Pony Power

We've been cutting brush off the fence line and feeding it to the goats in the evening while the goats are penned for the night. Free food for the goats, and eventually the fence line will be clear enough that we will be able to put up permanent fencing. I got tired of carrying the brush and decided to use the pony Sam instead. He's such a good pony! What a wonderful helper he is!

Say CHEESE!

My dear hubby built me a new cheese press today! He is so handy! So in the press is hopefully going to be Cheddar. The one thing, I'm going to have him change, is to add feet to the bottom so that it will be easier to put a tray under it for draining the whey off.

Baby Bird Rescue

While doing chores last week, husband discovered a baby bird that had fallen out of it's nest. We couldn't find the nest, nor was I willing to ignore the poor thing. So, I've been taking care of it in hopes that it would survive and be able to take care of itself in the end. So far so good. It can now fly short distances and is starting to learn to eat on its own.

The first photo is of just after rescuing the bird and the second photo is a week or so later.

 

 

Happy Memorial Day

So far, I've picked 8 1/2 lbs of Sugar Snap Peas out of the garden. I'm so impressed with this variety of peas. Also, this year a nice little oops happened when I planted some annual ryegrass as cover crop. It didn't germinate until after I had planted the peas. So, the peas grew up with the ryegrass and that kept them cool and gave them some support. Next time I plant peas, I will do this again only I will wait to plant the ryegrass after the peas have sprouted so as to give the peas a head start.

The lettuce and other salad greens are there, but for some reason, they are very slow to grow. Not sure if it's the clay in the soil or that we've had a lot of rainy weather this spring. Potatoes were just hilled, and are looking good. A couple more weeks and they will be flowering and getting ready to makes tators.

The green beans were spotty, and so I've replanted most of one row. And the cowpeas (purple hull, and silver hull) were also spotty. I'll have to look and see if I have more seed to replant part of those rows as well. I think I planted the beans a little too early. 

The rest of the garden has been tilled a couple of times in preparation for the hot weather crops. Squash, pumpkin, peppers, tomatoes. I'm not sure what else I'll plant.

  The girls out on pasture.

 

Redirection, Reflection, Rededication

A lot has happened this past year. I won't get into all of it, but the first week in Jan. this year husband was in a major wreck in his big truck (18 wheeler). This has led to the both of us reflecting on what we want and setting goals in that redirection. So, the both of us are rededicating ourselves to making a real living on homesteading/farming. With the long term goal of getting him out of the big truck and being able to stay home.

Having said all that, I was thinking about the garden when I started writing this blog post. We moved to a new and better place to do our homesteading/farming. And now I have a new garden spot to work with. Every year on Memorial Day, I'm going to take a photo of it and keep track of it's progress. How well it's doing and what I've planted.

This year so far has been a great year for peas. Usually by this time peas are burned up due to the heat. But, we've had lots of rain and some cool weather. The beans are not so great. I'm going to have to replant part of one row.

Merry Christmas, and New Year's Resoloutions

I know I haven't posted here in a while (my bad), but I've been rearranging my priorities lately. Life is always evolving into something different. I've changed up some of the hobbies that I'm going to concentrate on. There's only so much time in the day, and I've always had the philosophy that less is more. Which leads me to New Year's resolutions. I don't normally make resolutions, more like I reflect on the year past and look to the new year and decide on what is important or not and try to improve on the year.

I have sold my wheel and gone back to spindle spinning. Why? Because I want to concentrate more on the hobbies I really, really like namely horses. I've been involved in horses (and dogs) for a very long time. I sold my horses 4 years ago when hay was hard to find, but now I'm back with a horse and a pony. I also want to spend my indoor time (aka rainy weather) on knitting and to some extent spinning. LESS IS MORE.

So, my spinning resolution for this year is that I want to spindle spin enough yarn for a sweater/cardigan. There I said it, crazy as it sounds. It may take me a year, it may take me two. But, either way, there's no hurry.

My knitting resolution is to finish the couple of projects I've had on the needles for a few months before I start another knitting project.

And I hope everyone has a very Merry Christmas!

Pony with No Name

Recently we had the opportunity to rescue a pony that had been neglected and was going to the auction barn. Poor guy was thin and did not trust humans. We brought him home, rehabilitated him, and now he is in the work force. As with all our livestock, everyone here has a job, or they go. He is doing well in his training as a draft animal and will be a great help around here doing the heavier jobs that our draft goat, Shadow, can't do.

However, the poor guy doesn't have a name! We, here on the homestead, can't agree on a name either. I like Scout, our son likes Bill (from The Lord of the Rings), and my husband likes Ed. So, I've decided to have a name the pony contest. Submit a name in the comments page and if we agree on that name, the winner of the contest will receive 4 oz of roving from my sheep. The winner can pick from either white or grey.