Mountain Sunday * 30 August 2015

South of the barn.
30 August 2015

East over the barn.30 August 2015

North of the barn.30 August 2015

Photos from the Farm * 28 August 2015

Welcome to our farm!

Two wonderful things happened last Wednesday.

You started First Grade, and we had two little chicks born.

Can you see them?
Do they look like their mother?
Do they look like each other?
What's different?

Each week I'll show you a picture of them as they grow up. You can watch them change from little fuzzy chicks to adult chickens. We hope they grow up to be hens, not roosters, because hens lay eggs.

These small chickens are growing up.
They were born 19 July 2015.
They look like small chickens, not like fuzzy chicks.
How many weeks old are they?

Did you count the weeks on a calendar? If you counted 5 weeks and 5 days, you are right!

I thought you might like to see where most of the farm animals live. Next week I'll show you a map of our barn so you can see what it looks like inside.

Here are a few of the other animals that live on our farm.

This is Curly. Why do you think we named him Curly?
He is a buck, a boy goat.
There is another buck in the background, his name is Zeek.

These ducks live on our farm, too. They are not our ducks, they belong to the neighbor, but they come across the road to our farm every morning for breakfast.

They love to eat the chicken's food, and the turkey's food, so I have to chase them home every day.

Here is another animal that lives on our farm.
He doesn't live in the barn.
His name is Miles.
Miles and Matt are best friends. When Matt is gone to work, Miles sits by the back door waiting for him to come home.

I'll tell you more about Miles and the other animals on the farm every Friday when you are in school. I'm excited to show you around and tell you about all the things that happen here at Welcome Home Farm.

I hope you enjoyed this short visit! I hope you come back every Friday to see what is happening on the farm.

You can ask me questions, and I'll answer them. Your teacher will bring me your questions, and if your handwriting is neat enough that I can read it, then I will post your question here and answer it for everyone to see.

I hope you visit again next Friday! Have a great week!

Floating Eggs

I found a nest where one of the Bantam hens had been laying.

As I picked them up they seemed very light.

I have no idea how long the eggs had been sitting there so I decided that I would float these to see if there were any good ones in the clutch.

Every single egg floated to the top of the water!
These are getting buried!
If we tried to get rid of them any other way it would be too smelly!

This is our tried and true way of checking the freshness of eggs that we aren't sure of. If the egg sits at the bottom of the container filled with water, it's probably a fresh egg.

If it floats at all we usually throw it away. If it floats like the ones in the photo, we bury them!

Mountain Sunday * 2 August 2015

South of the barn.
2 August 2015

East over the barn.
2 August 2015

North of the barn.
2 August 2015

Cows

Remi is getting bigger! We had to get a larger halter for him. This one is a bit too big, but I'm sure it won't be long before it fits him.

We're pretty sure Echo is settled. She should calve in February.

There's something calming about tending livestock. It makes life so 'real' for me. It's such a grounding feeling to go out each morning and come in with milk and eggs.

It's pleasant to hear the cows mooing, the chicks peeping, the sheep and goats bleating, and the turkeys gobbling. It takes some effort, but I work at letting all those sounds drown out the sounds of the cars, trucks, and sirens that are blaring from the highway that is only three houses away.

It's a little bit of heaven here, and a lot of work!