IDA slowed down in it’s approach to the coast line and just made landfall around 5:30 AM this morning.  It’s still raining outside and the wind is blowing pretty good but nothing really bad.  It’s light out but there is no sunshine LOL  Here’s a pic from the front yard looking into the oaks and the sky:

Of course you can’t tell in the photo that the wind is blowing but you can see some of the rain drops that are falling.  I took the photo when it has stopped raining for just a bit.  Most of the rain is really gone through and we’re left with the wind portion of the tropical storm.

The garden has really gotten a nice watering yesterday and overnight.  This will definitely give my seeds that I planted this past weekend a nice boost :-)  I am working on planning what I will be planting in the remainder of my garden…  I still need to plant more lettuce and more turnips… those are things that we love to eat during the winter months and, they are veggies that also grow very well during our mild winters here on the Gulf Coast.

Well, I need to run and get going for the day.  Hope you have a good one!

Yes, the tropical storm is here.  I just got home from the office (it’s 10:30 PM).  I thought it might be a good idea to head home because we are under a curfew from 10 PM till 5 AM in the morning here on the Gulf Coast of Alabama due to the storm making landfall around 2 - 4 AM.   It’s a bit breezy outside and raining like everything.  On the way home I could see all of the leaves covering the streets.  But really, that’s not unusual this time of year because they are falling anyway.  Maybe the storm will help to make that happen all at once instead of them falling a little bit at a time (which makes raking and blowing the leaves a weekly chore).

The schools are all closed here tomorrow since it’s going to be rainy, windy (tropical storm force winds) and just overall nasty weather.  The news is saying that there will be a good deal of flooding in the low lying areas due to the amount of rain that we’re going to get from this storm…  But where I’m located, we’ve never had any problem with flooding thank goodness.

Well, SAM has been with me almost 100% of the day today.  He doesn’t like to be alone… I don’t know if that is because he lost his owner and is afraid he’ll loose me too or what.  But he has to go where I go… including to the school to take DD and to pick her up LOL.  He’s such a good boy buy I just don’t know how we’re going to be able to keep him with our outside dogs, our one inside Maltese and the one inside kitty.  He’s just not socialized toward other animals, especially any that are smaller than he is.  So, for now, we’re just keeping them all separated and locked up in separate rooms.  I’m kinda thinking about getting him a extra large crate so that when we do let the kitty out of lockup or the Maltese out of DD’s bedroom, we will not have to worry about him attacking them.  I know it’s just nature and he’s a hunter type dog.

Too bad I never went to sleep last night LOL!  Long story but I’ll give you the short version after I share some gardening news with you.

Saturday morning and afternoon we had a great time outside in the garden!  It just felt so good to get out and dig in the dirt, ya know what I mean?  There’s just something about getting back to the Earth and enjoying the great outdoors with the plants (veggies in my situation) and animals (cows and chickens for me!). 

Kitty and Davison (our Black Angus “puppy” cows) are getting so fat!  And they are so spoiled too.   I would have never imagined in a million years that I would begin to love cows!  But I’m really attached to them and I’m glad that we’re going to keep them through the winter and into the Spring.  To the casual passer-by they are just two black cows or steers.  But we can see how they are both so unique and different in everything they do and how they act.  Kitty has a “moo” that sounds like an elk call.  Davison has a very deep “moo” that will rattle the windows LOL  The shapes of their faces and necks are different, the “tuffs” on the top of their heads are different…. we can just see how beautiful they are and how individual each of them are.

Now the chickens, we’ll they are just so entertaining!  I had a little fun with them today.  Most of the hens had already gone into the next boxes to leave their “presents” for me (eggs) and I thought I would give another peek just to make sure one of them didn’t slip back in to lay another egg.  Well, I interrupted “Miss Priss” (her nickname for today).  She is one of the Rhode Island Reds.  She gave me a look like “Hello, can’t you tell I’m busy in here?”  Take a look:

So I quickly excused myself and went back to the garden to work a little more.  I decided I would go back later (which I did) and this time she was ready for me… head first waiting for me to open the nest box door…

For some reason she was just taking her own dear sweet time laying her egg today….   Now Buffy, she wanted to play Peek-A-Boo…

And she caught me in this pic:

DH worked on flipping the compost bins which is a big job considering they are 3×3x4′ tall and… there are 4 bins!  We really needed to flip them so that we could get some air mixed up and fluff them some AND, we also needed more room because we’re running out!  I was able to use a couple of wheelbarrow loads from the compost bins.  Some of the material on the very bottom was close to being finished - so that is what we used to supplement several of the raised beds that I was going to plant in today.

Later this morning (after I’ve had a little sleep), I’ll be going out to do some planting in those beds that DH prepared for me.  I am so excited that we are making our own compost from the leaves that fall out of our trees, from our kitchen scraps, from our steers’ manure, from our chickens’ manure, and from the lawn clippings that we obtain from our yard.  It’s had to tell in the picture above, but this stuff is rich and black. 

DH asked me what are we going to do with all of this compost.  That was an easy question to answer…. I told him that we’d be using it in the new raised beds we are going to build for the Spring planting LOL  Between that and supplementing the raised beds we already have, I’m sure that I’ll find a home for all of this compost.

Now a quick explanation of what I was blogging about with the peas and the tomato cages…. I planted “Alaska” which is a shelling pea.  The vines are supposed to grow to be 2 1/2 feet high.  So I planted the seeds around the base of the tomato cage and I’m using the tomato cage as a mini trellis.  And, around the tomato cages I planted some lettuce and some chard in the empty space.  Here’s a pic:

OK, time for me to end this post and get some sleep…. now for the reason that I haven’t been to sleep all night.  Well, around 2 PM I headed up to the office to meet another volunteer who is working on “the project”.  Well, we have so much work to do up there and we stayed until very late and until we were very tired - until 3 AM.  As we locked up and were headed to our vehicles, I saw a dog in the parking lot.  At first it scared me because you never know if stray dogs are mean or nice.  Well, the office is right next to a 5 lane highway…. I told the other volunteer that I was afraid that the puppy would get hit by a car.  Well, when I said “puppy”, he stopped, turned around and looked at me and wagged his tail.

That was it… I couldn’t leave him.  He came over to me wagging his tail and was the sweetest thing ever!  He was a full-grown chocolate lab.  No collar or tag.  I took him inside the office and locked him up in the bathroom while I ran to WalMart and purchased treats, a water bowl, a food bowl, a collar and a leash.  Oh, and I found him a huge rawride bone to chew on.  When I came back to the office, I got the collar on him, loaded him up in my vehicle and took him home.   So this morning, he is in the living room, relaxing and occasionally looking over at me and wagging his tail almost like he is saying “thank you” for saving me.  I woke DD and DH up and they are both in love with him already.  He’s just the sweetest dog.  He even knows how to sit for a treat and he minds pretty good too.

He’s definitely someone’s pet because he teeth are pretty and clean, he’s been trained a little, and even his toenails are clipped (meaning he’s a dog that also lives inside the home).  Let’s hope that he’s “trained” too or I’m going to wake up in a couple of hours to a mess by the front door LOL

And wow, it’s almost 10 AM LOL!  I have lots to do this morning…. heading down to the office at 2 PM for some volunteer work.

First though, we have to finish up in the garden area this morning.  DH has just left to go to the feed store to purchase more calf feed for the boys, Kitty & Davison.  We are trying something new - we feed them 1/2 of their daily feed in the morning and the other 1/2 in the late evening.  Inbetween they eat all the hay that they want.  This new schedule is working better for them…. hmmm, how do I know?  Well, you can tell alot about an animal by its poo.  When we feed the entire amount of feed for the day all at one time, it’s just too much for their stomaches I think.  By splitting their feeding schedule between the morning and late evening, they seem to do better.

This morning I’ll be planting at least 2 more raised beds with some carrots and some beets.  Last year the carrots were so sweet!  The difference between the carrots we grew in the garden and those I last purchased from the store… well, let’s just say “no comparison!”.

I want to do something with the SWC that I grew tomatoes in this past summer but I’m just not sure what would really be a good veggie to grow in them for the fall/winter.  EG seems to be having very good results with broccoli so I might try something like that… maybe some broccoli raab since I haven’t had very good luck with broccoli. 

You’ll get to see some updated pics of the garden this evening… I plan on taking some pics if I can find my camera today LOL.  I want to show you how I will be using the tomato cages as a trellis to grow the Alaska Peas on.  Plus, I am using the space around the outside of the tomato cages for my lettuce and chard.

Something else I planted yesterday was some of the garlic that I purchased a while back.  I know… a little late getting it into the ground LOL   I was hoping to get it planted about 2 months ago but the lack of time interferred with the garden.

It’s time to start thinking about some of the goals that I would like to set for 2010.  Can you believe it’s already November?    One goal that I have for 2010 is to acquire 2 rabbits for our little farmette/homestead. 

I already have the perfect spot for them (pre-planned of course).  I don’t plan on having the rabbits for meat initially.   It’s their manure that will benefit us the most.  Rabbit manure can be used straight in the garden without having to worry about it burning the plants,  So it’s a great way to improve the soil in raised beds as well as supplement feed the plants.

Another way that the rabbits will be beneficial — worms…. I plan on growing worms under the rabbit pen.  And guess who will get some of the worms?  The chickens!  The worms will be an additional source of protein for my chickens.   So there are 2 immediate benefits to having the rabbits here on our little farmette — manure for the garden as well as a place for me to grow worms for my chickens.  Of course there’s always the benefit of having rabbits to pet, hold and love :-)   When I was young I had rabbits for pets.  Rabbits make great pets because they are nice and quiet LOL  Plus, they are a great way to quickly dispose of garden scraps and green vegetable scraps - they turn this into a great manure that is mild and can be immediately used in the garden.

A 2nd goal for 2010 that I’ve really been thinking alot about is a chicken tractor.  Patti uses her chickens to prepare her raised beds for planting.  How?  Well, they consume the spent veggie plants, scratch and eat bugs in the raised beds, and till up the soil all while leaving poo to supplement the soil.  What I would like to do is build a chicken tractor that can also function as a rabbit tractor too.  We have plenty of grass and land and I could also use the “tractor” to graze the rabbits.

Just some ideas to think about for next year.  Well, I need to get outside and get busy!  I will check back in later this evening with some pics!  Have a great Saturday!!

Well, today I decided that I needed a day off.  I needed a day to “catch up” on sleep and things around the house and garden.  I’ve been working until pretty late every night and sometimes into the early morning hours.  Unfortuately, that hasn’t left me much time to do anything around the house. 

First of all, I went to bed early last night and slept until around 1 AM.  I got up, got on the internet and started browsing through all of my favorite blogs that I needed to catch up on.  It seems like most everyone is slowing down on their gardening efforts with fall and cooler weather kicking in.  Here in the South, it’s awesome weather to grow so many veggies!  I got sleepy again about 3 AM and went back to bed.

It was time to get up this morning at 6 AM so I could get my day started and get DD to school.  But, even with all of the sleep I had, I just felt pretty run down and worn out.  So after I took DD to school, I went out and fed/watered the chickens and calves and visited with them for a little while.  I came back inside and decided that I would lay back down for a little while.  Well, that little while turned into 1 PM!  I guess my body just needed some R&R for a while.

After picking DD up from school this afternoon, I went back out to feed and water as well as get some more seeds into the raised beds.  In the garden I have the following veggies planted:  lettuce (Red Sails & Romaine), peas (Sugar-Snap & Alaska), carrots, turnips, broccoli raab, radish, and some swiss chard.  I’m really getting excited about growing cool weather veggies.  In the South, we have so many bugs to worry with during the summer months.  About the only time that we get any relief is during the cooler winter months.  We rarely have freezing temps (only a couple of times over the winter months) and when we do, we try to cover the garden to keep it from freezing, which has worked so far.

The two types of peas I have planted are Sugar-Snap and Alaska.  The Sugar-Snap vines can get as tall as 55-65 inches!  I have them planted so that they can grow up the 7′ high trellis that I used for the tomatoes last summer.  I also have more of them planted where I normally plant my pole beans.  So these peas will have plenty of room to grow :-)  I can’t wait until they start producing!  They are 66 days to harvest.  I hope that I have enough planted to allow us to eat fresh snap peas as well as plenty to blanch and put in the freezer.

Now the Alaska pea vines do not get that tall.  The package says that they will grow to be about 2 1/2 feet tall.  These peas are the shelling variety (like English peas).    I have them planted next to the 3′ high fencing that surrounds the garden.  I also decided to use some of my tomato cages as trellises to grow this variety on.  I will try to take some pics and show you tomorrow on my blog.  I placed the tomato cages inside the raised beds and planted the pea seeds on the inside of the tomato cage.   They have already germinated and aren’t too far from grabbing hold of the tomato cage.  On the outside and around the tomato cages, I have planted some Swiss chard.  This raised bed is going to be beautiful once it’s mature.  The chard I planted is the 5 color chard.

I took a pic last week while I was outside working one morning…. it’s a picture that only a gardener or farmer can really appreciate LOL!  It’s 3 days worth of what I picked up behind the calves to put into my compost bins….  DH and I keep the grazing field “picked up” of the bombs that Kitty and Davison leave for us.  We do this for 2 reasons.  The first reason is that I don’t want my back yard smelling like a cow pasture and the 2nd reason is that this stuff is GREAT for the compost pile!  I like to keep everything cleaned up and tidy even if it’s in the calves’ area.  We keep it picked up using the pitch fork and the wheel barrow and then toss it into the compost bins and cover with some leaves.  You wouldn’t believe how that keeps the smell down.  When you walk into our back yard, other than hearing the calves mooing and the roosters crowing,  you don’t “smell” them and wouldn’t know that they are there.  Anyway, here’s an idea of how much manure 3 day’s worth looks like:

Our wheelbarrow has been used so much… unfortunately this week while I was going around picking up “bombs”, one of the handles broke and part of the underneath bracing broke.  That on top of the tire that must be air-ed up on a regular basis and it has several holes rusted through, well… we need a new wheelbarrow!  This is a tool that we just can’t do without around here.  For my birthday last week, my mom sent me a check — guess what I’m going to use that money on?  LOL

In closing, I would like to share a video that I took with my cell phone.  The quality is horrible but still, you will get to see how sweet Kitty and Davison are and how they are like big puppies.  I took this video last week when I went out to feed one morning.  You’ll get to hear Capri crowing several times - he’s such a loud-mouth!  I am hoping that I can get another video with the calves moo-ing so you can hear the way Kitty moo-s.  He sounds like an elk!  Anyway, enjoy!!

Well, I played hooky from the office today…. but I had a very good excuse!  See, I’m babysitting my friend’s 4-year old son.  That’s a good reason, isn’t it?  So I had a wonderful nap this morning while DD played with the midget.  Then when I woke up, we went outside and fed the animals.  I also spent some time in the garden and got the collards, lettuce and chard transplants in the dirt.  The 4-year old had such a good time digging in the dirt.   He likes planting seeds and plants too.  We tilled the soil with the cultivator, dug little holes with the spade and got all of my transplants into the ground.  He also poked holes in the soil and planted the pea seeds for me.   I explained to him that the pea seeds (which he said looked like peas!) would grow pretty plants that would make peas for us to eat.  He was just so amazed!

Children love playing in the dirt - I know I did when I was younger.  I followed my grandfather around his garden and listened to every word he said.  I’ll be 47 at the end of this month and working in the garden with my grandfather is still something that I can vividly remember.  He showed me the best size to pick the cucumbers, how to tell if the butterbeans (aka lima beans) were ready to harvest, how to dig potatoes and “side-dress” the corn. 

You know, you’d think that a 4-year old with a short attention span would be like a bull in a china shop in my 24×24 garden.  But he was the best little guy.  He “dug holes”, found worms, planted and just had the time of his life.  Now he wants to be a farmer when he grows up and have cows, chickens and a garden.  Wonder where he got that idea from?  LOL

I’m up early this morning…. I have a few things to do before I head down to the office this morning (where I’ll be all day and probably 1/2 the night).  It’s a quarter till 7 AM and finally beginning to get light out.    We’ve had a week of almost record-breaking high temperatures but I think the cooler weather is now headed this way.  A band of rain showers moved through last night which is followed by a ;ittle cool front.  I could tell the difference when I left the office last night (after 10 PM) to drive home.  Even though the roads were still wet, the air had a cooler, almost drier feel…   But it will not stay dry for long as we have another band of rain that is going to be moving through today:

I was so hoping that “the project” that I’m working on would be complete enough so that I could have my weekend off…. well, that isn’t the case unfortunately.  I’ll be going in to the office today and tomorrow… so much for this weekend, eh?

I am just so wanting to get outside and spend the day in my garden!  I have so many things that I want to do - like PLANT!  LOL  But, for now, I’m committed to this project and everything else will have to go on hold.  One thing I know for sure, after this project is completed, it will be a cold day in h-e-double hockey sticks before I even think once, much less twice of volunteering for such a time consuming task.  Every day that I’m at the office, all I can think about is how much I would rather be outside in my garden than sitting in an office in front of a computer and paperwork.  Just thank goodness I can finally see the light at the end of the tunnel.

Well, it’s light enough to go outside… I’m going to feed and visit all of the animals this morning :-)   I’m checking my chickens to see if they are beginning to molt.  With the changing amounts of daylight hours and the onset of fall, they should start molting any day now.  This will also mean a very sharp decline in the number of eggs they lay.  Molting is a natural process in the life of a chicken - it will just be the first time that my chickens (or ME) have gone through it LOL

Hope that you have a great weekend!  And that you can get out and do some work in your garden (dig a shovel full of dirt for me!!).

Well, I’m up bright and early this morning (been up since 3:30 AM actually!).  I’ve been working day and night (literally!) on this special project that should be wrapping up soon.  Unfortunately, for me it means that I haven’t been out to the garden or to see the animals since last Friday morning.  But don’t worry, DH and DD have been taking care of them and doing the feeding and collecting eggs.   Thank goodness — without my family filling in for me and covering my chores, I don’t know what I could have done LOL. 

I usually leave out early in the morning and I don’t get back home until 1 or 2 AM…. yeppers!  But yesterday evening I was just dead beat and couldn’t go any further.  So, the group knocked off at 6:45 PM and decided to call it a day.  We all needed some rest.  Nodding off at the computer isn’t good and we don’t want to make any clerical errors in our work (would be disasterous!).   So I came home and was in bed at 7:30 PM.  I slept until 3:30 AM (8 hours) this morning.  I feel like a million bucks this morning, all rested up and ready to go back and tackle “the project” again.

But back to the garden and animals…. guess what?  The Rhode Island Red that was broody has FINALLY gotten over it.  Yes!  DH has been out feeding and collecting eggs and said that for two days in a row she hasn’t been sitting in the nest box.  So that is good news.  She was defintely one meany while she was broody LOL   Otherwise, the Rhode Island Red hens have been so sweet.  I would definitely recommend this breed to anyone who would like to keep chickens for their eggs.   All of mine have laid the largest, oval brown eggs… many of which have been double yolks!

My last trip to the feed store yielded a purchase of garlic and onion sets…. I had gone to the feed store to purchase more feed for the steers and was very happy to see the garlic and onion sets there.  I probably purchased way to many onion sets though LOL  I am hoping that I will have a little time this coming weekend to get them into the ground.

Well, it’s 5 AM now and I really need to get going this morning :-)   I hope that you’re having a great week….

Wow, I did something I haven’t done in ages!  I SLEPT IN!  I didn’t finally wake up and get up until 10 AM {{{YIKES}}}   But the reason may have to do something with me working down at the office for 16 hours per day LOL  I guess I just finally had to get some catch up rest.  But our project is going very well and we’re at the final stages.  I can’t wait for it to be completed!  Then I can get back to my life, my garden, my animals, my family and my home!  For now, I have the best husband ever who has been taking care of things for me at home, with DD, in the garden and with the animals.  Hopefully soon I can let you know what the “project” is…. I just don’t want anyone to search for information and find this, my person blog…. ya know?

NOW on to some good stuff!  Thanks so much Granny for registering and I’m so happy that I’ll be seeing some comments from you :-)  I can’t wait to try your seed mat method…. I had to go to Wally World for more computer paper the other day  and before I picked up the computer paper, I went over and picked up a bottle of Elmer’s school glue LOL   I also went thru Mickey D’s for a sausage biscuit and came back to the office to eat my biscuit and used a paper towel so I could save the napkins I got from the restaurant LOL  I am going to try the radish seeds on the seed mat…. I think they should probably work well.  I can usually grow radishes very easily.   But I’ll let you know how they do!!

Preparing the seed mats inside will save me some time because lately I haven’t been home during the daylight hours.   Plus it will be so much better in dealing with those tiny seeds like lettuce, carrots, collards and turnips!  You are so right, kitsapFG, Granny is definitely a hoot and a treasure :-)   I’m really surprised EG doesn’t use this method because you could really get some organized squares (and straight lines) with the seed mats.  His garden is so neat!

Thanks GrafixMuse for commenting!  I know, I was going through withdrawals too while my blog was down LOL  Oh the cows are fine…. they are so funny though!  They think they are pets, ya know?  And they want the attention FIRST…. they don’t think we should feed the outside puppies or the chickens BEFORE we take care of them LOL!    They have started “moo’ing” at lot more too.  Before, they were really pretty quiet.  Now when the outside puppies hear us come outside, they get excited and bark — so they in turn alert the cows who start mooing.  So as we’re entering the privacy gate from the side yard to the back yard, it sounds like a zoo with barking, crowing and mooing LOL

Speaking of mooing, I am going to try to record Kitty and Davison’s “MOOS”… it’s really funny, but you can tell the difference between them!  Davison’s MOO is so deep…. and Kitty’s is just the weirdest MOO I’ve ever heard LOL  I’m going to play with my cell phone a bit (it has a video recorder on it) and see if I can record a short video clip of them.    OH, I’ve already put in my order for my birthday/Christmas gift from my family.   I want one of those hand-held, digital video cameras.    If everyone goes in together on it, it won’t cost very much per person.

Well, got to run…. have a great day and I’ll try to post more tonight when I get home!

Well, it’s finally 5 AM LOL   I’ve been up for an hour and a half already.  I went to sleep fairly early last night and had just gotten enough sleep and I was awake much earlier than normal this morning.

Dan's Urban Veggie Blog

Thanks Dan (Dan’s Urban Veggie Blog) for the comment!  I’ve missed checking out your blog since mine went down.  I’m still putting up the blog links that I had and I got yours back up on my site just a minute ago.   I’ll be going over to your blog in just a bit :-)  I’ve got to catch up on your tomatoes!

This morning I’ll be going through some of my seeds and getting things together for planting in the garden this weekend (or for starting inside under the lights).  I’m really excited about my fall garden…. I have most all of the garden planned out using PlanGarden.com.

I still have to work out exactly which varieties of each veggie that I will be planting, but this will be a good start to get me going.  I have plenty of seeds to plant that are great for cooler weather.  But there are still a few varieties that I would like to try - for example, I would love to plant “Tall Telephone” which is a sweet pea from Freedom Seeds.  I believe this is one of the varieties that the Dervaes plant in their garden that seems to grow very well and looks to be productive as well.  I plan on placing an order with Freedom Seeds this week some time. 

Freedom Seeds is on the front lines of the battle to preserve open pollinated seeds. With an initial launch of 75 vegetable seeds from arugula and beans to kale, peas, turnips and much more, gardeners can be confident that the seeds they buy from Freedom Seeds have been carefully screened for genetic manipulation. The worth of these seeds has been proven by compatibility with their environment, instead of being made tougher and more durable by genetic engineering. They possess the nutritive properties of old and locally developed strains, based on eatability instead of portability.

Well, I’ve got to get started getting ready for the day now.  I hope that your Tuesday goes well!