Odds and Ends Post

 Here's my new toy.....a rototiller.   Who knew gardening tools could be so much fun?    Now I have to admit that Joel used this instead of me to break up the small garden some more to get it ready for planting.   And as soon as these tornadoes and thunderstorms pass I'll be out there planting my little heart out!

 Alrighty, now.   This is a doughnut.   A huge, plate-sized doughnut.   Let me explain.   As I've been driving thru town recently I noticed a banner next to the Shell gas station announcing "Mrs. Miller's doughnuts on Saturday".   Well, I just happened to be in town on Saturday and I pulled up to a small neatly painted, white, converted school bus.   And as I peeked inside the  back exit door I saw Mrs. Miller, an Amish woman, busily making more and more and more doughnuts.  And Mr. Miller was selling them as fast as she was making them!   No kidding!  There was a line of patrons in front of me.

When it was my turn to purchase, I realized that all the doughnuts were one size.....gi-normous!   They actually measured 6" across.   I had to buy some to show Joel and when I arrived home we had company visiting us.  Well, put on the coffee pot!   And we all enjoyed Mrs. Miller's doughnuts with our coffee.  Jeremy announced that we need to "get some of those" every Saturday and make it our family ritual.   Who can argue with that?  

 I had to take a pic of our new toys at work near the kitchen garden by the house.    I've sorta taken over the Polaris.....at least for now.   giggle.......Hey, the guys shouldn't have all the fun!

 Here is another bluebird protecting his nest.   Unfortunately, every time we go back to the main garden we have to pass the bird house where his new family resides and he flies out to distract us from the nest.  Don't worry, big guy.  We'll leave you and your family alone.

 The back of the Polaris has become the holding ground for some of the plants that will soon be put into the kitchen garden.   But I don't have a potting bench or  green house or any where else to put plants right now, so, this was as good a place as any for them to hang out until I get them planted.   There are strawberries and asparagus just waiting for some rich soil to hang out in!

 Ummmmm, I told you I sorta took over the Polaris.   And I travel with iced coffee in my favorite Tervis tumbler while I drive back and forth from the garden to the house.

Oh, my goodness!   One day I was painting the posts for the main grape arbor and 3 days later there were buds and leaves popping out all over the vines!

 I think they're really pretty.....don't you?

 As I was driving around the lower edge of the property by the deep woods I noticed this clump of pink blossoms.   I believe it's a native azalea.   And in my favorite color, too!   How fortunate for me!

 Our orchard, grape arbor and valley with Hinch Mountain in the background....with lovely clouds.   We love it here.......every day is so pretty, no matter what the weather holds for us.

 Remember the snowbush this winter with the snow layered on it's branches?   Well, it's blooming now and the blooms look like miniature versions of a hydrangea bush.

 And the birdhouse we put up several weeks back has new residents....a pair of tree swallows with beautiful blue-green heads and wing feathers, pure white breasts and some black on their wing tips.   They are very busy building a nest inside, preparing for a new family.

 My guys taking a much deserved break while shoveling the mushroom compost on the main garden.

 The main garden.....we're making progress.....so far we've planted lots of cool weather veggies like 3 different kinds of cabbage, 2 different kinds of broccoli, 2 whole rows of Kennebec potatoes and 1 row of Yukon Gold potatoes.    Lots more to come..........

 Things tend to get messy when we're working outside.....as evidenced by the front seat of the Polaris.   Hey, this is hard work!

Jeremy got a lesson on how to operate the Kubota from dad and was dying to give it a try.  Go for it, kid, mow away!

This picture of Joel and I is hideous, but Jeremy took it and thought it was hilarious, so, here it is.   He says it's his version of the famous painting, American Gothic.   It was 80 degrees at this point and we had been shoveling for hours and were about to fall over.....oh, well.   Anything to humor our youngest...giggle.....

Well, those are the odds and ends that sum up our daily life this past week.  One thing is for sure, we are never bored.  Now if this rain would just stop so I could get out there and do some more planting!

Dirt under my nails,
Debbie

New Workhorse

Ahhhh, yes.  Men and their toys.   Joel finally had his wish come true.....ever since we bought Whispering Oaks he has been dreaming, talking about, looking at and drooling over different sized tractors, mowers and combinations of the above.   Well, he picked out the one he really wanted and it got delivered a few days ago.   Here it is being delivered....

Yes, my husband hasn't stopped grinning from ear to ear for days now.

He can mow 60" wide with one swoop.  He can use the box dragger on the rear to level our gravel lane coming in to the farm.   He can move dirt, mulch, and whatever else he desires with the front end loader.   Oh, and horror of horrors.......it came with a huge book of accessories that you can buy to add on to the lovely orange machine.   

Here we go again with a guy explaining the thing-a-ma-jigs and whatcha-ma-call-its.   giggle......The mower drops down off the main machine for times when you just want to use the front end loader.   Joel could hardly wait for the delivery guy to leave so he could just get behind the controls and try it out for himself.

 And off he went down into the deep ravine in front of our bluffs.    That area really needed to be mowed as it hadn't been mowed since late last fall.  

And then he went back down the other side, over and over again until the low lying area under the bluffs was cut back down to size.

Now it was time to try the front end loader.   He used it to pick up the dirt that was humped up over the lawn around the smaller garden.   Yes, he got the hang of it right away.   Of course!    After all, he had driven much larger tractors around his parents camp on the Eastern Shore of Maryland.   And over much rougher terrain, too.    To him, this was a piece of cake.

I drove the Polaris over to the edge of the woods and caught up with him.   And this is how he greeted me.   Yup, he's one very happy guy.  As I drove off, I actually heard him whistling as he was mowing.   

What more is there to say, except....

The End
Debbie

Tilling, Plowing and Mowing

In one of the recent posts I told you that our neighbor just showed up with his tractor and started to till our garden for us.  

Here he is, happily breaking up our soil.  His box tiller was broken so he did his best with what he had working at the time.   Not a problem as we were happy to have the help.

This little existing 16'x9' garden is filled with mushroom compost.   I planted 3 rosa Rugosa bare root rose plants down the middle.   By fall, they should have some rose hips ready for us to harvest.   I think I'll also grow some more flowers in this bed so that I can cut fresh flowers to put in vases inside the house.

And remember the mushroom compost we picked up?    I know it doesn't look like much, but it sure took a lot to unload it all, shovelful by shovelful.  

First Joel and Jeremy unloaded the compost from the back of the pickup, and spread it all over the smaller garden closer to the house.    As I drove the truck around the perimeter of the garden, they hefted the compost onto the garden.    That took one evening......and there is more to come!

The next day Joel and I headed outside to the main garden behind the barn.    Ok, let the fun begin!!

First, we measured and staked out the perimeter of the garden, then, we were able to run string lines for the number of rows we wanted to be able to plant.   At least this part was fun......now on to the hard stuff.

Where we had string lines running across the garden, we dug out the loosened soil and threw that shovel of dirt onto the "row".   By working our way down the line we created lower paths and much higher beds.  Each path is going to have a couple layers of newspaper put down to block the sunlight and then a heavy mulch of straw.   As the summer wears on both the newspaper and straw will begin to break down and another layer can always be added.   By doing this we hope to decrease the amount of weeds we have to dig out of the paths.

The loosened soil in the planting beds is well over a foot and a half deep, providing nice loose soil for the roots of the vegetables to grow in, which is supposed to help give us healthy plants with a strong yield.   Hmmmm, we'll see.  We got all these ideas from The Vegetable Gardener's Bible by Edward C. Smith.   It all makes sense to us, and now we'll see how it works out in real life practice.   After all, gardening is one big science experiment....each year dealing with different rain patterns, bug infestations and blights of all kinds.    How much fun can one girl possibly have?

I guess we'll repeat whatever works and try something new for the things that fail.    I'm not afraid to fail since that is how we'll learn to do things better.    You can be assured we are going to fail a lot.   So, laugh along with us as we try our hand at all kinds of new experiences. 

 Whew!   That's a lot of compost to shovel!  

Resting my aching muscles today,
Debbie

"The" Checklist

We all have one, don't we?   A list of projects that we'd like to finish up....maybe it's written down and tacked up on the refrigerator or just in your head.   It's funny how that list can just grow and grow, isn't it?   One of the things on my list was for my guys to cut off 3 of our inside doors so they would close over the area rugs.  

 

 And thanks to the handy work of Joel and Jeremy the doors now glide over the rugs without a hitch.

 While the guys were busy with the doors, I started to paint some of the wood around the farm that needed a bit of sprucing up.   A few days earlier I had pressure washed one of the grape arbors to prepare it for paint.   A few hours of washing and scraping was all it took so the wood could accept a decent coat of crisp white paint.

 While I was at it I decided to paint the posts of the birdhouse and feeder we installed a few weeks ago.

 And here is the arbor......almost done.  Can you see the bluebird getting ready to go inside his house?    Poor guy, I think I scared him to death painting around his nest.   He kept flying out and sitting on a nearby tree branch watching me.   I hurried as fast as I could to get "his end" of the arbor done so as not to stress him too much.

As I type this we are under tornado warnings.....hmmmmmm, maybe a storm cellar is going to go to the top of my list after today.

Watching the sky,
Debbie

The Adventure Continues

Oh how I wish I had taken my camera with me yesterday.    But I goofed in our haste to get into the truck and get on the road so I'll have to paint you a mental picture instead.   First I have to backtrack so you'll have some context for my little story.   When the farmer, Mr. Walker, sold us the farm, he showed us a 9'x16' raised bed garden up near the house.   He explained that he went to a mushroom farm and got some compost for the bed.   Neighbors who have visited us since we bought the farm have regaled us with stories of the huge onions and great tomatoes Mr. Walker grew in that bed.   I knew I had to get my hands on some of that mushroom compost for our new big gardens!   Right?

Well, when Mr. Walker visited us a couple months ago, I asked him again about the mushroom compost and he told me where the place was and what highway it was on, sorta......  Needless to say, I Mapquested how to get there.   A few weeks ago I called Monterey Mushroom and they put me on a wait list!   Really?   A wait list?   That's how popular this place is during Spring planting season.   Wow!   It wasn't a week later that I got a call that we could come on April 22 between the hours of 8 and noon.    Yippee!

Yesterday Joel and I hopped in his truck, each of us with our travel mugs filled with our favorite caffeine fix.    He had hitched our largest trailer behind the truck and threw a huge tarp into the bed of the truck to cover the mulch so we wouldn't lose it all the way home.   As I was driving I suddenly realized that Monterey Mushroom is south of Knoxville.........in the Eastern Time Zone, and we are an hour behind in the Central Time Zone.   Oops!  That meant that even though we left at 9am Central, we wouldn't get there until 11:30 Eastern.....with little time to spare before noon.   Ummmm, I stepped on the gas pedal just a little bit as we made our way up and down and around mountains and plateaus and steep grades to get to I-75 South.  

We made it by 11:30, checked in at the guard gate of a huge operation and the guard directed us toward the back of the mammoth property.   Over a very muddy, rutted dirt road.  At 10m.p.h.  Throwing mud up onto the truck and trailer with each muddy water-filled pot hole.   Of course it was raining all day yesterday for this outing of ours.   We finally reached a line of dump trucks, cars towing trailers, and many pick up trucks with dump trailers behind them.   And we waited and watched in fascination at the very efficient operation.  

One man skillfully maneuvered a front end loader to an enormous steaming pile of compost off to the far left side of a football stadium sized area.   Another man in a yellow slicker raincoat directed trucks into the right position for them to receive their portion of the black gold.   It was fun to observe the different vehicles and the amount of compost they would ask to be loaded into them.   Ahhh, just one big dump truck ahead of us and then it will be our turn.   Finally the yellow slicker guy directed us into position and he came up to our window. 

This is what he said to us with a big smile and a thick Southern accent.   "We're going to dinner now.  Don't let anyone park over there behind you."   And he left.  Yup!  Just like that!  He jumped into the  cab of the front end loader with the driver and they took off for the main building down the hill.   Ok, now.   Joel and I just looked at each other and laughed!   What are you going to do?  We had driven thru fog down a treacherous mountain to get here and we were determined to wait it out.   So, we opened the windows and shut off the truck engine and thought we'd just relax a while.   Pee-you! 

There were 2 huge retention ponds between the main buildings and where we were positioned waiting for the compost.   One of them had really brown water and Joel supposed that was fertilizer.  The other was a little better looking but they both were, shall we say, odiferous.   I could hardly breathe.....seriously, I put my shirt over my nose so it would decrease the smell.   And once it got into the truck it wouldn't go away.   And we were stuck there for who knows how long?   

Not half an hour later the guys showed back up and yellow slicker directed us to back up into position.   Joel and I weren't going to miss this show and we both jumped out of the truck to watch.   We hustled to lay our huge tarp in the bed of the trailer while the expert drove over to pick up a load of steaming fine grained mulch for us.    He was so skilled with that loader.  He watched the springs on our trailer as he gently sifted the mulch onto our trailer and stopped when he thought he had put the max amount our single axle trailer could handle.   Then he went back for another, smaller load.  He was so good that he was able to pre-load that front end loader on mostly one side.   When he got back to us he gently dumped that side load into the bed of the truck, with only a few handfuls of mulch landing on Joel's back bumper.  And just like that, he was done!

Yellow slicker pointed to an old red abandoned building up the sloppy, muddy pothole filled road and said there would be a shovel leaning up against the building that we could use.   Joel drove us over there and we used the shovel to level the mulch in the bed of the truck so we could close the "lid" over the truck bed for the drive home.   We brought the remaining long part of the tarp back to the tailgate and fastened it with bungy cords so it wouldn't flop all the way home.   The rains washed away a lot of the mud as we made our way home and we pulled into our lane as the sun was starting to poke through the clouds.

Guess what we're doing today?    Ummm, yeah.  Spreading all that mulch over the 2 newly dug gardens.   Oh, I forgot to tell you!    Monday evening a man we never saw before just came driving up our lane with the same old tractor  that had plowed our garden last month.   He went right back to the big garden behind the barn and repeatedly worked the big chunks of earth until they were nice small pieces.   When he finished the second garden we walked over to the tractor and I simply asked him, "Who are you?"  He grinned and said he was Precious' uncle.   Oooooooh, that would make sense.   We chatted with him a while and then he tipped his big black hat at us and was off.  

That's our life these days,
Debbie......loving every minute of it!

Quick Peek at Our Easter Decor

Even though we are still living with quite a few boxes unpacked due to the lack of cabinets in the kitchen and small closets in the entire house, I still can't resist the urge to decorate.....just a wee bit for the holidays.   Our back porch is the main entry into the farmhouse so it's the natural place to do a bit of decorating.  But the porch is long and narrow and when it rains anything up against the screens gets wet, so right now I've put all the rocking chairs and tables up against the house to protect them.  

This sofa table used to be in our living room but it works so well out here on the porch and gives me a flat surface on which to put cute objects.   Like the ceramic bunnies.....and the chalkboard....and the runner I made years ago from an old ragged quilt in Easter colors.

As you can see, I've been having fun experimenting with the grandkids' chalk.  Who knew that chalkboard art would be elevated and find a place in home decor?

And doesn't everyone have an egg wreath hanging on their door?   Can you see the April mini-quilt hanging in the background?  I just love those monthly little guys.

I even found my Easter tablecloth.....miracle of miracles!    And the bunny plates, cups and saucers are just too cute.....

Ok, I know I promised that I'd show you pics of my cabinets.....and then I forgot all about it.   So here is the bookshelf built along the right hand side of the refrigerator in the kitchen.   I am so happy to finally have a home for all my cookbooks.   After the rest of the kitchen is finished, the counter portion of this bookshelf will have a matching countertop installed.   But for now at least there is a painted wooden countertop in place.   And the bunnies are very happy to rest there for a while. 

 Behind the bunnies is a needlepoint of fresh asparagus that I stitched many years ago.   The fresh asparagus remind me of Easter, and so every year the stitched pic gets pulled out for a few weeks and displayed.  Normally I have much more put out for Easter but this year I'm keeping it simple.  Works for me!

How do you decorate for Easter?
Debbie

Happy Easter

I believe that Easter represents a time of renewal.   The leaves are pushing their way thru the bark of trees, flowers are popping up out of the ground where there once was snow and birds are busy preparing for the next generation of their kind.  All around me I can witness the joy of a fresh start as the earth "wakes up" from it's winter slumber.

All born again Christians will celebrate the resurrection of our Lord, Jesus Christ, on Sunday.   All things are made possible thru Jesus.   He gives you the very breath you take.   He watches over you as you go about all the mundane activities of your daily life.   He is with you in joy and sadness, sickness and health, want and bounty, and yes, even when we sin He is with us.

And, sadly, we all sin.  Every day.   Without fail.   But the hope we have is that Jesus died on that cross almost 2000 years ago and he took our sins upon himself by giving himself as a living sacrifice in place of us.   We are the ones who deserve that punishment, but God loved us so much, can you understand this?......God loved us so much that he gave his only begotten Son to die on the cross for us. You and me.   And all we have to do is accept His invitation to become part of His family.  He's knocking on your door, won't you let Him in?

Yes, it's really that simple.  Jesus is knocking on the door of your heart.   Think about opening up to Him, just tell  Him you know you've sinned, and that you accept Him as your Savior.   It really is that simple.....just pray for one minute.   Admit to God that you have sinned and ask to be forgiven.  And Jesus will be with you, he will dwell in your heart and your sins will be forgiven.  And your name will be written in the Book of Life.   And you will dwell in heaven after you are gone from this earth.   And you will be part of a family bigger than anything you have ever known.   And you will gain peace. 

And then go and find a church so you can learn more about the miracle of salvation.....salvation from our sins.   And be part of something much larger than ourselves.   And you will find a refuge from the hustle, bustle, and stress of our everyday modern lives.  I promise you, if you just ask Jesus to come into your heart, you will never regret it.  It will be your "fresh start" just like the earth waking up from the winter's cold.

Praying for your "fresh start",
Blessings to you and your family,
From Debbie & Joel

You're Not Going to Believe This

Joel has become fascinated with raising our own pigs.   Yes, I said pigs.  Well you can't have pigs until you have a pig pen.   And so, in typical Joel fashion, he read several books, researched online, talked to the locals and then hatched a plan.   One day last week he and I walked our land to decide on the best location in which the little porkers would reside.   Then he ran into town and bought the supplies to build the pen,  4"x4" posts, hog panels and hardware, and bags of cement.  He was grinning  from ear to ear when he pulled in our lane with his trailer full of supplies.   Gotta love a man that gets excited about a hog pen!

 Hmmmm.....hog panels.....16 feet long and 34" high.   The wires are close together along one long side of the panels and that side goes against the ground....so the little piggies can't get out.  And supposedly, the pigs cannot get over the low fence.  Let's hope pigs don't fly!

Joel came up with "The Plan" and Jeremy did the grunt work.    It was nice to see my guys working together on this project and they got a lot accomplished in one day.   Here, most of the posts are in and cemented in place.

It helps to have the right tools.....and Joel certainly has plenty of tools!   Um, but who am I to give him a hard time about that?   He has seen the huge array of "tools" in my sewing room so I don't dare say a word.  giggle....

The pigs will be under the shade of our oak trees during the hot summer and when the leaves fall next autumn they will be warmed by the sun during the cooler months.   And Joel made sure they had plenty of room to roam around their "yard".

Whew!   Last post for the main part of the pen.   The only thing left to do now is put in posts to hold the gate we picked up the other day and the pen will be ready for our guests, Pork Chop and Bacon.  Yes, Joel has already named them and they aren't even here yet! 

Wait till you see the "house" he is planning for them.   Hopefully that will get done this next week.   Jeremy certainly has been a huge help to Joel.  With Joel's eyesight difficulties, it would have been almost impossible to hammer in all the staples that hold the wire.  But Jeremy got lots of practice hitting the staples as he put them all in himself.   But isn't that how it should be?   A father handing down his knowledge to his son?   I believe they both had a great sense of accomplishment at the end of the day.   And it looks great, too!  All I had to do was supply them with a thermos of steaming hot coffee.....that was an easy day for me.....

Here, piggy piggy!
Debbie