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Hi Everyone,
We started the week with a broken well and a broke air conditioner/heater. The AC repairman showed up Monday morning and found some crimped wires and a leak in the coils. The crimped wires were easily fixed, but we had to get a whole new coil unit—and that had to be ordered and therefore he had to come back on Tuesday to install it. The well needed a new pump and a new tank—and those had to be ordered and they came in Monday afternoon so they showed up Tuesday afternoon to install them. Both cost a pretty penny and we thought that we were going to have to use the money from the recent sales of quite a few cows—money that we had planned on using to add onto a barn for equipment storage and a new feed room with a concrete floor. Since we have gone to one ton totes the feed is being stored in our garage. It wouldn’t be too bad if the tractor wasn’t starting to wear away the grass in front of our concrete pad at the garage. So in order to keep grass around our house we need to build a new feed room down at the barn. Our feed room now is in a portable shed—but we cannot get the one ton tote bags in it. So it is time for a new feed room. Then we are tired of the cows standing in the mud waiting to be milked during the rainy season. So we plan on expanding the concrete around the milking parlor. To our delight the Lord supplied efficient funds to pay of the AC and the well without having to touch the cow money that we needed to use for these much needed projects.
I was grateful to get to spend Monday in the greenhouse—planting and rat proofing. Years ago we bought a 50 foot roll of half inch hardware cloth to keep the rats from eating our strawberries in the garden—to only find out that it wasn’t rats eating the strawberries but worms and roaches (so now we grow our strawberries in GreenStalk towers). Last year we used that hardware cloth to keep the deer out of the green beans—to only have them eaten by rabbits instead. Well, last Monday I came up with another idea for that hardware cloth. We had cut the roll into four eight foot long pieces, and our shelves in the greenhouse are eight feet long. So I grabbed one of the pieces and attached it to the back of the shelf and then bent it forward and attached it to the front. Then I cut little pieces to cover the ends. The only problem I have now is that the shelves are 18 inches deep, but the trays are 21 inches long. Each eight foot section could hold eight trays—but the wire prevents the trays from being able to hang off the edges so I have to turn the trays the other way which means I can only get four trays on the shelves. For now that is all I need, and for now I am pleased to be able to hopefully “rat proof” my precious seedlings. I have planted lettuce so many times since last fall and the rats have eaten them. I planted flowers twice and the only way that I have the little snapdragon plants that I have now is because when the hard freezes came we moved all the plants into the poultry kitchen and they were able to grow. With the greenhouse shelves rat proofed I could then focus on potting up some mullein, snapdragons, and strawflowers. Then I planted a new tray with lettuce and another with spring cabbage.
Tuesday was the BIG day! While we were milking the service man showed up to service the generator. Then the AC man showed up to replace coils on the AC unit. As soon as we were done milking I bottled the kefir and then I answered emails and put the orders together. As soon as lunch was over we headed to the milk house for an egg packaging party. We were hoping to get done before the well people arrived and had to turn off the water—but we didn’t make it. We quickly filled up the sink with hot soapy water—so we could wash up the bowls and our hands when we were done, and we filled up a five gallon bucket with very warm water—so that we would have warm water to clean any dirty eggs. Once the eggs were done I needed to plant a tray of cabbage seeds and water some of the plants in the greenhouse—but we had no running water. Then I remembered that I had some five gallon buckets full of rain water from the last rain, so I watered the plants and got my hands dirty planting cabbage seeds. It worked out great because I could rinse my hands off in the rain buckets and then go inside the milk house and wash my hands in the sink of soapy water. Perfect! Then I decided to go to the garden to harvest some greens for the next day’s delivery. When I got inside I went ahead and made the receipts for the Jacksonville orders. It was after 7:00 when Mom said that we had better fix dinner—even though they were still working on the well. We needed a meal that didn’t require much water, so we had French toast and eggs. I went next door to the milk house and dipped a big bowl into the sink of soapy water and carried it back to the house so I could clean my hands as needed. It was 8:00 before Papa came inside to eat and the well people went home—and we had running water again.
February 1st arrived just the way I like it—warm and Springy. The highs were in the 80’s and the lows in the 60’s. For many years I have said that I could not live anywhere that spring did not begin February 1st. If I could hibernate every cold day of the year I would—bare foot and a short sleeve is my type of weather. I know that there will be many more cold days before warm weather is here to stay, but I shall enjoy the beauty of the next few months as plants begin to bloom and the grass starts to turn green. In the meantime we have another bit of spring on our farm—the first batch of broiler chicks arrived on Wednesday. We shall be receiving broiler chicks every two week until September, and we have new egg layer chicks arriving in March.
Penny went to spend time with her mother Thursday and Friday, which meant that we had to wash all the milking equipment—Steve and I that is. Mom and Papa were trying to work on redesigning the heifers hay rack so that they can all get to the hay at the same time. While we were washing up, our neighbors drove up and told us that there was a cow in the road. We headed out to the road and found our new South Poll bull out. Jabez had taken advantage of an already semi-smashed fence—of which he finished off and headed out to see the world. Maybe he is ready for some girls! I stayed with Jabez while Steve went to get a bucket of feed, and Mom and Papa came to help. Jabez soon got tired of looking at me and decided to go back through the woods to get back into the field where he came out. He found the vines a little more than he felt like dealing with and soon found himself back at the road. By this time Papa had arrived and was able to shoo him toward the driveway. Jabez did his fair share of running around the yard before we finally got him convinced to go in the gate. Steve then dumped the bucket of alfalfa pellets in their feed trough and he and Papa buried some t-posts in the ground so that they could fix the fence—all the wood was rotten. I went back and finished up in the milk house. Then after lunch Mom and Papa went back to work on the hay rack and Steve and I headed to the garden to weed in the caterpillar tunnels. Two months ago it seemed like a good idea to leave the weeds around the spinach and garlic plants to help protect them from the freezing cold weather—well, it wasn’t a good idea anymore. I worked at weeding the spinach that was really happy to see the light of day. The weeds had grown long and spindly and were really taking over the bed. Most of the bed was full of hen bit, but there were some large thistles too. The nice part was that the weeds came up pretty easy. At 4:00 we all stopped and cleaned up and then I harvested some broccoli, Steve gathered the eggs, and Mom and Papa worked at loading up one of the eighteen month old heifers to deliver her to her new owner. Elsa wasn’t too sure about being singled out of the herd, and Steve and I were soon summoned to come and help. Papa didn’t want to take the time to run her down to the panel pens where we normally load cows. He was hoping to be able to quickly load her from the field. We did manage to get her corralled up at the gate and then Mom backed the trailer up—but getting her to load was a different story. The amount of time spent trying to convince her to load, was probably the amount of time it would have taken to chase her through the fields and to the panel pens where the loading is easier. In the end they did manage to get her loaded—and delivered.
Friday found us delivering another bull to a family who had asked to purchase him back in July—but our cattle trailer was out of commission and we had no way to deliver and they had no way to pick it up. It was November before Papa had the trailer all painted and a new floor installed—but then the holidays were upon us. January was super busy and here it is February already. It was a good hour away—and we got lost a few times, but in the end little Elmo arrived at his new home. It was a beautiful farm buried in the middle of a pine forest. They have huge gardens and lots of pigs, chickens, goats and cows—it was a nice little country homestead.
As the week came to a close we took some time to relax, I got the ironing done and we had a nice visit with my sister Nichole. A new week is upon us and I look forward to seeing what the Lord has in store for us.
Serving you with Gladness,
Tiare