It didn't always grow large or maybe wasn't as easy to grow as I expected but the rabbits have never let me down and have always produced more than enough fertilizer to keep my sprouts growing strong.

If you come across any good sites for garden designs please post a link here. I have been looking for sites that are visited frequently by people of similar interests.

Tuesday, August 23, 2011

Whoo Hoo - The Kids Are Headed Back To School.

This summer has been full of challenges. Three members of our immediate family have faced various medical complications and spent time in local hospitals. A dog got into our duck pen, and we lost almost all the ducks and the eggs keep disappearing from the chicken coop. I think that crows are taking off with the eggs but I can't say for sure.  At the very least I can say with some certainty that the culprit is an animal that flies; because the goats do not stand for anything "strange" to be inside their pen and have no trouble horning anything that doesn't belong there.

The children started their new elementary school on Monday 8/22/11 and although things will probably be a little shaky and unscheduled for the next week or two, I will be able to carve out time to write about what is going on down on the farm. I've missed not being able to write about the exciting adventures of owning a farm. It's not like anyone follows this blog, but by charting our farming experience we can learn from our mistakes and have something to look back on and share with our family and friends.



Cow has gotten So Big. It's amazing now much she has grown in just a few short months. We love her. She is incredibly smart and greets us at the fence every morning.  She also makes a fairly good watch dog as when anything unusual goes on out in the back field she is an incredible alarm system.
My only complaint is that she is showing signs of boredom. Yesterday she picked up her water trough; (a heavy duty plastic cement mixing pan) and slammed it down repeatedly, cracking it up. But oh that wasn't enough for her, she then jumped into the pan and pushed at the crack until the crack gave way and became a six by six inch hole out of which all the water once contained inside flowed out of and promptly flooded her pen.    Way to go Cow..... Another $15.00 down the drain... What shall we attempt next?  There has to be something you can not destroy!

Harvest Time

Harvest Time