Day 14

1, Snow. More like cotton falling down from the sky.

2. Oh. My. Goodness. The piggies are getting so big. Today they got moved onto fresh pasture. I'd been waiting to move the sheep to a different pasture so I could move the electric fencing. You can see the pasture behind them has been thoroughly turned into mud. Which is good, because hopefully that means death to all of the thistle plants!

3. What else? Worked on Herbert (yes, little bits of progress there), caught up on emails and phone calls. Rather wasted the afternoon (in a good way), but redeemed it by a) failing to get dinner on the table in time and b) cleaning the shopping white board and organizing a dresser. Also, thankful that Scott bought stuff for dinner on Wednesday that we could use for dinner today. And fresh salsa.

Also, hoping to get caught up on blogging sometime this week. If your friend with me on FB, you'll know that the last half of December was kuh-ray-zee. 

Day 352

written 2/12/2013

1. Driving to the Woodburn Auction we passed a store selling what looked like sugar cane... cool.

2. At the Woodburn outlets with Andrew doing some last minute Christmas shopping. 

3. My birthday present! My birthday is in February, but the gift that the boys were going to give me didn't work out.  So yes, it took a while, but I'm very happy with the end result.We also opened up Tyler's (11th) and Mom's birthday presents (21st) as Mom is going in for surgery the next day and we hadn't gotten all of Tyler's presents when it was his birthday. So it was a mini party!

3. Our rather last minute attempt at taking a family photo for Christmas letters. With Mom going into surgery, this was it!

4. The result. I think it turned out pretty well. You can't even tell that Jacob is wearing sweat pants. :) From the left... Sara, Dad (Jeff), Daniel, Mom (Ann), Jacob, Scott, Andrew, Tyler

5. What else? Finally taking the older hens and some extra bantam chickens to the Woodburn Auction. 

Day 257 Friday

Trying to start doing chores earlier...

Jacob waiting at the feed mill with me

The apple cider press awaiting use

Hannah W and family over for picking apples, making cider and picking blackberries

Cute piggie buttocks!

Other happenings - working on the TSP and using my new router guide, having Hannah over for an impromptu dinner

Day 237

Day 229

1. A close up of the grain scoop this morning after I pulled out of the duck's mash bag. Apparently our bantam hen had gone into the bag to lay her egg...

2. Piggies!

3. Jerk Chicken from Cooks Illustrated July 2012 issue. It was delicious! Also served it with black beans, rice w/ a dash of lime juice, salad, and honeydew. The honey dew went really well with the chicken juices.

4. What else? Starting to pick up school again - Jacob read to me for about an hour. Also piano lessons and brought the apple cider press up near the house.

Day 212 (Tuesday)

written 8/2/2012

1. The boys processing my meat chickens - yay.

2. Joseph tuning out piano while Scott, Tyler and Jacob look on.

3. What else? Bible study at Jana's, ie, lots of driving and adventures in getting there, Joseph and Hannah over for dinner, a game of Ticket to Ride with Peach blueberry cobbler - thanks, Tyler! :)

Day 208 (Friday)

written 7/29/2012
1. A farm tour of Birds and Bees Community Farm. 
2. A clever composting system using stock panels
3. Honey!
4. Last-minute-evening blueberry picking
5. What else? Lap swimming in the morning, errands in the afternoon, a nap and munching on blueberries while watching the Opening Olympic Ceremony. 

Day 197 (Sunday)

1. Parish group of Joseph and Hannah F's...
2. All of the piggies!
3. Rebekah & Cal with Brownie the cow
4. A picture of yours truly with the pigs
5. What else? Church of course, visiting with friends, doing farm chores with R & C

Day 189

1. Jacob showing Laura W his amazing bow and arrow while we barbecue steak
2. The only proof I have that Laura was here (bad friend!)... our shadows waving while she did farm chores with me... (fyi, and I have a grain bucket hanging from my side...)
3. What else... Home Depot in the morning, lots of woodworking, starting to watch Foyle's War, working for Dad, taking a nap in the sun, the first pesto and fruit salads of the season, hanging out with Laura

Day 102

1. Bottle feeding Moe (on the left) and Curly (on the right) at 8am this morning
2. Moe waiting for Jacob to feed him
3. Finally got new contacts! Yay. I can see my eyes again. :)
4. Hanging out with Kate in Canby. We've just finished our chocolates from Ladybug Chocolates.
5. Putting up fencing in the orchard for a few of the sheep. 
6. What else - getting treated to lunch at Kate's house, moving the rest of the sheep to new pasture & feeding minerals, visiting with our neighbor Nancy this evening who came over to see and feed the calves.

The newest member of our cast

 

 Please join us in welcoming Brutus!

Brutus was graciously given to us by our friends the Paynes.

We are hoping that he will be insturmental in eating weeds in the pasture.

Fingers are crossed that he might, just might, eat some thistles.

Which, if it wasn't for that promising thought and the fact that he's extremely friendly,

he might not still be ours.

I believe his escape count is so far at 5.

This is why we swore we would never get a goat!

This only includes escaping far enough to eat the roses around the house.

Not the times hes escaped from one pasture to the other!

Also the sheep were hilarious. It might take a while for him to gain their acceptance.

He trotted after them wanting to be friends and they would run away in horror.

Then when he turned around and started walking away, they would timidly follow him. 

Even though they were sure he would kill them any minute.

Curiosity might have just killed a sheep, let alone a cat.

Well, that's all for right now. Sorry for the bullet point writing, but my brains fritzed tonight!

A painted house and other farm ramblings

So the house is done! *Little happy dance* To be honest, I think we are all pretty surprised that we actually got it done before the rains set in... there just nearly wasn't enough drama in getting it done to make it feel normal! So here's a mostly done shot of the house. It looks even better now that we got things cleaned up and put back but it's dark outside, so I don't think taking a picture this minute would fully capture the glamour. ;)






Here's a candid shot of some of the sheep at evening time. Overall, they're looking really good. In fact, we should have babies sometime soon. Like, I should figure this out... soon!  It helped that we had such a wet spring. We haven't had to feed them hay this summer.





And our back door. This gets the most improved award of our yard for this year. Especially now that the roses are blooming. The sunflowers have added a lot... I'm hoping next year to do sunflowers along the other side too!

Painting. Or why it rained today.

First things first... this was taken with my own, yes, my very own camera. I am so happy... I originally made grand schemes to buy a fancy schmancy camera like all the ones my friends tote around... but my laptop died instead. So, when my grandfather graciously re-offered an old camera. I jumped at it.

Tyler, who has mostly lovingly shared his camera with me, is happy. Actually I don't know if that's true... I'm just guessing he's happy.. and I'm happy. So it's all good. And it's actually a pretty nice little camera... better than just the average point and shoot but not as  cumbersome as the "change a lens every time you move" cameras.

So onto more important things... As you may or may not surmise from the above photo, which I wouldn't if I were you, 'cause I am not Sean from Psyche. Tyler is standing by the front door about to take down the lights on either side of the front door. WHICH, we only found out a month ago are mounted UNEVENLY. That's right we've been living in a house with uneven lights. How embarrassing. Of course, it's not like anyone has ever noticed, because nobody, hardly anybody, ever comes to our front door. Everybody comes to our back door. Or even the sliding glass door in the kitchen. It's been more than once that we've looked up and realized a customer is about to knock on our glass door!

So Tyler is about to take down the lights because we are painting the brick. When we repainted the house about three years ago, we decided to leave the brick for a while and see if we liked it. Well, we didn't love it and we didn't hate it, so since we are painting the shed (hopefully tomorrow), we decided we might as well paint the brick too. And the brick really isn't "nice" brick. It looks fine here, but as soon as you get up close to it, it's pretty messy lookin'...

And I realized yesterday, that maybe nobody ever comes to our front door because you can't really see it. Being red, it just blends in. Well, it ain't going to no more!

So today the boys spent a good part of the day priming the brick. Such hard workers! Even Jacob was out there the whole time. And I even went out there the last hour and helped with filling in the holes. Earlier, I was busy, you know, with inside stuff. :)

Now that it's primed, I think it looks better already. The house looks much more homey as you drive up the driveway. Plus, when Mom and I went out to check on it mid-afternoon, we realized that the porch area reminded us of the house she grew up in. Which made it feel like it was the right decision.

So cute... he's just so cute. :)