Oh Deer!! ;)

It was a calm cool evening last Friday and we had invited over some friends for a campfire with cider and doughnuts in honor of the beautiful season of fall.
Just before the company arrived the phone rang. It was Joshua who had been out hunting on public land. Everyone held bated breath and leaned eager ears toward Dad who had answered the phone, hoping that the message being relayed was that Joshua had "harvested" his first deer of the season. Watching Dad's face intently, our hopes were realized with Dad's raised eyebrows and rejoinder of "You did!". Pandemonium of high joy broke out around the house, and before dad had a chance to set down the phone he was bombarded with questions, "Is it a buck or doe?" "Did it run far?" "Is it a big one?" "Do we need to go help pick it up?" When he finally was able to answer all our flurried questions we were handed down this information: It was a doe. He was just tracking it and therefore did not know how far it ran or size of its body (when Faith called him a little later, Josh, who had just found the doe, exclaimed "holy smokes, she's a cow!") and no we did not need to go just then, some other friends were going to help him.


When we did get the deer home several hours later, our eyes confirmed Josh's opinion of her body size especially the length of it. After some deliberation, we hung her in the garage. That's right, this poor doe was not only shot, but also hung, and then later quartered and chopped up. Cruel aren't we=) The next day we transported her to the processor.

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Now lets jump to Sunday morning. I had gotten up to milk the goat and wandered bleary eyed into the kitchen to get the bowl and other implements I needed. Glancing out the window I saw Fiona on top of her dog house in a statue-like position staring fixedly at the back yard. I sleepily wondered if she was frozen=) it being a very cold morning, and in my stupor did not think to check out back and see what she was looking at. When I did glance in that direction I was shocked to see a half dozen or more deer wandering around our stream and pond.


The deer had never visited our pond in the daylight before, always just leaving their hoof prints behind at night. The reason for this sudden change, is that we have very smart deer! You see Joshua was gone that weekend to a pre-training camp for the National Guard, and the deer just to make positively sure there would be no danger, came on a Sunday morning when he wouldn't have shot them anyways. Very religious deer don't you think? ;) Seriously It was probably the cold snap that persuaded them to stay out a little longer, but we still lean toward are first theory just a little, because we haven't seen them since, the deer things.

~Chs

Chickens and Potatoes.

Despite the misleading title, I am not talking about a casserole
or dinner combination.

Real live chickens, I mean, not cooked. Just the other day Josiah wanted to do a portrait session with our ladies. Let me introduce you. This is Lightning.

This is one of our unnamed Rhode Island Red Chickens. Isn't she pretty?

Napoleon (one of our baby roosters) wanted to know what was going on
and to get in on the action. Handsome fellow.

A day or so later, it being a beautiful sunny day, we decided to dig up
our potatoes, and the chickens decided to help out.

One of the "Crow Sisters" helped look for any potatoes we may have left.

We got a little less than a bushel of Kennebec potatoes, some of which
were smaller than golf balls while others were baseball size.

Our red potato came in all shapes and sizes (there were some that look liked Mickey Mouse, others resembled Snow men and still others reminded us of old fashion perfume spray bottles) filling up half a bushel.

Josiah diligently searched for the very last potatoes which might have been missed, with the help of a pitchfork. We are very thankful for this "crop" of potatoes, and all the other blessings God has given us from our garden.

~Chs and Josiah

Behold the Frost cometh!!

The day started cold yet sunny and with the forecast predicting a very heavy frost that night. In consequence, the afternoon saw the Sauve clan trudging out to the garden to clean it of its produce before it was claimed by the vicious plant murdering icy particles, known commonly as frost.

We had already gathered most of the pumpkins and squash who reclined "elagantly" in the sun, shining a beautiful orange in the sunlight.

Therefore the first thing to take care of was the rows and rows (99 plants in all to be exact) of tomatoes, the majority of which, lamentably, were still green.


Despite said fact, we managed to get a good two pecks or so of red or at least reddish tomatoes, along with another peck or two of green tomatoes, the uses of which I will clue you in on during a following post.


Graces job was to harvest the herb bed, which included such lovely smelling herbs as; spearmint, chamomile, chives, lovage etc..


While we were slaving away in the garden, the chicks were allowed the free range of the yard. This group of curious chicks, led by our future rooster Napoleon, decided to check out our fort.


Other things that had to be saved before the cold weather that night, were cabbage, beans,


cucumbers, beets and peppers.


One of our best helpers was Fiona who loved green and ripe cherry tomatoes, along with countless other vegtables. She even danced for her treats. Now don't we have a talented goats?


Collecting the rest of the pumkins concluded our harvesting and we went off to dinner and a goods night sleep without any troubling dreams about the fruits in our garden freezing.


The next morning we awoke to a beautiful shimmering world, and Josiah who awaits the first frost with held breath anticipation, headed out into the frosty world to take pictures and enjoy himself.





Everything was a crispy white.


Everything was also slippery, Josiah was in heaven, I was not. He just had to slide down and across everything, and of course get me to do it too. Despite the slippery aspect I thoroughly enjoyed my time out in God's creation. Everything had a new clean crisp look, feel and smell to it. Even the air was fresh and invigorating.


We should be ever thankful to God for the changes in the season, for though God is unchangeable, he is a God of amazing variety, and each year I am reminded of this when the first frost cometh.

~Chs

General Bullfrog.

The other day as I walked toward the garden minding my own business, I passed the crock (a cinder block structure in the ground that is full of water) and the sound of a large kerplop and sploosh hit my ears. Recovering from the blow ;) I peered down into the murky depth of the crock intent on discovering what had made the disturbing noise, I saw a shadowy shape of a large frog sitting on the muddy bottom of crock.

I ran and told Josiah who came out armed to catch the creature. Upon doing so we discovered a ginormous bullfrog.

General bullfrog, as we called him was to large for the crock so we evacuated him to the pond where he would be much more comfortable, if that is he stays away from our resident
Great Blue Huron.

~Chs

The Day of Visitors.

Last Friday was a day of visitors. First, at noon Uncle Dave, Dads brother, came for lunch. Uncle Dave lives in California, but comes every year for his post office reunion.


We enjoyed showing him all the new things at our "Mini Farm".

Joshua found out that Uncle Dave had done his Basic training at the same place where Josh is going to do his, and they both enjoyed discussing all about the different points of basic training.

Our next visitors were Mr. and Mrs. Diekema, long time friends (Mr. Diekema married Mom and Dad) who have been living down in Florida for twenty or more years.

It was delightful to see them as we hadn't for over four years, and we immensely enjoyed the fellowship time we were able to spend with them as fellow Christians.


We took them on a tour around our back path's,


and they got to see the finishing of the channel first hand.


We even coerced them into trying out their hands at milking Fiona.
Over all it was a wonderful day of visiting and talking with friends and relations.

~Chs

Java's in the Dog House!

Fiona uses the dog house as a look out. . . .



. . and Java hides inside.

Backyard Makeover Episode 4: Mud Mud everywhere!

So on the Tuesday after Labor Day, Mr. Ostrander a wonderful friend from our church came over with his tractor to start on the pond.

Here comes the big Tractor!!


Then came all the discussions of the possibilities of how, where and when.

Then the very first shovelful was dug!!

We all watched in amazement as Mr. Ostrander worked the giganticus machine.

There were a few leftover piles of grass which we quickly carted away so Mr. Ostrander could continue the river.

Wahoo!!! front half of the river is done, the pond is begun.

The frogs loved the mud and water.

Shovelful after shovelful he pulled up. It took a whole week and a half for him to finish, but when he was done it was....

Wonderful!!!


We are so thankful to Mr. Ostrander for his great generosity and for all the time and effort he spent on our pond. But.... though the pond is done, there is still "piles" of work, to be spread out. So please stay around, and I will keep you updated on the "Backyard Makeover".

~Chs

Backyard Makeover Episode 3: Good Bye Grass!

The next step toward getting our pond dug out back, was to cut down all the thick grass so the ground could dry out.

Well, we found out that cutting down grass wasn't as simple as it sounds. It involved tons of labor and the sacrifice of gallons of sweat, along with the gain of aching muscles, which we didn't even know existed.

For one thing, it took a lot of large steps to accomplish the huge goal. First we used the heavy duty high powered trimmer that our friends kindly loaned us to whack down the thick resisting grass. Next the grass had to be raked into piles for easier removal. This step was the cause of loud groaning during the following days, due to the many blisters formed on the aching hands of the raking crew.

After the grass had been painfully raked into piles they had to be picked up and loaded into the trailer of our faithful Tractor, which transported them (with a little help from his driver =) to the burn pit in the yard where they were consumed.

Until we discovered that said grass was akin to weedy hay, which our dear goats enjoy immensely. This knowledge saved the poor grass from the horrible fate of being burned, and caused it to be reserved for the purpose of being eaten. ;)

The toughest part to demolish in the back, was the section over grown with tough reeds. These reed were to stiff and too long to be cut with the weed whacker, and therefore had to be chopped to pieces by hand.

But we persevered day in day out. (okay, so we weren't working twenty-four/seven by any means, but it seemed that long)

Another job that was necessary for the weed whacker to be able to work properly, was the removing of any large twigs, stumps and woody materials. Josh was our man, swinging the ax o'er his shoulder.

After days of labor the back acre was conquered.

So now the back acre is ready for one of the final steps, digging! Pond and river here we come!!!

~Chs