Archive for August, 2009

New – “Old Style” farm kitchen

Friday, August 21st, 2009
First: please pray with us for little Ben – my great-nephew, just diagnosed with ALL B Leukemia. 80-85% survival rate. He starts his chemo soon. Mom and Dad, and I’m sure my sister and her husband, Ben’s grandparents will need us swamping them with prayer during this time of trial! Thanks!!!

Farm stuff: The thorny pig weed has taken over.
We have people even right on our street that have never seen it. One thing, it’s not in with the goats . . . it is everywhere where a chicken has roamed around here.

Thorny pig weed is a terrible plant that has HUGE thorns and it is very invasive. It is the worst kind of Amaranth – and while you could eat the leaves – who would want to go thru the pain??? When you get stuck, it is painful for days on end – YUCK!!!

On a good note: the office/sales room is getting painted yellow and black and is actually turning out somewhat cute – Pat has to finish the lighting tracks – the builder or someone made two rooms in the house with lights on the side of the wall instead of in the ceiling and both of them are AWFUL!

Pat is finishing the kitchen tonight – yahoo! We started months ago with a dear woman that came and helped tear it all out, sand it down and get it ready for re-do – - – well, until Pat decided that to teach cheese classes I actually had to have a working kitchen. It was near impossible to tear out the kitchen without complications that might make me cancel a cheese class. So, it wasn’t done until now – we took a month off of cheese classes and started in on figuring out how the builder actually put these counters in – strange is a very mild term. No normal way to put in counters for sure.

So, tonight we will celebrate having a kitchen retro fitted to look like a 1950′s farm kitchen – minus the chrome edges on the formica countertop. (Now, when can I get the matching fridge???). LOL

OK, so it wasn’t short like I wanted – school starts soon, maybe my notes will be short then – it could happen!

Marilyn, AKA The Goat Woman

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Summer Updates

Thursday, August 13th, 2009
We’re cleaning, weeding and getting ready for breeding season with the goats. We hope to have 7 milkers in about 6-8 months.  A few of our chickens have had babies -  and one turkey hen is suspiciously missing . . . after 1 month I’m sure we’ll have lots of new additions to tell you about!

We’ve made lots of soaps this week in anticipation of the craft season starting – I think everyone has finally figured out what my sister Claudia knew all the time: the Shea butter soap is Sensational!! The new Sandalwood shaving soap is curing! I have mint and rosemary soaking in Olive Oil right now to make Rosemary/Mint soap later today. What a pleasant mixture!

As we get ready to start our CSA – we have ideas pouring in from those of you who are desperate for good, clean, truly local food. Keep it up – we need to know what you’d like to see in produce from here and how involved you want to be in the farm. We’re collecting recipes to include with every share day – we’ve gotten some fabulous ones!

Did you see the ABC news report about the 12 most pesticide-ridden fruits/veggies? Peaches tops the list – we hope to offer you pesticide-free peaches next year. All it takes is the weather cooperating as we will not contaminate our fruit or veggies. Makes me a little crazy to see all the news about what’s supposed to be “food”.

Have you seen the Food Inc. movie??? Joel Salatin, my hero! What a role model! From homeschooling to raising chickens – we’ve learned so much from this man.  The movie is coming out to purchase soon and we will have a few copies to share around. This is not a scare tactic movie but reveals a lot about what kinds of food are subsidized and why it’s so much more expensive to buy REAL food. This is just an eye-opener that I think every American needs to see.

We are getting ready to build raised beds. We hope to use the almost the entire front yard, a new bed in between the greenhouse and the goats and along the back of the greenhouse behind the goat yards . . . should triple our garden space. With well over 20 families signing up for the CSA and some working here -  it should be a growing season to remember.  We are scheduling work parties and cherish your help – all of the beds must be done or mostly done by the end of September. This way they can “cook” over winter and be ready to be planted as soon as the ground is ready in Spring.

There are a few things that will be planted right away before winter: spinach, more strawberries, the garlics, etc. Most of the rest of the herbs, rhubarb and such will just need to be covered and protected.

Oh, and the porch needs to be transformed to windows/sliders to make a wonderful meeting place for those coming to visit the farm. Lots to do – but what an awesome time of growing and learning and doing!

Keep the ideas pouring in -  now to go find out if my lost boy is out in the pasture asleep on his goat Whisper . . .

Marilyn, aka the Goatwoman

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