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Hi Everyone,
It might be a cold day outside—and inside, but no one can deny that it is officially SPRING!!!! The azaleas, dogwoods, pears, hog plums, redbuds have been blooming, and a few days ago that wisteria decorated itself with long clusters of purple flowers. I have dreamed of having a wisteria vine for ever—but Mom is very sensitive to certain flower smells, and we do not know if she is okay with wisteria. The other day as Mom and I were eyeballing some wild wisteria, we discussed that we should pick a bloom and see how she reacts before we ever plant one—but then since Mom passes out with certain smells we really are not in any big hurry to find out. There are more exciting things to do in life than to do allergy tests.
All signs of mud have officially been removed from the milking area—actually it was the last thing to disappear. The old milking parlor has been torn down, which caused some customers to be concerned that we no longer had milk for sale. The parlor was right behind the milk house, and everyone could see it when they arrived. The new one is in a temporary place behind the big poultry kitchen—and it really is pretty hidden. Once the building was demolished, then the slabs of concrete were pulled away. The two 8 x 8 foot slabs were taken to the back corner of the garden to be the floor of our future compost bins. Now we just have to have the concrete blocks delivered to build the surrounding walls. Once the parlor and the slabs were removed from the area, then all the muck was dug out and deposited around the farm to fill in holes—bull holes, dog holes, tractor tire holes, ruts, well-travelled areas, etc. When all the muck was gone then fresh clean sand was brought in and the area was leveled off. Drainage has always been a problem with the area, so the reshaping of the contour of the land has been necessary—plus the digging of long trenches filled with rock to help direct the water flow away from the parlor. Last Monday the framing in of the concrete pad began, and on Friday it was poured. It won’t be much longer before the new metal milking parlor is drug up onto the concrete and set up for milking.
While I had plans to work in the garden on Monday—we didn’t actually make it there. Mom and Steve worked on removing the grass from another section of the courtyard so that Mom could plant the three Phenomenal lavender plants that I bought her last year. While they did that, I planted flower seeds in seed trays in the greenhouse. We hope to have lots of flowers to cut and sell as bouquets come summer. In between digging and planting, we were helping Papa drag the concrete slabs to the back corner of the garden. Once I had all the flower seeds planted—well not all the flower seeds, because I ran out of potting soil—I transplanted some more lettuce to the garden tunnel.
Tuesday was a very busy day—as all Tuesday’s seem to be. At 10:00 the piano tuner showed up to tune both pianos, then at 10:30 the vet showed up to dehorn and tag cows. When they left it was about 1:00 and time to get lunch so that we would be ready to package eggs at 2:00. My piano student showed up at 3:30, and then it was time to harvest the vegetables for the Jacksonville delivery. Before we harvested, Steve and I locked up the ducks for the night and separated the calves. It wasn’t easy to separate the calves though because all the cows wanted to come and the calves said that it was dinner time—they are still on the old time. We stood around waiting for the calves to drink their dinner, and thankfully we were able to shoo off the cows and only get the calves. Now that the fields are turning greener and greener, the cows are tired of hay and want to spend all day on the green fields. We cannot leave the cows on the green field all day, because they will get diarrhea—too much fresh spring grass is not a good thing, but the cows don’t know that! Once we had the calves heading for the barn we followed behind in the truck, and to our dismay one jumped the fence to go visit Patriot (America’s Jersey bull that we just weaned and he is now living with the sheep). Steve headed over the fence to shoo the calf back and I opened the wires so she could get back out—without jumping. A little while later Steve announced that he had found quite a few clumps of wild onion—a dairy farmer’s worst nightmare for no one wants onion flavored milk! I quickly joined him and we dug up every last little bulb that we could find. I was grateful that the calf had jumped the fence so that we could find this pungent unwanted weed.
Thursday was a rainy day so we swapped days with our worker Steve. Usually he works until 4:30 on Thursday, and until 1:00 on Friday. Since we desperately need to get a lot of garden work done in order to get it planted this week, we swapped the days and he went home early on Thursday and late on Friday. This enabled us to get some much needed shopping done. We go grocery shopping about every six weeks, and it was going on seven and I was out of white vinegar for the laundry. We also needed to get some other things for the farm. Thankfully it did most of the raining before we headed to town so we really didn’t have to shop in the rain.
To my delight we got to spend Friday in the garden. The garden bed that I am planning on making a cut flower garden (sunflowers, cosmos, gomphrena, amaranth and zinnias) needs lots of help, and to my dismay the tiller broke half way through it. Steve did manage to get one bed almost finished—we still have to harvest some sweet potatoes out of half a row. Since we couldn’t work in the flower bed, we decided to tackle the last three rows in the onion bed. The cotton plants were still standing, and the weeds were getting thick. I might grow acorn squash in those rows. A friend is coming over tomorrow to help us tackle some more. I was ready to throw in the towel last Monday, but I am beginning to see the light at the end of the tunnel. The garden never looks like it will get planted, and then it usually does happen—but there is so much to do! Some beds still need weeded, the one bed needs tilled and weed cloth laid out, and all the beds need top dressed with compost, and the walkways covered with woodchips. Then of course the obvious needs done—the seeds planted!
Saturday was officially the first day of spring and we still had our winter décor up. We usually change the décor on the first of the month—but life has been too busy. I insisted that it must be done yesterday, and Mom was on the same page. So, once Papa left for the Gainesville delivery Mom and I began to undecorate the dining room, and then about an hour later a customer showed up wanting to buy a lamb. Mom continued to pack up the decorations and I headed down field to show them the sheep—and try to catch one. Two hours later I had to admit defeat—I am not the lamb whisperer, Papa is. Admitting defeat I told the lady that as soon as Papa could catch a lamb—we would call her since she only lives five minutes away. When I got back inside Mom had everything packed up and the boxes stacked at the garage door—and she had the spring garland hung. She was ready to decorate the table but needed help to get the glass off the table. Once the dark green tablecloth was removed we covered the table with a pink tablecloth and in the middle we topped the pink tablecloth with a white vintage embroidered and drawn thread tablecloth—that was passed down from my Great Grandmother or her sister. The napkins are a light seafoam green held in place by wooden black bunny napkin holders that Mom made. The room truly is light, airy and very springy—I am in love with it.
Since it was the first day of spring, and the dining room was freshly decorated, I was determined to serve a very springy meal. I harvested some asparagus out of the garden, along with some carrots. I had already harvested some lettuce, and I thawed out some chicken breast. I thought that I had everything that I needed, but then I realized that I didn’t have enough carrots, an onion and no celery for the salad. So off to the garden I ran—which is about 300 feet from the house. I gathered some celery and an onion and headed back to the kitchen. Once I was back in the kitchen I realized that I forgot the carrot—thankfully I had some in the cooler from a previous harvest, so I just had to walk out to the milk house. When I got back to the kitchen I was ready to begin—and the first thing I did was wash and peel everything. I sliced the chicken breast and soaked it in an egg, milk, mustard mixture and then floured it and fried it in butter. The carrots were sliced matchstick style and sautéed in butter and seasoned with parsley—of which I only had to go as far as the front courtyard to get some fresh parsley for just the other day Mom painted an old metal water tank, filled it with soil and planted an herb garden for me (parsley, sage, thyme, lemon balm, chamomile, oregano—and we still want basil and onion chives). The salad was 100% Shepherd’s Hill Farm produce: lettuce, carrots, onion and celery. Once the chicken was all cooked I added some more butter to the pan, some crushed garlic and the chopped asparagus and sautéed it. I also hard boiled some eggs and stuffed them. Yes, it was the perfect spring dinner.
It is now 7:30 at night, Papa is gone, and I must head out into the not so perfect spring weather (cold and rainy) and gather the eggs, feed the dogs, and lock up the chickens for the night. I hope that you have a great week—and don’t forget to get out and dig in the dirt, and be sure to plant something that you can harvest and eat!
Serving you with Gladness,
Tiare