more rain...

I have a strong craving to do some hard work but it's so wet and I was so miserable the last few days I'm almost scared to go out in it. ha ha. Call me a girl if  you must but I hate being sick. I hate sitting still too. I guess being Monday I could do my Monday chores. You know, clean the kitchen till it sparkles, put the laundry in and do the dishes. I really should scrub the kitchen floor too. It's long past due.

Today I was daydreaming about my soon to be fishing pond. Right now it only catches the rain and slows it down so when it rains a lot, which is has been this spring, it looks like a lovely pond but when it stops raining it disappears quickly. So this summer before it dries up hard I'm going to dig it out and dump a bunch of bentonite (sp?) clay in it (ie kitty litter) and find me some beautiful water lilies and cat tails and stock it with trout. This time next year I'll have my fishing pole in the barn so when I'm done milking and doing morning chores I can fish until I have to get the kids up. Sounds like fun huh? That's what I've been dreaming about this morning. Watching the rain come down. My kids are at my aunts house since there is no school today. So it's just me and the farm. Kinda lonely but it's a nice break too.

This is my 5th morning without coffee. I didn't even bother to see if it tasted right this morning because my head is still sorta clogged up and for some reason that throws off my taste buds. Something to do with my ears. When I was a kid I had a tumor taken out from behind my left ear and during the surgery they messed up some nerves that allow the left side of my tongue to taste. Strange huh? So anyways for over a year after I had that done I couldn't taste anything on the left side of my tongue but I could still feel everything like normal, hot, cold, etc. It slowly got back to normal but now days when my head gets clogged up my taste buds get wacky. Something you didn't know about me huh? I'm  full of all sorts of oddities like that. Thanks to that oddity I don't bother having my favorite beer either because it's a waste of a good beer. So yes, I'm missing coffee and porter like ya wouldn't believe. Anyways.

I have a date with a girl from grade school. We were best friends in elementary school and grade school but my mom moved us when I was in 7th grade and that was mostly the end of that. So I'm excited. By then my head will be back to normal and I'll be able to enjoy a starbucks coffee. Yay!

I better get something done.

I think spring is finally here...

So yesterday I finally had enough energy to get out of the house. The garden exploded while I was ignoring it. Go figure. What's that saying? A watched pot never boils. Anyways so the garden looks like it's coming along nicely. I picked salad for dinner again. Though my taste buds are still out of whack from being sick so I didn't really enjoy it, not even the home made dinner rolls or the chicken. Ah well. When you don't like to taste food you don't eat as much. I guess it's not all bad. Anyways. I'm down to 18 turkeys. They are an interesting creature. They're still in the brooder in the garage with the chicks. They really don't seem all that much bigger. The geese on the other hand are growing. I was surprised since I haven't seen them in a couple of days they really seemed to jump in size. They're still in the brooder in the barn. I only lost 3 of them. I guess they're all little more user friendly. I guess one of these days I'll know exactly what I'm doing but until then...

I saw a snake in the garden yesterday. No I don't mind snakes. It was sunbathing on my brick wall. That has to be a good sign that things are warming up. There was a blossom on one of the tomato plants. I still have more to put in the ground. You should see the volunteer tomatoes, they're bigger then the ones I started inside. They're poking up all over in my lettuce patch. It'll be kinda nice. Last year they were some funny looking tomatoes in the garden but they make great sauce either no matter how untomato they look.

A girlfriend from gradeschool found me on facebook yesterday. I'm excited, it's been years since I've talked to her last. It looks like we have a lunch date. How fun. Funny how life goes. Who'd thought 20yrs ago that'd I'd be here. But then if you'd told me when I was 10 that I'd be farming I would have thought that was pretty cool. I was the typical girl. But if you'd told me back then that I'd have a farm and not a single horse I would have laughed. Go figure. Anyways.

Life sure is funny sometimes.

Being Sunday I don't feel the need to get a lot done though I know everything that I haven't done the last three days is waiting for me tomorrow. That wears me out just thinking about it. Atleast we're not due to have rain till Wednesday or Thursday. By then the garden will need some watering so it'll be welcome.

I think I'm going to make the most of the last little bit of my vacation and take a nap. I have another John Wayne (romance) and another Barbara Streisand movie to watch... I'm only half looking forward to 4AM Monday morning. I guess half is better then nothing.

Can't move forward without moving forward I guess.

Did you know eHarmony is having a free communication weekend? I'm lonely. So sue me. I should just save my change and get one of those mail order kind. Import 'em. Just kidding!

Almost there...

Well seems as if a full day of sleep and another day of doing nothing might have done me a lot of good. Now if only the sun would come out to encourage me to get outside and re-energize in the garden. A new coat of sun tan wouldn't be such a bad thing after all this rain. Wouldn't it be nice for summer to be here? It's only a few weeks away. Though ofcourse it'd be just my luck for the weather to heat up to 75 and all my lettuce, broccoli, cabbage and other cool plants would bolt. I know... optimism. The sun has been teasing me all morning through a thin grey layer of cloud. I don't see any dark clouds on the horizon so maybe, just maybe I'll get my sunshine. I already put my garden customers off for another week with the promise of a half dozen eggs and some fresh goat cheese.

Mr. eHarmony wrote. He seems to feel bad about shooting me down. Awww isn't that nice. Not. I said I wouldn't talk about that anymore. I think what is the most disappointing is that it is so nice to have someone to go out with on the occasional weekend. Ya know? I really don't have time to go looking for someone new. I really have no desire to either. It would be nice to just get familiar with one person. For once. Not have to relearn facts and figures, likes and dislikes, and everything else. I know I wasn't going to bring it up again. It's so hard to find good company. I mean sure the kids are great, the goats listen to every word I say and the dog is more than happy to put his paw on my knee and let me fill his ear as I scratch behind them. But it's not the same. Boy does that sound sappy or what? Yea, see I told you I was sick. It shows.

I really need to clean out the brooders and the barn and the chicken house and do the laundry and the dishes and mop the floor and I really really need to try not to work too hard. I need to go make sure my two peaches are still growing and my two cherries haven't been eaten and the kiwis still need to find a home in the ground somewhere. Oh and the garden needs weeded and... Yea you get the drift. Maybe I'll turn on that John Wayne I found yesterday. My head is starting spin at the thought of all my chores backed up.

You know how I know I'm still sick? The coffee. It doesn't taste good yet. My tastebuds are out of whack. It's not fair. Can you imagine a morning without coffee? I can't. Though I have now for three mornings. I'm surprised I'm not going through withdrawals. ha ha.

Ok enough rambling. One chore and then a nap. I'll ease my way back into responsibility.

Wish me luck!

Vacationing...

Did you think it was possible to get a vacation when you're running a farm full time (plus two kids, but no one likes a bragger)? Well I got one. All the rain has caught up to me, I'm sick as a dog. But, my aunt is here taking care of the important stuff with the help of my 8yr old. Milking the goats, turning the eggs in the incubator, taking care of the kids, she even saved my chicken stock. Isn't that nice? So me, I've been watching Sally Field and Barbara Streisand movies, I even watched one with Elvis. I've watched Steel Magnolias, Funny Girl and Fried Green Tomatoes. I've been doing a lot of sleeping too. It seems like forever since I've been able to ignore all my chores. Sure it's not the best way to get a vacation but The River Runs Through It, The Man From Snowy River and Shawshank Redemption along with all the other good movies make it enjoyable. Don't you just love old movies? All of these are from Netflix. It's saved me from being bored to tears while I can't sleep. Technology is great. It hasn't all been laying around though. I did have to rescue a sparrow that decided to fly into the house today. That got the adrenaline pumping (for him and me both). I would have taken a picture but my camera phone was full and I didn't want to hold onto the little fellow any longer than necessary.

This is probably the last vacation I'll get for awhile. Hopefully the next one won't see me stuck in bed getting over a bug. :)

I think I'm going to look for some John Wayne and Clint Eastwood movies while I'm online.

Have a great weekend!

shrek, mayonnaise and 30lbs of chicken...

That sums up my day. I'm a little depressed and on a pity me wagon so empathy or stop reading now. :) I'll try to hold back.

So my disastrous date Saturday was about as bad as I thought. Another one of those "I have a ton of respect for you but there's no spark." Boy have I heard that line before. Over and over and over again. Truth is I need a Shrek, someone so damn fugly that they forgive my fugliness. That's me holding back. I promise you won't hear anymore about it.

Today I made mayonnaise! Seriously. And it was really really good. I'm shocked at how easy it is to make and boy who knew that real mayonnaise was yellow? Well as yellow as the yolks you put in it. I think I might try it with the whites too next time. I read that it makes it lighter colored and thicker. I'm also going to find some different oil to experiment with. Turns out cheap olive oil needs more spices to cover up the cheap olive oil taste. And here I thought I was being classy by buying olive oil in the first place. That'll learn me!

Tomorrow I'm going to make a loaf of russian rye bread and some chicken salad with that mayonnaise.

Chicken. So I got back 30lbs of chicken today. Only $38 to process. Not too bad, though that's not counting all the feed they've eaten because I kept putting off butchering them. Not my fault. I'm a mom and a home maker and a healer of boo boo's, not an animal slaughterer. So there. :) Anyways. So tonight I stuck one of those big guys in the crock pot, well I tried, he didn't fit. So I found the biggest pot I had and stuffed him in it. He barely fit. The lid wouldn't shut till he was cook so thoroughly that his legs fell off. I know how's that for a mental image if you didn't know what I was talking about? Anyways. So in went the bird 3.85lbs of bird, a bottle of porter, a bottle of wheat and enough water to cover most of him. Along with some bay leaves, sage and other yummy chicken spices. Oh and a big ole stick of butter (no not goat butter, I haven't made that yet). He's been cooking slowly since about 3pm. We picked off what we could eat for dinner and the rest of him will cook down till I can separate the bones from the meat. The juices will be cooked down, the meat and herbs put into their proper homes and I'll have stock, chicken noodle soup and chicken salad. I really need a pressure canner. That's the next thing on my list. And more canning jars (the goats are using almost all of mine).

So overall today wasn't so bad. Mr. eHarmony was a flop but hey. What can you do? I can't afford a face lift so I guess I'm stuck looking for Shrek. I wonder if Shrek has a good career and goes to church. Hmm... I guess anything is possible. I did go from a housewife to a milkmaid/farmer. If that's possible anything is!

Oops. Sorry I wasn't spose to mention that again. I'm going to cross it out for you so you don't have to read it. I told you I was feeling sorry for myself. It doesn't happen too often but sometimes. It hurts. Rejection. I know, screw him, what does he know? Not much obviously. But still it's hard to get there without getting all jaded and thick skinned. I don't want to think everyone is a dillhole. I really don't. It's not his fault I'm buttugly. It's the pain. He was nice. Well maybe not so much. I'm way too easy to get too. Time to toughen up! Roar!

Anyways.

I think I'm going to have to put my garden customers off another week and I really don't like to have to do that. But it poured down rain almost all day. Just came down by the bucket full. Seriously. It's so freakin' depressing. All this rain and I'm going to need some of that chicken noodle soup because I'm going to be sick.

Anyways.

I sincerely hope the rest of you are having better luck at love and gardening than I am. Kiss your significant other, they're such a wonderful part of being human.

Good night!

All this rain is SOOOO depressing...

How do you get out of a slump when it's caused by the weather? The last two mornings I slept through my alarm. That's how down all this rain has got me. I started milking the goats twice a day this week which means with missing mornings it's once a day in the evening instead of twice a day. But what do you do? The volume on my alarm is at it's highest. I'm sure it's just all this weather that has me down (couldn't have been the disaster of a date I had Saturday night). I'm completely unmotivated. Even my Monday morning cleaning routine got skipped. Tuesday saw me doing laundry and dishes which I didn't do Monday. Sometimes I hate being the only adult in this house. That's depressing too. Do you see the theme here?

Farm chores do continue though. There was a gathering of hands in the barn last night for milking, which I am really thankful for.

My oldest saves me sometimes. She's such a blessing to have around. She's only 8 but she begs to help with milking every single day. I've let her try a few squirts in the past but today I handed over the goat to her. She made it about half way through before she handed her back. We only take half a gallon of milk up to the house every day so we milk that into quart jars and then milk the baby goats milk into the pail. The goat on the stand is Georgia, this is her first year milking and she gave us a single doe kid. She's very patient.

Another blurry shot. My aunt Nina came over. She's also someone who saves me. When I was growing up she was the only real parent I had and although she didn't really know what to do as a parent she made me go to church 3x's a week. I'm thankful for that. Anyways. So she came over to watch Elizabeth while Michelle and I caught the roosters. She came while we were milking and so I encouraged her to get in touch with her childhood. Her family had cows which when the electricity went out she got to help milk. Two old pros on the stand. The goat on the stand is Icy, she gave me the triplets and a gallon of milk every time I milk her. She's been very forgiving of my newness. She also has teats on her that cramp my hands every time I milk.

My garden is slowly growing. Slowly. No I don't have any pictures of it because I'd be too embarrassed to show them anyways. My chinese cabbage has bolted (I mentioned that before) and now has beautiful yellow flowers on it. It's a rather attractive plant and taste great too. I keep meaning to get out and plant corn and more lettuce but it's so wet and muddy I think the seeds would just get moldy. I'm half debating putting off my garden customers one more week because I can't imagine the weather being any different by Monday. I guess  it could be worse. It could be snowing or hailing or a tornado could take away my entire garden. Now that would be a good excuse to put off my garden customers. :)

Oh and the roosters. All but three are gone. 9 birds and I'm sure they were atleast 50lbs of poultry. I only picked up one crate from the butcher because the note said it'd hold about 10. Well they fit but it was a tight squeeze. When I took the crate back I took a look at some of the other crates full of birds and I am now pretty sure I should have grabbed two crates because all the other chickens were half the size of the roosters I took in. I guess that's what I get for keeping them for a year. I might try to fire up the bbq and grill chicken tonight. Or I could cook one whole in the oven, I don't think it'd fit in the crock pot. I'll have fresh chicken stock for cooking. Oh chicken salad. Now I'm hungry. I'm going to make a loaf of dill rye bread so I have something to put chicken salad on tomorrow for lunch. I should talk about food more often it just raised my spirits. :) Think I'll be sick of chicken by the end of summer? Maybe by the end of June. Ah June. May really didn't leave much room for anything. I hope June isn't the same.

Anyways. I need to find some vita B or something. Maybe a nap. I need some sunshine.

Anyways. Have a great week!

thou shalt bear fruit... just not very much of it this year.. :)

About a month ago or so I bought some fruit trees. These are all the semi-dwarf type that have multiple grafts so they'll produce 3-5 different varieties of each fruit. If you haven't noticed I'm going for diverse around here so I thought this would be the best way to do that with fruit trees without taking up lots of room (another must considering I'm only farming 2.18 acres). I got an apple, peach, plum, cherry and pear tree. I also got a pair of kiwis (I've seen two outdoor gardens here in Oregon's Willamette Valley that grows kiwi's successfully and I love kiwis so I'm going to see if I can do it too. 

So the exciting news. I have cherries, peaches and kiwis. 

The not so exciting news is I have a total of two cherries on the cherry tree...

three kiwi's on the kiwi vine...

and two peaches... 

My mouth still waters at the idea of it. I guess I'm lucky to have any fruit at all since trees tend to take a few years before they produce. You can bet your butt I'll be keeping a close guard on my precious fruit though. How nice to bite into a home grown peach... 

Hopefully next year sees more fruit. 

They'll be a nice extra to add onto my list for my garden customers. (thinking like a business woman?)

Compromise, early mornings and another week gone by

So mornings start at 4AM now days so I have enough time to get everything done before I wake the kids up to get ready for school. Unfortunately I am one of those people who need more sleep than what I get waking up at 4AM so on the weekend I turn off my alarm and let myself wake up naturally. My oldest likes to help me milk the goats so it works out pretty good that way. We end up down in the barn about 7AM instead of about 4:45 which is when I get down there during the week now. So the goats have a little bit longer of a wait but I think the extra attention they get from my kids is reward enough for them. With the garden season about to start up I'm going back to milking twice a day. This week I'll be trying my hand at making Queso Blanco and I'm really looking forward to it. I need to make another batch of yogurt but my incubator is now incapable of handling foodstuff. All the hatching chicks have really made a mess of it and until the last batch hatch I'm stuck with it being a mess. Yuck.

The learning curve of raising turkeys and geese is in full swing. Lesson learned: going cheap really isn't cheaper. All the poultry is out of the "brooder" (my bathtub) and in two separate brooders. The new brooders consist of straw bales in a square with a section of cattle panel laid on top to keep out most problem animals out (the goats, dogs and chickens). The goose brooder is in the barn and the turkeys and chicks are sharing a brooder in the garage. More food and water to pack around but I have my bathroom back and my bathtub is shiny and spotless once again (my floor still has straw on it).

I told myself to take a picture (one thing I find most intriguing about reading others' blogs is the photos)  but I never did get around to it. I picked a salad for dinner. It was picture perfect; five different types of lettuce as well as spinach. It was great. I hold myself back from eating a lot of salad, I could eat it everyday for lunch and dinner and not complain, but I'm afraid between the cold and wet weather my garden is lacking a little just yet. Cross your fingers for a break in this rain so I can plant another batch of salad. A little bit of sunshine on that list would be nice, but no heat above 60. Picky? No. But 60 and sunshine really work well with all the farm chores and salad growing.

I had another date Saturday with Mr. eHarmony. I'd tell you how it went but honestly I haven't a clue. Nough bout that.

Well here's to clear skies tomorrow so I can plant corn, salad and a few other garden yummies.

Time to get the kids ready for bed.

Have a great week!

what's that word?

The one where you let someone else do something instead of doing it all yourself. I just had it in my head a second ago but when you need something that's when you can't find it. Anyways. I found a butcher for my roosters. They have an appointment with the big guy upstairs (er down the street) on the 25th. Finally I'll have my hen house back so I can start collecting eggs the easy way instead of picking them up here and there all over the yard. I once found one by running over it. The hen had laid it behind my front tire. Weird huh?

Update of the week since I never seem to be able to get back here in between. Saturday we went to the local Wool and Lamb festival. They had a parade in the morning and my oldest daughter sang with her class in the afternoon. Elizabeth thoroughly enjoyed the parade.

She discovered that parades were made for candy. And she didn't let a single piece of candy get by her. 

Even the giant horses didn't scare her away from going after the candy. She had a one track mind.

Oooooh! Candy!

She's such a doll. I know everything thinks their kid is cute. :) She was more fun to watch then the parade itself.

Friday we got the geese and turkeys in. They're sharing one brooder. The key to letting geese, turkeys and chicks share a brooder is to keep it dry. They really don't seem to mind each other other than the geese really make things soggy. So a thick layer of straw in the morning after cleaning out the brooder and then a second layer in the evening to make sure they have a dry bed to sleep through the night. Then scoop it all up and start over the next morning. It adds to my work load but I tried having three brooders and I was still cleaning brooders every two days so this really isn't that much more trouble.

My cell phone takes blurry pictures and I can never remember to change the batteries in my digital camera so more blurry pictures for you. I couldn't get them all to say cheese at the same time. Go figure.

Hatching chicks. I think I posted this pic last week. I'm finding I'm having a lot of beginners luck this year. The goats turned out to be the most patient, forgiving, beneficial things I could have done. And now this. I've hatched 9 out of 14 eggs so far. From what I hear those are good odds.

These are the last two that hatched. The light colored one is my favorite. It's from a green egg. I have another one that looks just like it from the other green egg that hatched. They're a grey with silver tips and yellow bellies. I can't wait to see what they look like as adults.

And last but not least. I couldn't help it. She's cute.

I wrote my first mass email for my garden customers yesterday. I'm not much of a newsletter writer. Not much of a writer at all but somehow I'm going to have to learn that knack. The garden is loving the rain and warm weather we had last week. Except one of my chinese cabbage's bolted. My peas are really coming along, I have my first salad the other night and it was awesome, I have a dozen tomatoes in the ground and more to plant. I still have way too much to till before I can call it good but until this rain goes away it'll just have to wait. I've discovered peas don't start under glass, zucchini, lettuce and tomato seeds pop up quick under glass and I'm getting better at recognizing weeds. :) The joys of being a newbie. 

Ok. I'll try not to take all week to make another post but I'm not promising anything. :)

...

I'm starting to sound like a broken record but seriously I can't believe it's been a whole week. It's amazing how fast this year is flying by. It's almost half over.

Remember last week I was complaining about waiting? Well one of those things I was waiting for has arrived. The very first chick to be born (hatched) on our little farm arrived on the 10th. Of course the other two eggs that were due to hatch the same did didn't. So now I don't know what to do with the little singleton. I have turkeys and geese that should be here by Friday but I'm not sure if they'd make a good match.

I do however have more eggs due to hatch in the next couple of days. My little singleton has been helping me turn the eggs. Or at least making a mess of the incubator. So I guess this little guy will get the comfort of my giant bathtub all to himself (hopefully herself) until I decide otherwise.

I've made progress in the goat aspect of my farm. The four kids were getting a little big for their home on the back porch and their curiosity found them up in my garden. So they got banished to the barn. I took a snap of my dog thinking he's meant to be one of the kids. Yes, from my favorite chair.

My oldest kid with the kids. I can't remember if I posted this one already or not. But it's cute. Again from my favorite chair. 

And my youngest kid with the kids. In the milk stand. :D See I told you I'd take a picture of it. Saturday we took all the kids down to the barn. I ended up working more than I had planned on that day. (I had a date) But the kids enjoyed it (all of them).

More kid shots. They really liked the milk stand. I'm actually starting to consider the possibility of keeping all the goats for expanding my dairy next year. I can only have 7 goats before I have to get a permit to sell their milk so this would be within the limits. If I do that though I'll invest in an electric milker and milk two at a time. I don't think I could find the humor in milking 6 goats by hand. Though I hear some people do it.

I don't know how well this next shot will turn out. I found out that I can take panoramic pics with my cell phone. Well this was yesterday on the back porch waiting on the food in the bbq. I bought myself a new bbq Sunday. Which it only took me about 3hrs to put it together but my back was burnt by the time I had it done. Go figure. (My ex-inlaws came to visit Sunday also but I'll save that for another post)

Doesn't it look like a nice day of relaxing? Elizabeth (the little one lounging in the chair) has the idea. Kick back and relax until dinner is done.

First bbq of the year. A day to remember. Chicken thighs, steaks, corn on the cob and potatoes. A cold porter in my hand. I was a little rusty after spending the whole winter not grilling so the steaks were a little done and the chicken could have used another few minutes. But the marinate I made gave me more room for error. (I made a lot because my dad and older brother were over for dinner. But that's a post best saved for a sofa and heavy tranquilizers.)

Time to take the kid to school!

Hurry up and wait already!

That's exactly how I'm feeling. I'm in a rush but it's just a rush for this waiting. I'm waiting. Waiting for the sun to come out and dry up my muddy garden. Waiting for the salad and stuff to grow that's already planted. Waiting for tomorrow to come so I can see if milking once a day is working. Waiting for the goat kids to get old enough to wean. Waiting for the eggs to hatch in the incubator. Waiting for the alpacas to have their crias in hopes that their girls. Waiting for Saturday to come (I have another date with Mr. eHarmony). Waiting for my next "paycheck" to come in so I can finally get that beehive set up. Waiting. In the meantime I find myself lost and my brain going nuts. Mostly wondering where all this waiting is going to get me. Wondering if I'm forgetting anything that requires waiting for.

This morning oddly enough I woke up at 4:30, exactly when my alarm was suppose to go off. But somewhere in my sleepy head I was thinking well the alarm hasn't gone off so I put my cell phone (it's my alarm clock) back down to wait for it to go off. Don't ask me why I was still half asleep. Well I waited, and waited and I think I dozed a little bit but I didn't think that was possible since it had to still be 4:30 since the alarm hadn't gone off. Eventually I got tired of waiting, it felt like an eternity had passed. Guess what. I hadn't turned the vibration off the phone so the alarm had gone off. Again and again and again while I laid their waiting and snoozing and wondering how it was possible for life to stand still for so long. It was 5:15 when I picked my phone back up to see what was taking so long for my alarm to get me out of bed. I'm actually surprised I'm even admitting to that. I feel like such a moron. Of course then I was a half asleep moron but still. I doubt I'll ever let that one go. That's worse then forgetting to put coffee grounds in the coffee pot and waking up to hot water. Worse then forgetting to put water in the coffee pot and waking up to a really funky burnt smell. Worse then putting bread yeast in my coffee instead of sugar (hey it was in the crock right next to the sugar). Worse then... well I think you get the point. Anyways this morning has really started off with a bang. To make matters worse I think I almost had a panic attack (not on the outside just on the inside, shove those emotions deep down where no one can see them right? Super mom doesn't panic!) or really close to it. I hate it when that happens.

One a different note...

This is how I garden. Or at least this year I've decided on a new way to make things grow. My aunt use to collect parts of old houses back when I was a kid. Where she lives they'd let her know if a house was going to be torn down and she'd go take down the doors, windows and whatever else might be useful later on. Well she was collecting a ton of windows with the hopes of making a green house eventually. Eventually turned into almost 30 years later and the windows still sat. Well this summer when the dude I was dating let go of 40-50 free windows I'd found on craigslist ("oh yea I'm going to get them, don't you worry." and three weeks later they weren't gotten and were then gone. A good lesson if you want it done right do it yourself.). Anyways. My aunt let me clean out her shed and collect her windows.

The six pane glass windows work great for the square foot gardening idea. Though they're not a square foot but the idea is the same. After they're laid out we can plant the seeds in the squares and then lay the pane of glass in the frame to help warm the soil and make sure the chickens don't scratch up the seedlings and keep them from becoming mud puddles. As the seedlings grow I can remove the panes one at a time depending on which squares grow fastest and use those panes for different windows. Eventually I can take the window frame itself off and move it to start over. Very handy.

Yesterday we introduced the goats to the alpacas.

As is normal alpaca behavior one alpaca was sent forth to check out the new comers to decide if they are a threat. Since my female herd only consists of two breeders and one cria that left the job of defender up to Twila since she doesn't have a baby by her side yet.

Twila makes quite a regal looking herd protector. Doesn't she? Legacey and her cria Gyn is in the background. The little kid in front is Daisey (she's one of Icy's triplets) and the kid off to the side is Buttercup.

I love watching the goats frolic. My youngest kiddo is frolicking with them. The kids don't really seem to get that they're under inspection and don't really seem to care. But they sure are cute huh?

The whole inspection thing went on for quite awhile. You can see Icy and Georgia (my milkers) in the background checking out the kids, though they don't seem to recognize them as their own. I've been wondering how they'd react when they saw them again. We've been careful to keep the kids in the backyard so as not to stress out their moms. But they don't seem to care so much.

Six kids. My oldest loves playing with the babies as much as my youngest.

My oldest in the backyard with the kids. Me sitting in my favorite chair. I have such a great view though.

My backyard consists of a very fun cliff which I've dug a stairway out of. Again me sitting in my chair because it's a great vantage point to watch the kids play. My oldest and the kids play for hours back there climbing up the cliff and jumping back down onto the porch. To have that kind of energy again would be great.

Ok I better wrap this up and do some chores. Or take a nap. :)