Holiday Season Upon Us

Catchup time!

First, produce from the garden:  Arugula and our first baby tomato:

 Next, our deck was replaced:

Then the frost and freeze hit us for two nights, and no more cukes or beans.  :(  We do have broccoli, cabbage, collards, radicchio, kale, spinach and romaine still growing, though. They have done well through the frosts.  Still have some tomatoes holding on.

Not only did the frost hit, but our fridge went out and our H/VAC system!  It was an expensive month.  Fortunately, we had heat just in time.  This is the fourth time our fridge has gone out in the last 4 years.  What is it with us and fridges???

Then Thanksgiving came and we went to our daughter Michelle's home for a few days.  Our son, Tristan, and his girlfriend, Tracy drove down from New York with their dog, Lilly (bulldog on the left) and they stopped at our home to see it for the first time.  They also helped move some furniture around.  That night we watched old home movies around the time Tristan was 5 just to show Tracy what a cute kid he was.  Tristan is in the middle back with Tracy on Gary's right.  Michelle is in pink and her hubby, Brian, and 6 kids (4-14) are in front.  The Mastiff is Daisy.

 We ate a lot, but exercised too and the weather was perfect on Thanksgiving Day.  

Now we have to do some landscaping around the deck and front and get ready for Christmas.  That will entail a trip to North Carolina near New Year's.  But more on that later.

Oh, and yesterday, for the first time since we got the house in April, Gary and I managed to make it back to the end of our very woodsy five acres.  It was very grown up with briars and probably some critters we didn't want to see during the summer, so we waited till now that things have died down a bit.  We need to get it fenced so we can get our goats this spring.  However, we had no idea what it looked like.  Now we know and it's not as bad as we thought.  We are hoping to do the fencing ourselves with a person who has done fencing before to help us.  Should be an adventure.

Hope your Thanksgiving was wonderful and relaxing.

Life's still good...

Little Green Things!

After I arranged the hay bales, Gary helped tighten wire between three T-posts, one at each end of the bales and one in the middle.  The wires serve two purposes: to hold the plastic sheeting and act as a trellis for the climbing veggies.

 

tightening the wires

 

All planted and waiting for magic

 A layer of organic soil was placed on top of the bales about 2 inches thick.  I patted it down, and began planting my seeds.  A few days later - MAGIC!

Pole beans!

Cucumbers!

 To keep them warm at night and keep the moisture in, I spread the plastic sheeting over the bottom wire and tuck it in at the bottom.  Every morning I uncover them and give them a big drink.

Protection

 Also happening around the "almost farm", we needed our beautiful oak trimmed over the well pump in the back of the house.  Bobby came and climbed all over the tree taking out limbs that took me weeks to burn.  But we saved some beautiful logs for a CAMPFIRE, all you RVers that are coming to visit!

Man in tree

It is not all work and no play.  The Sunbelt Expo was coming to Moultrie, Georgia, and we attended on the last day.  Six hundred acres of BIG machinery and little machinery like this 1904 Hit and Miss Vertical Engine that churns fresh icecream!  My brother, Bob, has one just like this.  I sent him this photo and suggested that at next year's reunion, he do the same thing!

There were animals, seminars, gardens, tractors, food, and tons of stuff to see and do.  We spent all day there until they closed up, then drove the 1 1/2 hours home exhausted but with lots of fun info floating around in the brain.

Hubby enjoying himself!

 So how's the garden?  This was taken today.  Some things lasted, but some things needed replanting.  I have never had a garden, so this is all new to me.  Trial and error (a lot of that). These are cool weather crops, so I'm hoping my tomatoes make it to fruition. 

I have very little bugs, just some mites on the beans, which I spray off with a jet of water, them coat with Neem oil (also organic).  I'm trying to keep everything Organic - so much healthier.  

This week, we are getting an estimate on our rotten deck, going to a farm tomorrow to see pregnant goaties and some landscaping plants and ordering chickens!  They won't be here until the spring as they are MAILED through the USPS - yep.  

So more fun things will be happening at the "Almost Farm".

More Good Times

Our drive down to Raleigh from Red Oak, VA was very pleasant, stopping at antique and junque stores along the way.  Southern States Farm and Feed Store is (almost) replacing Walmart.  Now we compare prices on goat feed, chicken feed and fencing.  Who woulda thought?

Anyhow, we arrived in Raleigh with hugs and kisses to the daughter, Mandy and family.  Ainsley was turning 7 on Saturday and Granny (Gary's mom) was turning 91 on the 17th.  Saturday was a busy day with Jack (10) looking good at his second football game of the season.

Cute redhead fourth from right

 Ainsley had a million little giggly girls at the gymnastics facility for her birthday right after the game. 

Big smile for the camera

That night we had dinner with our dear friends, Dick and Diane at their home.  Fabulous meal, thanks, guys!  Seeing them is like we never left Raleigh.  Such good friends!

But work awaits.  We left Monday morning for Lake City and it rained the whole way down.  Ugh.  During our vaca, I often check the radar in LC to keep tabs on the weather.  Because of the great big green, yellow and red spots over our area day after day, I was hoping our house would still be standing on its original foundation.  It turned out we had 7 inches or more in a couple days, but fortunately everything was just very wet.  We did have a new pond down by the road which will recede, but it was 'unusually heavy rain', says the locals.  That makes two:  'unusually cold winter' and 'unusually heavy rain'.  We are just hoping no 'unusually bad hurricanes' show up this season...

We found a guy with some straw bales and drove over to pickup 13 bales (all that would fit in the truck).  I've never had a garden, so this is trial and error, folks.  Get ready for anything...  

He understood what I was trying to do, and wished us luck.  

Feeling 'farmerish'

 This is how one makes a Strawbale Garden. First the foundation:  newspapers, which I watered to keep them in place.   

Then a layer of weed barrier landscape fabric (kindly left by previous owner)  topped with flattened cardboard boxes (saved from our move).

Place the bales cut side up and string side on the sides squished together.

OK, it's not the straightest garden, but I did it myself and those bales are HEAVY!.  Call it a free-form garden.

Now comes the conditioning.  First you water and water.  The rain helped with that step.  Then you spread fertilizer over the tops and water it in with a fireman's type nozzle for deep penetration.  The idea is to get that fertilizer into the middle of the bales.  I want my garden to be as organic as possible, so I used Milorganite (also called poop in a bag).

What is Milorganite?

Milorganite fertilizer is one of the oldest branded fertilizers on the market today.  It is composed of heat-dried microbes that have digested the organic matter in wastewater.  Milorganite is manufactured by the Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District.  The District captures wastewater from the metropolitan Milwaukee area.  This water is then treated with microbes to digest nutrients that are found in it, and cleaned water is returned to Lake Michigan.  The resulting microbes are then dried, becoming Milorganite fertilizers.  The Milorganite program is one of the world’s largest recycling efforts.

 Cool, eh? 

It will take 15 days to pretreat the bales until planting time with a specific routine that includes watering and adding more fertilizer.  Slowly the inside of the bales heat up to nearly 160 degrees, composting enough that the bacteria inside is activated and begins to digest the straw, making the nitrogen and other good stuff ready for the little plants.

I've also begun my non-GMO seeds (a little late, but you can't go away after planting baby seeds and leave them unattended). 

We have babies!

I used half peat moss and vermiculite and stuffed cutup paper towel and toiletpaper rolls (that have been collected for months).  Right now I'm doing cool weather crops: Kale, Parsley, Egg Yolk tomatoes and Roma tomatoes that will be transplanted when the bales are ready.  And I just noticed we have babies:  the Kale and Romas are awake and growing!

The rest of the seeds will be direct sown when the bales are ready. Lake City and Fort White have a seed exchange policy.  You can order free seeds, and hopefully be able to return some at your harvest!  I must have ordered twenty different veggie and flower seeds from them, and with some luck, some may produce.  

Our home faces south, and I love to look out the kitchen windows at our front yard, but with the sun's lower angle now, it can be quite intense.  So I made some kitchen curtains from old lace.  We can still see out, but it is a pretty, cottage-like, sun dappled light now.  Poetic, huh?

 

Gary is happy playing homeowner: trimming trees, altering pipe locations, cutting grass, and being healthy.  We went to the Mayo Clinic to get his new contact lens, and so far it is working great.  We will have a followup appointment in a couple weeks just to make sure everything is OK.  We like going to Jax as we get to see the beach, too.  

Next on our list is to get a tree-trimming guy out and a fence estimate.  Gotta get fence before goaties!  

Research, research, research!  Fun, Fun and Fun!

Life is SOOOO Good!

What I Did on My Summer Vacation

Being retired is somewhat a permanent vacation.  Unless you decide to have a farm.  But we will get to that in a minute.

August 17 was drive to Raleigh Day.  Nine hours later we were there!  Hugs all around, then hit the sack.  August 18 was drive to Stockton, NJ day.  Ten hours later (taking the scenic route up 85 and left at Richmond, and right on 81North) we found ourselves at a detour.  Only fifteen minutes it took to figure out the detour and we were at my brother Bob's house.  Hugs, and out to dinner, then bed.  Next day, we went for our favorite bagel (notice I said "our") then drove over to High Bridge to pick up my son, Tristan and his girlfriend, Tracy.  Their train from New York was delayed a bit due to a fire on the tracks (!) but they were only 20 minutes late.  Hugs all around, and we headed home.  Saturday Tristan and Gary did some work for Bob.  Gary cut the grass and Tristan prepared a 1905 Ford fender for painting.  Bob does restorative work on antique cars as a hobby.  Tracy and I went shopping in downtown Frenchtown, an historic old town on the Delaware.  Lots of antiques, boutiques and cafes.  Fun times!  We had a burger grill that night for dinner and Tracy made macaroons for dessert!  No time for a picture, they were gone immediately!

Sunday morning we were expecting 20 or so people for a picnic.  My other brother, Kirk, brought 10 pounds of black sea bass he had caught (his hobby is fishing) and mixed up a spicy batter and fried it all!  That only took 5 hours but he kept it coming!

Tristan adds Tabasco

This was a special picnic because my 91 year old uncle had moved down to NJ from Vermont this summer and he was the guest of honor. I had not seen him in about 10 years since my Dad's funeral.   Looks pretty good, eh?  Still likes a beer or two..

Uncle Ollie

 My niece, Jennifer, and her little girl, Gaby were welcomed at the door.  She'll be three in Dec.

And believe it or not, not one person took a group photo!  Arrrrughghg.  Perhaps because it was sooo hot and humid and then rained in the middle of the picnic.  Even more humid later, but I did get to spend time with every person.  It was wonderful.  And we will do it again with even more people next time.

Doing some research on goats, I found a farm in Virginia just a couple hours north of Raleigh with Nigerian goats and a bed and breakfast!  We decided to leave Stockton a day early, drive to Harrisonburg, VA and spend the night.  Get up the next morning and drive to Red Oak for dinner, breakfast and a lesson on goats!  We left on Tuesday with nice weather and landed in Harrisburg where Gary wanted to find something for dinner in our room.  He came back an hour later with a fruit cup, a hummus and crackers and a chocolate bar.  Yum.  BUT, he found an Amish Antique Barn that opened at 10 am.   Ohhh, lots of fun there.  He found an inexpensive cowboy hat, I found some material and a couple Mason jars for my collection.  TONS of stuff, and we stayed longer than expected, and even for an Amish turkey Ruben on homemade rye bread.  Delish!

Finally we got going and drove through farm country that was straight from the picture books.  Just charming.  We found The Cornerstone Farm after driving by, and it was a farmhouse with a wrap around porch and comfy chairs and flowers all around it.  A bee was interested in the Salvia...

Barb was finishing up some phone calls, so we walked around to see the animals.  They had:  ponies, horses, goats, 3 guard dogs, an Alpaca and llama, chickens, turkeys, geese, ducks and guinea hens and bunnies and one little lamb on 92 acres.  Whew.  There were only two owners, Barb and Wade (who was in Colorado on vaca).  And this brings me to my earlier point.  With a farm there is no vacation - together!  Wade also works as a corrections officer with the Virginia DOC.  So he was off with some buddies sporting something.  Barb was left with all the animals and a foster young lady of 16.  She was still in school, so helped with chores when she got home at 4 pm.  

Saying Hello

Two Old Goats

We enjoyed meeting the goats, and I asked many questions.  She did sell the babies, but it would be too much of a ride to bring them to Florida.  She is 'drying them off' (slowly  discontinue milking) so that they will be ready to breed in October.  The babies take about 5 months gestation, and come usually in multiples. So the goaties did not need milking at night, just in the morning. 

Barb was wonderful, and answered every one of my questions, and then cooked us a delicious chicken dinner ("no one we know") with pie and icecream for dessert.  We fed the goaties, gave them some hay and closed them in for the evening.  Gary and I retired to our room, took a shower and did some reading on some goat politics.  Farmers can have it rough in this era, too.  But I can't go into it here.

Seven am and up at at 'em with some fresh coffee with fresh raw goats milk.  YUM!!!  Then out to the barn to feed the babies and milk a few.

Barb showed me what to look for when purchasing a goat.  Conformation, breeding history, and health records were all important.  They are all adorable and only 22" at the withers for the does, 23" for the bucks.  She had about 8 bucks, but they were kept on the other side of the house, far away from the does.  A male buck can impregnate a doe at 8 weeks.  So you decide quickly what your plans are when the babies are born, oh yep.

The does love to be milked because they get grain while you are milking them.  They just jump on the bench, you clip their collar to the stand, and they begin to eat.  Meanwhile, you clean the teats, check the milk quality with a strip cup, and begin to millk.  It takes (for everyone but me) 5 minutes to milk each goat.  But all four were very patient while I tried to get the milk IN the cup and not all over me.  That skill needs some practice, but it's not hard.  Usually Barb uses a pail, but it was easier for me to try to hit the opening of the cup, rather than the specially lidded pail.

After the milking was done, we let them out to play, and while Barb was getting breakfast food ready, we watched the babies play with a plastic 'boat'. 

Playing peekaboo.

 And Bethel -

eating the grass that is always greener on the other side of the fence...


Soon the farm bell rang.  Come and git it!  First we had to choose our eggs.  Hmmm, even though they all taste the same, I chose a dark brown one, and a tan one, and Gary chose two tan ones.  

While they were frying up, I had a really good taste of fresh goats milk.  It is very sweet and creamy.  Nigerian's have the most butterfat in their milk which makes great cheese and soap.  Both of what I want to do, so of course, I need the right goat.

And this is a Farmer's Breakfast!   Aaaaaaaaaahhhhhh

We really didn't work that hard to have eaten all that, so we called it brunch and didn't eat until later that night.

This small creature is a velvet ant. Which isn't an ant at all, but a wingless wasp.  I had never seen anything like that in Florida, just fire ants.  But they live here apparently.  These guys are really hard to kill.  It took me 4 times scrunching my feet on it to separate it and kill it.  Their sting is so strong, it is dubbed the "cow killer".  Ouch.  Don't touch.  

We left later that afternoon, and drove down to Raleigh, stopping in Clarksville and Oxford at antique shops before we arrived at our daughter, Mandy's.  But that's another story.

Life is good and FUN!

summer camp at mompom and poppy's

July brought three of our grandchildren from St. Pete to stay with us for Summer Camp!  We named it Pompy's Camp, weird, I know, but it worked for the kids.  Lauren had just turned 11, Graham will be 8 in October and Henry will be 4 in October.

Hours of preparation went into planning and purchasing.  The Dollar Store has opened a commercial account for us!  Bug jars, water guns, noodles, toothpicks.  Michael's loves us, too.  Socks, jewels, Easter eggs (yep, got 'em on sale from Easter!).  Lest us not forget WALMART:  marshmallows, pudding, all meals, a HUGE FOUR FOOT POOL... the list goes on.

Drive to St. Pete to pick up kids and help the family move in to their renovated (and I mean TOTALLY renovated home - a year and a bit) and a three hour drive to Lake City.  Kids good as gold.  Showed them their rooms - ugh, oh, forgot Henry's overnight diapers.  Well, it's time he was out of them anyway.  He promised he would hold it till morning.  And he DID!  Proud Henry!

First we need to catch some critters around here.  There are some strange ones, but Graham found a green grasshopper and Lauren caught a anole (alias gecko).  Henry's ants got out of the airvent.  Oh, well...

After we filled the pool to warm up a bit, we played pinata water balloons.  Henry did very well eventually, and even Poppy got in on the act.  He took longer than Henry even with the blindfold off!

I wanted a memento of this occasion (as if I'd forget) so we mixed up some cement and made stepping stones with the jewels.  They dried the next week, and now they are by the driveway.  Sweet.

Dollar store hit.

An unusually sweet moment....

Lauren is very artistic and made this sock puppet and lightning bug using those Easter eggs.  She decorated the outside and put a battery votive light inside so he lights up at night.  We had a dozen eggs, and each one was different.

Graham's favorite activity was driving Ariel with the siblings in the hay behind him.  He could reach the pedals, but Henry couldn't so Poppy helped him out.

Marshmallow sculptures and Bullseyes on coffee filters (for gun practice, water that is..)

Poppy enjoyed making a tire swing and Lauren and sister, Ellie pose.  Ellie came with Mom and Dad to pick up Lauren, Graham and Henry.  Lance and Charlie were still at camp.  Yep, we can still remember all their names.

It was a great success, and will no doubt be repeated.  Thank you, Pinterest, for all the ideas.
Boy it was quiet when everyone left.

Our non-human animals ventured out again in the peace.  Our little fox on top of the sand that she had dug out of her den.  We never saw her pups, though.  She has since left, thank goodness,  because chickens will be coming in the fall.  Chickens and foxes do not mix.

This 'sweet' thing stayed with us (under the house) for a little while, but has since left, too.

And turtle raced me back to the house from the mailbox.  Then he headed to the horse pasture next door.

We continue to make progress on the property.  I have totally washed the exterior of the house with a squirt bottle of Clorox Cleanup and a brush and a ladder.  It sparkles!  I painted the shutters and now they are up and beautiful. Gary built me a potting bench, and himself a work bench in the garage.  We will do some landscaping when it gets a little cooler.  Our coop plans are chosen and hopefully my son and brother will come down for Thanksgiving and help build it.  I also need to convince my brother to clear some of the back forty so we can get fencing for our goaties.

Speaking of goaties, I received an email from Cindy and Mike who have 11 goats that they need to rehome.  We went over to see them and glean some info about how to take care of goaties.  We are more interested in dwarf Nigerian goats, and these were a mix of Boer and Nubian.  The young ones were cute, but Cindy and Mike did not do much care.  The previous owner disbudded the young ones, trimmed hooves and they were not milked.  Three important things I wanted to know a bit more about.  So we admired their huge barn and beautiful home, had some ice water (it wast 102 outside), and departed. 

More importantly, Gary is spot free once again!  His last PUVA treatment was on July 7, and even though his Dr. wanted him to continue once a week, he said no, he was going to take a break until his checkup in December.  

And more exciting news:  His sweeeeet eye doctor here in Lake City really wanted to help Gary with his continuing eye problem: scratchy corneas, dry eye and ingrown eyelashes due to the intense radiation a year ago.  So she said she would talk to other Doctors at a conference she was attending the end of July.  True to her word, the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville called and set up an appointment for him last week.  We drove to Jax for the first time (an hour) the day before as his appointment was for 7:40 am and treated ourselves to an overnight hotel!  [Special Mayo rate at the Holiday Inn Express and free breakfast!]  I ordered some fabric at Calico Corners for curtains spending a good couple hours, and a few bucks, and then we drove around the city and to the beach having lunch at the Pita Pit - delicious.  Had an early night. 

Next am, we finally saw a doctor at 9:30, Katherine Gold, an Opthamologist, who told him two options: surgery to remove the mucus membrane on the lower lid and upper lid that had turned into skin, thus the scratching, replacing with skin grafts from inside his mouth; and a kind of electrolosis for his eyelashes.  Neither was appealing to me.  Most of all because even a biopsy can send this cancer into overdrive and begin lesions again, and second of all because she said it may be multiple surgeries and may not work even then.

So then we saw Bridgett Keener, a contact specialist, and after checking Gary for all kinds of stuff, he tried on a special lens that is larger and has a hard center with soft edges.  Although she did not have the prescription strength he needed, as soon as he put on a temporary lens, it was instant relief.  So she will call with delivery of the ones he needs, and we'll see if our insurance will cover the cost of those...

Other than that news, we are headed up to Raleigh on Wednesday and then on up to see my brothers and Tristan (son) and girlfriend, Tracy, and then a longer visit in Raleigh on the way back for our grandaughter's 7th birthday and Gary's mom's 91st birthday!  

That will be the last trip we plan to take for a while.  My garden must get planted.  I am planning a strawbale garden, so stay tuned for that adventure..  All family and friends will have to come to us (and you are all welcome!) so that we can get our rears in gear, and get our 'livestock'.  Lots of things to do till then, so thanks for visiting, and please make it a physical visit anytime!

Life is still so GOOD!