Friday afternoon reflections

This seed basket can only mean one thing; it's time to get back into gardening and my livelihood! It's very odd starting seeds now, being it's January and all. I am not complaining, it's just odd. I made my first attempt at sterilizing potting soil this week for my trays, and it must have been alright because the French marigolds are popping their little heads out today after being tucked in just 3 days ago.

Over the past weekend we constructed our very first 'hoop house' and we're hoping it won't need the tarp on for long, but seeing as how it was down to 20 degrees F and killed a bunch of our citris grove a few days back.....you just cannot be too safe!

Max turned 2 this week! He has started repeating quite a few words/phrases that he hears us say, so I imagine it won't be long before we have another storyteller on our hands. One of his favorite activities is playing in the animal run.

We have had a couple afternoons of sitting around the fire after school and snacking, and listening to goat's baaing in the background ;)

Sometimes life is just better with a cat.

Mid November 2016

It's been way too long since I've updated, so I really don't know where I should begin. Let's just say that a lot has happened to the house remodel. We like our house. And it's finally getting better outside. We are even pumped up about starting some new things in the backyard soon. We've had a ton of helpers with everything and are so thankful for family and friends who are willing to donate their time. The latest changes around here have been:

1. The completion of the deck.

2. The chicken coop with a flock of hens.

3. A tree-house right out our back door.

4. Clearing the bamboo forest to make way for garden space.

5. Both older boys are attending school.

Briggs-Kindergarten

Finn-Pre K

5. Finding out we're going to have a daughter sometime in March!

6. Getting a dog whose favourite thing is to bite up shoes.

This week my family is here visiting and we've already fixed up the chicken run so that the littlest chickies can't squeeze through the fence and get taken away by Rufus.....and get buried alive in the dirt. (Luckily, Finn was watching and came to her rescue. She survived and all is well!)

Today we baked cookies using the pecans that we've been collecting from trees, and some will be sent with Briggs for his Fall Festival. And later this week we get to join him at school for a Thanksgiving luncheon.

Looking forward to doing a little thrift-ing for baby clothes, and fabric shopping so that Mom can get started on a new quilt when she gets home.

Photo booth last Sunday

Treasures

Happy June! Is 2016 really half over? I've been trying to downsize our things before the big move later this month, but this week I found something I'm pretty excited about adding to our item collection. In the back of my mind, I wanted to find something other than our cracking plastic stuffed tote that we keep our costumes and dress up clothes in. So yes, when I saw this magnificent piece of furniture, I had to check it out. It's a treasure chest and I think it's perfect :) The kids are having fun playing "ride in the boat" with it as well. Double the fun!

In Marigold Croft news: Tomorrow I have to do some major cleaning of the kitchen to prepare for the installation of appliances that are happening in 2 days. We spent the last weekend sheet-rocking, and I'm proud to say that I've learned more about 'taping and joint compound' than I ever thought possible. In a matter of several youtube videos, I'd like to think my carpentry skills have improved 100%. So that's another finishing up project on the list for this upcoming weekend!

Fare thee well,
jaylyn

The bread maker

Highlight of the week: BAKING!!! I remember my mom baking in the kitchen of my childhood home, and smelling fresh bread come out of the oven. That yeasty, comforting smell that only comes from baking :) Even today, I will be walking past a bakery and think it smells so home-y.
Something I always wanted to do was to start baking our own bread so that my boys can have those memories too. And my hope was to get to the point where we slowly transitioned from buying it, to making most of it ourselves. But, with our week as it usually goes, I was only able to bake bread once during the week. On Tuesday mornings to be exact. And let's be honest...those 2 little loaves were devoured within a day or so. (We do like our pb & j sandwiches around here) So, I decided to go on a quest to find a helper. Look at this fancy new gadget I found while I was out thrifting. Behold, the bread maker!

I do believe that this (not so little) machine will be a game changer for our family. In fact, I know so! Day 2 of ownership, and I've already made 2 loaves of bread. And while I do love to make my own peasant bread by hand, it is pretty nice to be able to leave the house while this thing works for me.

Fare thee well,
jaylyn

Practicing Gratitude: Week 1

Things I am grateful for:

1) Being able to stay home and raise my children

2) Lemon ginger tea- How have I gone this long without it?!

3) Friendships outside the home

4) Supportive online communities (Resources!)

5) Access to clean water, and fresh food

Monarchs, Windows, and Chicken dreams

This week has been all about transformations.

Let me start by sharing with you our caterpillar project.Thanks to the abundant patches of milkweed at the croft, we adopted 6 young caterpillars and 2 little eggs (that we know of). I decided to keep them on their leaves in a vase on the kitchen island so that we could see them every day. I felt it really helped to learn about the whole process this way. Yes, sometimes they managed to escape and we found them crawling around on the floor, but generally they did not feel the need to get too far away from their leaf source! Soon enough, they were plump and ready to change. We got lucky, and witnesses almost all of them shedding their skin and becoming chrysalises. So far, we've had 4 "hatch" and have enjoyed letting them flutter off our hands and watching them they take their first flight into the air. I had never done this as a child, and I was just fascinated by the whole process.

Start watching closely. Just about to break outta there!

 So after we could start seeing their black wings inside, we moved them to a screened-in container, although we let one just emerge right out in the open. She stayed hanging around until we noticed her flapping her wings. Ted said, "I think she wants to fly away!" And we let her crawl on our fingers and  right away she flew to the window. I opened it for her, and off she went :) It was very cool!

  I returned 2 caterpillars back to the milkweed because I didn't want to pick any more food for them and then end up with even more eggs hatching and more caterpillars to deal with. Currently, we are still observing the last 2 which have been in chrysalis for about a week now.


In other news, the house is coming along nicely. We have our windows and doors installed. Yesterday, we learned that the siding on the front is now done! Sorry I didn't have my camera with me, but you can imagine.

This nook with new windows really brightens up the family room inside.

 And we have another project in the works, which is having half of the car port taken off. This included the sauna area, (which was a little sad) but we saved the cedar and stained glass for when we build our own dry sauna. The point of taking this out is that we will have a way to get a vehicle, a trailer (for hauling goats), and other larger equipment to the back yard.

We also are considering doing something like this in the far back lot where it is prone to flooding. We thought the goats would have fun climbing around it if we put some type of spiral staircase on it. Plus, it would irrigate our gardens and store water for the chickens, etc. But that is still a long way off.

 I have started thinking about what heritage breeds I want to raise though. Did you know there's a chicken breed called Mrs. Pepperpot? I would totally keep that as her name too. Maybe 'Pepper' for short. Here's a few more that I'm interested in: Blue-laced red wyandotte, Black copper marans, Americauna, and of course it wouldn't be a Morehouse flock if we didn't get a Barred Rock hen too!

Fare thee weeeeell,
jaylyn

p.s. I'm cutting back on coffee. It's just making me feel awful, and I'm starting to worry that I'm relying on it too much to get through the day. I've decided to alternative between half caffs and smoothies.

Jingle bells

I've decided to test my patience, and occasionally include some videos from the month. These things take FOREVER to upload on here. Oh well.
Sorry I can't figure out how to rotate the bathroom. Jingle bells...always being belted out around here these days. Old Mc Farmer is tonight, on a one horse open sleigh :)