And the Fields are Ripe for the Picking.....

 The Purple hulls we picked this morning-these are Louisiana Quick Picks-they are huge! We did have an infestation of army worms earlier in the week-wiped out the back part of the garden in just a few hours! Jeff got them sprayed-and thankfully-they've recovered nicely!

 Just an example of how big these things really are! Some are at least 12 inches or more long! We picked over 1/2 a bushel this morning-even after the worms! Next picking will be great!

One of the tomatoes-they aren't doing very well this year :(  the first one to get ripe had a big bug hole and the whole bottom was rotten!

We've spent the biggest part of the weekend canning! Yeah! We've put up 16 quarts of potatoes-oh yeah-we dug them on Saturday morning-didn't get as many as we'd like-but thankful for what we did get!-3 qts of pickles-11 pints of pickles-2 qts of green beans with potatoes and 1 qt of peas-we put the ones we picked today in the freezer to can later. Jeff canned 9 pints of corn from a friends garden earlier in the week and 7 pints of pickles as well. The squash is starting to ripen and we put 3 qts of it in the freezer, too.
Forgot to mention last few posts that something did get the momma turkey and all but 3 of the chicks-and all over night. We've got the last 3 in a cage and they are growing like weeds! And we've got rabbits coming out our ears!!! Jeff's got to butcher some and get them in the freezer and off the feed bill-boy has rabbit feed gotten expensive. I'm checking into some alternative feed sources-like Comfrey-they ate some the other day and really seemed to take well to it-I intend to dry some later today and see if they'll eat it that way as well.
We have 3 1/2 days of school left before summer break-well the kids do! I'll work until June 21st-I believe-then I'll have a few weeks off. We are planning a camping trip to Crystal beach where we stayed last year-then later a week at the State Park in Galveston-then leave from there for Surfside for a few days. We aren't familiar with that area-but thought we'd try some place different and it's close to where Randy is living at the moment.
Have a great Memorial Day!

Farm Update

 Newest pic of the garden-5/19-the Jacob's Cattle beans are really beginning to dry out-makes the front of the garden look bad-but looks can really be deceiving!!

 Saturday morning's yield-the first of the bell peppers and cucumbers #3-5!

 Just 2 of the MANY cucumbers on the vines-Jeff made 7 pints of pickles today! The first of many more to be put up!

And 1 of several watermelons we've found-one of them seems to grow nearly an inch everyday-how is that possible?

 The field corn is at least 8 ft tall now-most of it anyway! And it is putting on ears like crazy! The sweet corn is very short-but is making ears as well.

 The purple hull peas should be ready to start picking this weekend-I pray every night that the deer don't find them before we can pick them! We saw 2 does right up from the house on Saturday night and I saw a doe and an itty bitty fawn-SO cute-last night on my way to Church.

 Figs on the new tree-there are only a few-but such a good sight!

And last-but surely not least!-Kaytlynn lost her 1st tooth this afternoon! She was rinsing her mouth out with the water hose-so I turned it on her head and just cooled her off! It was 93 degrees when they got off the bus-hot!
We've canned 57 pints of green beans so far-they need to be picked again now! Alana froze 6 quarts for them-what a blessing after the deer got them all last year. I made 7 half pints of sugar free strawberry jam and put up a pint of jalapeno peppers on Saturday. The potatoes still need to be dug and the cattle beans continue to dry. We haven't eaten any of them yet-they sure are pretty-I hope we like them!

Garden, Bees, and Baby Turkeys!!

 This week's pic of the garden-we now have Jacob's Cattle beans that are about 5inches long! The green beans are blooming like crazy, the corn is coming right along, and so are the cucumbers! A few of the tomatoes are blooming in the raised beds up next to the house-and the comfrey is growing beautifully as well! We've had just enough rain to keep things growing-we did water a little on Wednesday-the cukes were looking a little droopy-but then we got nearly 2 inches of rain on Friday-thank you Lord!

 Jeff opened up the bee hive after Church today-and what a wonderful surprise! The bees have drawn out about 6 frames of foundation-and some are capped off! So all is progressing as should be. His second hive is due in this Friday from an apiary in Ohio-hopefully they will adjust and do as well as these have so far!

 First look into the hive in 2 weeks-surprise-they are building comb just like they should!

 And on Friday-the turkey hen hatched her eggs! She hatched 11 of the 12 she was sitting on-the 12th one she had pushed from the nest earlier in the week-guess she knew more than we did!

We've been having trouble keeping them in the pen with her-they go right through the wire on her pen. When we came in from Church today-she had flown out and was keeping up with them in the pasture. She even flew into the face of one of the cows who got a little to close! Now we have to decide whether to put her up-then pen the babies under a light in a cage-or just let her try to raise them on her on. I'm just scared the dogs will get them-or a night time visitor!
OK-I got a shock when I tried to log into the blog today-some of you already know-they changed the format-so it may take me a little while to get used to the change-but I did like the way they changed the picture downloads. I don't know how many times I've waited for pics to download-only to find I'd clicked on the wrong ones. Now we can see them ahead of time-YEAH!
The hummingbirds are finally showing up-we have at least 2 that are making an appearance-they were pretty busy this morning. We also weaned the calves today-it will be fairly noisy around here for the next few days until they get over not being with momma!
Have a great week!

My Tulip Tree is Blooming!

My tulip tree finally bloomed! I bought the tree nearly 10 years ago when I was delivering mail with some money I had received. An elderly neighbor of ours when I was growing up planted one and we watched it grow as we did. One day she called by Mom-all excited-her tulip tree was finally blooming! Today I finally understand her joy! I can only see 2 blooms at the moment-and they are really up high. When we added on to the porch last year-Jeff wanted to cut it down-but I talked him into just kinda building around it-so far so good! Now it might just get to stay!!

Newest pic of the garden-although it was taken on 4/5. We are due some really tough weather here shortly-and we fertilized and plowed them for the 2nd time yesterday-so I'll try and remember to take a new pic in a few days! Everything is growing like weeds this year-we are SO very thankful to God! We tend to get a little tickled at each other-we'll walk down and check on it in the morning (I'm still in fear the deer will find it and wipe us out like they did last year!)-when we check again in the evening-we can see the growth from earlier in the day! It really is amazing! Kaytlynn & Mady played in the corn yesterday-just running up and down the rows. I can't wait for it to be taller than them and really watch them play in it. We kept catching Kaytlynn just laying out in the rows-staring up at the sky-oh the days of being young!!

Bees are Here!

Well-we finally got to pick up Jeff's bees in Navasota yesterday! Here he is getting ready to put them in the truck for the trip home-they rode up front with us all the way home! 3,000-5,000 honey bees with 1 queen!

Getting the queen out of the main package-she's in the small box with the orange tag.

Queen cage with a few workers protecting her.

Jeff's got the queen in the frames and the workers are going in!

These bees are busy(hehe!) It only took a couple of hours and they were about their business-coming and going-it was amazing! He'll take the lid off tomorrow to make sure the queen is out and everything looks fine-then it stays closed for 2 weeks. Then open it up to make sure the queen is laying-then let them do their job!

Nothing has hatched yet in the incubator-doesn't look good. Don't know what went wrong-but better luck next time I guess. The garden on the other hand looks wonderful! I took a pic the other day-I'll try to get it posted asap.

We had a great Easter-started with Sonrise service @ 7am-then breakfast-then normal services. Had lunch at Jeff's mom's and lots of family! Was a long day-but good! The kids enjoyed the Easter egg hunt as well.

Have a great week!

Update!

One of the sweet sea gulls on the beach last Wednesday-it was such a beautiful day-and we caught 4 fish while wading-but the water was like stepping into ice!

This hen found her way into our bedroom on Saturday afternoon-I had run her off the back porch all day-she scratched around and stayed awhile-but she didn't lay an egg. We might have to buy a screen door for our bedroom just to keep the chickens out-You might be a Redneck if...

The first picture of the new garden-taken 3/17-it was a little cloudy-but I want to remember to take pictures of it every week or so to keep up with the progress.

Ok-this started out as a different kind of Spring Break-from Friday afternoon until after we left for Church on Sunday morning-our lights had gone out 7 times! We had Jordan's birthday party in the livingroom-no moonwalk as planned due to the rain! We tried to start planting the garden on Monday morning-but after several rows-just couldn't stand playing in the soup anymore. We did get the corn and Jacob's cattle beans in, though.

We left Tuesday morning for the beach-tried to fish on Bolivar-but it was just way too crowded-we couldn't find a place without too many people. We rode the ferry over to Galveston and got checked into the hotel-had a really good few days!

We bought 2 pear trees while at the beach-so got them, along with the rest of the garden planted on Friday. Then when I went to check on it Sunday morning-the corn and beans we had planted on Monday were already up! Now even the seeds from Friday are coming up. And we got over 2 inches of rain today!

Jeff picked up a total of 12 bitties-so we have them out under a light. We set 18 green eggs and 8 turkey eggs in the incubator on Sunday as well. So hopefully-a good hatch is on the way in a few weeks-actually chicks should hatch on Easter!

We heard from the apiary-we can pick up the bees on April 7th-so Jeff's looking forward to getting them and getting them installed in the new hive.

Have a great week!

Kylee's First Tractor Ride!

Kylee got to ride the tractor with Grandpa for the first time today-she LOVED it!! I was worried the loudness of it would scare her-but no way! She wouldn't go to Alana or me-she wanted to stay on with Grandpa! She is crawling all over the place-pulling up and beginning to let go-and now has 4 teeth and 2 more nearly here and she is still so little-not quite 15 lbs yet!
Wow-have we had rain this last week-3 1/2 inches yesterday alone! Jordan had his 8th birthday party yesterday here at our house-it was planned for outside with the moonwalk-but not happening with all the rain! And to top it off-our lights had gone out 7 times since Friday afternoon! Luckily-they did stay on for the party-and haven't gone out again!
We got out this morning and planted a little in the garden-got the tomatoes-peppers-some comfrey I'd ordered-some dent corn and Jacob's cattle beans in. We had to finally stop-the ground is just soupy-it's so wet. I really don't want to complain about the rain-we went so long last summer without any! But the warm sunshine we got today was SO nice! And we are heading down to the beach in the morning for a few nights! We are packed and ready-we'll do some fishing and just hang out and relax a little bit. The beach always seems to have such a calming effect on both of us!
Have a great Spring Break-we're sure gonna try!