The Honeymoon Suite...

For chickens, that is.

I ordered my egg incubator last week so I figured I had better get Uncle and a few of his lady friends set up in the small coop so as to not get eggs mixed up with any that Cornelius might have anything to do with. I want meaty chickens, not miniature! So far I've managed to get four hens in there but the rest of them are steering clear of me wondering warily what I am up to. I think I will grab them while they are sleeping. You know, a bit of stealthy fox in the hen house kinda business.

Rain, rain go away...

They forecasted a long, wet spring. Whoever 'They' are, they've hit the nail on the head. Rain, rain, rain. All it does is rain! The only thing thriving in my garden is the onions. My pea seeds needed to be pushed back in the ground and I suspect after today's deluge, my bean seeds will need it too! Bah!

And unfortunately, there is no end in sight. The forecast for the rest of the week? Rain.

Cute as a button

The kids and I hit the road today and made a trip to Edmonton to escape the grey clouds and threatening showers that were hovering over our house this morning. Of course duty called before all that and I had to chase one of the neighbors (giant) yearling bulls out of my field first. He decided to plow through two strands of barbed wire in order to either a.) say hello to my girls b.) eat the greener grass on my side of the fence or c.) all of the above. Never a dull moment around here. Anyway back to the point... we went to the fabric store and I found some ADORABLE fabrics in which I plan to make a couple of summer dresses for F. That is if farm duties don't prohibit me from doing so. I will post the finished product as soon as its... er... finished. Hehe.

Conversations with a 4 year old

S and I were in Wal mart today(I hate that I have to shop at Wal mart but my small town doesn't really give me much in the way of choice) and I decided to stroll through the bathing suits to see if anything caught my fancy. Not that there is any sunshine to wear a bathing suit in but here's hoping!

S: "What are we in here for?"

Me: "I wanted to look at the bathing suits."

S: "Why? You have a perfectly good bathing suit at home."

Well, he told me, didn't he! I can't imagine where he gets that from! *wink wink*

It's green at least

The garden is growing like crazy(so are the weeds) with all this rain we have been having. All we need now is a bit of sun so the soil will warm up and my seeds will germinate!

I went gung ho weeding my front garden but as you can see the grass and dandelions are ever so sneakily moving back in! It's hard to motivate one's self to go out in the rain to weed!

This is my recently renovated herb bed. I dug my chives and thyme out(they are the only herbs that survive the harsh Alberta winters to come back in the spring) put a whole bunch of cow manure, topped with a layer of spoiled hay, then a layer of compost and raked the soil back over. In addition to the chives and thyme there is now lavender, rosemary, oregano, dill and fennel. And my lovely bleeding hearts in the foreground.
The vegetable garden. In May I dug out all my perennials, rototilled the garden into two strips and it is all dedicated to vegetables. My rhubarb is now in the bed at the front of the garden along with saskatoon berry bushes and day lilies.
This is where I moved my raspberries to at the far end of this row. This strip is all berries. Raspberries at the south end with strawberries on the east side, then two red currants, a patch of grass that wouldn't allow itself to be rototilled and four blueberry bushes snug amongst the chicken litter.
Garlic in the foreground that I planted in the fall. I was so pleased to see that 10 cloves sprouted even though I planted at least twice that. Next is three varieties of potato- red, white and purple. Then snap peas around the teepees, four rows of onions, more pea teepees and then five rows of carrots- purple haze, king midas and a mix variety of orange, yellow and purple. Lastly is four rows of beets- baby ball and golden.
The other row of the garden isn't much planted yet. There are broccoli seedlings, kohlrabi, and brussels sprouts and hopefully if the weather improves and the soil dries out a bit, I can get in my beans, cucumbers, zucchini and whatever else that's left to plant!

Happy Gardening!

It happened

Early this morning white stuff was falling from the sky. Most of it has melted except for this patch in the field.

So not impressed!

What a big boy!

Well it happened... my baby boy turned four earlier this week. My how time flies! And he's so mature now too *chuckle* it was almost like he woke up that morning and decided he was a big kid!

Seeing as my husband had to head back to work early we celebrated S's birthday twice; once on the weekend and then again on the actual day just me and the kids. Originally when asked what he wanted for his birthday dinner, S had said Uncle(as in, the mean old rooster) I told him that we couldn't eat Uncle because I needed him for breeding stock. So he settled on just a regular old roasted chicken for dinner with rice and broccoli and cheese sauce and a raspberry cake for dessert.



The actual birthday came along and while F was at school, S and I made the batter for vanilla cupcakes. A birthday just isn't a birthday if you don't get to lick the beaters!
S and I spent part of the day in town together. We went to the Farmer's Market, played at the playground and went out for lunch. After a simple supper I put the finishing touches on S's vanilla cupcakes with chocolate butter cream and blueberries and home made vanilla sandwich cookie ice cream. Yum!

It was a wonderful day for a wonderful little monster boy! xoxo