I hope spring is here, finally.

I sure hope spring has sprung here. I got my seedlings started earlier this year. Had them all growing under flourescent lights in the summer kitchen till this past Saturday. We decided that instead of the added expense of covering our little greenhouse with some type of plastic we would just opt to use a cold frame for the seedlings as I am not starting near as many as I normally do. But still a plenty. So Rodger and Jason took off Friday evening after work and went to Lowes to pick up 1 sheet of the clear poly carbonate panels to cover the cold frame. Less chance of hail damage in the event we have that. And hoping we dont for sure.  So they got my cold frame built and put inside the fence in my herb garden to keep the dog out of it. She likes to carry off things she finds with our smell on it. She gave the guys a fit stealing their building material and tools Saturday. Poor Sasha had many new not so nice names that day. But they got er done. Then I got all the seed trays moved in and watered with compost tea. I do have some nice sturdy seedlings this year. yay me.

 Monday we had rain off and on all day so I spent my day going in and out of the house to take the top off, put the top on, repeat. This lil cold frame can heat up really quick with very little sunshine. This is so much easier to heat than trying to keep my little greenhouse warm enough for healthy plants. Tomatoes and peppers need warmer soil to sprout and grow than some other seeds. I did invest in a couple heat mats that are made just for the seed trays I use to supply some heat from the bottom to warm the soil and speed up the sprouting process of peppers and tomatoes. They worked just great. I had misplaced some of my bell pepper seeds and could only find the orange heirloom variety when I was starting the seeds. The next day I located the other pepper seeds and decided to start some of those as well. I used a deeper, about 6 inch deep, crate that I had to line with a feed bag, add soil and sow the seeds. The soil being deeper I could not use the heat mats under this crate. So needless to say I have tomatoes and peppers started one day using the heat mats that are several inches tall and a crate with pepper and some Amish paste tomato seeds that are just starting to sprout and come up where I wasn't able to use the heat mats. Heat made all the difference in how quickly the seeds came up. Also this year I have been using all natural fertilizer on my seedlings. I procured some composted goat manure from some friends and am making compost tea to use on the plants. In this compost tea I added some Lactobacilli serum to the bucket in which I have the manure for the tea. I have had no problem what so ever with damping off disease this year starting seeds. That in itself is a big plus for me trying to start seeds really early. Normally I just start my seeds in the greenhouse in early April no later than the second week. When we get cooler nights the soil cools even with the warmth of the sun during the day and I usually end up losing a lot of seedlings from damping off. In the greenhouse I could use about 3 tablespoons of hydrogen peroxide to about 1 and half cups water in spray bottle and mist the soil where the seedling are and this will sometimes stop the damping off and save the plants. But dang who needs the extra hassle. Not had to use that this year at all. I am very thankful and happy with my little bit of success  with seed starts.

Saturday I got my herb garden weeded and all cleaned out of debris from last season and over the winter. Talk about hard on the damaged back and bad legs and knees. Oh mercy, Sunday was tough. Anyway, that bed is all ready to add more herbs seedlings to when danger of frost is past. Maybe late April or early May will be safe enough to plant them without protection. I still have the strawberry bed to weed and get mulched. I planted 25 new strawberry plants this year to replace some that were spent. I intend to use straw to mulch them in with from now on. I learned the hard way that wood mulch was just too coarse a material to allow the runners to reach the soil and make roots and renew the bed.  Some of us just have to learn things the hard way. Was nice to not have to spend much time at all weeding but dang in the long run cost me in having to replace some plants. Chalk that one up to a well learned lesson at the school of hard knocks. I seem to learn a lot of things at that school.

Last week on one of the warmer days I got the fruit trees sprayed for the second time. Most of the stone fruits and pears had already lost their blooms. Not sure if they were lost from the light snow and cold or just that they were done. But the other trees, apples and nut trees are in 1/4 inch green tip stage and time for a spray. Got the neem apray mixed and Jason put the spray tank in the bucket of the little tractor and hooked the pump to the battery and off we went to spray. We had to use the tractor as my 4 wheeler is out of commission for a bit till the guys get a chance to work on it. Got er done tho.. At this point it is just wait and see how much damage the cold snap did to the trees that had already bloomed. Seems most of them were in the "process" of blooming and not in full bloom. I have noticed the pears are still making blooms so I might get a bit of fruit after all. God willing and we dont get any more serious freezes. We will take what we can get and be thankful.

We have been looking around for an "estate rake" to use in the big section of yard and orchard. An estate rake is used to rake up grass clippings to take off the yard. Usually pulled behind a 4 wheeler or mower. My intention is to use the clippings to compost for organic matter to add to the garden and orchard.  In reading and researching holistic orchard maintenance a lot of focus is on soil microbes and helping keep healthy soil. One way to do this is using the grass clippings to mulch trees and then encouraging the clippings to decompose to supply nutrients to the trees. Lactobacilli is one culture that aids in this process. I found online a method for making the lactobacilli serum to treat the soil and compost with to speed up the process.  A very simple process all in all. It is started rather simply. I will post this info in another post very soon. This serum can also be used to spray chicken and livestock buildings to eliminate odor from manure. It helps to decompose the same manure when put in compost as well. Anyway I have a science lab in my kitchen most days. One of these days I will have a mess when an experiment goes amiss. Till then I keep trying stuff.

In the house I learned to make a new bread that we are now addicted to. It is focaccia bread. Its an artisan Mediterranean bread. The authentic version has olives in it but none of us like olives so I dont use those. It was odd to me at first to make a yeast bread and not use bread flour but recipe uses plain all purpose flour. I will share the version I make for us. I use my Kitchenaid mixer to make this as I cant use my hands long enough to knead bread anymore.

Focaccia Bread

2 cups plus 2 tablespoons of hot water in Kitchenaid bowl
2 tablespoons sugar
3 1/2 cup all purpose flour
2 teaspoons yeast
1/2 tablespoon salt
1/4 cup olive oil

In mixer bowl with hot water add in sugar, and 1 cup of bread flour, add yeast on top of this flour. Add remaining flour and then the salt. With dough hook attached mix ingredients a bit, maybe 1 minute. Pour in olive oil and mix well and continue kneading for about 5 minutes. When dough is smooth and elastic, turn off mixer and cover bowl and let dough rise till nearly double in size.
Prep 2 cookie sheets by oiling them with olive oil and sprinkle with cornmeal. When dough is ready turn on mixer and stir down dough. Divide in half. Press each half on the cookie sheets pressing with fingers till it is about 1/4 inch thick. Let sit for about 10 minutes. No need to try to be perfect, this is artisan style bread.
To prepare to bake, preheat oven to 400 degrees. Using fingers make indentions all over dough and drizzle with a good olive oil. Sprinkle on about half teaspoon dried rosemary over each pan with dough. A good sprinkle of parmesan cheese, salt, pepper, garlic powder, and chopped sun dried tomatoes that have been preserved in oil. You can also drizzle a bit of the oil from the dried tomatoes over bread as well. Top with a light layer of shredded cheddar or mozzarella cheese.  You can add on some chopped olives if you enjoy those as well. Put in oven and bake till light brown. Tear into pieces at serving or cut like bread sticks and serve with a marinara sauce. Enjoy!!
We can make a meal on this and a bowl of marinara sauce.  This is a bread that you can top any way you like really . If you love garlic cloves by all means slice some onto dough. A thin layer of pizza sauce would be yummy with your choice of pizza toppings. An easy bread that can be used many ways. Limited only by the imagination.

Not much else happening here on the homestead, so till next time, blessings from the McGuire homestead.

stella

Yep, back again for another round

I started my lil blog several years ago to more or less document our successes and failures here and to share a little bit of knowledge from things we learned along the way. Then somehow I started slacking on keeping my blog updated. Now seems like I am about 5 months behind. And a lot can happen in 5 months around here. After my last post we got to drive to Arizona and see our kids and the grandbabies out there. I tell ya, nothing like 2 little boys to make a feller drive for days no matter how much it hurts the body. They are worth every pain tho just to see those happy little faces. Then November was hunting season and spent most of the month in west Ky at the lodge helping out there. Back home and then flew to Arizona to spend 3 weeks or so with the kids and those precious lil boys again thru the Christmas holiday and the littlest one, Zach's 2nd birthday. Got back to my homestead shortly after new years and here it is March already. Dang where did the time go?

We have decided that we want to get all our garden planted by mid April this year like we use to do several years ago. It was just what my dad always insisted on doing. He said if you plant early things sprout and start to come up and you get them in ahead of the spring rains and just do so much better. Never knew of a year when dad failed to have a productive garden. Last fall Rodger did manage to get our garden plot turned so it can be worked a bit earlier this year. So this gives me hope we will be able to plant earlier this season than in the past few years. I did start my transplant seeds early also. I already have cabbage up, although they are lil ones yet. I did suck it up and invest in 2 seed tray heat mats to use for the peppers and tomatoes this year. Both of those need a bit of heat to sprout well and come up. I have herbs started as well as the tomatoes, peppers and cabbage. In my herb garden it is just easier to transplant small clumps of herb plants than to try to keep ahead of the tiny weeds that tend to come up with them. As far as my experience I have less lost of seedlings and plants this way. Not to mention I know where I planted things so less chance of them being trampled when I am in there doing weeding and harvesting.

I have done a lot of research on orchards and fruit tree care this winter when it was too cold to get out and do projects outside. Well at least for me. I want to be a snow bird and go south in winter as I get older. Just no place like home tho. Anyway, we strive to use very little to no spray on things here. I am well aware that it kills the soil and depletes it over time to use pesticides. We use No weed or grass killer, herbicides, on or near any of our crops. We decided to try to go organic as far as how we care for the orchard. I did a great deal of research on Neem as a tree spray. On researching it I found that most places, big box stores and even local farm stores just sell "chemical" sprays, not really organic. But they do sell neem oil spray. Only problem with this is the neem they sell is only 1 or 2 components of true whole neem oil. So I found an online source for whole neem oil. I thought with shipping it was kinda pricey but after checking the price of the partial stuff sold at farm stores it was actually cheaper over all. If interested in any of this info visit the site www.groworganicapples.com on growing organic and www.neemresource.com for the pure neem oil. Finally this past weekend I did get the first round of neem on my fruit trees and grape vines. I sprayed with the neen and fish emulsion to give the trees a nutrient boost for leaf production. We had put fertilizer on the trees and grape vines prior to the spraying. I did find a few small branches on my peach and cherry trees with bloom. Not totally bloomed out so that was a plus. I am sure we will have some frost and cold weather before we actually get to spring so hopefully they will bloom and produce some fruit this year. The apple and nut trees are not even in green tip stage yet so they should do ok. It is strange in east Ky to have 70 plus degree weather in February so this was the problem with some early blooms. I had read a news article saying that lots of commercial orchards are having an issue with trees blooming too early and will likely suffer frost and freeze kills this year. Cant imagine the price of fruit this fall if you can purchase it at all. If news is saying lots of killed fruit it might be wise for all of us that use a lot of canned fruit, homegrown or otherwise, to stock up on canned fruit early ahead of the price increases. 

                                                       Before pruning sweet cherry trees.

                                       
                                                   After pruning sweet cherry trees.

                                 Northern side of our orchard after pruning and before clean up

Last spring I ordered some baby chicks to raise a new laying flock. I being the dummy ordered 25 Buff Orphington pullets. Love this breed. Very docile sweet hens. I had hopes of getting at least one rooster albeit by mistake but that didnt happen. So I had 25 hens. Gosh they all started laying and I was over run with eggs. It is near impossible to sell country eggs here when people can go to the store and use their food stamps and get them cheaper. So I ended up giving a friend half my young laying pullets. I kept 12 and still get too many eggs. Not that that is a bad thing. I do appreciate the effort the girls put in, but just how many chicken fruit can a house of 2 or 3 eat? Well not as many as they provide. But I have a couple people who do get eggs from us so that helps a lot. We plan to build a new run this spring for them so they can be outside a bit but as for now they have to stay inside. Too many predators and our lil girl Sasha is not old enough to know to protect them. She thinks they are for her entertainment right now. She is just a puppy at 10 months old but will outgrow that stage soon we hope.

Last spring a friend in Virginia sent me some thornless blackberry starts. Most people say blackberry shoots, I call these things trees. This is gonna be a learning curve for me for sure. She had told me to tie them upright to a stake or fence. So this I did to the side of the garden fence. Oh geez, I was tying plants all summer. Once you have them growing upright then clip the top to a manageable height. Then they send out limbs off that stem, clip those limbs to about 1 to 2 feet in length. Those limbs will make more lil limbs, clip them to about 1 to 2 feet. All the growth I got from the plants last summer will bloom and produce berries this season. God willing. But am thinking now I sure dont need 25 of those "blackberry trees" I will be picking berries till the cows come home. But thas ok, I will be thankful and consider my self very blessed. Not to mention the fact I ordered some thornless raspberry starts this spring from Starks. Speaking of which, we decided if we are gonna plant trees, and perirrenial plants we are best served to just pay a bit more and get good quality healthy starts. So I will be probably taking our a few of the blackberry plants that are smaller and putting in some raspberry plants on the end of the row on the same fence as the blackberries are now. I am pretty excited to have berries that dont leave me bleeding when I pick them. I also had to purchase some new strawberry plants. I had a good idea once but it didnt work as I planned. I had planted strawberry plants in holes in landscape fabric then mulched them. It worked great for keeping weeds down. BUT the strawberry runners were not able to take root thru the layer of mulch thus they did not live once the plant reproduced. So my strawberry bed was not able to renew itself and now it has scarcely any plants. So last fall I took out the landscape fabric and mulch, tilled the soil, added organic fertilizer and am ready to plant new plants. I am gonna attempt to find some saw dust to use as mulch this year or maybe collect pine needles. It should be much easier for the new runners to take root and keep the strawberry bed renewed very year or so.  You live and learn I reckon.

These are the blackberry bushes tied back to the garden fence. Not to mention this is November.
These things were still growing into December. When we pruned the fruit trees in early February I went by the outside of the garden fence and clipped off some blackberry limbs that were hanging way over the outside. I am sure the deer will help themselves to any plant material or berry that is hanging out of the garden. Or the crows will help themselves. I do have netting to put over small trees and fruiting berries to prevent crow lose this year I hope. They ate all the grapes on the grapevines that are to the left of the blackberries outside the fence. They are going to be trellised this spring with a T-top trellis for ease of covering with netting when the grapes start to ripen.

So now you have a little bit of a catch up post. I am certain I am missing filling you in on something important so maybe I will remember it next time. Till then, blessings from the McGuire homestead.

stella

Its not so bad after all

I thought our poor garden was gonna be a total bust this year, but its not so bad after all. Although we still have plenty grass in there that is covering up some things it is still decent. We have made enough pickles to last a year even if we don't have any more. The vines are nice and green, just no cukes or even bloom on them. Not sure about why that happened. But we good either way. Our taters are not visible for the grass but the vines have already died back and its time to dig those. Most likely we will do that this weekend if no more rain till then. Well probably Rodger, Jason and Miranda will get em out. My pepper plants are short but have lots of lil peppers on them and still growing. The tomatoes are nice size plants, green and have lots of little tomatoes. They will just be a lil later than we are use to because we planted everything later this year. I hope to have sweet corn in a week or so. And I think we will have plenty to last us.  Watermelons and cantaloupes are coming along too. Beans are starting to bloom. Not sure why they came up so spotty but we should have enough to last us. The corn we planted for cornmeal is huge and the ears are huge as well.

Rodger is 5'11 and the corn is twice as tall as he is. This is the Reid's yellow dent. An old fashioned open pollinated variety that we save our own seed for. So far we are happy with this variety for stock feed an to make corn meal. The chickens sure do like this stuff shelled. They don't eat much of it in summer but in winter it is a different story. Makes nice dark yellow egg yolks too. Rich and healthy for ya.
I am making progress on the herb bed, finally. I did get my new lavender plants planted in the herb bed and some sage plants that I had started in the greenhouse. They have been in pots for a several weeks to get some growth before transplant. Sure makes a difference in how hearty they are in the ground. I got some mulch put down too around the mature sage plants as well as the new ones.

I plan to try to get the sage cut for drying tomorrow as the weather has been much less humid for a few days. Rodger helped me last evening to get the rest of the weeds pulled so we could lay down black plastic to kill out weeds in the far end of the bed. By time we finished it was too dark to get a good picture, but trust me, it sure looked better.

This section of the herb bed has been established for a few years and has filled in pretty good and it has mulch so not much problem with weeds growing in here. A few strays that are easy to pull out here and there. The section that will have the black plastic on it for a few weeks is gonna be used this fall for  a few cabbage, maybe broccoli and brussel sprouts for a fall crop. After I harvest the sage tomorrow I plan to make a spot to sow some parsley seed to cut this fall. I am guessin if I plant it late I can let it come back in the spring an go to seed for a new crop next year without reseeding. Kinda takes care of itself. I have lost my tarragon plants. They got over run by the oregano and mint. Suppose I will have to obtain some new plants next spring. I still have enough dried to last a few more years. Seems like on the farm, its feast or famine. In those "feast" years I can and dry everything I can get my grubby lil paws on so we don't run short in the "famine" years. It has worked well for me so far. My strawberry plants near the driveway are still producing some. I did get the bed weeded, it just needs mulch put down now to keep the weeds out. Same with the bed in back of the house.
My new lil beans that I planted in the bed out back came up rather spotty but the ones that are up look nice and healthy. I will trellis those for extra beans to can and save seed from. I feel better now that we kinda have a handle on the weeding here. That got pretty depressing for a while with all the rain an heat and not being able to get any thing done about the over growth.
The excess rain has sure made nice berries this year. My 1 thornless black berry plant that my friend Rosie gave me a couple years ago had lots of nice big berries on it. I know this because I stood out there a few days ago an picked and ate about 2 big hands full. So sweet and juicy. I still have more than enough berries canned to last a few more years without having to pick any in the awful heat. So I took the lazy way out this year.
I finally got my car in today to get the right seal put on the moon roof to keep it from leaking. It seals nice and tight now. The mechanic also unclogged the drain hole so it don't get water inside anymore even if the seal should leak. He did say this is a rather common problem with these vehicles. Now to get the duck tape residue off the top of the car. Maybe I can get that done tomorrow too if it don't get too hot or rain on me.
I know this subject is touchy with most people but some of us still smoke. Yeah I do, and yeah I know its bad for ya. Now get off my case. With that said, we turn our attention to the ones of us who still do smoke. My friend Anna sent us a cigarette rolling machine. Bless her heart, so kind of her and her hubby. Hubby and I can both smoke for about half what it was costing for cigarettes. The machine is so dang neat. Much improved over the ones of long ago like I have of my dads that you had to lay the paper in, put the tobacco on the paper and dampen the edge, manually roll the lil handle to roll the cigarette up. Hell I would have to stop smoking if I had to do that. I have "NO" experience rolling. Nuff said about that. But when we go to the big city we plan to get our tobacco to start rolling our own smokes. I like menthol so I guess I will be finding the menthol filters to roll with. So if you still smoke it is well worth lookin into purchasing the rolling machine that basically shoves the bakker into the filter cigarette thingys. But if ya wanna really cut down or quit, by all means do so or roll ya own. Anna also sent me a huge bag of lavender that she had dried. I love love love the smell of lavender. So very relaxing to me. My plan is to make some lil sachets or bags and fill them with the dried lavender and store with bed linens. I will likely make a pretty one to just hang on the head of my bed and hope it helps me sleep a lil better. Hell any thing that will help a lil. Maybe if I do enough things that help a "lil" that all those "lil's" will add up to a good nights sleep. One can alas dream, er hope to dream.
Not much else happening here on the farm, so till next time, blessings from the McGuire homestead.

Stella

Life goes forward

Life goes on, forward most days, but only one day at a time. This weather has been yucky, we have had too much rain for the garden. Might be hard to believe but the grass has about taken over. Its still far too wet to get in there to work so the grass will keep growing. We do have a few nice days forecast thru the weekend. We should also get a lil break from the heat as well with temps staying in the mid 80's. I can do 80, its those 90's that do me in. I don't acclimate well at all any more. I am either freezing or burning up. I don't have a happy middle any more. But at least my knees will be happy for a while. I got the last of the series of 3 injections in my right knee yesterday. It is a bit sore but not as bad as they have been after the injections. So there is a plus. Now if only this stuff will kick in and do its job and relieve the pain in the knee joints I will for sure be happy about that. But the doc said it would take a while and depend on a lot of factors. So we wait. I don't do well trying to squat down to weed beds and such. So guess that is out of the question. But I certainly have plenty of it to do. I did manage to finish the beds out back this evening with Rodgers help. Still need to get the strawberry bed by the drive and the remainder of the herb bed weeded. Rodger bought me 20 bags of mulch to put down on the berries and herbs to help cut down on the weeding. Maybe I can get a lot of that stuff done this weekend as it is suppose to be nice and not rain. After I get the mulch down it can rain a bit to settle it in but no downpours please.

Last week after my doc appointment we had to make a trip to Lexington to Sam's club to pick up supplies for the company and get a few things stocked back up for us here at home. As the rain destroyed our onions in the garden we bought a 50 lb bag of onions at Sam's. I have been slicing some of those and getting them dried out in the summer kitchen. I also bought carrots to dry an celery. I am surprised at how many carrots and celery flakes I use in cooking. Lots to say the least. Our carrots did not grow this year either, not sure if it was too wet or too cold when we sowed them. But we planted twice an none made it. I still have enough carrot chunks in the freezer to last another season but needed some dried to make my version of Ms Dash. It has been a challenge at best to dry things in the dehydrator in the summer kitchen for a while. The humidity is high outside and it takes longer even in the dehydrator. But we making progress. Still got a lot of onions, all the celery an carrots to dry. Maybe by time I start canning beans I will be done with all the dehydrating. Rodger did make it to the garden last weekend and picked a bunch of cukes and we made bread and butter pickles with those. Tomorrow evening we will pick again and make more. We do use a lot of pickles. Rodger will eat the pickles as a snack if I don't have a dessert made. We try to make at least 20 quarts of bread and butter pickles and about that many kosher dills every year to last all season. When I have cukes that get too big to make good dill slices or spears I usually chop those and can them as chopped dill pickle for use in deviled eggs and such. Lots easier than chopping as you need them. Just open the jar an take out what ya need for the recipe.

Our yard had gotten beyond over grown before Rodger could get it dry enough to mow. Kinda resembles a hay field right now. Wont take long for it to grow back tho. He even ran the weed eater in the garden between some of the rows of veggies to get the grass out that was really tall. Its hard to believe it is almost mid July already. Where the heck did the summer go. Well I have lost most of mine going to the doc once a week for the past 6 weeks for the injections in my knees and before that we were on vacation. With the injections I am suppose to stay off my feet for 48 hours after so that has knocked out 3 days per week of not being able to get anything done. But we done with all that.

My hens are all trying to set I think, I have 6 sitting on eggs and the layers are still laying with them. That is a waste of good eggs. I have 4 hens that have been setting long enough to hatch 2 batches of chicks and have not hatched one. So if its not unbearably hot out tomorrow I may try to get the eggs out of those nest an trash em. The chicken house needs to be cleaned out again but not sure how spunky I feel with a wheelbarrow. I could use the waste on the beds in back where my Lima beans and tomatoes are. The broccoli I planted late is not doing anything so I think I might get it out of those beds and put a layer of chicken manure and bedding down on the bed and cover it over with black plastic or newspaper, if I have enough here at the house. That should break down nicely and make a good spot of fall cabbage and maybe some greens, or lettuce and onions. But definitely cabbage. Not sure the cabbage in the garden is gonna do any good or not. Rodger said the cukes have taken over the cabbage row where we didn't get those trellised. Not much you can get done when the weather wont cooperate.  It has stayed so wet that we still don't have the greenhouse taken down and stored away yet. I sure wanted it nice and dry before we try to disassemble it and put it back in the box for use next year. It was dry this evening but was too late to get it taken apart after Rodger got in from work. Maybe this weekend. I think our weekend list is growing by leaps and bounds. Our plan for tomorrow evening is the pick cukes and put the net fence around the grape vines here in the yard. The vines are loaded with huge grape clusters. The nicest ones we have had yet and I sure don't want the chickens to see the grapes and start eating them before they get ripe. My luck we will fence the chickens out and then wild birds will find em and eat em all. I see a good amount of grape juice coming from all those nice grapes this fall if we can keep the critters fooled. I don't think I will make any more jelly as we still have a lot that I had made a few years ago when I had a good grape harvest.

Not much else happening here on the farm, so till next time, blessings from the McGuire homestead.

Stella

The weather is unpredictable, as am I

I guess since I don't get up every morning like most hard working folks and leave the farm to go off to my job I don't keep any kind of schedule. If I do set times for thing they are kinda vague. The time frame of usually a week, give or take and few days. I got started on the baby cocoon that I had told you about and posted pics on my last post of the finished product. Later that night, couldn't get to sleep so I started on the lil hat to match. I got it all done the same night but too late to add to the post. So here is a photo of the lil hat. I have no pattern for this either, I just started at the top with a chain of 6 stitches and linked them together and did double crochet to increase till I got the the size that would fit over my fist then started the single stitch to decrease a lil bit and finish it off. Then made the lil poofy ball for the top by wrapping the yarn many times around my fingers, tied it in the middle and clipped the loops. Then with the ends of the string used to tie it together I put those thru the top and tied it off.

So what do ya think? I like it and I think its cute. Just long as it keeps a lil boy warm and happy is all that matters. Now on to the next project. Not sure what it will be just yet tho.

I have a doc appointment tomorrow to get meds refilled and I am mailing some kefir grains out to a couple folks. One package will go to my good friend Deb in MS and the other will go to my reader and new friend Lisa in Wyoming. Had intended to get those out today and it has not been a good day. I have felt like hammered crap all weekend. So I stayed lazy and stayed in. Rodger picked up lil padded envelopes today on his way home so I will bag up the grains tomorrow and mail them on my way to the doc. These things grow something ferocious.

When I put the grains in fresh sugar/molasses water 48 hours ago the level of the grains was at the line. You can see how much they have grown in that time. So ladies when you get these grains they will grow. I am sending enough for both of you to start 2 quart jars of Kefir just in case you happen to kill one. That is how I did the first bunch I got. I usually put about 1/3 cup sugar(white, brown, just nothing artificial) along with about 1 tablespoon of un-sulfured molasses in a quart jar, add water about 4/5 the way up the jar and stir to dissolve the sugar and molasses and add the grains along with any liquid that is with them. I cover the top of my jar or jug now with a coffee filter and put the ring only on the jar to keep out "stuff". Let sit for 24 hours and taste, it should be slightly tart. After 48 will be more tart and at this point you can strain the grains out of the liquid, save the liquid, that is your good for-ya kefir water, and mix a new batch of water, sugar/ molasses and put the grains back in there to continue the process. Tonight when I made the water for my grains I used maple syrup instead of molasses. Just to change up the flavor a bit. When making kefir water you do not want to use chlorinated water. Only spring or good well water. We have well water here so I have no issue. Also if you want extra calcium in the kefir you can add a piece of clean, organic egg shell. This stuff will almost dissolve the eggshell in 48 hours. Makes the shell really brittle. And we know us girls need our calcium. If you want to make a batch of flavored kefir that is a lil fizzy after you strain out your grains you can take the jar of kefir water you have made and add some pieces of fruit to it and let it sit on the counter with a lid on for another 24 hours to ferment. I have so far made raspberry and strawberry and I used my homegrown frozen berries. It tasted great. So get creative and enjoy your new science project.

I love getting free stuff in the mail. I tinker around online and sign up for free product samples just cause I can. Today in the mail this is what I got and just for filling out a simple coupon online.

Kinda neat, eh? I can do 2 loads of dishes, 2 of laundry and have lots of coupons and travel size shampoo and toothpaste, all for free. And free is good, yes? Yes it is.

Our weather is as unpredictable as I am this month. Dang over the weekend we had probably an inch or more of snow, it melted the next day, then some rain and cold, now they are giving more snow for tomorrow and by Saturday it is pose to be in the 60's. What the heck! If it is that warm this weekend we will be outside pruning grape vines, planting trees in the orchard. I finally got the trees I had ordered a month or more ago and they are nice for the cheap price I paid for them. I desperately need to get my asparagus bed mulched to keep the weeds down so I don't have to weed so much this year. Dang I don't have time or energy for that stuff. We have 30 plus new grapevines planted near the orchard that need to have stakes so they will develop straight trunks for a couple more years. I am sure the trees in the orchard need some trimming too. And here it is March again and we don't have our grapevines here at the house pruned back yet. I need to get the building ready for baby chicks too. Not sure when they will be here but very soon I hope.

Not much else happening here on the farm, so till next time, blessings from the McGuire homestead.

Stella

Just what I needed.........

........more lil orphans to take care of.

  Not like I dont have anything else to do. Gosh it takes an hour twice a day to just feed the lil orphans that I have now. A total of 4 lil chicks that the momma hen kept tossing out of the nest and wouldnt take after hatching. One of them was wet and his body so cold I almost tossed him thinkin he would not live. I am glad I didnt because when I brought him in the house and put him in the incubator and got him warm and dry he is doing fine. So I got 4 babies with no momma that will take em. The lil orphan kittens are doing good. They have learned that I am their food source but they still dont let me pet them. But thas ok too. As long as they get food and water is what matters. I have to refill water pans several times a day for the animals and birds that are out in this unbearable heat we have been having. We havent had rain for most of a month now. There are no water holes or creeks for the critters to find water. With the mild winter we were kinda prepared to have an abundance of insect pest like mosquetos and fleas, ticks and the like. But there has been very few. I guess because there is no water for them either and they died. Not saying thats a bad thing tho.
We on Saturday as I was going down the hill to feed the lil kittens I took a tumble. Not a pretty sight for sure. At first I thought for sure I had broke my arm and maybe foot. But as time went on my pinky finger side of my right hand hurts really bad as does the big toe on my left foot. Of course being hillbilly I was barefoot and got my feet caught in some netting that I had placed near some landscape plants to keep the chickens from digging them up and hit the ground hard. Any way I went to the doc today for other things and had them do an xray of my hand to make sure I didnt crack the bone. I am sure it is not a complete fracture but maybe a crack due to how much pain it gives me. Not the time of year for me to be handicapped too.
Guess I will get the results tomorrow if its broke or not.
We had planned on butchering off the cornish cross chickens this weekend as they are now over 7 weeks old and still not big enough to butcher. They should have already been in the freezer. They have had high protein feed 24/7 and that makes em grow. Not these. I always ordered my chicks from Marti poultry farms in Missouri and found that they have closed down due to illness in the family. It was a family operated business from what I gather. I orederd from McMurray hatchery this year and not sure if they dont have good breeding stock or what , but this group of chicks have not grown like the ones I got from Marti. So I guess I will try another hatchery next time I get birds to see if I can find one with better quality.
We have been picking strawberries again and raspberries every other evening. I have enough raspberries now to make a batch of raspberry jam I think. Maybe I will do that tomorrow if its not so hot I cant breathe in the summer kitchen. I really need to go get a load of mulch to use on my herbs and go ahead and water them I guess or I may lose a lot of my new plantings. Probably the only things that will get watered will be the new stuff that is not established good yet. The rest of the plants will be ok I think. So thas my options for tomorrow I suspose.
Not much else happening here ,so till next time, blessings from the McGuire homestead.

Stella

Movin right along

We are still moving right along with the gardens and picking peas. Tonight I canned up 10 quarts of sugar snap peas. Not sure what the next thing will be to can, probably blackberries. They are looking good so far and I am sure the rain we had last night has helped them along a lot. The raspberries are starting to ripen too. When we picked the peas last evening we drove around the field looking at all the other plants and noticed the raspberries starting to turn in places so it wont be long on those either. I am really looking forward to raspberries this year. They wild blackberries here on the farm produce like crazy every year with no need to do anything special to them. I may ask Rodger to mowed near the blackberries in the field so I can avoid a few chiggers and ticks. I love picking blackberries but I alas get bit by every bug known to mankind. I read somewhere if you increase your intake of zinc in summer it will deter skeeters and other biting bugs. I do have some zinc supplement here so maybe I will give that a try.
While I was in the summer kitchen canning peas I walked down to the strawberry bed that is out back and picked a bunch of strawberries to eat. Those things are still producing and blooming again. I did manage to find the energy to weed the old onion bed so maybe tomorrow I can weed the asparagus bed and get some mulch in there to keep the weeds at bay. I really don't have the gumption to go out there and weed like I have in the past and if I don't fix it now they might be a loss. I walked back to the grape arbor out back and noticed the young chickens chasing bugs near the grapes. I got to looking closer and they were catching Japanese beetles. So I caught all the jap beetles off the grape vines and toss em in the chicken house for the smaller chickens. Now if I could teach them where the bugs live and they could help themselves without eating grapes it would be a good day.
Our temps have cooled a great deal the past couple days. It is actually cool outside this evening. So maybe tomorrow I will feel like getting out in the herb bed and doing some more weeding and get the plants fertilized so they can get well rooted before it gets really hot weather here. Even tho the rain was wonderful for the gardens it was sure rough on my arthritis. Got up this morning with my knee swollen again. Don't know what its problem is. Probably just arthritis flaring up. Dang it sure makes life on the farm rough.
Not much else happening here, so till next time, blessings from the McGuire homestead.

Stella

We are still alive here

I thought I might should post and let my regular readers know that we are still kicking here. All is well on the home front, feeling like we might be getting somewhat caught up with stuff for now. For a few days anyway.
I think the strawberries are done with their major crop for spring and will give me a lil rest. I am so thankful for the bountiful harvest tho. Got about 10 gallon in the freezer and 20 pints of strawberry jam made so that should do us till the next season of berries. Friday night we picked the first of the English peas. I sure hope to have enough of those to can some. I cooked the ones we picked on Saturday and they were so dang good. Put some taters in with em and made fried corn bread and I had green onions. I am convinced heaven is right here. A country meal fit for a king. Or queen.
Mothers day weekend we finally got the rest of our garden in. The sweet corn, green beans, maters, peppers (3 types), sweet taters , cukes, eggplant, and squash are all planted. Rodger was in the field mowing earlier today and said the sweet corn is starting to come up. This weekend Rodger hoed and plowed out all the stuff that was planted earlier in spring to keep the weeds at bay. It all looks real nice now. I still might plant 2 more rows of green beans in our garden. We use lots of green beans here. That is the only green veggie Jason will eat so we have them a couple times a week. I noticed other day when I was in the garden that the tater bugs are not so bad on the taters. If they don't get any worse than they are now I don't think I need to worry much. I am happy about that. I did end up planting about 200 tomato plants again this year tho. And about 100 peppers total. I didn't have enough peppers last year so maybe I will this time around. We are supposed to get rain tonight or tomorrow so that will help things spring up faster. I did get my herb out of the green house and planted into the herb bed this evening too. I have about 15 nice sage plants now that hopefully will provide enough sage for our use. It takes a lot when ya start making homemade sausage in fall. I kept a few tomatoes here to put in the herb bed too for quick slicing tomatoes and to save the seed from. I am pleasantly surprised that I don't have more weeds in the herb bed than I do. I know I weed it a few times a year but seems like last year there were far more weed problems. But then again the herbs are bigger and can shade some of the weeds out. I need to get my lil Mexican cukes planted in the bed too. They are fast maturing and will do fine starting later. Maybe tomorrow if it don't rain too much.
A couple weeks ago on one of our strawberry picking trips to the field, Rodger with a lil help from me got the raspberries weeded. They have lots of lil berries setting on them now. Am hoping for a good crop. I love the flavor of fresh raspberries.
As of now my greenhouse is empty. I got all the pots out this evening and set them on the borders of the herb bed near the house so I can water them without having to leave the hose lay out in the sun all the time all the way to the end of the yard. The grapevine cutting that I attempted to root did great. I got 34 out of 40 and they sure look healthy and hearty. I took cutting off the kiwi vines when I pruned them too this spring and most of them have roots now. I am not sure if the rooting hormone that I used to dip them in made a difference or the fact that the sap had already risen when they were pruned. But seems I had more take root this year than last. I really have had a good season starting odd stuff this year. I planted some asparagus seeds that I gathered last fall and had in the fridge all winter and most of them have come up too. I just took them out of the greenhouse and set them out so I can keep them watered till they get bigger. I think maybe my next task will be to weed the asparagus bed and strawberry bed again and maybe get mulch put down. Once the garden comes in I just don't have time not ability to keep all the beds weeded. My knees and back just don't allow that anymore. So I am gonna have to think of ways to cut the work back because Rodger and Jason don't have time to do it either. Jason will have his own things to care for soon. He and Rodger took the lil tractor and bucket and built raised beds near the rock wall at his house and a bed in front of the front porch. I gave him some maters, peppers, herbs and flowers to plant there. I will be much easier to keep neat and he wont have to go near the top of the rock wall to mow now. Much safer too.
I had a brain storm last night and decided today that I would start picking flowers and stuff to dry to make homemade potpourri. I love the smell of potpourri. Not to mention it can look pretty too. Up the road from our house near an old house site that are lil tiny old fashioned roses blooming now and they smell heavenly. With Rodgers help I picked about 2 gallon of those roses to dry and some lavender from my yard, lemon mint, and fever few blooms. It does look pretty right now but will fade as it dries. I do need to get the fixative oil to put in it after it all gets real dry and store it away for later. I have stayed kinda busy today but nothing strenuous hopefully that will make me hurt tomorrow. Guess we shall see in the morning.
Not much else happening here, so till next time, blessings from the McGuire homestead.

Stella

Almost time to plant

It is about time to plant the rest of our garden stuff now. We should be beyond frost after the first of May. Then the tomatoes, peppers and other frost sensitive stuff gets planted. We have peas that look great, onions are starting to make bulbs already, lettuce is coming up, carrots are peeking thru the ground, cabbage are getting settled in to grow. So far so good. The forecast is for rain for  another week here. I suppose this is what the old folks called "blackberry winter". It usually is rainy and cool when the blackberries lose their bloom. It has rained too much to allow us to get the mowing done in the orchard and it looks like a hay field. The trees are just peeking above the tall grass. Hope Rodger can mow tomorrow if we don't get more rain tonight. I would love to get the weeds cleared from the strawberries I moved in the field near the raspberries last year. The plants are huge and beautiful. We have picked nearly a gallon of berries just picking over them and getting the ripest biggest ones off. And boy do they have a good pronounced sweet strawberry flavor. IF we don't get rain maybe I can work on those tomorrow. I have a bed of berries here at the house that will need picked again tomorrow and those plants are loaded with berries. I am thinking this is the first year we will be able to say we have enough berries to fill our needs. And appetite for strawberry shortcake. The raspberries are near the plants in the field so I will try to weed them out as well. That I think will require a heavy pair of thorn proof gloves. But the raspberries are so worth it. This year, Lord willing, I would like to can some raspberry and strawberry syrups to use this later. Got to freeze a lot of them too for desserts. Raspberries or strawberries and chocolate are a match made in heaven. I guess that means too that I need to make sure I got a good stock of sugar for canning season.
I did get some parsley cut for drying yesterday and it is drying nicely. I use lots of parsley in cooking. It don't have a lot of flavor alone but sure adds a lot of flavor to foods. Next on the cut and dry list is gonna be sage and chamomile. I am happy my sage plants have came out and really are growing well this year. I have a bunch of lil ones started in the greenhouse to transplant to the herb bed a lil later.
I should be thinking on how to house chickens in a few weeks. I have my layers living in the brooder house for the winter and they still live there. I will be getting my first shipment of Cornish cross in mid May and they need living quarters. A friend and co-worker of the fellows has offered us some baby guineas. I know they make lots of noise but they are good to alert you to things creeping in the yard that Luna might miss. Luna is kinda off patrol duty for a while. I was really upset last week when she went missing for one whole day as that is just not like her. So after supper one evening Rodger and I were gonna go in different directions to look for her. I was afraid she had gotten off the farm a lil and someone had shot her. If that had happened nothing or nobody would have been safe passing thru here. I was sure livid at that thought. So Rodger took a flashlight and went to look under all the outbuilding and under the old house across the road. He came back in about 5 minutes to get me. I was sick thinking she was hurt. She was under the old house and had 2 lil puppies. OMG I was so relieved to see her. I had looked there early in the day and didn't see her. She went under there for shelter and to keep her babies safe. They are so dang cute. I am so hoping they look like her. We have no idea what the daddy is so they will not be full stock Pyrenees puppies. But they are her babies and I am gonna have a hard time seeing them get adopted. I don't even want to think about that yet. She does come to the house to eat and get water, then she is off to take care of her babies.
As for you all that knew I had surgery on my left shoulder and elbow in February. It is doing better. Actually the elbow is mostly good, the shoulder is still painful and stays sore and stiff. The doc tole me it will probably be like that due to the bursitis in the shoulder joint. Not what I wanted to hear, but I have to live with it I guess. Beats the alternative.
As of right now we will b planting trees tomorrow in the orchard. The friend and co-worker that offered the guineas brought us some apple trees(Wolf River) and some cherry trees this evening. Guess I need some compost to get them going good. I do need to trim the grass at the base of the other trees in the orchard so they can get light and air circulation. Might help keep down disease later.
Not much else happening here, so till next time, blessings from the McGuire homestead.

Stella

Back from vacation and now we are getting caught up

Gosh hard to believe I have not posted since March 27th. As of last post the stuff was growing well in the greenhouse. I had 3 hens hatch out 8 baby chicks as we were leaving for Nevada on April 6th. Jason had the fun task of taking care of the chickens, cats, Luna and the greenhouse while we were gone. He obviously did a good job as everything is still alive and growing. The baby chicks are so cute. I let the big chickens out of the building today and the momma hens brought the lil ones out to scratch and explore. They walk funny cause their lil crop is so full it throws em off balance.
We got to Nevada to see Rob and Amoy on Friday night the 6th. They picked us up at the airport in Elko. We got to spend the week of Robs birthday with him and Amoy too. My lil boy turned 26 already. On Sunday we went to visit Robs job site and see the gold mine and the huge pits and the underground mines as well. We didn't go down into the underground mines tho. When I have that much dirt over me ya can say I am a goner.

Rodger got to see the drill rig up close that Rob had sent him a picture of earlier this year. That thing is huge.

This is a picture of the open pit mine where Rob works.

We also got to go see the remains of the old town of Cortez which the mine is named for.

 This is a picture of Rob and Amoy in front of their new house in Nevada. We got to help them put in some landscaping while we were there. I think it made the house look so nice.

Rodger and I standing on a balcony over looking the Hoover Dam on the Nevada/Arizona border.

Snow capped mountains in the distance on our drive to Las Vegas early last week. A long drive and a whole lot of nothing along the way. We had a good time tho, lots of good food, drinks and fun.

Before we went on vacation my friends Gretchen and Carl sent me this lil garden hopper. Dang this thing sure saves the back when planting. I am sure it will be great when we get started picking beans and garden stuff. I cant do a lot of standing and bending over to plant and this thing sure helps. And it has a place to hold my coke can. This is the new strawberry bed where I tore out flowers last fall and covered the ground all fall, winter and most of this spring with black plastic to kill weeds. Worked out great. We put down a weed barrier and then made holes to plant the plants. Tomorrow we will get the mulch put down and the hoops over the top with deer netting to keep the critters out. I got about 75 plants moved into this bed. And many more to go elsewhere.

As soon as we got back home Rodger mowed the yard and plowed the peas and onions out in the big garden. The peas and onions look great. The peas are vining and climbing the fence he put up before we left. Last evening we planted 2 rows of potatoes, 2 rows of carrots and some lettuce. After supper today we planted the cabbage that I had ready in the greenhouse. So we do have a good start on the garden. I hope I can move more strawberries tomorrow if it don't rain. There is rain and cooler weather in the forecast for several days. I have herbs that are ready to be cut and dried too and I must get started on that.

Before we left I did get my baby chicks ordered for meat birds. They wont be here till mid May tho which is OK. Sure don't think Jason would have appreciated them arriving while we were gone and him having to babysit them,  Not much else happening here, so till next time, blessings from the McGuire homestead.

Stella

I'm back in business

Well computer wise that it. I got my old Toshiba back from Jason and he put windows back on it and now I am good to go for now. I like this lil puter. It serves my needs just fine. If I can ever get my programs all installed and working again.
We had company all weekend. Josh came down and spent the weekend with us. He does that on occasion to get a break and just relax a bit from the hustle and bustle of everyday life. We were glad to see have him here. He also came to get some of his pork to take home. I think he was taking his bacon home to smoke and get frozen. Probably next weekend I will get ours trimmed and sliced up and put in the freezer as well.
I was outside plundering in the yard looking at some of my ornamental plants. Some of my bushes have lil soft buds on them and its far too early for that. If we get some really cold winter like weather it may freeze them out. My strawberry plants are still green as can be. I don't even have mulch on them yet cause they never got killed back in the fall. We really have not had any really winter like weather here in east Kentucky. Still have some herbs that are green as well. Got 3 hens setting now. For goodness sake, they should know they don't need babies this time of year. When its nice outside I wanna go play in the dirt but I know its far too early. We had a wet fall and had a time getting it dry enough to pick corn. Then it was wet till now. Rodger never got the corn stalks bush hogged down or the big corn field turned under. We plan to plant corn this year in a field that is sod. So it really should have been plowed last fall. But not to worry, Rodger got it turned this weekend and here it is early January. If the weather stays dry this week I think he is taking some time off work to get the other ground turned as well. The place where we had corn this year will be planted in pink eye purple hull peas, sunflowers and sorghum. All of these will help rebuild the ground. We planted wheat on the garden plot we used last year. In spring half the wheat will get plowed under for a garden and the rest left to mature about July or so and harvested for grain and flour. I have went thru the seed catalogs and really don't need to order many seeds this year. I just need to find some odd food stuff to raise for fun. I try to grow at least one oddity every year but always try to have something we WILL use. Last year was the lil Mexican sour gherkin cukes and they made fun dill pickles. This year I am kinda leaning toward trying amaranth for greens and the seeds for flour.
Not much else happening on the farm, so till next time, blessings from the McGuire homestead.

Stella

Up to date and now out of town

I think maybe over the weekend I finally got some things caught up on the homestead and ready for the winter. Well with exception of the things that have not been killed back by frost. In our area down on the river we have not had a good killing frost yet this fall. My strawberry plants are still green and making runners like crazy. Really don't want to put mulch on those till they get killed back or they will freeze out when it gets cold because they try to keep living under the mulch and don't go dormant. Same with the asparagus bed. I did get the herb bed dead-headed and all the junk raked off it last weekend. It does look better and not so much like a jungle in the yard. It will get a layer of mulch as soon as we get a good frost.
I had an eye doctor appointment this morning and then left town to come to west Ky to help Aunt Ann with her hunting lodge and cook for the deer hunters. I will likely be here till after Thanksgiving.. Most likely leave the Monday after Thanksgiving and head over to central Ky to visit my friend Rosie and spend the night then on home the next day. I will only get a couple days to rest up then we butcher hogs. Maybe I can take a long break after the second week of December. All that kinda depends on whether or not Rodger gets our corn picked this week. If it is dry enough he is going to get the corn in and if not that will get put off till later. Deer season for modern fire arms opens this coming weekend here in Ky and every male I know is heading out somewhere to hunt. Rodger will be hunting with Josh the first weekend of season and then Jason will hunt with Josh the second weekend. Hopefully they will get a few deer for meat for the freezer. It cost a small amount to travel to hunt but is cheap as compared to buying the same amount of meat from the grocery and much more healthy for you. If they get more than a couple I know I will have to can some of the meat as we wont have freezer space. It will be close with some hog meat that needs to be frozen and then a half a beef in early December. But we will be set for the year. With that in mind, I may not get to rest when I get back home from working out here. I may be busy as a cat covering it up canning venison. But that's a good thing.
Will up date as the week progresses here and try to keep you all abreast of what is happening on the homestead too.
Till next time, blessings from the McGuire homestead on the road.


Stella

Time to start putting things to bed

Its time for us to start putting some thing in the gardens to bed for winter. The weather was really nice today so I got out and got started weeding and cleaning out some of the beds here at the house.I had planted herbs in what used to be my strawberry pyramid and had 1 huge tomato plant in there as well. The chickens kept eating the tomatoes so I pulled the vine out. I had no idea that tomato plants had roots that large. I used my lil gardening fork to get out all the weeds and stir up the soil a bit. It looked much neater when I got finished. I secured the netting around the bed to keep the chickens from digging all the soil out or making a dust bath in there. Then I got the asparagus bed dead-headed. I still need to get the lil weeds out of there and get mulch put in for winter. But somehow I got sidetracked like I am known to do and moved on to the big herb bed out front. I had made the mistake of planting a couple castor bean plants out there and they were far too big to pull out. I had Rodger cut them down with a hatchet and disposed of them finally. I got the spent basil pulled out and off the compost. The seed from the basil had dried on the plants and fallen to the ground. So next year they will come up and hopefully I wont have to start basil plants. Basil is an annual but will reseed itself if left the mature in place. I found a couple tiny lil Mexican sour gherkin plants in the herb bed as well. I guess I missed a few lil cukes at harvest time and they sprouted and came back up. For the most part the new section of the herb bed is done and waiting mulch. I still need to get the mints deadheaded and ready to mulch in. Rodger was going to help me do that this evening but it started to rain right after he helped get the castor bean plants out. We are supposed to have rain for a couple days and the temps will drop to around 30 at night an high of 50 in the daytime. I have been really lazy this week when I should have gotten my chicken house cleaned out and fresh bedding put in for the pullets. They should start laying real soon. It will be nice to have my own eggs again. My friend Deb brought me enough to last us for a couple weeks till mine get busy.
Our plan for the weekend is to get the 2 deer skinned out and the meat processed this weekend. It will be nice to have extra meat in the freezer again. In the past year we may have purchased 20 lb of meat total. We raise all our own veggies and have our own meat here on the farm. I know it is healthier for us and we know how the meat was handled.
Not much else happening here on the farm right now. So till next time, blessings from the McGuire homestead.

Stella

A close call, cleaning the cellar

I think I might have mentioned on here a few times about how I don't like snakes. Well yesterday evening I was weeding the flower bed near the cellar and dead-heading the hollyhocks that had finished blooming. I got in there with the pruning shears and cut the stalks down and tossed them to the other side of the side walk so I could dispose of them. I then proceeded to pull the weeds our of the bed, the few that there was. I had put a large section of a post in there to keep Luna from sleeping there when the plants were lil. Got to the last handful of weeds and started to reach for another weed and THERE it was . A copperhead, coiled an ready to strike. And my hand was about 6 inches away from the dang thing. I screamed, Rodger came running with the shovel and killed it. My guardian angel was working overtime last night. I had been walking around that dang thing for probably a half hour or more. So blessed that I didn't get bit. Doing some serious thinking about digging out all the flower beds when I have experiences like that.
The weather was nice here today, a lil hot but still you could work outside without burning up. I did get my outbuilding straightened up again before it got too hot to work in there. I thought it was about time to clean the cellar out and mop the floor and get it ready to put more canned stuff in there.I had a crate of fresh onions in there that I had got last fall and some of them had started to sprout. Took those to the summer kitchen and sliced those and they are now drying in the dehydrator. Should be done tomorrow so they can be crushed for onion flakes. I had a few jars of food to empty out that had changed color and a few had unsealed. Got all that out and the jars washed an ready to be re-filled. After supper I finished weeding the herb bed. The weeds sure grow fast in there where I didn't get mulch put down. But its clean now so maybe that will hold it for a week or so. My lil tiny Mexican sour gherkin vines are so pretty, but tiny and fragile looking. I guess they are supposed to look that way. I did see a few blooms on them too. Tomorrow I will need to check on the cukes in the big garden to see if I can make some pickles. Yuck! I still have 2 rows of strawberries over there to weed as well. Rodger has been trying to get the mowing done so he don't have to worry with that over the holiday weekend. We are hoping to have a family get-together on Sunday for Rodgers family so they can see Rob and Amoy. Yeas! my lil boy will be home this weekend. I cant wait to see them. Its been a long time since Thanksgiving. Rob called earlier this evening to say they were leaving Elko about 6 pm their time. They will arrive here in the wee hours Saturday. Please say a prayer for their safe travel. A 30 hour road trip can be kinda tiring.
Not much else happening here, so till next time, blessings from the McGuire homestead.

Stella

Its hot and the rain missed us

Our temps have been in the 90's here for several days and the humidity is awful. This afternoon it clouded over an made a lot of noise but no significant rain. It barely dampened the deck. But it did cool off a lil bit. The gardens are growing really good in spite of not having rain. We are hoping to get the garden worked out this weekend and that too will help. It serves 2 purposes, aerates the soil and gets rid of any weeds and grass that have come up since last time. The tobacco worm beans need to be trellised as they have runners on them now. They should be blooming before too long. Its hard to believe we are well into June and the gardens are small yet. We should have had fresh tomatoes and beans by July 4th but I sure don't think that is gonna happen. I know the tomatoes wont be ripe by then. I may have the beets canned by then tho as they are the earliest thing in the garden so far. Oh well, what is to be will be.
I should have a load of wood chips for mulch tomorrow. The contract crew that is cleaning the power company right of way said they would dump as many loads as I want on our property and be happy to do so. They need a place to dump them and I surely can use a bunch of those to mulch ornamental with as well as the herb bed. I know the trees have not been sprayed as all the chips will be off my property. It will just be a matter of getting them hauled to the places I need them. That probably will involve a fork and 4 wheeler with the wagon. Not a job that can be done in the mid-day heat tho.
So till next time, blessings from the McGuire homestead.

Stella

Daisy and Delilah

The puppies now have names, Daisy and Delilah. I think Daisy is all white and Delilah has dark ears. They are so cute. Jason said he was playing with em this morning and took some pics. Dont they have cute lil smiles?

The lil girls sitting beside their pool. They will get in the water when they get hot and this will make a nice place for them to cool off. Luna don't know they live in the neighborhood yet and I think when she finds out she will be guilty of puppynappin.
I had some minor chores to get done today. Got more homemade laundry detergent made so I can do laundry tomorrow. I did go to the garden and put the fertilizer on the melons and pumpkins that are finally up. The potatoes look pretty good for a change.

These look better and have kept their leaves longer than any potatoes we have had in the past few years.

The beets will be ready to harvest in a couple weeks I think. And the beans beside them are doing really good. They  are the heirloom variety Kentucky wonder bush bean that we ordered from Baker Creek seeds this year. ALL our garden veggies are heirloom now and we can save our own seed.

Where the grass is we have trees planted there, That is the new orchard we started last spring. The trees are small and young yet but they will grow. They have grown a good deal just since last year.

I am standing near the row of raspberry plants with the orchard behind me looking west. Just beyond the strawberries that have been mulched was just disc again today and Ladino clover planted there. Toward the front of the truck is the main garden and to the rear is the corn field. We had so much rain for a while that I am kinda afraid to say we need rain. But it would make things take off and grow better. Gentle summer rains make plants grow by leaps and bounds. Although the gardens here will be able to get water being so close to the river.
This has been the extent of my day. Till next time, blessings from the McGuire homestead.

Stella

The strawberries are mulched

Finally, the strawberries have mulch around them. Before it has always been too wet to get in the patch so it got put off. Then we had priorities, getting the main garden worked out. Then my help abandoned me last evening to help Jason build a pen for his puppies that will be here this weekend. This evening after we ate supper we finally got in there and Rodger tilled and Jason and I spread the straw. The plants are kinda small yet but we did get a good layer of straw around them. They will grow taller because of the straw surrounding them. Maybe this fall when they bloom again we can get a few berries. They do look so much better and well kept.

Ya have to agree it does look better. I love being in fresh plowed ground with bare feet. Nothing in the world like it. I'm sure that wont last long as there is a row of raspberry plants to the right of the strawberries.

 As soon as these things get big enough to drop thorns on the ground there will be no more barefoot stuff in the berry patch. Some of the raspberries do have lil berries on them. So I will at least get to sample them this year and hope to be blessed with lots next years. These are surrounded with rotted straw and compost from the chicken houses. That should make em grow.
The berry patch is about the extent of our accomplishments today. The fellers worked and I had to stay in out of the heat. But I cant complain, at least its not raining everyday.
So till next time, blessings from the McGuire homestead.

Stella

The hot weather is here to stay

I know, we were complaining a week ago about the cool damp weather with all the rain we have had. OK I am done with this hot stuff for a while now. It has been in the mid 90's today and pose to be all week with intermittent showers. The humidity is about too much and its just the end of May. I can not imagine how bad it will be in July and August. None the less I did get a few minor things accomplished today in spite of the heat. I went and got the truck load of straw to mulch the strawberries with. I used 1 bale in the brooder house to get it ready for the lil chicks that will be here this week. ALL 50 of em. Yeah I am a lil crazy at times. But the building is all set up waiting their arrival. When they get big enough to let out they will be allowed to free range some. Well most likely until they find my flower beds and then they will get confined to a pen. Anyway still have the straw on my truck. Rodger intends to till the area between the rows of berry plants before I mulch to loosen up the soil. So maybe we can do that tomorrow. He got kinda busy this evening helping Jason set post to build a pen for his puppies that will be here this weekend. My friend Rosie's Great Pyrenees had puppies and Jason is getting 2 of em. My aunt is taking 1 also and we will have all 3 here this weekend. I can only imagine how cute they are. They do make beautiful dogs. I will post pics for ya to see when we get them. Luna is gonna love this. She wont know what to do with 3 lil girls like her. Jason is building a pen for his so Luna don't go visit an dognap the puppies.
I finally got my greenhouse shut down for the spring season. I had a good deal of leftover plants, some I am planting and some giving away. A co-worker of Jason's is taking all the sweet potato plants, and probably most of the other stuff too. I keep hearing threats toward my greenhouse around here. I think I may have went a lil overboard planting this year. But dang by now they should know that's how I do things.
So till next time, blessings from the McGuire homestead.

Stella

Busy holiday weekend

With this being Memorial Day weekend the guys were off work for a 3 day weekend. So we did manage to get a lot done this weekend. But first off I would like to take a minute to thank all our heroes who made the ultimate sacrifice so we can all go about life as usual. So Thank You from the bottom of my heart.
We were privileged to carry on as usual here as well. Rodger got the corn plowed out on Sunday as it was still a lil too wet on Saturday to do most anything in the garden or field. On Sunday morning we had planned on being in the garden fairly early to beat the heat with forecast in the 90's. Well that didn't happen but we did get there all be it later in the morning. We hoed most of the garden out and finally decided to come to the house and take a break from the mid-day heat. He went back on the tractor a bit later an did plow the corn while I finished hoeing thru the remainder of the garden. It was after sundown before we both finally finished. Oh my goodness the skeeters were hungry and ate well I might add. ON me. Being near the river does have a few drawbacks. Thas is one of em. Rodger said I didn't need to be in the garden this morning and that he would go in there early and run the rototiller. So that he did. The garden looks so nice now that its been plowed out. My dad alas said stuff just grew better when ya plow and work it out. This evening after the sun started going down we started moving the compost and rotted straw from last fall and spreading that around the raspberries. Got those done FINALLY! We had a good bit of rotted straw left and put the rest around the fruit trees in the orchard. The rotted straw stinks and I didn't like the idea of putting that around strawberries where they might come in direct contact with it. Got most of the trees mulched in till we ran out of rotted straw. Tomorrow I am going to pick up a load of straw to mulch the strawberries with and a lil extra for the brooder house. Hopefully I can mulch the strawberries tomorrow evening while Rodger gets the yard mowed, again. I must get the brooder house ready as well for the new babies that will be here end of this week. I ordered a bunch of 50 heavy breed assorted chickens so I can keep some layers and butcher the rest before raising my final batch of Cornish cross this fall. So as you can tell there is never the lack of something to do here on the homestead. I can keep myself occupied 7 days a week here and stay busy. Well except when it gets really hot. Then you most likely will find me in the house. My meds are making me wimpy.
So till next time, blessings from the McGuire homestead.

Stella

Trying to see the pretty things

Dang with all this rain and storms we have had since I don't remember when, I guess I am blessed to have anything left to bloom and look pretty. We have had several pretty good rain showers today and after it stopped I got out and took a few pics here around the house. The big plus with the pretty stuff is I can see it and think of the wonderful friends who have shared seeds and plants with me.

This is the beautiful hollyhocks that Rosie gave me the seed for and they were planted last year. They are just starting to bloom. In the foreground is fever few that she also shared with me. Later on in summer it has beautiful white daisy like lil flowers on it.

The flower border at the back of the house is filled in with plants from my friend Madeline. The old porch rocker is one I sat in as a lil child on the porch of the old home place. It is more for sentimental value than sitting as it is about rotted down. Maybe a few more years left in its life.

The grapevines are loaded with lil grape clusters again this year. They got pruned heavily this spring and are still sprawling.

The border to the left is Lariope (monkey grass) that my aunt Ann had given me last spring. It will thrive almost anywhere and makes a nice edging for drives and such. The herb bed has a lil fence around it now to keep some animals from walking thru it. The new herbs in there are starting to take off now and grow. Still have more young ones to plant in there too.

This is the new bed extension in back of the house. It is planted with leeks and the new strawberry plants from my friends Gretchen and Carl. I am still short 1 bag of mulch to even this one out and eliminate the bare dirt spot.

v

This is the banana pup that my friend Deb sent me from Mississippi last week. This is the musa basjoo variety. This banana tree is grown for fiber and not the fruit. It has gotten 2 new leaves on it just since I got it. I think they are capable of growing up to 2 ft per week in the warmer summer months. It will also flower when it has 35 leaves or reaches 10 ft tall. I am thinking in a few years it can be moved to a place where I can put a hammock chair under it and have shade.
Anyway not much going on here today will the rain. All I have succeeded in doing is getting my hair cut and just stayed inside. The cool rainy weather does a number on my joints.
So till next time, blessings from the McGuire homestead.

Stella