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Hi Everyone,
I could not have crammed one more thing into last week if I wanted to—well, technically I could have if I only had the strength to push myself a little more. There was a long list of things that needed to be done Saturday afternoon, but when 1:30 rolled around there was no more strength left and the only way to muster up a little bit more strength to finish out my days chores (dinner, piano practice, dishes and a shower) was to spend the afternoon sitting still. I had to turn my back on: the pumpkin that desperately needed to be cut up; the tray of canning jars that needed to go upstairs to their storage boxes; the herbs that needed to be ordered; the respiratory tea bags that needed to be made for the next respiratory emergency; kombucha that needed to be made; and the baskets of white potatoes that still desperately need to be canned. Instead I curled up in my Grandpa’s recliner that he left behind when he went to Heaven and Mama and I spent the afternoon relaxing. Exhaustion had hit me hard—and as I put it, “I had no push left!”
To start the week off my dear cow Sally was just days away from calving and she developed a severe case of mastitis. Milking her out was pretty painful for her—but before I could milk her out I had to wash her udder first. Sally had somehow managed to get it very dirty and as I was washing it I leaned forward to get a peek behind her leg to see if I had gotten all the dirt washed off—and let’s just say that my head was in the wrong place at the right time when Sally lifted her knee and gave me my first bloody nose (it took me until 50 to get one). My first words as I grasped my nose in pain were directed to my Papa, “I hope it’s not broke!” He assured me that it was not broke as he went to get me some paper towels for the color red was becoming quite popular as I sat there beside my cow wondering how in the world was I going to get my cow milked. I had one goal—get my nose to stop bleeding so that I could milk my cow. Mama was inside not feeling her best (and I never thought to ask Papa to milk the cow), but God was merciful and I soon learned that bloody noses do not last forever and after I cleaned up I got Sally milked and then headed inside to “get away” from the pain in my nose. I was supposed to help with the milk bottling and equipment washing but a blow to my nose left me wanting to just be alone for a little while. Mama was not too happy to hear about my misfortune and threatened to sell all the cows if I didn’t learn to be more cautious—I got kicked in the knee a few weeks ago. Hopefully I can be more cautious—but I remember telling an intern once as he questioned the safety of me climbing a poorly stacked pile of wood “You get to work on the farm because “cautious” was on your resume; I get to work on the farm because I was born into the family.” Truthfully there is not a cautious bone in my body (well sometimes), but I had better figure out how to obtain at least one cautious bone.
After lunch I had recovered enough to go back to work and Shayne and I headed to the garden to harvest pumpkins and then he helped me prep a bed in the North Market Garden so that I could transplant the first of the fall garden seedlings—zinnias in fall colors. Starting tomorrow I plan on spending the next week starting the rest of the fall garden in seed trays in the greenhouse.
I long to work in the garden Tuesday afternoon—but it took us until 1:30 to get all the milking equipment washed. Then I had a chicken to get in the oven for dinner, yogurt to make, and lunch to eat. It was 2:45 when I finished and headed over to grab Shayne (who was busy packaging eggs). Papa got home from picking up a new batch of chicks (meat chickens) and I had totally forgotten to have Shayne set up the brooder for the new chicks. So Papa and Mama had to scramble to spread the woodchips over the floor and fill up the feeders and the waterers. I worked on packaging eggs while Shayne helped Papa. When Shayne was done I told him that I desperately wanted to work in the garden but it was now 3:00—and he leaves at 4:00—and I had a lot of things to do. The eggs needed to be stacked on the shelves, and the chicken from our last processing was still in the chest freezers and needed to be transferred to walk-in freezer for we would be processing more chickens on Thursday and Friday. He transferred the chicken (because he likes cold more than me) and I transferred the eggs. It was then 3:15 and I told him to set a 30 minute timer—we were going to the garden. I had already grabbed our weeding tools and some gloves, but on the way out we had to grab two large tubs for weeds. We then pulled weeds as fast as we could in the North Garden, and when our tubs were full we dumped them out for the chickens to eat and we headed back inside to spend the last 15 minutes of our day packaging eggs. We didn’t get as many eggs packaged as we needed to—but I did get to spend 30 minutes in the garden.
I had spent the last two weeks going through my seed collection seeing what seeds I had and what seeds I needed to order for the fall planting. All the seeds I ordered had arrived, but I still needed to find a local place to buy some seeds in bulk—collard, broccoli, carrots, mustard, and rutabagas. When you buy in bulk from a local seed store you can get a whole tablespoon of seeds for $1.50. When you buy from a seed company you get about a half a teaspoon for $4. The local seed store that we have used for many years recently closed and the only two places I knew of were about 45 minutes away. I had heard about Mayo Fertilizer and Seed Company that had opened an office in Lake City and I gave them a call—and to my delight they had seeds. So as soon as work was over Tuesday I jumped in the car and went to town to buy some seeds. The roads I had to take to get there took me past places in Lake City that I had not seen in a long time—I usually do not go to that side of town. On my way there I noticed a brand new elementary school—so of course I had to take a detour around the block on my way home. The old school had been torn down and a brand new two story one had been built in its place. As I drove on down the road I passed the elementary school that I went to and I noticed that the grass was not mowed and the school sign was gone—I took a quick detour and realized that the school had been closed (the students had been rezoned to the new school). I took another detour past another elementary school and couldn’t figure out if it was open, being remodeled, or being destroyed. By this time it was 5:00 and I found myself in rush hour traffic. I thought that I would never get home—our once quiet town is becoming quite populated. When I got home I did a little “school” research before I started dinner and then I had the Jacksonville receipts/orders to put together for the following day.
I thought that Shayne would be able to get us caught up on the eggs on Wednesday—but alas Mama had spent all day Tuesday mowing and all evening raking up what she had mowed. On Wednesday she needed Shayne’s help to pick up all the grass and dump it in the compost heap. That took up most of his day. He did manage to get half of the eggs done. How I miss our Tuesday egg parties where a bunch of people pitched in to get all the eggs from the whole week done in an hour. Come 4:00 Shayne went home and I put the calf bottles in a bucket to heat up. It was almost 5:00 when the wind started to pick up and the sky was getting blacker by the minute. I told Mama that I should probably close down the garage door and she told me that I had best get the calves fed their bottles before it rained. So I grabbed my shoes and socks and headed for the bottles. When I came back outside with the bottles it was starting to sprinkle. I knew that if I took the lane around to the calf barn I would get soaked—so I decided to take the short cut through the back yard and over the septic drain field to the back of the calf barn. As soon as I got there my picture was taken and I wondered about the safety of climbing over a metal panel. Thankfully the calves came over to me (yes even Emmy came to her bottle on her own free will) and I was able to stick the bottles through the bars and feed them that way—making sure that none of my skin touched the metal just in case it lightning again. Our dog house is not in the best of conditions and therefore our dogs do not feel very secure in a storm—and before I finished feeding the calves Yasha and Aliyah had joined the calves in the corral. As I headed up to the house they followed. I drove the golf-cart into the garage and both dogs joined me. As I closed the door I saw Aliyah jump into the golf-cart, but once the door was down I couldn’t find her anywhere. I then got down on my knees and looked under the door and saw her sitting at the end of the concrete—in the pouring down rain. I tried to get her to come back in—but she is not crazy about the cats being in the garage too. Yasha didn’t mind the cats, and Sunny Boy didn’t mind the dogs—but Aliyah didn’t like the cats and Catalina was not too happy about the dogs. Aliyah refused to come back in the garage—until there was a loud KABOOM and a bright flash of lightning. I didn’t have to ask her twice after that.
Thursday and Friday we processed chickens—89 in all doing half each day. The process went smoothly, but we were not done before 6:00 each night. We always seemed to get a late start, and then it would be around 2:30 by the time we had them all processed and chilling. Then we had to package the liver, hearts, heads and feet before we started figuring out which chickens we would package whole and which ones we would cut up into parts. Then I would spend about 45 minutes cutting up about 16 chickens and then we had to vacuum seal all of them. Once everything was package we could begin clean up—at least the finishing parts of clean up for Papa, Wayland and Shayne had been doing some clean up off and on all afternoon. We thankfully had help for most of the time—but Wayland had to leave by 3:00 and Shayne at 5:00. Thankfully all that was left by then was clean up and Mama and I were out by 5:30—but Papa still had to scrub the floor. Thursday’s dinner was easy—cubed steak and rice, but I was quite tired on Friday and I just never could think of what to eat for dinner. The easy meals that I could think of required cheese—and I was out of it. I finally settled on bacon, eggs and French toast with some of the Kalacrow’s Whole Grain sourdough bread. That was a real treat!
Sally surprised us Saturday morning with a new little heifer—and to my dismay Sally had developed mastitis in another one of her teats. That leaves the calf just two teats to nurse on—and us no teats to produce good milk. I was so tired that it was hard to focus on what I was doing—but little by little the chores got done. I walked down pasture to find Sally’s hiding calf so that Papa didn’t have to waste time looking for her. Then I had to pack the Gainesville order and take care of customers. It was going on 1:00 and Papa was still out in the fields doing chores. I went to do my best to pack the van—but to my dismay all the ice chests were still in there from Wednesday’s delivery to Jacksonville. I emptied them all out and got the Gainesville ice chests dragged over to the van with a tub full of ice ready for Papa to pack it all in the van—and Papa drove up just then. I headed inside to fix him a kefir smoothie—but first I took off my socks and threw them in the laundry telling Mama that I was done for the day—I just couldn’t go no more. When Papa came inside he told me that he was not able to put the calf back because he couldn’t find her. When he was putting the cows back she was there—but she wouldn’t follow the cows. He tried to put her in the tractor bucket—but it was too hot. So he quickly came up to the house to get the golf-cart and when he got back she was nowhere to be found. It was late so he had to abandon the search. I put my kefir drink in the fridge, grabbed my socks out of the laundry basket and headed back outside. To my great delight the Lord was merciful on my poor exhausted body, for just as soon as I arrived at the field where the calf had been she stood up and then laid back down. I drove in and picked her up and put her in the floor of the golf-cart and drove her down the lane to her mama. Then I headed back to the house and returned my socks to the laundry basket and spent the rest of the afternoon in my Grandpa’s recliner.
Now I must get Mama to edit this journal so I can send it out and go to bed.
Serving you with Gladness,
Tiare