1st week of August 2009
We were blessed with several days of lovely rain last week. The pastures and gardens are rejoicing and we even had to postpone our chicken butchering due to rain which gave me a day indoors to catch up on neglected house and computerwork. We butchered 137 pastured chickens on Friday which was our largest batch for one day. Chicken butchering is definitely a team work activity which involves the whole family plus a few friends who helped in the morning. Even our four year old helped his 7 year old brother catch the chickens to deliver them to the butchering station. Our daughter is now an accomplished "gutter" and we even convinced the "squeamish about blood" teenager to assist with cutting off the legs before he became the chief bagger/weighing technician. Once cleaned up from the butchering, I went to work cutting lots and lots of flowers for two weddings and also picked up an order of flowers from my Amish flower growing friend. For one of the weddings, another friend (pictured) and I arranged 22 quart jar bouquets.
Working with flowers is fun but I was drained of creative energy by the end. Both weddings were outdoor occasions and thankfully had beautiful weather despite the threatened rain. Once the flowers were in order I gathered up my books and veggies to give a talk at a community garden Saturday afternoon. Wow, I was tired and very thankful not every weekend is as full as this one. For giving Saturday's talk, I bartered for a massage from the garden coordinator. That will be much appreciated and needed!
In addition to harvesting many varieties of vegetables right now, there are also some delicious fruits coming into season. Bell pears are an old time early variety and our one tree is prolific this year. The flesh is a bit more grainy than the later Bartletts and they tend to turn brown rapidly but still are very delicious.
The wild blackberries are also ripe and I've been sending the children with buckets to pick along the woods lane. Tonight we plan to make a pear blackberry crisp to enjoy this tasty fruit season which will quickly pass to another flavor.
After three bull calves, our daughter's Jersey cow finally gave her the gift she's been waiting for, a heifer calf. Little "Violet" is getting plenty of love and attention and hopefully will become a very tame cow. Counting the beef cows also, this is the seventh heifer calf in a row. We'll see if the streak continues as we wait for several more Herefords to give birth.
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