Category: Uncategorized

Up until a few days ago we had 3 baskets of potatoes in our basement. It’s not pitch black down there but it is pretty dark. No matter, the potatoes sprouted awhile back. I put a few lids from rubbermaid containers over them but they pushed the lids up, up, and up, about a foot in the air actually! What’s a poor farmer’s wife to do!? We won’t have more potatoes until fall and I just hate to buy them. So, I saved them. They turned out GREAT. I highly recommend you try this. Snap off all the sprouts and discard them.  Some sources say they are toxic so I don’t take any chances. Peel the potatoes.  It doesn’t matter if they’re getting soft or wrinkling up a bit.  Feed the peels to the chickens, of course.  Some say that’s a bad idea too but I’ve never had any trouble. Scrub them clean, and cut in half if you prefer.  I didn’t cut mine. Boil, covered in water, until a wooden spoon can mash into them a bit.  You DON’T want them falling apart. Drain water and let the potatoes sit in the pot awhile to cool. Cover with cold

Monday: grilled cheese & chips Tuesday: chicken on grill & noodles Wednesday: Parmesan crusted fish fillets & garlic pasta Thursday: chicken patties & homemade mac & cheese Friday: roast in the crockpot Saturday: homemade pizza & garlic bread (trying a new dough recipe) Sunday: leftovers M: hamburgers & hot dogs on the grill & chips T: steak on grill & noodles W: tilapia in crockpot w/ garlic cheese sauce & hashbrowns R: spaghetti & garlic bread (or baked rotini) F: ham slices & homemade mac & cheese S: nachos What’s on your menu this week?

Maci after playing in the mud Johnny chewing on a stick Buster the bunny Did you know we raised zebras? 😉 The first batch of chicks from the incubator just moved out to the barn Two hens sharing a nest box Baxter playing with our friend’s little boy June, she’s a heartbreaker, can you tell?

This made me laugh… Last night: Brian and I stand in the barn, checking out the 3 ewes that have yet to lamb. We agree that she (Angel) is definitely pregnant and so is she (Bonnie). The ewe lamb, born here last year, well we just aren’t sure. Hopefully she is, we’ll see. She’s not too fat and you have to look very closely to see an udder. Hmm. This morning: I’m in the barn for a good 10 minutes when I’m walking by the sheep pen and suddenly notice a lamb curled up in the straw, looking around. What the heck, where did YOU come from!? I look at the lamb pens…one….two, three. Wait, again, one…. yes, two, and three…turn back to the big pen…. four. Four lambs!!!!!! Yay!!! It took me watching for several minutes to figure out the ewe lamb was the mother. She was standing by the baby but not very close. He was all cleaned off and looked content. I shuffled around some other sheep and scooped up the baby to move him to a new pen. Normally momma follows right along by us but this mom wanted nothing to do with that idea. I

We had twins born yesterday and guess what… they’re still alive!!! Yahoo!! So let’s hope the deaths were just a long string of coincidences or at least that the problem has run it’s course. Baby Joy is growing up so fast, she was smaller than the new twins when she was born but has really filled out. Angel, still pregnant, along with 2 others. Keeping our fingers crossed!

So much has happened, where to start! Went to the conference, had fun.  It was the Farm Bureau Young Farmer’s Conference.  The whole weekend was pretty much based on farmers defending themselves against all the bad media about our food supply.  I was nodding my head agreeing one minute and feeling very frustrated the next, over and over again.  Brian and I were discussing it on the way home and he said he understands but if that’s what I really believe than I need to be one of the people standing up and talking about it.  I’m not sure if I’m going to take that on yet but if I do I’m going to get my facts straight before I go gabbing about the whole topic.  It WAS great getting to know some of our fellow farmers better, I’m really looking forward to getting more involved! 🙂 I really missed church on Sunday.  I think that is a big turning point for me.  First I felt like I SHOULD go, then I made myself go, then I enjoyed it, and now I miss it! A lot.  I’m still tossing around the idea of another blog and I think I will

Just popping in to say we’re going away for the weekend so I may or may not be around for the next few days. We’re taking the laptop so we’ll see if I use it much. In an effort to sleep better and quit stressing out so much I’ve left the computer in the kitchen the last few days instead of taking it to bed with me. I’ve been enjoying a few good books and trying to give myself a couple hours each evening where I say enough is enough and just sit down. I’m trying really hard to get 8-9 good hours of sleep in. So far, so good. A few quick updates: -Of the 12 eggs that went into lockdown 10 hatched so we have some fuzzy new additions! 🙂 -I left work on Monday and took 3 dead lambs down to Michigan State University for necropsies. I don’t know if I mentioned it here but we’ve had 3 ewes lamb so far and out of 7 babies 1 is alive and flourishing. So far we don’t have any lab results back yet. The gross exam didn’t show much except a possibility of toxoplasmosis. That is passed by

I put together a rough schedule based on last spring’s weather and what I plan to grow. To start indoors: Tomatoes start 4/1 plant out by 6/1 Eggplant start 4/1 out by 6/1 (or dc 6/1) Cukes start 5/1 out by 6/1 (or dc 6/1) Pumpkins start 5/8 out by 6/1 (or direct seed 6/1) To direct seed outdoors: Peas try as early as 4/1, then succession plant Onion sets 4/8 Corn 5/25 or a little earlier Beans 6/1 Sunflowers 6/1 Carrots 6/1 or earlier I’m sticking with 6/1 as my tentative finally-no-more-frosts date since that’s about what it was last year.  Who knows what will happen with this funky weather!

I made a list of things I need to accomplish this month.  I think I’m going to make a habit of setting goals every month instead of making one big list for the entire year. Here’s what’s on the list this month: Finish the newsletter and sent it to the printer Order broiler chicks Order shrink bags for chickens Make seed starting schedule Build seedling shelves Research turkeys and try to order eggs or chicks From where I stand our winter reprieve is over.  I’m feeling the pressure to get things organized and planned before spring comes and the physical work begins.  I HAVE to get this newsletter and order form put together this month.  The holdup there is that I can’t very well take orders unless I know what we’re offering and when.  That means figuring out the broilers, whether or not we’re offering turkeys, and the changes in packaging (if any). I called JM Hatchery yesterday and placed my order for chicks.  I put in for 3 batches of 100 birds each.  We’ll get the first chicks around the end of March and have the last ones processed in early September.  The plan right now is to rotate

For those who blog, do you find yourself thinking “oh, I could blog about this…and this…and this” throughout the day?  I do that a lot.  Especially, for some reason, when I have a bad day.  I think it’s because bad days around the farm are usually so ridiculous they’re almost funny.  I’d like to think I have a knack for weaving together stories of woe that make you laugh (like the one about the midnight chicken rescue) but those stories are probably only funny if you have the same sense of humor that I do.  I must be a little bit twisted. So here’s a few highlights from today: 10:17 PM (last night): dog whining, likely has diarrhea, I just got to sleep! 2:00 AM: dog again, I said a prayer thanking God for preparing me for children and wrote Brian a note saying do NOT feed Bear, then spent 1/2 hour trying to fall back asleep 4:15 PM: Home from work, found a repeat of the other day’s lamb delivery, aka one stillborn one live, this time they’re very big lambs and the live one has a bent over front ankle that keeps him from getting up on his