Monday 5- 21- 2018

It was a busy Monday morning.  We slept in until 730am.  It's the first time in a long time that both of us have slept all night. It was great to see it was late when we finally woke up. 

We had a nice breakfast together of fruit parfaits made with yogurt, berries, cinnamon, and walnuts. 

Dude got right to work fixing and slimming down a drawer that swelled. I broke a glass container filled with hot tea yesterday (all over the tops of my feet -ouch). I didn't realize I hadn't gotten it all wiped up and swelled this drawer, getting it stuck and not able to open.  He is amazing and got it trimmed in no time. The drawer holds our onions and the narrow shelf holds our baking pans like cookie sheets and muffin tins.

Then he headed outside to feed the animals. 

I made a few pickled eggs. I am the only one that likes them so only made six of them. I peeled them and put in a canning jar.

Here are the casts of characters for my pickled eggs. 

Basically you heat 1.5 white vinegar, 1 cup of water and whatever you want to pickle them with . I added salt, pepper corns, pepper flakes, minced dried onions, and dill seeds. 

Heat and pour over the eggs. Refrigerate. 

My grandson now wants to be a chef (and yes, still the Grim Reaper and a Cowboy) so I got out some fabric to , at least, make the hat. Hopefully he will like it. 

Summer, the horse that stayed behind, began the day running the fields crying and calling out for her sister.  By midday she was doing better with the sheep out in the pasture with her. 

Dude spent the day in the garden. He did get cantaloupe (it does very well here), watermelon, more beets (I want to dry them and use the powder) and cucumbers planted.  Last week he planted a few rows of sweet corn. Yes, we are late but we are replanting due to dud seeds and the dog digging everything up and chewing down the fruit trees and roses.  We put up a fence and began again. 

The swarm that took over our old hive is still there.  It is right in the garden and facing it. This swarm is strong ,large and flying all over. We need to turn it around and move it. We will probably do it the way my dad taught me.  We will attach the two supers with brackets and block the entrance (all done at night) and then move it. I need to get an epi pen first -the one we had was super old. It is used in case of an allergic reaction to a sting. We had decided we were not going to buy (usually about $250) a swarm since we keep losing them(everyone I know is losing them) but we would collect swarms.  This one came to us. God had other plans for us. 

The honey wagon will arrive to empty the septic tank on Wednesday... yes, not everything is on the homestead is cozy fire stoves and growing vegetables - smile. 

peace