June Green

I think that this may be my very favorite time of year; the warm green days of June with the majority of summer, heat and garden bounty to look forward to. The leaves on the Birch trees and the green plants covering the forest floor are my favorite shade of green, lush and bright. We have had three overcast days of scattered showers. When I awoke this morning fog surrounded the house. I love fog. We get it so rarely, that whenever we do it reminds me of vacationing to the Oregon and Maine coasts when I was young. Now the ground is moist and spongy. The air is sweet and clean. The sun is filtering through the trees and shining on the wet glossy Birch leaves.

On Saturday we had our first thunderstorm and good rain of the year. The kids and I were so excited when we heard the first thunder. I have written before of our love of Patricia Polacco's Thundercake, and our desire to make our own Thundercake. Last summer we did not have a single thunderstorm -and we were looking forward to one so that we could make a Thundercake. So going into this summer I promised the kids again that if we heard thunder we would drop everything we were doing and make a Thundercake, and so we did. Of course, our thunderstorms tend to come and go within about fifteen minutes, but we were able to get started while there was thunder, and the afternoon remained stormy. We changed out the recipe and made a gluten free chocolate cake out of Against All Grain that was very good and moist. Unfortunately I attempted to make a Chocolate Swiss Meringue Buttercream for the frosting, and we lost power before we'd incorporated all the butter. So no matter how much Noah and I attempted to hand whisk the frosting it never had the right texture. Never the less, we enjoyed it thoroughly. We got power back late that night.

With the exception of fierce winds on Saturday, the last couple days of cool rain have been wonderful for the garden. Some years we don't get any cool rainy days until July, so all the tender starts just struggle to stay alive through our hot sunny June months and then take off mid summer. The garden is planted. turnips, peas, carrots, greens and beets are coming up. Brassicas, squash, tomatoes, cucumbers and all the other heat loving starts are in. I've got a few blank spots for direct seeding cilantro, basil and another batch of greens. We downsized on garden space this year as we took out a few rows to make a flat grassy play spot for the kids. So I ended up starting more than I had room for. I was planning on tilling an old goat pen and planting corn in the fertile space, but we have two geese in the space right now and I'm not sure if they'll get moved out in time.

We moved the coop of our youngest layers into a moveable hoop house so we could have more nutritious eggs. Now our lower chicken coop is available for the turkeys and Cornish that are in the hallway and desperately need to move out of the house. Over the next couple weeks we'll be shuffling birds into appropriately sized summer homes, and cleaning out the goat barn before it will be time to start weeding daily. Dustin is going to install drip irrigation in the garden which should save me an hour or two daily of watering. I'm looking forward to having more time for my children and for doing fun summer activities together.

Here's to enjoying the lush green days of summer!

Recess (for the goat kids)

 We have been having such a busy spring with all the goat kids, a new puppy, garden work and finishing the official home-school year, that we still have a couple doelings without names. But here they are. I'll bet you can tell who my favorite is, as she tends to be front and center whenever I'm in the goat pen.

 Isnt' she flashy?! That is Zuri's doeling Ember on the left. This is Zuri's third doeling and we have yet to keep one for her - and us. Zuri is my favorite milker. I love the shape and capacity of her udder, the shape of her teats and how easily milk comes out. Her conformation is decent. Her main flaw is that her back is not level and it rises in the back. Supposedly this could make for kidding difficulties. Ironically Zuri is one of my only does that has kidded without much assistance. She is a solid, sturdy doe, and doesn't put all of herself into making milk - she keeps her weight on and I like that about a doe. She has an unusual mothering instinct for a goat - she adopts strays. If another mom is not taking care of her kids well enough, Zuri will work them away from their dam and take over. She is our only doe that does not ram the other goat kids, but watches over them all.

 Above are two of Xanadu's three lovely doelings. I think we are going to call the Chamoisee doeling on the right Eden. I haven't come up with a solid name for either of her brown doelings. Finding E Place names out of Literature is not all that easy. We are tossing around Elysian and calling her Elise.

For triplets they are remarkably similar in size and conformation. The light brown one on the left was first, then the Chamoisee and then the darker brown on the right. I usually think the first kid is the bigger and better conformation but studying these three I just barely detect that she is maybe a bit longer. I want the dark brown doeling to be just as nice as she is the most friendly and curious.

Right now my goat plans for the year are to keep the three bucklings intact. Use them for breeding this fall and butcher them before winter gets too fierce. I am going to try to sell four doelings mid summer. I am also going to sell one or two milkers. Which would leave me with three to four milkers and two doelings going into winter. I guess six seems to be the number I can't get bellow. I just can't resist bonding and keeping doelings each year. I think the buck we used was pretty great. His dam was a very nice doe from Lucky Star Farms in Washington that a friend of mine brought up. She was wide, level and had a great udder and was a high producer. Unfortunately she and her daughter were attacked and killed by dogs this winter. She is the grand dam to Xanadu, Zuri and Dahlia's kids.

I attempted to take a video of the kids a while back. If you can get past the bad filming, it is fun to watch them.

A Wild Roots Spring

 
 Our Spring Tree is outside already. I just realized that I never shared our pretty Spring tree space with the baskets underneath and nests that the kids made in the window behind, so, there it is. I think we brought it in too early. We had a spring tree by early March... that is when I needed it. The tree leafed out quickly and we had to cut the Birch pollen pods off (Actually Noah cut them off and put them in a bag in the freezer for the bees). But then the leaves started to curl up and die... maybe it was the lack of fresh water. Anyhoo, the good news is that there is hardly any snow out that window now.
 

 Balloon nests we made earlier in the spring.

The chicks started hatching Friday through Saturday. Avery was very excited. She spent at least fifteen minutes reading to them. She actually translated into chick speach and it came out as "peep peep".

Not the best pictures (again). But I wanted to share our current goat barn with you. A month ago the barn was only able to be divided into half. However, we had five goats do to kid. The past few years we've put up a temporary divider (bottom left) into the back stall as well as another temporary wall (above) to make four separate "stalls". I guess we haven't had more than three goats kid at once in a while, as that has been plenty until now. This year Dustin spent an afternoon trying to figure out how to divide one of those pens in half to give us five separate areas, one for each doe. We didn't have room to have a swinging door - and it is so temporary that it didn't make sense to spend a lot of time constructing something. He ended up making the divider in the above picture that connects the solid back wall with the blue panel. Heavy boards just slide down to form a wall that I can pull out and stack along the wall during the day and then slide back in at night when all the does go into their stalls with their kids. 

Xanadu has a kennel in her pen so that her kids can get away from her if they need to. It has taken a week, but I think she is finally willingly nursing and caring for all her kids. Whew! I place the kennel in an awkward spot so that Xanadu doesn't ram her head into the woven mesh panel when she is angry that another goat is looking at her. I don't think she will do it anymore now that her kids are older, but the first couple days after kidding it didn't matter who I put next to her, she didn't want them so close.

Xanadu's three doelings are all about the same size. They are all really pretty with different coloring. The one above was first out, the second had Xan's coloring and the third is like the first but darker. I can't tell right now which is the nicer doeling. They all look so similar.

I've been feeling slightly guilty for bashing Dahlia in my last post. So I thought I'd share a couple pictures of her that show that she's actually a pretty doe. Above you can see that she is fairly level. You can't quite tell her, but she is deeper in the barrel than some of my does, as her dam and granddam were. I think it is connected to milk production, allowing them to eat more at once or digest more or something. 

Not the most flattering pose. But if you look at her udder, it actually is quite pretty for an empty udder and I don't think you can say that about too many empty udders.

 Every morning while I toss hay, refill waters, help kids nurse and move goats around, Avery sits with the kids. In her lap is Ember, and Ember's brother is licking Avery's face. Both siblings are really nice looking.

And there is Noah with Denali's doeling Ester, names after our favorite and closest town and playground.

Well, as you can imagine, life has been pretty hectic here. If I was really eager I could be sowing radishes and hardy greens in some of the garden beds. Instead I'm just trying to get on top of house cleaning, food prep, toothpaste, mouth wash, bug spray making. This week I'm hoping to get the car ready for summer, tire and oil changing etc. I'm starting to harden off some trays of plants. In the past I've lined our back porch with flats. However, this year I've got a puppy that goes after the starts, pulling them out as I remember my children doing as toddlers. So I was thinking a table was in order, but in reality there are just too many trays of starts, so I'm thinking Kira is just going to have to stay off the porch for a month.

I'm trying to get ahead on grain free snacks. I took all the salmon out from last year and I'm smoking it over the next few days. I'm hoping to make some jerky and some nut crackers as well. This week is our annual May Day celebration that I've been anticipating for some time. I'm hoping we can make it, as another cold seems to be working it's way through the house. So far I have remained unscathed but I'm not sure if the kids are going to be ready to socialize in time.

 I have a shipment of bees coming in on Friday. Once again I have a new strategy, which is that I will be setting up the hive at a friend's garden, that is better located for bees than ours is. It is low down and level, so it get's better morning light and hotter temperatures. So Friday; hiving bees, Saturday; possibly start sowing a few beds with hardy seeds, keep hardening off starts and keeping the puppy away from them. It is going to be a fun and work filled month. Yes, I have a lot of work to do, but I feel so blessed to have it!

The barn goes from 5 does to 14 in eight days!

 This winter we managed to bring our goat numbers down to six does. I did attempt to have them all bred last fall with the plan to keep my three to four favorite milkers and just milk them through for a couple years without re-breeding in an attempt to scale down the farm chores and feed costs. Five of the does ended up bred. The sixth doe was a two year old that never cycled this past fall. I have a theory (not just mine I'm sure) that when I wait until the second year to breed, that sometimes the yearling/one and a half year old gets too fat and then she doesn't cycle. I've had this happen twice now and wasn't able to ever get the doe bred. Both times we ended up butchering the doe and sure enough, in the words of my friend who did all the butchering work,"She was the fatest goat I've ever seen". If I had it my way the younger goats would just get brome hay, but as I have them all in together, they all got a majority of Alfalfa this winter which probably didn't help. Moral of the story, is that I'm more inclined to breed the first year.

So, here is everyone's kidding stories.

Zuri: I had already been doing midnight or rather 3 a.m. barn checks for over a week when Zuri came into labor. It was a couple days before she was due, but it was full Moon which tends to help things out sometimes. Her udder hadn't gotten enormously full or anything, but I noticed her ligaments were completely gone Sunday morning. My family was coming over to celebrate Noah's 8th birthday. We've had at least two other goats kid on Noah's birthday, and we knew it would be likely this year as well. I got to visit for a few moments with family but then had to leave D to cook burgers, prep hamburger toppings and heat fries etc. while I played mid wife. We have a security camera in the goat stall that connects to a small t.v. in the living room, so everyone got to watch Zuri push out a healthy black and tan buckling and a solid black doeling with white frosted ears and nose. I went in on the buckling when I realized he had a leg back, but it was quick and smooth to get the leg forward and pull him out. Both are good size and vigorous. I named the doeling Ember. She is a darling and my overall favorite of the season. She is just flashy, long and level.

Camelot: Later that night it appeared that Cammie was in labor. This was a surprise because I had bred her so many times that I didn't even bother putting her due date on the calendar as she had never seemed in heat or had been receptive. I grabbed some sleep and then went to sit with her around 4 a.m. She kidded to a small buckling. I was a little surprised to see how small he was as I would have thought that she'd either have one big kid or two small ones. But she seemed done and was interested in her baby. I bounced her (a technique where you stand behind and lift her belly to feel for kids/bones and knobby parts) didn't feel anything so proceeded with newborn care. Cammie was being very attentive and started passing placenta. The buckling was nursing fine so we called it a night.

Denali: Tuesday night Denali went into labor. I thought she was going to make short work of it so I invited Noah to join me as they are close. Little did I know that we'd be up late into the night. It was one of those kiddings where she seemed to be pushing and you'd think she'd progress quicker but she didn't so you wonder constantly if everything is alright and if you should go in. While we were sitting with Denali, all of a sudden Cammie started pushing like she was kidding. I figured right away that she must have another kid inside - (who would no longer be alive by now.) Sure enough, it took a lot of work with Noah holding her, but I finally pulled out a slightly decomposing buckling. And boy did that feel good when I finally got it out as I was beginning to think I'd need to call the vet. This was the first time we've had a doe retain a kid after delivering one. Afterwards I was worried about Cammie's health. After consulting my goat herbal I gave her olive oil with cayenne tincture, echinacea tincture, fresh rosemary, goldenseal and fresh garlic orally and cayenne, rosemary, garlic and an antiseptic herbal blend into her uterus. I also gave her low bush cranberries which she ate as well as warm black strap molasses water. The next day I repeated this dose three times over the day but I was worried that she had a uterus infection and that it may not heal completely or worse, that she might die. So I consulted with my vet and got antibiotics, an anti-inflammatory and a calcium injection for good measure. I was feeling like I was not in the mood to mess around - or lose a good doe. I've continued giving her the herbal treatments as well. She is on day nine of her antibiotics and seems almost back to normal. Her buckling is growing solid. She is a great first timer mom despite the circumstances.

Denali kidded to a super cute black and white doeling with fun white markings. Unfortunately Denali rejected her doeling after the stress of labor. We have had this happen before with first timers and they have always come around. We kept Esther in a kennel inside her mother's pen. For a couple days we held Denali every few hours so that Esther could nurse. After three days Denali had decided that her daughter was pretty great after all and she is now taking care of her daughter and they are both doing well.

Dahlia lost her ligaments and starting behaving oddly on Friday, but waited until Saturday afternoon to kid. Which in some ways was considerate of her if I had not been waking up every hour to check on her, afraid that I'd miss being there for her. Her labor went well. She had a small black and tan buckling followed by a small black and tan doeling, both with white marks on their foreheads. Dahlia has been a great first timer mom. Her kids were nursing well from the get go and she has been very protective over them and not wanting to leaver her pen. So, I've just been leaving her to do her thing.

Xanadu usually kids on day 153 which is three to four days later than most my does. But she is usually consistent so I was planning on her kidding on Saturday day 153. She was HUGE! We were pretty sure she was having triplets. Sunday morning she had lost her ligaments completely and she was acting strange. Of course it was Easter and we had big plans to share Easter dinner with family away from the house. I was pretty sure that she was going to wait until later in the night to kid so we went ahead and left the house. By the time we were on the way home I was on the edge of my seat. However, we hadn't missed anything. Sunday night passed, we watched her closely all day Monday. She did lots of up, down, up, down, pawing, pacing etc. She ended up waiting all the way until Tuesday night to kid. Of course by then I was already sleep deprived from the past two nights. I was headed to bed around 11 when I noticed a long trail of goo hanging from her backside. I stayed up to watch her for an hour and decided I could head to sleep for a couple hours. Ended up in the barn at 3 a.m. First came a solid light brown/grayish doeling of good size. I went in to see what was up and found a head, so I reached down and pulled forward both legs to help her come out easier. A second bubble started coming out shortly thereafter and I pulled out our first Chamoisee (the fancy term on Xan's registration that describes her coloring) doeling out of Xanadu. We've had bucklings that have looked like her but never a doeling so that was fun. Then the third kid was solid brown, darker than the first. And it was a female too! So our first set of female triplets born here on the farm, and all with different coloring than we usually have. Mama was very attentive and the doelings were strong and quick to catch on to nursing - although Xan's big teats always poses a mouthful for new kids.

The next day we noticed that Xanadu was rejecting the brown kids and favoring the Chamoisee kid. We held her so that everyone could nurse. I put the kids in a kennel so that they would be safe at night. Today she was favoring a brown kid and rejecting the other two. I think she may just be overwhelmed by all three of them. By tonight I saw her nursing the kids on her own, so hopefully she'll stop being such a stinker.

It has been a while since we have had first timers kid. Camelot is a Xanadu grand daughter. She is out of our buck Zoro. Denali is a Xanadu daughter, also out of Zoro. Ironically enough I did not think Zoro made a very good buck. The only reason we kept both Cammie and Denali is that they were the kids favorites, and as a result are well handled and friendly. Both does look really nice. Their udders are lovely. Cammie's teats are perfectly plumb; even and hang straight down. They are nicely placed on the udder. They are pretty small, but they'll get bigger. Her udder has a nice shape and attaches smoothly to her body. Denali also has a nice looking udder. She looks like she will produce less than Cammie, and her teats point out just a bit, hopefully not enough to bother me when I milk (I hate having to tweak teats in towards the pail - just a pet peeve of mine). Dahlia is a Zinnia daughter, Rose grand daughter. Unfortunately I think she is the least quality of any offspring either ever had - but most of their daughters were very impressive. Dahlia came out of Xavier, our nicest buck. And her Dam was a beautiful doe. So I think that she will grow into her body. But right now I don't like the looks of her rump - not as wide or level as I'd like it. Her body is is short in length and height, but then she is only a yearling. Dahlia does have a nice looking udder. It has the shape of her grand dam's. I have a feeling she may be the best producer out of my three first fresheners, as her lineage have been my best producers.

 My camera broke recently and I have yet to replace it. Worst time of the year to lack a camera! I've taken a few pictures on my husband's work camera but as he takes it to work I have not had the chance to take many or upload them yet. So, here are a few I managed to get with my Ipod, but they aren't very good. More pictures coming soon of all our beautiful adorable goat babies.

 Cammie's buckling

Ember, still wet a wobbly.

In other news, the house is once again filled with the sounds of chicks peeping, some Ameracaunas and crosses that we hatched as well as some black sex links from the feed store. And in even bigger news, we have had a Black Lab puppy for two days now! We have been open to the idea of a puppy for a while now, but wanted to get one going into summer. We also didn't want to be pursuing puppies and instead were kinda hoping that it would just happen, and this one did. She is only about six weeks old, a little too young, but that is because her mom was hit by a car and died. Dustin was able to observe her for a while with her brother and three sisters. He was drawn to her right away. Needless to say we have all fallen in love with her. Her name is Kira. I managed to get a few shots last night.

Is there anything cuter than a six week old black lab?!

Spring is Here

 Well, of course it depends on your definition of spring. Snow still blankets the ground but bright warm sun fills our house and melts the roof, drip drip. Above Princess Spring battles King Winter, and ya know she always wins eventually.

Last week I helped put on a Spring Equinox celebration for Children of the Boreal, our Waldorf influenced home-school cooperative. In advance a girlfriend and I got together and made pussy willow nests, dyed eggs with onion skins wrapped around them among various other tasks. For the celebration we had a Time walker story accompanied by drumming and performed by an adult time walker. The children planted calendula and sunflower seeds in egg shells and had their faces painted. My children are still talking about how the feast was the best feast ever! The kids got to take home a "branch of spring"; a pussy willow branch tied with a pastel ribborn, an egg candle and a water color painting with a spring poem called Mother Earth Secrets.
 

 Eggs dyed with onion skins

And on the right, non dyed eggs from the Welsummers and Ameraucanas

 

 Here is a nest with Avery's beeswax egg candle and her Imbolc blessing.

 Seasonal Spring Table. I adore it!

 Avery so carefully helping in the kitchen.

 This weekend we went to the North American Dog Races. We have friends that have an Arctic BBQ each year and it has become a family tradition for us to join them. This was the warmest, least windiest day I can remember looking back at past years. (I think I must have had a smudge on the camera lens).

We have spent most the month of March battling one cold and then another. Thankfully despite having colds this week, the kids have been in good spirits. They decided it was time to ditch the snow pants and wear their water pants outside this week. I sat on our south facing back porch almost every afternoon during the heat of the day while the roof dripped and the kids played. One day I pulled out my banjo and tried to play but I did have to tune it twice in the space of just a few minutes. 

Due to a sinus infection that just won't go away, I haven't had much extra energy. D has been gone this week so meals have been simple. I am feeling behind on spring cleaning and seed starting, but there will be time to catch up after I regain my strength. Today I am setting eggs to hatch a few days before Easter. We have two weeks till the first goat kids are due. Almost time to put up the kidding panels and plug in the tv/goat stall surveillance camera. New udders are forming on at least one if not both doelings as well as a yearling. I think we have three if not four does kidding in the space of a week. So Exciting!

May your days be filled with sun, warmth, inspiration and energy!

First Week of March in Pictures

The sun is filling our home and we are thankful. Thankful that the long dark days are behind us and warm sunny days are ahead. We are thinking and dreaming of spring. This week the kid's and I made nests. The pictures above are of the kids making nests out of yarn, hay and other natural materials. I made a few nests using wire and Pussy Willow branches that turned out well.

 One of the best decisions I made this year for our home school days, was to have individual circle time with each of my kids. Last year there was daily strife during circle time; throwing bean bags too hard, intentional bumping or roughness, arguing or belittling each other, and I realized that their needs and wants were so different that they each needed their own circle and story time without the other around. As a result, Avery's circle time is cozy gentle preschool time with finger plays and lots of fairies. We do various nursery rhymes and basic introductory letter and number work. Above she is jumping over copper rods to Jack be Nimble Jack be Quick, she goes backwards or forwards depending on what I call out.

One, two, buckle my shoe as we toss a bean bag back and forth. Her catching skills are improving.

 

 Our alphabet song that we do motions and sign language to.

Noah's circle is a more rough and rowdy and challenging. Above he is balancing a copper rod on his head and then he sees how far he can walk with it. We do several bean bag activities that are tricky and take a while to learn. We are beginning to work on juggling. I think it would be great if we were both able to juggle.

 

 After circle, Noah reads me a couple first readers and then depending on the day, sometimes I read to him. Other days we do a story recall and then write out story summaries.

This week in school Noah worked with spelling stories and geometry.

 Avery has a Explode the Code primer work book that she likes to work in while Noah and I do his math lesson. I try to sellect letters for her to work on that I've already introduced via story and that she has had a week to work with already.

 I think gelled bone broth is a beautiful thing. I am consuming it almost daily in the form of various soups. I have miso or light vegetable soups for lunch most weekdays.

 Happy Geese eating their daily wheat grass.

 Afternoon goat walk. Gotta exercise those pregnant girls - and ourselves.

 "Come on, you guys want to run down the hill?"

Playing on the hill above the goats. The kids roll and slide and make-believe play on this hill just about every day while I milk.

And that pretty much sums up our first beautiful week of March.