Category Archive: quilts

Here is our new arrival, still wet, and having her first meal.  We thought McKenzie and the other Shetlands were all bred earlier, so were not concerned and put all the ewes together with our Cormo herdsire.   Dumb idea which won’t happen again.   This was a bit of a surprise as we thought we were done.   And again, we think we are done.

These are the blueberry bushes that I am becoming very acquainted with.   See on the right how the berries will ripen 2-4 at a time/place.   So the same bushes are picked over and over again.  It seems slow as I only get about 5# or l gallon an hour.   However, I now have 50# in the freezer.  We love blueberries in various ways during the winter.

My design wall is not as big as needed for this flimsy.  I have finished and the border you see on the bottom is all the way around.   Next, I will pick out the backing and get it on the quilting machine where I will look at it for 2 weeks and then decide I need to get it done right away.   And the frenzy will begin, but it will get quilted and bound in time for gifting.

And in between the other fun stuff on this farm,  with this heat, we are fighting fly strike, which is no fun for humans or animals.

eseDH went to the gym alone this morning.  Beau wanted to go for a car ride, but settled for a good brushing and a treatWhen we were through, this office waste basket was full of discarded dog fur and he was happy with his treat of string cheese.   And I bet he feels a lot better in this warm weather.

Even mini farm life is busy, and especially so with this beautiful weather we have had.  There is always so much to do.   And the dogs don’t get brushed often.   There are the lambs that need to be halter trained and the stalls that each need cleaning at least twice a week if I want to keep the work doable for me.  There is the fencing, and the weeds, thistles, nettles and most of all, we need a garden, blueberries, grapes, raspberries, and an herb garden in addition to the hoop house we have.   This year we are moving the garden that has been on the hillside up to a flat area, so that means creating new beds.  There are hanging baskets to water and flower bed weeding to do.

These are all extras in addition to the normal feeding and household duties.  I have accepted that I cannot do it all without help.

So today, I hired two young men to layout the new garden beds and plant somewhere around 300 potato starts and one hundred onion bulbs.   It feels so good to have them in the ground now.  Sometime in the next the two weeks, we will plant corn, green beans, and squashes in the rest of this area.  They will return to help with the nettle, thistles and weeds on the fence line

 While they were doing the new garden area, I was able to get the tomatoes tied up as well as weeding in the hoop house.  It should have been done 2-3 weeks ago, but it is done, and now, I need to keep up with it.   Already the kale is getting out of control.   I picked the parsley and it is time again to pick the peapods and once again, I managed to plant more lettuce than we can eat.  But neighbors, chickens, and sheep are always willing to help.These are called Egyptian walking onions.   The little white bulb lets on the end bend down and plant themselves into the soil, thus reseeding themselves over and over.   They are a hot onion, so I use them in cooking.