Just not getting along

Well I knew that all our farm animals don’t always all get along – but today I found out just how much our peahens don’t like the Roosters.

I looked out the window today and saw thisfullsizeoutput_a7a

It’s our peahen being such a bully to Rocky the Rooster and Rocky is just trying to get away from her. Now even though Rocky isn’t my favorite chicken, it was the prime example of being a bully. I don’t know what, or if Rocky was doing anything, but when I was watching this whole thing play out I saw the peahen coming after Rocky and trying to fight him.

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Finally Rocky went inside the brooder house and then guess what? In went the peahen. Then another peahen showed up and stopped for a second, looked around, and then slipped inside the chicken coop. Now what happened next is something that I don’t know. But I do know that all the chickens came running out and the peahens stayed inside.

I guess that’s why they call them chicken.

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Making soap

So what have I been doing lately? As you know it’s not keeping up with my Blog so the question is ‘Have I been taking naps all day or what?’

Well the answer to that question is that I’ve been working on my soap inventory. I’ve got a show coming up in June – which means I have until May 6th to get my soap done to cure.

OK, so that sounds like a long time and it even sounds like a long time for me when I just hear it. But I usually make around 22 bars at a time (which is a double batch) and I try to make soap every night. So when I want to have at least 45 batches done or 23 days of making soap every night when we’re not working on other life things like a wedding in May or your real job… well you guessed it, things have been busy. 

And to be honest it’s been a lot of fun. I’m not sure how many batches that I’ll have done by next weekend but I’m hopeful that it should be enough. I’ve got someone looking at the molds that that William designed for me and what I’d like to see if I can get 2 to 4 more of them. Then I’ll really be cooking 🙂 I won’t have the molds ready for the soaps for this upcoming show – but I’ll have them for the summer. 

Below are some pictures of the soap that I’ve been making lately. I know that I’ll be able to catch up with the bath bombs and the orders for the stores that I am selling at too in the next couple of weeks. Yup, who would have thought that this soap making business would keep me so busy and how much I love it! 

Herb Garden and Rosy Cheeks are the ones that are waiting to come out of the mold today and set out to cure. I'm anxious to see how they turn out. It's always a surprise!

Herb Garden and Rosy Cheeks are the ones that are waiting to come out of the mold today and set out to cure. I’m anxious to see how they turn out. It’s always a surprise!

Another new one this Spring and I'm not sure what I'm calling it. It's a Black Raspberry Vanilla fragrance with small exfoliating beads in it. Smells wonderful.

Another new one this Spring and I’m not sure what I’m calling it. It’s a Black Raspberry Vanilla fragrance with small exfoliating beads in it. Smells wonderful.

Morning Sunrise - this one is a bright citrus scent that is very hard to keep in stock!

Morning Sunrise – this one is a bright citrus scent that is very hard to keep in stock!

Sassy Come Home - a popular soap that's made with milk, honey, and oatmeal

Sassy Come Home – a popular soap that’s made with milk, honey, and oatmeal

It's Fair Time! This one is a new one for me - Cotton Candy fragrance

It’s Fair Time! This one is a new one for me – Cotton Candy fragrance

Lazy Lavender with lavender petals on top

Lazy Lavender with lavender petals on top. It’s one that I will make probably 50+ bars of and hope to have enough for the sale 

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Waiting for Spring

It’s hard to be patient sometimes isn’t it? I mean once you have some good weather and the sun shines you really get spoiled. And now it’s been raining and then after it quits raining it rains some more. 

Now I know that when it comes to July and we’re all looking for rain for our crops we’ll wish we had some of the wet weather that we’ve been getting lately… but honestly it could stop for just a little bit couldn’t it? At least for a week or two! 

So the farmers are all patiently waiting for good weather and one of those farmers is Daryl. He’s been working on getting all the equipment in shape and ready for when the weather does turn and he can get in the field. Let’s all hope soon. 

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Happy Anniversary to us!

Happy Anniversary to us!  Wow doesn’t that almost seem impossible that we’re married 34 years? To me it does. I mean wasn’t it just yesterday when we were kids and we had our whole lives in front of us just waiting to be started? 

But I guess there has been a lot of things that have happened in both of our families and our lives these last years and I think that’s what I like the most about having an anniversary. It makes you literally stop and think about what has all happened in the past, both the good and the bad, and you actually take the time to remember them. Some make you sad because of the family that isn’t here anymore, but there is also a lot of good and fun things too. 

So with the weekend being super busy, we still wanted to do something fun so we headed up to Rochester Minnesota to spend the night. We knew that we couldn’t spend the whole weekend with other things going on, but it sounded like a fun time and I was pretty excited to have the chance to just hang out with Daryl for awhile. When we got there we got all dressed up and headed out for supper and then checked in on some local establishments for an anniversary toast. And the best part of the trip was that the hotel that we stayed at 34 years ago is still in business.  Yup, it was the same hotel – pretty romantic huh? I’m just glad that the hotel is still there. Seriously. I mean it was an established hotel 34 years ago 🙂  

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We couldn’t stay long the next morning and after a quick trip home I gave Daryl his Anniversary gift. And guess what? You know that your’e married for a long time when you’re just as excited to give an electric grease gun for an Anniversary gift as your husband is to receive it. 

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So here’s to us and now on to the next 34 years! 

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Posted in Family, Places to visit | 2 Comments

Earth Day 2017

I was invited to a baby shower that just happened to be at a Winery in Guttenberg Iowa. Now if you haven’t ever had a chance to go to this town I would highly recommend it because it’s a pretty cool town by the Mississippi river. There always seems to be things to do and see. 

So like I said my mission was to get to the winery (after making a quick batch of soap of course this morning) and try not to be too late. 

And guess what? BAM! I was absolutely on time! Yup, perfect timing. 

The baby shower was tons of fun and with the weather absolutely perfect for a drive I decided to stop off on one of the look out points to see what was going on with the river today. I mean it was Earth Day and everything. 20170422_142225

There wasn’t too much happening and with the weather just starting to get nice I’m sure hoping that the weatherman is wrong with next weeks forecast. They are saying the 4 letter word again – snow possibly for Wednesday. 

YUCK! So I guess we better really enjoy this perfect weather while we can. 

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Looking for boys

You know when the baby peacocks were young I really thought that they were going to be Peacocks and not Peahens. Now I don’t know why I was so positive on thinking this way,  but the one little peacock that died so early was so little I just figured these last 2 would be boys because of their size. 

Well good thing I don’t identify the sex of peacocks for a living. Yup you guessed it, we’ve got all Peahens. Now this isn’t the worst thing other than I’m worried that they are out looking for boys and there isn’t anything on our farm. And I sure don’t want them to run away in the meantime to find them. 

So now I’m in the market for some boy peacocks. I know someone who had some peacocks so I just need to contact him to see if he’s got any extra boys hanging out. I can also go to some of the swap meets that will start soon in our area and I’m pretty sure will have some there that I can buy. The only problem with that is that I’m thinking that I’ll be bringing home more than just a couple of peacocks because they have the coolest stuff there!  I mean I can hardly go to our local farm store and not walk out with some new little chickens or ducks so a swamp meet just mean trouble for me!

Take a look at the picture below. This is how our Peahens spend their days – just hanging out in our farm yard looking for boys…fullsizeoutput_a77

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Happy Birthday Daryl!

With Daryl’s birthday on a Monday this year, it’s a little harder to celebrate. But he said he did have a great day and with a fresh pan of brownies that was his birthday cake, we were able to celebrate it with the kids even if it was with Skype.

And with his birthday card with a certificate for a weekend to go to a Colts game – I’m thinking that it turned out really well for him.DSCN9357

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Happy Easter!

Happy Easter! 

I ended up putting together some Easter boxes earlier this week and I am still smiling with the comment that the lady at the Post Office gave to me. 

To backup this story – see I got some Easter candy, some small gifts, a couple of gift cards,  and of course some beef jerky made. Then it all got packed up in two boxes and was taped shut and ready to go. One  box for each of the kids. So when I walked into the Post Office to mail them the lady behind the counter was very nice and had asked if I was sending them off to our kids or grandkids. When I said that I was going to send them to our kids she gave me a puzzled look and then I said that I like to send the kids gift boxes even though they are out of school and kind of grown up and everything. She just smiled and kind of nodded with what I took as an approval. It was kind of a mom look. You know the eye contact with the side of her mouth kind of brought up and a small nod all in the same split second. Yea,definately a mom look. 

And when I’m packing up a box to be sent out, I always remember what the boys told me one time – they said that getting a surprise box in the mail is almost better than Christmas. You really don’t have any idea what your’e going to get. 

Here’s a couple of Easter cards that went in the boxes. 

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Good Friday is here!

It’s that time of the year again when Easter is close by and you know what that means

It means that it’s also close to Good Friday! WhooooHoooo!!

Now even though we honor all Fridays as all good Catholics do with a fish fry – on Good Friday it means that we spend the night at the local Red Lobster 🙂

We started the tradition quite a few years ago with the kids and have been celebrating it every year since. See with my last job I would get gift certificates that I put towards Red Lobster and when it was time to order at the restaurant the sky was the limit.

I mean we order appetizers and any seafood dish that you want.fullsizeoutput_a74

It is an awesome tradition!

And this year was the same. We had mushroom appetizers and full plates of lobster, shrimp, and tons of good things.

See we make a promise in our family that this is the only time during the year that we can go to this restaurant so we always want to make it good!

With our bellies full it was time to head out for the night to see what else was going on and to celebrate Daryl’s birthday.

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When the sun shines on the farm

You know the old saying ‘When the sun shines you make hay’

Well have you ever wondered what you do on a farm if the sun is shining and the hay isn’t fit? 

Let me tell you that you can do a lot of things. And if it’s Saturday or Sunday, it really doesn’t matter. There are things that need to be done and you just have to do them.  

So as you can guess the sun was shining this weekend and it was FANTASTIC! It sure seems like a long time since we got some nice warm weather and even if it was really pretty windy, I’m not complaining. (I know crazy isn’t it?) 

I spent most of Saturday working in the house and starting to replenish my soap stash. I’ve got a few shows coming up and one of them is pretty big and takes a lot of inventory. Todays’ soap was Barefoot in the Grass and I was pretty happy how it turned out. 17796776_1883022741953614_4698646066638940160_n

I’m working on another batch of soap while I’m writing this and tonights soap is Lazy Lavender. It’s one of the best sellers that I have and I usually run out of it pretty fast. 

I even went for a walk on Sunday afternoon. I kind of wanted it to be a walk/run, but it only turned out to be a walk. That’s OK, I was just glad that I got some fresh air and who cares this early in the season right? 

I also spent most of the weekend doing laundry and hanging out the loads on the line. Even though it’s much easier to just throw them in the dryer, it’s just not the same. And in our house we seem to keep all the laundry until the baskets are over flowing and end up having a full day of keeping the washing machine going. I think I did 7 loads so far and there is only two of us in the house! 

Daryl was really busy, he was a farmer on a mission! 

He cleaned the cow yards and hauled manure20170408_105815

and gathered some volunteer trees that were grubbed out by my brother and came back later and put them on a pile to be burnt on another day. Just wondering why they say you ‘grub’ out trees? 20170409_143333

He also took a couple of loads of corn out of the bins to get ready for this years cropDSC_0069

and finally he seeded down some water ways in the corn field for this spring.fullsizeoutput_a6f He used the seeder and for some reason I just love this piece of equipment. I mean it’s nothing fancy and for sure it’s pretty old, but it’s pretty cool! Daryl thinks it’s over 60 years old. And if you check out the paperwork, you can sure plant a lot of things with it. We just usually put in seed oats, bromegrass, & grassed that goes into the mixture to be spread. DSC_0060

Now don’t think that we worked all weekend. On Friday night we went out for supper with some of Daryl’s classmates to celebrate birthdays. 

On Saturday we went to a local Mexican restaurant before we headed to a Surprise Birthday party for a friend. For our supper at the restaurant  we weren’t expecting platters for our meal! fullsizeoutput_a6c

And at the end of the weekend while my soap is still cooking on the stove, we’re ordering a pizza from our local restaurant and the moon is just coming out for the night.20170407_235222  

Yup, what a productive weekend we had! 

 

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