Showing posts with label gardening. Show all posts
Showing posts with label gardening. Show all posts
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
"Time Doesn't Wait for me...it Keeps on Rollin'"
So...It's been a good, long time since I've posted a blog. I'm not 100% sure why I haven't posted in the last 2 months or so....lots of reasons, maybe...but anyways...I figured that from here on out I'd at least put up 1 blog a month....even just for me and mine...as a time-line of sorts. I'm not sure that I've got anything of consequence to say...I really just enjoy looking back on years past and seeing where life was at during a certain month or moment...seeing how little Gavin was during a garden post in 2010 or revisiting Ivy's first birthday. I dig that. I have decided that I will try to at least post a monthly "scrapbook" blog of our family's going's on....It's mostly for me and mine, but please feel free to enjoy life along with us. Here's what I've got in this installment:
Chrissy and the kids went down to New Jersey for a few days. Gavin spent the afternoon in pop-pop's kayak tooling around the creek in Deptford, NJ.
Our seeds have germinated and are starting to fill out. Gavin is keeping his own garden this year. This is his row of lettuce. Should be ready to eat in 3 weeks or so.
We keep an asparagus patch...the nice part of that (besides it being a perennial and requiring almost no work) is that it pays off in EARLY Spring. We're harvesting about this much every 2-3 days:
Chrissy went to yoga class and the kids and I hung out on the deck. They made a "nest" for themselves under the slide. Too cute.
Our strawberries are looking great. Lots of our other fruit trees are looking good as well....peaches, apples, nectarines, blueberries, cherries. We're hoping for a nice, big harvest this season.
The kids hanging inside the blackberry arbor.
We finished our chicken coop a few weeks ago. Here's our girls "expressing their chicken-ness" on their roosts...there may be a rooster or two in our midst, however.
case in point.
Alright...that pretty much brings us up to speed on the going's on around here. Thanks for reading. Hope you are all having stellar Spring seasons. Here's hoping for a fruitful Summer harvest and some great memories with our families.
God Bless.
Tuesday, March 13, 2012
Small Shifts and Poultry Progress
I make up words for things in my brain...or use words in unconventional contexts. Ivy does the same thing. If she's sitting by the fire, she doesn't feel the "warmth"...she feels the "heatness". One word that comes up in my mind this time of year is "shift"...as in "The Shift". To me, The Shift is that time when Winter is finally transitioning out, the ground is starting to thaw, patches of new green start to appear, the ice on the pond has melted and you catch a glimpse of an occasional ripple as a fish makes a quick turn near the surface. Normally, around here, Winter is a VERY long season. As that temperature drops in November...you start to batten down the hatches; put the lawn furniture away, pull the boats up out of the water, tune up the snow blower. Then it's almost 5 full months of very cold and very snowy. We like to be outside quite a bit in the Winter but with little ones, it sometimes gets tough...you know the drill...spend 45 minutes layering them up with warm clothes only to get 10 minutes outside before a face plant or tumble sends snow where it shouldn't be. I dig Winter...but I LOVE the shift...that means, boating, fishing, gardening, outdoor living is right around the corner.
This year's "shift" was hardly one at all. We experienced the 4th mildest Winter on record here and got to spend a great deal of time outside all season. It is still nice to think about Spring and all the outdoor stuff that goes with it. It's been in the upper 60's this week and we've been talking full advantage of this gorgeous weather. I'll show you...but first....
Chicken Update!
The girls have just about tripled in size since we got them. They are two weeks old now and all of them have their wing feathers and most of their tail feathers in:
They are still cute...but it won't be long until they hit that gawky, feather-ruffled, necks-a-little-too-long-for-their-tiny-head stage...the "teenage" phase as it's known in chicken raising. I'm still anticipating one or two of them to be a rooster..we'll see.
Well...being that the ground is thawed, work began on their coop:
My pops (Pa, as he's known to his grand kids) has been designing and mainly working on this baby. We're thinking it's gonna look pretty cool as it comes together.
So today, after work, I got changed and in about 2 minutes was outside with the fam working in the yard. There's some work that needs doing on our gardens so we started on that. We had dinner...then right back outside. I took the kids for a sunset ride in the boat:
with snacks:
and swans:
We even managed to do the thing that spawned this blog's name:
We found the Blue Heron (this was the best shot I could manage as I fumbled in my pocket for the camera while it was flying away from me.
After we docked, we had 15-20 more minutes of daylight. Gavin decided to "reward the day with a little fishin'" as we've been known to say around here:
While Ivy and I played catch with her new junky frisbee-thing:
Ivy insisted on bringing the frisbee back in her mouth. It wasn't until 5 or 6 tosses in that I realized that what I was doing wasn't playing "catch"...
I was playing "fetch".
Which sort of works...cuz I've never had a dog.
Not a bad Tuesday.
Then God said, “Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb that yields seed, and the fruit tree that yields fruit according to its kind, whose seed is in itself, on the earth”; and it was so. And the earth brought forth grass, the herb that yields seed according to its kind, and the tree that yields fruit, whose seed is in itself according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. So the evening and the morning were the third day. - Genesis 1:11-13
I love that part.
This year's "shift" was hardly one at all. We experienced the 4th mildest Winter on record here and got to spend a great deal of time outside all season. It is still nice to think about Spring and all the outdoor stuff that goes with it. It's been in the upper 60's this week and we've been talking full advantage of this gorgeous weather. I'll show you...but first....
Chicken Update!
The girls have just about tripled in size since we got them. They are two weeks old now and all of them have their wing feathers and most of their tail feathers in:
They are still cute...but it won't be long until they hit that gawky, feather-ruffled, necks-a-little-too-long-for-their-tiny-head stage...the "teenage" phase as it's known in chicken raising. I'm still anticipating one or two of them to be a rooster..we'll see.
Well...being that the ground is thawed, work began on their coop:
My pops (Pa, as he's known to his grand kids) has been designing and mainly working on this baby. We're thinking it's gonna look pretty cool as it comes together.
So today, after work, I got changed and in about 2 minutes was outside with the fam working in the yard. There's some work that needs doing on our gardens so we started on that. We had dinner...then right back outside. I took the kids for a sunset ride in the boat:
with snacks:
and swans:
We even managed to do the thing that spawned this blog's name:
We found the Blue Heron (this was the best shot I could manage as I fumbled in my pocket for the camera while it was flying away from me.
After we docked, we had 15-20 more minutes of daylight. Gavin decided to "reward the day with a little fishin'" as we've been known to say around here:
While Ivy and I played catch with her new junky frisbee-thing:
Ivy insisted on bringing the frisbee back in her mouth. It wasn't until 5 or 6 tosses in that I realized that what I was doing wasn't playing "catch"...
I was playing "fetch".
Which sort of works...cuz I've never had a dog.
Not a bad Tuesday.
Then God said, “Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb that yields seed, and the fruit tree that yields fruit according to its kind, whose seed is in itself, on the earth”; and it was so. And the earth brought forth grass, the herb that yields seed according to its kind, and the tree that yields fruit, whose seed is in itself according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. So the evening and the morning were the third day. - Genesis 1:11-13
I love that part.
Wednesday, March 7, 2012
What are you, Chicken?
So...beyond Gavin learning to ride a two-wheeler and Ivy learning to cruise on the Strider bike, Some other cool progressions have been shaping up around here. I've started playing music in a "band" again, actually it's more like a quartet (and and occasionally a sextet)....My friend Andy, his wife, Maureen, Chrissy, and I have established this little bluegrass collective that we call The Grape Pickers. Gavin will sometimes break out his collection of harmonicas and rip a few notes while Ivy goes crazy with a shaker or tambourine (that's the sextet). We have 1 legit gig so far, in late August. More to come on that as it gets closer. In other news...this year, we will be drip irrigating our gardens from collected rainwater, something we've been talking about for a few seasons. Additionally, garden-wise, we are expanding our gardens a bit and starting an informal gardening co-op with two families and a young man from church. We've always harvested more than we use, and have given away bushels of produce to friends, family, and causes. We'll still be able to do that, while adding to it the pleasure of getting to garden along-side some our dearest friends as we work together to bring forth a harvest. This also is something that has been in my head and heart for some time, it was just never the Lord's timing for it...until now.
Now, all of that is big news (at least for us)...but the biggest (and cutest) news of all is that we are now raising chickens!! We got ourselves a nice little collection of Rhode Island Red hens who will be giving us delicious, home-grown, eggs by late Summer. We are so excited about this. Right now they are 1 week old chicks living in a brooder in our home school room.
A quick story about that:
I knew the chicks would be arriving soon, so last week, I picked up all the equipment that I would need: pine shavings, feed and feeder, water fount, heat lamp, thermometer...all I had left to buy was the actual container for the brooder. Now...people use all kinds of home made contraptions as a brooder: kiddie pools, cardboard boxes, Rubbermaid totes...I guess that would be pretty cost effective but...I wanted something that looked kind of slick and "farmy"...I decided to use a galvanized stock tank...the setup looked like this:
Notice at the feeder is Gavin's wind up toy chick....hey, we wanted a visual here...just until the real peepers arrived. 2 days later, our girls were home and now our brooder looked like this:
Pretty much the cutest things in the universe, right?
We got to naming a few of them: Chatty Baby, Little Jerry, Pickle, Marilyn 1, Marilyn 2...i think that's as far as we got. We spent the first few days down there just about all the time. Gavin got really good at handling them. I've read that if your chicks are consistently and lovingly handled early on that they will be more docile as they grow up. Not sure if that's true but...we'll find out, I guess. So after 2 days, we noticed some things. First, baby chicks grow FAST. I mean, these things nearly doubled in size in 48 hours. Second, their wing feathers were starting to come in:
It's unreal watching them grow. It's like watching your kids grow up, only 10 times as fast. Our friends, the Corbett's, came over that night and my buddy Andy says "So, how long before they can hop out of the tank, a week?"
nope.
6 days.
Well..in all honesty, one didn't jump out of the tank but, as I was sitting there watching them scamper around, a few of them COULD have jumped out if they timed their jumps right. That's just about the last thing on earth that I need....I pictured Chrissy calling me at work, kids SCREAMING crying in sorrow in the background, as she tells me that 3 chicks were missing. No way, man.
Well, that night, the brooder looked like this:
After harvesting the screens from the basement windows and laying them across the top of the brooder, I knew that I had made a rookie mistake...I bought a tank that was too shallow. Now, I figured that I could bungee cord some flexible fencing or chicken wire around the thing to build up the sides...but then it would look all ghetto...I knew what I had to do. I took back the 44 gallon stock tank and exchanged it for the 169 gallon stock tank! Tonight...the brooder looks like this:
Now we're talkin'. a full foot deeper, 4 more square feet of running room...I'm able to suspend the feeder (although I did settle on a home-made, ghetto-looking bar made of scrap wood, drywall screws, and some random brackets). I must say...I'm much happier (and so are the girls).
The coop will be ready in a few weeks and by late April, the hens will be ready to move outside. If they keep growing at the rate they are, they ought to be about 75 lbs. each by then. here's some random chick pics:
Ivy learning some "mothering" skills
Gavin learning some "Don't always be a complete spaz" skills (kidding...LOVE this kid).
Nose to beak
oh yeah...
...they also have tail-feathers, now.
*sniff*...they grow up so fast....*sniff*
Now, all of that is big news (at least for us)...but the biggest (and cutest) news of all is that we are now raising chickens!! We got ourselves a nice little collection of Rhode Island Red hens who will be giving us delicious, home-grown, eggs by late Summer. We are so excited about this. Right now they are 1 week old chicks living in a brooder in our home school room.
A quick story about that:
I knew the chicks would be arriving soon, so last week, I picked up all the equipment that I would need: pine shavings, feed and feeder, water fount, heat lamp, thermometer...all I had left to buy was the actual container for the brooder. Now...people use all kinds of home made contraptions as a brooder: kiddie pools, cardboard boxes, Rubbermaid totes...I guess that would be pretty cost effective but...I wanted something that looked kind of slick and "farmy"...I decided to use a galvanized stock tank...the setup looked like this:
Notice at the feeder is Gavin's wind up toy chick....hey, we wanted a visual here...just until the real peepers arrived. 2 days later, our girls were home and now our brooder looked like this:
Pretty much the cutest things in the universe, right?
We got to naming a few of them: Chatty Baby, Little Jerry, Pickle, Marilyn 1, Marilyn 2...i think that's as far as we got. We spent the first few days down there just about all the time. Gavin got really good at handling them. I've read that if your chicks are consistently and lovingly handled early on that they will be more docile as they grow up. Not sure if that's true but...we'll find out, I guess. So after 2 days, we noticed some things. First, baby chicks grow FAST. I mean, these things nearly doubled in size in 48 hours. Second, their wing feathers were starting to come in:
It's unreal watching them grow. It's like watching your kids grow up, only 10 times as fast. Our friends, the Corbett's, came over that night and my buddy Andy says "So, how long before they can hop out of the tank, a week?"
nope.
6 days.
Well..in all honesty, one didn't jump out of the tank but, as I was sitting there watching them scamper around, a few of them COULD have jumped out if they timed their jumps right. That's just about the last thing on earth that I need....I pictured Chrissy calling me at work, kids SCREAMING crying in sorrow in the background, as she tells me that 3 chicks were missing. No way, man.
Well, that night, the brooder looked like this:
After harvesting the screens from the basement windows and laying them across the top of the brooder, I knew that I had made a rookie mistake...I bought a tank that was too shallow. Now, I figured that I could bungee cord some flexible fencing or chicken wire around the thing to build up the sides...but then it would look all ghetto...I knew what I had to do. I took back the 44 gallon stock tank and exchanged it for the 169 gallon stock tank! Tonight...the brooder looks like this:
Now we're talkin'. a full foot deeper, 4 more square feet of running room...I'm able to suspend the feeder (although I did settle on a home-made, ghetto-looking bar made of scrap wood, drywall screws, and some random brackets). I must say...I'm much happier (and so are the girls).
The coop will be ready in a few weeks and by late April, the hens will be ready to move outside. If they keep growing at the rate they are, they ought to be about 75 lbs. each by then. here's some random chick pics:
Ivy learning some "mothering" skills
Gavin learning some "Don't always be a complete spaz" skills (kidding...LOVE this kid).
Nose to beak
oh yeah...
...they also have tail-feathers, now.
*sniff*...they grow up so fast....*sniff*
Sunday, July 31, 2011
Canning Update
100% success!! all 27 quart jars sealed properly!!
My kids are going to get so sick of pickles :^)
My kids are going to get so sick of pickles :^)
"Don't Bogart That Can......Man"
So...you're probably asking yourself....what does a throw-away line from the 1994 Gen-x coming-of-age film "Reality Bites" have to do with canning vegetables? (actually....I'm sure you AREN'T asking yourself this....BUT....if you were....the answer would be: Nothing....except maybe the word "can".) It's been a really long night so....forgive me if I'm a little mental.
Right now it's 1:27 am. I've been at this since 8:00pm. Part of me never wants to see another pickle again for the rest of eternity....the other part of me wants to eat nothing but...
Anyhow...this is my first attempt at canning. I don't have a pressure canner so anything that I can has to be able to be processed in a water bath canner. The first victim was a huge batch of pickles:
27 quarts in all. I've read a million articles and blogs about canning. Everyone seems to have their own take on it. I'm coming to find that it's more an art than a science. You ask 100 gardeners how to can pickles and you'll get 100 different takes on the how-to specifics. I took the knowledge that I found and added my own spin....At the end of the day....I'm hoping for an 80% success rate. I guess that means....out of the 27 jars I processed tonight....I'm hoping for 21 or 22 of them to seal properly.
If that happens...I'll be thrilled.
I'll letcha know tomorrow how things panned out. As for now....I think I'll finish my drink and then head on to sleep. This stuff's like a part-time job...the "simple life" certainly is work....but fun work.
Right now it's 1:27 am. I've been at this since 8:00pm. Part of me never wants to see another pickle again for the rest of eternity....the other part of me wants to eat nothing but...
Anyhow...this is my first attempt at canning. I don't have a pressure canner so anything that I can has to be able to be processed in a water bath canner. The first victim was a huge batch of pickles:
27 quarts in all. I've read a million articles and blogs about canning. Everyone seems to have their own take on it. I'm coming to find that it's more an art than a science. You ask 100 gardeners how to can pickles and you'll get 100 different takes on the how-to specifics. I took the knowledge that I found and added my own spin....At the end of the day....I'm hoping for an 80% success rate. I guess that means....out of the 27 jars I processed tonight....I'm hoping for 21 or 22 of them to seal properly.
If that happens...I'll be thrilled.
I'll letcha know tomorrow how things panned out. As for now....I think I'll finish my drink and then head on to sleep. This stuff's like a part-time job...the "simple life" certainly is work....but fun work.
Friday, July 29, 2011
The Summer Stretch
This time of year is special. It's that 4-6 week stretch where there's tons of sun and 90+ degree cooking-hot Summer days. A pre-dinner dip in the pool becomes a given and, if you stand still enough, I think that you can actually HEAR the garden growing. The harvest is daily and plentiful. Here's a shot of today's take:
There's my boy snagging a cuke to nibble on. Here's one way that I know that it's Summer...I find these all over the house:
You'd think that I've got mice but, alas, it's just the kids grabbing a little garden goodie to munch on before supper.
I'm going to try my hand at canning tomorrow. I have 50 lbs of cukes that need to be processed. I've done lots with freezer and fridge preserving in the past but have never used a bath canner. I'm looking forward to hopefully being able to put some food on our pantry shelves that will last for a year or so.
I've read the books, I've looked over the recipes....I'm going to add my own twist and hope for the best.
The crazy thing is that...let's take cucumbers for example. They cost about $.75 each on sale at the grocery store. I've got about about 24 cucumber plants. I payed about 10 bucks for all of them. They are putting out around 15-20 cukes a day. The savings that you realize by growing stuff yourself is insane. It becomes practically free. All told, I've got about 100 bucks, out of pocket, into my garden...and, when it's all said and done, If you had to pay retail for all of what we harvest, you're looking at easily $2,000-$3,000 worth of stuff. In this economy....how can you not grow something?
Hope all your gardens are heaving and all your crisper drawers are full.
God Bless.
There's my boy snagging a cuke to nibble on. Here's one way that I know that it's Summer...I find these all over the house:
You'd think that I've got mice but, alas, it's just the kids grabbing a little garden goodie to munch on before supper.
I'm going to try my hand at canning tomorrow. I have 50 lbs of cukes that need to be processed. I've done lots with freezer and fridge preserving in the past but have never used a bath canner. I'm looking forward to hopefully being able to put some food on our pantry shelves that will last for a year or so.
I've read the books, I've looked over the recipes....I'm going to add my own twist and hope for the best.
The crazy thing is that...let's take cucumbers for example. They cost about $.75 each on sale at the grocery store. I've got about about 24 cucumber plants. I payed about 10 bucks for all of them. They are putting out around 15-20 cukes a day. The savings that you realize by growing stuff yourself is insane. It becomes practically free. All told, I've got about 100 bucks, out of pocket, into my garden...and, when it's all said and done, If you had to pay retail for all of what we harvest, you're looking at easily $2,000-$3,000 worth of stuff. In this economy....how can you not grow something?
Hope all your gardens are heaving and all your crisper drawers are full.
God Bless.
Wednesday, July 20, 2011
Welcome To Flavor Country
Squashes are paying out steadily.
Red Raspberries are providing daily post-swimming snacking
Tons of green tomatoes soaking in these steamy-hot sunshiny days, getting ready to ripen.
Green peppers plodding along and quietly handing over the goods.
Cukes plants are pumping them out, dozens a day....which inevitably brings about:
Leo Family Pickle Factory. Our biggest single batch ever....three gallons worth. We've got our garden cukes and green peppers in there. Our onions won't be ready until late Summer.
Now that's what Summer ought to taste like.
No wait....actually:
Now.....THAT"S what Summer ought to taste like. Some folks ought to come over and help us eat these.
Keep the garden green.
Blessings,
Mike
Red Raspberries are providing daily post-swimming snacking
Tons of green tomatoes soaking in these steamy-hot sunshiny days, getting ready to ripen.
Green peppers plodding along and quietly handing over the goods.
Cukes plants are pumping them out, dozens a day....which inevitably brings about:
Leo Family Pickle Factory. Our biggest single batch ever....three gallons worth. We've got our garden cukes and green peppers in there. Our onions won't be ready until late Summer.
Now that's what Summer ought to taste like.
No wait....actually:
Now.....THAT"S what Summer ought to taste like. Some folks ought to come over and help us eat these.
Keep the garden green.
Blessings,
Mike
Thursday, July 14, 2011
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
You know how I know it's Summer?
Because I can snap a random photo of the backyard and capture...
1. The charcoal Grill
2. The newly set-up swimming pool (complete with "first dip" this evening...super-cold, but worth it)
3. A healthy looking garden
4. Chairs around the fire pit
5. Some random kids in a jon boat pulling catfish out of the lake.
...all in the same photo. What you can't see is the 15 or so sunnies and blue gills that the boy and I landed before dinner tonight....we threw them back :^)
Let's see...we just harvested all of our broccoli today (Gavin and Pa blanched and processed it). Our Spinach and Swiss Chard are coming to an end of their plantings...we're going to take over the broccoli garden with a new planting of those. It's the first year we've ever done any mid-season plantings. It's so exciting to see the months of planning and work come together in a garden full of goodness.
Here's to hoping anyone reading this has a stellar Summer season.
Keep the drinks cold
Keep the grill hot
Keep the garden green
Keep the fish biting
Keep the kids close
Keep Christ first
Go Summer!
Sunday, June 5, 2011
"Dominion" wins and fails
Genesis chapter 1 gives man "dominion" over "every living thing that moves on the earth".
"Dominion" is a cool word. The fact that we are allowed, by God, to "have dominion" is even cooler.
"Dominion" is defined as:
1: supreme authority.
2: the right of the owner of a thing to use it or dispose of it at his discretion.
3. a territory or sphere of influence or control; a realm.
I both succeeded and failed at "having dominion" over my land this weekend.
"Taking dominion" over the earth and that which lives on it is one of the first jobs that God gave Adam. He gave him this job even before The Fall...which tells me that, original sin or not, we ought to have an understanding of how our environment works and how to control what lives on it. We were going to be doing this whether or not we screwed up. It's a mandate that is both simple and daunting.
We feel that a big part of "taking dominion" over the land is to understand how things grow and to utilize the soil to produce food which sustains us. In doing this, we are in control of our our land, we understand the basic principles of planting, germination, growing, and harvesting, and use what The Lord had provided for us to survive, as well as to bless others with produce. Given our proximity to water, it also includes having a knowledge of fish and fishing.
In that aspect, while being humble, I'd give our family a "Win". This year. The fish are biting and our garden is doing very well. Many of the first time crops that we tried this year are producing wonderfully and we have been harvesting this-and-that since mid-May. All of the "warmer weather" crops have taken nicely and we anticipate a nice harvest of veggies as the months progress.
But....there was also a big "Fail" attached to this weekends "dominion".
Traditionally, we do not have a problem with varmints and critters eating up our garden. I'm not exactly sure why but, there are a number of nut trees surrounding our property, as well as the lake, and maybe there is enough food being produced by those to keep the squirrels, rabbits, woodchucks at bay. We have never had any widespread varmints getting into our garden.
Until recently.
There's a rabbit....one rabbit...that keeps showing up in our yard. I snapped a pic of it earlier in the year, maybe you remember...it was in our yard while the swan was right off out dock and it seemed like a cute little photo op (See if you can spot him):
Well, that little cotton-tailed nuisance has been back here just about every day....and every day, it has been content to sit and nibble the clover in the backyard. When we spot it, we send The Boy out to chase it out of the yard...we'll yell "Go Get 'I'm Mr. McGregor" and everyone has a laugh...it's all innocent fun...yeah...until today when he was spotted in my carrot patch. Now, say what you will but, one rabbit can absolutely decimate an entire garden if it wants to. I've got way too much invested in our garden to allow some twitchy-nosed long-eared rat to take down our plants. It was time for action
Now remember, we were given dominion, or: supreme authority, over that which moves across the earth. I set out the have-a-heart trap but the little bugger didn't take to it. We had to get more serious. The fate of our crops were hanging in the balance (can you feel the Hollywood-like suspense building?!)....It was BB gun time. (just so you know....we, by law, can't shoot "real" guns on our property due to the closeness of other houses or else...this things head would have been turned into a canoe.)
My BB gun is a sweet one. A Crossman 10-pump with a fantastic scope that could allow you to shoot the wings off of a gnat at 30 yards. It's 14 years old, a bit rusty, but still fires true. I pulled that baby out and lobbed an old diet coke 2 liter into the yard to take aim to dial in the scope which needed a few adjustments. I got it true and by this time, the rabbit was along our side yard, less than 25 yards out....an easy kill-shot.
I pumped the BB gun up, chambered a BB, took aim....the thing was so close that I could have decided which eye I wanted to shoot out. I drew a bead on this adorable little Destroyer of All Leafy Delicacies.......and fired......
nothing
The little bugger just sat there, twitching his little nose at me....then he hopped into the neighbor's yard.
Turns out, the misfire happened due to a misshapen BB that got hung up in the breech of the barrel. I've fired thousands of shots out of that gun and never had an incident like that before. The weapon WAS old, unoiled, and not kept in the best possible operating condition. I'm left wondering if The Lord was telling me to be merciful over the creatures in my yard or to take better care of the weapons that he's led me to learn to use. I may have to pray this out a bit.
But...I'll tell you this much.....
WalMart opens at 7am and you better believe that I'll be there purchasing a brand new air rifle....If this new one hangs up at the moment of truth...then I'll KNOW that God wants me to let him go....Otherwise, I plan to have unmolested veggies and a nice new pelt for Gavin at about this time tomorrow evening.
"Dominion" is a cool word. The fact that we are allowed, by God, to "have dominion" is even cooler.
"Dominion" is defined as:
1: supreme authority.
2: the right of the owner of a thing to use it or dispose of it at his discretion.
3. a territory or sphere of influence or control; a realm.
I both succeeded and failed at "having dominion" over my land this weekend.
"Taking dominion" over the earth and that which lives on it is one of the first jobs that God gave Adam. He gave him this job even before The Fall...which tells me that, original sin or not, we ought to have an understanding of how our environment works and how to control what lives on it. We were going to be doing this whether or not we screwed up. It's a mandate that is both simple and daunting.
We feel that a big part of "taking dominion" over the land is to understand how things grow and to utilize the soil to produce food which sustains us. In doing this, we are in control of our our land, we understand the basic principles of planting, germination, growing, and harvesting, and use what The Lord had provided for us to survive, as well as to bless others with produce. Given our proximity to water, it also includes having a knowledge of fish and fishing.
In that aspect, while being humble, I'd give our family a "Win". This year. The fish are biting and our garden is doing very well. Many of the first time crops that we tried this year are producing wonderfully and we have been harvesting this-and-that since mid-May. All of the "warmer weather" crops have taken nicely and we anticipate a nice harvest of veggies as the months progress.
But....there was also a big "Fail" attached to this weekends "dominion".
Traditionally, we do not have a problem with varmints and critters eating up our garden. I'm not exactly sure why but, there are a number of nut trees surrounding our property, as well as the lake, and maybe there is enough food being produced by those to keep the squirrels, rabbits, woodchucks at bay. We have never had any widespread varmints getting into our garden.
Until recently.
There's a rabbit....one rabbit...that keeps showing up in our yard. I snapped a pic of it earlier in the year, maybe you remember...it was in our yard while the swan was right off out dock and it seemed like a cute little photo op (See if you can spot him):
Well, that little cotton-tailed nuisance has been back here just about every day....and every day, it has been content to sit and nibble the clover in the backyard. When we spot it, we send The Boy out to chase it out of the yard...we'll yell "Go Get 'I'm Mr. McGregor" and everyone has a laugh...it's all innocent fun...yeah...until today when he was spotted in my carrot patch. Now, say what you will but, one rabbit can absolutely decimate an entire garden if it wants to. I've got way too much invested in our garden to allow some twitchy-nosed long-eared rat to take down our plants. It was time for action
Now remember, we were given dominion, or: supreme authority, over that which moves across the earth. I set out the have-a-heart trap but the little bugger didn't take to it. We had to get more serious. The fate of our crops were hanging in the balance (can you feel the Hollywood-like suspense building?!)....It was BB gun time. (just so you know....we, by law, can't shoot "real" guns on our property due to the closeness of other houses or else...this things head would have been turned into a canoe.)
My BB gun is a sweet one. A Crossman 10-pump with a fantastic scope that could allow you to shoot the wings off of a gnat at 30 yards. It's 14 years old, a bit rusty, but still fires true. I pulled that baby out and lobbed an old diet coke 2 liter into the yard to take aim to dial in the scope which needed a few adjustments. I got it true and by this time, the rabbit was along our side yard, less than 25 yards out....an easy kill-shot.
I pumped the BB gun up, chambered a BB, took aim....the thing was so close that I could have decided which eye I wanted to shoot out. I drew a bead on this adorable little Destroyer of All Leafy Delicacies.......and fired......
nothing
The little bugger just sat there, twitching his little nose at me....then he hopped into the neighbor's yard.
Turns out, the misfire happened due to a misshapen BB that got hung up in the breech of the barrel. I've fired thousands of shots out of that gun and never had an incident like that before. The weapon WAS old, unoiled, and not kept in the best possible operating condition. I'm left wondering if The Lord was telling me to be merciful over the creatures in my yard or to take better care of the weapons that he's led me to learn to use. I may have to pray this out a bit.
But...I'll tell you this much.....
WalMart opens at 7am and you better believe that I'll be there purchasing a brand new air rifle....If this new one hangs up at the moment of truth...then I'll KNOW that God wants me to let him go....Otherwise, I plan to have unmolested veggies and a nice new pelt for Gavin at about this time tomorrow evening.
Sunday, May 29, 2011
Planting Day Pics
It's a blessing watching things grow...whether it be spiritual maturity, spiritual blessings, children, or other living things. We find such a joy in watching the blessing of life and health grow out of the ground. I never cease to be amazed at the amount of sustenance that comes out of one tiny seed that is cared for and nurtured....there's a sermon in there somewhere, right?
Here's our plots as pictured from the back deck.:
the two long gardens on the right are new to us this year. They house all our leafy greens, herbs, tomatoes, peppers, and about 1/2 of our cucumbers.
Here's several shots of the larger gardens. On the left in the first pic is our "companion plantings" of tomatoes and basil. In the last photo, to the right of the wooden arbor, there is a trellis for our snap peas. About 4 years ago, my dad bought us one of those shade gazebos from Big Lots!....well...the netting only lasted one year. We had kept the iron under the deck under the premise of "We can find some use for this stuff...it's too cool to throw away!". Well, my pops was right. He cut the bottom off of it and Gavin and I zip tied it together and stuck it in the ground. As it turns out, it makes a super cool trellis for snap peas.
Go Resourcefulness!
"Leafy Green Alley" closest to farthest we've got a mesculin lettuce mix, light green lettuce, Swiss Chard, Kale, and Spinach. The Leo Family is going to be "regular"...I can tell you that much.
It won't be long until we're up to our eyeballs in strawberries. There was 1....repeat...ONE ripe strawberry today, which I picked and gave to Gavin. It's funny...looking back at our "Planting Day" blog from a year ago.....this time last year we were harvesting quarts of strawberries every day. It's cool to see how much the weather effects what and when you harvest stuff.
The lower gardens. 30 years ago, everything beyond the granite posts was swamp. Goes to show you what decades of grass clippings can reclaim.
Oh...AND we filled up the splash pool.....
....AND caught a crazy huge bullfrog.
We had friends over later in the evening for a campfire and good fellowship.... Not a bad Sunday at all.
Yeah God!
Here's our plots as pictured from the back deck.:
the two long gardens on the right are new to us this year. They house all our leafy greens, herbs, tomatoes, peppers, and about 1/2 of our cucumbers.
Here's several shots of the larger gardens. On the left in the first pic is our "companion plantings" of tomatoes and basil. In the last photo, to the right of the wooden arbor, there is a trellis for our snap peas. About 4 years ago, my dad bought us one of those shade gazebos from Big Lots!....well...the netting only lasted one year. We had kept the iron under the deck under the premise of "We can find some use for this stuff...it's too cool to throw away!". Well, my pops was right. He cut the bottom off of it and Gavin and I zip tied it together and stuck it in the ground. As it turns out, it makes a super cool trellis for snap peas.
Go Resourcefulness!
"Leafy Green Alley" closest to farthest we've got a mesculin lettuce mix, light green lettuce, Swiss Chard, Kale, and Spinach. The Leo Family is going to be "regular"...I can tell you that much.
It won't be long until we're up to our eyeballs in strawberries. There was 1....repeat...ONE ripe strawberry today, which I picked and gave to Gavin. It's funny...looking back at our "Planting Day" blog from a year ago.....this time last year we were harvesting quarts of strawberries every day. It's cool to see how much the weather effects what and when you harvest stuff.
The lower gardens. 30 years ago, everything beyond the granite posts was swamp. Goes to show you what decades of grass clippings can reclaim.
Oh...AND we filled up the splash pool.....
....AND caught a crazy huge bullfrog.
We had friends over later in the evening for a campfire and good fellowship.... Not a bad Sunday at all.
Yeah God!
Saturday, May 28, 2011
Planting Day 2011...We're In!
Well....It almost wasn't but, today ended up being our warm weather crop planting day, as has been the tradition around here for some time....the Saturday of Memorial Day weekend.
Until about 4 days ago...the weather around here was HORRIBLE...absolutely NO sun and tons of rain for 18 solid days. We were going to postpone our warm weather planting day for a few weeks. I was afraid that our cool weather crops wouldn't stay viable....but they did...and the weather cleared up perfectly...and we ended up scrambling to gather up our seedlings and threw them in the ground today.
It ended up being a really nice day. Planting Day is one of my favorite days of the year. There is so much promise. There is so much potential. These vulnerable little seedlings that will become monsterous heaving vines. Last year, I planted 7 cucumber plants, all of which would have fit in the palm of my hand on planting day, that ended up yielding well over 200 lbs of cukes throughout the season. We had cherry tomatoes that got planted at about 8 inches tall that ended up topping out at over 11 feet tall and giving hundreds and hundreds of DELICIOUS jewels.
We made some major changes to our garden this year. We used to container garden our tomatoes and peppers. At the end of last year, we put in 2 new large raised bed gardens. "Large" like 48 ft long by 4 ft wide. We're putting our tomatoes and peppers in the ground this year. It is lots of work to get all those containers together each year, and the soil only ever gets 1 year of planting....and no worm love. With the new raised beds, the soil gets to spend year after year gaining nutrients AND will receive the castings of thousands of earthworms over the course of the year....which amounts to black gold for a grower.
Additionally, we started experimenting with "companion gardening"...putting crops near another that mutually benefit for a number of reasons, whether it be nutrient distribution, pest control, or flavor enhancement. For instance...we've got our basil inter-planted with our tomatoes. Doing this makes tomatoes taste sweeter. We'll see.
We also added a TON of new leafy greens to our garden this year. Chrissy has been making these amazing fruit smoothies that hide spinach, kale and other leafy greens in them. They are so nutritious and SO tasty.
If there's anyone besides me reading this by now...please let me reiterate that our family keeps this blog mainly for ourselves...but which we also invite others to share in what The Lord has been doing in our lives....it serves as a virtual "diary" of where The Lord has taken our little family. The blessings, the struggles, the victories, the frustrations. I never want to be perceived as boastful or prideful. In fact...I often question The Lord as to why he has given me the blessings that He has...my family, my life, my land...I am so sinful and so undeserving...but His grace is so wonderfully covering....
Anyway....as a record for myself...just like I did last year...here's a list of what we have in the ground in 2011:
Harvestable Fruit: (we have lots of young fruit trees still not yet mature enough to produce yet...nectarines, peaches (apparently taking a year off after producing last year), pears, Asian pears). Anyway...here's what we expect to harvest:
Cherries
Strawberries
Apples
Red Raspberries
Black Raspberries
Blueberries
Herbs:
Sage
Oregano
Basil
Dill
Cilantro
Mint
Rosemary
Chive
Garlic Chive
Horseradish
Veggies and what not:
Zucchini Squash
Summer Squash
Butternut Squash
Carving Pumpkins
Sugar Pumpkins
Snap Peas
Broccoli
Garlic
Spinach
Kale (2 varieties)
Swiss Chard
Lettuce (2 varieties)
Collard Greens
Asparagus
Carrots
Pickling cucumbers (vine and bush varieties)
Slicing cucumbers
Peppers (4 varieties)
Tomatoes (5 varieties)
White Onions
Red Onions
We've definitely gotten a bit ambitious this year. I think we'll be o.k., though. I'm going to take more pics tomorrow but, for now, here's a few shots of planting day 2011:
the turtle we found in the yard.
Planting with The Girl
Planting with The Boy
The kids harvesting some chives
Last year we started a "tradition" based on Proverbs 12:11..."He who tilleth the land will be satisfied with bread" by baking homemade bread and making an herb infused dipping oil from our garden herbs....this year, Chrissy tried something a bit different....she made a garlicy bean dip with some garden sage.....we didn't bake bread, but did use a nice hearty grain bread from the local grocery store. It was good....very good....VERY garlicy....I think I smell garlic coming out of my pores.....and my eyes.
Now we get to watch out seedlings mature into plants that produce great amounts of fruit. Much like we continue to do with our children.
Thank you, Lord, for the blessings and grace that you have bestowed on our little family.
Until about 4 days ago...the weather around here was HORRIBLE...absolutely NO sun and tons of rain for 18 solid days. We were going to postpone our warm weather planting day for a few weeks. I was afraid that our cool weather crops wouldn't stay viable....but they did...and the weather cleared up perfectly...and we ended up scrambling to gather up our seedlings and threw them in the ground today.
It ended up being a really nice day. Planting Day is one of my favorite days of the year. There is so much promise. There is so much potential. These vulnerable little seedlings that will become monsterous heaving vines. Last year, I planted 7 cucumber plants, all of which would have fit in the palm of my hand on planting day, that ended up yielding well over 200 lbs of cukes throughout the season. We had cherry tomatoes that got planted at about 8 inches tall that ended up topping out at over 11 feet tall and giving hundreds and hundreds of DELICIOUS jewels.
We made some major changes to our garden this year. We used to container garden our tomatoes and peppers. At the end of last year, we put in 2 new large raised bed gardens. "Large" like 48 ft long by 4 ft wide. We're putting our tomatoes and peppers in the ground this year. It is lots of work to get all those containers together each year, and the soil only ever gets 1 year of planting....and no worm love. With the new raised beds, the soil gets to spend year after year gaining nutrients AND will receive the castings of thousands of earthworms over the course of the year....which amounts to black gold for a grower.
Additionally, we started experimenting with "companion gardening"...putting crops near another that mutually benefit for a number of reasons, whether it be nutrient distribution, pest control, or flavor enhancement. For instance...we've got our basil inter-planted with our tomatoes. Doing this makes tomatoes taste sweeter. We'll see.
We also added a TON of new leafy greens to our garden this year. Chrissy has been making these amazing fruit smoothies that hide spinach, kale and other leafy greens in them. They are so nutritious and SO tasty.
If there's anyone besides me reading this by now...please let me reiterate that our family keeps this blog mainly for ourselves...but which we also invite others to share in what The Lord has been doing in our lives....it serves as a virtual "diary" of where The Lord has taken our little family. The blessings, the struggles, the victories, the frustrations. I never want to be perceived as boastful or prideful. In fact...I often question The Lord as to why he has given me the blessings that He has...my family, my life, my land...I am so sinful and so undeserving...but His grace is so wonderfully covering....
Anyway....as a record for myself...just like I did last year...here's a list of what we have in the ground in 2011:
Harvestable Fruit: (we have lots of young fruit trees still not yet mature enough to produce yet...nectarines, peaches (apparently taking a year off after producing last year), pears, Asian pears). Anyway...here's what we expect to harvest:
Cherries
Strawberries
Apples
Red Raspberries
Black Raspberries
Blueberries
Herbs:
Sage
Oregano
Basil
Dill
Cilantro
Mint
Rosemary
Chive
Garlic Chive
Horseradish
Veggies and what not:
Zucchini Squash
Summer Squash
Butternut Squash
Carving Pumpkins
Sugar Pumpkins
Snap Peas
Broccoli
Garlic
Spinach
Kale (2 varieties)
Swiss Chard
Lettuce (2 varieties)
Collard Greens
Asparagus
Carrots
Pickling cucumbers (vine and bush varieties)
Slicing cucumbers
Peppers (4 varieties)
Tomatoes (5 varieties)
White Onions
Red Onions
We've definitely gotten a bit ambitious this year. I think we'll be o.k., though. I'm going to take more pics tomorrow but, for now, here's a few shots of planting day 2011:
the turtle we found in the yard.
Planting with The Girl
Planting with The Boy
The kids harvesting some chives
Last year we started a "tradition" based on Proverbs 12:11..."He who tilleth the land will be satisfied with bread" by baking homemade bread and making an herb infused dipping oil from our garden herbs....this year, Chrissy tried something a bit different....she made a garlicy bean dip with some garden sage.....we didn't bake bread, but did use a nice hearty grain bread from the local grocery store. It was good....very good....VERY garlicy....I think I smell garlic coming out of my pores.....and my eyes.
Now we get to watch out seedlings mature into plants that produce great amounts of fruit. Much like we continue to do with our children.
Thank you, Lord, for the blessings and grace that you have bestowed on our little family.
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