Sunday, January 20, 2013

Another week




Sunday, January 20, 2013
Saturday morning was down around zero and neither Fern nor I enjoyed milking. She gave less than 1 1/2 gallon.
Sally did not let the sheep in with the cows thus preventing them from getting at the new round bale. It was perched in the hay ring atop the uneaten old hay and she was afraid it might tip over. Also, Milton, the steer, finds the sheep annoying, or perhaps amusing, and chases them around which encourages them to jump into the hay. Fern had all day Saturday to eat her new hay and today she had a lot more milk. It was about one and three-fourths gallons.
Martin is home from Tucson and he came up today to pick up his dog. He did many useful things around here including speeding up my computer, fixing Sally’s virus control, also went to the dump for us, and more. We gave him some good bean soup. That I made yesterday..

Monday, January 21, 2013 Martin Luther King Day
It was six degrees when we got up, went to a high of eighteen but was quite windy and unpleasant. We got nine eggs and nearly one and three quarters gallons of milk.
We let the sheep into the beefer pen today with some reservations about the round bale, but we were not happy about their access to water when in their pen all day where they just have a single bucket. In this cold weather it freezes up quickly. The large bucket in the beefer pen has a heated water tub. The sheep did go right over and drink.
I managed to do some editing today. Sally threshed some more wheat grain and worked on her weaving. We had a lovely dinner of chicken livers from the Luick’s home raised birds. They were sautéed with bacon grease and soy sauce.
When we were coming back from the barn in the gloaming Willie showed us that there was a fine big box over by the gate., presumably left by the UPS man. Willie was a big help dragging it over to the house. It proved to contain a large screen monitor for my computer so that I can see better. It was sent by DS Bret.

Tuesday, January 22, 2013
Nine eggs today, one and three fourths gallons of milk. It was about 5 degrees and got up to about 14. We kept the sheep in until about noon, then let them out to play.
Sally and Willie took advantage of a lack of wind in the morning and walked over to her little house. It was looking very good and keeping warm inside. She was glad to see that she still has half a tank of fuel. A couple of months ago someone was helping himself from the tank.
We defrosted some of the new porkchops. I prepared them using a recipe I developed which involves peanut butter and soy sauce. They turned out perfectly and we ate every nibble except for the bones for Willie. Sally made shortcake and we had it with strawberries I had frozen (warmed up in the Aga) and clouds of whipped cream.

Thursday, January 24, 2013
It is not any colder, it just feels that way. Another day starting around -10 with a high around +5F, mostly sunny but with a biting wind is leaving us all tired, yet reminding ourselves that is even colder farther north. The cold seems to have become cumulative. It is harder to heat the house and the water system warming box in the barn can’t stay warm.. Besides the light left on inside it, Sally puts four ½ gallon jugs of hot water inside it and by evening they are starting to freeze.
The chickens don’t seem cheerful. We got nine eggs again and Fern gave 1 ¾ gallons of milk. Putting the machine on her this morning was no fun. The hoses on the claw are too cold and stiff to flop down as they need to do to close off the vacuum as necessary. Plus the pulsator wasn’t working at first because it had slid out of position. Sally arrived in time to help attach the cups.
Later on Sally cheered us up with a tart made with four kinds of fruit and jam from the frig and a chocolate biscotti crust using biscotti she found in the freezer. of course I whipped cream again.

Friday, January 25, 2013
Almost a gallon and a half of milk, and ten eggs. It wasn’t quite as cold, about zero instead of ten below. Sally was having some work done on her little house and had to jump into the car and go see the workmen before milking. They tried to fix the Monitor heator but no luck. Quite disappointing.
Things went a little better in the barn this morning. Fern has been coming in very dirty for no good reason which prolongs the milking occasion.
Abby is flying back to Maine tonight and we look forward to seeing her tomorrow with Mark and Annie.
I just received an invitation from Sally Fallon to speak at the November 2013 Wise Traditions conference in Atlanta, Georgia.

*****************************************


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad