Thursday, October 21, 2010

Busy fall

We have been absent from the blogging a lot this fall. This is supposed to be our winding down time where we plan our garden for next spring. Not so. I started nursing school this past August and it has taken up most of my time, what time I have left is spent working and getting the farm ready for winter. Kelsi has also been very busy too, she took at full time position at her job a few months back which keeps her very busy. 

So I have a bunch of photos to show all that we have been up to
 We recently harvested 18 of our meat birds. We did 8 one day and 10 on another day. We have decided that we aren't going to raise meat to sell to other's. The line between profit and loss is very thin in the meat business. Plus I really don't like having to harvest the chickens. Taking another creatures life is not a very rewarding experience. In these pictures you can see the difference between a standard commercial variety(Cornish Cross, left side of photo), and the kind we raised(Right side of photo). Very different
 Redstar Rooster
 Cornish cross rooster
  Pierre has become very friendly these past few months, he follows me everywhere and lets me pick him up. 
 He's pretty silly

 He gives hugs

 We also recently adopted a cat that we named Henry. The mice have been terrible this summer. They ate all of our potatoes, some melons, and a few squash. We are hoping to fix this problem with Henry's help. He is pretty helpful around the house already.
 He keeps my seat warm when I get up
 He checks for leaks in the dishwasher
 He gives a thorough inspection
 He asks us for our opinion
 He checks the laundry to ensure they are dry throughout
 We have also been doing quite a bit of preserving. These are our tomatoes. 
 We had a lot of extras, so we decided to can them.
 Kelsi dellegently stirs the pot




 We gathered nearly 5 gallons of green and purple peppers from the garden
 They look so small here, but there is a lot there


 We also went to the farms market and bought more fruits and veggies. This 37 pound box of tomatoes only cost us 20 bucks! Sweet deal
 This is the extent of our canning so far. The table was nearly covered.
 Looks pretty good!
 Hot cinnamon apples: 6quarts
 Applesauce: 7quarts
 Peaches: 12quarts
 Pickles: 18quarts

Crushed tomatoes: 20quarts
Pickled green tomatoes: 7 quarts


That's it for now, thanks for reading!

5 comments:

flowerpower said...

looks like you are wel on your way to getting your farm going love your caning ,will you be selling all that ?

Mike said...

No, this is just for our use. We are hoping to reduce the amount of reliance we have on the grocery store. It would be nice though to produce extra for our friends and family

Danni said...

Ohmygosh - I *love* Pierre! I had always heard that geese were grouchy and mean but that guy looks like a hunk o'love!
Henry is absolutely adorable, too, but I'm terribly (sadly) allergic to cats so I'll just have to admire your little guy from afar...
Everybody needs a job - glad he's keeping your dishwasher inspected! lol

taylorgirl6 said...

Wow! That's a lot of work you two have been up to. Glad things are going well on the farm, and I hope things slow down as the weather gets a little colder.

Pierre is quite the love muffin. I wish he could teach our chickens a thing or two. And Henry is gorgeous. Is he going to be the new "program manager" around your property?

Keep up all that hard work and don't forget to update all of us!

Mr. H. said...

Wow, that is a whole lot of peppers. I like the purple varieties as they always seem to turn color for us...even in a bad pepper year. It looks like you two have been very busy with the canning as well...again, wow, I'm so impressed.

I love the cat pictures.:)

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