Monday, May 24, 2010

Sick kids & busy day

Both girls are down with the stomach flu, so I spent the day putzying around the house getting stuff done while I made dry toast and cleaned up puke and did all the stuff moms do with el-sicko kids. Fortunately I think they're both on the mend.

Chilly this morning - 28 degrees. Glad I haven't planted much in the garden yet.


Enough putting it off. Gotta do something with all that milk piling up in the fridge. Put two gallons on the stove for cheese and had three gallons left over. The box has seed potatoes in it. The green bucket has this morning's milk, as yet unstrained.


Making yogurt:


Incubating:


Cut up 45 lbs. of potatoes for seed potatoes. Here they're spread on the table to let the cut sides air-dry for a day. I'm hoping to plant by tomorrow since we have weather moving in after that.


Caught up on all the laundry.


I hang whites on the drying racks even in summer because it's so much easier than clipping each and every sock and pair of undies to the clothesline. Make a note: buy extra clothes pins as part of our preparedness supplies.


We have a family of starlings nesting in a hole in the side of our house. By sheer coincidence it's in the wall of my office, so I've been listening to the sounds of chicks making chick-noises for weeks now. I'll be glad when they're raised.

Here's one of the babies:


Here's the mama, about to feed. To get this shot I crouched inside our greenhouse and mostly closed the door (hence the odd-looking stuff around the edges) because otherwise mama wouldn't come near the hole with me standing there trying to take a picture. I'm actually rather pleased with this shot.



Mowed the lawn, which was looking decidedly shaggy. Before:


After:



Lydia says, "Let's play!"

4 comments:

  1. Patrice, your days are so productive! I love reading about all the work that you get done on the farm. I hope the girls heal up quickly!

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  2. laundry (line-dried) has such a fresh clean smell and irons up really nice. i live on five acres and do not have farm animals but lots of fruit trees and berries. yesterday and the day before i spent a little time making jam from the wild plums, raspberries, blueberries and blackberries that i had stored in the freezer at the end of last season..had to make room in freezer...but i do can most things...including chili, spagetti sauces, soups, etc.. your dog is beautiful..i have to chinese sharpei that are my constant companions. do you sew or quilt?

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  3. I agree with CCR...I'm constantly amazed at what you do in a day. It motivates me. I am curious Patrice...what was your childhood like? Were you raised on a farm? Do you have siblings?

    Tricia

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  4. To answer questions:

    LOL, I *seriously* hate sewing. My mother, who is quite expert at sewing, despaired of ever teaching her only daughter to enjoy it. I *can* sew, but only under great duress. It ties me up in knots. I simply cannot understand how some people say it relaxes them.

    I deeply admire quilts but have no talent for them myself.

    I wasn't raised on a farm, I was raised first in the suburbs then later on a one-acre parcel just outside of small city. The proximity to wilder areas gave me a taste of nature and impelled me toward biology in college, but we never had anything more exotic than some pet chickens as kids.

    And I have three brothers, no sisters. All my brothers (and parents) are now urban. I've always been the "nature freak" of the family and I suspect my brothers think I'm a little nutso to shovel cow poop and try planting wheat, but they like coming to visit nonetheless.

    - Patrice

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