Corn Stalking

This is a LOT of sweet corn and dent stalks in the back of my truck. It took 4 people and 1 machete to load all these donated stalks for decorating the mill. Took me an hour to unload it by myself.

Vegan Colon Anatomy Lesson

Yes, this is a sweet potato from my garden. Joshua pulled this giant out of the dirt and called it a colon potato. So we brought in the house and took photos. I used a fork for size, it weighed over a pound. Those are regular sweet potatoes next to it.

And this is what we served for lunch and dinner that evening. It was tasty.

Happy Halloween!

Schoch Mission Visit

We had our friends stay over at our place this month for their mission home base. They had presentations and family to visit in the area. We had collected donated dental and medical items for them as well as specific items they needed back in Africa. I got to make vegan dishes from my garden and learned about vegan requirements. I have a great recipe for vegan waffles. 

Handmade African clothes hanging out to dry. Our friends wore these often during their stay. 

The colors of the fabrics were stunning.

Joshua their son riding Luna our Fox Trotter. Osa and Zilla kept them company on the ride. Alan keeps Luna from eating too much grass.

Doug, Tamara and Joshua Schoch saying good bye to our farm. They are headed back to their

 mission in Tanzania next week.

They are great people to have as friends doing wonderful things in Africa.

Loaded up with 7+ luggage bags full of food, medical and dental supplies. 

Till we meet again in 2015. Happy Trails.

Gate Me Gladly

Alan posing for me at the Chinese gate at the Botanical Gardens. One of our dates to Avery Island, LA about 13 years ago; I had him pose at a similar gate. This time he has a beard and he is my husband.

Botanics

St. Louis has a huge botanical gardens. We got to see about half of it on this very hot day. Every plant and tree is labeled. 

My favorite, maidenhair fern.

Chinese garden.

There would have been more but my camera died half way through. But there was a plant sale there and I came home with irises from all over the world.

Basilica in St. Louis

Last Sunday, we brought a friend to the airport in St. Louis. We all got to take a tour of the Basilica there. Words cannot express the beauty of the mosaics in this church.

The ceiling

Domes

Sidewalls

Altar

Adoration chapel

another chapel

The liturgical balcony is 2 stories tall

The best, the Pieta. I got to touch the bronze copy of Michelangelo stunning sculpture.You are allowed to.Probably will be the only time in my life, I can touch a sculpture by my favorite artist.

You can see where people have touched the sculpture over the years. The knee, the cut, Mary's hand.

This Basilica was like stepping into a jeweled box. 

Feeding Big Dogs

Here is Zilla at 1 year old. She will be full grown with a weight around 200lbs. Her parents are both very large. Unlike, Osa who is on the smaller side for a German Shepherd around 70 lbs.

We have been looking to keep weight on her and normal dog food is not cutting it. So we are supplementing her diet with raw cow legs, dry food and canned food. Both dogs patrol night and day on our farm, lots of energy.

I can get these cow legs three dollars a bucket full at my local butchers. I have to dig out the ones I want to bring home. The flies are free. I can choose from goats, cow or sheep and pigs. But I know my girls like cow.

My yard looks like a forensics body farm lab. Cow parts and other things strewn about the yard to keep my dogs happy.

Zilla is very happy.

A Taste of Sun

It finally stopped raining after almost a week of downpours in the Ozarks.

Daisy takes in the setting sunlight before hunting in the humid night.

A haul of sweet corn from my experimental garden.

My sunflowers are bent, laden with seeds and hungry bees.

Fixing A Wounded Wedding Ring Quilt

 I was asked if I could fix a vintage hand quilted wedding ring quilt. The quilt was sewn in the 1980's using poly/cotton blend fabrics and washed and dried multiple times before I got it. The problem was that several pieces were threadbare.

Some parts were missing. Some fabric just needed stabilizer added to save the original fabric.

Worn pieces were lifted, stabilized and resewn in place.

I traced each piece and hand appliqued over the original piece, preserving the original work.

Hand quilting each new replacement.

My handmade puzzle pieces.

Sewn and ready to live a bit longer.

Quilt in progress. I used safety pins to mark the places needing repairs. It was over 100 tiny pieces and took 2 solid weeks to fix. The finished quilt was given as a wedding present from a mother-in-law to the bride.

Tea, cat and seeds.

With all this July heat I am able to make sun tea on my deck. I savor the tasty sun tea. My cat Poppy, has lost his winter fat and is a lean can once again. Summer heat means my collards have gone to seed. I am winnowing off seeds from their husks. Busy as always in the summer.

Busiest July Ever!

This July has been the busiest month for me ever. My late start gardens are now ready for harvest. What happens when you plant 10 green beans? You get green bean monsoon. And I will never plant 10 zucchini plants this close again. I have a zucchini forest that I crawl into to harvest in. I have cabbages, cucumbers,corn, beans, tomatoes,squash, potatoes and yams all waiting on me. But I also have several neighbors who enjoy the bounty from my garden. I have never worked so long in my garden before. From 8-12 lunch, then wait for the afternoon heat to pass 4-8, put up poultry at 9 (over 70+) then dinner. A farmer never gets rest this time of the year. Then I am planting my fall crops. I am always covered in straw and DE powder. And it is almost August now. Things are looking like an early fall with blooming morning glories and rampant copperheads. The rains have come and everything is green and growing. It has been such a productive summer. I thank the Lord for all this wonderful food. And I am happy to share with my friends.

Chicks and Roses

I finally put these 4 week old chicks in the Big House or the adult coop. These were late hatch of chickens and guinea chicks that were left behind or abandoned by their new moms. I call them orphan chicks. Since I have the time, space and set up to raise them, I go ahead and raise them in the house. Since they are 5 total, they will form a gang and look out for each other in the adults coop.They are in a bigger cage inside my adult coop. They will stay in that until they are about half the size of an adult. Their 3 month old older siblings (30) are now free range with the adult poultry (56). I bought 30 chicks to replace the ones the foxes got last summer. However, this summer has been less foxy. So I have some over abundance this summer. I will cull the roosters (dinner)and keep the hens. It is going to be a busy fall. We give the eggs to our church since we simply do not eat that many. And selling eggs is more work than I have time for on the farm.

These are the only red roses on my farm as the rest are pinks and yellows. These climb all summer and bloom all summer. I keep them since they are a good filler when nothing else is blooming. And it is a sturdy rose even under the snow and ice. It is always nice to come home and see these red roses waiting by the front of the walkway.

Tree Down

 This past week we had a night storm and I drove up my drive to have my path blocked by one of our trees. It was a nice shade tree for the driveway and will be missed. So this weekend we worked on clearing the driveway and chopping up the tree. We saved the big logs for firewood and used a loaner chipper for the smaller branches. It was hard work but we got it mostly cleaned up before the next storm came.

  

 

This was a nice shade tree and it will be missed. 

We will put in a blue spruce in its place this fall.

Husband clearing the branches

Chipper lessons on the PTO

Good news is that no animals were harmed under/in the tree.No birds and no squirrels in this tree.

But a ton of ticks, ants and beetles. I saved 2 tree truck slabs for counting the age of this tree.

Our tree was in full leaf and full of sap. It weighed a ton and then some. The root ball could barely be moved by our tractor even after the limbs were removed.