pictures....

Round one finishing up.....
   Next we plant beans, peas, and such, then its time for greens and more cabbage.

Basil

Sage

I`m going to dry some of my herbs to use over the winter, I used some of the oregano and basil in our homemade spaghetti sauce, it was great.

These  are the hubby`s guinea birds. they still bunch all up when you walk by, but are warming up to us some. An unfortunate cricket came by while I was feeding them the other day....Ive never seen such a ruckus like these birds made over that poor bug.

Ol BBQ here is really enjoying all the garden scraps and is getting rather hefty. She really likes the mud hole we made for her.

                          Let a kid hold your phone......you end up with 15 pictures of the cats hehe

               

The bad side to keeping animals and a little bit of me ranting...

So a few weeks ago we had some rough weather. We had a heat wave come through and for a few days it was about 106 degrees give or take. We had some trouble with the bunnies. The first day of the heat, we lost my California buck, so the hubby put up fans at each side of the pens and gave everybody extra water and such. The next evening, we lost 4 more bunnies. So at this point I made him take all the rest of them into the house. Messy and smelly, but we managed to save the rest. I wish everyone couldv`e seen how he was so worried and even bathing the last one to pass in cool water trying to save it.

We raise them for meat and to sell, but we love our animals, and respect what they give us. We try to be kind and loving even if (like with the pig ) we got them to raise for food.
The hubby started me on the path to raising and growing our own food by making me watch a documentary about how animals are raised and how food is grown for us by big companies. I recommend everyone watch that . It made me open my eyes, and look at my fast food a little differently. I had a family member say that we were mean for raising animals for food, so I thought I would make sure that everyone who knows us, or reads this knows how and why we do it.
If you go to a chicken house for example, they are stacked up so tight they can hardly move, and suffocate and live in their own excrement. Our chickens get to run around the yard, or at least have large cages that are on the ground, so that they can have bugs, grass and such. Our bunnies are given grass, hay, and rabbit food, and are routinely loved on by us all. Our piggie is on the grass, with a nice big mud hole for it to play in. In fact, I never knew pigs were so silly and comical, this one runs and plays like a puppy. If you see how hogs are raised for meat like for the grocery stores, they are given medications to keep them alive because their living conditions are so poor and they cant even turn around they are so packed in their fences. 

Basically, I just want everyone to know that even though we do hunt, and fish , and raise our own meat. We do it for the health of our children, and to know that our children see that even though an animal has a purpose of meat, or eggs, or even guard dog, it should be loved and cared for.

 When hubby decides to try the chicken tractor idea, we had no clue it would be such a success. We had to buy a whole new chest freezer to put up all the groceries this man keeps hauling into the house. He is on a roll. So far ......

• over 50 quarts of stewed tomatoes
• 40 some odd bags of sliced squash
• 6 qts spaghetti sauce
• 10 qts of hash
• 7 or so qts sliced zucchini
• 5 or so gallons of stewed cabbage

 The okra and corn will be coming in soon, and he is planning a round of green beans, peas, and such to plant next. I`m excited to see him having so much fun, and it fun to make homemade spaghetti sauce. Here's how we did it.

We sliced the tops off the tomatoes, squeezed out all the seeds and juice, trimmed the other end off, and just threw them into the food processor. One you have enough, just cook on very low heat, add spices and we added some onions and bell peppers chopped up in the food processor. It didn`t take very long, and we had fresh sauce for our spaghetti that night. Best part is I knew exactly what was in it......no preservatives or anything.







We had to trim the tomato plants and spruce up the garden after an incident in the garden. Apparently critters were enjoying our very lush little garden spot. Me and hubby were picking tomatoes by the laundry basket fulls one day and suddenly he says woman, go get the gun.....run.... so of course my silly butt says "why? did you find a snake? " Needless to say he looks at me funny and says heck yeah i found a snake....run woman.....
So I tear off into the house, find a gun, and bullets..... run back to hubby who is looking kind of intimidated......and with my bare feet and shorts on run and throw everything at him. He says he found a copperhead.....a big one. so after he shoots the poor thing, about twice .... he looses it, cant find it anywhere......then I hear him almost shriek, its had done crawled over his shoe......So the snake is dead, hubby didn't get bitten, and he declares we are done in the garden for the day.  I wasn't as worried about the snake......I had more problems with the big wasp that flew up my shirt and the big  spider that I had on my arm.  Bugs just freak me out.....

Rooster chorus line

Well it has come to my attention we may have quite a few little bantam roosters. These past few evenings have been quite noisy, as the little ones try their hardest to learn how to crow. It`s really kinda cute how they sound.It seems more like a croak than a crow, but its cute all the same. Now I`ve got to start making little pens to put them in though so they wont start fighting.  We let one little pair of bantams out on the yard, and they walk around with the ducks, and roost on top of another cage. I love how they like to follow us around the yard , and just be silly.

We have moved the guinea bird babies out of the brooder into a cage in the yard. They are cute little buggers, and have started to make that weird noise all guinea birds make. They still seem a little skittish, but I'm sure if we keep at it they will warm up to us good.

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Gardening

The garden is getting into full swing now, with tomatoes, squash, and zucchini literally flying off the vines. I`m running trying to keep up with putting everything up, thank goodness the hubby enjoys freezing stuff too. Yet the freezer is full already , so we are going to try drying some of it in the dehydrator, and start canning what we can too.

I have been getting creative and trying to find different ways to prepare squash, and have tried stewing them , baking them, grilling them, casseroles.....you name it. My favorite way yet has been to slice them in half longways, sprinkle them with salt, pepper,butter,  and garlic powder, bake them until tender, then put cheese on top, and bake until the cheese has melted .

We had quite a few cabbages to get ready all at the same time, so we looked it up, and found out you can freeze them. Just cut them into quarters, blanch in boiling water for about 3 to 5 minutes, then cool in ice water. Put into freezer bags and freeze. Since the leaves are still large, when you go to use them you can even have stuffed cabbage, or just cut them up and have boiled or fried cabbage, or add to soups.


We have cucumbers, okra, corn, and watermelons that should be getting ready to start making soon.

For the love of bunnies

Baby bunnies have arrived on the scene, and the girls couldn't be happier.

One of my favorite pictures of miss Willow.....

I caught her !

After a while this poor puppy needed a break, so hubby made the dog pen.....

Now they have room to run and be messy, and hide from the child who makes them dress up...

Here's what happens when I give over the care of my flowers to hubby , mums in June (still don't know how he got them to come back from the dead little sticks they were after last fall)

It`s been a while....

I can`t believe it`s been so long since I`ve posted . It has been really busy around here lately with work and such, but now that it`s officially summertime I should have some free time on hand. The pig is growing like you wouldn`t believe,and has turned into a source of laughs almost every day. I never have seen a pig frolic and play, it`s really cute. The ducks are full grown now and have started to fly some. The hubby hatched out another batch of baby chicks. We acquired some baby guinea birds and are anxiously awaiting their help with the tick situation. The garden is starting to produce now, and the chicken tractor seems to have done its job well....the garden grew faster than I`ve ever seen. We also have been growing cabbage, never tried before, but it has worked great, and we`ve already harvested 2 heads. Still waiting on the tomatoes. The plants are loaded down, but they haven't turned red yet. It`s ok though, because while we`ve been waiting Ive been able to get some fried green tomatoes for my patience.

The hubby got creative and built a dog pen out of cattle panels, so we got a much sturdier and cheaper spot for my doggies than we would've`e gotten if we had bought a dog kennel. Most dog kennels are 10x10 and cost $270 or more. We have about 40x40 for roughly $120. 

I now have an official herb garden (thank you dear ) and have planted oregano, parsley, dill, sage and rosemary. I also have some basil that the munchkin started at school.  Plans are going to plant more, and mulch the plants already in.

Here`s some of our squash, the very first batch, Willow decided we needed to document this occasion. She`s too young to remember us doing this before so she thinks it has been awesome to eat our own garden food.  It was funny to see her run around hunting for squash with a basket. Little squeals of joy every time she`d see one. When the tomatoes start getting ripe this may be a problem. I foresee her in the garden with pieces of tomato everywhere, a bottle of ranch dressing and a big tummy ache. Tomatoes are her passion.