Early morning garden

Watch out potato bug! The guineas are coming right along to get you, but not a moment too soon.
I like this picture because it would lead one to believe that I have a weed free garden! teh hee!

Early yesterday morning while the sun was coming up (and beaming right in my eyes and camera but I had to get a weedless looking shot ;) and the grass was still wet with dew. At least the sun was shining!!!!! Thank You Lord!! We have really had some beautiful days lately and it is so welcomed after sooooooo much rain. Notice there is still no deck on the back of the house. I have been promised that it is coming soon.


Tomatoes, of course are our favorite thing ever, and they seem to be getting ready to blight. We have read that the best thing for a rainy season is to mulch around them. I am afraid that I will have to get a fungicide after them as they are already turning yellow at the bottom. The mulch is really good and rotten and I know it didn't burn them. We really try to go as organic as possible and we are getting better and better each year with that but occasionally we have to pull out all the stops and spray. When the guineas get old enough to do thier job I hope to only have to spray for blight and such but not for BUGS!!

Please don't click to enlarge or my secret will be exposed. Weeds!! Lots of weeds!! The soil is so hard after so many weeks of hard rains that you can hardly get a hoe in it. We have really great soil with all the barn loads of animal poop and truck loads of mulch that has been put in over the past 8 years. Not hardly a rock to be seen. (Sorry Leslie, I know that you grow lots of rocks over on your homestead but we have decided to not go that route) No rocks here but tons of weeds and I am not sure how to get a handle on them now. I worked my crazy self to death the past couple days with the mattic/pick to get 3 rows of corn hoed out. Yes 3 days from daylight til dark......jus kiddin' but it was really hard to do.

We do however have some good looking veggies such as several different varieties of summer squash that are coming in now! Yummy!! I have beets to be canned or pickled like TODAY!!!!! I hope all of your gardens are doing good and that they are weed and rock free!!!!

Not so Simple Saturday down on the farm

Here are the 2 big boys who keep watch over Le Poulet Hous

Foghorn Leghorn on the left is the meanest blankety blank blank I have ever seen. I pray that no one ever leaves the henhouse door open and he gets out cause he Will get me. He has eyed me for months now.......almost got me back in the spring. I was bent over....LOL! LOL! Just picture it!!! LOL again..... and I sensed something coming from behind, looked between my legs and it was him levetating 2 foot off the ground with wings spread heading for my rear......now what would he do with this big fat rear? I was right beside a big red handled shovel.....I mention the red handle cause I can spot it quickly and it stays near the henhouse just for times like these.......the rest is history shall we say........... not really I couldn't get quite the swing that I wanted at his head but came pretty close. He stomps and stammers at the wire on the lot everytime he sees me now...... he wants to finish what he had started I guess!!!!!

And he crows all day and all night........."Becky" ...."Oh Becky"...."Where are you, honey? Come on out here. I have something for you!"

The other little boy is so quiet and docile!! I love him!!

*****

OK So it's like this..... I should not even be thinking about sitting here on my bum on this crazy computer with ALL the things I need to be doing outside and inside..........

wash dishes from last nights late supper (Had to get in some serious fishing time with the grandpunks, guess who didn't catch a single fish..moi),

finish mowing the yard (had to come in a take an iced tea break and see what you guys were doing today),

take off the trash,

weed the garden,

weed eat(maybe I could just weedeat the weeds in the garden?)

Weed the flower beds (as I was riding the lawn mower around I would see this big poke bush in the middle of the flowers or a big clump of grass that has went to seed or a dandelion, etc, etc,.....)

Clean out the chicken coop (WAY OVERDUE!!!) (Will be quite a feat with Foghorn in there might I add)

Put the chicken poop on the grass around the fishpond (I know it will burn it but this soil has zero nurishment now, nothing but shell soil, whatever it's called it's lacking everything and a good layer of chicken dung will do it some good!!!)

Pick Blueberries and make another SCRUMPTIOUS blueberry pound cake for a picnic tomorrow, ( remember new oven and I can now bake ;-)

and I forgot what else there is to do.......... I am sure that I'll figure it out by the time I get this all done!!!!!

OOPS!! I better go now. I hear a big dump truck pulling in the driveway. The boss is back home. How can I get him to do anything around here if I am not working????? Shhhhh!! Our little secret, right?

Well girls, here's the story!

I am CRYING here.

Go on over to my other blog http://shabbylittleshack.blogspot.com/ and get the whole story. I'll keep you posted on the progress.

Becky

City girl or Country girl? You decide! I'm unsure!

Anxiously awaiting Nubian babies. Saphira is really getting large even though the picture doesn't capture it well.

Violet is also getting huge. I think she will go first. The due date for Saphira is July 13th. Not certain for Violet but she started showing first. It's always exciting around here during kidding season, it's just never been so late in the year :-)


They look like they are discussing motherhood...."cloth vs. disposable"......"breast vs. bottle"...."This midwife is a nut, don't ya think?" ......... "I think I'll just throw these kids while she is asleep cause she will be a wreck watching the birth"...... "Yeah, me too"

This is what a farmgirl drives and rides around the farm in.

This is what a city girl drives and rides around in. You see, I am mixed up!!

Then here we go again. Brand new state of the art convection range. Remember my old wood cookstove? It is just around the corner. The city girl in me can cook on the new range and when I feel like it I can cook on the old timey wood stove. The best of both worlds!!!!!!!!

I love it! Thanks honey!

I spent the whole day in the kitchen. I made 2 loaves of Amish Bread, one for the freezer. 21 biscuits that I flash froze and put in the freezer to bakeoff as needed. Thrifty huh? I made a fabulous Blueberry Pound Cake with fresh blueberries , the first of the season. It was the oven all these years that kept me from being able to bake cakes that were more than just barely edible. I never volunteered to bring dessert to a function cause they were so ugly. This new oven bakes so steady and evenly. Does that make any sense? Just come on over and we'll make something together and you will see!!

Amish bread rising. The range has a "proof" feature but I haven't tried it yet.

Looky, looky, I finally have an oven with a window and light. That could be why my cake turned out soooooooo good, I didn't have to peep in the oven by opening the door ;-)

After being, married for 32 years a couple will start thinking alike. Well, we did that many years ago and boy is that scary! Before the range came in I had decided that I would be a good little housewifey and make him a favorite of his, Liver and Onions. It was going to be a surprise. Last evening we were getting the new range in it's place and Danny looked at me and said "The first meal that I want you to cook on this stove is 'Liver and Onions'." Well, he got his hearts desire tonight for supper and he was a real happy camper.

So ladies, I want you to decide which role fits me. City or Country girl?

A starry night boat ride!

Saturday was the Summer Festival at Claytor Lake State Park that I had mentioned previously. We have only been on this lake one time, and it was just in a cove near the marina that we put in at, so we knew NOTHING about it. We put in way down the lake from the festivities this time and ventured down to find the party.Only because we hadn't a clue where we were going. The map of the lake was at home in my office!! OMG the lake was beautiful!!!!
Soooooo many sailboats! I love sailboats!! There are never any sailboats on our other lake :-(

Look at him. He was astonished with the townhouses. Look at that jawdrop LOL!! He turned around and told me that we should sell both houses and just buy one of those and stay on the lake all the time. Allright by me but not in a townhouse. I picked out my piece of property on the lake that already has my big red barn on it!!! BEAUTIFUL!!! I'll have to hunt the pic.


This was a great way to kill some time waiting for the sun to go down for the fireworks to begin. We met up with some friends with a YACHT!! and we tied up with them to watch the fireworks. This is my land behind us ;-) hahaha....... what's not so funny is it was a loooooooong way down the lake from where we launched our boat. Did you know it's dark when you have fireworks? Think about it!!

Yep it's pretty dark by now. Let me tell ya now, this was the very best fireworks I have ever seen!! The sky was ablaze with continuous color and tricks I have never seen. We all loved it. Then suddenly no skylights. Only a little red, a little green and little bitty white light on a zillion boats trying to find their way in the dark. Well a bunch of the folks knew where they were or could really see in the dark. We couldn't. I have to hand it to Captain Danny because he just navigated his way in the dark on a strange lake and had us loaded in one hour and on our way home. We really had some tired little pups with us. 12 hours on the lake boating, swimming and taking in the festivities at the park. Whew we were all tired. We all loved it, even boating in the dark!!



Check out all the sailboats on this video!

One more trip around the sun, boating adventure and NO PATIENCE!!!

Well, where do I begin?

I guess it begins with a tiny little blurb about my birthday being yesterday. I would not mention it due to the fact that I have had too many of them in the past and that story has gotten old!!! Not really, I am so thankful for the fact that I am able to continue having them so I can see more of my lovely family and friends and be able to do the things that bring me joy!! Thank you God for letting me turn 47! I LOOOOOVE MY LIFE!!!!

Next the big boating story! Sunday afternoon was gorgeous (NOT RAINING FOR ONCE) so we decided to hit the lake. This was Leslies first trip on the new boat, probably her last one!
Look at it go! The wind in our hair. Smooth sailing!

Emma loves the new boat cause she loves to go fast!! The faster the better for her!!

Danny on the other hand, likes it real slow. He enjoyed a nap while the kids were in the water. That was until they splashed him, I am not sure where they got the idea to do so ;-)..........So anyway after the nap we were going to cruise the lake for a bit......got 5 miles down the lake from the truck and BAM!! The hub in the propellor came out so we were only able to barely putter back to the truck. Colton napped the whole way back. I nearly cried. I would have had we not had enough propeller action to keep us moving at least at a snails pace! Better than rowing right? We only had to be pulled about 40 feet by another boat, and we had help getting it pulled up on the trailer too. We now have a new prop on the boat and the old one repaired and in the boat for a spare.
We had to get the boat fixed this week cause we are all anxiously awaiting a Summer Festival this Saturday at Claytor Lake State Park. There will be festivities all day and then at dark fireworks on the lake. A big barge sits in the middle of the lake and there are about 100 boats around it to watch. I CAN'T WAIT!!!!

My birthday gift!! My new microwave. The other one died over a month ago. This one matches, in color only, my fridge and dishwasher. ...........drum roll Please!..........the best part is I get the matching range too!! It is on it's way to me but I just found out it is to be here on Tuesday. I have no patience when it comes to things like this. When I buy something I want it right then. My other appliances are Whirlpool. I did my consumer research junk and got the best on the market at the time, a couple years ago. I don't understand how they came to that conclusion that they were the best because they are horrible. I have never liked them from day one. I will replace them soon. This time I did no research and bought what I wanted due to the bells and whistles that the item had that matched my needs. I can't trust a bunch of overpaid geeks telling me what I should buy.

The range and microwave are Samsung. The microwave is very basic, I don't do much microing anyway. The range however.........another drum roll please.......is a smooth top 5 burner, CONVECTION RANGE with the hidden element, has a warming drawer and it is a steam clean!!!!! OMG I can't hardly wait. I will have to learn how to cook all over again with convection. I will probably burn everything and end up cooking on my wood cookstove!!!!!! LOL!! I burn everything on it too ;-)

Baby fowl update!

Boy there sure have been a lot of changes made around this little farm lately! My daughter Leslie's dh built her a FABULOSA chicken coop so I separated my old hens and sent 6 of them to live in their new spa-like serene setting. They will never come back to the poor living conditions that they were living in here :-(

You can read the rest of the story over at http://www.cemommy.blogspot.com/
Here's a close up of the guineas and turkeys.

My beautiful little white guinea. She is very rambuctious sp? LOL and she also loves to eat so I named her, what else but Becky!!!

Started out with 60 eggs, hatched out 44, not to bad for a beginner huh? 29 guineas out of 38 eggs, 4 turkeys out of four, and 11 chickens out of 18 eggs.

Bathtime!

Jus kiddin'.........I put them in the enameled bathtub only briefly while I cleaned their box and it looked like a Kodak moment to me!! We spent the day yesterday dispersing the keets and chicks out to their new homes. I am down to 6 chicks, 6 guineas and 4 turkeys. My BIL is to get the turkeys this weekend. Boy it was a lot of fun and a lot of work too trying to be an old hen. I am getting another load of white leghorn eggs ready for the incubator and plan to start it about next Tuesday. I do not want another hatching day on Fri, Sat and Sun!! Leslie and I both need some more young blood in our flock and now is a good time to get those eggs started so they will be laying when our 4 year old girls give out. My 5 White Leghorns are still giving me an egg almost everyday, rarely do they miss a day. Actually they may not be missing because I have found an egg eater (a buff orpington) and she is getting ready to be dumplings!!

So you see I haven't had very much bogging time lately, with the babies, the garden and all the other crazys that go on around here everyday!!

Take care!

Becky