The Weather and Farming

The forecast for the next couple days is not one I wanted to see, not after planting so much of the garden. We just don't have this kind of crazy weather very often and this year we even planted nearly a month later than last year. We decided to hold off since it was so cold and snowy.

The forecast is calling for wind chills in the teens with a possibility of snow flurries. Back east, I knew the last snow flurries to be called, "poor mans fertilizer" but here, with tender tomatoes planted, it means one thing, "hurry to get the plants covered !" The fruit trees are full of blossoms which can also mean disaster for our crops if it gets really cold. I count my blessings that although we try to grow a lot of our food, we don't have to depend on what we grow. We still have money to shop for food and the stores are always full. I do love picking ripe and ready to eat organic fruits and vegetables that we know all about. Know the seeds, know they are not genetically modified and know what the land around the garden is like too.

We have successfully dealt with hard freezes after planting so we know what to do, but still, its not ideal.

With our eating habits changed a bit due to the CHIP way of eating, but we have personally tweeked it to fit our life. The garden has been a huge blessing to us. Freshly picked collard greens, carrots and cabbage fill our plates regularly and boy do they taste good. A few stray potatoes also have appeared when cultivating where they grew last year. The soil has kept them better than any root cellar could.

Licorice looks about ready to deliver and if she is like so many of our goats through history, she will pick this upcoming cold night to give birth, which means I will be out there in the barn, all bundled up...oh wait....we put the winter clothes in the attic already ! Well, I will be layered with clothes I guess, waiting for the blessed event to take place. I like to be there to watch that all goes well and since we milk our does, we take the kids away at birth and bottle feed them. It just works out better for so many reasons. The kids bond with us and make for a more gentle animal to handle. We feed the kids their mothers milk. The way things are done in most dairy's around the world.

I have noticed a few honey bees around my fruit trees in the last couple of days, which to me is a good sign. Hope we see more. We had hives but when killer bees were discovered within 15 miles of us, we opted to not keep bees. With children outside playing all the time, that just presented us with a risk we were not willing to take.

Just filled all my bird feeders and had to chase away a flock of grackles. Those are not birds I want hanging around. Noisy, messy and just plain invasive.

I feel so blessed to be alive, to be so loved and to love. I feel blessed to have faith and hope and to know there is more to life than what we see. Life is good, it really is.