My Country Story

I want to share with you a little about myself and the reasons why I am so excited about this opportunity I’ve been given to start my own little “farm”. I feel so incredibly blessed to have this opportunity.

See, I grew up in the ‘burbs of St. Paul, Minnesota, typical city corner lot. But my dad didn’t. And in fact his brother took over the family farm which happened to be approximately 2 ½ hours from our city home. So for the first 7 or 8 years of my life our family would travel to “the farm” on a regular basis. I know there were summers that it probably was almost weekly. We learned to help with chores. Their main income was from the diary cows. I remember them having chickens early on but as I got older I don’t remember the chickens much. They milked at 5:00 a.m. and 5:00 p.m. We all would help, my job mostly was to wash the udders and teats before the milker was put on. I would wait till uncle would tell me who was next. I also helped set up and clean the barn, scraping the center aisle clean and feeding the cows. I LOVED the smell of the barn. To this day it brings back wonderful memories. You know the smell. As you are driving through the country, most people say “Ewwww, what’s that smell?” I say, “Ahhhh, the farm.” LOL

As a teenager we went less often. One of my cousins, my uncle’s daughter (Judy) who is 7 years older than I, married a farmer and lived only a few miles from her family. We got along great!!! We became fast friends when I was in my later teens. At 20 I moved up north to a small town where another relative lived. Here I met a family who became great friends of mine. They were also dairy farmers. I was at their home all the time soaking in the farm life. After a year in Detroit Lakes, MN I moved to Exeland, WI to be near my farming family. I lived there for about a year visiting at chore time as often as I could. My cousin, Judy, and I would talk about me buying a farm near her someday. Right about this time my other cousin, John, who had taken over his dad’s farm, decided he didn’t want the farming life anymore. OH how I longed to buy that farm. The Family Farm!!! If only I had been married and ready, that’s all I could think about. It never happened. (Today it sits empty, no one to take it over, I still want it!!!!) I moved back to the city and started back to college but never really left the country behind. I was really into country, cowboy boots, hat and all. The summer before James and I started dating I went on a big vacation with my mom, we went to Montana!!! We toured one of the famous ranches of Montana, Grant-Kohrs Ranch, as I dreamed. While there C.M. Russel became one of my favorite artists after visiting the C.M. Russell Museum.

That winter I fell in love with a city boy and moved out to Bellevue, WA. I wore cowboy boots under my wedding dress and line-danced with my friends. But after that, superficially the country left, but never from my heart. For the first couple years of marriage I would talk about it a lot, wanting to live in the country. I even took him to visit “the farm”. He got to see first hand what I was talking about. We visited Judy’s during chore time. Kelsey got to go up in the hay loft to see a new litter of kittens; she was only 4 or 5 years old. But that didn’t trigger anything in him. So I just let it go, stopped talking about it and we lived our happy city life. We bought our first home in a tiny little town outside of Seattle. It was definitely the country, but we lived in town on your standard city lot. I drove by farms everyday!! Then we moved back to the big city, Bothell, because we really wanted to be near our Church family. Out in Sultan we were 40 minutes away with no one nearby. For three years we lived in Bothell in our close-knit community. We developed wonderful friendships, started some great traditions and were able to really grow in our faith. After a couple years in Bothell I started to talk about wanting more room for the kids to run and more to garden! Wishing my children had the opportunity to explore nature on a daily basis. Kelsey was really into Little House on the Prairie books and would even tell us how she wished we could live in the country. I’m not sure what the catalyst was in gearing James towards wanting to get out of the city. It could have been his daily 2 hour commute by bus on the crowded freeways but something awakened his roots, the roots of his Kentucky hillbilly relatives! J

It was a whirlwind of activity; I can’t even remember when he first said, “Okay, let’s do it.” So we fixed the house to sell and looked and looked to buy a minimum of 2 acres. We weren’t sure where right away. But we soon fell in love with the Kitsap Peninsula. We hoped to have huge gardens and maybe some chickens. Here we are nearly 8 months into our new adventure and WE are loving every minute of it!!! We have big dreams to really make something of our chicken farming, to live off of our land and animals as much as we can. And someday, maybe someday, James can retire to the farm. But we’ve discovered our market…is at his job.

That’s my story! Now you can get a better understand to why I am SO excited about our adventure.

The first picture is of my brother climbing to the top of my uncle's silo. That was entertainment back then. Also, I want to add that at the ripe old age of 17 my brother took care of my uncle's farm for a whole summer while he took his family on a vacation across the USA. SEVENTEEN, he milked the cows 2x a day, fed and cared for them. Plus I am certain he did field work.

The 2nd picture is the front of the old barn. There were 2 barns, one old one (pictured) and one built as the new milking barn. Probably held 60+ cows. I think my mom was taking pictures of my brothers getting ready to jump out of the hay loft, they'd shimmy down the rope. That's how we entertained ourselves back then. :)

I have DSL!

I no longer have to wait for my gmail log-in page to load.
I no longer have to resize my pictures to upload to blogger or send to a friend.
I no longer have to say "forget it" when I want to go to a website that is taking too long.
I no longer have to listen to the CLASSIC high pitched dial-up connecting noises.
I no longer have to push a button to get online.
I no longer need to have my voicemail say "I'm either using my lovely dial-up or away from the phone".


Will I miss dial-up?
Maybe.
Only because it actually helped me not waste so much time on the computer because it wasn't worth the wait!

Lord, have mercy on me.

They are here!

On Saturday evening, after a full day of barn building, the girls and I put straw in the back of the van and headed south to get the goats. We were home by 8PM with a mama and her kid in the back of the van. They are settling into their new home nicely I think. They miss their bigger busier farm, they had 2 other mama does and 6 kids (slowly being sold off), 2 horses and a yard full of chickens. So our place is quieter. I think they really appreciate the time we sit out there with them and brush and talk to them. I've milked 3x now...morning and evening. I wasn't going to do that but for now I'll milk 2x a day but only on ONE side. Butter, the kid, only feeds from one side of her mama so she is quite lop-sided until I milk her out. It sure is a learning time for me, to figure out the best hand hold and squeeze. I'm glad she is tolerant...well, as long as she has her molasses grain in front of her she is. At each milking I get between 1.5-2# of milk. Two pounds is approximately a quart. That is very little compared to what her very experienced previous owner would get. So I'm hoping each time I'll get a little better at it.
Below is a picture of Firefly looking out the back window of the van. And the other picture is of them in their new home.

Milk Stanchion (stand)

I completed the milk stanchion yesterday which is the milking stand where I'll milk.
Here is what one typically looks like but I fashioned one out of the huge shelving that was along one side of the barn. Basically I just needed to build the head pieces and feed area. The bowl is for feeding them their grain while they are milked. The doors in the background will not be there come Saturday.
I love it!!! It will work perfectly.

I changed the day we get the goats to Saturday. I was suppose to get them Friday evening but begged for one more day. At 6PM Saturday I am to be in Ollala to milk my goat for the first time(so I can get some pointers if need be.) and then bring her home.

getting ready for goats

have been so busy working on the goat barn and fencing lately. I love the way the barn is turning out. I've made the plans pretty much, with just a little help, and it's looking great. I just can't believe all that there is yet to do and we are SUPPOSE to get the goats this weekend. I just don't see how I'm going to be ready. If I just get the barn secure so they can stay in there until the fencing is done I guess that would work but I'll feel bad for them. All but one of the posts are set and that'll be accomplished today with ease. The children have been helping me with that. They shovel gravel while I tamp and level. Here is what we've accomplished thus far:

This is what we started with. Just a 3 sided shed. Nothing but some shelving inside.

So far here is where we are at. To the left of the window will be a big gate of sorts to enter into the pens. The first pen will be the main one. The second one, behind the white 1/2 wall, will be my kidding pen. Pregnant does will birth there and kids will be seperated from mama's there when weaning is necessary. To the right of the window will be the door into the rest of the barn which will be storage of all sorts and also the milking area. To the right of that door is a post and from there over will be walled off. My milk stand will be right behind that big piece of plywood that is leaning.

This is looking at the feed trough we made. I love how it turned out. This picture was taken before the window was in and before the 1/2 wall went in to seperate the 2 pens.
The trough will be used to feed mostly hay. But one spot on the end will probably have a mineral feeder.

Back to work for today. Will for sure finish setting posts and also will build the rest of the milk stand. It's half done. Then I'll either start stretching fence, hard to do though alone, OR will start putting up the front wall siding. We'll see if I can convince Kelsey to help me stretch fence or not. After all, they are her goats too.

Oh yeah, last weekend I bought what I am sure was my last gallon of cows milk!!!

Barn Raising

This past weekend as many know, we had our "barn" raising to raise up a much needed guest house. Since our move to the country and across the Puget Sound waters of Seattle we've had a steady stream of guests. Not to mention the numerous family memebers that visit frequently. In this new house of ours we really don't have an extra room for them so we thought rather than be cramped and risk the chance of visitors not coming because of that we'd build a guest house. Under 200 sq. feet and there is no permit required. It's primitive in that it has no plumbing but it's built just 5 feet from the main house so there is easy access to the bathroom just inside the back door. Okay, enough advertising. :)

We had quite a crew. Six couples, including us, came from across the water to help us out. They all have first dibs on the finished facilities and chance at a weekend of farm life in the quiet of the country. Above is our lunch time break group photo! Even some of the children were great helpers. Mom caught this picture of Nicholas.

Here, below, is what they started with first thing Saturday morning. All week James and Rade worked at getting the foundation done so they could start out on the floor and walls right away.

Father Christopher came out mid-morning to bless the foundation and our efforts to complete the task we started. He even worked his way over to our barn we are working on to welcome the goats in 2 weeks and he sprinkled the chickens as well!!!

Here, Jenny and Steve, rest briefly.

With nearly all hands on board the 2nd wall goes up!

By the end of Sunday (a few stayed over Saturday night and joined us for Church Sunday, working for a short time in the afternoon), some wall boards were up and the big beam for the roof was up! See the little "hobbit" hiding in the picture?

It was quite a grand weekend! Mom stayed on to take all these wonderful pictures but yesterday afternoon headed for the train and Minnesota. We will miss her!!!! But can't wait till she's back in July to stay in the guest house!
Through all this building, Valerie and I were able to get 9 post holes dug for the goat pen!!! I hope to finish that this week and then get the inside pens built. I need to be ready by May 12.

St. Brigid Farm is now taking reservations for the guest house, call or email for availability.

Goat School Day 2

Yesterday was the 2nd day of goat school and we were to learn about milking. First, we got to have milk and cookies, GOAT milk. We were all pleasantly surprised at how creamy and tasty the milk was!! It was DELICIOUS!! I would have never guessed it to be goat milk. I can't wait to have my own.
Then we headed to the barn where each child would get a chance at milking. Here is a picture of Kelsey having her turn. It's hard to learn but she got a few squirts out. She'll have plenty of practice once Firefly comes home with us.

Right as Kelsey was getting up from the stand and Charissa was about to get her turn Miss Sherie ran to the stall where a pregnant goat was in labor and said, "She's getting ready to push."
The milking lesson was interrupted but by something far more exciting...the birth of twin does! It was quite the experience as Miss Sherie at a couple times was frantically on the phone with friends to figure out why this first time mama was taking so long. Turns out that both does were trying to exit at the same time. Once she made Ladybug stand and pushed babies back in they repositioned and came out easily. It was most exciting!!! Both my girls were fascinated. Here is mama and babies just minutes after birth while Charissa looks on!

St. Brigid Farm

Over the weekend we came to settle on the name of our little farm.
After receiving the suggestion of naming the farm after the saint commemorated on the day we moved in or signed papers or something like that, I began to do some research. I knew there were saints one could call upon for certain situations and patron saints of certain jobs, etc. So I searched for farmers, and chicken and dairy. What I found was most pleasing!
St. Brigid, commemorated on February 1 (new calendar) is known to be the patron of chicken farmers, milk maids, dairy workers, etc. The story goes that St. Brigid's mother was a slave and her master had a dairy. Once Brigid was older and her mother became ill but still had to work, Brigid took over the dairy. Under her care the dairy prospered greatly. She would make butter and give a large portion away to the poor but still would sell much to make a great profit for the master of the dairy.
I loved the story of St. Brigid so much and that she was the patroness of so many in farming. To top it off, we have a dear dear friend who's patron Saint is St. Brigid. She is now a novice at St. Paisius Monastery in AZ. We miss her so much but are so happy and excited for her in the choice she has made. This will be a loving reminder of her, although not the direct reason for the name.

Oh most Holy St. Brigid, please pray unto God for us!

Here are the labels we created over the weekend. They are dual purpose and will later be used on milk product (cheese, yougurt, soap) once we start producing that (only a month away). The house on the label actually looks a lot like our house!

We are into goats!

Firefly is a five-year-old doe who just gave birth to Butter on Saturday, April 14. Butter is a doe, both will be coming home with us sometime within 4-8 weeks. Just as soon as I finish the barn that will be theirs. Here is a picture of Butter with Kelsey.
Yesterday we started a goat class at Maplebrook Farm.
For 3 classes we will drive down to Ollala to learn all we can about goats. This past Tuesday we learned about the uses of goats, what they eat and we got to introduce all 4 babies to bottles for the first time and to romping in the field for the first time. It was so fun to watch these tiny little goats jump and run. Next week we'll learn to make goat cheese and do some more feeding, and also about fencing. The last week we'll get to milk the goats and have cookies with goats milk.

Here is Firefly with Butter (middle) and her adopted brother. Pretzel the other mama doe gave birth to triplets and Firefly only had one so they took one from Pretzel and have worked on her adopting him to even the mama's out.

Butter nursing.

Charissa took a liking to one of Pretzels does. This is dangerous. They are so cute we are tempted to take her home as well. But we'll hold off and Charissa will get the first one born to us next year.

Joseph with one of Pretzel's kids.


On A Few Other Notes:

We lost a chicken. Can't find any trace of anything around the fenced yard or coop. It's a mystery. I just really hope that one of my neighbors didn't walk off with it while we were away yesterday. No sign of forced entry. No pile of feathers anywhere. No half eaten carcass. It's sad.
Our guest house piers go in this Saturday and the week after the whole thing goes up in what we are calling an Old Fashioned Amish Barn Raising. We have 4 families joining us thus far. All will be taking Amish names for the day and Valerie and I will be making a t-shirt with their name on it with an Amish pic of some sort on the back. We hope to have the guest house (as rustic as it will be with no plumbing but having electricity) weather tight by the end of the day on the 28th.
Can't wait to break it in. Maybe someday I'll be able to advertise..."come work on a real working ranch for the weekend" and people will actually pay me to pretend they live on a farm for a weekend. LOL What a novelty these days!!! If it had a toilet I'd bet anything I could really make some money renting it out. But....oh...in the olden days people used outhouses. Hey...that could be part of the novelty couldn't it? ;)

Christ is Risen!

I dyed the red eggs for Church this year. It was fun!
I used mostly our eggs from our chickens, but had to buy 2 dozen store bought eggs.
Below you see the comparison between the sizes. The store bought ones are huge compared to my little chicken eggs.
Also, I attempted the traditional method of dying with onion skins and it was very successful! I doubted that it would work but I was proven wrong. They are so beautiful. And my farm fresh eggs soaked up the dye so much better than the store bought. My theory is the washing process that store bought eggs go through.

My babes on the Eve of Pascha.

He said I've been watching you dad, ain't that cool

I'm your buckaroo, I wanna be like you
And eat all my food and grow as tall as you are
We like fixing things and holding mama's hand
Yeah we're just alike, hey ain't we dad
I wanna do everything you do
So I've been watching you
Chorus to "Watching You" by Rodney Atkins

A Little Bit of Heaven

The other day, well, the other day in mother-speak which means it could have been up to 2 weeks ago, I had read that the hummingbirds were back from the migration away. I have always thought hummingbirds were the rare breed you never did get to see to much of because they move too quickly and well, I just never saw them no matter how much I tried to attract them with sweet nectar filled feeders on the front porch.
Here in our new home I have a big beautiful picture window at the kitchen sink...big. It's one of my favorite things about washing dishes is I get to look out over our beautiful front yard with not a street in sight. Our little deck runs along the whole front of the house and in front of that there is a hedge of flowering currant. Currently it is covered in beautiful bright pink blooms (you'll see below). In the last couple of days I've seen fleeting glimpses of a hummingbird, but.....last night!!!! I got a little bit of heaven in my own front yard!!! I stood and washed dinner dishes and after I awhile I noticed not one hummingbird coming to drink at the currant flowers but up at one point there were up to FIVE!! They danced around and drank and darted and fleeted and then they'd rest!! on the tree directly in front of the hedge. Yes, rested on the branch! Most of the time there were 2 or 3 and this went on for 30 + minutes. As soon as I was done with the dishes I braved the possibility of scaring them and grabbed my camera and headed to the porch. It was dusk and they move VERY quickly so I didn't know if I'd be able to get any shots but I tried. At first no flash so I wouldn't scare them but I didn't get much but blur. So I used the flash. The first picture below is without flash, hence the blur but I LOVE it because if you look closely you'll see the blur of the hummingbird moving up the picture. The other two are with flash, one the hummingbird is resting and the other it is drinking. I couldn't believe it. I was in awe standing out there on the porch. Charissa joined me and we felt so blessed as these little creatures darted about, sometimes just inches from us and they'd stop and hover just in front of us looking and then dart away. They make an incredible humming noise akin to a large bumblebee but louder.
I truly felt like I was in heaven.

Just some updates and a request.

We continue to get eggs everyday, averaging 3 a day so far. One day we had 5! I'm told we'll soon have more than we know what to do with. I'm not worried as we already have 3 families lined up to buy!!! I think we'll need more layers! This little prairie girl is the one who loves going and collecting eggs the most and working with them. Charissa loves the bonnet I made.


Below is a look at our fresh eggs frying. LOOK HOW BEAUTIFULLY DARK ORANGE THEY ARE!!!!! MMMMMM If you don't buy fresh farm eggs or "free-range organic" from the store you are not familiar with how an egg is suppose to look. Crack open an egg and compare it to this! You'll be amazed! I couldn't help myself...I just had to try one and it was delicious. I can't wait until after lent!! I'll be eating them everyday!

Here are our hens loving the outdoors now! They devoured the grass within the fencing very quickly and so as I've been digging up the sod for my garden (which will be to the right of this chicken run) I've been putting the sod chunks in the run. They love it! They follow me around now all over as they want more and more "pasture". It has convinced me of the necessity to provide as much natural as possible. They much prefer it. Their feed troughs of commercial food go untouched for the most part! yeah...money saving!!!


Last Friday, March 16th we had sun and 72 or so degrees! This is what the kids insisted on. Today? It was 30 degrees and frost on the ground!

And for my REQUEST!!!
I'm decidedly a very bad planner and therefore struggle nearly daily with the idea of cooking for my family. I would love some ideas of menu planning and some of your favorite FAMILY-FRIENDLY, TIME- FRIENDLY AND HEALTHY-FRIENDLY recipes! I know I have access to great cookbooks but I want to know what works for real people all the time. I can read through cookbooks and planning organization cookbooks...but what's life? Please share some recipes your family loves (especially if you have little ones). I emailed my aunts and uncles who all raised families and even some cousins who have little ones...but no one has written back. :(
I know my biggest problem isn't knowing what to cook it's more along the lines of self-discipline to actually follow through with the plan. Please pray for me.
You can email me recipes and ideas if you want or post them here for all to see.
susansophia (dot) f (at) gmail (dot) com

"You Can Farm"

I was introduced to Joel Salatin author of above book and owner of Polyface Farms.
Boy do I wish I had 2 days to just sit down and read the entire book!!! I am truly inspired!!
Watch out James!

I read something last night from the chapter regarding philosophies of farming. He lists different reasons to farm for the right reason basically. As I've read this book I often think of our friend, Rade. Rade you NEED to read this book!

Clean, nutritious, personally-inspected food. (title of section within chapter)
People's personal involvement with their food needs to be encouraged. I can't imagine why folks who see how many things get botched up by the government would entrust the safety of their food to that same institution.
Honestly, the government can louse up just about anything it sets out to do, in such creative ways you or I can scarcely imagine it. They set out to care for widows and orphans with something called Social Security, and end up with a boondoggle that will well-nigh bankrupt the country and that has grown into a retirement entitlement for all. They set out to reduce manure going into waterways and build manure lagoons that cause more contamination than if they had never been built. They set out to protect the American eagle and end up absconding a farmer's tractor and his livelihood because the fireline he ripped in as a last-ditch effort to save his home upset a nest of endangered mice. They set out to reduce filth in huge slaughterhouses and put all the neighborhood mom-and-pop shops out of business. The list is endless, and it doesn't matter whether you're liberal or conservative, you know about bureaucratic corruption and stupidity.
Why would any of us entrust the government with protecting our food? Do you think all the huge outfits that receive government oversight are dedicated to turning out the cleanest, most nutritious food? Of course not.
The sooner we involve people with their food and show them there is something better than Twinkies and PopTarts, cardboard tomatoes and cellulose apples, greasy spareribs and pale eggs (btw...I have NEVER seen such brilliant dark yellow yolks like I've seen in my newly laid eggs!!!), they will realize the "system" is totally rotten. We cannot get an educated, proactive populace as long as we have an agriculture so far removed from end users that they think milk comes from jugs and fish sticks swim around in the ocean.
Nothing is as clean and nutritious as a customer-inspected facility and business. When the relationship marketer must pass the scrutiny of the discriminating patron, who personally looks over the entire operation, you'd better believe not one in a thoughsan would risk doing something unscrupulous. But a huge entity with a lot of "No Admittance" doors, with a bank of Philadelphia lawyers and millions in product liability insurance to protect it can hoodwink, smooth talk, and weasel out of anything.
Let's restore integrity in the food system by getting involved with it, personally.

She's growing up!

Kelsey Anna is just over 10 years old and she is definitely in her preteen time. Hormones are starting to rage and she is developing an attitude I hope won’t last long. I decided it was time to have “the” talk with her. Mostly to talk about the change that was taking place in her body. I wanted to make this a special time so we had a date. I bought her a lockable case and put toiletries in it and then I bought her a journal. But this was going to be a special journal for US. I thought of this while at the store and really love this idea so thought I would share it with you in case someone else might like to use it. This journal would be a place for us to write back and forth with each other. Sometimes it’s hard to face your mom/dad with tough questions or just words of sharing. Sometimes it’s hard to face your kids to tell them something important or even to apologize about something. This journal will give us an opportunity to be open with each other without feeling proud or nervous. What better time to start something than while she is young and VERY receptive. She loved it! That very first night she wrote to me and even with questions from that days talk. She also wrote some quotes from a book she liked. She kept it 2 nights and the 2^nd entry had another question and something that SHE wrote (created).

Someday she may not want to write to me, as she gets older and more into her teens. But she’ll be able to look back at this and hopefully be reminded of our friendship and the love I have for her.

“The window of heaven is love and the door to salvation is pureness.” By Kelsey Anna

Wow!

What a weekend!

We had a wonderful and busy weekend! As James mentioned in this post we had a rare opportunity to travel down to LA without children for a 3 day date! The purpose of the trip was to go to The Getty Museum to see the exhibit of the St. Katherine Monastery Icons. I felt so blessed to be able to do this. It is still vivid in my mind. The beauty and the holiness! I do have to say it was astonishing how crowded it was. And knowing that the vast majority of those looking at the Holy Icons really had no idea of the awesomeness and holiness of the "art" they were viewing really did interfere with my ability to experience it fully. It was so crowded and so distracting. I even overheard someone joking, yes joking, by saying...."Hey, (someones name) you're suppose to touch them for luck." They both laughed! It was sad and offensive as many of us orthodox lovingly venerated these holy icons. But overall I am really glad that we took this opportunity and I know we were blessed being in their presence as God was there!
While down in LA were were truly blessed to be able to visit some wonderful friends. Friends we do not get to see nearly enough! Chance and Cybil were wonderful hosts. They opened their home to us and then promptly left for their own weekend trip to a wedding. So that visit was way too short (just a few hours) but it was so nice to see them and we are very grateful they offered their home to us the entire time. Thank you! Their little girl Salome is growing up so fast.


We visited often with the Aaron and Sara and their two little ones were very entertaining.

This is Basil, Juliana and me!

On Sunday we visited St. Barnabas Orthodox Church and then had lunch with the Plews and the Ma'ae family. Thank you all for such a wonderful time.

Above from left to right starting in back...Aaron, Sara, Juliana, Toy, John, Cassian and below Bella, Basil and Nava. We had such a great time!

And now the news that James speaks of...
Later that day I was in the house and all of a sudden I hear Charissa outside screaming as if for life. I think the worst and go running. She's standing in the chicken run screaming, as I get closer I hear that she is screaming "EGG, EGG, EGG" (You would have thought the child was being carried off by a hungry bear.) I ran back in to yell into the house, "She found an egg!". I run to the chicken yard and meet her as she is CRYING and holding this tiny egg, saying "I found an egg, I found and egg! Isn't it beautiful?" She is crying!!!! I said, "Why are you crying?" "I'm so excited!!" was her reply! Wow. After that we put it in the fridge and got to work getting the nests in. For an hour Charissa whistled and sang as she did farm chores for the chickens. She spread straw over mud and helped me with the nest. It was such a fun afternoon! (Despite my 3 hours of sleep the night before.)

spring one day....winter the next

Two days ago the weather was just amazingly beautiful. We had sunshine and mild temps. I took a walk to take in all the signs of spring. Above you'll the hedge of black currant in my front yard is budding and even has some flowers starting to open. It's gorgeous!


Then today as we sat inside reading and playing we hear very loud patters on the roof. What do we see? Snow pellets, large bouncing snow pellets about pea size dumping! They continued until everything was nearly covered. Then they slowly turned into a gently falling snow. The kids had a blast! They even built a snowman out of it.

Something I read...

I'm reading "First Fruits of Prayer: A Forty-Day Journey Through the Canon of St. Andrew" by Frederica Matthewes-Green, during Lent this year. I'm just in the introduction which is quite long and read something I just loved! I must share...
She's talking about sin being sickness. The goal of life in Christ is to be healed...
This is really a long process. It takes a lifetime. But it is God's plan for reclaiming and transforming His world....
Though we may do many things to increase our self-control (like fast, keep a schedule of daily prayer, tithe, and sacrifice time and money), one of the main things God uses for our spiritual growth is other people. As they interact with us, frustrate and annoy us, we are over and over given opportunities to act in love. The main evidence that we are growing in Christ is not exhilirating prayer experiences, but steadily increasing humble love for other people. (something she touched on at the retreat which I might have mentioned in my post regarding the retreat---is God speaking to me?)
The cardinal rule is humility. We don't understand humility very well in our culture; we're more attracted to a model of heroism, which deals out punishment to wrongdoers and wins admiration as a champion of the right. But this was not a usual feature of early Christian spirituality. Instead, even wrongdoers were to be treated with love, in the awareness that we are equally sinners....
So the goal is to avoid judging anyone, and steadfastly to resist getting angry. (My favorite sentence is next hence the emphasis.) Other people rub off our rough edges, and so we grow into the likeness of Christ, who forgave His enemies from the cross.

Oh Lord and Master of my life! Take from me the spirit of sloth, despair, lust of power and idle talk. But give rather the spirit of chastity, humility, patience, and love to they servant. Yea, O Lord and King! Grant me to see my own transgressions and not to judge my brother, for blessed art Thou, unto ages of ages. Amen (Prayer of St. Ephraim)

Forgiveness and Butchering day!

First and foremost....

As we begin this Lenten Season I bow before you and ask forgiveness if I have offended any or all of you, (my 11 person audience). May you have a fruitful Lent.


Secondly....the pictures below are not for the faint-hearted. Do not scroll further if you are a vegetarian (during lent only doesn't count-if you are curious about what's below). It isn't gross..I don't think.


Ironically, I chose to spend my Clean Monday cleaning (butchering) my very first chicken! I was very nervous and was not at all ready for this job. But a co-worker of James' was desperate to rid her coop of a mean, nasty rooster who attacked everyone and I was not about to let the meat go to waste. So after reading 2 different books on the subject all morning, James headed to Sharon's with pellet gun in hand. (He was warned that it was NOT a good idea to even get close to this thing.) An hour later he pulled into the driveway with bird in bucket. I immediately strung him up and went to work. Surprisingly, the roles my daughters took in this adventure were completely the opposite of what I would have ever expected!! Kelsey hid from it all saying who mean I was and Charissa was right there pulling feathers like a champ!
Below are a sequence of pictures. First of us plucking feathers. Second of the bird cooling in a bowl of water waiting for the "drawing"(a much nicer word for "pulling the innards out") and the last is of me and my prize. It went surprisingly well. Next time I'll remember to cut out the vent (which is where the contents of the intestines leaves the body) BEFORE drawing out.
I think I could get used this!

I interupt the post below for this public announcement.....
I just wanted the world to know that I love this man!!!!
He is my friend, my companion, my partner and the most incredible father in the world!!!

Thank you, James, for all you do for us. For always being there, for providing and for loving. for making my dreams come true!

Women's Retreat thoughts

I just got back from a wonderful weekend in Vancouver, B.C where I attended a women’s retreat hosted by St. Herman of Alaska in BC. The guest speaker was Kh. Frederica Matthewes-Green! It was really a wonderful, relaxing and growing time for me. She is a very sweet, soft-spoken humble woman who had a lot to share and it was very practical and needed for me. I will share one thing she said from each topic. There is so much I wrote down I want to share it all but it may not make sense and the post would become too long. If you ever get a chance to hear her speak, do.

She spoke on the 3 Basic Spiritual Disciplines:

1. Prayer (relates to relationship to God)

Specifically she talked about the Jesus Prayer. She gave us several scripture where Paul tells us to pray constantly. Romans 12:12, 1 Thessalonians 5:17, Ephesians 6:18

Here are just a few snippets from her:

• Prayer is a spiritual exercise! Everybody wants to be transformed (poof) but nobody wants to change (work). Theosis is a process of change (work).

2. Fasting (helps us gain control of ourselves)

This one is hard to pick just one thing. She talked a lot about our passions and bringing them under control and doing that by fasting. But why do our passions torture us so? Because the evil one. He drags us down, he entices us, he wants us to doubt God, he nudges us, tempts us, violates us, lies to us. He tempts us with pleasures and then plummets us into despair by his whispers of doubt and lies. He works very hard at this. Western Christianity does not take this seriously. The evil one is a joke. Fasting strengthens us against temptations. Strengthens us against our passions.

3. Almsgiving (relationship with others)

If we want to test how we are doing inwardly (prayer and fasting) look at how we are doing outwardly (how we relate to others). If we are doing well inwardly it will reflect outwardly. We can’t always tell that our prayers are “doing” something to us or that our fasting is strengthening us. Sometimes we feel our prayers are dry but we force ourselves and we don’t always like to fast it gets old after awhile, but to test is to look at how we relate to others, we will be loving and giving more and more.

On another note…several people I spoke to had gone to the Getty Museum Icon exhibit. I WANT TO GO!!! I’m trying to figure out how I can get down there within the next 3 weeks (it ends March 4). I’m terrified of flying!!!!! I’d rather pack up my van and drive with four antsy children then get on a plane. Any suggestions! James said, “You are NOT going down there without me.”

Flying the coop!!!

Today was the day....

to fly the coop!!!!

We were all so excited!

The kids lined up!

The dog stood watch!

I got the camera out!

And....


an hour later...

they are still inside!

LOL But at least it's done!!!!