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Hi Everyone,
Fall is here, and there is no doubt about it. The leaves are turning colors—and yes that does happen here in North Florida. Some plants are even starting to turn brown—like the hostas, turmeric, ginger, and elephant grasses. The lawn has brown patches in it—but that is due more to drought than to it being the fall season. This is the time of year when you walk outside in the morning and think that it is just a little bit cool, then an hour later when you walk back inside you think that your house is way too hot. The mornings have been so gorgeous lately that when I go outside in the early morning I wish I had a hammock to curl up in and just relax and enjoy the cool air, and listen to the birds wake up. This morning it was 5:30 when I went outside, and it was so quiet and still outside and the moon was so full that I really wished I had a hammock and could just curl up in it and go back to sleep. Is it ever quiet in the city? This morning there were no bugs chirping and the birds were still asleep. The wind was not blowing, and it was perfectly still and quiet—so peaceful. Sometimes I wish that we milked by hand so that we could hear the sounds of nature all around us—but my arms would never last so I am glad that we have machines, even if they are noisy. They are not too noisy though, for we can still hear the mockingbird singing away overhead.
Monday morning Moises did manage to show up for work—but he climbed out of Steve’s truck with two crutches and a boot cast and unable to put any pressure on his foot. Moises spends the first half of his day bringing in cows for us, and some of them can be pretty feisty and bust through the hotwire insisting it is their turn. We knew that there was no way Moises could dodge cows. When Mom told him that, he opted to just go home—which was very wise, for even if he stayed around to wash the equipment, it would have been too much for his poor foot which the doctor said should be elevated for one whole week. To say that we missed Moises all last week is an understatement. Moises doesn’t do anything that we cannot do—but in all honesty, Mom’s and my little bodies are just not made for washing heavy equipment. Steve and Papa had to be roped in to washing the tanks, the hoses, and to help us break down the equipment so that we could wash it all. I am pretty strong when it comes to tightening screws—but I cannot unscrew them. Papa tells me to not tighten them so tight. Then the milk hoses go on real easy—but they do not come off real easy. You should see Mom and I playing tug-of-war. Moises called tonight and said that he can walk on his foot now, so he is planning on being back to work tomorrow. If he cannot dodge cows, he is planning on packaging eggs and washing the equipment. I can tell you for sure that he is tired of sitting around doing nothing, and we will be more than happy to let him have his job back.
Once we got the milking and the equipment washed up Monday, Mom and I headed to the garden to join Sue and Leo as they weeded and prepared garden beds. Actually, Mom and I washed our fair share of the equipment and then we left the rest to Steve and Papa so that we could join Leo and Sue before it got too late and they had to leave. When Steve was done, he joined us and helped broadfork a new garden bed where I plan to plant yellow onions next Saturday. The area was very hard, and I could practically do gymnastics on the handles of the broadfork as I tried to pull it down to the ground. The blades go twelve inches into the ground and then you pull the handles down to the ground to loosen the soil. When Steve came out I asked him to help me broadfork. I was laughing so hard when he couldn’t get the broadfork to lay down either—he even wrapped his legs around the handles hoping to get all his body weight into action. After about three to four feet, it did get easier as we got into softer soil. Then we struck gold—I had planted three sweet potatoes back in March in order to get some sweet potato slips for planting in June. Those sweet potatoes multiplied and to my delight we had a nice harvest of very pretty sweet potatoes. I didn’t wait too long either to cook them—for we had some for dinner that night.
One thing that I am learning is that when a day is so full of things that need to be done, is to just go with the flow. I do not have to milk the cows, wash the equipment, bottle kefir, make yogurt and package eggs all at the same time. Each is done in its own time, and when it is done—we just go to the next thing. To our delight everything went very smoothly and all of that was done by 12:30. We then broke for lunch and then had the joy of working in the garden. Our zero turn lawn mower is broken—again, and part of the garden is not able to be mowed down by sheep. Therefore, Papa put the bush hog mower on the back of the tractor and bush hogged the grass in the garden. The bush hog doesn’t make for the prettiest of cuts, but it made it possible for the push mower to get in there. So Mom mowed, and Steve raked. Steve also helped me pull out the massive weeds that were suffocating the rose bushes. Then I pruned off the dead branches. Shortly before 3:30 I headed inside to get ready to teach piano lessons.
Wednesday morning I decided that it was time to put Yasha to work—guarding the turkeys. In the mornings in her hoop house she barks and runs circles desiring us to come and pet her—and let her out. So, I took her to the pasture, took off her leash and told her that her job was to guard the turkeys. She headed off for the turkeys, but after about 10 feet she stopped and turned around to see if I was coming—and I was not. I was heading back out the gate. She looked at me as if to say, “Where are you going? We are supposed to do this together. All my life we have checked on the turkeys and other animals—TOGETHER!” I knew that she couldn’t squeeze out between the gate and the post, so I just left her and went back inside to get ready for milking. About ten minutes later I came back outside and was looking out to the pasture to see what Yasha was finding to do. Before I went inside, she had made her way over to the turkeys and was sniffing around checking things out. To my delight, she doesn’t chase the turkeys. Well, I couldn’t find her in the pasture, but I did find her sitting nice and tall on the concrete in front of the milk house. She would rather be my buddy, than guard turkeys. I took her back out to pasture and saw that over the years other dogs have dug holes under the gate. Though they are covered over with grass now, they still dip down under the gate. I put Yasha back in the pasture and then I put a PVC feeding trough under the gate. Every night Papa and I go out to lock up the turkeys and we bring Yasha back up and put her in her kennel. One day she will sleep out in the pasture, but for now, she is still a puppy and I want to know where she is and what she is doing at all times. As the week has gone by, Yasha has done very well. Tonight I found her sleeping on the backside of the turkey pen. She even mingles right in the midst of them. This job will last her six weeks, for then we will process the turkeys. Since Yasha is really laid back toward the animals, I think that she will be a really good guard dog for the sheep. Not too sure how we will get them to bond, but we will cross that bridge later.
Does your mind make life harder for you? Have you ever realized that the worst part of a thing is thinking about it—the actual doing is not that bad. For many, many years, we have had someone milk the cows for us on the days that we process chickens. Then a year ago we lost our milker, and all this year we have had to milk the cows ourselves before we can process the chickens. Then after we bottle the milk, Moises cleans up the equipment and Mom and I set up to process the chickens. Well, last week with Moises being laid up, we not only had to milk the cows before doing the chickens—but we had to wash up all the equipment before we could do the chickens. It was about 12:30 when we finished, and we ate lunch. After lunch we set up to process the chickens and it was about 2:00 by the time we got started. While we were eating lunch—already super exhausted, we asked Papa how many chickens there were to do. We have found that 40 is a good number for us. We order 50, knowing that some will die, and hoping that there will be at least 40 left come processing day. Well, evidently, not many died in this batch, because Papa told us that there were 51 chickens to process—and we were already exhausted before we had even begun. In the end we found out that there were 53 chickens, and we didn’t finish until 6:30. When we got back into the house, the fridge was frozen over and we had to empty it out into our walk in cooler and freezer. Then since the chef that we do not have, was not on duty, we did not end up eating the steak that we had thawed out for dinner. French toast and eggs ended up on our dinner plates instead.
Friday began with our energy supply in the negative—but the cows still needed to be milked, Moises was still on sick leave, so the milking equipment needed to be washed, and yogurt needed to be made. Then all 53 chickens needed to be packaged. Most of them we packaged whole, but twelve of them needed to be cut up into pieces. It was 3:00 by the time we got started and things were going pretty well. All the whole chickens were packaged, but the twelve chickens still needed to be cut up. Then about 4:45 God said, “That is enough for today, you need to go cook a nice dinner and relax for the rest of the evening.” Well, He didn’t actually say those words; instead He caused the vacuum sealer to quit working. We have a problem with it, got parts to fix it, but the mechanical side of it is too complicated so we need a mechanic. So, we cleaned up, put the twelve chickens in the cooler, cooked dinner, and relaxed for the rest of the evening.
Saturday Mom asked me if I had any plans. I was still running on exhausted mode, so I told her that all I needed to do was practice my piano and figure out what hymn I would play for offertory and watch Gardener’s World and get my ironing done. That is all that I had on my agenda after we—milked the cows, bottled the milk and kefir, washed all the equipment, packed the Gainesville order, finished the receipts, and got Papa on his way to Gainesville. Once all that was done, I heated up some pumpkin soup, and we had a salad and sat and watched Gardener’s World. Usually I try to make wise use of my “YouTube” time by getting my ironing done or folding laundry. This time I honestly thought that the wisest thing for me to do after I finished eating—was to recline on the sofa and relax. When the show was over we did the dishes, and then we headed over to the Poultry kitchen to see if the vacuum sealer would work—and it did. So, I cut up the chickens and Mom packaged them. I was really pleased that I could cut up a chicken in a little less than three minutes. In one hour we were done and the machine worked—until the last three packages of chicken wings. It sealed them, but it didn’t suck all the air out. We put them in the freezer, and today Mom was able to get them sealed up properly. Now we have two weeks to get the machine fixed before we need it for the last batch of chickens for the year.
Once we had our chicken mess all cleaned up then we headed to the garden to harvest some white sweet potatoes for dinner. We have two garden beds full of sweet potato vines—but to my total dismay, we could not find any sweet potatoes bigger than a golf ball. Maybe they will be there in a month. I then had to come in and re-think my dinner menu, for what I was going to have would no longer work. We ended up with some cabbage, lamb meatballs, and quinoa.
This next week we shall be preparing for the Farm Day next Saturday. I hope to see many of you here—and don’t forget your cameras and a picnic lunch.
Serving you with Gladness,
Tiare