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Hi Everyone,
Are you flexible enough to have your weeks plans changed in a moment—like at 9:30 on a Sunday night? Well, that is how my week started last Sunday. When I had finished my journal I realized that I had a message on the phone from my dear friend Lydia. She wanted me to call her back as soon as I could—and thankfully she doesn’t retire before 10:00 at night because it was after 9:30 when I called her back. The original plans were for her to come up Thursday and spend until Saturday with me, because she was going to be spending the beginning of the week with her sister Emily, and her family. Needless to say, Emily’s family ended up sick—so Lydia wanted to know if it was okay to come up Monday (as in less than 24 hours from our phone call). She would spend the first half of the week with me, and then if Emily’s family was well, then Lydia would spend the second half of the week with them. Sounded like a plan to me and off to bed I went.
Lydia was not expected before 8:00 Monday night; therefore I had all day to vacuum the floors, dust two bedrooms (mine and hers) and clean two bathrooms. I could work on that after milking—but Mom and I decided to head to the garden after milking and I harvested the acorn squash and then we started weeding the East Garden Tunnel so that we can plant cover crops this week. I figured that I could work outside until 3:00 and then I could come inside and clean—but at 3:00 we were intensely weeding and I didn’t want to stop. At 4:30 when it was time for Steve to go home Mom and I had about 15 feet left to weed in the whole tunnel—we just couldn’t stop! We finally pulled the last weed sometime after 5:00, and by the time we got inside it was twenty minutes till 6:00. I needed to start dinner—but I was filthy from weeding and really wanted a shower before Lydia arrived. I had no idea how I was going to cook dinner, eat, help Mom wash the dishes (because the dishwasher died), get a shower, vacuum, dust and clean two bathrooms in two hours. I checked the cookbooks for a zucchini and canned fish casserole and they didn’t let me down. I quickly assembled the casserole, popped it in the oven and headed for the shower while it cooked. When dinner was over it was well after 7:00 and I was thankful that Lydia had called at 7:00 and said that she was just leaving—she lives two hours away. Mom offered to do the dishes while I headed to clean. I was almost done when Lydia arrived shortly before 9:00, but as the day came to a close I could rejoice that the weeds were gone, the bedrooms and bathrooms were clean and I had my dear friend Lydia for the week.
I will admit that neither Lydia nor I were very energetic on Tuesday. I had spent two weeks in the heat weeding, weeding, weeding preparing for the Garden Seminar—and then we spent all afternoon Saturday doing the Garden Seminar and all day Sunday at church, and all day Monday in the garden. Lydia had gone on a 26 mile bike ride with a friend on Saturday and many other things so when Tuesday came along we both were ready to crash. It is nice when you have a friend you can enjoy working with, playing with and relaxing with. Truthfully though—there really wasn’t a lot of time to relax. Mom and Papa decided to work on the topper to the new arbor, and since Lydia and I would be inside she asked us to: make some lemongrass tea, some Roselle jello, and lunch. There were also email orders to answer, kombucha to make and yogurt to make. By 2:30 all was accomplished except for the kombucha—we ran out of time, and we were late for the egg packaging party. When the eggs were done we did relax a little before it was time to cook dinner.
On Wednesday we got the cows milked, the orders packed and lunch out of the way. Then we were able to spend some time together playing the piano (me) and the violin (her). It is always such a joy to play music together—it is always one of the highlights of our times together. Later that day I did manage to get the kombucha made, and we did have lots of down time to just sit and talk.
The calves are multiplying in the milking herd and every week we seem to add about two new cows to the milk tanks. Bella has given birth to a “Spot”, Emma had a “Star”, America blessed us with the most handsome red and white “George”, Gail gave birth to a little heifer that is so full of spunk that we called her “Stormy”, and Saturday morning Abby gave birth to a little girl that Lydia said we should call “Maria” since Maria Von Trapp used to live in an Abbey. We try to give our calves names that will help us to identify who their mother is. Then this morning Rosa gave birth to a little bull who is so huge we should probably call him Goliath—he was only three weeks late! Well, lots of calves usually mean lots of milk—and too much milk means we cream. So Thursday was the first day for us to cream. When the creaming was done we made yogurt, and then we ate lunch. When lunch was over we headed to the garden. Lydia and I harvested the spaghetti squash, walked through the garden looking at everything and finding that the egg in the Wren nest in the garden shed had hatched and that the eggs in the nest built in the goldenrod in the garden had hatched. It was fun to keep track of the progress of the little birds over the next three days. It took us until the third day to finally see the parents of the goldenrod nest. They were cowbirds as far as we could tell. While we were harvesting in the garden, Papa, Steve and Mom were placing the topper on the arbor. When Lydia and I were done in the garden we dropped our produce off inside and then we headed out to the pasture where Yasha and Aliya were. Lydia had not met Aliya yet and she was very excited to love on both dogs. I am very thankful that Yasha and Aliya are not jealous of each other. When we introduced Sheba to Jill years ago I had my arm scratched by Jill’s teeth as she lounged at Sheba because I loved on Sheba and not her—so I am quite cautious when I have two dogs wanting attention at my feet.
We had just finished eating dinner and Papa was reading the Bible to us when my sister Nichole came in and told us that we were needed outside. When we got outside there was a truck and a trailer in our yard along with my sister, her husband, their two children and a friend of theirs and his daughter. The surprise was what was on the trailer. Mother’s eyes got real BIG and she gasped in excitement as the reality of what she was seeing set in. For years Mom has dreamed of a wood cook stove and when we moved our old wood shed up to the yard one of the ways Mom and I wanted to use it was as an old-fashioned kitchen with an old wood cook stove—but we didn’t have a cook stove nor did we know how to find one. Well, my brother-in-law is from the mountains of North Carolina and he had connections. Gary and his friend had been planning for months to gift Mom with a cook stove—but kept it a secret until it was actually delivered. The cook stove needs a little tender love and care and Mom and I need some major lessons on how to use it—and the shed needs to be finished inside, and maybe we shall whitewash the walls.
Friday morning we had a crew helping milk. Gary’s friend had come to Florida not just to deliver a wood cook stove—but to pick up a young beef cow for his 11 year old daughter from another of Gary’s friends. Since she was interested in cows they asked if she could come and help milk—and we said “sure”. My sister Nichole came with her daughter Makenna and son Josiah. Makenna helped Grandma milk her cows by mixing up feed, and the young lady helped me by mixing up feed. I let her wash up some of the cows and hook up the claws and strip out the teats at the end. She has milked goats before—so she was a natural. They had a lovely time and milking was over before we knew it. We then had to get ready for chicken processing. We had 44 chickens to process and a nice crew to get it done fast. It is the last of what I will call the Spring Chickens. We will take off the rest of July and start back up either the last Friday in July or the first Friday in August—it will depend on how fast they grow. The last few batches we have processed at 7 weeks because they are giants if they go 8 weeks. We finished the chickens around 3:00 and then Lydia and I each grabbed a large galvanized watering can filled with water and a pair of clippers and we headed for the garden. Our mission was to pick flowers to our hearts content. There were loads of zinnias to choose from, along with many shapes and colors of celosia, marigolds—the long stemmed kind. We managed to find a few sunflowers still in bloom and two hidden white gomphrena plants that had come up from seeds from last year’s plants. I also picked Mom a bunch of Cherokee Sunset Rudbeckia. When our watering cans were maxed out we headed to the house where Mom joined us in the kitchen and we gathered quite a few vases, pitchers, and jars and filled them with flowers. We had a blast!
With the beginning of a new month, we had new tenants move in. As I was at the milking parlor Friday morning I saw a mama skunk and her three babies coming walking across the side yard and disappear under the front of my greenhouse—anyone want to practice clogging right now, the greenhouse is open for practice. Ha! Ha! That night we saw them again—as they walked across the back yard and disappeared under the back of the greenhouse. After her babies were snug in bed, then the mama skunk came out and scavenged for food in the yard and pastures. One night while we were eating dinner she was too—and I got a video of her wandering around in our backyard. I have tried to get a picture of the four together—but my timing is never right.
Saturday was Lydia’s last day. It turned out that come Wednesday her sister’s family was still sick so Lydia decided to stay the rest of the week with us—I felt sorry for her sister, but I was delighted to have Lydia for the whole week. We only get to visit with each other twice a year—my birthday in November and then in the summer. We milked the cows and packed the orders and then it was time for Lydia to pack up, but first we had to dig up some marigolds for her to take home to her garden and then I also sent a Canna lily plant home with her. It was close to 2:00 when Lydia was all packed and on her way home. Mom then worked on mowing the courtyard while I got all the farm receipts entered into the computer. Then I helped Mom mow and rake around the greenhouse and the milking parlor. When dinner was over I ironed some shirts for Papa and I practiced my piano for church today.
I had a lovely week—and I hated to see Lydia leave. We greatly enjoyed each other’s company and had lots of memorable times together. I hope that you have a great 4th of July tomorrow!
Serving you with Gladness,
Tiare