May 16, 2012 by Debbie.

Jo delivered 3 baby goats last evening, all normal presentation even though the first was breech. It was an blessedly uneventful kidding! We were so ready for a healthy kidding! The first born, a buckling, is the smallest. The second born, another buckling, is the largest - at least twice the size of the little buckling. The third was doeling and is just a tad bigger than the smallest. We’ve never had such small babies as these two. We can only guess that these were conceived at two different times as there is such a disparity between sizes.

Here’s a picture of the first two - look at the size difference!

And the whole family together -

They’re all Oreo colored but the doeling has a lot of brown on her backside, brown buckskin. Jo has some brown on her but the Oreo look came from the daddy, Arador!

More later, thanking God for a great night and safe delivery,

Debbie

Posted in Homestead living | No Comments »

April 29, 2012 by Debbie.

Gardens are still doing well! I’m so excited we actually are growing food again. I had forgotten how much even a small garden can cut down on grocery shopping. Pleased, too. Today I picked peas before we headed out to church.

I’ll be making pea salad tomorrow - how refreshing that will be! There will be one or two more pickings but the heat (86 yesterday), very high winds and caterpillars are taking a toll on the peas.

The moths and butterflies have been thick this spring and their caterpillars have  eaten up most of our cabbage before I remembered to put bt on them. I thought it was pill bugs and was putting DE on the ground. I have one intact head of cabbage so we’ll have one good cabbage meal and then I’ll replant this fall as it’s too late now. Here’s one of the green bean patches, another was planted two weeks after this one and I’ll plant more in the pea spot after refreshing the soil with some amendments.

A friend shared some white pumpkin seed with me and I’ve set out 3 plants. The one under the white crate was just set out recently. The white crates protect some from the wind and sun, giving the plants a head start. Our plants have to be sturdy to live through our winds up here on the hill. The white on the ground is DE - pill bugs love new transplants. The cage is guinea protection.

The two tomatoes and two peppers in the grow house are doing really well - they have clusters of tomatoes on them. I can almost taste fresh, home grown tomatoes!!!

This is the second Key Hole Garden - planted mostly with tomatoes - never have too many tomatoes!

So far, I really like the Key Hole gardens. We’ll see how they do in the dead heat of summer before I make a commitment to many more.

I’ve also been working on some native flowers/plants that I’ll share next time!

good gardening to you,

Debbie

Posted in Homestead living | No Comments »

April 4, 2012 by Debbie.

It’s the morning after 12 or 13 tornadoes came though the Dallas/north Texas area and I’m sitting at the kitchen table enjoying the cooler weather. I’m also watching Pepper, John’s cat, chase around the west yard, hunting birds. Zip he runs up the tree. Zip he comes down, bird-less. His perch is the porch swing side table so he can stay out of the wet grass that is almost jungle length thanks to the recent rain and warm weather.

A friend who lives in Forney, Tx had baseball sized hail and a tornado in that city destroyed a dozen or more homes, damaging many more. The friend’s home and kitties were safe and sound, God’s blessings on her and her husband and kittie family.  I love thunderstorms so I nappped through most of our loud display. Poor Watson was shaking at my feet. He’s relieved today is beautifully calm.

I’ve picked broccoli till  we’re about sick of it. The asparagus is coming on thicker and the winter spinach and lettuce is turning bitter with the heat we had, up to 87 last Saturday. This week’s ‘cold front’ is much appreciated. We should stay in the 70’s for a week or so.

Well, to the point of this post - here’s some pictures of our spring wild flowers we’ve found here. We’ll look for more after this week’s rain but here’s the start.

Blue eyed grass

Pink evening primrose - wow! I read about the medicinal value of this ground cover. I definitely want this one to spread.

Lazy Daisy - lazy cause they don’t open til the sun is fully up - sleeping in!

Somehow I’ve lost the picture of the Star Lily. It was a fragile, tiny little white flower. If I find it, I’ll post it. If not, not. Profound, huh? Hopefully more to come after a walk through the pastures again AFTER things dry out.

Easter is this weekend. Let’s not lose sight of what Easter really represents - the price Jesus paid on the cross and then arose from the dead to give us new life and bodily healing. Spring resurrection.

Posted in Homestead living | 1 Comment »

March 16, 2012 by Debbie.

John knows I don’t like cut flowers so he did the best thing possible - brought me a picture of a spring flower!

So, it IS spring! Along with normal spring chores we’re trying to add new garden beds here at Beulah Land. I learned about Key Hole Gardening a couple of years ago. They’re used with great success in dry climates that have little top soil.  They seemed very productive so I thought we’d give at least one a try. Here’s the url for detailed direction on how to do the Key Hole Gardens - http://www.debtolman.com/keyhole.pdf

I’m not going to go into directions here, just wanted to share the pictures of ours.

We don’t have any rocks to build up the garden so we used cement blocks instead.  Unfortunately the cement blocks don’t lend themselves to the middle cut out so there’s garden space wasted. I may rearrange the blocks somehow.

With the cardboard along the edges, this bed still needs another layer of block and then the cardboard will be cut off so it doesn’t look so ragged (ugly.)  I used an old tomato cage for the compost center. I need to line it with a finer mesh to hold compost in and outside bedding material out of the center cage.

After seeing the pictures I realized I had to go redo the ‘key hole’ portion of the garden. It was way too big and took up too much planting space. Here’s the new design.

What a great way to use up the pizza box - no waste!

John pulled all those weeds and grasses out of another bed that is ready to plant now, too.  More to come later on the Key Hole gardening.

Posted in Homestead living | 1 Comment »

March 7, 2012 by Debbie.

Not quite spring yet even if we’ve had temps in the 70’s and even one day in the 80’s. The winter crops are paying off now, though, so eating fresh green food again makes it feel like spring.

Nothing like a couple of sinks full of spinach, broccoli and kohlrabies.  Last night we ate most of this in an out-of-this-world stir fry.

I found this trumpet shaped spinach in the batch. Somehow the leaf formed a circle instead of a flat surface.

Odd shape, but it tasted just as good!

This morning I pulled some radish out of the salad bed. The lettuce is ready, too, but I didn’t want to pull it until just before eating it. You can see how much spinach we got in the green bag.  I’m going to start some flowers from seed today, too - zinnia, marigold and cosmos, pictured below.

I started seedling pots of several different veggies as well - summer and winter squash, melon, pumpkin, cucumbers and who knows what else - it’s been a couple of hours since I planted them so I don’t remember. I have more lettuce and tomato seedlings in pots in the grow house along with more broccoli and kohlrabi but this warm weather make make those two impractical. I splurged and bought 6 strawberry plants at a nursery this week that need set out.

March 13 is suppose to be our last freeze date, but I’m not taking a chance on it myself. I think I’ll wait til first of April to set out things ……… at least that’s the plan now!

Posted in Homestead living | No Comments »

March 2, 2012 by Debbie.

Betsy kidded Feb. 21 and presented us with a beautiful, healthy baby doe, Kady. Unfortunately, Betsy died the next day due to a tear in her uterus.  I think the vet and his staff were almost as upset as we were. He told me he had prayed for her a quick healing or a quick release. I really like having a vet that will pray for his patients. I know Betsy got the best of care.

Kady is doing very well bottle feeding. She thinks John and I are her people. She responds to our voices. Since she was a singleton she’s by herself in a safe stall. As she grows we’ll have supervised time with one of the younger does. I tried a play date but the younger doe did not play well and got sent back away. Kady can see the other goats through the fences but she’s relying on us to teach her goat things.

John does well teaching goat cuddles after the evening bottle.

The vet said sometimes things happen we just can’t fix. Sometimes I just don’t like Mother Nature.

Posted in Homestead living | 1 Comment »

February 12, 2012 by Debbie.

This past week, I heard someone commenting about how no one hangs their clothes on the line anymore and how she likes to when ‘the weather permits.’ I’m glad she hangs her clothes out, don’t get me wrong, but we live in Texas - when can’t we hang out clothes?!

I do feel for full time working women/men who have to juggle household chores around work time. That does make hanging clothes on the line more adventuresome but doesn’t have to stop it even for bad weather. I thought of old time houses which were built for dealing with lives not filled with modern conveniences, such  a washer or dryer. The women who had a washer, usually a wringer washer (I’d love to have one of those now!) and not an automatic washer, also had a wonderful place to do their laundry. It was called ‘a service porch.’ I’d love to have one of those, too, one of these days! I had a wringer washer years ago and was too stupid (aka young) to appreciate it and gave it away. But I digress.

Old time housewives, or household help, did their laundry on service porches. If the weather was bad, a clothes line was strung across the service porch to dry the clothes as well. Sometimes there was an additional wood or gas stove on the porch to do the cooking in the summer time. Oh, another dream of mine - a wood cook stove!

Again, I digress.

Since there is no service porch here at Beulah Land as our house was built in the 1970’s instead of the 1930’s, we have adapted our own version of indoor clothes drying. For 12+years I’ve used this small wooden rack that a friend gave me. She bought it at a garage sale for 75 cents and needed one screw to fix it.

I can load it down really well but today I didn’t need to as ……………………………….

a dream has come true!

John bought and hung my new indoor clothes drying line!!! ta-da!

He even made me a clothes pole to push the line up where I won’t decapitate myself walking through the area. The door on the left is slightly open. That’s our signal that the hot water tank is turned on. We only turn it on when we need hot water, saving a lot of electricity along with what we don’t use for an electric dryer! The added benefit is the moisture added to the air from the clothes drying.

I feel rich - I am rich! Pioneer women didn’t even have an outside line to dry their clothes. They laid the wet clothes over bushes and low tree branches. Women on the Plains didn’t even have many bushes or trees to use! How quickly our perspectives can change.

It’s not wet weather that has caused indoor laundry drying this weekend, but 25 degree temps outside. My mom hung clothes outside in Ohio all the time, even diapers for babies, in the snow and ice. I remember bringing in jeans that were frozen solid. The freezing process removes a lot of the water from the clothes (think of how meat becomes freezer-burned - completely dried out) and then we’d have to lay the clothes around the house. We had a temporary line we strung in the upstairs kids’ bedroom but I seldom remember using it.

John was busy this morning hauling in wood while this cold spell lasts. He looked like Nanook of the North with his little red wagon full of wood.

You notice I’m cutting the sides off this picture s you won’t see how messy my sewing room is! I just finished 4 days of subbing last week and have not caught up with life here. Course, even with 0 days of subbing, I still hadn’t cleaned house before. Sounds good, though.

Speaking of subbing, the K kids made a new worm bed for me a couple of weeks ago. We had a glorious time learning about earth worms and then holding them. Only one boy refused to touch or hold a worm. Then the kids started my spring lettuce for me in pots we fertilized with some worm castings (aka ‘worm poo-poo.’) I brought the pots home and put them under lights for now. The kids want to taste the lettuce when it’s big enough so I’ll transport the pots back later.

And the next time I go in, I’ll take in our new Worm Factory. I am rich. I splurged. I had a 50% off deal from Garden’s Alive and finally broke down and bought one. I’ve dreamed of one for years and never could bring myself to spend the money but now that I know I can use it at school and not just for my own selfish enjoyment I splurged.

In the top of the Worm Factory is  a small container where I’m hatching out some Red Wiggler earth worms. I’m not sure that’s working yet or not. The bucket beside the Worm Factory is water that is de-chlorinating  so I can use it in the mushroom kit I bought. I told you I splurged.

Spring time is a great time for dreams to co

Posted in Homestead living | No Comments »

December 26, 2011 by Debbie.

Merry Christmas to all, belated as it is! We had such a good time with the family for Christmas. We set up the Snow Village and John’s Lionel train from when he was a child. It was the first time Avery had seen the set up and the boys were all old enough to run the train by themselves.

Lily and Watson, our granddogs,  celebrated with us and Watson got to stay with us for a visit. Watson has adopted John and follows his every move. He’s upset he can’t sleep on the bed with us but other than that he’s fit in nicely. He and Pepper, John’s cat, are still reconciling their natural differences. Pepper is spending a lot of time up high and moving around while Watson is either sleeping or outside with John. Lily never bothered the cats and she was much smaller.

Watson is a Australian Shepard and his coloring is much like a coyote, so much so that the goats won’t come near the fence when he’s outside.

We’ve gated off the dining room, one of the two rooms with carpeting in our house. Watson remembered the ham and other food in there, though, and tried to get to it via the outside window.

 Watson’s going to have a rude awaking when John heads back to work on tomorrow morning. I’m in for a day … Watson pacing from room to room hunting John.

Here’s a picture of the wall hangings I made for the Kindergarten teachers in Whitewright for Christmas. I can do the stitching and designing but John had to write the names in for me! Thank goodness for his strong, steady hand. The Red School house wall hanging was made by a pattern. I designed and created the other two patterns.

Here’s the first wall hanging I made, using the standard house block pattern.

This one will be mine as there are mistakes I wouldn’t want anyone else to share! First mistake was the houses should be all facing the same direction but I cut two out backwards.

It’s a good time to finish up a lot of projects just waiting to be done. I’ve put the binding on 2 baby quilts, one Christmas quilt and the Houses wall hanging this week.  I also finished up the hand quilting on the K classes quilt we’re making together. Tomorrow I hope to bind it so it can be washed before I appliqued the kids’ hand prints on the borders.

John finished covering the grow house with plastic so I could transplant the broccoli, kohlrabi, spinach and arugula. I planted a bed of lettuce with radish inside also. The kale seeds were planted outside as they can take the cold, tasting better after a frost.

It’s been a busy week!

Debbie

Posted in Homestead living | 2 Comments »

December 11, 2011 by Debbie.

I didn’t realize it had been so long since I posted on the blog. I completely missed posting in Nov. We had a great Thanksgiving, with our home grown turkey, Frank. Other than Thanksgiving and sub-teaching, I don’t know where the time went.

I did finish this quilt that went home with a dear, dear friend. For some reason,  I fought with the border hand quilting on this quilt til I thought I’d scream. Still it was a happy quilt to work on. I pray for the person I’m making the quilt for as I work on it and all  I could pray for this friend was joyous psalms. Very appropriate as she’s a happy, smiley person.

This entry will be short, it’s after 8:30 pm which is past my bedtime. I’m going to cheat and send you to www.quilts.beulahland.com to get double duty out of that posting!

Merry Christmas in case I let time slip by again,

God richly bless you all!

Debbie

Posted in Homestead living | No Comments »

October 28, 2011 by Debbie.

Everyone may not think so, but I do. I think camels are absolutely beautiful. I wouldn’t even mind being spit at by one. After all, why shouldn’t a camel spit at someone staring at them? I’m a sub teacher and I’ve known kids to spit for less.

John and I saw these two beauties on the way home from church recently.

I didn’t know camels could be so different til I saw the right camel’s white face.  I wanted John to get a close up picture of it but she kept puckering her lips as if to kiss us or spit at us. I chose to believe the kissy face myself.

We had just gotten rain so the ground was all muddy - what a blessing rain is. We still need more to break the drought but so glad for what we did get.

Remember the old brand of cigarettes, Camels? I wondered why they were named that as I always associate camels with dry, something I’m assuming wouldn’t be pleasing in a cigarette, but I can’t think of ANY thing that would be pleasing those nasty things.

These two camels had babies earlier this year. I haven’t seen them with the parents so assuming they are being weaned or separated for some reason.  I know with goats the bucklings are separated at 6 weeks as they are viable then.

As nice as it is to see these camels, I hope they’re NOT a sign of north central Texas turning into a desert!

Posted in Homestead living | No Comments »