This has been a busy week.  Spring is coming in with a long to-do list.  With the added stress and to-do of working from home, educating the kids and other COVID-19 stresses the farm is a source of stress relief.  We have been taking advantage of nice days and working inside early in the morning or when it is raining, in addition to having a modified “Spring Break”.  Many friends have asked, “what’s going on down on the farm?” I think this has just been a conversation starter to talk about anything other than the virus, but I promised to do a blog post with pictures of what we have been up to.

I’ll start with the cutest thing first!  This is Captain Crunch, Crunchy for short. He is the baby boy born to Cherrio today!  He is super cute!  He arrived right on is due date.  My husband when back to check on Cherrio this afternoon and there he was, not a peep out of Mom.  The baby was all dried off and happy as could be.  Mom did a great job taking care of him.  We have about 9 more babies coming this week.  This is based off the ultrasounds at the end of January.  God willing, we will be posting a lot of baby goat pictures this week.  This also means there will be new babies for sale on our Sale page!

In other goat news, we have a new milker on the stand.  We sold her kid so she is ready to join the milking ranks.  She did not think this was a good idea.  She does not want to be milked so she just sits down.  We have to train her with positive reinforcement that the stand and milking is a good thing.  It normally takes a week and lots of patience.   A stressful process for us all.

Inside the high tunnel things are growing well.  We still have another week or so before harvest, but the kale and radishes will be right on time.  There is a hard frost warning for Friday night, so we will be waiting till Saturday to transplant tomatoes and peppers.  The average daytime temp in the high tunnel without the sides open is about 120 degrees.  With the sides up it drops down into the 80’s.  At night the low is about 40’s.  That is a huge temperature swing, we are looking forward to some warmer nights soon.

Outside, we are shaping garden beds, mulching isles and laying down row covers when they are needed.  The garlic bed is at the bottom of the picture, all the logs and wood around it is holding down the wire we have to use to keep the chickens out.  Chickens are a huge frustration when we start moving dirt around in the garden, they are overly helpful.  We spent a whole day this week, re-fencing the chicken yard with 6 foot chain link.  This is in hopes to keep them out of the garden while we prep the beds and plant the crops. We are keeping our fingers crossed.  Until we know for sure we can keep them in, I will keep my garlic covered!

When I am not working on the farm, cooking, teaching my kids, teaching for school or cleaning the house, I am making masks.  The Governor issued an order that everyone must wear a cloth mask when they go out in public.  This is like a step above “cover your cough”.  Other teachers at school have helped me gather supplies and now it is time to cut and sew.  I’m happy to be able to contribute to my community and help maybe slow down this virus.  The link to the pattern I am using is below.

https://tianascloset.com/index.php/2020/02/06/face-mask-against-the-coronavirus-epidemic/

Lastly, I will leave you with this strange photo.  Can you figure out what we were doing in the kitchen this week?  We roasted the peanuts from last years garden.  I know we should have done it a long time ago, I normally roast them before Christmas, but I just never got the chance.  They still turned out great!  Growing peanuts is one of our favorite things.  There is nothing like the taste of a home grown peanut.  We all look forward to the day we can grow enough to make peanut butter.  Until then, we eat them plain, on yogurt, and in ice cream.  We roasted these in honor of all the baseball games we are missing.  It seems weird to be working on the garden without the soundtrack of baseball in the background.

So many things right now seem different.  We are trying to cherish the blessings, like the time together and online concerts.  We are praying for hospital employees and the sick.  Life is uncertain and seems like it is out of control, but we will hold tight to the truth that God is in Control.  We pray God’s will be done in our lives and that he guides us to be His hands and feet.  I hope you all have a great week.  Thank you for catching up with us.