Friday Farm Fotos: Barn Swallow Rescue

If this lil' feller looks sorta unhappy, it's because he's having a pretty bad day.

This is a baby barn swallow, and this morning I found him on the floor of the sheep barn-

he had fallen out of his comfy little nest sometime last night.

He was lucky- the night before one of his siblings also fell out and was trampled

by the sheep before I found it the next morning.

Mr. and Mrs. Barn Swallow just had to build their nest in the highest peak of the barn, too-

a place where even our tallest step-ladder won't reach.... but even if I could put him back, he would probably just tumble out again because there are 3 more babies in the crowded little nest.

(Great, more tumblers to worry about. *sigh*)

Not knowing what else to do, I picked him up and put him on the ledge of the gate so momma and daddy could see him on their way in... sure enough, it wasn't long before they were stopping by and giving him a bite to eat.

He is tiny....

And he doesn't pay me any mind while he waits on his next meal.

All I can do now is keep an eye out for any predators that might be on the lookout for a helpless baby; it's up to mom and dad to do the rest. Fingers crossed....

Happy Friday, everyone!

From my Kitchen: Road Side Bounty

Double rainbow over the field.

One of the things I love best about this time of year is all the little roadside stands that pop up along the highways and country roads selling yummy fresh fruits and veggies. These people are usually just hardworking "tailgate farmers" who sell their goods at reasonable prices and try to have the freshest products available, sometimes even coming right out of the field with them.

Most weekends we tend to hibernate in order to stay away from all the traffic (especially holidays), but this weekend we took a couple of day trips, one with our bicycles and the other just to do a little sight-seeing in the mountains, and along the way we passed several roadside stands, finally stopping at one on a less-traveled road.

Anyone that knows me knows that my love for sweet corn borders on insanity. I mean, I can plow through a half-a-dozen ears before I have to come up for air. But my love for sweet corn is only rivaled by one other thing- fresh, plump strawberries. I don't waste time when those things are near, I just dive right in and ask questions later.

Since we had Lily with us, I stayed in the car with the air conditioner running while Hubby checked out the goods at this particular stand. He came back to the car with a smile on his face and said,

"They have peaches and cream corn." (My favorite.)

"They also have watermelons." (His favorite.)

Then he said the magic words-

"They also have fresh strawberries by the quart or gallon."

I think I squealed.

No, I know I squealed.

They also had peaches, although they weren't from around here, but I never met a peach I didn't like so he got a small bag of those, too.

This bounty of fresh fruits and veggies pretty much made up our menu for the weekend- the corn and watermelon were perfect with the pork barbecue sandwiches we had Saturday, and the peaches got turned into a cobbler....

And the rest of the strawberries became a pie.

(The "rest" being ones I managed to keep from eating.)

Even the chickens enjoyed our roadside bounty- they got to enjoy the leftover corn cobs and the strawberry cappings.

Lily, however, was a little confused as to why the chickens got a treat and she didn't.

Happy Tuesday, everyone!

Summer's Here! (A tad early...)

Lily trying to stay cool in her pool.

I wonder if there's room for me in there, too....

Welp, I'm trying to get back into this bloggie thing again, so bear with me.

While I was taking a break from the computer, Blogger went and changed the looks of everything on me, so now I'm having to figure things out as I go.

*Sigh*

Summer came a bit early for us this year- we've already been having some unusually warm weather and the forecast for this weekend is supposed to be near 90. *Whew* We need rain, too- the ground is drying up and the plants and gardens are needing a drink.

Here's what else is going on around here:

The Buzz from the Hive: 
The honey bee colony that moved into the home we set out for them back in March have been working up a storm.... we've added 3 new supers to the hive in the last month ("supers" are boxes with frames for storing honey) and these little workers have already filled them full of honey!  I did a post last year about the precious little honey bee, and in researching some of my facts I found I came across something that blew my mind- it requires 10,000 worker bees to gather a pound of honey, and they will fly the equivalent of more than twice around the world to gather it. Talk about being "busy as a bee"... that wears me out just thinking about it!

The Scoop from the Coop:
The final count for spring chicks this year was 34- and I've sold all of them but 8. I'm trying to find a home for 4 of them who I'm pretty sure are roosters. (And that's one thing we don't need around here is more roosters...) You would think that after hatching off that many babies, the last thing these crazy little fuzzy-bottomed hens would want to do is sit on more eggs....

Think again.

And if you look close enough at this picture, she almost looks like she's smiling.

Smugly.

From my Sewing Room:
A few months ago I made it a point to try to get my sewing room more organized- and keep it that way. I especially wanted to figure out a way to tame my fabric stash, which can get really out of hand at times. (Not that I have that much fabric, but after I dig through it a few times looking for something it looks like a bomb went off.)

One day I found these cool little organizers on someone's blog-

You just tuck the ends into these little "clips" and wrap the fabric around it and once you're done, it looks like a miniature bolt of fabric.

I wanted to keep two fabrics together for certain projects so I wrapped them on the same bolt.

Now I'm sweet-talking Hubby into building me some beautiful wood shelves to store them on... *Squeeeal*

(If you want more info on these organizers, click here to go to the website.)

Well, that's enough for today I guess... hope I didn't bore you too bad.

Happy Tuesday everyone!

Friday Farm Fotos: What A Wonderful World

 "I see trees of green, red roses too.

I see them bloom for me and you.

   And I think to myself, what a wonderful world."

"I see skies of blue, and clouds of white.

The bright blessed day, the dark sacred night.

And I think to myself, what a wonderful world."

Life is finally slowing down (a little bit) for now, computer woes are hopefully fixed, and I'm working on some new posts for next week about what's been going on around here lately. Until then, I'm going to spend my time getting caught up with all my blog friends- I want to see what's been going on in your world!

Happy Friday everyone, and most of all, Happy Mother's Day!

Friday Farm Foto: Oh, you again....

I'm pretty sure these little chicks get tired of seeing my big head peeking into their coop every few hours- in fact, their expression in this picture says it all:

"Oh, it's her again."

But I can't help it... I have a fever and the only cure is more fuzzy-bottoms. :)

A little unexpected blog break is happening for me right now... there is much to do like mowing the grass and lots of spring cleaning of the house and the barns, and I've been doing a little embroidery work to pick up some extra money.

 I've also experienced some issues with Blogger lately, like not being able to

leave comments on some of my favorite blogs. Well, actually I was able to comment, but then they would disappear-  for some reason they were going into the "Spam" folder.... very frustrating.

(By the way, you might want to check the spam folder on your blog to see if my comments or comments from others might be in there...)

I almost decided just to stop blogging... but then I would miss all of you terribly

and I have so much to share that I'd like to stick around for a while longer.

Hopefully things around here will slow down and I can get my blogging mojo back soon.... *sigh*

Happy Friday, everyone- I'll be back, I promise!

(Almost) Wordless Wednesday: Ready to Ride

 Or, maybe not.

 

Friday Farm Funny: This little game we play

My precious Edie, the sweetest sheep God ever made.

Every day it's the same routine:

I start the morning feeding chores at the big barn where Daisy and Edie's stall is located...

not because they're that special (which they kinda are) but because it's also adjacent to where the chicken feed is kept.

I give Daisy and Edie a little grain and a nice, tasty block of hay, and then it's on to the chicken coop.

But then I turn around to see they are following me...

abandoning their grain and hay and walking along beside me on the other side of the fence.

Almost as if they want something more from me...

Could it possibly be the sweet corn I have in my bucket which was supposed to be for the chickens? Hmmm?

Try looking at this next picture and NOT imagine that they are saying,

"Oh please, just a little nibble? Puh-leeese?"

And then, like a National Geographic special on sharks- the feeding frenzy begins.

Daisy is always the first to get her head through the fence and her tongue to the scoop...

(Edie is a little slow...)

The corn flies out of the scoop as she licks all she can before

Edie manages to get her head through the fence...

Then Edie mops up what's left...

Ever heard of a "milk moustache"?

This is very similar and it's called "corn lips".

Once the corn is all gone,

they turn and calmly walk back toward the barn;

back to their grain and hay......

*Sigh*

I feel so used....

Happy Good Friday, everyone!!

Friday Farm Fotos: Fuzzy Bottom Maternity Ward

They're heee-ere!!

Well, not all of them- in fact, not even half of the eggs have hatched yet,

but it looks like we will have a bumper crop of Spring Chickies for 2012.

Before the hatching even began, we almost had a terrible tragedy...

I heard one of the hens making a unusual squawking sound, like they do when they're scared or very upset, so I went up to the coop to investigate.

To my horror, I saw a huge black snake in the nest box with it's mouth wrapped around

one of the soon-to-be hatching eggs! 

Without thinking I quickly moved into Chikie Protector mode... I squeezed Mr. Snake's head until he gently laid the precious egg back down, then I lifted him out of the box and introduced him to the business end of my garden hoe.

I'm just glad I was at home when it happened, or Mr. Snake wouldn't have stopped until all the eggs in that box were gone...

A couple of days later, the first chick hatched..... *squeal*

Then came the second one....

 In the meantime- while we were waiting for all these hatchings to slowly take place,

somebody had to get a bath....

Then there were more....

How many we have once they're all hatched is anybody's guess... there are still at least a couple dozen more to go. In the meantime, I get to "Oooh" and "Ahhh" over each one... and I also get to be the first to hold them! *tiny squeal*

Have a happy Fuzzy-Bottomed Friday, everyone!

Friday Farm Fotos: Broody hens and a Big Bee Welcoming Committee

Lily gets filled in on the latest hen house gossip.

Some of you may remember back a couple of years ago when Dad helped us get started in beekeeping with two hives of our very own...  sadly, one hive didn't make it through the first year, and then last spring we were heartbroken when we found out the second hive- which had been the stronger of the two- was gone as well.

Last Saturday, Hubby was working in his little shop behind the barn and since it was 80 degrees that afternoon, he had his doors wide open to help keep cool. He started noticing honey bees flying inside the door and gathering around our beekeeping supply box and the empty hives in the corner. He finally called for me to come and help him try to get the bees out of his building, and I told him I thought they might be looking for a home.

Hubby was a little skeptical at first, but he went along with my idea to set out one of the hive boxes and see what happened... we watched closely the rest of the evening and even Sunday morning but didn't see much activity. But once we arrived back home from church Sunday morning we looked up the hill and couldn't believe our eyes- the sky was black with a swarm of bees trying to get into the hive. An hour later, they had all but moved in and started cleaning house! They were literally throwing the old comb and dead bees out the front of the hive... and I told Hubby it looked like we were back in the honey bee business!

We have no idea where these bees came from, but we are very glad to have some again. I am feeding them sugar water every day to help them get off to a good start, and I hope they like it here so much they decide to stay around for a long time. (If you want to see a short video from a couple of years ago of me "feeding" sugar water to a honey bee, click here.)

************************************************

It's that time of year again.....

Right now I have five (yes, five) broody silkie hens on the nest...
and you know what that means- chicks will be coming soon.

*SQUEEEEAL*

Sometimes when I look at these determined little hens, I can't help but wonder-

what on earth do they think about while they sit on those eggs for hours on end?

Sometimes they are shy and don't want to face the world, so they just turn their fuzzy bottom to it.

Either that or they're just mooning my camera.

And sometimes they let you know what they think of your camera (and you) 

with a swift peck on the hand.

Maybe we should be asking the Daddy what he thinks about all those babies on the way....

I don't know about you, but he looks a little bewildered to me.

Like he's wondering how he's going to pay for all those diapers.....

Happy Friday, everyone!

Friday Farm Fotos: Changes

I've not been doin' so good on this here blawg thing lately....

For some reason the days are rolling along so fast right now and since the Daylight Savings change I've been losing track of time even worse than before... it's dark for almost 2 hours after I get up in the mornings, but now it's daylight for a long time after the supper dishes are cleaned up! *JEEZ*

There have been some changes around here lately; some sad, some happy.... and some letting go of things that were before and moving forward.
A few weeks ago Hubby looked at me out of the blue and said, "I don't know if I'm going to be able to put up hay this year."
This took me totally by surprise since he was so excited about all of his new hay equipment just a couple of years ago.... but I understood where he was coming from since this statement was made after we left the doctors' office for the last time and he issued Hubby a pretty stern warning about taking it easy from now on.

So the tractor shed has gone from looking like this:

To looking like this.

Gone are the big tractors and all the heavy equipment- now a cute little tractor sits in their place, complete with a front loader to make our life easier.

(This means I can clean out the barns now without having to use a wheelbarrow! *squeeal*)






And since we'll be buying our hay this year we will stack it next to this tractor in the last stall of this shed instead of storing it in the barn.... this was decided upon after we found out a skunk thought the barn was a no-tell motel and checked in for a couple of nights on top of some bales of hay and ruined them.




That's enough for today... I don't want to spring too much change on you at one time.
I'll save the rest until later. (insert evil laugh)

But just in case you're wondering, Lily is still spoiled.
I don't see that changing any time soon....



Happy Friday, everyone!