Parade Day

 It is that time of year again and being the county seat we host the county fair and parade! Now, if you consider we have a population of 600 and something that makes the fair and parade a big deal! Here in Coldspring that means we close down a state highway for an hour so our little parade can go through town!

(just a note...the Old  San Jacinto County Jail is haunted and it  has been documented by many paranormal investigators...maybe a visit and a post on that later!)

 You may be wondering why it takes an  hour for a small town parade..well...we have the Battle of the Bands!

OK,it is just a battle of 2 bands because that is all we have in this county! It was still a great band performance!

 Sadly,our town lost but I prefere to think of it as we came in second!

  Then came the ROTC....

I could have gotten closer to the parade for better pictures but I had me a piece of shade staked out and I wasn't about to give it up for the sake of better pictures! This is Texas folks,and it is still hot here!

Then there were many shiny trucks with pretty young girls,rodeo queens past and present and all the politicians wanting to be reelected and, of course, ya gotta have a firetruck!

Cute homemade floats full of cute kiddos!

And the FFA,every small towns favorite,well, after the football team!

Then my favorite ...the  trail riders! I was particularly fond of all the mules! Don't ask me why because I don't know why...but I like mules! I would have me one if I could some how justify needing one....but, between you and me, I ain't plowing the garden with a mule no matter how cool I think they are!

I am pretty sure we had more folks on horses and in wagons than spectators!

 Most of the riders had just come of a trail ride here in our beautiful Sam Houston National Forest area...

 We had our one trick rider who did the whole parade standing on his horse!

 Was he brave or just plum crazy...you  decide!

 So there you have it ,a glimpse into REALLY small town life !

Lightening Strikes Thrice

Yes, it most certainly does ! Let me tell you all about my Thursday afternoon! I was sitting here on the computer when it begins to rain...not thunder and lightening ,just a nice gentle rain.Then out of nowhere ...BOOM!!!!  It was so loud it took my mind a second to register what had happened! I ran to the back door in time to see smoke and debris floating down from the sky...lightening had struck one of the big trees ,the second closest to the house! It is about 30 or 40 feet from the house and in the goat and turkey pen! It is the one in the middle of the picture right past the well...

I ran out to check the goaties and everyone was OK, a little rattled but thankfully fine! You can see the stripe where it blew off the bark...

There was an outside light hung on this tree, it was blown to pieces!

This is the 3rd time in a little over 3 years that we have had lightening hit within a ..hmm..I'd guess about a 50 ft radius from the house! Right before we moved in lightening got another tree on the far side of the goat yard and after we had been here about a year it got the transformer on the pole about 20 feet from the house!  This time it fried my internet router, actually just the power cord, even though everything is plugged in to surge protectors, the air conditioning unit and Hubby's dog's electric fence! Oh, and blew out a breaker that goes to Hubby's shop! The AC is going to be the whopper...sigh.It will be covered under our homeowners insurance but we have a big deductible. Plus we will loose another of our lovely big trees. That is the victim  in the center of the picture...

Well, the good thing for the day was I finally was able to kill the chicken snake that had been getting all my eggs for the last week! I can't remember if this is 8 or 9 chicken snakes  for this year... apparently I live on top of some sort of electrified snake pit!!!

Got Kittens?

Well,we sure do! 6 little kitties to be exact!

I am a big ,big  believer in spaying  and neutering your pets! These little cuties momma, that I creatively named Kitty, was  cruelly dumped off in the woods by our house and well...ya know how it goes!

Kitty will be making a trip to the vet in a few weeks and so will all these little fur balls when they are old enough.

All farms need cats right??! I will say kitty has taken care of our mice problem in the shed and to me she has already earned her keep in doing that!

The Boy has already claimed a favorite as his and named it Charcoal...I hope we  can find homes for a few of them ...but if we can't ...oh well ...I guess they will just stay here on the farm and dine on shed mice!

 It is catch up time once again! I have been finding it difficult to post regular these days,so I will try and catch you all up on things around the farm! Hubby is back in China so I am single woman homesteading once again. School has started back for us and this includes Fridays at a home school co-op,a new thing for us.I have to say I find it tiresome standing around watching kids all day,next year I will definitely volunteer to teach or help with a class. I don't do real good with "down time"! I am used to being busy!  I know so many of you are  getting your first taste of Fall...LUCKY ! We are still in the lower to mid 90's, factor in the heat index and well... it stinks!  I have been out every morning trying to get the Fall garden planted,it was only 70 degrees this morning when I got up,you are probably thinking that is lovely weather but the humidity was 99% ! No,that is not a type-o ,I said 99%... So far I have gotten the whole area tilled I intend to plant and the first rows I got planted are already up! 2 rows of Roma green beans and 2 rows of purple hull peas!

I side dressed them with compost provided by the ever pooping sheep! I have in 2 rows of contender green beans and  3 more rows of purple hull peas! I also have a few yellow squash I need to put out. That is it for the warm season crops,oh and the around 30 tomatoes!

I also have most of my cool season crop started in seed beds.Next month will probably be cool enough to get them out.These crops will grow all winter here,cabbage, kale, beets,collards and turnips,carrots,rutabagas, parsnips...I never have had any luck with broccoli or brussel sprouts but I may try them again any how!

A good size storm was brewing the other day,it didn't give us any rain but we got the thunder and cool wind which was nice,not as nice as if it had rained,but still nice.

This storm had an effect on the goatie girls let me tell you! They got in the mood to party! The were all running  and leaping and butting heads and running and leaping some more! It was quiet a sight to behold! The pictures don't do the event justice.

They were all fluffed out with their hair all standing on end...eventually they got tired and I picked them some yummy leaves for a snack,I figured they might need a little snack after all that running around!

Lola wanted a few scratchins too!

They turkeys are always in the middle of things,here are the Boys. They had other names but I long ago took to calling them Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dumb! For those of you who raise turkeys out there,I know you  can understand how these names are perfect for the boys!

I  am dreaming of Fall,I hope all you are getting a taste of it already are enjoying it! As much as I want to have the coolness I want those veggies from the garden first!!! So, I guess I will endure a little longer!

I won the Battle!

It was a long hard fight....many times I despaired and thought I might not make it...but in the end I was victorious! My goodness, you may be asking, what was going on? Well,I will tell you ! I have been up to my elbows in pears once again! The first time I received pears it was about 10 gallons, this time it was 25 gallons of pears!!! A wonderful dilemma! The race was on to get all this wonderful bounty put up!

Texan has been canning pears too and she sent me some recipes she found.The first one I made was these whole spiced pickled pears....

I got 6 quarts of these...hmm...that didn't even make a dent in the pears! They are so pretty whole in the jar...something about them reminds me of Christmas...I don't know why.Then I made 14 quarts of pie filling!

Still got a ton of pears!!!! I made some spiced pickled pear chunks that are pictured above with the pie filling!

Oh yeah! The whole time I am running the dehydrator and dehydrating pear slices for snacks!

Then I get to the pear sauce...OH MY GOODNESS!!! I will never be able to eat apple sauce again with out comparing it to the pear sauce! It is so delicious! That's it, I decide, the rest of these babies are going to be made in to pear sauce,and that is just what I did! 3 and a half batches of pear sauce to finish them off! I put them all in various jelly jars because I thought that would make them the perfect snack sizes!

I did a dozen of these little jars too...by this time I was sticking pear sauce in any thing!!! I have 4 time the amount shown here put up!

Let me tell you all,I have a lot of jars and I ran out of jelly jars! Hubby and The Boy ran up to the store and got me 2 more boxes and I used every single jar and ended up having to put the last of it in 2 pint jars! I am thrilled to have been able to put up all this wonderful pear goodness! That being said....I am so glad to be done!!!! Days and days of peeling and canning pears.....I was even putting up pears in my sleep! Seriously, I was dreaming I was canning! I couldn't escape,those pears wanted to do me in! They just didn't know who they were up against, a woman who finds a way to can everything! I love to can,even though this was slightly exhausting, and if some one showed up at my door with another  truck load of pears or anything else for that matter, I would gladly take them! Now....it is time for Fall gardening! No rest for me I tell you! Farmer's Almanac is predicting another cold wet winter for us.....got to think about getting ready for that too!

Here is you goatie goat picture for the day!  It is Harley once again, he is looking for a treat of pear peelings!

How to Get it to Rain

Rain is something we have been lacking in around here lately! If I had only know all I had to do was to try and set out my tomato plants I would have done it weeks ago!

I got about half way through and it began pouring!

Before the rain, the  ground was so hard and dry I couldn't even till it up! Hubby had to do it for me! We got over an inch of much needed rain and it looks like more is on it's way today...sigh...and some cooler temps!  I hope this means the worse is behind us...

 I will hopefully be planting some green beans and peas out there soon and starting a few cool weather seeds in side to go out later. I already put out a little batch of turnip green I started in side just to get a jump start on things.The Boy loves a mess of turnip greens!

I have a lot of black gold, compost to all you non farmers out there, this year! I have been distributing in all the raised beds and will be able to give everything in the garden this fall a good layer!

Here are some kohlrabi just sprouting! I already set out one egg carton of them in  one of the  raised beds.

Here are some asparagus I started from seed last spring,they will go out next spring to the garden.They were super easy to grow from seed,they germinated very well!

Just because he is so cute,here is Harley standing on a log trying not to get his hooves wet!

Shouldn't every post have a goatie goat picture?!?!

Catch Up!

I t has been a busy week so I have some catchin' up to do! The last several days I have been up to my elbows in pears! Pears are the hot climates apple! You can grow apples here but you won't get a bumper crop,pears on the other hand...well, one big tree will make more than you know what to do with! My pear tress are just tiny sticks but I am lucky enough to have a friend who gave me about 2 bushels!

Now, don't judge these pears by how they look! Like apples there are many different pears for different uses. These are caning pears and they are usually "ugly" and hard as brick bats! Perfect for caning! Let me tell you, peeling this many brick hard pears is hard on the hands but I persevered and got every single one put up! I have quarts of pear halves in syrup, bear butter,pear preserves and diced pears in syrup. Also, lots of happy critters because everyone from goaties to chickens loved the pear peelings!

On to farm happenings!  We said good by to Sir Loin ...this picture is at a bad angle, he was much plumper ....

and all this springs sheep babies...

and hello to my new freezer! With these and the chickens and rabbits I am looking at not buying meat for a year! Plus our animals were totally grass feed and chemical free and if you were to put a price on that meat...well, it would be a considerable amount more that the stuff in the grocery store! I am really excited by how much we will save by not buying meat for a whole year! Now if I can get a decent fall garden I am estimating saving around $ 400 a month in groceries! I will still have to buy stuff like flour and sugar and oatmeal but for the most part we will be eating our own farm raised goodness!
We replaced Sir Loin,meet the new Sir Loin and his momma Sadie! Yes, he is alive,he is just napping!

They are both Dexter cattle. This will give us 3 cows,now we just need a bull and our herd will be complete. Their calves will give us meat and and extra to sell every year to make hay money if we need to buy some hay.

I haven't shown you the goaties in a while and Isobelle was asking about them so I took some pictures this morning while I was visiting them. Butter Bean is always looking for treats!

Look at his tongue sticking out trying to get a hold of my skirt! Crazy goat!

Here is Mr.Tumnus looking suave and debonair..

Sweet Pea is napping in her and Nibbles' favorite spot, it is an old ash pile where we burned some wood. For some reason they love to lay in it. Doesn't she look sweet....she looks like she is praying an a little light from heaven is shining down on her.

Doodah is ..well, Doodah!

Lola, Doodahs daughter, is getting big! She is a wild goat but she will still come up for some scratchins' if the mood hits her! I think she has crazy eyes and she chews cud at warp drive! Maybe she has goatie ADHD!

Her brother Harley is sweet,calm and gentle.  He lives in the buck pen with his daddy and Butter Bean and him and Bean play all day long! I am hoping to sell him this fall when he is a little bigger. Someone will be lucky to get him as a herd sire because he has such a great disposition .We already sold his brother, Bo Diddly, and we didn't even advertise him for sale!

And I can never forget our Nibbles girl! She is by far our most beloved girl, just look at her sweet face! Her boys are long gone to a home together to be pets for 4 children.

Just for the heck of it I thought I  would throw in one of Clyde! He is such a funny looking fellow,little skinny legs with a barrel body and big ole long skinny head! He is sweet as the day is long! You can let him "donkey lip" all  over you and he will never bite.

Now you all have the whole week of the Laughing Duck farm catch up! Hope you enjoyed it!