Family Fun: Pop-up Pond

It was raining buckets on Tuesday.  Clay soil, saturated water levels, a couple low spots that all the water tends to flow into, and a very rainy year, all worked together made a pop-up pond in the back yard. 

 First the kids and I played in it. The turkeys tried to follow us, as usual, but they did not understand the appeal.

 Then after about an hour, the ducks and geese finally realized that it was a magical kingdom for them to play in.

It was mostly gone by the time hubby came home from work and all gone by Wednesday. I guess we know where to put a water feature if we ever decide that we want one.

Family Fun: County Fair

Our first county fair in the new county (we did not go last summer).

 We let the kids each pick 2 rides, since it is very pricey.

 There were also lots of great free farm games, like playing in the feed corn.

 And of course lots of farm animals! This is a beautiful grand prize winning Nigerian Dwarf goat -- the kind that I hope to have some day. I bet her kids are expensive, but I intend to ask the owner about it next year.

 We watched some sheep shearing.

 Checked out the rabbit competition to see whether we want to enter some bunnies next year.

  We admired the unique varieties of poultry and the prize winners.  Our friends that split the turkey poults with us entered their turkeys. They only got third and fourth places. Okay, well good to know.

 Practicing milking

 Bee keepers

Family Fun: Grandpop's Visit

This is the picture I took:

 All these others are the Pro pictures from Grandpop:

We went blackberry picking at one of our favorite spots. They are so huge and juicy.

 

 

 

  Big sister A is looking so fashionable here.  I love watching her figure out her own style.

  Not sure what happened to make L make this face, but I think it's cute.

 

 I like this series of pics showing how my goosies follow me around. They come around when they see me putting the turkeys in for the night.

  Then we have a little visiting time.

 Then I carry the feed bag over toward their house and they honk excitedly and follow me to their dinner.  Not sure how I am going to part with them... Someone told me that they are like dogs in personality and I really think that is true. They want treats, let me pet them, and they like to just hang out together and see what I am doing.

 

Farm Fresh: Swimming in Tomatoes

 This has been a lovely summer for gardening -- not too hot and raining regularly at almost perfectly spaced intervals. I harvested all the last onions and carrots 2 weeks ago.

 It's my first year successfully growing carrots. I think interplanting them with the onions really worked well. We harvested about 20 lbs of carrots from the 4 rows I planted.

I also harvested all the remaining leeks and beets. I should have harvested the beets earlier. The first set were much more tender. But I have just been so busy with the tomatoes! We are averaging one basket full every day. 

What are you doing with all those tomatoes? you might wonder...
Canning! Often into the wee hours of the morning...NOT recommended, but soon they will (probably?) stop producing as much and then harvest will be over. I am trying to keep up with the flood.

 Last year I canned 45 jars of salsa. We have 10 leftover... so I canned 36 more jars of "Fiesta Salsa" and "Zesty Salsa" from the Ball Canning book.  Then since I have a good crop of tomatillos this year, I also made 10 pint jars of my favorite "Tomatillo Salsa" (also from the class Ball Canning book-- which I like better than all my specialty canning books btw. The Ball Canning recipes always turn out well.)
 I am trying a couple of different tomato sauce canning recipes now. The one I think I will like the best is Basil Garlic Sauce.  I am also searching for other "quick meal in a jar" type ideas.  I have two different pickled vegetable recipes that I think I might be able to just mix with olive oil, some feta cheese, and olives -- to toss with pasta for pasta salad. Maybe for Christmas I will get a pressure canner and start making some real meals in jars next year.

 I canned peaches too, but hubby is eating about one jar a day, so those won't last long. I made a new batch of pickled beets with the ones I harvested from the garden.

The next tidal wave that I foresee is winter squash. I planted a TON. And they are going a little crazy growing away from the places I planted them, over the fence and through the fence.

 I am not planning to feed most of this to my family.  I am going to only feed the poultry minimal grain this winter, but lots of squash, mangel beets, and sunflower seeds that we grew ourselves. Buying mixes at the feed store is pretty pricey and I want to be more self sufficient.