24 inches long . . .

Springtime comes and out come the fish! And OHHHHHH what fun fishing is. (for the children that is)

Along with some makeshift fishing poles, my brother brought out some actual fishing tackle and a couple of fishing poles. All the children have tried their hands at it and it seems to be a hit with all of them.


Tonight when I got home from school the older boys and Macy had just pulled out a 24 inch catfish. They are going to clean it and then eat it tomorrow for supper. I'm not sure if I will be trying it yet. It still gives me the YUKES.

Nolan's new color pencil holder design. I enjoy the natural materials used to make a creative storage place for the pencils they use when they draw. I think it might be an item that he could market on my Etsy site. :)

too many styles . . .

Did I mention that I love WARM weather! I think spending 21 years in California spoiled me a bit concerning the warmth from the sun. When the sun comes out, and it is warm here, it's like a breath of fresh air . . . an unexpected Christmas present . . . the taste of pasta after a nice glass of wine . . . OK, I'll stop with the analogies. It is WONDERFUL outside here when the sun is out though. Blue skies, clear, and the feeling that the warm weather of summer is only a few moments away. . . CAN'T WAIT! And the fact that everything here is now in FULL bloom and the promise of it staying this way is real convincing. And I am glad.

A few weeks ago I commissioned a relatively new artist to create a work of art for my home. Herrick, AKA Jax Hamlin, came up with this whimsical pen/ink and colored pencil drawing that now hangs proudly in my kitchen along side the other eclectic arrangement of French, Turkish, Australian, and American art. As an artist, I like TOO many styles and periods of art to be locked into decorating within one period of art history or style. Since the "Three French Hens" have some other French art pieces to "hang" with, they fit perfectly into my groupings of three on our back kitchen wall. Here's the closeup of the piece he made, and below is the spot where the hens occupy. If you are interested in obtaining a limited edition print of this original, please visit Jax Hamlin's Chicken Art site. If you do, you and me will be "same, same." :)

pushing it up . . .

Macy is all about the blooms that are happening here on the farm. She took this picture of one of the trees that are in bloom now. It sits behind the garage and is filled with beautiful, yellow, fuzzy buds!

Since I have been on break this week, and the weather has been EXCEPTIONALLY nice, the children and I have spent most of the day outside cleaning up the debris from the property getting it ready for planting. Nolan and I hauled some junk wood into a pile so I can burn it tomorrow. (I secretly like burning things) This is the area where we are having our garden this year. I cleared the front part and parked the chicken mobile on it so the chickens can start leveling the ground and fertilizing it for me. Next week I am moving them onto this area so they will spread the ashes around. Who needs to dig when you have 23 chickens who will scratch the earth up for you in a week.


This is our large make-shift, skid composting bin for this year. These pallets where littering the property so we decided to put them to use. I often think of my city days composting and laugh thinking how "loose" I've gotten with having things be "just so."


And then there are the farm skills we are learning along the way. When we got here, on the back side if the grain barn we found one of these 16 foot high, 400-500 pound doors that was off the track and laying on the ground. Since it was winter, we couldn't do anything about it until now, and decided to try our hands at putting it back on the track. :) After repairing the track, we first started by squat lifting it, like we were at the gym, and pushing it up while we inched backwards. The sheer weight of it almost killed us! So, we propped it up for the night using a post, and today got the improvised plan of using the ladder and the gator to push it up against the wall. We hooted when it worked! We muscled it up using a lever system and was able to secure it to the track and close the doors. I love it when things work like that.

included a picture . . .

I thought I would update the previous picture with this one (which is much better) from the back of the property. I also included a picture from the front of the house looking out the front door. The front, which is really not a way we will be entering the house, has a porch and steps, but no sidewalk leading up to it. I think years ago the horses pulled up and dropped people off, but as for the last 30 years or so, the side door has essentially become the "front door."

I took this picture tonight because I am going to be doing a work of art that includes the buildings and life around my farm. My farm . . . I love the sound of that. I am working on a large drawing of this image that will eventually be cut up into 2.5 x 3.5 card sizes and sent to people all over America and Canada. Is it part of an artist trading card swap that I have been involved with before, and this month will be doing again with the theme of farm life. How appropriate for me. :)

thanks for the light . . .

Sipping my coffee this morning, I couldn't resist taking this photo of some of the children eating breakfast. In addition, I wanted to get a photo of the chandelier I installed. This particular one Jeff gave me years ago after his family's exodus out of California. I used it outside in one house, and stored it for a couple of years while we rented homes, and now it has found its permanent spot right here. Thanks Jeff . . . it's perfect for our eat-in kitchen!

This Sunday morning we are going to visit a friend's church, then go over to a families home for the afternoon. Visiting takes on a new behavior now that we have animals to tend too. Since our cow is on a schedule, each morning and evening we are tied to the barn for our daily ritual of milking. It is a pleasure and a benefit having animals, and it is also a whole lifestyle change being homeward bound. We take our animals into consideration now when we do anything.

within the month . . .

Here's the view from behind the pond looking up toward the house and barns. We have had some REALLY warm weather this past couple of days so all the snow has melted, and the trees are starting to bud. I hope this means spring is coming soon! I am excited to see what this place looks like in the spring and summer. All the books I read concerning buying a farm always suggested looking at it through a whole year to see what each season looked like. Unfortunately, we had a couple of weeks to decide and buy this place so we didn't have time to see everything in bloom. I do know that we have a few fruits trees, but as for the rest of it . . . :)

We have had pizza night every Friday for probably 10 years now, and Ildi is now making our own Mozzarella cheese from our extra milk. In addition to cheese, for several months now she has been making all the yogurt we eat as well. And it is REALLY good.

Today she started her seedling for the garden in the house, and hopefully within the month, we will be able to till up our ground and get our garden in for this year. We'll probably do the same type of garden we had last year, since it was so successful, and add a few more square feet to the operation.

We have also decided to try our hands at another additional kind of animal. We are going to check into getting a couple of pigs to raise and butcher for our pork this year. Seems interesting . . . and challenging at the same time.

on the roof . . .

Some more before and after pictures for the fans of my interior decorating ability . . . peel paper, paint, and put my junk in. It is a simple format to follow. Those people who make/produce/star in the HGTV series Design on a Dime have nothing on me. Give me the thousand dollars and I will actually BUY something instead of getting it out of the trash or off the roadside! This is considered the 'library' room. It is more a formal living room, but since we don't have formal furniture, it not really that formal in there.




This is the view from the back enclosed patio to our property to the northwest. The pond is still frozen over (it is our water source for the house) and we have several acres of pasture beyond it that stretches to the row of trees in the background. It is really pretty to sit and look out of the family room and watch wildlife naturally occur. To the left is the chicken house that we haven't used yet.

Yesterday Asher took on a new position as a Dish Network installer. Why not have them start working at a young age! Really he was un-installing the myriad of high tech equipment that was attached to our roof. Apparently, the people that owned the house prior to the foreclosure had a GREAT need for lots of TV channels. Three mounted dishes on the roof, and one located in the yard near the pond. The boys have decided that they are making shields out of them so they don't go to waste.

until another day . . .

The kitchen was a blur the other day when the children made our noodles for the spaghetti dinner that night. We spared the wasteful expense of the Playdoh extruder and instead collected a couple of noodle makers these past few years. We have two pasta makers now, and have recently gotten them out to make homemade noodles with. As if TWO were not enough, last week Ildi's mom sent us yet another one to add to our pasta making ability. That gives three children the pleasure of making pasta at the same time. Who needs Playdoh when you have REAL DOUGH!

Composting Lesson Number One: Never pile a whole bunch of manure in the barn thinking that you will "get to it later."

Tonight, as I was mucking the area where our cow sleeps, I noticed the manure pile I was creating was slightly smoking. Just a hint of wispy smoke rising from it. I didn't think too much about it and went on with my business of throwing new bedding down for Janey to have a dry spot to sleep on. Since I have composted for years, I was aware of the breakdown of material and the heat that happens during composting. I knew that piles of green matter could sometimes reach REALLY high temperatures causing combustion, but I did not think that my 'little pile' of manure, in my barn, would be one of them.

After finishing the cleanup of milking, I waved Nolan over to come and look at my smoldering pile and said "Now this is composting at its finest" and then was planning to just let it set until another day's work. And I am SOOOOO glad I didn't. Both he and I decided right then to take the time to spread it out on pasture. (spreading it now also gives it a chance to soak into the ground before spring sets in) Thermophiles, microorganisms that live and grow in extremely hot environments that would kill most other microorganisms, were busy at work heating up the pile to the point of burning some of it. (Shawn would be happy that I have studied that a bit) As we forked it onto the Gator to move it out, we uncovered some ashy sections that had actually BURNT! That's science for you!

All in all, we got it all moved out to the field with a little more respect for decomposing matter.

a big deal . . .

Another beautiful Sunday morning in the great state of Ohio. Great state of Ohio? I'm not sure of that, but it is a beautiful morning anyway.

Yesterday I spent the day "hauling" people again. Since I had most of the last two weeks off school, I decided to drive some of my Amish friends to a sale in the largest settlement of the Amish in America. Holmes County Ohio. We were there most of the day walking around looking at all the machinery, animal tack, and farm equipment. The Amish men are REALLY into auctions and getting a "bargain."

Yesterday we got another load of hay from a local man here in Defiance county. It was the first time I bought hay from him. Second cutting alfalfa. (sounds like I know what I am talking about with grass now huh?) Since I was gone, Nolan had to be in charge of unloading hay and "settling up" with him. Since he is so close to his sixteenth birthday, now starts the two year apprenticeship program with dad to handle the finances and learn how to financially run a home. He got his first experience of dealing with another man, by himself, and writing out a check. Not to be a big deal to us who have written out checks and dealt with business transactions alone for years, but to a sixteen year old . . . it's a BIG DEAL.

view from the south . . .

Looking out the back/side door to some of our property this morning we were greeted with a winter frost/freeze over all the trees. It was ABSOLUTELY beautiful. This is the south view from the house looking over the woods and creek. Our 4 acres of woods is connected to a greater 100 acre or more patch of woods that follows the Auglaize River up to Maumee which eventually flows into Lake Erie.

This area is filled with history and I am starting to find out more about the area we are now calling home.

The city is on the site of Fort Defiance, built by General "Mad" Anthony Wayne in August 1794 at the confluence of the Auglaize and Maumee rivers. Today a lone pair of cannons outside the city library overlook the confluence and mark the location of Fort Defiance, which faced the Maumee River.

We've been here over a month now, and I am finding that I am enjoying it more and more each day.