We're Officially Farmin' Folks

First egg

Howdy-Do

The fair is next week, but I thought I'd pop in with a quick "No I'm not dead" hello.

Hello. 

And:

It feels like fall, my garden has pretty much gone to ruin (stupid weather. And weeds), I'm sewing like crazy (fair stuffs), school will be starting in a few weeks, canning/freezing is omni-present, we butchered the roosters last night, we got 2 Delaware and 2 Silver-laced Wyandot hens (did I tell you that?), and then the Buckeye hen we had, the dishwasher just beeped, Sprouts asleep, the kitchen's a wreck and I must go.

Later Gators.

Gathered Up

Kind liking all the posts I've been seeing where all the pictures come first and all the chatting comes next.

I can hardly believe July is nearly over, that the fair is next month, that we'll be starting back up with school next month and that my BABY will be ONE next month. This year has flown.

This summer is flying and I can't think of a gol-durn exciting thing to write about. We've just been living.

The weather has been all over the place: cool. beastly hot and rainy. (B. sent us all down the basement the evening we got the flooding you saw in the garden pictures. Not real fun to hear on the news: "Don't look for the rotation before seeking shelter. The clouds will not allow it and any tornados will simply appear...") cool and rainy. beastly hot. no rhyme or reason and the bugs are so bad, not real conducive to playing outside. 

I'll be picking my first batch of beans tomorrow, and probably basil. Other than a little yellow from all of the wet, the garden seems to be doing good. It's grown even more since those pictures were taken.

And I get all crazy after a day of weeding, tilling and mulching and start taking pictures of my sunburnt  dust covered self.

I've got lots of canning to do, homeschool assessments to do, last years books to put away, this years to get out, fair projects to work on (and to decide what to do) and and and...

Tonight we're going to go get a few more hens. The 6 that we got a few months ago? FIVE roosters and ONE hen. Really. I think we go took.

Or someone knew what they were doing and picked out most of the hens, because really, even though they were straight run, to get only 1 hen? Something ain't adding up.

A snippet of home and farm.

Trying to slow down and savor.

The Flockette

Shunning the well meant advice of a friend, I called the Craig's List add and asked if we could come look at their chickens. Ordering the peeps we wanted meant we wouldn't be getting them until the beginning of September. And we (particularly B.) REALLY wanted Buckeyes. 

My sister who is working on replacing their flock came along, so armed with a Standard of Perfection list I printed off the 'net to aid me in determining the gender, we were off.

The rooster that greeted us at the farm was BEAUTIFUL. I hope we don't have one, they're too pretty to butcher.

The list didn't help me a lick.

I picked out 6 that I thought looked the most like they could be hens, handed over our (uh my sisters. We didn't have the right cash) $18 for the lot and headed home.

We still don't know what we have. Nobodies started crowing so I guess that's good.

 The 2 that Anna took home haven't either.

The kids say we have 2 hens and 2 roosters because "Two of them are huger." 

There were 2 age groups in the pen together when we picked them out.

The names vary by the day, but right now I think they're Ellie, Thelma Lou, Charlene Darling and Opie. (that one's Beanses.)

 Yes, we're big Andy Griffith fans. But those names are also switched up with the girls from 7 Brides for 7 Brothers. The kids favorite movie, pretty much ever. (Beans picking a song the other morning before Bible: "We sthing Besth Yoh Bufill Hie?")

They come running when they see the kids (and have since their first morning here) and are picky eaters. Won't touch fruit, can't get enough broccoli.

They should start laying around the end of August and we'll add more to the flock (different breed though) in the spring.

And B.'s already talking meat birds, a turkey, pigs and goats. 

~*~ Yes ~*~

Hay~

             B. cut about 1/3 of the hill yesterday before he had to quit or run out of diesel.

I'm guesstimating that it's about a 25x90 foot field. 

But math and I aren't real close friends, so I could be WAY off.

I picked a good hot morning (79 degrees by 9:30 with 82% humidity!) and raked it into rows.

Biscuit helped.

Pretty darn proud

hay (noun): grass grown and dried for fodder. (Or in this case to mulch our fodder, the garden. Close enough.)

The tomatoes are mulched and rain came an hour later.

Guess B. won't be cutting the rest this evening, which is kinda good because I'm pooped.

One thing about backyard farming: being too small for actual equipment, it's all man (uh woman and boy) powered.

Variation On A Dream

   ~*~As a disclaimer, once I sat down to type this NONE of it was as articulate as I wanted it to be. The more passionate I am about something, the more jumbled it sounds. So just muddle through and I think you'll get the idea.~*~

"You sound just like my husband, you're such a farmer! Always looking to what you'll try next year!" My co-worker Debbie chuckled at me. I took that as a compliment. One of the things I have wanted most, ever since I was a little girl, is to live on a farm. I blame watching re-runs of Lassie on that partly. June Lockhart answering that crank phone in her apron and house dress, the barn a stones throw from the house and that delightful farm kitchen are vivid memories and longings that run deep.

I didn't want some big commercial operation, nor for it to be our main source of income, and really I suppose it would technically be a homestead. But to me, homestead sounds hopeful but with some desperation and fear mixed in. Like the Ingall's toughing it out and the desperation and hardships that surrounded them when they staked their claim on a homestead. To me, farm sounds much more established and sure, a family centered life full of crops, animals preserving and heartiness. At least in the 1940's and 50's images that come to my mind.

                                                            Something more like this...

                                                                          Or this...

(the house is cut out of this one for a reason: it burned a few weeks ago)

But we just have a few acres with a house plunked in the middle of it and a pond taking up a large portion of the back section. (Have I mentioned my dislike of the pond before? Let me do so now. Don't. Like. The. Pond.) We really have no reason to move. I like our house (most of the time), I like our road, I like the area we live in. But I still want a farm. I want that secure feeling and image of family that a farm gives me. 

And then backyard and urban farming became popular and I thought "how corny", that's not farming, how can you "farm" in your backyard?" But the more I thought about it, the more I realized that the face of farming- at least my vintage-y vision of it- is changing. There are families who want farms and that same feeling that I do, but land/finances/jobs and myriads of other things make it impossible. So they do what they can with what they have and are happy calling it a farm. That's nice for them, but I was gonna keep praying the Lord will bless us with a REAL farm so I don't have to pretend too. He hasn't seen fit to answer. Farms are finding people everywhere, and a blog I read on occasion made me crazy when after praying for a few years God dumped a farm in their lap. I have been praying since I was a little girl. Why not us? (and why this particular case really grated on me, I don't know, but it's no one here) I started feeling some sympathy for those backyard farmers. And then I read a quote (that I have looked for high and low and CANNOT FIND ANYWHERE) which basically said: "Stop pining for the dream that's not happening and start looking for ways you can bring part of it to reality.

 The ton of bricks hit me: I can make part of that farm dream come true. I can suck it up and even though we may not have the big old barn, rambling white farm house, and assorted livestock I would love to have, I *can* still say with pride "Why yes, we have a farm- a backyard farm" And so, with the delivery that came last Tuesday,

Half-pint Farm was finally born.

 

B. got really excited making a few design changes with the builder.

                                 I was happy about giving our business to a "local" company

Happy Baby!

                                      

It makes me so happy every time I look out the window

>CLICK ON THE BELOW VIDEO!<

Chicks will be ordered shortly, and I am BEYOND excited : )