Farm Tours Restart

Welcome back for more tour of Vicktory Farm & Gardens! Didn't mean to let nearly a year go by. Today we will be strolling in the Barn Garden and talking water and weather, hope you wore your boots. Anna could run to the kitchen and get some bread sacks to go over your shoes but those stilettos your friend there has on definitely won't do.

In the scheme of things this garden sits west of the house, I can see parts of it from my new big bedroom window (the lilac hedge blocks a full view). In past posts you have seen the South Pastures that sit just west of the Barn Garden and share a pond, and in Hang Out Spots tour you saw the yard that is just the other side of the east boundary fence for this garden.

Let's get started, come off of the driveway here and come through the gate in Dirt's special fence.

You'll see a lot of plastic 5 gallon buckets around the Farm, they come in super handy. I use them to pick up my weed piles so I can throw the weeds to the chickens, easier than a wheelbarrow I gotta get up more often than a wheelbarrow load or I won't be able to unkink my legs.

There is a little strip of garden that separates the driveway from the main Barn Garden. We'll come back to that at the end.

For now we are going to go on through this second gate, gate way actually, because the gate is old and needs fixing. This walk way is rather muddy because the rain off of the big barn roof comes through here and out into Barn Pond. This issue is in the process of being solved, unfortunately it isn't at the top of the list.

I do a lot of ditching around here, no the "d" is correct, I dig a lot of water ways. I'm a hydrologist. The biggest issue about keeping someone out of the garden early in the year in the PNW (Pacific North West) is water and soggy soils.

This is what the soil looks like this time of the year when it gets walked on. Not a good look for garden soil.

That is the reason nearly every gardening area here at VF&Gs is a raised bed that has hidden electrodes around it so that you get blown to the next county if you step on the bed. Well, not really but a girl can fantasize about things, can't she?

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A raised bed is one of the basic season extenders here at VF&G, one I wouldn't do without. We make them simple. No treated boards, no plastic "lumber", no concrete blocks (the poison they all leach has a way of undoing that home grown goodness plus they harbor slugs, bugs and fungus) just a three to four foot wide bed not much longer than twenty feet (otherwise you find yourself cheating and jumping the bed to get to the other side). They are sometimes straight and other times they go with the contour of the landscape. We employ them not only in the "vegetable" gardens but also in the ornamental gardens as well.

The soil in these beds is nice and fluffy and can actually pass the soil lump test just fine right now, if you took a similar sample of some other areas like the lawn or the market garden strip in the pasture rotation, it would not pass the test for a couple of months. It is also warmer than soil that is all soggy and wet because it can't drain.

Being able to get into the garden at this time of the year is a real bonus, and in spite of my being slightly jealous of those areas that get real snow and ice for winter, it is why I love living here in the PNW. With a few season extenders PNW gardeners can produce food for most of the year. So yes, our tomatoes are a challenge and fresh corn is barely a month long treat but if well attended to, a PNW garden can provide very well.

It also allows for gardeners to stay ahead of weeds. I suppose that ice and snow has a damper on weed growth but being able to weed during the slower growth months of winter really helps this procrastinator stay ahead, okay, a few steps behind the weeds.

Winter weeding is an art all to itself. I should tell you all about it soon. I hope you noticed a specific pattern to the little garlic plants coming up, it is called equidistance planting.

But for now lets look at another season extender, my cold frame. It sits just to the left and forward as we came through the last gate (the gate way). The area around it is trying to find itself, the beds just in front of the glazing side is becoming Bet's herb garden area but this funny spot back here is having some serious identity issues.

Here is the front glazing side of the cold frame, it is oriented exactly to the south. Not necessarily always the best choice, sometimes it is better to catch the sun a little earlier and orient it slightly to the east, but when you only have one and you can't make decisions well, you go with normal and average sometimes just to get the job done.

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There are some things inside, lets lift the lid and see.

A few flats of last year's left over onion seed, onion seed like just a couple other vegetable seeds is only really viable for a year, but I hate throwing things out so I went ahead and dumped the packets into flats just to see what I could come up with. And I think the showing was worth my trouble. This week I will be seeding flats with this year's main crop of onions and in a couple more days these guys in here will be ready to come out and head to a garden bed. Most likely in the North Garden.

So this is the view looking west from the cold frame area. We rather went crazy with the garlic this year. It will be interesting to see just how much we really need to be planting. Even though Dirt eats lots of garlic, with the varieties we end up growing he doesn't eat as much of it as when we get it from the market. So it will be interesting to see how sales of garlic go this year and how much we really need to plant. Yippee I am so excited about our new adventure. But we'll talk more about that later.

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For now let's go over and look at Bet's two new peach trees.

The names escape me at the moment, I'll get back to you on that in the morning here, They are semi dwarf and won't get much over fifteen feet or so. Bet says she is looking forward to coming out here with a good book and a saddle pad and taking her breaks from work under her peach tree, she has a few years yet before that vision actually fleshes out but I love her patience and I admire her faith. I now understand what it means to have the gift of faith, Bet has it. In spades. About absolutely everything.

Here is the other peach tree, the two trees line up with a spot she has picked out for some other trees. They are semi dwarf and of course deciduous, so the fact that they sit in the center of the garden isn't a real problem. The sun will climb up in the sky before they have their leaves and there will only be a lovely dappled shade underneath them, just perfect for somethings that can't take the heat of our dogs days of summer, five days in August.

This is our hoop house made from livestock panels. It has been a lot of things, a gourd arbor mostly, a cold greenhouse in the late winter/early spring and a great spot for the mums to get their early boost if it is a super cold winter.

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Most recently it served as a chicken coop so that Bet could separate out some of her breeds. It may be that again soon. There is supposed to be a chicken coop built along the west wall of the barn, it will serve to keep the water from the base of the logs of the barn and house Bet's breeding stock but the Hot House/Market Shed complex comes first and then we might collapse for a month before we tackle this project.

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If stock panels weren't so stinkin' expensive at the moment I'd have more of these, I'd anchor them a little differently, but this one was hard to do because there is a concrete slab we were spanning with the hoop.

Standing up here at the hoop house and peach trees looking south we can see Bet's duck house. It finally got its front doors on and so the ducks got kicked out of the big barn and now Bet comes out and locks them up out there at night and lets them out in the morning.

They were being pretty good at staying on their side of the fence until the last couple of days. Something will need to be done to keep them from coming in here and pulling up the garlic and onions. They seem to be attracted to the green, go to pull it out, taste it as they are pulling it out of the ground and decide they don't like it. Unfortunately Bet hasn't successfully trained them to replant it!

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They really like their pond and they can wander all over on the other shore and up around the turkey pens but they seem to like to dabble in my garden this time of the year. I think its the green shoots of the garlic, I haven't seen much signs of slugs and other treats, besides if they are in here the slug and bugs are also out there.

Bet and I have been doing a bit of research about dealing with grey water, specifically the water from processing poultry, for when we apply for our license to process. We have come across some interesting info about cleaning water by running it through bogs planted with cat tails and some other specific water plants.

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The heavy stalks in the water in the center left of the above picture is a little colony of cattails. I am really drawn to cattails and would love an excuse to have a larger planting of them up around the Barn Garden.

The boggish place just to the right of this fence line has been filtering and dealing with the grey water from the farm house every since there was inside plumbing here. It is a great system and rarely puts off an odor, some compost piles smell more than our little un-designed bog.

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The pond just beyond the bog supports bull frogs, cat fish, occasional escapee trout, and the ducks of course appear to thrive here. Not to mention the resident river otters and beaver clan along with clearly healthy pond side flora.

Here's a view from the far southwest corner of the Barn Garden. The fact that the majority of our grey water has its own system and doesn't go through the septic makes our septic all that much more healthy. Besides in a septic system the grey water would pretty much end up doing what it is doing right now. Go through a soil/plant root filter before eventually ending up in the pond.

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It is all so freakishly green I can hardly speak of it. Funny, things on farms were green long before now and old farmers knew how to protect the water and soil supply. They didn't really need the Birkenstock, or black nail polish crowds to tell them how to take care of the earth that they depended on.

Here is a big view of the south west side of the barn and the hoop house. In the foreground is one of the gazillion weed piles. Lots of my weed piles, stuff the chickens would rather not eat or just the stuff that is more than they can handle, are cold compost piles.

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They eventually rot down and no, the weed seeds aren't burned up, but man that takes a heck of a hot pile and I'm just not that into doing that at the moment. The hot compost will come when we have to start dealing with poultry offal from the processing. But as for the weeds, I'm beginning to think they aren't so stinking bad, I really feel strongly, come 'round July or August especially, that we actually ought not to weed any more. But that's a discussion for another day. Right now I love weeding.

And I love tossing the weeds to the chickens so that Bet doesn't have to put alfalfa in the hay rack that you see the hens sticking their little head in (the bluish green square on the right half of the coop. This is the winter housing and where the breeding stock hang out. In the summer the eggers and the meat birds head out to the pasture and will become an integral part of the pasture rotation that we will be incorporating this year. MiG. Managed intensive grazing. Making the most of less land. And something Dirt and I are very excited about. But... you guessed it, we'll talk about that another day.

If we turn around and look east we come across my aronia berry bush. I have some more up at the nursery beds that will be coming down here this month during transplanting days.

I have no idea yet if this moon signs planting business is really effecting the plants and bugs and weeds (there are days for dealing with everything!) But it sure is doing a good thing for making me get stuff done and not get sidetracked with a bazillion jobs all at once. I need a way to keep me focused or I end up not getting anything finished because I am doing too many things.

A better view of Bet's herb beds in front of the cold frame, the bright green little tufts off to the left of the picture are her chives, a lavender and a sage is just beyond that.

The bed between that one and the cold frame is filled with lavender starts from a plant that I rooted in place by heaping soil up around it and in the middle of it. Each branch then became a rooted plant. It is a great way to multiply several different types of shrubs and herbs especially when they have been neglected of seasonal pruning and get all out of shape. A "do over" of sorts.

These are a examples of raised beds that are not straight. I would like to do more large gardens with not-straight beds but that will come later in my life I think. Right now I just like to get it done and get them planted. Soon I will have more time to shape and have fun with different geometrics in the garden.

These big lumps here on the far left are not more weed piles, they are my enormous comfrey plants that if I have time will be busted up this year and dispersed through out more areas of the farm. Comfrey is an amazing plant in the apothecary and out in the garden. Its huge leaves are great in the compost and add some really good extra nutrition, because of deep roots it can pull up lots of minerals from the sub soils.

I can't think of a plant that doesn't like to be near comfrey or have its big leaves as a mulch during those five hot days in August. It is another great bog and pond edge plant and has tremendous water filtering abilities. It is just simply a must have plant.


This for me is a dreamy view. I like to look far across the pond to the other bank and the white barked aspen. To me they are like the paper birch in the painting by Carl Larsson of his family picnicking or the one where they are fishing. Sometimes I like to think I live in Carl's world.

This is the little gate way and walk that Bet takes to let her ducks out. This spot is also in need of an identity and restructuring, something I hope Bet and I can get to and get into process later this spring or at least by early summer.

We turn around and head back for the gate by the barn. Our raspberries here on the right on the fence line await their annual trimming and tying up session, hopefully this year I will get to it before the leaves are out, that makes a tough job tougher. I'm utilizing a bit more of my wonderful black weed mat, Water goes down through but weeds are really discouraged from growing and it is even impervious to armor piercing quack grass.

On the right side of the weed mat walk way you can see a couple of step in black plastic posts. Those mark where I think I want some climbing roses to go up over some hoops toward the raspberries, forming a arbor-ed walkway here. I like secret little walk ways and such so we'll see. The fence post in the fence line are old creosote and I keep the raspberries back from them for the most part but I would like to move the raspberry operation some place slightly less toxic entirely.

As we head back out the gate you can see the walkway, between the barn wall and the chickens, becomes a holding place for my mums in pots and the fruit trees awaiting their new home spots.

Sometimes I get a little crazy with the old and makeshift things we've got going on here but then most of the time I just embrace the character of it all. And then, I am thankful that God has placed me here and not in a modern home on an uninteresting, history-less plot of land.

Like the stories this little garden by the driveway holds for us.

Some where in that center bed lies the first casualty here on VF&Gs. A murdered sheep was buried by yours truly about our second or third year here. Back in '88. Dale's flock of sheep had come out here to live but not before the pet lamb of the wife of one of his worker fellas had been mistaken for a locker lamb. So after the flock had been here a while Dale dropped off a sweet little Cheviot to hang with the group, replacing the mistaken identity lamb.

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Well, sheep are flockish, and they did not accept her, She spent most of her time many yards from the flock, she ate separately from them or after they were done and had moved on she would come and clean up the leftover. She was excluded from coming in the barn to get out of the rain or the heat.

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Then one day it was particularly rainy I was glad to see that she had obviously gotten to go in out of the rain because she wasn't in the barnyard. But when I looked over the door I didn't see her. Well this is turning into a long story and has nothing really to do with gardening so I finish it up later.

Along with buried sheep and my second oldest's pet goose being buried in here, down by the lilacs there, was where the out house stood for the former resident and now neighbor and old work buddy of Dirt's. All another long story about just how small the world is and confirmation on God wanting us here.

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But as for the outhouse part, Dave says that when he left home for the Korean war the out house stood right about where the lilacs are or maybe a little over to the right where the path goes out onto the lawn. But when he came back there was a new addition on the house and indoor plumbing.

Well that's the end of the tour, long one for such a small space, you can come in and take advantage of the indoor plumin' if ya need to and you can stay for a cup a tea ifn' you'd like. I gotta get on with the hallway project but you can pull up a chair and keep me company while I paint.

Inspired to Share a Memory

So Saturday, I spoke of how Mildred inspires me, she does so with nearly every post, I try desperately not to be inspired by her lovey tea, coffee, chocolate and lemonade sets, lest Dear Dirt, just a poor school teacher and sheep shearer, be driven further into poverty by his wayward wife and her tucked away plastic.


So because of Mildred, and Empress Bee, who is always gallivanting off to sea, wearing a tiara, to eat cake, luscious delightful cakes and when she is on land is always speaking of making these clearly southern creations of hers, and because I live with Cake Girl, I was inspired to build a cake Friday. If you're hungry and you missed it, scroll on down and have a slice, there is a little left I am sure.



Another inspiring person I read is LindaSue, (you are all inspiring really, otherwise I would not be reading, and I hope to get to you all). She is in the middle of kidding season, not to be confused with comedy month. A while back she told of going to rescue a neighbor's_goat that got it's head stuck and the rest of the herd was bashing the poor thing.

Then in another post about kidding she and Kathy were discussing how goats and sheep have little sub-herds within the larger herd and so now she has inspired me to tell you a story of when Dirt and I were starting out in the sheep life. Pull up a cushy chair 'cause this is another of Lanny's Longies.


As most of you know, Dirt and I rent our farm from the late Dr. Dale Tibbits DVM and his lovely widow Norine. Twenty-two years ago, after we had been here a year Dale brought his sheep from another farm out to this farm to eat for the summer. The flock stayed into late fall, mid-December, and one actually lambed here, a very early, but not unheard of, start to lambing.



Dirt found the momma and lamb off by themselves, we scooped them up and brought them into the barn until Dale and his farm manager could come and pick up the rest of the herd before they lambed under the inexperienced eye of his crazy renters (us). How inexperienced were we?

Even though I had been raised by a farmer boy and a farmer girl, the farmer boy went on to be a suburban businessman because farmer girl never wanted to be on a piece of land that even remotely looked like a farm ever again. So my farming knowledge came from having been farmed out to cousins in the summer and listening to hours and hours and hours of farming stories, lore and advice all my growing up years from my father. And the gazillion books I read. That was all the experience I had, but it was enough to know that Dirt had next to zero.

I had already introduced him to gardening and learn that he knew that plants went into the ground and that was pretty much the extent of his garden knowledge. But he was especially deficient in the lamb department, because when he saw the lamb he freaked out because it had a tail! I stood in disbelief because even though I had never been around my cousin's sheep farm during lambing season I knew they had tails that needed to be taken off. Besides, had he never recited Little Bo Peep?

The flock, ewes and the ram, came back early the next summer so that the lambs could stay at the other farm and be weaned. While the flock was here, Dale asked if we wanted to see them through the next lambing season and he would split the lamb crop with us. "Cool" was our less than mature answer, we thought Dale made that offer because he saw what great farmers we were.


Lambing season went really well (the last year that happened) and late winter passed onto early spring in a "happy go lucky, laid back, life on the farm", John Denverish sorta way. Everything about "farming" went well for Dirt and I that year. My garden had been huge and profitable, nearly every meal clear into early spring came from the garden, the root cellar and the cow that we had butchered. And now with lambing season having gone so well, we looked forward to the lamb that would be on the table next winter.

One day Dale's farm manager shows up on his way back from the auction, and in the trailer he has a young sheep, a Cheviot type. He explained to me and attentive little Stephanie, that the previous fall the lambs that had been kept over at the other farm for weaning were then ready to be slaughtered but mixed in with the lambs for slaughter was the farm renter's pet lamb. On slaughter day the slaughter guys arrived before he or Dale could get there and of course the first lamb to be dispatched was the friendly little guy who immediately came up to the fence when people showed up.

The renter's wife was very sad, and a little mad, so Dale and his farm manager, Bruce, promised to replace it. So here they were with the replacement. Which I found rather humorous because it was clearly no one's pet and wanted nothing to do with people and it was here at this farm instead of the other farm where the renter who lost the "pet" lived. But that was how things were done in my life from then on out.

I was happy to have her, she was very pretty and very different from the rest of the flock, however the flock did not agree with me. Yes, they could tell she was different but they were not happy to have her. She was all white, clean white face with stick up ears, they, being all Suffolk, were white fleeced with wool-less back faces and legs, and their enormous black ears droop slightly to the sides of their heads, very different sheep indeed. You might say like day and night. And they knew it!

For weeks she was not allowed in the barn by the other sheep. When they were all outside she was many yards from any of them at anytime. I felt very bad for her and gave her extra treats, but as she was not very trusting of humans sometimes she didn't always get her treat, because our big moosey tame Suffolk were always there to get it before she did.


One morning we were having some nasty spring weather, I sloshed out to the barn to do chores and I was glad to see that she got up the gumption to go inside the barn with the other sheep. Poor thing was against the wall on one side of the barn while all the other girls were lined up at the wall feeder on the other side. I felt bad for her but at least she was in out of the weather.


After lunch I went out to check on everyone and see what was going on. I didn't see my new little friend anywhere in the barn. She must have gotten tired of being a wall flower and went outside, the weather had cleared so she would be okay. I went to lean over the half door to grab the water bucket and it wasn't there. What the heck had those silly sheep done with the bucket? They were all staring at me in a rather sheepish manner.


"Girls, where is your bucket?" I said as I hopped over the door. Once I was in the barn I could see that the bucket was under the feeder. "For crying out loud, I was coming out to give you more water, there was no reason to throw a fit," I exclaimed to them as I tried to tug the bucket out from under the feeder.

I had to get down on my knees and reef on the bucket to get it out, "What the heck?" I griped while tugging and tugging.

Once I got the bucket out I could see there was something else behind the bucket way under the floor of the feeder. I reached and grabbed onto it and pulled out my sweet little friend.


They had bashed her to death, and then stuffed her under the feeder hiding the evidence with the water bucket. The evidence was clear, the bucket was still retaining it's new oval shape. Unbelievable, murderous sheep. Just because she was different. Not of their herd.

I was sobbing by the time I got her out from under the feeder and shaking by the time I got her out of the barn. I had yelled and screamed hateful things at my other dear sheep, now that I knew what they were capable of, shewing them out of the barn and locking the out into the pasture.


I was racked with sobs as I headed to the house to call my husband. His friend and colleague, Jim, answered the school phone.


"Jim, is Phil there?"


"Yes, but what is wrong?" Clearly Jim could hear the distress in my voice.


"Oh, it is horrible, one of our sheep is dead, the other sheep killed her."


"That's too bad, but are you sure she is dead?"


"Yes, I am sure."


"Did you try Sheep P R?" he says completely even toned.


On any other day, if it was someone else, that quick witted Jim was pulling this on, I would think it to be rather funny, but not today and not to me.

"Uh, Jim, could you just get Phil please?" I say in a sad voice, not a hint of laughter.


"Sure."


Phil got on the phone to hear the bad news and he said to just put her in the wheelbarrow and that he would take care of her when he got home.

"What are you going to do?" I asked.


"I'll just take it out onto Weyerhauser land and set a trap for the coyotes."


"You can't do that. You can't let her be torn to bits by those coyotes."

Long pause on the other end by the sensible husband talking to the irrational, momentarily overly sensitive wife.


"I'll just bury her" I say. I thanked him for talking to me and being willing to help but that I would just take care of it.


So back outside I went. I hoicked the body into the wheelbarrow and took a break while I surveyed the areas where I could bury her.


All around the house and in most of the pasture the soil is nearly rock-less, so that wasn't really a factor in my decision but I didn't really want to go too far as the baby and little Steph were in taking naps. I thought of how the Indians planted fish under the corn for a better crop so I figure I would put her in my garden where I was going to plant tomatoes.


I got the shovel and began to dig. I took a break to go get my inhaler and continued. I had a beautiful grave dug for her. Sides were straight up and down it was nearly chest deep, okay it wasn't six feet down but this wasn't a county grave site and she wasn't a human. So I hopped out and took another puff on my inhaler as I went to get the wheelbarrow, aka hearse, with the poor deceased sheep in it.


I wheeled her right up to the edge and though it didn't seem very dignified I figured my best bet for getting her into the hole was to just up end the wheelbarrow and let her slide on in. Besides it was better than what Dirt was going to do to her.


So I grabbed the handles of the wheelbarrow and up they went, but contrary to expectations she did not slide right in. I did not account for rigor mortis having set in and her molding to the wheelbarrow. I tried to shake her out but all that happened was that I lost hold of the wheel barrow and the whole works went into my beautiful grave.


Oh this was not good. All that was sticking up were the handles of the wheelbarrow. Straight up. I stood and stared at it for quite a while. Then I resolutely turned toward the house.


I walked back to the house, grabbed the phone, dialed the number for Dirt. Again Jim answered, but I spoke so firmly and my voice was strong enough that Jim just answered with, "I'll get him, hang on."


When Dirt came on the phone I explained that I had dug a beautiful grave in my tomato garden. He agreed that it was as good a place as any and it might do the plants some good.


I explained to him what had happened when I attempted to dump her body in. He inquired as to what I wanted him to do about it.


"I wanted to know if we could use the handles of the wheelbarrow for tomato stakes?"


To which he busted out laughing and told me no, that he had just bought that wheelbarrow and no, tomato stakes should not cost fifty bucks. I told him I thought he was being very narrow minded and unfair. He told me to get the wheelbarrow out of the hole.


So I did. But first I took another puff off of my inhaler.


That garden saw many grave stones in the next year. Then we had to branch out. There have been a lot of deaths here at the farm, there have been many sorrows, tears, anger and a little callousness has set in also, reality eventually dawns on even the idealistic. Many deaths have come after hours of work, like floating cold lambs in the bathtub till your arms feel like they are going to fall off, only to have them never make it.

One time my husband and some of his work friends and their wives rented my sister's house on Cannon Beach, at the last minute I didn't join them and my girls because my favorite Nubian goat was so pregnant with triplets that her back legs went out and she couldn't move. Even though I was fairly pregnant myself I would hold up her back legs and take her for "walks." That however, was one of the successes of our idealistic crazy work. She lived for many more years and her triplets all survived too.

As another blogger Cliff, a real farmer says, This Farming Game Is Not For Sissys. And there have been plenty of times that I have come to the clear conclusion that I am the chief of sissys. But then there are times when I am Eldon Barker's daughter and I buck up and put my shoulder to the grindstone. Once in a while I even come out with a funny story. Thanks Linda for inspiring me to share this one rather humorous story.

Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow

This is yesterday's scenery, it is very peaceful and pleasant.




Very calm and very serene.

This is light fog compared to what we have had for the last few days, but I still needed to see a little sunshine yesterday. I needed something besides soft, quiet, damp, steely blue. So I went with Dirt on his Saturday shearing job. He promised me sunshine. He promised me foothills above the clouds with some wind.

Well I had fun chit chatting with Dirt all the way down through the big valley and up the other side but the fog was actually thicker up in the foot hills. And even though it was fairly chilly it was not cold enough to make the fog exciting, nothing more than more lovely soft, quiet, damp, thicker steely blue fog.

Here are Dirt's clients. All waiting patiently for him to come and de-fleece them.

The first little guy is not so thrilled with his missing locks.

But Dirt just keeps on shearing and shearing.

And one by one the bags were filled.

Until the pen is empty.

Today the sun came out. I celebrated by making a yummy Clementine Cake, with orange curd filling and whipped cream for icing. Unfortunately it was racked before it cooled enough so two of the layers stuck to the rack. But it all went into the trifle bowl and now the fog it really gone.

Tomorrow there are more promises of sun, (I'm more confident in these promises after today!) Dirt is home and I am well and going to prune trees!

Six Geese A Laying

On the sixth day of (not after) Christmas
my True Love gave to me,
Six Geese A-laying

Six geese? Ahh, the six days of creation that confess God as Creator and Sustainer of the world (Genesis 1).

Creation most certainly is a gift!

The participation in creation is a gift, note that the six geese are a laying, all of creation is invited to participate in creation, creating still, still a laying according to His good Word.

Each day of creation is a gift in itself. Just as in a gaggle of geese there are unique individuals, squawking and honking in their own manner but together to make a whole.

Day One, the first goose a laying: In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form, and void; and darkness was on the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. Then God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light. And God saw the light, that it was good; and God divided the light from the darkness. God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night. So the evening and the morning were the first day. Earth, darkness and light, Day and Night. Precursor to rest and productivity.

Day Two, the second goose a laying: And God said, "Let there be an expanse between the waters to separate water from water." So God made the expanse and separated the water under the expanse from the water above it. And it was so. God called the expanse "sky." And there was evening, and there was morning—the second day. Sky, heaven. Where the clouds roam, change shape and intrigue us.

Day Three, the third goose a laying: And God said, "Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear." And it was so. God called the dry ground "land," and the gathered waters he called "seas." And God saw that it was good.
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Then God said, "Let the land produce vegetation: seed-bearing plants and trees on the land that bear fruit with seed in it, according to their various kinds." And it was so. The land produced vegetation: plants bearing seed according to their kinds and trees bearing fruit with seed in it according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening, and there was morning—the third day. Land and all vegetation, producing seed and bearing fruit according to the type of plant it is, procreation. And the beginning of gardening! God's grand garden.

Day Four, the fourth goose a laying: Then God said, “Let there be lights in the firmament of the heavens to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs and seasons, and for days and years; and let them be for lights in the firmament of the heavens to give light on the earth”; and it was so. Then God made two great lights: the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night. He made the stars also. God set them in the firmament of the heavens to give light on the earth, and to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good. So the evening and the morning were the fourth day. The sun, moon and stars. Spring, summer, winter, fall. Years and foretellings. The star that guided the wise men two thousand years ago.

Day five, the fifth geese a laying: And God said, "Let the water teem with living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the expanse of the sky." So God created the great creatures of the sea and every living and moving thing with which the water teems, according to their kinds, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. God blessed them and said, "Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the water in the seas, and let the birds increase on the earth." And there was evening, and there was morning—the fifth day. Animal life of the air and of the sea. Beautiful birds, slippery fish, oysters, clams... and procreation. Amusement, amazement and wonder. Who can understand the way of the bird in the air?

Day six, the sixth geese a laying: And God said, "Let the land produce living creatures according to their kinds: livestock, creatures that move along the ground, and wild animals, each according to its kind." And it was so. God made the wild animals according to their kinds, the livestock according to their kinds, and all the creatures that move along the ground according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good.
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Then God said, "Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground."
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So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.
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God blessed them and said to them, "Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground."
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Then God said, "I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food. And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air and all the creatures that move on the ground—everything that has the breath of life in it—I give every green plant for food."
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And it was so.
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God saw all that he had made, and it was very good. And there was evening, and there was morning—the sixth day. Land animals: fluffy furry beasts, creepy crawly things and us! You and me, Adam and Eve. And more procreation. And more wonder and amazement, and confounding, for who can understand the way of a man with a maiden.

Not only the gift of a world of wonder but the gift of our job, to subdue the earth, rule over it, be the steward of it and all that inhabits the earth.

God's Creation and His invitation of participation, procreation, a gift not a curse.

We were out and about in God's beautiful world today.

Dirt had his first shearing appointment of the season, the prelambing season.

Some folks, like Kathy, appreciate their mommas sheared up so that lambing goes a little easier. Kathy cancelled until the weather gets a little more settled, but Tammy decided not to.

When we arrived at her snowy place she mentioned that she was hoping Dirt would have called her to say, "not today." She didn't realize that her snow was unusual for the area today and that Dirt had no idea it was several degrees lower at her house and sort of white. (We are mostly green now.)

It really doesn't get warmer from here on out until, oh say some where in April if we're lucky! However, hopefully not so crazy as the week before Christmas, but certainly not "warm." Dirt didn't mind the cold, shearing has a tendency to up your core temp anyway so it was just the rest of us that suffered. (Well, the others suffered, I spent most of the time in the truck with two seed catalogs.)

So here are all the fluffy warm wooly sheep. Not the least suspicious.

However, they're not understanding why this fellow is getting undressed (almost) and redressed in their chilly barn.

Well, they don't know what just happened! All they know is that it was very scary, noisy, and weird and now they are the ones that are undressed. And add insult to injury, no one is handing them some coveralls!

At home in the Laundry/Hothouse, some more signs of spring.

Thought you might like to know, on this day that we are talking creation and participation, that my onions did pretty well.

They are on a rather high shelf so the pics are not the greatest. At least you can see I have some little spindles of onions.

The only seeds that did not germinate well were the older ones packaged for o'six. So there you go, proof that they mean what "they" say, that onion seed only lasts one year.

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Spent the rest of the day looking for on-line seed houses and scoping out some of the selections I might make this year.

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Some chicken dumpling pie and some more sweets tonight before we do whatever fun activity Dirt picks out for us.

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Tomorrow, on the seventh day of Christmas, we will be preparing for another feast and another gathering of good friends to ring in the New Year !

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Dear Reader, I hope you enjoyed your sixth day of Christmas and in some way the gift that God gave us of the six days of creation.

Getting Fleeced

Or not, seems to be the subject of the day around here. The plan was to skirt and wash fleeces today ands we are getting it done.

This fleece, off of one of Dirt's sheering customer's sheep, is spread out on the tarp for skirting and evaluation by the girls. Skirting involves taking the worst of the fleece off, the stuff that has so much dung in it that it won't come clean it is also the wool that is often britchy, flat and without character this one is headed to the insulation pile. I will be using all the nasty and not worth washing fleeces as insulation in a box made to store my fuchsias and geraniums.

There are some good ones in the pile. It is just a matter of going through them. And that means we won't be going into town or playing around till maybe Thursday if we're lucky.

This is what comes from not installing a hot water heater in the Laundry House, Dirt. We all refused to haul hot water to the washing machine in the driveway that we are using to wash the fleeces. That means that Dirt hooked the hose up to the hot water heater in the dining room closet.

This is the rack where the fleeces will dry after they are washed and rinsed. The frame has hardware mesh on it.

You can make all the red neck cracks you want, we've heard them all and probably invented half of them ourselves, self evaluation can lead to humor. Even though we do this in the broken washer. the water can not agitate or all the wool will felt and that is only a good thing once it is clean and ready to be felted

Here is the hose that comes from the house that fills the wash tub that holds the dirty fleece that soaks un-agitated in hot water.

And Dawn dish soap.

See you back here when we get some done. Or the world comes to an end, oh wait then you wouldn't be hearing from me then either.