Because I want to remember...

It's seems like I haven't been in the mood to post lately. I think there are a few factors to this...work has been busier than normal...good busy, but busy nonetheless, home life is always a dance, balancing that work, family, and farm. I suggested to a friend/fellow blogger this morning that sometimes writing a blog post will help you/force you to remember the good things in life...and maybe it will help you move past some of the bad. I thought I would take a moment or two to go through some of the things that have been going on around Fresh Egg's Farm.

I feel like the farm offers us some consistency in our lives. No matter what else we have going on, the animals will need fed/watered/hayed, the garden grows and the lawn needs mowed etc. etc. etc. I'm thankful for that, although at times it's stressful to be in the middle of another project (or blog post) and realize that the goats are bahing for their food and to be let out. I force myself to make time for pasture, from time to time - because I realized that for a bit, I was more or less going through the motions of feeding and letting them out to pasture and not stopping to enjoy them. Now, I make sure that, when I can make time for it, I spend at least a few minutes in the pasture, talking with my animals, scratching their heads, giving them hugs and snuggles and laughing at their antics. They make me happy.

Our birds are FINALLY acting like real chickens! Each day, it's like an Easter egg hunt at our farm. While we have two nesting boxes, which they seem to want to sit in together and fight over, someone (ahem, Andy, our Blue Andalusian...I'm looking at you here), likes to find her way into the turkey's side of the coop and lay her eggs over there. I don't know if the egg laying sneaks up on her and she just doesn't think to get to the nest in time or what...crazy bird. I did have the opportunity to watch her lay an egg though. This time, she was in the nest, I thought something might have been happening and she kept getting comfortable and then wiggling around and repositioning and the next thing I know - she pushes out an egg! I've never witnessed that before. What an honor and an amazing thing to watch. We are getting lots of eggs now - which is AWESOME...but you know what...life has been so busy, we haven't even had the opportunity to TRY them. Can you believe it? My plan is to make some sort of lovely egg dish for dinner tomorrow, so we can all try them together. It's very exciting for us. The eggs are light brown, dark brown and white...hopefully soon we'll get some of the Easter eggers (they lay blue/green eggs) and can round out the look of our egg carton.

Our garden is better this year than it has been in the past - although we still got it in too late and I know some serious changes we need to make...I'm excited about future gardens. We got lots of tomatoes from the garden, although we could have gotten more, if we had staked up the plants like we should have...next year. We finally got some pumpkins - which will make sweet decorations and maybe a pie or two (yay fall), although we've learned about trellising and will likely trellis the pumpkins and squash...next year. We've also seen super cute trellis options for beans and such (I think Mark is going to be busy, building trellis options for our garden...I'll help, but he is super builder). Garlic and potatoes were great too, although we know that we could get a better crop with a few adjustments. Next year, our gardens will be different and better.

In extremely exciting news...we are getting ready to harvest honey for the very first time. We have decided to open this experience up to anyone that wants to come out. I hope we'll have a few takers that want to learn about the experience with us. The plan is to take off all the honey frames either the day prior or earlier in the day of extraction, so that the likeliness of someone (other than us) getting stung is limited. Yesterday we got our bottles - we decided to get a case of the 2# glass jars and a box of 50 of the 2 ounce little bears. The bears are more of a sample size and the 2# will be for us and if we have extra to sell. I have no idea how much we will even be able to pull off of the hive...I'm hoping for a billion pounds, but we'll likely get around 20 :-) I'll share another blog post after the extraction party.

So I've had to force myself to look at all of this good, because we also had something extremely terrible happen here. Our LSG (livestock guard dog), Ollie, passed away, extremely tragically and unexpectedly. He had been digging his way out of the pasture lately and we were afraid that he'd get into the road, so we made the decision to put him on a long lead, that would allow him to go between the barn and the pasture. Unfortunately, he tried to jump a portion of the fence that we'd been using as a makeshift barn door and got hung up and ended up hanging himself. The boys and I were coming home from picking up the boys from school and as we drove down the driveway, we saw his body hanging from the fence...we thought he was just struggling...but he was already gone. Our hearts are broken. His body is being cremated and his ashes will be spread under the bush where he liked to lay with his flock.

To end this post on a happier note, I want to remember this past weekend. Mark gave me a weekend getaway, for my birthday. He purchased a weekend pass, for each of us, to attend the Mother Earth News Fair, in Seven Springs, PA.  First, Mark and I have only been away, on our own - without kids, without it being for work etc., since we've been married - well, this is the third time. In 17 years. We even spent a portion of our honeymoon visiting with our older daughters (their bio-mom still had custody, at the time). So, when I say "We needed this time away" - you know I'm speaking the truth. Second, the weather was a perfect way to enter into Fall. The air was crispy and cool, with hints of the warm sun shining through. A thunderstorm and heavy rain made for perfect snuggle weather on Saturday. We watched the leaves turn colors over the few days that we were there from just a touch of orange here and there to bright oranges and reds streaking through the entire treeline. It's such a beautiful area. We were happy with the hotel and the food we ate. It was such a nice time...But finally, it was awesome because of the content of the Fair. It is a three-day event, at a ski-resort, in PA - there are vendors, both inside and out, showcasing their sustainable living goods. Throughout the day, they offer many breakout sessions with a WIDE variety of topics - from authors highlighting the content of their books to seed saving to live poultry slaughter/processing and everything in between. We walked away from the event with a renewed sense of excitement about our farm and our journey. We've been second guessing our poultry slaughtering methods - but when Daniel Salatin, yes, SALATIN, as in Joel Salatin's son, as in Polyface Farms fame - processes chickens, using the exact same method that we do, I think we are good. And when the person teaching how to make goat milk chevre cheese, is also using the exact method we do, again, we are good. In addition, it got us thinking about the future of the farm. We, as stated above, need to better set up our garden - perfect our seed starting and saving processes, perfect our planting/transplanting methods, add/take advantage of all our spaces by putting in cold frames and raised beds etc. While we are perfecting our gardening methodologies, we need to also perfect our "putting up" methods. When we were at Mother Earth News Fair, we had the privilege to listen to Niki Jabbour - "The Year Round Vegetable Gardener" author and Sherri Brooks Vinton - "Put 'Em Up" author and look forward to ordering their books. While we were there, we bought some delicious kettle corn and maple syrup. We bought Gage some tea - he's been getting into the idea drinking more natural herbal teas. For Cora, we got her a bunch of seed packets to get her started on her bee garden - she wanted a garden of her very own and I think that giving her the bee garden will help her understand pollination, beauty, bees, seasons etc. Drake was honored with a gift from a vendor. The gentlemen were so impressed with Drake's confidence (his willingness to crochet on the bus, without fear of being made fun of etc.) that they gifted him a skein of beautiful light olive green yard (50/50 mohair and wool)...he has already made a hat with the yarn and it's really cute...so "him". Finally, it was good for me to see some excitement from Mark, about our farm. He's so even tempered that I'm not always sure what he thinks of all this craziness, but he seemed just as pumped about most things as I felt. Which makes me even more excited.
...and these are just a few of the things that I want to remember.

Celebrating Life

This weekend we celebrate a few things, but the most important celebration is Mark's 49th Birthday. WOOT! For 49 years, my handsome hubby has made this world a better place and we celebrated him by never letting him get his own cup of coffee, extra snuggles, great presents from the kids (Gage gave him a Science Game, Cora made him an awesome frog out of her very cool and colorful duct tape, Drake hand knit a case for Mark's pocket knife, Kait/David gave him a Spider Man Comic from 1979 and a gift card to Pizza Hut - his favorite eatery :-)), and yummy food. In our house, the birthday boy/girl gets to choose if they want to go out to a favorite place or if there is a special homemade dinner that they would like. Mark chose to have meatloaf (I make a mean meatloaf), macaroni and cheese, green beans, strawberries, rolls and for dessert - homemade Carrot Cake (the recipe follows). It was a long day, but a day of comfort foods and sharing so much love for Mark. I hope he realizes how awesome we think he is.

Mark’s Carrot Cake
Ingredients:
4 eggs
1 1/4 cups vegetable oil
2 cups white sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking soda
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
3 cups grated carrots
1 cup chopped pecans

Icing:
1/2 cup butter, softened
8 ounces cream cheese, softened
4 cups confectioners' sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup chopped pecans

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour a 9x13 inch pan.
In a large bowl, beat together eggs, oil, white sugar and 2 teaspoons vanilla. Mix in flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt and cinnamon. Stir in carrots. Fold in pecans. Pour into prepared pan.
Bake in the preheated oven for 40 to 50 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. Let cool in pan for 10 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack and cool completely.
To Make Frosting: In a medium bowl, combine butter, cream cheese, confectioners' sugar and 1 teaspoon vanilla. Beat until the mixture is smooth and creamy. Stir in chopped pecans. Frost the cooled cake.
SO DELICIOUS!!!

Ta Daaaaaa!

Celebrating Spring...I've definitely got a case of Spring fever - being cooped up in the house is never good for me. It's cold and snowy outside. The water is often frozen in barn and we (by "we", I typically mean Mark) need to carry out heavy pails of water when we go out. Our fingers are painfully cold, by the time we come back in. I don't get to visit with our animals as long as I would normally like...I miss them.

I miss green things too - everything is sleeping outside - although the silhouettes of the naked trees look beautiful against the sky on sunny days, it's hard for me to go several days without seeing the sun...gray skies...UGH.

I'm trying to counteract the winter blues/cabin fever with planning and dreaming about spring. We have a lot of projects planned for the spring - most I've already mentioned here (the bees, the chickens...) but I haven't talked garden planning. We went through and evaluated our gardening from last year. With all the stress that happened last Spring, we really got a late start on planting. Most of our seed starts outgrew their containers (and unfortunately died), before we could get them planted in the ground. We had our neighbor till the garden very late in the year and really didn't get a good crop of anything. Sure, we enjoying homegrown potatoes, peas, onion, cucumbers, beans and zucchini - but not nearly on the scale that I was hoping for. Also, I realized that we really left our zucchini on the plant longer than we should, making the skin tougher. We also used a green bean seed that I wasn't very happy with - very stringy. Now, we have a lot of leftover seeds - some to get into the ground for this year and others we will hopefully be able to trade for other seeds or provide to someone who needs them more than we do (maybe we will plant some of the green bean seeds for donation??).
Seed starts - soon we'll need to move from the planning what to plant to the actually seed starting. Last year, we put our seeds on a table in front of our dining room window - which unfortunately also acted as a cat bed (Grrr) - they would actually lay on the plants to look out the window (brats). So this year, we are going to set up an area in the basement with a couple of grow lamps overhead - this should hopefully keep the animals away and provide sufficient lighting. In another exciting/different move, we've always purchased potting soil in the past - but this year, we are going to be able to take advantage of our "homegrown" potting soil. This week, we'll be digging out some of the bottom of the pile compost mix that has been baking in the back yard since we moved here. There should be some pretty good compost under there - we are also adding bunny and alpaca poo (which we have PLENTY of around here) to the mix. The GREAT thing about bunny and alpaca poo is that they do not need to be composted (aged) to put on plants, as long as they haven't been mixed with too much urine. I don't know if any of you are aware of this - but bunnies and alpacas will set up a restroom area - the poo berries are typically piled up in one area, easy to find, easy to shovel off a bit and the pee is fairly separated. We also have Cora's worm garden this year and perhaps we'll be able to make some compost tea to put over our seedlings as they grow and as we transplant them outside. SO we should have FREE soil/fertilizer for our plants!! Awesome - this helps us in two ways
1) We don't need to pay for any of this awesomeness
2) We don't need to figure out how to dispose of any of our compostable waste
The perfect solution.

Things I am looking forward to this Spring/Summer:
1) Peep Peep Peeps of baby chicks
2) Shearing our animals
3) Cleaning and spinning the fiber and creating a masterpiece from them
4) Buzzy bees and warm honey
5) Eating homegrown food, right off the plant
6) Goat milk - making cheese, soap, lotion
7) Oh! Goat babies boinging around the barn and back yard area :-)
8) Our first egg (...and every other awesome egg)
9) Eating backyard raised chickens
10) Making our yard cute/pretty again - plants, gardens, chicken coop
11) Seeing which of our fruit trees produce fruit this year
12) Seeing our finished, big, red, barn
13) Sitting on the porch with a glass of sun tea.
I'm sure this list will grow, but for now, that's a pretty good start.

Celebrating Football???...Finally - today is the Super Bowl...49ers vs. the Ravens. In honor of Mark's 49th birthday, I'm rooting for the 49ers. Honestly, I do not care about football - we only watch one game a year, this one and it is more for the commercials, the snacky food, the razzing each other about who is going to win etc.
Soooo Go NINERS!!!!

Just a quick note to say...

THE BARN ROOF IS COMPLETE!!!!!!!!!!!

Monday, Monday...start at the bottom :-)

Mark has been doing an amazing job with the roof. He's all the way to top of the first layer, on the right side and working his way across. By the looks of it, he might be done by this Friday! Which would be AMAZING!

Same side of the roof - slightly different angle.

Mark - on the roof!

Have I mentioned how much I LOVE LOVE LOVE the shingles?

Seriously, aren't the shingles awesome!

...and because I thought you could use some farm cuteness...There is Ollie and Jester in the barn hallway, snuggling.

My first attempt at canning grape jelly...which ended up more like grape sauce.

Putting the grapes through the food mill. Kinda not so attractive.

Grape skins and canning jars.

Grape skins.

Grapes!!!!!

How the grapes started.

Starting to de-skin.

Grape skins.

Um...this is going to take longer than I thought!

Frankie has the most beautiful eyes.

Itty, Frankie and Steve snuggling under their favorite bush.

This weekend started pretty rough. I got a phone call on Friday morning. It was my mother calling to say that her best friend, since 3rd grade, passed away unexpectedly. She was heartbroken. I grabbed a shower and took a PTO day and went to be with my parents. It was tough to see how hurt my parents are, but I'm so glad I had the opportunity to be there to support them.
The next two days, we spent working on the barn - we NEED to get the shingles up. With the cooler weather, it's been a constant reminder of winter and thus the need to give our animals a comfortable home. The open shelter of a barn has been great during the hot summer we've had - but now we need to finish the siding and the roof...hence the rush of activity you are seeing here.
Sunday - well, that was the official, back to school shopping day. The kids had some extra money burning holes in their pockets, so we took them to a few places of their choice to look at video games and clothes. We grabbed school supplies and a ton of groceries.
I also tried to make grape jelly..and well...not so much. Meh! Next time :-)

More to follow...

We've been working on the barn a lot lately. We have all the remaining siding (that we had) put up. We've been working on the shingles and making good progress.

More Progress!

Another day...more progress!

What a difference a day makes :-)

Starting this morning...

First upper level piece of siding going up!

A beautiful Passion Flower, these just randomly grow on the property, thanks to the previous owners!

Mark, obviously focusing on safety LOL.

That's better!

Mark stole the camera and forced a picture of me!

...and here's where we ended for the day. Not too shabby - considering that Mark and I were on our own today.

And with that - I'm so tired. Time for "quiet time" with Mark and off to bed. Back to work tomorrow!

Today at the Homestead

As promised, we went back to work on the barn today. We are worried that with this sudden transition to cooler weather, that fall...then winter will be heading our way and we won't have our animals prepared. Today, Mark's brother, Jon, came and spent the entire day helping us working on getting the 2x4s that the siding will attach to. We also framed out the upper level doors and put rails on either side.

Tomorrow - we'll be back at it. I feel accomplished.

Me and Mark's brother, Jon, working on the barn.

Itty, Frankie, Ollie, and Jester playing "King of the Hill" with our bench.

Steve and Jester - hanging out in the pasture.



Mark and Jon - giving me a heart attack! Be careful Mark!



Safety first Mark!



Mark and Jon.

Steve's so dreamy LOL

Drake and his Uncle Jon - close up!

Drake and his Uncle Jon on the upper level of the barn.

Mark and Jon, working on the barn

Changes

...and then sometimes life just goes to Hell. Since my last post, we've gone through a wave of ups and downs. I don't want to bore you with the details; however, let's just say that marriages are fragile creatures and even those couples that seem that they will last forever crack under pressure. We've gone through some pretty rough spots and it seems that each day we are deciding whether we can...will...should stay together. I love my husband. He is absolutely my best friend, partner in life and wonderful father to our kids. Sometimes things get sticky though. We'll just have to see how time goes and hearts mend.
On a much, much happier note...after a bit of a hiatus (between personal issues, me traveling to Portland, OR for last week and more...things have been on hold a bit...Mark has been working when he can and my parents have helped a lot too), we have hit the barn in full force. It is looking great! We had all five of the kids at the farm yesterday, as an early Mother's Day present - they all provided me with a full day of manual labor (so much better and more appropriate than anything store bought). It was nice being able to show them how to do something and just let them do it, while Mark and I worked on other things. We have the sheathing and roofing felt up on the roof, the fence braces are going in and the fence is rolled out, two walls on the main level have siding up, all the internal pen walls are complete.
We still need to...
Before the animals move in:

• Finish two main floor sides of siding
• Put in four braces and stretch the fence
• Build the six pen doors (two pens just have one door each, the other two pens have double doors and one pen is just going to be open
• Get feed containers and waterers
• Build the external doors to the barn (or come up with a temporary option for this

After the animals move in:

• Finish loft siding
• Build doors for loft
• Put rails in the loft, for safety
• Finish window vents
• Paint
• Shingles

I'm sure that I am missing some steps...right now though, I'm still trying to recover from a week spent in another time zone (three hours off), including getting up real early and staying out with co-workers - lots of fun and lots of work and now we are back to reality. :-)
Cannot wait to post the "It's Done!" post...but for now, I'll settle with "It looks Great!" post. Happy Monday all...
Let the barn envy BEGIN!

Tiff, Kait and her boyfriend, David started working on fence post braces - they did a great job! Kait and David rolled out the fencing too, it still needs positioned and stretched, but it also looks great!

Another view of the fence brace handiwork!

Inside of one completed pen, just need the doors built and installed.

LOVE the way the siding is looking (unfortunately, so do the wood bees!)

Side of the barn, facing the pasture area. You can see more great fence braces to the right :-)

Full picture of the end of the barn that faces pasture. Above the siding, we are going to put in basic wire mesh windows, with covers build from 2x4's and siding so we can choose to vent or not.

End of the barn facing our driveway.

Mark did an amazing job putting on all the roofing felt. Now the roof is protected if it rains...not perfect, but at least it's not totally exposed. We are going to focus on some of the main floor type tasks, so we can get animals in place and will focus on the shingles in a bit.

Another internal view of the siding that I think looks so nice. I'm happy with our choice.

Siding and pen wall.

All the pen walls built out...looking good.

AND HOW COULD I FORGET! Captain (one of our three outside kitties: "Captain", "Jack" and "Sparrow") had her (unexpected) litter of five kittens last week. She is a beautiful long haired black cat, that the people that lived in the home next door to us previously, just left at the house. All their left cats have claimed out home/yard as theirs now. The kittens are all black, one with a tuft of white on its chest. They are so tiny. Captain is doing an amazing job being a mom. She's always been the more timid (read 'psychotic') cats in the group and I wasn't sure how she'd be as a mom - but she does great...she hides them well, nurses well, snuggles well...they are a great addition and a bit of a much needed distraction. Congrats Captain!