Another great article to read

Artificial Stupidity

This is great and so true of our culture today...

A great article regarding the roles of men and women

http://networkedblogs.com/4fofC

Plants and seeds

My sun room and sun porch are now filled with plant starts I received from Azure Standard yesterday and seeds are pouring in.  I am itching to begin planting but have to wait one more week for a decision being made about our house here.  If we move I will be planting about a month behind schedule so will need to resort to some frost covers in the fall to complete the season.  I also received a great book yesterday, "Dick Raymond's Gardening Year".  It is a month by month pictorial schedule of what to do when - and since his growing season in Vermont is very similar to the one here it should be easy to follow.  Our apple trees are blooming and I hope to have Gina begin taking a bunch of pictures so I can start adding pics as we progress with the garden through the year.

On another note, Lucas and Eric are excited about attending Veritas Press' End of the Year gathering next week and getting to put faces with students and teachers they have met online.  Hopefully, the rest of us will be packing..:-)

Working on figuring out new homestead blogger system

I have not been posting much as we are trying to figure out the new homestead blogger set up.  I have a feeling it will take me a few days.  I will miss my farm picture I had at the top of the other blog - this one was the prettiest I could find but still doesnt quite capture farming like I want it to. Oh well, sometimes new  improved technology is not always a blessing.

We are busy getting the garden ready and watching the orchard trees bloom.  More turkeys are laying on clutches and spring is definitely in the air.  We will wait to plant until the end of next week in case the folks that say they want to buy our house follow through.  Dick Raymond's "Joy of Gardening" had been recommended to me by a mentor of an agriculture class I am taking and it is an excellent book.  I will be trying out his "Eat N Store" garden plan as well as continuing with some raised Stout method beds.  I hope to get Gina to begin some pictorials of the garden as it progresses...

Fire

For many years I have taught my children that even when you think what you are going through it tough (and my kids have been through some tough times in their lives) there is always someone who has suffered more than you.  This lesson became quite evident to all of us Wednesday night.  Just as we were preparing for bed, my older daughters heard an explosion and came to tell me they thought our neighbors house was on fire.  I followed them downstairs to confirm this (we both live on 20 acres so our houses are not very close) and sure enough as I came into our living room, huge rolling flames and smoke were rising from their house.  I called 911 and as I was talking with the operator, our neighbors called in the fire themselves.  Apparently they were sleeping when it started, so we saw it first since it started in the garage which faces our house.  We are thankful to God that He brought them both out alive.  As the fire was raging we heard explosions which turns out to be ammunition exploding in their garage.  Unfortunately both of their cars were in their garage so not only was their house completely destroyed but both of their cars and all 3 of their cats as well.  As can be imagined they lost everything and are devastated.  And then of course there must be that awful contingent of society that is now showing up in their driveway with pickup trucks (after the owner and fire chiefs are not here), driving around the rubble and shouting all sorts of really crass and heartless things...

We were blessed by God in a big way during all of this, as we are surrounded by woods and the fire could have gotten really out of hand.  We left our property pretty quickly in case this were going to happen.  The firefighters (6-8 trucks) contained the fire rapidly and God blessed us by diverting the smoke in a different direction.  We were very concerned that our animals would suffer from the intense smoke but it didn't come our direction at all.  Thanks be to God for this and prayers please for our neighbors as they attempt to recover from this catastrophe. 

Mothers Day

My 5 year old, Emma, said yesterday, "When I have a Mothers Day, I am going to have lots of desserts and no soup!"

Turkey poults!!

Our first set of Red Bourbon turkey poults (or is it pullets? - I can never keep that straight) hatched yesterday.  We have 8 fluffy babies following their mama hen around - they are so cute and hopefully will make good eating and breeding stock in the future.  It is so fun to make new discoveries on the farm as they happen and finding baby animals is one of the best.

Moving?

We are anxiously awaiting news about whether a family that has expressed intent to buy our house here will be making an offer in the next week.  Apparently they have some tax issues to straighten out but our realtor is pretty sure they will be moving forward.  We are excited yesterday to find out that a property we had a lot of interest in came back on the market.  It had sold earlier in the year (it is a foreclosure) but apparently that has fallen through and its back on the market at a signifigantly reduced price.  There is an additional 20 acres behind it (the house comes with 20 acres now) that our realtor is pursuing to see if they will sell.  40 acres would give us a nice jumping off place for our farm and the possibility of picking up more land around the area is good since its not heavily populated.  The second piece of land borders state land (its a mountain) which would be great for the animals since they would not be up against someone else's home.

We know God will provide exactly where He wants us to be - we just need to be patient!

On another note, I picked up a used copy of a book called, "The Sovereignty and Goodness of God" by Mary Rowlandson. She was a puritan who was captured during Prince Phillip's war.  I hope to delve into it more later today.

No piglets yet - butchering day

Still waiting on the piglets - hopefully any day now.  Steve and boys butchered a goat, our first turkey and some roosters on Saturday, during intermittent periods of rain.  Its been raining so much here (its raining again today) that its beginning to feel like England or Seattle.  I itch to put plants in the ground but the fact that we will probably be moving in the next month and the possibility of a late spring freeze (most folks don't plant until the end of May here) keeps me from doing so.  Its actually fore-casted to snow tomorrow.

We are beginning a plan of hospitality nights on Fridays and Family Sabbath meals of Saturdays starting this week.  Unfortunately the first hospitality night is being ousted by a church family dance we found out yesterday but that will be fun as well- the kids are certainly looking forward to it...

More piglets?

Our second sow was looking rather restless, tired and uncomfortable yesterday and would not be around the other two.  Even though it doesn't look like her teats were filling with milk yet, we wanted to make sure her farrowing space was prepared, just in case, especially after last times disaster.  Our kids made an electric netted pen around her with a shelter, food, water and hay for nesting.  Hopefully we will see piglets in the next day or so...