Spring Time

50 pounds of potatoes in the ground by March 17.  In the south bed, 15 pounds of Red Norland and 10 of Dakota Pearl.  In the north bed, 25 pounds of Yukon Gold.  It took us about two hours, but we added mulch to the rows to keep down weeds.  Let's see how this year goes!

Horseradish is peeking out.

 The first daffodils are already a few days old.

and the cherry bushes are blooming.  Of course, we will probably have a late freeze (or even a regular one!) and kill any cherries, but these surely are beautiful.

Even a few crocus flowers are here and there.

I'm trying a new location for seedlings this year, and they sprouted in less than three days.  I think that means I finally found a good location!

Until next time, remember, this is not paradise.  It's Purgatory Ranch.

Meat Coop Progress

Chick Season!

Please forgive the sporadic pictures.  Jimmy helped with picture taking, so we have a little bit of everything.

Soup is a hot broody mess each February, apparently.  Last year, she successfully hatched out Chicken Little.

 This year, we ordered an incubator, had Soup in a much chick-friendlier location, and got busy on our dreams of hatching our own flock.

 All seven of our eggs inside successfully pipped and hatched out.

 They were successfully incorporated into Soup's own brood of seven of eight eggs hatched.

Sadly, this morning, I discovered one of Soup's chicks had fallen (been ejected?) from the nest and died.  Still, we stand at 14 chicks.

Now to see how many are roosters.

Clean up, pick up, put away

James and I are both clearly itching to get back to work in the garden.  Last night, on a whim, we raced out after dinner to tidy up as much of the garden as possible in preparation for tilling.  We still had drip hose lines, T-posts, and sunflower stalks to clean up.

Yesterday, I finally stripped the last of the Hopi blue corn from their cobs.  Next up, I'll grind it for blue cornmeal!

This morning, James is away, helping a friend move, but when I reviewed the quantity of things still to be done, I hustled outside as soon as Miss G went to sleep, leaving my trusty Assistant to watch her and JoJo.  I managed to construct a "found materials" compost bin of half a hog panel, a gate, and a pallet.  The winter's accumulation of leaves from the basement door is swept up and ready to decompose.

I also sorted out a pile of odds and ends that were abandoned at some urgent point in the winter.  Wood went to the scrap lumber pile, t posts to their own piles, metal to a pile, and the tipped over stone bench was righted.

The burn barrel needs to be lighted, but I'm exhausted, so that will wait for another day.  I need to finish my seed list, and I'm sure I'll find plenty of other garden-related tasks when Miss G goes back to sleep!

Until next time, remember, this is not paradise.  It's Purgatry Ranch.

Work in Progress

My bathroom is going from this...

 To this...

 To this...

 And finally it will turn "surf blue" when I have the walls washed, spakled, and sanded.

Meanwhile, Toeless (aka Princess) gave me a chuckle as she tried to raid the food bucket!

Until next time, remember, this is not paradise.  It's Purgatory Ranch.

Morning has broken...

... like the first morning

Ice, wood, and furnace

My breaking ice for the last two weeks has resulted in piles of "ice pucks" near each coop in the yard.  I'm ready for a few of the piles to melt away in the comparitively sweltering highs in the 50s for the next ten days. I don't know how other people manage water for their chickens in cold weather, but heated waterers aren't feasible, so, depending on the severity of the cold, I haul water four (or more) times a day.

 I am grateful that these chickens seem to suffer less frostbite than our turkens.  I think this improvement is a result of both breed and superior coop construction.  James is definitely stepping up his game with each coop.

In addition to chicken chores, I've been streamlining my wood hauling.  Our wood burning stove insert is in the basement, so our wood piles are under the deck.  The challenge is, however, to sort the wood.  Our upstairs fireplace can fit quite long logs, but the stove is significantly smaller.  While I'm loading my wood cart, I find myself creating a new wood pile of logs that won't fit downstairs.  I'm interested to see how much would was usable, especially since we rarely use the upper fireplace.

Oddly enough, in between the original draft of this post and the finishing of it, our electric heat pump failed.  Funny the things I learned about my AC/furnace when it stopped working.  The wood hauling served me well, as the primary heat to the house for 48 hours has been the stove.  I've done pretty well, if I do say so myself, but the new furnace, to be in place tomorrow, will be welcome for bedroom heat!

Some part of me would love to not have a furnace, but the reality is this: I can't chop wood right now.  When I'm pregnant or caring for a newborn, I can't haul enough wood.  We need the AC in the summer, as our house is not built to circulate air efficiently.  Still, this was a worthwhile experience in knowing that I can heat the house in a "disaster" with very little interruption to our lives.

Until next time, remember, this is not paradise.  It's Purgatory Ranch.