I did get some seeds started, the peppers are just starting to peek out of their pots and the geraniums are going wild. I would like to start my tomatoes at some point today and it seems it's time to plant peas & swiss chard outside. This is my first experience with either plant and I'm very hopeful. I do have a gardening guru/ nemesis, Tony, the crossing guard at my daughter's school. He is a true old school Italian gardener and knows EVERYTHING. Every afternoon at 3:15 I get his seedling report, and somehow he is always a day ahead and an inch taller. He also always shares his bounty with me, so I never complain, but silently I do vow to beat him just one time. He is really in my head now.
The babies are laying quite well now, at least 3 eggs a day. I still have been unable to get in touch with our adoptive chicken family yet, so the big girls are also still maxing and relaxing in the coop. Poor Delila is getting shaggier by the second, she is like a car wreck, you just have to look. I've added pic's for your amazement.
The goat house has had slow progress, it's still in the box, although we did manage to remove the direction book that came with it. I just hope my marriage is strong enough to survive the construction. We are heading down to Tractor Supply this evening to pick up the goat fencing, posts, goat & chicken chow, and maybe a pair of new overalls for me. It just doesn't get any better then that!
Now to those @#*% bees. Joe and I attending the first beekeeping meeting of the year. "Is there a doctor in the hive?", pretty clever huh? It was jammed packed with really surprising uses for all bee products, including honey, stings/venom, and propolis. Now to my sting, a very seasoned beekeeper explained the time has come to feed the little darlings. I bet you didn't know you feed bees, wait till you read what they eat. She recommended granulated sugar on a piece of slit paper. I have fed my bees a sugar syrup that is pour into a top feeder, never straight sugar. I'm game, I'll try anything once. Well guess what, paper blows in even a slight breeze. Bees really don't like you to repeatedly crush a piece of paper on top of them and then pour 2 lbs of sugar on top of the paper. Final score Bees 1 Tracee 0. I'm still typing, so I think I'm going to survive but man does that sting hurt.
I'm selling the soap as fast as I make it. People love it, they are buying it as gifts as well as for themselves. I'm sending out my first show application this week. I should be showing my line at Maplewoodstock. It's a cool art and music festival held in my old stomping grounds at Memorial Park in Maplewood on NJ July 10th & 11th. I will get some shots of my displays for you to check out. Joe has crafted a new mold for me with a lovely curve to hold your thumb as you use the bar. The first time out the results were less then perfect. The soap somehow adhered to the swoop and would not release, a double batch of milk & honey soap is now cut into chubby rectangles sans swoop. Live and learn. We're making our second attempt tonight after Tractor Supply. I think I will make 2 batches, an unscented bar that I've had a special request for and maybe Gardner's Bar in honor of the start of the season to sow.
If that's not enough I have started a really interesting read called "Radical Homemakers, Reclaiming domesticity from a consumer culture" by Shannon Hayes, try saying that 10 times fast.
It is really excellent and hits home for me. A short quote from the book that I loved so much I had to read it out loud to my family follows;
"A true home is inhabited by souls who live, breathe, eat, think, create, play, get sick, heal, and get dirty. It will wither in an antiseptic condition. A true home pulses with nonhuman life - vegetable patches, yeast, backyard hens, blueberry bushes, culturing yogurt, fermenting wine, and sauerkraut, brewing beer, milk goats, cats, dogs, houseplants, kid's science projects, pet snakes and strawberry patches."
As I read this I took mental note of all the things in that list which already or soon will be in my home. I may just be on the path to radical homemaking and I just wouldn't have it any other way. If nothing else I do feel better about my housekeeping.
Surviving the garden!
Tracee
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