First Sunflower

The first sunflower is blooming!  The garden is finally looking like a garden, not like a pile of hay with bits of grass sticking out.  It is always encouraging when it gets to this point.  The marigolds are blooming, too, so there's a little color out there.

The garden is going in bit by bit.  We finally got the tomatoes off the ground on their horizontal trellises.  This was a genius idea I got from my friend Haley of Comet Farm.  We tried so many other ways of tying the tomatoes up before, and they always grew too large and flopped over, causing the fruit to rot on the damp ground.

It's just T-posts with clips supporting the cattle panels.  The tomatoes grow through the wires and are held up.  We are planning a second layer for later in the season.  I can't speak highly enough of these trellises.  They have made tomato-growing in our climate so much easier.

 
The pumpkins have been planted, and we are beginning to build the corn beds!  It's the same as last year's garden - rye cover crop crushed down by moldy hay and black dirt.  The black dirt is from the pit that our friend Danny dug, thinking he was going to build a cob house and farm.  The "cob house" is still a pile of rubble, but we have a pond now and lots of black dirt for the garden.

It looks like a bad year for the stem borer moths and the squash.  I've been hand-picking hundreds of eggs off of them every day.  As long as I get the eggs off, it keeps them at bay.  An organic farmer who visited recently asked me why I don't just spray bT on it.  Because I'm just not willing to expose myself (and my baby, because I'm nursing!) to pesticides, even "organic" ones.  I do use diatomacious earth on occasion, and soapy water, but usually I just hand-pick pests into soapy water.  I can do that for my little garden.  I realize that's just not possible for any scale of commercial enterprise, which makes me appreciate my home-grown vegetables even more.

Beyond the tomatoes, eggplants, peppers, tomatillos and summer squash I've got the watermelons, cucumbers, casaba melons and beans planted.  We have spiffy new trellises for them - T-posts and wire.  They are even braced, which makes them the garden trellises of my dreams, ones I was asking Ethan to build for years.  We'll see how they turn out.  We have yet to find a long-bean trellis that really works for us.  Last year I used my old laurel oakling with sections of red-top fencing.  It was ugly and collapsed mid-season from rot and the weight of the vines.  We've also tried posts with twine tied back and forth, and the very worst one that killed all the pole beans, posts with bits of twine dangling down along the row.  The twine just rots in our very humid climate.  I'm hoping the wire we've invested in will be used again and again in other trellises.

We are trying to trellis the melons and cucumbers this year.  I've heard of people growing them on trellises, and I want to try it out.  I don't have a good set up for them yet, so we're still trying different ideas to see how they work.  I'm hoping it will help keep the melons from rotting this year -  always a tragedy in previous years.

Yarn Along

 

Still working on the Phoebe's sweater for Clothilde.  It is turning out to be so cute!  I tried it on her already and I really like the look of it even without the sleeves and hood.  I am thinking of knitting a couple that way as a long winter vest of sorts, one that she can play outside in without fear of getting the sleeves dirty.  I am just in the process of cleaning all the wool and putting it away, and even copious amounts of gall soap did not completely restore her white wool undershirt sleeves to their previous not-grey color.  She is definitely a girl who needs machine-washable sleeves (perhaps even with a touch of bleach).

When I was taking the picture, Clothilde took the chance to try out knitting herself - I am always amazed at what she absorbs just from watching us:

Nature Finds

We found a little mouse in the barn!  He must be eating the spilled oats.  He (or she, I suppose) was so small.  It could jump shockingly high and tried to climb a tree to get away from us.  We let it go, of course, after we took a picture.  It was so cute.  I think we have quite a lot of mice around, judging from the number of snakes we also have, as well as the big old owl that comes and sits right on the garden gate in the evenings.

 We found a glass lizard in the yard.  There were actually two of them (just friendly?  Or friends with benefits?).  They are lizards with no legs, and their tails will fall off if they are distressed.  We see them often, usually in the spring time.

A patent leather beetle?  We've had so many beetles lately.  I think they really like the permaculture beds in the garden for some reason.  I find all sorts of beetle grubs when I'm transplanting starts.  A lot of them are probably dung beetles, of course.

 The garden has some impressively huge crickets in there, but keeping up with them are some equally impressive wolf spiders.  Sometimes I find a mama with it's babies on it's back, or an egg case.  I wish they ate the squash vine borers.

This was a really cool caterpillar the kids found at the farm.  I'll ask my dad, the butterfly guy, what it is.  He told me, but I've forgotten already.  Will have to add notes to this one.

The slime molds are gearing up in the garden.  I wonder if this is one of the "dog vomit" varieties.  I'm not terribly familiar with slime molds, except about how they act like plants, animals and fungi all at once, and simultaneously congregate in one spot with perfect conditions, although they start out in different places.

This is my favorite - a blooming moss garden on the outdoor shower.

Mother's Day

Isn't she cute with her toddler step stool?  Do you see how well she can reach the doorknob?

 Looking back, I can barely even remember the time when I could set her down and she didn't go anywhere.  And were her cheeks really that chubby?  I don't think she ever chewed on the wooden baby teether, not even once.

Rose dressed up as a beautiful flower fairy.

Don't worry -  this one was staged.

I have mixed feelings about Mother's Day as a holiday.  I love the opportunity to honor my mother (and mother-in-law),  but over the years I've decided that Mother's Day is bad for me.  I think it's all the pressure to be appreciated.  I never get to sleep in and my family always dissolves into tantrums while I try to do something quiet and focused for once.  Usually I end Mother's Day feeling either like crying or packing a backpack and quietly moving to New Zealand.

In light of now being three decades old and therefore wiser and more mature, I decided to take Mother's Day into my own hands this year.  I woke up before everyone else on Saturday and brushed my hair, something I only get to do about twice a month.  Then I finished knitting a sleeved on Clothilde's Phoebe sweater.  Bliss!  I couldn't even believe it was happening without someone climbing on me. 

Once the children were awake I did massive amounts of laundry and swept, mopped, and oiled the wood floors while Ethan slept in (he wasn't feeling well).  All three children helped out and had a great time.  There was a minor tussle taking the spray bottle of water and vinegar away from the toddler (she was squirting us all with it).  By the time Ethan was awake, I had even already planned a special breakfast for Sunday and taken the recycling out.  I of course realize how transient a clean house is, but it really made Mother's Day wonderful.

On Sunday morning, sleeping in was actually enforced because Clothilde flopped over my legs and I couldn't move without waking her up!  That morning I made sausage patties for breakfast with our home-raised pork and even dried sage from the garden, our eggs fried in butter, and soaked-flour pancakes made with home-made Matsoni yogurt with strawberries and local wildflower honey.  Everyone was delighted.  Pancakes are a rare treat for us because eating something that sweet first off in the morning makes me feel funny all day.  It was fine when paired with sausage and eggs, though.

I spent the rest of the day starting more seeds for the garden and making a grass-fed beef stew and an apple tart for my mom for dinner.  We brought dinner to her house, and I picked a bouquet of wild and garden flowers for her.  My brother, who is back in town after finishing yet another semester at CMU, came over for a rare visit.  It was a wonderful day, the best Mother's Day yet. 

If there's anything I've learned in my time here, it's that you really have to appreciate yourself, too.  There's just no way my family could ever have given me a clean house for Mother's Day, but making it happen as a gift for myself was wonderful.  And since I wouldn't be a mother without all of them, doing nice things for them on Mother's Day not only made everyone very happy, it also seemed appropriate.

End of Week Joy

Whew, I'm so glad it's Friday!  It's been a tough week.  All our extended family has been unavailable lately and Ethan's work was threatening to send him out of town for an unknown number of days.  It's been so long since they asked him to travel, but it is always like that - not sure when he'll be leaving, not sure for how long.  It is very disruptive to family and farm life.  We are so lucky to live so close to all our extended family.  Everything would be so much harder without them.

I'm also still trying to get used to being 30.  It's been strangely hard to change decades.  I know everyone over 35 scoffs if you say 30 feels old, but the truth is that to anyone under 30, it IS old!  Three decades is a long time to be here.  I think there is also a 9-year change for all the decades, with so many thoughts about leaving behind one decade and beginning another.

 Clothilde has been "The Little Engine That Could - And Did" lately.  Did you know we have to keep all the dining room chairs tied up when not in use?  Otherwise nothing is safe.  One of the worst toys we have - which was completely fine, and even convenient in sweet little Rose's hands - is the toddler step stool.  Dangerous.

One of our friends called her "relentless."  I think that's a fairly good description.

I am realizing that when my other children were small, they were super careful.  I let Mirin help chop veggies when he was 2, and I always let them use kid scissors from an extremely early age.  They had good sense!  I had to wrest the kid scissors unhappily from Clo-Clo this week because she was putting them in her mouth and snipping them.  Huh!  And she definitely wins hands-down over Mirin on which kid has broken more stuff.

 

 We are working on the Practical Projects block of 3rd grade now!  Mirin is building his workbench.  He is really enjoying this part of homeschool (I knew he would) and is making plans for other projects.  There are also some plans for a loft bed, a sandbox and a tree house in the works.

Unwinding

Summer is here, with all of the usual heat and humidity.  It's still just early summer heat-and-humidity, of course, none of the late summer 95 degrees and 100% humidity that we can look forward to.

I am excited about summer vacation.  Home schooling is a huge time and effort commitment, and I can't wait to have some time for my own projects and interests.  I'm also excited that Rose will no longer be able to bring home nasty little viruses from school every week.  It has earned her the nickname of "Typhoid Rosie" around here.

I am even now thinking over our year of homeschooling, and making notes about what can be improved.  Next year I want to spend more time on things we all enjoy.  This year was Mirin's 3rd grade year, and we spent so much time on the Old Testament stories.  I really don't like the Old Testament stories!  They are all about how mean people can be to each other.  They are the propaganda basis of current political conflicts and civil rights abuses that make me angry and upset.  They made me depressed all winter!  (I should add that the Christopherous curriculum really does make a nice little booklet of the stories and removes all the weird stuff about genital mutilation, rape, domestic abuse and slavery.  Maybe the problem was that I went back and read the real stories just before teaching this block).

And then our Native American studies felt rushed.  We should have just focused on the things we really like and are inspired by.  That's what is really important.  It is so true that as a teacher you have to be able to bring things to life through your own heart and soul.  That kind of soul-level teaching just can't be pretended.  At least I'll be able to try 3rd grade over again in a couple of years!

Looking over 4th grade, I am very excited to work with the book Earth, Air, Fire, Water.  It is all about making toys and devices that harness the powers of the elements.  The first time I read through it, I thought it was a great book, only it was written in that same pretentious style that so many Waldorf materials are written in.  Then I looked at the front and realized it had been translated from German.  Is it possible that all the English-speaking American Waldorf authors have absorbed the "translated from German" style of writing, and that's why they all have that same tone?  It's a good book, and even is authentically translated from German.

 The cows are out grazing!  I hope we have bought our last bale of hay for the season!  There's so much more milk now that they are on the good green stuff.  Everyone's casting off the shaggy winter coats as fast as possible.

It is also quickly becoming "Roach Season" around here (not pictured, for obvious reasons).  The Northeast might have mud season, but at least they don't have Roach Season.

We've been greeted by the enormous 2-inch long ones flying around our porch light like moths lately.  We had such a wet, mild winter, it looks like it's going to be a tough season.  The ones that have overwintered in the walls are coming out in style.  The boric acid and diatomacious earth I put down has worn out it's effective life.  I saw several of them swimming around in it with no ill effects.  I killed 12 of them the other night, and I have made a sworn quota of at least 5 large ones every night.

I realize that they are fairly harmless - after all, they aren't venomous or bite or anything, but they do chew holes in the fruit and get up to all sorts of mischief I'd rather not talk about.  The huge flying ones seem to try to land on people and crawl around all over you.  Outside I leave them alone, but inside my house they are fair game.  I'm taking my roach-killing oath seriously and have mentally mapped out their favorite haunts to check every evening.  They seem to really like the piano for some reason.

I realize that in other places roaches are not common unless things are really unkempt or dirty.  Do not assume this, it is only because you don't have Roach Season where ever you are.  I assure you this is not the case in Florida.  There are hundreds of them just outside the door in the magnolia leaves,  and most of them come in from outside, like ants do in other places.

May Fair

 We all had a blast at the Morning Meadow May Fair over the weekend.   It was at the Little Orange Creek park where Earthskills was this year.  It has become one of my very favorite parks.  There are beautiful oak trees every where, and an old cemetery from the 1800's that the park is restoring.  The weather was beautiful and we saw some old friends we hadn't seen for a really long time.

With the beautiful ribbons and singing, it was really a magical event.  Only one little kid fell.  It was when Rose's class was up doing the maypole dance.  All the little kids were chanting, "It's easy!  It's easy!"  Just then a little girl went down face first, and everything ground to a halt. 

Mirin was not expecting to be part of a may pole dance, so he ignored us telling him that the "dress code" was white with a flower crown.  He did wear the crown he had made earlier, but refused to put on a different T-shirt, so he was the kid wearing deer-hunter orange when his old teacher from Heart Pine School had him join in.  At least he was not completely alone.

The big kids also neglected to bring shoes, but it was ok.  They only remembered halfway across town, and we were already late.  They are good at avoiding ants and fire nettle already from being a the farm.

Nature Finds

 This was a strange insect Ethan found inside of a gopher tortoise burrow that the darn dog tried to dig up.  The gopher tortoise is ok, don't worry.  He just moved his residence.  The stupid dog, not so much -- her paws were bleeding.  Now we have a huge 6-foot pit going across the path to the pastures.
Is it a cave cricket?  An immature mole cricket?

 The evening primroses are blooming all over the place, especially in the garden, where I hesitate to call them weeds.  They open like bright yellow stars all over the green every evening.  We have been staying out later in the evenings to work in the garden.  It is hard not to when it stays light for so long!  Yesterday evening we took a walk down the driveway to see the May fireflies sparkling in the forest and to listen to the frogs singing in the pig's wallow.  It sounded like a wild frog party over there.  They stopped as soon as we were within 20 feet of them, even though we were very quiet.  We were not invited!

 A long-headed grasshopper.  The grasshoppers are really getting going these days.  I do fear for my garden.  I think they are eating holes in the eggplant leaves, although it could also be the numerous wooly bear catterpillars.

This was interesting!  Just before nightfall I was finished being kicked all over by Nougat (I was milking her), I put all the mama goats back in with the babies and they were all nursing when I saw this on the garden gate. It looked so much like a big mama roach nursing her babies we laughed Ethan got a photo.  She is certainly the matriarch there.

Bad Cows and Unrespectable Fences

This is Meathead and Explorer trying to figure out who's bigger and stronger.

Explorer, our little Jersey/Devon bull, has been out with the girls for months now, but when someone's in heat he usually tries to ignore it.  On the rare occasion he gets up the courage to try mounting, he is usually knocked off by crazy Isla.  She gets very possessive.  Meathead was the lowest on the horn-and-shove list before we put Explorer out with everyone.

The cows have been SO BAD lately.  I can barely even bring myself to write about them.  They haven't been quite Igor bad (I still need to write about that story), and not quite as bad as when the sheriff had to return them last year, but still...BAD.

The summer grasses are just beginning to grow, and we had wanted to keep the cows on hay for just a little longer to give them a chance to get established.  But Geranium, Isla, Chestnut, Matilda, and Flora had other ideas.  Meathead and Explorer just followed along, so I guess I can forgive them.

They were getting very antsy, and every evening when we went home they would stand in a line along the fence and moo at us, foghorn-style, in protest.  They knew there was green stuff out there that we were depriving them of, and it just was not going to stand.

Last week they busted down the electric fence AND the un-electrified "brain cage" and ransacked the barn.  Of course they were long gone by the time we got there.  They had moved themselves to the first grazing line and were laying there, bloated and chewing.  I first realized when I found the goat's barley and copper ration completely empty and the bucket a good 15 feet away from where it was supposed to be.  Then we saw the barn.

They had devoured three bags of oats and two bags of barley, ripped open a bag of mineral lick and scattered it all over, trampled open a bag of Sul-po-mag fertilizer and spread it around, disassembled a nice hay bale intended for the goats and spread it on top of everything and made sure to leave a whole bunch of cow pies all mixed in with it all.  (Of course, it wasn't all their fault.  We had neglected to close it up).

Matilda was so full she refused to even look at her milking ration, although it didn't stop her from stalling on the way to the milking barn to half-heartedly lip at some grass.

And it didn't stop there.  We tried getting them back to their hay bale, but they let themselves into the second line, and then onto the other side of the property.
I was talking to my friend Karen who has a herd of mini Jerseys, and she was complaining that she has to go around and play little games almost with the cows to try to get them to behave.  It's so true!  There's just as much social drama with them as with any group of human beings.

Older Mother, Older Kids Now

Mirin made this great circlet for the upcoming Mayfair out of grape vine, yarn and the golden velvety calyxes that are falling from the Magnolia grandiflora blossoms.

My 30th birthday last week has brought up all sorts of thoughts of change.  The truth is, I am no longer a young mama with young children.  I am an older mama with older kids now!

The experience of being a young mama with little kids has been totally different for me than being in my late 20's with big kids and a toddler.  Of course it is nice now that people are no longer so judgmental.  I remember the looks of condescension on the faces of old high school and middle school acquaintances that I would run into around town.

 "Oh," they would say, looking at either a chubby baby, a grungy toddler, or my pregnant belly.  "Well, I guess you're busy just being a mom, then."
They were all still in college and the recession hadn't hit yet. 

I enjoyed being a young mama.  I enjoyed my pregnancies so much more.  At 28, I was a grumpy pregnant lady.  My back hurt and I felt old and creaky.  My relationship with my baby has been different.  I was so much closer to my own childhood, I think I identified much more with my babies when I was 20 and 23.  I bonded differently with them somehow. 

I was thinking about this a lot earlier this week.  We have a neighbor with three home schooled children all slightly younger than my kids.  She often has stopped by while we're in the middle of some beautiful and well-thought out Main Lesson that my children quickly abandon to go visit with her boys.  I usually just sigh and put everything away.  Once they are outside like that, there's not much hope of getting them in and having them focus on anything, so I just let it go and head outside to supervise.  The boys are very rough and wild, and they like to "sword fight" with Mirin, so I feel like I need to be out there to keep someone from losing an eye.

A few days ago we went on a little walk while I was letting our winter wool soak, and we walked past their house and the boys were in the front yard.  My kids were thrilled and I let them go over and say hello.  Their mom chatted with me for a few minutes, and then asked us to leave because her baby was napping and she wanted to do other things.  I told her I understood (I do) and we left right away, but I couldn't help feeling a little surprised, because we always welcome them even though they drop by inconveniently all the time.  Maybe I'm just a wimp about sticking up for our needs, but I do think friends should be welcomed.  

Then I realized, she's older than me, and I'm having such a hard time with managing baby/home school/healthy meals my family will actually eat/laundry/farm/finances/dairy cultures/big kids fighting and I must be at least a decade younger.  I bet it's even harder for her.  I really can't imagine being ten years older and doing all this, I really can't.

Roses - and a bit of a rooting tutorial

Last year my friend and I took cuttings of many heirloom roses.  She showed me a great method of rooting cuttings.  I've since tried it with figs and mulberries, too.  It works incredibly well and is very easy and low-maintenance (a must around here!).

All you need is a plastic ziploc bag and some potting soil.  The bag can be any reasonable size.  I've used the sandwich ones and also gallon size.  The important thing is that it can be sealed.

- Put 2-3 inches of potting soil in the bottom of the bag.

- Cut cuttings (for roses, about 3-4 inches), and strip off bottom leaves.  Poke the ends into the soil in the bag.

- Add a little water, but not too much.  You just want it to be moist, not damp.  The only cuttings I took that didn't start were because I added too much water.

- Gently blow in some air into the bag and seal it so that it has a pocket of air.  It will create a little rain forest-like environment.

- Leave it be for several weeks, either inside near a window, or outside somewhere sheltered from temperature extremes.  I occasionally check on them and blow more air into the bags.

- After about three weeks I start checking the bottom of the bag to see if roots have formed.  When I can see a lot of roots, I pot them up, tearing the sides of the plastic bag so I won't disturb the root system too much.  I put about three cuttings in each gallon bag, and only one or two in the sandwich size.  Two was a little crowded.

My roses have grown into 2-gallon pots now, and are blooming this spring.  It's been so fun to see what they are when they finally bloom.  Unfortunately, I didn't take notes or anything when I was taking the cuttings, so I have no idea which they are, except the St. David roses that are from my rose bush I already have.

Yarn Along

Joining in with Ginny today!

Despite the warming weather, it is so nice to have yarn and needles in my hands again!  I won't even talk about all the things that had to be cleared away so I could get this picture - and the baby feet still made it in!  (these baby feet wouldn't have missed out for the world, of course).

I am knitting a Phoebe's Sweater for Clothilde.  I've had this book for years and have always intended to make Rose one and give her the book and the sweater for her birthday.  I had really hoped to right after Clothilde was born, because the story is about a new sibling.

For some reason, I always found it hard to begin - not wanting to carry the book around with me to knit it so it would be a surprise, but not having time to copy it out.

Well, I've at last made a start!  I'm knitting a small one for the littlest daughter first (I thought it wise to start small, just in case), and I have been really enjoying the slip-stitch pattern. It's just different enough to keep things interesting, but I can still read in the truck and knit on the way to the farm.


Also, a funny wool incident-  I was washing my winter wool yesterday to put away because the weather has been so hot and dry.  I had just finished spinning the water out of the last sweater, unrolled everything from the towels and had it laid nicely on my laundry tree - when the bottom fell out of the sky and it began to pour!  I quickly brought everything inside, and unfortunately the only place in my house without wood floors that won't mind the drips is my super-tiny kitchen.
Too many cooks is nothing compared to having to share with a laundry tree!  I hope today will be properly hot and dry again...

My Side of the Oak Thicket

We have been reading My Side of the Mountain on the way to and from the farm in the evening.  It was a book both Ethan and I enjoyed as kids, and we knew Mirin would absolutely love.  After hearing the first few chapters, he became enchanted with the idea of making a house in a tree, despite the fact that hemlock doesn't grow here and we have no such trees, unfortunately!
I suggested his pit as a good alternative, but it was too public and easy to see, he replied.  So he has been digging out a new pit for a hideout in an oak thicket.

It's almost big enough to move in, he says.

There is certainly something about nine, I think, when children start really thinking of independence, and there's that draw to go off and live by yourself - at least you think you can.  It began just before Mirin's 9th birthday.

"I'm running away," he would announce.  Or several times he began making plans to stay at the farm, even building a shelter and getting his bow ready to shoot a rabbit for a survival dinner.  Of course once a few seconds of real solitude sunk in he was back or running after the truck as we drove to the gate, saying he'd changed his mind.

When I was ten I got to live in France with my grandmother and my great-aunt and uncle for three months during summer vacation.  That separation from my family, although painful at first, was so needed.  It gave me such a great perspective on my family and my culture, and the opportunity to feel on my own and have the freedom of thought to begin that long and often upsetting change through adolescence.  I remember how important that space is to be able to try out different selves as you decide who you are going to grow into.

I also think about the yo-yo affect - how children are always having times of clinging to you.  I often feel like tearing my hair out in this phase, and long for my own silence and solitude.  Then they come right out of it and run away, leaving you sniffling and longing for the days when they were chubby and cute and wanted to be held.

And then there's some day that will come (and I know faster than I will anticipate) when they really do leave and go off on their own.

Nature Photos - Thistles

We've had some gorgeous thistles blooming at the farm this year.
The flowers look like sea anemones.  The goats love eating them.  Some of the sow thistle stalks got to be taller than I am.  They bite them off at the bottom and crunch them down until they get to the buds.  It's funny to watch.  I can't believe they don't mind the thorns!

Marking

I knew, as soon as the first three boys were born, that it was going to be really hard to mark (castrate) the kids.  We've only ever had girls born, and I do wonder if the reason we had so many boys this time was because we didn't give them apple cider vinegar in the fall due to the cost.  They say it makes more girls.

There are about three ways, according to Natural Goat Care, to mark kids (lambs, too, I think).  Just reading about them gives me the shivers.  There are the bands and the crushers, first of all.  The bands, while easy and seemingly humane, are supposed to be the worst way.  Pat Colby cites research that showed significant abdominal bleeding from the banding.  The crushers, which sever the sperm tubes kind of like a vasectomy, also leave the buck "bucky" with his usual libido.  We didn't really want four bucks running around for another year.  The goats are hard enough to deal with without that.  So we did the third way, which is supposed to be the most humane - with an old fashioned knife.

Our friend Ed Sherwood had come out and steered Meathead with Ethan so he had some training.  I held the babies.  Although I'm sure it was pretty bad, I think it was probably more traumatic for us than the boys.  After we marked Huckleberry, I was crying and sure we had killed him.  He wasn't happy about it, of course, but the next day was bouncing around almost as if nothing had happened.  They don't bleat nearly as much as when they are dehorned, and I think mostly it is about being held down rather than the marking.

It was hard, but thank goodness it's all done for this year, and they have all healed perfectly.  It was definitely one of the hardest parts of farming (for me at least).

{this moment}

Joining in with Soulemama today!

{this moment}

A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week.  A simple, special, extraordinary moment.  A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

Summer Gardening Begins

The summer garden has been started!  It's like the first day of school putting the tomato starts out there - all by themselves and exposed to the elements and the harsh, cruel world.  I worried about them, but they survived the latest gusty cold front and are putting on some new growth already.  The eggplants had a close scrape.  The sprinkler was badly adjusted, and they weren't watered in well enough, but even they seem to have recovered and are settling in nicely.

We also got a crazy corkscrew carrot from the winter garden!  I still can't believe how nice the carrots are this year.  They look like sumo wrestlers compared to the usual pencil-thin-and-nubbly ones we've always grown.

I really want to grow all of our vegetables this year.  Organic vegetables these days are so freaking expensive, and now that I've been spoiled by having a lot of garden fresh vegetables, I can hardly even bring myself to eat the ones in the store.  They are so soggy and over-handled, and such a far cry from being able to be simply sauteed in butter with salt and pepper to bring out their flavor, because there just isn't much there to bring out.  After a season of mostly store veggies, with occasional bunches of broccoli, arugula and greens from the garden - I'm inspired!

A Birthday Bouquet

Last week as I was looking out of the window while we were driving back from the feed store, I remarked how I couldn't believe people weren't out along the roadside gathering gorgeous armfuls of the beautiful spring flowers.  The hairy mullein is especially dramatic, sending out twisting flower spires.  Unfortunately, I think that most people respond to the wildflowers by calling the county to come mow the roadsides.

Ethan brought me this beautiful wildflower bouquet over the weekend, as an early birthday present (my birthday is on Friday).  We made some jokes about the last birthday bouquet I picked for my dad.  My parents are such nerdy nature people - they never said, "Wow, the colors are stunning," or "How unusual!  You even included a sprig of sweet peas from your garden!"

No, they didn't.  Instead all through dinner they kept up a discussion about whether the one plant was really a Lepidium or not.  I'm surprised my dad didn't get a reference book out about it!

Nature Photo - Paw Paws

The paw paws are blooming now.  They have such a striking presence in the pastures.  When I was a kid my parents would go to the Ordway-Swisher Preserve for my mom's Masters research on Opuntia pollination, and the first little way along the road was covered with pawpaws - quite a sight when they were in bloom, but even better, I thought, when the fruit was ripe.
Paw paws are actually toxic to grazing animals, but since we have a lot of other plants and we don't pressure the pastures so much, we haven't had any problems with them.  I think they might be beetle pollinated, because they are always covered with different beetles.