skunk alert!

Forgot to mention that I've been having a skunk in the house quite frequently lately. I heard a bunch of racket in the utility room early this last week. Vanna was in the house and the cats don't make that much noise so I figured I had better check it out. Good think I was cautious and opened the door slowly because right in my face was a skunk. I, of course, quickly closed the door. I reopened it and sure enough, he had gone underneath the bathroom floor. I leave that area open so that my water pipes won't freeze in the winter. I was really worried that vanna and the cats would harass the thing and make him spray in there (can you even begin to imagine what that would have been like?), but they left him alone. I took a bath and could hear him right under the tub. He's been coming back here and there, but I don't think he's slept here in a few days. I've moved the cat and dog food, so hopefully he'll go look for food elsewhere. I really think that he is after all the eggs that are all over the place. Maybe that's why I can't find any outside. Bummer.

By the way, Skunk-Off, which you can get at the vets, really does work. It's miraculous. I'm keeping some on hand forever.

not too much happening

except that I do have 3.5 holes dug for my wood shed. Yippee. Geez, if I don't get my butt in gear I'm going to be in serious wood trouble like I was last year. I'm pretty sure I'll get it done, really, but it's going to be close.

I ate my first goose egg this morning. Oh man, was it delicious. Seriously tasty. The difference between store bought eggs and fresh eggs is unbelievable. It was about 2x the size of a duck egg, which I have also been getting. Maybe one every other day or so. I don't know how often geese lay eggs, but I found this one a few days ago. Since then, nothing. I get a bit worried that they are laying them outside and who knows where, but hopefully they'll start laying inside as winter approaches.

I'm going to have problems with keeping all the fowl in one place. The ducks are just messy and bossy, the guineas are taking to terrorizing everyone else, including the turkeys, who really just want to be left alone. I am definitely not sure how this is going to work out. For next season, the guys are going to pick out hens only, and ones that can handle cold weather and still lay a lot. It will be a lot better than having tons of roosters running around trying to make with all the chicks. Poor girls!

I did spend Thursday night celebrating some friends birthdays. Kurt bought everyone he knew beers, (which means he bought a lot because he knows everyone), and we toasted to Wendy whose birthday was the following day. She lives in Alaska and gets to seen views like this:



Here's most of the rest of us:
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I also built a communion table for the local Episcopal church. They are starting a meditative, non-traditional service for those of us pagans who like a bit of ritual but can't handle too much of the trappings found in regular services. I went last Sunday night and it was the most beautiful service I have ever been to. I just loved it. I'm not sure the table will fly--I built it out of old goat barn wood, and as much as I love it, it's on the way rustic side. Perhaps too much for even a non-traditional service. We'll see....I'll use the same kind of construction for building another table and shelves for the goat this winter. I think it's going to look awesome.



Otherwise, everyone is good. The guys celebrated their 14th birthday and had a couple of friends over. They got a few hours sleep, I think. It was fun. The electricity went out for a few hours which added to the excitement, and once it came back on, it was movies and video games for who knows how long. I'm tired, that's all I know!!

bill

So I moved Bill's fence yesterday. He is getting way too big to fit into the duck house. He definitely was starting to do his job of pooping and turning the ground, though. I think I need a few more pigs to really make a success of using them for fertilizer and a rototiller. But it's possible that I'll get more next year. I might raise them for a few people, and then they take care of any butchering. I really don't want anything to do with that project. We just can't do it. Sigh....

I have some pictures, but am really having a hard time publishing them this morning. I think it's time for a run anyway. Will try to post them later!

guys' pics

Shady:

Bucky:

Station:

Benj:

Alfred:

it's getting cold!

Geez--it's 34 freaking degrees this morning! It was pretty cold the night before as well, but at least I remembered to shut the windows last night so I can't see my breath this morning. Frost everywhere. In spite of the cold, most of the chickens, turkeys and guineas are still roosting out in the trees at night. We had a decent size storm a couple of nights ago with a lot of wind, but they seemed to do just fine. Strange creatures.

It is definitely time to start thinking about finishing the coop roof, insulating the inside, and building the wood shed. I definitely haven't done as much as I should be doing--it's taking me a bit to adjust to school. Not that I mind it, just that it will take some getting used to.

I'm still hunting for eggs--they just refuse to use the nests. I did find a guinea egg right in the middle of nowhere. Very strange. Usually they find a private space. I mean, wouldn't you if you were going to lay an egg? It should be a very private matter, I'm thinking! But I've been finding at least one egg a day from the chicks. I bet I've got tons more sitting out somewhere.

Although it's possible that they are getting eaten by skunks. Vanna got skunked but good Friday night. Right on the deck. It hurt to be in the house the smell was so strong! I had picked up some deskunking stuff from the vet last year after Vanna had gotten skunked the first time. It's a miracle product. Not a bit of skunk smell on her at all. Pretty cool! And I didn't even need to use that much. Totally worth the money!!

Here are some pictures that the guys took recently.

Ok, maybe not...let's try again.

for korinne!

backpacking solo

My backpacking trip was the most awesome trip I have ever taken, although the first time I kayaked at Isle Royale is pretty high on the list, too. Anyway, what a great time. I spent the first night with my ranger friends Dawn and Marshall, and their swell kids Forest and Cole. It was great. They fed me huge amounts of homemade pizza. I was wishing I had some of that later in the trip!

Going solo is an experience that I think everyone should have, especially women. Most of the women I met said that they wanted to go solo but were afraid to. There was something so very empowering about having to be completely responsible for myself, and not just in an "I don't really know what I'm doing won't someone help me" kind of way. Going solo, for me, meant that I could listen totally to me. I stopped when I wanted to stop, ate when I wanted to eat, slept when I wanted to sleep. I realized that I was actually listening to my body as I hiked. I could adjust my pack in response to a tired back or shoulders, and I know that I didn't do any of this kind of listening when I was there with someone else. Then, I was more worried about whether I was talking too much, going to slow, needing/wanting to stop too much, having bad breath, being boring and what not. I began to realize that my whole life has been centered around listening and worrying/thinking about others. About what others think of me and how they perceive me.

It's all a bunch of bull, actually. Why don't we hear our own voices as we move through the world? Why do we listen for other voices before respecting and responding to our own? When I do listen, I know that I am happier, and, as a result, my kids are happier, too. It's a bit ironic. What most would consider selfishness actually leads to a happiness that spreads far out beyond ourselves. I'm grateful for the experience of hearing myself so loudly. I think if I take these kinds of trips regularly, my voice won't fade into the shadows as it has in the past.

It's a very cool thing.

But I did run out of food. Well, out of carbs. I only had 2 packages of tuna left. When I realized I was running out, I did a 17 mile hike one day so that I could make it back to Dawn and Marshall's the next day (I think a 7 or so mile hike.) Dawn thought I'd be coming that day and made peanut butter cookies. I ate 6 in about as many minutes. Best cookies I've ever tasted.

What a great adventure. I can't wait to go back!!

my first big tree

So I haven't really spent much time thinking about what I was going to do about wood this year. I knew I was going to take down the big tree by the old house because I intend to do some gardening there and I need more sunlight. Half of that tree is what ended up smashing the roof of the old house, and although there wasn't any rot in the other half, it seemed like it was ok to cut down. I'm not someone who really wants to cut tons of trees down, but I do think that there are times when it's important to do so. The guys were a bit sad about it, and I don't blame them. It was a pretty fine tree.

I was a bit nervous about attempting to drop this tree--it was by far the biggest tree I have ever cut. It was bending a bit towards the old house, and because I intend to save as much of that wood as possible, I didn't want the tree to just land on it. I cut some notches, tried to predict where it fall, and low and behold, it dropped exactly where I wanted it to. Really, I don't think anyone could have done it better. Not even me a second time around!


There will be a lot of nice wood, but I am buying 3 cords from a guy around here as I know I won't have enough of my own to last the winter. That will be perfectly fine, though, because I can continue to work on wood this winter for next year.

The next big project I need to do this fall is build the wood shed. I've decided to move it a bit farther away from the house than what I had originally intended, mostly because I don't think it would look very good there. It will be somewhere beyond the formost tree in this picture, and in front of the big tree that can be seen in the background. More or less, that is. I'll be able to use the old posts from the goat barn, so that that will save some money. Instead of having a shed with a peak on it, I'm thinking of just making it a slanted roof with the same green metal roofing material that is on the house. It should look and function pretty well. Down the road I'll also move the propane take from behind the house to behind the wood shed for ease of getting it filled. Right now I can't really put a garden in where I want to because the propane truck will have to back up close to the house.



Can't remember if I posted pictures of the cleaned out goat barn area ( a few more beams to move but I need some help), and the bonfire pit. Things are looking pretty good!!

the chicks

So the chickens are really growing and some of them are just unbelievably beautiful.

And they are laying!!! I found the first egg by a pile of wood out in the open early last week, and then Rio found another one underneath some stacked wood in a small opening. I'm not sure if they were guinea or chicken eggs, but they sure were cute and tasted excellent. For the rest of the week, I couldn't find any, but I figured that they were hiding them somewhere. Finally, this morning while working on some nests I was building, I found a nest with 6 eggs in it. Awesome!! I left one in a nest box so that hopefully the hens will realize that they can lay in the boxes. I sure don't want to have to be hunting everyday. I'm pretty sure that there must be other nests by the coop somewhere, but I sure can't find them. I did find 2 guinea eggs underneath the brush from the big tree I cut down (more on that later). Rio thought he heard them in there, and he was right. I'll take one egg this evening and put a mark on the other. That way I can keep exchanging the eggs everyday and can make sure that none of them go bad-- otherwise they'll just keep moving the nest. hopefully they'll also start laying in the nests. I sure wish I would have had them finished a few weeks ago. Darn it!!!



The nests were pretty fun to build, although I really wasn't sure how to do it. I used up a bunch of old wood pieces, so it looks pretty sloppy, but I kind of like it. It's got a certain kind of class!

it's been a freaking long time!!!!

After not having posted for such a long time, I figured the above picture that Kurt took of Bill's butt seemed appropriate. Sigh....

It doesn't seem possible, but school starts tomorrow! It's been great that it is starting after Labor Day, and I love the extra week of summer that we now get. But still, there is so much left to do before winter hits, and school starting means that I will have to work hard at getting things done on the weekends. That's not such a bad thing, really, but still, it's just the whole idea of summer vacation being over.

But although I'm a bit bummed about summer being over, I have to say that this has been the most productive, fun, and peaceful summer that I have ever had in my entire life. I loved working outside from morning til night, and I loved seeing all the progress here. I'm very excited to start planning on what will go in the gardens, and all the other changes that I intend to make next year. Very exciting!

But first, here's some pictures that Kurt took at the "I don't want to go back to school" party we had at the goat this weekend. Surprising, no one got bloody drunk, at least as far as I could tell, and we had some kick-ass pizza which Shawn and Kristie helped me make. Not so shabby!

Rio and Watkins: (the real Watkins was getting ready to do a bike race)



Here is Liz and Shaun and Kristie's baby, Henna:



The man!: