Category Archives: The Farm

December is Going Fast

Christmas, Christmas Tree, Reflections, The Farm, Winter

Going, going, and before we know it December 2025 will be, gone. We will be starting a whole new year. But today I’ll just catch up on a few things from this month.

Finishing What We Started

Back in February, I wrote about our adventures in shopping for a used car. At that time we did not find a vehicle that was what we were looking for so we decided to have some repairs done to our 2006 Honda Odyssey and continue to drive it. After some inexpensive repairs it continued to serve us well until a few weeks ago when the cold weather set in.

When my husband told me the van was not running good, we decided to restart our quest for a different vehicle. After about a week of searching online and at dealerships, discussing what type of vehicle would serve us best, how much we wanted to spend, and waiting two days for the snow to stop so we could safely travel the 45 minutes to view the vehicle that we hoped was best, it finally happened.

We purchased a 2016 Toyota Highlander. It’s been a week since we brought it home and I am so thankful every time my husband comes in and says, “I love that car”. I have to give a shout out to Jim Riehl’s Friedly Chrysler Dealership in Lapeer, Michigan and our salesman, Mike Lamet, who made the car buying experience pleasant and seamless. We couldn’t be happier.

Preparing for Christmas

Wednesday was our nicest day this week. My husband and I went to the farm to cut our Christmas tree. I know it’s late for putting up a tree, but we thought it best to wait because we are concerned that the tree will dry out before Christmas. We will keep it well watered, but we had a very dry year, and the tree is already excessively thirsty.

The temperature was near 50 degrees (10 Celsius) but as you can see there was still snow on the ground.

The sun was doing it’s best to break through the heavy cloud cover.

We did see bits of blue sky.

Some of the chickens even came out for a visit.

After looking at a few trees, we finally selected this one. The first one we looked at was nice until my husband went to start cutting and discovered a crook in in the trunk near the bottom. The next one was also a nice tree, but I thought it was too tall for our space.

The one that we brought home was full but still short enough that we could put it up on the table we have been using for the past several years. I like the idea of having the tree on the table thus Ranger isn’t tempted to lift his leg on it. Male dogs are known to do that with real trees.

Once we got the tree home and up, I discovered I only had one strand of lights that worked (and two that didn’t). Not enough for the tree. Since we planned on doing some shopping on Thursday, we decided we would pick up some lights then. Decorating the tree would have to wait.

On Thursday our first stop would be Hobby Lobby so I figured we could pick up some Christmas lights there. My husband asked me several times that morning “are you sure we can get lights at Hobby Lobby?” Since they always have a huge Christmas section, I was sure that they would have Christmas lights. What I didn’t realize was that they had all of their Christmas items on sale for 60% off. The light section was cleaned out.

Since our next stop was Culvers for lunch we decided we could run into Walmart (next door) to grab some Christmas lights. I truly realized how late we were getting the tree up when Walmart was sold out of the lights we were looking for as well. We were looking for strands of the muti-colored mini lights. They had None. They had a lot of strands of all white, but we didn’t want that. We also found, hiding on a bottom shelf, some strands on multi-colored lights with the larger bulbs. Since we didn’t want to spend the whole day running into stores that may or may not have what we were looking for we decided to go with the larger bulbs.

It was late in the day, and we were pretty worn out by the time we got home so decorating the tree would wait another day.

On Friday I decorated the tree while my husband made a delicious pot of chicken soup for our dinner.

This year our tree is decorated with lights and angels. It’s been several years since I decorated with my Snow Angel collection, so I decided this was the year. Incidentally the angel on the top our tree is older than some of my kids. My best guess is it’s around 35 years old and I have never replaced the lights in it.

The rest of the shopping we did on Thursday included picking up a few gifts for the grandkids and making sure I had things I need to make Christmas brunch.

I still have a few gifts that I am making that need to be finished but I should have time to finish things up by the 25th, even if I take time out to watch the Lions game on Sunday. I might even have time to do some baking. 🙂

Thanks for visiting.

Did you put up a tree this year?

Fall is in the Air

Bees, Black-eyed-susan, Chickens, Fall, Nature, Reflections, Ruby, Sunflowers, The Farm, Wild Flowers, Wildlife, , , ,

Fall is in the air but the temperatures this week were more like summer.

We’ve seen a lot of skies that look like this lately – deep blue with fluffy white clouds. How about joining me for a walk at the farm?

Ruby will join us, but since she likes to move faster than we do she will probably lap us a couple of times. Don’t worry if you hear something rustling in the weeds or the woods behind us it’s probably her.

I love these Black-eyed Susans that we planted along the fence two years ago.

Such a brilliant splash of fall color.

It was tempting to cut down this thistle, but the flower is so pretty. Maybe I’ll cut it just before it goes to seed.

Some of the chickens are enjoying their day foraging near the pond.

Maple trees are beginning to show their fall colors.

There are lots of bees in the golden rod.

Asters are beginning to bloom

The white ones as well as the purple.

And purple loosestrife is still in bloom.

This butterfly posed for a couple pictures then fluttered nearby as we walked the back field.

The oak trees are loaded with acorns this year.

Some have begun to fall.

The hickory trees have fewer nuts this year than last but still enough to feed some squirrels.

This Norway spruce is loaded with pinecones.

I wonder what kind of pinecone craft I can come up with. Do you have any ideas?

Oh my gosh! Elderberries! I’ll come back and pick these after we finish our walk. This is my first year picking elderberries. The first few years after we planted them I would wait for the berries to ripen but before they were ripe the birds would eat them all. I then discovered that the elder flowers are as good or better than the berries for making syrup or tincture, so I began harvesting the flowers in the spring. This year I forgot to harvest the flowers and while there are not a lot of berries here there are enough to make a small batch of tincture. 🙂

We’ve already seen a lot of the bees are foraging in the goldenrod and I’m sure some are in the sunflowers as well. One thing that you might notice, if the wind is just right, is the smell of honey drifting from the hive. This time of year, when the bees are in the goldenrod, is the only time that we smell honey while at the farm.

We still have a lot of sunflowers in bloom.

Some are so tall they are having a hard time holding their heads up.

Colby Jack (above) and Bernard (below) are waiting for some treats.

Should we give them some apples?

Somebody grabbed my camera while I wasn’t looking (and took my picture). You wouldn’t do something like that – would you?

Colby Jack and Bernard say, “Thank You for the apples”

I hope you enjoyed your time on the farm. Thank you for joining me.

Tuesday Morning at the Farm

Bees, garlic, Reflections, Ruby, Sunflowers, The Farm

It was a cool, crisp, fall-like morning despite being late August.

I visited the gardens and took a few pictures before getting started on my task for the morning.

The bees were all over the sunflowers.

This bird was perched on a goldenrod in the back field.

The above picture was my workstation for the morning.

These are the tools I used.

Cleaning the garlic was my task.

The sights, the sounds, the whole atmosphere was beautiful.

The sky was deep blue with fluffy clouds drifting by.

I couldn’t have asked for better working conditions.

Ruby stopped by to remind me to take time out to play.

It took about 75 minutes to clean that bucket full of garlic, including tossing the ball a couple times for Ruby. (I neglected to take a picture of the clean bulbs.) Conditions were equally as pleasant this afternoon when I finished cleaning the second bucket full of garlic. What a relief it is to have that job finished.

I am still canning tomatoes (31 quarts so far), dehydrating eggplant and freezing peppers. We have been so blessed with a bountiful harvest this year.

Thanks for visiting.

Garden Goodness

Apple Trees, Apples, Bees, Fermenting, Flowers, garden, garlic, Hibiscus, Peach Tree, Pollinators, Reflections, Sauerkraut, Sunflowers, The Farm, Tomatoes, , , ,

Hello and welcome. Despite having very dry weather, and doing our best to keep things watered, our gardens have flourished.

Blooming Beauties

Right now our hibiscus bushes are the star of the show.

Their large, showy flowers are stunning.

I don’t like to play favorites, but if I had to pick a favorite flower, it would probably be the hibiscus.

This hibiscus that I planted three years ago on my mom’s birthday was just beginning to open on Sunday, August 10, which would have been my mom’s 80th birthday.

Today it was in full bloom. 🙂

Several weeks ago we decided that we needed to rework the memorial garden the we planted this spring. This garden memorializes our parents who have all passed away. The beautiful lupine plants that were planted on either side of the rock were struggling, apparently not getting enough sun. My husband dug them up and planted them in the very sunny prayer garden and they have since developed new growth.

On Saturday, August 9, I visited my sister who wanted to thin her flower beds. My husband and I decided the shade loving hostas would do well in the memorial garden. My sister had just what we were looking for. She was very generous, selecting the large beautiful plants, instead of the ones the deer had eaten. The two light green hostas were one that my husband split before planting. I also brought home a lungwort plant that my husband split and planted (the dark green wilted plants). It looks sad after being transplanted but I read that it will develop new growth and should be fine.

Veggies

Our garden situation is changing daily and some of these photos are about two weeks old. I’ve just fallen behind in my blogging.

The honeybees that moved into our empty hive seem to be doing well.

Bees love squash and pumpkin blossoms.

And this is what can happen when a pumpkin or squash blossom is pollinated. 🙂

A basket of fresh garden goodness. My husband has been bringing home this basket full of veggies every day.

Eggplant, sweet corn, beets, green beans, tomatoes, banana peppers and cucumber were the haul on that day. Many of these vegetables are being eaten fresh. Others are being canned or frozen.

I made four pints of dill relish last week.

On Wednesday my husband and I made a trip to the orchard so I could can some peaches. On Thursday I canned 23 pints of peaches and had a dozen left over for eating fresh. Sunday, I made peach cobbler with five of the fresh ones.

One of our peach trees produced two peaches.

One for my husband and one for me. They were perfectly ripe when I picked them yesterday and so delicious. The orchard peaches, that were picked before they were ripe, were not as sweet as these.

They are not ready yet, but it looks like we will have a great apple crop.

The other thing the bees are enjoying right now are the sunflowers.

But who doesn’t love sunflowers.

This week’s projects include canning tomato juice (I did 6 quarts yesterday), making sauerkraut (I started it fermenting today), and cleaning garlic (tomorrow or Thursday).

Thanks for visiting.

An Interesting Morning at the Farm

Bees, Bunnies, Gardening, Reflections, The Farm, , , ,

Graden Update

When my husband and I arrived at the farm yesterday morning we decided a garden tour was in order before we began working on our to-do list. It had only been a couple days since I had checked the progress in the gardens (my husband visits and/or works in them daily) but it seems they have grown in leaps and bounds since I last saw them.

The summer heat and intermittent rain has done wonders.

Everything is lush and green and many things are either flowering or fruiting.

So far we have harvested small amounts of Swiss chard a couple times to have with our dinner.

We now have some banana peppers ready to harvest and within the next week I expect to start harvesting green beans and cucumbers.

It won’t be long before the potatoes are ready to come out of the ground, but first we will harvest the garlic and get it drying in the barn.

I Could Hardley Believe What I Was Seeing

We see a lot of interesting and strange things at the farm and I don’t always carry my camera, so I don’t get pictures of everything. This first story is one of those times.

One of my tasks this morning was using our weed-burning torch to burn off some of the weeds around the edge of the pond. It’s quite common for frogs to be hidden in these weeds and jump into the water to avoid the danger, so when I saw/heard the splash I wasn’t surprised. I was however surprised as I watched a small furry animal pop up and begin swimming across the pond. It was a baby bunny, not much bigger than my hand. I didn’t know rabbits could swim. It was a tense couple of minutes, and I prayed “Lord don’t let it drown” as I watched it doggie bunny paddle the whole width (approximately 30 yards or 27.432 meters) of the pond. I lost sight of it for about half a minute when it exited the pond on the other side. Then I saw it scamper off into the woods. I would have felt so terrible if the little critter hadn’t survived. When I told my husband what I had witnessed he exclaimed, “No way!” But it really did happen.

A while later my husband also had an “I don’t believe it event”.

This is the first year since 2013 that we didn’t start off the year with bees in our hives. After losing two more hives over the winter, we made the decision in the early spring not to spend the money to buy more bees.

For the past several weeks I have been hearing my husband express his regrets about not getting bees. We have seen a few honeybees foraging on the farm but not nearly as many as when we have one or more hives there.

The two hives were still set up where we kept the bees last year. The weeds/wildflowers were growing up around them, so my husband’s task was to weed whip around them. When he finished the weed whipping, he announced to me “the bees are back”. “No way!” I exclaimed as I headed toward to hive. Sure enough, bees were coming and going as if this were their home. We’ll know for sure in the next few days if this was a swarm of bees that has decided to use this hive as their new home. Free bees how cool is that?

Thanks for visiting.