Here is a “catching up” on the day-to-day happenings here in the last few months.
The garden:
The summer garden continued to thrive well into October but
the tomatoes finally met their end at the frost which hit during the first week of
November.
Jack’s pumpkins failed
miserably due to squash bugs and vine borers so I replanted them in a different
location in August.
They did much better
and we enjoyed a small pumpkin harvest in November.
We got a fun little crop of sweet potatoes which was surprising because I planted them very very late.
In September, we planted the fall garden. I have mentioned how we were solarizing a
large space within the fenced garden area to plant a no-till garden.
I felt pressure to get the plants in the ground asap because
I had started the seeds indoors in the only place available – our master
bathroom over the useless tub - and they were outgrowing their seed starting
trays. Plus, we just wanted them out of the bathroom. 
We worked extremely hard and got it in at what I thought was
“Late” but then we continued to have temperatures in the high 80’s for another
6 weeks so all of the lettuce bolted and the other brassicas were not
happy.
My dad set up a drip tape irrigation system for it so we
don’t have to hand water the garden if there is a dry spell.
In the rows we planted Row 1: Green Cabbage, 2:
Brussels Sprouts 3: Red cabbage, 4: Brussels sprouts, 5: Green cabbage,
6: a mixture of all leftover plants including some broccoli.
I also had this bed of broccoli.
We painstakingly found and carried each and every one of
those stones up from the creek. The
creek dried up completely this summer so it was easy to get to the rocks.
However, there were a few times when I flipped one over there was a
cottonmouth or copperhead underneath. It
made rock hunting more exciting.
The cats LOVE the garden and are so funny the way they
politely stay on the walkways.
(at least while we are watching)
They have caught several mice and moles in
the garden.
Once the weather finally cooled down, the plants started to do well and the cabbages are actually heading!
The broccoli did
not produce much even though the plants were huge.
and the Brussels sprouts –
well, we are still waiting on them.
There are wild, green onions growing randomly within the
garden – at first that bothered me but I just let them be and they have
contributed to dinners a few times now.
Bees:
My dad found that bees had made a hive in our barn. I was so excited because we want to get bees
in the spring so how lucky that they already made a hive! Wrong!
We borrowed some bee keeping supplies from my friend from church and my
dad and I braved the barn.
Unfortunately,
the bees turned out to be yellow jackets – aggressive ones at that, so we got
rid of their nest.
I did not get stung
but it was weird watching the bees deliberately attack us but
their stingers couldn’t get through the gloves.
My dad did get stung because he did the exterminating.
We also discovered bats living in the barn. They were pretty cool. They have moved on now but I am sure they’ll
be back.
The pond:
The pond dried up quite a bit this summer. So much so that it is more of a large
puddle. My dad is working to clear the
edges of all the brush and debris before it fills up again in the spring.
There are small fish in there and frogs, and
turtles. Amazingly no snakes have been
spotted. My parents are going to clean it out and aerate it with a solar
pump. Someday, in the not too distant
future, it will be a nice pond.
Chickens:
Our chickens finally started laying in late October. (Literally
the day after we butchered the meat chickens – coincidence?) They lay a beautiful array of colorful
eggs.
We get about 20 a day so as you
can imagine, we have a ton of eggs. We
keep the clean, bigger, prettier ones to sell, and the rest we keep on the
counter to eat. Unwashed eggs don’t
have to be refrigerated. I will start
water glassing them soon but for now we have been able to sell any excess. We have had two farm stand sales down at the road and sell them there but we leave this egg sign up whenever we are home.
Just this morning our regular egg customer
drove up and bought 11 dozen!
We are very fond of our girls and the two roosters, Kyle
and
Jacque Pierre.
Jacque needs to find a
new home. He is rooster number 2
and Kyle doesn’t like him.
Some of the chickens look different and we can tell them
apart so they have names.
Becky – she has the
bad hair
Jessie
The Hawk
Dottie
Veronica
The 4 fluffy cochins are named Plumette, Odette, Annette, and
Lizette but no one knows who is who.
The rest we call “One of the red ones" or "small grey ones"
Projects:
We did a lot of fence repair and removal in the late
summer.
The weird, wedding arbor thing
out front with the lattice backdrop in the woods was taken down (shown in this picture)
and we
fixed/repainted the fence white.
Then we replaced a falling apart wire fence with the same wood
style as the font and painted it to match the deck.
We also sanded and painted the propane tank.
The kids' play area had fencing cutting it off from the
rest of the yard.
It was very awkward so my dad ripped it out and took out a
tree so that we can cut through the yard that way.
We also had to fix the planter that was
there so it looks a lot better too.
We moved, remodeled, improved and painted the kids play
structure. My parents remade it for them so they bought new equipment for a more ninja type course and two play tents, one for the top and one for the bottom so the kids can sleep out there.
Before.
During:
After:
The sink drains in the bathroom started making bubbling
sounds when someone was in the shower and the toilets were slow to flush so we
got really scared and called a septic co. to come and pump it out. We have never had one before so it has
worried us – especially since we don’t know for sure when it was pumped
last. We had a general idea of where it
was but I had to dig quite a bit to find and uncover the lid.
It was pumped and is good to go for another
4ish years.
The kitchen is 99.99% complete and we are currently
finishing up the kids bedroom renovation of changing 2 rooms into 3. It will be done before the new year!
Visitors:
My friend Jenni from AZ and her family came out and stayed
with of in early November. It was SO fun
to have them here.
Everyone had their respective friend and we had a great time
– despite a cold front that made for some frigid days.
We went to Diamond Crater and looked for diamonds. 
It was a strange experience.
Mostly boring and we did not find anything
even close to a diamond.
We took them to stick their hands in the hot springs which
is a must for all visitors
and walked the promenade behind bath house row which
I had never done before.
Jenni helped me rip out all of the summer garden that had
frozen and we planted 90 cloves of garlic.
We made some sauerkraut that did not work out and in general
just had a lovely time.
Random things
Tarantula:
Super fat caterpillars that fall from the tree and sometimes land on you:
A poor watermelon caught in the trellis:
Fall was beautiful:
The doggos are a joy, we love them so much:
We are enjoying the changing of the seasons for the first time in our lives. I never realized how diverse they could be but each one has it's own beauty.
