The last time we went to Costco, I splurged and bought canned artichokes. We used to have them sometimes on pizza back in Boulder, and it seemed like such a treat after several years.
Phil had some on pasta on Thursday night, after a good day of finishing the cattle fence next door (just about) and woke up Friday feeling just a little off. But often with the amount of dust and fungi in the country, he has a stuffy head first thing. A few more artichokes for breakfast, and he had a full blown migraine.
How frustrating, to have a treat turn to a day of physical pain. He slept most of the time.
It's interesting: our biofeedback keeps getting more acute. I realized I cannot eat Costco's natural peanut butter, with only peanuts and salt. Apparently, peanuts are usually grown in rotation with cotton, and cotton, genetically modified, is one of the most heavily sprayed crops. So it's back to organic peanut butter only: no painful joints in the morning.
Phil was better today. He dealt with some of the frustrating tasks hanging over his head: he managed to get the wheel back on the trailer, then brought another load of hay. He placed it in the field next door. The little boys had gone with him, and they happily picked blackberries, even managing to save some for the rest of us, the sweeties. From the number of red berries yet on the bushes, we'll be blessed with blackberries for some time yet.
He also moved the cows into the bottom section, and, for the first time, gave them a little section across the ford in the creek. We went down later to see if the cows had actually crossed the creek. Phil figured they had, at least for a bit.
Our little walk had a funny companion: Mr. Bigglesworth followed us the entire way.
He also is just about finished with fencing next door. He has a few more gates to put in, but to have perimeter fencing down both edges is such a great relief. Hopefully Butch will never again look out his window to see cows out his window.
The field next door looks like a summer field. The color is completely different than spring. It's still beautiful, in its own way, but that bright green has gone.
Phil had his first instance of purposeful chemical poisoning around the farm. He bought Raid to kill a nest of bald-faced hornets that had taken up residence right along a fenceline next door. After his two stings last year that gave him full body hives, he wasn't interested in another showdown. And a nest of yellow jackets had decided to build right on the electrical box. He sprayed one entrance. All died. But the back entrance was still active. He sprayed again. Those died. He needed to use the electrical panel, and some yellow jackets that must have been foraging had started to build a new nest right there, and they stung him in the ear. He defeated them, though.
I have liked being a chemical-free farm, without any -cides. But I like a husband without hives and swelling, too.
As for me, I continue to fight the blues, a feeling that we're standing still. I went to weed the asparagus on Thursday, and all I did was hoe the section we'd weeded two weeks ago. It took an hour or so. Standing still.
I suppose there is consolation that standing still is better than going backward. If we did no weeding, we'd simply be replaying last year, when all got away from us, and all crashed and burned. To have some things come out well maintained, that would actually be progress. Just not fast progress.
Yesterday, I spent a few hours blessing my future self: I started to hoe the greenhouse, which is starting to get overgrown after the tilling a few months ago. I didn't get much beyond the edges of the various pots. Hoeing and weed pulling is hard work in muscles that I don't use frequently. I attempted hoeing today as the sun went down, and was glad I hadn't started earlier. I'm ready for a rest!
The ten elderberries I bought were looking worse and worse in their pots, so I planted them in the greenhouse, in the newly hoed section. Only six were still alive, and four of those had long rootlets break off in the transplanting process, despite all the care I could give.
I planted the lemon tree, too, in the greenhouse. It had grown to the edge of its 5-gallon bucket, but did not appear rootbound. I hope it is happy in the greenhouse ground.
And my little fig cutting that I took about two months ago has leafed out, so I planted it in a pot. I might transplant it into the greenhouse, too, for a time; I haven't decided yet.
The first two groundcherries have ripened in the greenhouse. I'm grateful not many in my family like them: I think they're delightful.
And Phil and I enjoyed our first plums today. The bugs are out in force now, so that the stonefruit orchard was loudly humming with green beetles the size of a quarter, but despite the larvae in the little fruits, we enjoyed the flavor and color of the Santa Rosa and Burbank plums.
The laying hens peck around the stinging nettle. I planted it behind the compost pile, and I think there's a preponderance of worms in that small area. One of the nettles may not make it (and one they entirely dug up: I'm not sure if I rescued it in time: we'll see), but one plant especially is growing tall and strong. I can't wait to have nettles to eat, nettles for foliar spray.
We had a laying hen die this week. She had spent several days prior looking like she was trying to poop all the time. Maybe a stuck egg? We didn't do a post mortem. Today Jadon came out to find the puppies tormenting another hen. He tied them up and went about his business. I happened to pass the wood chip pile, so covered with feathers it looked like snow.
The dogs had been plucking the hen. They didn't bite her or kill her, simply pulled all the feathers off her back and neck. She died a short time later.
What to do? That's the second bird the puppies have teased to death. Is it time to give them up? That would really make the family sad, I think. While Bitsy follows me, the puppies follow Phil. He goes to move cows, and there's his faithful Socks and Shadow, shadowing him. When the cows got out this week, naughty Cleo went even farther afield than the rest, and found herself trapped behind a fence and she couldn't remember how she'd entered.
When we started her on her way, Socks made sure she kept right on going, barking at her heels. "He has herd dog blood," as Phil said, and Phil was impressed that, when called, Socks stopped and came. He didn't keep after Cleo in a frenzy, but was (somewhat) controlled.
The boys take the puppies on the trampoline. They run in circles, laughing hysterically, as the puppies try to follow along.
Do we pen the hens, rotating them to new pasture? They are such foragers, that seems mean. Do we pen the pups, and hope they outgrow their rascally ways?
Phil put the pups on leash, stuck their noses in the dead bird, and communicated to them, firmly, that that was not acceptable. I am sure they got the message. For the moment. Will it be enough? We need wisdom.
We've only been getting one egg a day in the box. I'm not sure where the other ladies are laying, but if the box-layer was the deceased, it's going to be hard eating around here the next several months, until the chicks commence.
The chicks remain adorable. All the other birds we've had seem to go through an awkward adolescent stage. These never really did. They are fast and cagey, so I have a hard time catching them, but I still really like them.
The ducklings are growing well also. One is about 50% bigger than the other two. I wonder if we have two Mrs. and a Mr.
There has been much of good this week. A fixed trailer, renewed well water, internet interrupted and restored, next year's school books arrived, this year's school work winding down, Abraham's great leap in reading confidence, Joe wondering whether it was time for him to read, boys making little movies, Joe taking photos, Jadon doing math books just for fun, Isaiah recreating patterns in his critical thinking book and asking over and over, "Can I do one more page?" Oh, okay. Boys eating blackberries and sharing blackberries with each other
Perhaps the most funny moment came today, when Abraham, incredibly dirty after a week of good playing, took his shower. I had wetted him and soaped him, and he leaned against the wall of the shower for a moment. When we stepped away, there was a perfect skeletal imprint, all in dirty suds: back bone, neck, rib cage, hips. Oh, did we laugh.
Why be downcast, oh my soul?
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