Weekend of February 19-20
While Cris got the wheat planted on Saturday, I finished up the vadalia onions. We planted about 1500 onions total and I am not sure how many red potatoes. Cris and Alex planted most of the potatoes and onions last weekend while I was in Maryland visiting family.
We have about 1/4 acre of wheat planted for our use this year. It is a test plot to see if it is worth our while to plant more to sell. Cris will use the scythe to cut down the wheat when it's ready, in the late summer. We plan to store the wheat and grind it as needed.
Sunday we planted 400 strawberry plants. We ordered 500 but only 400 came in so we will have another 100 to plant in the next week or two. I could not have done it without the help of knee pads! The ground is a bit hard on the knees after a while.
In the cold frame (hoop house) we planted herbs: Sage, Thyme, Parsley, Basil, Dill, Cilantro and yesterday Cris planted various type of lettuce in there as well. We planted seeds straight into the ground. (rather than seedlings)
The seedlings we started at home are doing well. The tomatoes and cabbage are sprouting but the green peppers seem to take longer to sprout.
Our fish are coming back up to the surface again and are eager for us to feed them fish food. The bass and blue gill are growing nicely. We have seen a few turtles in the pond but hopefully Teddy killed the one and only snake last year. Teddy cannot afford to get bit by another water moccasin. Unlike other snake bites, a 2nd bit from a water moccasin could be deadly to Teddy. His body does not build up an immunity from the snake, but rather, makes it worse if you are bit again.
Saturday night we had our monthly dinner meeting with our friends at the dairy. We had a large crowd of about 30 people and the food was great. We discussed going in together to purchase butchering items so we can have a mobile butchering system and then farmers could borrow it and butcher their own animals for personal use (not retail sale). One of the members in the group is a trained, certified butcher who can assist. We would use it for smaller animals such as pigs, sheep, chicken.... we can't handle cows as they are too big and you have to hang them for days before butchering them.
We lost one of our bee hives last week. Unfortunately, this can happen if you are not there everyday to check on them. Another bee hive (possibly a wild hive) robbed one of our hives of their honey. Our bees put up a good fight but the other hive was a stronger hive and ours just didn't make it. They were all dead or gone within 3 days. If we had caught it in time, we could have closed up the entrance to the hive and put a sheet over the hive to keep the stealing hive from getting in and then they would have given up and moved on. Our other hive is fine and they have been busy gathering pollen. Their little legs are filled with yellow pollen. I plan to charge up my video recorder and try and tape a few hours of the entrance to the hive so I can see just what goes on during the day with these little busy bees. We are going to order 'nuc' hive to replace the one we lost. It is basically a queen and about 400 bees. You put them in their new hive and then they start reproducing and growing their hive.
Cris and I decided that it is more important to get moved out to the farm than to take the time to have a house built so we took a trip up to Dyersburg, TN and looked at some modular homes for sale at Clayton Homes. They are basically fancy trailers. We chose the model called Evolution because it has an "E Home" feel to it and it's really cute. It is 1200 sq. ft. and have 2 bedrooms, living room, kitchen, 2 bathroom, sun room. It also has a breezeway between the main house and the 2nd bedroom. The 2nd bedroom is almost like it's own little suite separate from the main house and has it's own bathroom. That will be Alex's 'pad' or for guests when they visit. We plan to put a large deck on the back. Cris and I can put up a deck in no time now that we have built a barn.... a deck will be a breeze! I really like the covered breezeway that the house has. I can see myself sitting there in a rocking chair and looking over the pond or farm.
The link to the house is:
http://www.claytonhomes.com/home_details.cfm?modelno=37EVL16802AH
The guy who is going to move the house out to the farm came out and checked the land, driveway, etc. and said it will be no problem getting it moved there. We plan to have the house on the top of a little hill and fortunately, no dirt has to be moved to accommodate the house. As soon as we finalize all the paperwork, we can get the house out there. We have to make arrangements for electric, septic and a well. We have an idea how much the septic and electric will be but the cost of the well is determined by how far they have to dig.
So, if all goes well, we will house our Memphis home on the market this summer. Alex is going to live on campus at the Univ. of Memphis this year....much to his excitement. He is really looking forward to college life....but I think more for the socializing than the actual education! (like most kids!)
