June on the Farm
Welcome to the Farm
June - so lovely with its long, warm afternoons. Black raspberries line the creekbanks and the scent of honeysuckle drifts in the wind. The sun is up early and stays late into the evening. The bees spend their day buzzing from flower to flower. The birds sing their chirping tunes. Mother Nature is arrayed in her finest attire. Life is full and vibrant.
What I've been up to...
June has been a whirlwind. In fact, I can't believe it's already the last Friday of the month! We've spent our time going to graduation parties, celebrating Father's Day, helping with our church picnic, and visiting friends and family.
On the farm, the garden is really coming to life. The warm days and thunder storms have really helped the plants to grow. We've been eating kale, lettuce, turnips, and lots of fresh berries. I am excited to tell you that we've gotten our 1st significant harvest from the strawberry plants!!! You can read about or past strawberry fails here.
In the greenhouse garden yarrow, echinacea, bee balm, sage, lemon balm, roses, and several varieties of mint are in their full glory. The gardens around the house have hollyhock, lavender, cat mint, roses, fox glove, and hydrangeas currently blooming.
In my spare time I've been drying herbs for projects and winter use. So far, I've dried mint, thyme, lavender, and chamomile. I would also like to dry/dehydrate some strawberries for adding a fresh fruit flavor into winter teas.
Recently, I decided to try my hand at some still life photography. The butterfly in the photo below died last summer. I actually dried him with this specific project in mind. It was fun to see the idea come together.
For my book this month, I just finished The Wise Woman by George MacDonald. I have to say that this book was not at all what I thought it was going to be. And quite frankly, I don't typically go for the Mythical/Folk Tale style books. However, once I got started the book drew me in. I found it very interesting to consider the allegory within its pages. This book was written in 1875 but I found it applicable for my own modern-day life. If you decide to read this book, I would love to hear your thoughts!
What Caleb's been up to...
Caleb has been helping to unload hay wagons some evenings. He also keeps the field-rows and meadow area of the farm mowed and helps me weed the garden.
He has been gracious enough to help me with a lot of recent projects. He cleaned the gutters on the house, helped mulch, hooked up a sprinkler for the veggie garden, ground corn for chicken feed, and put up a handrail in our house. (If you've never been to our house, our stairs are a real hazard for older people and little kids). I'm happy to say our stairs are much safer now! He even helped me take two little girls from church on a creek walk. I was thankful to have him be the lookout for snakes!
In other news, our washer decided to leak this month... Every time I did a load of wash, it would leave a big puddle on the basement floor. Thankfully, Caleb was able to replace a hose and we didn't need to buy a whole new washer!
In his spare time, Caleb built a lifeguard stand for the kids at our Vacation Bible School. I may be biased, but I think it looks great!
What Tucker's been up to...
Our furry friend, Tucker, managed to get himself into a lot of trouble this month. One morning, as Caleb and I were getting ready for work, we smelled something very unpleasant. A few minutes later Tucker came running to the porch smelling just like a skunk... Somehow, in the 5 minutes we left him alone outside, he managed to find a black and white buddy who promptly gave him a spray.
I hardly had time to bath him, wash off, and change my clothes before I had to rush off to work. Once at work I realized that the skunk smell must have gotten in my hair. All day my hair smelled like a skunk. I was so embarrassed! When I finally got home, Tucker needed two more bathes to finally control the smell. Let's just say it was not a good day!
Hopefully he won't try to befriend anymore skunks!
What the others are up to...
Our barn cat, Sophie, had four kittens this month. They are so tiny and their eyes are not yet open. Two of the kittens are calico, one is a tabby, and the other is gray. This is Sophie's 1st litter of kittens and she didn't seem to grasp the idea of being gentle with them. She would plop down and sit right on top of them looking around like "where did they go?" But, I'm happy to say that she's a much better mother now. Once they're a little bigger I'll post some photos of them.
The chickens are very happy with lots of weeds and garden scraps coming their way. They're laying lost of eggs thanks to the long summer days. We have one broody hen who I would like to have hatch chicks. We're looking into adding a rooster to the flock. We'll see how things work out.
So, there you have it. Leave us a comment and let us know what you think about this blog post and what you've been up to this month!
Thanks for following along,
Caleb, Abby, Tucker, & the rest
Comments