513
Hi Everyone,
A few hours ago I headed out to the garden to snap a few pictures of the garden and came across Goose and his ducks. Goose was given to us quite a few years ago along with two white Pekin ducks. Their names were Duck, Duck and Goose! Duck and Duck have passed on, but Goose is still happily honking. Actually I do believe that next to guarding his ducks, honking is his favorite pastime. Goose has lived in the chicken yard ever since we got him and his job has been to guard the new batch of laying hens from flying predators. The chicks move in with Goose and his duck buddy when they are a month old, and then once the chickens have matured and are laying eggs (about five months later) they are then moved out to pasture and Goose awaits the next batch of new laying hens. The Poultry barn is in need of some repairs and the compost yard needs to be cleaned out—so it was time to move Goose and his duck buddy out to pasture. We have eight ducks that sleep by night in a portable duck house and roam the farm by day. So Goose and his duck buddy Donald, moved in with Ducks one, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six, Seven, and Eight. The first few weeks Goose and Donald stayed off to themselves—but this last week Goose has finally bonded with the other ducks and you can now find him roaming the pastures and the yard. While most of the ducks waddle all over the place not giving too much attention to duck, there is one of the Khaki Campbell’s that has become good buddies with Goose and Donald—I am not sure which number she is though. All we know is that number Eight is always the last duck to bed—and she may not be the same last duck every night. He! He! Anyway, as I stumbled across Goose and the ducks I worked hard to get them all together for a picture. The ducks were not the problem—Goose was. He wanted to come up to me and get some loving. Yes, he is a very passionate goose. I finally did manage to get my picture—of which I posted with this journal, and I got a short video which you can watch here. I did make it to the garden in the end and you can see those pictures on our Facebook page here. We have collards, broccoli, mustard greens, kale, lettuce, onions, Swiss chard and carrots growing in the garden right now—and forget-me-nots, camellias and daffodils in bloom.
How long are your weeks? I have a little pocket calendar that I keep little notes in to help me remember my week so when I sit down here to type my journal I can remember what I did. When I read the entries for Monday and Tuesday I was totally shocked that I did those things last week—it felt like I had done those things weeks ago. One young man that used to help us out on the farm for a week at a time used to say that our days felt like they were a week long and our weeks felt like they were a month long.
So according to my calendar last Monday Papa and my brother-in-law Gary went to our hay farmer and brought home two trailer loads of hay. While they were gone Steve and Mom put together picnic table number two—out of five for our upcoming Farm to Table Dinner. I worked on answering “order” emails and then I headed to the garden. The mustard greens were “overgrown” with extra-large leaves, bug eaten leaves, crumpled leaves because there was no space for them to grow straight. So I pulled off all the “unsaleable” leaves and fed them to the chickens. With most of the pasture grasses brown the chickens were more than excited to see some green vegetables. When I got back up to the house Mom and I worked on weeding the Pinecone ginger bed in the front yard.
Tuesday morning we milked the cows and I bottled the kefir. Then I spent some time cleaning up another ginger and turmeric bed on the backside of the brooder house. The leaves had all died back—or should I say turned brown a fell over and made the place look like a trash heap. In the summer the plants are tall and green and give the place a tropical feel. When I was done cleaning up it was time for lunch and time to finish making the yogurt. Then we had an egg party to attend so that we could get the eggs all packaged.
On Thursday Mom and Papa got the third picnic table put together and the second table sanded and the first table stained. I headed to the garden to prep some garden rows so that they would be ready for me to plant white potatoes this week. I think that I am aiming for Thursday—it isn’t a root crop planting day according to the moon, and it isn’t Valentine’s Day according to the old timers around here—but it is a day that I should have time to plant them. I also hope to plant more lettuce, some green beans, zinnias and I have to replant the sugar snap peas. The seeds I planted a few weeks ago were from 2020—and they didn’t sprout (well, two seeds sprouted). So I ordered some new seeds and I hope that they get here tomorrow and I think that I shall take them straight from the mailbox to the garden dirt. Anyway, I managed to get two 20 foot rows weeded and then Steve was able to top them with chicken compost. Then Steve and I grabbed a big one ton tote bag (we get chicken feed in them) and headed up to the chestnut trees. I was watching another gardener on YouTube and he was standing beside a tote of worm castings when he mentioned that he also used leaf mold—and a light went off in my brain. We have lots of chestnut leaves with no place to put them—or so I thought. We have lots of empty one ton tote bags—because we get about two a month with our chicken feed. So Steve and I spent probably half an hour filling up one of those totes. We laid it on its side and I held it open while Steve raked the leaves inside. We raked and smashed, and raked and smashed until the leaves spilled out and we couldn’t rake anymore inside. We put the tote in the woods and now we wait for it to rot—like next year.
Friday morning my brother David stopped by during breakfast to pick up some mail. We had a nice visit—but when 8:30 rolled around it was time to head outside and milk the cows. When the cows were milked I bottled the kefir and then Mom and I headed to the garden. Mom was going to help Papa put picnic tables together and get them sanded—but Papa had to run into town to return a battery operated palm sander that Papa had just bought. The battery only lasted fifteen minutes and when you have five tables to sand and only three batteries the sander was not feasible. So Papa traded it in for an electric sander. So while Papa was shopping, Mom and I worked in the garden. I added wood ash to the two beds that Steve had topped with chicken compost and then I broadforked them and tilthed them. Next I ran the two row gridder down them and then I used the zipper to make two trenches in order to prep the beds for planting potatoes. Then I sat down and helped Mom weed in the garden bed where I want to plant green beans. It was a row full of white zinnias for Christmas bouquets—but the December freezes changed those plans. Now the bed is full of dead zinnias, weeds, and volunteer forget-me-not flowers. I would love to keep the forget-me-not flowers—but reality says that I need to pull them up and focus on using the space for green beans. I have another bed where I did save the volunteer forget-me-nots and I will be planting more zinnias in the bed with them. So I must be satisfied with one row of flowers—for my gardening space is quite limited right now.
We didn’t finish weeding in the row, but at 2:00 we thought that we had best break for lunch—besides, I had to finish making yogurt. Mom asked if I would be coming back to the garden and I said, “Yes” so we left the tools out. Then when we got inside for lunch my breathing decided to act up. For the last three weeks I have been struggling with allergies and sometimes they can make me very short on breath—and the cure is doing nothing. So I did computer work after lunch and Mom helped Papa put together picnic table number four and get it sanded. Later that day I did manage to get back outside and Mom helped me put away all the tools.
We had a long list of things to do on Saturday, but God had other plans—like serving others. Once all the morning chores were done we got a phone call from my brother-in-law saying that my sister Nichole was very sick and needed a prescription picked up at the drug store. He was out of town, and she was too sick to drive—so we headed to town to get her medicine and to pick up a few groceries while we were there. When we got home we had company—customers. One customer was just picking up an order, but then there was a family that had just stopped by on their way to spend the night at a local campground. They really enjoyed looking at the cute little lambs. Then we headed to the garden to pick them some greens. The children were really excited about the garden and I couldn’t resist letting them have the chance to pull a carrot up out of the ground. The seven year old little girl had harvested a carrot at a school garden—but the five year old little boy had never pulled a carrot out of the ground and he was so ecstatic about it. He couldn’t wait to eat his buried treasure. We showed them the herbs in the cottage garden and I introduced them to a weed called cleavers. Its name is derived from its function—its leaves are sticky like Velcro and they stick to your clothes. Children love to pull off sections of the plant and stick it to their clothes—and I love to help them.
When we got back inside I was starving—for I really hadn’t had lunch yet and it was almost 4:00. I grabbed a bowl of yogurt, honey and almonds and then the phone rang. A friend was calling me to catch up. We had a lovely talk and then I took some time to relax before I had to cook dinner. We never did get anything on our list done—well I take that back, I did manage to practice my piano for about twenty minutes right before I headed to bed. Yep, it was a long day, but it was a good day for helping those in need.
Serving you with Gladness,
Tiare