I Have a Dream

As the New Year and my 40th birthday approaches, I realize that I am on the back side of life, and I am okay with that.  But one thing that struck a chord, a very loud, off-key chord, with me was a letter in one of my magazines from a lady in her 60s who talked about still holding on to her homesteading dream. 

Admittedly, this scared the bejesus out of me (forgive the Irish).  Oh, no, there is no way I am going to be like this lady who has a 30-year dream unfulfilled, a dream that has the potential to be a reality, yet never has come to fruition.  No, my dream is not a dream, it is a goal, it is an ultimate goal with subgoals already planned in my head and even written out, somewhere, probably on scrap paper stuffed in the secretary desk.  Nope, not me.  Sinking in my chair, I thought, that could SO be me.  My flippant attitude about certain responsiblities and procrastination, (mine and my family's), my impatience, my fickleness, you know, all those good qualities one wants to exhibit in onself, very Jekyl and Hyde qualities that most of the fairer sex possess anyway. 

How am I am going to assure that I do not fall prey to this horror?
Sorry, Asics, but Nike has the answer this time-Just Do It...

I feel assuredly that this letter was printed to inspire and uplift an older generation to carry on, not give up.  But in me it has welled up an urgency to not take life so lightly and get my butt in gear!

Old Dog, New Trick

Sew, I am going to attempt to sew.  This is not an easy task as the nightmare of 8th grade home-economic sewing keeps popping in my head, sending me to a corner in the fetal position.  Well, maybe not that bad, but the 20 year old sewing machine that my mother got for me when I first got married is in pristine condition from no use. 

Well, here goes my first project - a pillow case.  I am loving these mix of crazy colors and patterns that I see on homemade pillow cases.  Of course there are fancy ribbons and embellishments that are beyond my current capability, but gives me a goal.

So a trip to a local Wal-mart produces these combinations for 4 cases.  Being a beekeeper, I decide to start with the bee pattern, but I will use the zebra stripe as the main case, just in case I totally mess up, a very high probability.

A little ironing, a little cutting, a little matching up. Oh, dear, I have got to learn to cut a straight line!  Time for a grid and fabric marker, me thinks.

Well, at least the pillow fits, sort of, could probably fit my king size pillow in there.  Now that I have the basic down, it's time to work on proper technique and hone my skills...a LOT!  But at least there may be hope. 

Merry Christmas!?!

Wow!  Where has time gone this year?  It was just summer, and now it is officially Winter.  What the heck?  How did I miss it?  Hmmm.  Time for some serious reflection.  Excuse me while I reflect for just a moment.  I will be right back...

Almost Summer

Summer is just days away and this year Lost Arrow Acres has taken a different path this year because of my finances and "paying" jobs; admittedly, the homestead has not lived up to its potential.  This was also a busy year with proms, graduations, teaching teens to drive, etc. Nonetheless, we got most of the chickens butchered.  Bruce gave skinning them a try.  It seemed to work pretty well (for me at least) as I just rinsed them and put them in the freezer.  Flower, our New Zealand White had 9 bunnies her first liter.  They were all healthy and happy little critters.  I feel it is too hot now to try and breed Thoretta, (originally Thor), Emmy, and I have a feeling that Snow is too old as she did not take earlier in the spring. So we wait until fall.  We had 2 swarms land in the oak tree by the pond and orchard, about 30 feet up.  We got the smaller one.  It is such a great feeling to get a swarm-free bees!  Bruce constructed a bucket on a stick with duct tape (Red Green would be so proud) and it worked splendidly.  We extracted one super and got about 9 quarts of honey from our established bees.  We have a couple of more supers to go.  The garden this year only consists of several tomato plants, asparagus that came and went, my garlic and then we have our berry bushes that did give us a few blueberries to munch on as we walked to the  four hives.   We have two apple trees that did not survive.  The rest are in need of some fertilization and water, which I plan to do today.  The peach trees are coming along nicely.  I am not going to get any more animals, i.e. chickens or goats, until the killer dog is gone.  It is too much time, effort, money and emotions for him to just eradicate for fun. Unfortunately, the greenhouse is in need of new plastic.  It is about 5 or 6 years old and has turned opaque.  That is another expense that will need to be saved up for.  Right now my main objective for this summer is to get the garden weeded, fenced to protect from the wildlife having free lunches, and to keep our bees happy and healthy.  I also want to "purdy" up the yard a bit more.  There are lovely herbs and perinnials, but I would like to have a few more splashes of color.  I did get a spring flower catalog (bulbs, such as daffodils and hyacinths) and have chosen a few that I would like to order and get in the ground this fall.  With the long summer days being upon us, I have more hours to work and plan on improving the homestead. 

The Bees

You may remember that we had two hives abscond last year, leaving us with two fairly weak ones.  One we know left because we did not feed them enough; the other ?  As of now, our two original hives by the chicken coop are 50/50.  One hive, the mean girls, are doing well (don't we always) and we added honey super #3 yesterday.  The other hive, the one that tried to swarm, is not faring so well.  We now know why-a failing queen.  This was her 3rd year, so it is understandable.  There was no brood but at least two queen cells.  So we will be keeping close check on that hive.  Our two newer hives in the front yard are still doing well.  We transferred the frames from the nuc into a full-sized hive body today, as well as a honey supper.  A little bit of capped brood and a lot of honey production going on there.  The  other hive was already in a normal deep super, so we just added the honey super.  Our newest addition, is a nuc that we obtained from a fellow bee club member.  We found the marked queen and her brood pattern is nice.  We will probably give her a couple of more days before we transfer her to the deep.  We also still need to buy a screened bottom board and inner cover, as well as maybe stock up on some honey super foundation.  But so far, our girls are hanging around and working hard.  I am confident that we will have a fair amount of spring honey this year.  I do need to plant some more bee friendly plants around the homestead though. I feel bad if they have to fly TOO far.

The Otter

There are some afternoons when I have to get out of the house and just sit on the swing by the pond. I am lucky enough to have watched ducks swim around fairly closely and this week I was a bit unnerved by the red tail hawks mating season. My mother informed me why they were making such a fuss...guess she finally told me about the birds and the bees.

But it seems all the really neat stuff happens while I stand in my office, staring out the window through binoculars. Just the other day I was standing up for a minute and looked out at the pond and saw a head swimming across it. Great, I thought, another pesky beaver going to chew down some more trees. But then something a little odd happened. It dove down into the water in a very odd fashion. I didn't see his wide tail either. I grabbed the binoculars and followed the the little air bubbles here and there. It's head surfaced again and then back down. More air bubbles. That was not a beaver. Then it came up again and had a fish. He laid back almost floating supine while munching on his catch; it must have been a very chewy fish, it looked almost like work to eat it.

The way he swam on his back made it official...an otter. There was an otter dining in my pond. I am not sure how long I stood there watching through those binoculars, but it was not long enough.

I just hope next time I can sneak down to the swing and watch him through my own eyes! Nonetheless, it was amazing.

How Was February?

This has been such an odd "winter." Mild temperatures. I have had to wear my winter coat just one day so far this year. Sweatshirts and pullovers have sufficed otherwise.

As of today, my kitchen table and another table is full of vegetable and herb plants, as well as zinnias, marigolds, cosmos and nasturtiums. I have broccoli, kale, collards and cabbage ready to plant. Actually, a few of my tomatoes are needing to either be planted or put in gallon pots. I have basil and dill at a good stage. I still do not have any sage or parsely and am a little upset about that. I was hoping to have that at least started. I am also behind on my bell peppers. I have hyssop, clary sage, borage and blue sage up but that is for our honeybees. I may have went overboard on the "bee mixes" this year. I think I have 3 or 4 packets of seeds to scatter this spring.

We are getting about 3 eggs a day and I have ordered "rainbow" laying pullets to come in late fall. I am not ordering in the traditional spring months anymore. So far, all the baby chicks that have come in January and September have not fallen prey to snakes-knock on wood. Right now, the roosters we got the last week of January are doing great-haven't lost a one yet. They are almost one month. I am keeping the heat lamp on them just a few more days, as the temperatures are supposed to drop back down into the 30s for a couple of nights this weekend. After that, I am going to shut 'er down. They are almost fully feathered.

I have more double digging to do. I only have 2 1/2 beds done. I am not going to complain about the rain, but it has hindered my beds a bit. Wet clay can be quite heavy-ugh!

A bit of slow month so far. But as the daffodils are in full bloom and the rosemary is covered in purple flowers and honeybees (not to mention the wasp I saw), I feel time will be flying by shortly.

Rain, Rain

Rain, rain...I won't say go away, because the pond is finally up. Overall, the weather has been very mild. We are now in the 50s and 60s, with some cold nights. However, I do wish there was at least little sunshine. I have had to put the lights on in the greenhouse. And I only have two double - dug beds in the garden. I was hoping to be a lot further along than that by now.

The rosemary is blooming and we have had a few days that the honeybees have been out trying to find something. They really are not in a very good mood this time of year...they seem a bit urgent. I even saw daffodils along side the road blooming. My daffodils have leaves up, but no blooms yet, thank goodness. I prefer to see them in the spring, not winter.

Although the pond is muddy now because of all the rain, I have the pleasure of seeing ducks. There are up to six on there, and of course the Blue Heron visits often too. The beaver is back at it, cutting down more trees. There are even a few logs floating on the pond. If he were a good beaver, he would help us cut down those cedar trees that are in the "pasture-to-be."

I guess I better go turn the greenhouse lights off now and hope the sun comes out tomorrow...

Chicken Update

The grab-bag of chickens we ordered in September are maturing nicely. We have three roosters in the freezer. We need to put at least two more there. (We had our first killing cone experience-it worked well for us.) The Barred Rock and Columbian Wyandotte are nice sized. Bruce wanted to keep them around for breeding purposes. I personally want them in the freezer for eating purposes. We shall see. Our multicolor (possibly a Salmon Faverolle) rooster is beautiful, but smaller. I thought we had Black Jersey hen, but it is a rooster. We won't eat him because he has something wrong with him. He had a tumor growth on his chest and his crowing is affected by it. He sounds like a car with a dying battery. We also have a loner, who I though was an "easter egg" hen. But, it crowed. Not sure if it is a dominent hen because of the loner status, or really is a rooster and just small.

I am so excited! Our little hens have started laying eggs. I have had four small ones, and of course, Penny's normal sized ones. We have dark ones and light ones. No white ones yet. I am wanting to order the rainbow laying pullets later in the spring for fun and that should really brighten up the egg basket.

But first, next week, in fact, we have 25 broilers coming. Little leghorns to put in the freezer in about four months. I have shut down the one side of the coop, so all the chickens will get used to only going in on one side. There was only two that roosted in there anyway. I will do one more final cleaning this weekend and buy a new heat bulb. At least these little guys will be all white and boring, so they won't have names to get attached to. I am hoping that they will be big enough before the snakes decide to wake up and come looking for them. It would be wonderful to have 30 chickens in the freezer. That will last us all year, along with the deer and rabbit, and occasional squirrel. That just leaves all the pressure for me to make sure the greenhouse and garden can keep up...great!

Clemson Extension Course

I am so excited. Oh, I hope I get to go. Clemson Extension is offiering a course on sustainable small farms and backyards. They are going to be discussing subjects such as beekeeping (hopefully I can recruit to ACBA), soil fertility, composting, livestock/forages, fruit and vegetable gardening, and marketing excess produce. It is a once-a-week course for six weeks. The only thing is I am not sure if I can come up with the registration fee. I have about four weeks, so hopefully it will work out.

Update 1

What's new at Lost Arrow since we last met? The family has finished planting 2 dwarf apple trees, 2 dwarf peach trees, 4 blueberries, 2 boysenberry and a thornless blackberry bush. We have ordered one nuc (bees) for spring. I would love to have more, but the finances are keeping us from expanding too quickly. Our roosters are finally crowing, just in time for them to butchered. We really did not have as many hens in the last bunch as I would have liked. We have 25 Leghorn broilers coming at the end of January to fill the freezer and maybe a few canning jars, late spring. I am still wanting to order some spring hens to keep the eggs fresh, especially with the low numbers of hens now. Right now, they are all free-ranging around the yard and all but one seems to find their way back to the coop by nightfall. I have a few seedlings up in the greenhouse. I am hoping to get those moved into my first intensive raised bed in a few weeks to have some early vegetables for us and maybe even for the market (not sure about that yet though). I am working on my second intensive bed, a few rows a day. I am hoping to get that done within a week or so and get some potatoes going pretty soon. The garlic I planted in September has come up since our weather has been so mild, so I got that bed weeded. I have been also doing a bit of wire brusing on the deck to get it ready for some new paint this spring. Since our weedeater was out of commission the end of last summer, some of the grass, especially around the house was a bit out of control, and I have been working on that with the hand shears a few minutes at a time. We have hooded megansers on our pond. If I pass by a window and see one, I have to get the binoculars and just watch them for a moment before continuing what I was doing. Even though it is only a couple of weeks into winter, I am thoroughly enjoying this winter and the preparations for spring.

Happy Now Year

No, it is not a typo...I am not going to dwell on the past year. I am not going to live for the future. I am going to focus on the now. What can I be enjoying in this season of my life, this moment in time? That is not to say that I will not plan for the future, or remember the past, but I will not ignore the now, as I can easily do.

I am loving the contrast of the cool temperatures and the bright sunny sky. I have been working on my intensive, double-dug beds for the garden. Since there was a wonderful rain a couple of weeks ago, the clay soil has been great to work with. I am, however, running out of compost...I guess it will be have to be straight rabbit manure soon. After the first couple of shovelfuls of clay, I am taking off my coat and pushing up my long sleeves, soaking up the vitamin D in the warmth of the sunshine. Sometimes I catch myself almost smiling in the joy of my labor. It is an odd feeling to enjoy much of anything in January, which makes it even more special.

Happy Now Year, Everyone!