There is a lot in bloom already. Phlox, tulips – some looking taller than ever before, Magnolia, bleeding heart, jack-in-the-pulpit, azalea and other spring blooming beauties. The forsythia and narcissus have long faded. Some of the lilac are already blooming and some are just forming buds. The night air is fragrant and wildlife is stirring.
The farm animals seem to know spring is here too. The chickens are laying a ton of eggs and of course the roosters are constantly going after the hens. Last night we butchered four chickens with the help of a friend. They took two and we put two in our freezer. This time we chose to butcher four Rhode Island Reds. They seem the most agressive of all the breeds we have and also are harder to keep in the chicken area. They want to roam the entire yard which would be fine if they were not inclined to go across the street and eat or dig any flower that was emerging.
The goats escaped the fence the other day and trashed several of my trees. Darn goats! Jerry has to try again to fix the fence so it will hold them. I am hoping the trees survive. At this rate I am never going to have mature plants!
Beauty the horse is much calmer this year. I still cannot get to her tail to brush it but when the vet comes out I am going to ask her to sedate Beauty so I can get those cockerburls out. She is letting me brush her butt some – but only briefly.
Having a cashmere goat is a bit different. Tulip is still quite shy and has to be lifted onto the milking stand. She does not like being brushed but tolerates it. I trimmed all of their hooves this week. Darla was the real pain. First she jumped on the milk stand, then jumped off behind it, tipped a shelf over and finally ended back up in her stall. I did get her hooves trimmed but made her wait until last. She didn’t like watching the other goats get ginger snap cookies when they were done so after I finished all of them I called Darla and she jumped right up on the milk stand!
The vegetable garden is growing too. I have tiny plants of carrots, kale, sugar snap peas, spinach, turnips, brussels sprouts, sugar beets, cabbage and we are already harvesting radish and lettuce. Some of the lettuce we planted the year before has sprouted on its own. I will be digging and moving those plants once we get ready to till that area. Adding the compost has done wonders for the ground! There are still many plants to get into the ground that are in the greenhouse as well as more corn and green beans to plant.
I am debating growing flax this year for fiber. I already have small cotton plants growing.
The bunnies have not had babies and I am wondering if maybe one of them cannot breed. They have been together for several months now but my female has not shown a single sign of being pregnant.
If you are in the area I invite you to come spend some time at our farm and wildlife habitat. Please email or phone ahead for reservations.
Sheri
Filed under Homestead Happenings by on Dec 20th, 2009. Comment. 
It has been a busy past few weeks on the homestead. The baby goats are growing like weeds. We are still milking so even though breeding season is here, it isn’t happening just yet.
The goat milk is being turned into cheese, soap, butter, ice cream and of course, some is being frozen for winter use.
The chest freezer finally was moved into the kitchen, a task I had wanted done for several years. The hoops are in place in the garden and seedlings are started. It will simply be a matter of covering the hoops with plastic when the time comes then walking outside to harvest fresh lettuce, carrots, radish, broccoli and cabbage during the winter months.
The past few weeks have been spent dehydrating tomatoes, peppers, garlic, herbs and whatever else I have come across. I have been canning, mostly tomato products such as sauces and soups.
Last year I canned lots of grape juice with the intention of making wine. The year came and went without that happening. However I am happy to report that the grape juice has finally been turned into wine. I have four gallons of grape wine in the carboy fermenting now. It is a beautiful burgundy color.
Speaking of making things to drink, I made four gallons of cola as well. I chose to sweeten it with half clover honey and half regular sugar. Although it was flat when I bottled it, it did taste good. In a few weeks the carbonation will be complete and we will open our first bottles of homemade cola.
Besides making lye soap recently, I have been making hydrosols, essential oils and spinning wool into yarn. Winter is certainly not far off and whatever is not used up of summers bounty will be lost. I have produced a number of hydrosols and essential oils. To date I have distilled chocolate mint, orange mint, spearmint and black stem peppermint.
I have some new lye soap creations I am excited about. I milled the soap so I could add spearmint hydrosol and goat milk to it. The new scents are Snowman Soap, a rich blend of spearmint, juniper berry and pine; Lavender Bliss, a relaxing and invigorating aroma made up of spearmint and lavender; Nature Soap, a mix of clove bud, spearmint and rose geranium and Peachy Dreams, a cool soap scented with lemongrass, clary sage and vanilla.
If that were not enough, I am finally finding some time to spin. I started with Johnny’s lamb’s wool. Johnny is white, so on the spinning wheel I have almost a full bobbin of white yarn, single strand. I decided a little color wouldn’t hurt, so tonight I dyed some of his wool neon purple. It is a gorgeous color. Of course I will not know what the finished color will look like until it dries and I wash it, card it and spin it into yarn. Besides spinning wool alone I have been coming up with other pleasing combinations of fiber. I have rolags made of a black alpaca/llama fiber; rolags of black wool from Pearl, silk noir and white angora from Gizmo; rolags of mohair dyed with walnut shells, silk noir and white angora from Gizmo and rolags of alpaca and cashmere from Tulip. These mixes of fiber should make some pretty interesting yarn.
Other current projects include making homemade noodles to put into the freezer for winter use and making beef jerkey to snack on. I also have plans to make some corn chips to keep on hand for late night snack binges. There are pears on the tree, the last batch, that need picked. Then it will just be a matter of waiting on the first frost to pick the persimmons.
Winter is indeed just around the corner, but our little homestead will be ready.
Filed under Homestead Happenings by on Oct 30th, 2009. Comment.
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