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Hi Everyone,
To everything there is a season—and O how I am enjoying the change of seasons this year. I have enjoyed watching the pecan trees get greener and greener—with their soft green leaves of spring. Today I was awed as we saw whole fields and long sections on the side of the road covered in yellow blankets as the coreopsis is in full bloom. The mockingbirds have a nest in the holly tree in the courtyard, and in the blackberry briars on the backyard fence. The bluebirds are nesting in the bluebird nesting box that my brother David bought for Mom some 30 years ago. Yes, it is spring and I am enjoying every bit of it—from the cool gentle breezes in the mornings to the warm afternoons. I think that this morning while milking the cows at 6:00, I got the first whiff of the chestnuts in bloom. It won’t be long before the mimosas are sharing their sweet perfume with us too. My brother David always said that it smelled like a perfume factory outside when the mimosas were blooming. They definitely have a more pleasing smell than the pungent smell of the chestnuts. Last week I was blessed to find a whole field dotted here, there and everywhere with wild long leaf plantain. For some people it is a weed to eradicate, because it makes their lawn look unkept—but for me it is a gold mine of medicinal help. Up north you can find broad leaf plantain, and once when visiting my Uncle in northern Missouri my sister and I found a plant that was two feet wide. I harvested it and dried it out in the hot van and turned it into some Soothing Salve. For the past ten years or so I have grown my own broad leaf plantain—but it doesn’t grow as big as it does up north. Then last year my bed of plantain kind of died back. Someone shared with me a bunch of new seeds—and they sprouted by the thousands, but they are so tiny. I have a few medium sized plants, but not enough to harvest. Last year was the first time in many years that I actually had to buy dried plantain to make my salves. I will not have to buy any this year because the back field where the cows spent the winter is so lush that the native long leaf plantain is growing in huge clusters everywhere. I spent about an hour Tuesday filling a large basket with the plantain leaves. The only negative was that fireweed (Heart leafed nettle—that has a fiery sting) just happened to like to grow beside in amongst the plantain. They say that in the wild the remedy for something usually grows alongside the poison. Plantain does take the sting out of the fireweed. Anyway, once my basket was full I came inside and filled all the trays of the dehydrator with the plantain leaves, and by Friday they were all crisp and ready for storage. I got a whole gallon of dried plantain! The one thing that I like about drying my own herbs is that they retain their green color. Every time I buy dried herbs they are brown—or dark green. Mine are bright green and hold their properties well. I still have a jar of dried peppermint from 2010 that will knock your socks off when you open the lid and take a sniff. I warn you not to sniff too hard for it is very, very strong—and still green!
To my delight I did get a little bit of weeding accomplished on Monday—but as soon as lunch was over we all headed down to our 1915 house. Demo was happening inside (you can get a video tour here) so there was a large dumpster outside. The other owner was trying to mow the grounds when something flew up and hit him. The previous “squatters” used the whole property as a trash sight—although I will admit they were organized trash collectors. All batteries were piled here, all computer parts were piled there, and all gardening pots were stored behind the barn. Our job was to clean up the trash! Some trash was pretty easy to find, but others were hidden below many inches of leaves and dirt. We even found an old toilet—but the last hurricane downed a tree on it and instead of being able to carry it out in one piece we had to pick it up piece by shattered piece. As we were walking around the barn we could tell that we were walking on something. It sounded like a tarp—but it was under layers of leaves. As Steve dug under the leaves he came across a whole stack of unused ceramic tiles. Most were in perfect condition—some were broken. All were stacked on top of a tarp. Beside the tarp was a pile of old tin—and on top of it was pile of old bags of potting soil, but the potting soil was no longer in the bags. Half of the bags had rotted away, and the other half were still readable. We spent a good three hours at least down there on a scavenger hunt for trash. We did find a few keepers—like some really good chains, but most everything was nothing more than junk that should have gone out in the dump years ago. The grounds are looking a lot better. I am enjoying watching all the old-fashioned landscaping come to life. The house is surrounded by amaryllis and crinum lilies. Where the old fence used to be there are gladiolas and narcissus. There are other flowers too that I have no idea what they are called. I was really upset when the person who bought the house a month before we did tore out the fence with the jasmine growing on it—and yes, he tore out more than just the fence, the jasmine went with it. There is wisteria, crepe myrtles, pecans and a big Camilla that I have adored for years. It is nice to be able to say that I own them—even though I share the ownership of the house with three other people.
Our goal this summer is to set up a four tunnel market garden. We already had the tunnels—two just needed to be moved and two needed to be assembled. One of the ones that we had been using (our East Tunnel) was kind of bent up from the last hurricane—and it was not as big as the other three. So when my brother-in-law started asking for one of our tunnels we gladly sold him that one so that we could purchase one to match the other three. Last Tuesday was the day to disassemble the East Tunnel. Danger of frost is past, so we no longer needed the plastic over our plants. The collards are almost spent, the green beans are just starting to produce, the forget-me-not flowers are making sure we do not forget them and the Swiss chard is starting to look like it will be forgotten very soon. The potatoes will be due for harvesting in a few weeks, and the zucchini is just sprouting. The last row is full of bitter lettuce. To my dismay my last crop of lettuce turned bitter just when it was ready to harvest—it looks so good, but tastes so terrible.
Anyway, we spent Tuesday taking down the tunnel. Well, let me rephrase that—Mom, Papa, Steve, my brother-in-law Gary, and Brandon spent the afternoon taking down the tunnel. My sister Nichole and I weeded the green beans and the acorn squash. I was tickled pink to find volunteer tomatoes and basil plants coming up in the West Tunnel around the acorn squash plants (they grew in that bed last year). The other plant that is volunteering itself is an assortment of zinnias—I grew them in that bed last year too. Some plants if you let them go to seed they will come up on their own the next year—that is nice in some places, but not all places. I am thankful for the volunteer zinnias and basil because the ones I did plant are not doing very good—or didn’t even sprout.
Once the tunnel was down it was around 4:30 in the afternoon. Everyone went home—but we went to work. Papa had evening chores to do, and Mom and I had to pick the green beans and then we had to harvest the collards, kale, and Swiss chard for the Jacksonville delivery on Wednesday. It took us about an hour to get everything harvested, then I put dinner on and we worked on packaging the harvest. I also had to pack some ginger orders—which meant take the scale to the barn, run back to the house and get the brush, head back to the barn, find out I needed to go finish dinner, and then when dinner was done I headed back to the barn—but it was getting dark now and I could hardly see (hay barns do not have electricity). I could have come back to the house for my flashlight but can I say I was too lazy—or was I just worn out? Once the ginger was packed I headed inside to do the receipts while Mom finished sorting out the vegetables and packing the meat orders. The orders have been growing and since we have been working with a stubborn cow we cannot get the milking and the packing done in a reasonable time in order to get Papa out on time—so Papa said that we have to do the packing of the veggies and the meat on Tuesday instead of Wednesday morning—after we milk. It was close to 10:00 by the time Mom finished with the packing and I finished with the receipts.
I said that we had been working with a stubborn cow—Miss Buttercup by name. We sold her a year ago because we couldn’t get her to come into the milking parlor. The people that bought her had no problem milking her—but they are moving out of state and could not take their cow with them so they asked if we wanted to buy her back. We thought that since they had been milking her, that she had calmed down. Well . . . milking Buttercup was not the problem—our milking parlor was. She absolutely hated our milking parlor. When she would come through the opening to enter the parlor she would refuse to go into a stall, and instead would go right through the exit wires—even though they were closed. Mom has told everyone that all Jerseys could be tamed—but you have to be able to spend time with them daily. That has been our down fall with quite a few cows that we have had to sell. We didn’t have the time to spend with them—and sure enough it wasn’t long before their new owners had them tamed down. Well, with Buttercup we had no choice but to spend time with her. She was in milk—and had to milk daily or she would dry off, and we needed more milk. The first four days were total failure, but for the last two weeks we have successfully got her into the milking parlor stall and milked her—but we had to drag her all the way. Once in the stall she was happy as a lark, ate her food and let down her milk. Then one day we set up some panels that made a path from the holding area straight into the stall—and Buttercup walked in like a pro. Sometimes she walks in by herself, and sometimes you have to encourage her a little—but we don’t have to drag her in anymore. Praise the Lord!!! I guess you can say that that is the only flaw in our milking parlor—the cows have the choice of coming in or leaving and there is nothing solid to encourage them to come in. It isn’t so scary to exit—but it is scary to go into a stall, but if you make a pathway that leads to the stall then that isn’t scary. You got to think like a cow to get a cow to do what you want it to do—it just isn’t always easy.
Thursday was a crazy day—it didn’t exactly go as planned. Our batch of chicks was supposed to have arrived on Wednesday, but the Post Office called us Thursday morning instead—and half the chicks were dead. Then we were supposed to pick up the Azure order at 10:45—so we milked the cows early. The original plan was for the family that helps us package eggs to pick up our order and theirs and then come and package eggs—but there was no room in the milk house to package eggs and bottle milk and wash up all the equipment. We couldn’t do it in the Poultry Kitchen because the person who sealed the floors put a terrible bumpy surface on the concrete so if you drop an egg on the floor you just about cannot get it scrubbed up. So we decided that it would be better if we picked up everyone’s order and they came to pick up their order and package eggs at 2:00. BUT—we forgot to call them on Tuesday and Wednesday, and by the time we finally got ahold of them on Thursday they were already halfway there. So the plan was for them to drop off our order with us, and then come back on Friday to do eggs—since we wouldn’t be processing chickens because they didn’t grow big enough. That gave us the day to get some things done. We had bought some strawberries—and they needed to be prepared for the freezer. Then I made some ginger syrup with the freshly harvested ginger—and I made some Dilly Beans (pickled green beans) with the first two harvests of green beans. Mom helped me snap the beans and then she spent the afternoon mowing. I spent the whole day inside—besides milking the cows.
Friday was another day spent inside as there were customers to take care of, yogurt to make, eggs to package and then I finally got around to starting the infusion process with a few of the salves that I make. That night after dinner Mom and I headed over to my sister Nichole’s place to see her new milk cow and their garden tunnel. Gary had done a great job reshaping the bent metal and he had it all put together with black plastic covering the floor. When my sister left home she was done with farming—but I knew that she was a homesteader at heart. They are gardening, have sheep, chickens, and now a milk cow. When Nichole was young she begged to have the milking job—and until the day she moved away she was the milk maid. She now has two children of her own, and her five year old son wants to help her milk so bad. Josiah is 100% boy—and dirt looks natural on him. They told him that he had to have clean hands in order to milk the cow—so he disappeared into the house and found some surgical gloves and headed back outside to help milk. Poor thing though—he couldn’t get any milk out. I am sure that he will continue to try and try again.
Saturday found me heading over to the milk house about 6:30 in the morning. I promise you that if I had a hammock you would find me in it early in the morning for it is so beautiful outside at that time. The air is cool and the birds are singing—but it is quiet everywhere else. I didn’t head outside to enjoy the morning though—I needed to set up the milking equipment and get the kefir bottled before breakfast. If I wake up early on Saturday it helps me to get everything done without any stress—otherwise there is very little time to bottle the kefir after I milk and before the order must go to Gainesville. This day I was even able to get a bunch of laundry folded before Mom and Papa had breakfast done. We got the milking done after breakfast and then I packed the orders—because Mom was busy helping my sister and her husband get milking stall measurements so that Gary could build Nichole a milking stanchion to milk her cow in. After Papa was on his way to Gainesville Mom and I relaxed for a little bit and then we headed to the garden. The tunnel had been taken down but the side fences were still there to protect the garden—but they were not secured. So we worked to make a straight line with the fencing panels and get them secured so that they didn’t fall over on the plants. We managed to get one side done before it was time to harvest the green beans and go take care of a customer. I have decided to turn the old Winter Garden tunnel area into our Summer Garden—a fenced in area to grow sweet potatoes, pumpkin, zinnias and peas through the summer. I will find some kind of cover crop for winter—maybe wheat for it is pretty to decorate with.
Well, that was my week in a nutshell—not a hazelnut shell either, more like a coconut shell.
Serving you with Gladness,
Tiare