Summer is here!

Well, summer is finally here.  We've been having hot weather this past week.  The high's have been in the mid to upper 90's.  It was 98 at one point in the day yesterday.  That makes for a lot of sweating!

John, Joshua and I spent some time talking with Ariel yesterday.  We all went out in the driveway and demonstrated many ways to actually start a fire.  She's 10 years old now, old enough to learn how to handle a lighter or matches safely.  She learned how to stack her tinder.  How to feed a fire.  How to restart a fire.  Build a fire bundle to take somewhere with her.  And most importantly, how to put a fire out.  We also made sure she understood that she should NEVER leave a fire unattended in the dry woods at this time of year.  Running for your life from a forest fire is horrifying!

I recently finished a crocheted baby blanket for my youngest niece, Felicia.  Her baby's due in September.  I made it from 100% pima cotton.  It washed up nicely, and should last the baby many years.

Crocheted baby blanket

I used Knit Pick's Crayon yarn.  It's a great yarn!  Too bad it's discontinued.  Oh well.  I have a pretty good stash of it, so I can use it for some time to come.

I've been teaching Ariel some baking skills.  We've made soft pretzels, strawberry shortcake, made some ricotta cheese and then baked whey bread and cinnamon rolls with the whey.  She's really liked them all so far.

We bought some fresh, dressed rabbit from a local lady on Tuesday and I made some fried rabbit.  Leftovers went into rabbit stew the following day.  Both were very yummy.  We still have another rabbit to cook and I think I'll try some hasenpfeffer.  Hasenpfeffer.

All the chicks that hatched 2 months ago have gone to their new homes.  We still have 2 bantam chicks and 3 week old RIR chicks.  Very cute, all of them.

Rhode Island Red chicks

Bantam chicks

Poultry updates

The chicks that hatched out 2 months ago have all found new homes.  Our friend Jennifer took the Brahma Cochin chicks and the RIR/Copper Moran cross chicks.  She posted a picture of them on Facebook.  Very cute!

Jennifer's chicks

Friends Mark and Lisa came on Tuesday and picked up the RIR chicks.  Here's a picture I took of them on Monday.

2 month old RIR chicks

We had the incubator set up and had 18 guinea eggs and 18 chicken eggs set.  And we got 3 chicks.  Not sure if the hatch rate was so low because of storms... muddy conditions on the eggs - killing the embryo?  Temperature wasn't right???  It's frustrating.  But, it seems I have the best hatch rates first thing in the spring.  The later I try, the lower the hatch rate.  Anyway...  We got 2 RIR chicks and one Brahma Cochin chick.  The Cochin chick had a "birth injury", it's one leg was twisted.  And the poor little thing expired yesterday.  These 2 chicks are promised to our friend Beth.  She got 8 RIR chicks from us last year.  Six were hens and 2 roosters.  One rooster has since become Sunday dinner.

Anyway... here's a picture of the 2 newest chicks.

Rhode Island Red chicks hatched 6 days ago

The chicks that our Bantam hen Pebbles hatched 6 weeks ago are doing well.  Pebbles is done raising them, and has started laying again.  So, she's back in with the rooster Fred and the chicks are in a cage by themselves.

Bantam duck wing chicks 6 weeks old

Fred and Pebbles

It's been a week since my husband had surgery on his neck, having a plate inserted to help stabilize his vertebra.  The surgery went well, and he's recuperating nicely.  His horrible migraine headaches seem to have been cured.  That is a great relief for him.  He's suffered with daily headaches for the past year.  Any relief he can get will really add to his quality of life.  His Parkinson's seems to be a bit worse though.  His shaking doesn't stop...  Maybe another week or two of recovery will  help.

Grand-daughter Ariel seems to be enjoying the summer so far.  We took another trip down to the creek and caught crawfish on Tuesday afternoon.  Josh tried to do a little fishing.  But it seems all the larger fish went downstream after the last big rainfall we had last week.  Oh well.  There's always the Spring River.

I hope everyone else is enjoying their late Spring/early Summer.  It's not really Summer until next week after the solstice.  But it's been 95 plus the past few days.  Thankfully, we have air conditioning!

Getting on with the summer

We're back from Georgia, Ariel's come to visit for the summer.  She's having fun so far, I think.  We went down to the creek and played in the water the other day.  That was fun.  She really can laugh.

Our garden is growing well.  My lettuce experiment hasn't gone so well though.  First it got too cold.  Then too dry.  Now... it's just died.  Oh well.

I'll go take some pictures of the garden later today and get them posted.

Ok, so I'm a day late... and kinda behind.  But, I did take the garden pictures.  Here they are!

Squash, cucumbers, Jerusalem artichokes and potatoes

Tomatoes and nasturtiums

Squash, melons and tomatoes