Tuesday, August 3, 2010

Morning Chores- Watering - A pet peeve

I slept in until 5 AM (thank you Tramadol). It was 78°, not much of a cool down.
Predicting 100° again today and dry.

I fixed home-raised scrambled eggs, home-made toast with purple hull jelly and soon will have home-raised milk to drink.

These days I am waiting until 8 AM to go out so my hands will limber up some. Got up Willow and put her into the barn with the two babies. The orphan didn't need much help this morning. Good! I let them nurse until they quit. While watching them, I lobbed off some very giant lambs quarter out of the lot. You almost need a chain saw if you let it get too big.

Flies are horrendous this time of year so I sprayed all the babies and cow with a safe for dairy pyrethrin spray. By the time, I milked out my little 1/2 gallon there were no flies buzzing around me. In about a week, I will just let the babies have one quarter each and then will pull them off so I can get some for us. I will just have to do this about three times a week. Right now they aren't taking it all so I will milk each morning to empty her out. The more you take, the more they try to replace it.

Bottled my little share, washed up utensils in the Milk Parlor and came back to the house.

Gardening

I turned the sprinkler on last evening and forgot about it, so the southeast corner of the house and yard got a good soaking! This morning I moved it west to soak the other newer shrubs, a viburnum and Little Lamb hydrangea and others. I will just give it a couple of hours.


I am still picking JB off roses........this morning I just sprayed again. Will they never leave?

I will need to pick sweet corn and tomatoes either this evening or in the morning and I have let the okra get too big....I did process the last two quarts of the peaches yesterday morning. Also need to pick the last of the PEPH peas. I am trying to decide if I should buy a few peaches or not this year.

I planted my one vigna caracalla (corkscrew vine) inside early this year hoping for more blooms. Sue mentioned that they like cool weather to bloom. I am betting I won't get a single one this year. It is climbing like crazy though. That's it heading to the roof at the end of the porch.
From August 2010
Can you see my desk lamp in the one? I refer to this corner of the dining room as my office....desk, computer, etc. I love being able to look out over things, especially the birds at the feeders in winter and the cats daily sitting on the porch swing. Don't know where they were this morning. They were all there when we fed them earlier.
From August 2010
It was this corner that got the soaking.

Pet Peeve

I just know Tide is no longer the product it once was. I used to be able to get that green tomato stain off my work clothes but can't anymore! I am betting the environmental government people have stepped in once again and made them quit using something. I will now have to bleach a tee shirt, an apron and a long sleeve shirt. They make them build appliances now that use less water, toilets that use less water....so dishes don't get clean, we have to flush twice....but they don't inspect large farming operations for cleanliness or factories who process our food and people get sick and some even die..........let the blasted cleaning products alone!!!!

6 comments:

  1. Glenda, sounds like you are working really hard. This heat doesn't help, does it?

    Your place looks really nice. Hugs

    ReplyDelete
  2. I am giggling about you "sleeping in" until 5 a.m. It is so cool that you make such use of the plants you grow, and the animals you raise. Do you grow your own wheat and grind it, too? I used to have a dream of living off the land, and you are very close to doing that.

    Thanks for the link, but I'm trying to remember where I would have said the corkscrew vine likes cooler temperatures to bloom. Ours is finally blooming, but it is actually a plant that likes warm temps, at least it doesn't like to get below 55 or so at night. I guess I'm not sure how much heat during the day it likes.

    I hope you are able to get your clothes clean.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I like your house, by the way. I just clicked on a couple of your photos to see the details. Is that a while nicotiana in one of the photos? Does it get aphids on it? I grew it one year, and it did. I want to try it again.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Sue, I have a lot of white nicotiana scattered here and there. They have had aphids in the past but not a single one this year. If you want seeds, just let me know. I can collect a bunch for you.

    ReplyDelete
  5. July 23, you mentioned lows of 60° and I assumed that meant it liked cooler night time temps and ours have been hovering around 80 for some time now. Maybe there is hope after all!

    ReplyDelete
  6. Oh, that's funny. Here in Nebraska, the spring lows are below 60 for quite awhile. The snail vines don't like the temps to be lower than that. It can be a struggle keeping them alive in their little pots before it's time to plant them. You can't buy them in town, just at the annual spring sale, where a nursery in another part of the state brings a whole bunch of different kinds of plants to sell.

    I'm glad you remembered what it was I said.

    Thanks for offering me some nicotiana seeds. I wonder if there's anything I grow that you'd like seeds of?

    ReplyDelete