A Sad Farewell to our Little Feathered Friends

We had an unexpected and unwelcomed visitor to our little farm this past week. Monday night as we were loading up the piggies to meet the butcher, (that is a whole post in itself... it took 2 hours!) I looked in the chicken coop and saw three poor little frozen hens and one bloody hen. It was so sad! As soon as I said what I saw, Caleb yelled, "Is it Afro?!" Afro is his special little Houdan hen with funky head feathers. Sadly, she was among the dead. He and Luke were both so sad. Caleb was teary. They have raised these hens since they were two-day-old chicks. These are the ones that came in the mail. (see March post)


We closed off the little ramp to their "chicken run" to keep them only in the coop that night and to keep our visitor out! To our horror, the next morning Eric discovered 6 more dead. Now we knew it was getting in some other way. We added more chicken wire all around the coop. The next night we put the baby monitor out there and the receiver in our bedroom, but we didn't hear anything and they were all okay Wednesday. Thursday morning I heard all the hens squawking so I ran out there and found a long, black, silky MINK in the coop!! He had killed one more and one was really bloody. We had suspected it was a mink because we knew it had to be something very small and sneaky. Now I was face to face with it! I grabbed a shovel and tried to whack it, but it kept hiding behind the nesting boxes. After about 15 minutes of FREEZING out there, I ran inside to grab Eric's gun. (We were in a super-cold spell... it was -10 outside!! The coldest it's ever been since we moved here!) Caleb was at the table enjoying his hot cocoa and reading a book, totally unaware of what was going on. He and Luke ran outside with me and Caleb shot it with Eric's .22! He hit it on the first try, but it moved just a bit more and he said, "I better shoot it again just to be sure!" ;) And so he did.

Here is the proud hunter with his kill. He said he felt a lot of satisfaction shooting the mink after it killed 12 of his chickens.




I called the Sheriff and made a report. There are two mink farms in the area (do people really wear mink!?) and it must have escaped from one. He said he is building a case against them to force them take more precautions. He took the mink with him for evidence. Caleb was SO BUMMED when he came home from school to find his mink gone. He really wanted to skin it! Mink are really mean. It was hissing at me as I was trying to chop it! They don't eat the whole chicken, just chew on their heads and eat their brains. It's really sad and very GROSS!

Now our poor chickens are traumatized! We have about 13 left out there and today we only got 2 eggs. Yesterday we didn't get any. Caleb called all of his egg customers and told them he wouldn't be delivering any more eggs. They had been delivering 6-7 dozen eggs each week. So, their little egg business is out of business for now.

OxMen 4 & G'ma O LIVE!

Here is one of the songs from G'ma O's Birthday Bash-- "Red River Valley". It reminds me of my G'pa O... a good 'ol cowboy song. The audio isn't the best because I was using my regular camera (Santa might be bringing me something better to record with next time!!) but you can hear the OxMen 4 and G'ma O. They were great!

G'ma O's 95th Birthday Bash

The day after Thanksgiving was my Grandmother's 95th Birthday. We celebrated in with a big party in Mesquite. It was quite the event! I'm not sure of the final count, but they prepared for 150 people and I didn't see many empty chairs.

G'ma O is pretty amazing. She lives in her own home, she gardens, paints, plays the organ & harmonica, eats VERY healthy food, still cans fruits and veggies in the fall. I hope I can be as healthy as she is at 95!




Below are the OxMen 4 (my brothers) who treated us to some oldies... all chosen by G'ma. They were great! They harmonize well!
[l-r Paul (guitar), Aaron (drums), Marc (bass), Eric (guitar)



After a few songs, we had a guest appearance!! G'ma O joined them on the harmonica. It was great!
Who would have thought all those years of hearing my brothers pound drums and blast guitars would eventually payoff in a day like this? They really were great!

She plays the harmonica very well. They were playing "You Are My Sunshine" here.


Marc, Jill, Michelle, Eric, Auntie Kathy, G'ma, Dad, Mom, Alicia, me, Paul, Aaron


A few of the girls (minus my sis'-in-law) .....

Little Anne Josephine with Great G'ma Josephine. Too funny not to include.


My Grandmothers: Mary Rawlins Beecher and Josephine Genevieve Fogliani Oxborrow. Aren't they cute!?


Here she is.. and happy this time! :)


G'ma O with her sister, Pete, and me. Pete's real name is Esther, but has always been called Pete. Their family all had nicknames: Jigger, Teensy, Sukie, Doc and I'm forgetting some...

Thanks for the great party, Mom & Dad! And thanks to G'ma O for living a wonderful life and letting us celebrate it!

Halloween

We had Eric's mission buddy Ryan and girls over for our 4th Annual Pumpkin Carving Contest. We missed Heather and Savannah who were home sick. Okay so it's not really a contest... but carving with the Konolds is serious business! They've introduced us to all the right tools, templates and techniques. BOO!










"I know there's something good inside this wrapper... if I can just get to it!"



I LOVED that they all wanted simple costumes this year... makes life much easier! :)


Sorting out their loot...... All that candy makes me sick! I tried to buy it from them... but they weren't interested in that!

Printing Blog???

I'm wanting to print my blog... since this is my "photo journal". I have actually done FOUR photobooks this year (miracle of miracles!) of my kids & trips, but I'd still like to print this.

I've checked out a couple of sites blog2print.com and blurb.com Does anyone have any experience with these or other sites? Let me know, pleeeease! :)

Our Summer Garden

I was just going to post a few pix of the garden, but then this cute little primary song came to mind... and so another video was born. (Cherryl, you're rubbing off on me!) :)

I love, love, LOVE growing a garden! It brings such satisfaction to start with dirt and end up with so much fruit and veggies. I really don't even mind weeding. I just love to see things grow!

Eric put in a drip system this spring and that made a huge difference! It watered evenly and everything grew much better! We planted 15 blackberry plants, 27 raspberry plants, and 120 strawberry plants in raised beds. It was WONDERFUL eating fresh berries all summer. Anne LOVED IT. Any time we were in the backyard she would wander over the berries and start eating! Ahhhh, I wish summer could last all year! (I guess it could if we moved back to Mesa, right!?) :)




Those boxes of green things (end of movie) look like apples but are actually TOMATOES! A hard frost was coming really early, like end of September, so I picked them all and let them ripen on trays in my garage. It's amazing they can go from little hard, green balls to soft, red, juicy tomatoes. Listen to me... what am I saying? I don't even like to eat them raw. (see previous post) But I really love watching them grow ... and making sauce with them!

It's CANNING TIME!

I was checking my sister's blog the other day and noticed that under my link it says it's been 4 WEEKS since I've last posted. what? Where does the time go and what have I been doing!? Well, I have been crazily canning/drying/freezing all kinds of yummy things from our garden and local fruit. Here is a sample of the fruits of my *intense* labor! :)

Little man was happy to pose with all the goods.

These are like little jars of sunshine all bottled up!

5 Pints of apple butter
10 Quarts of spaghetti sauce Yes, more that 50 lbs of tomatoes from our garden an NOT ONE did we eat fresh. I know we're crazy, but none of us like tomatoes... but we love pasta!
20 Quarts of apple pie filling Just dump it into a pie crust & bake. Voila! Apple pie in no time! I also use it to make apple crisp with a crumb topping and vanilla ice cream, of course!
30 Quarts of applesauce No sugar here... just the real stuff and it is YUMMY!
30 Quarts of Pears My kids' favorite! Next year I need to do at least 100! Luke will eat an entire jar by himself!
30 Quarts of Peaches From the orchard up the road. Yummy!
6 Pints of jam, plus TONS of little freezer jams in containers for Christmas gifts. I'm thinking ahead this year! No rushing around for neighbor gifts again like last year.



But wait, we're not done yet...............


We bagged up and froze about 40 quart bags of corn from our garden. It is sooo yummy, just like eating corn on the cob!


Peter Piper Picked a Peck of Pickled Peppers......

Our peppers did great this year. I froze 2 gallon-size bags for chili, sweet & sour chicken, and fajitas. I friend suggested last year that I freeze my peppers and I loved having them all year. This year I have twice as much!


Just to try it out, I also dehydrated a bunch of peppers. Man, they shriveled up to nothing! That (above) is all the peppers from 5 trays on the dehydrator... and it doesn't even fill up a sandwich bag! They are actually really tasty to eat just as they are, but I plan to throw them in soup or whatever?



And finally... APPLES!

This was a GREAT year for apples here! Everyone had tons on their trees. Eric's parents brought buckets and buckets from their friend's house every time they came to visit. Besides the applesauce and pie filling, I've been drying them. They are so tasty! My kids are hooked. We've been eating bags and bags of dried apples. Anne even learned to say, "Appoo" and reaches from some.

This handy-dandy peeler/slicer/corer is a MUST!! I got it for Christmas a few years ago (thanks Mom & Dad!) and I use it all the time! It also works great for peeling potatoes quickly for mashed potatoes.
The pigs have been loving all the scraps they get from my canning. (yellow bowl)


It does all the work and leaves you with a perfect spiral apple.


Just dip them in water with lemon juice for a minute or two and lay them out on the trays. I borrowed a friend's dehydrator so I can do double time... 15 trays at once.

The finished product... so good and good for you, too! I've been sending them in the boys' lunches. I guess Luke has been sharing them because one of his friend's Mom called me for my dried apple recipe. She said he was begging her to make some. Cute, eh?

Well, there you have it. I might be slacking in my blogging... but at least I have something to show for it! :)

Honey, here I come!

We just extracted our honey last weekend. What a fun summer it has been with the bees! We have learned a lot... what to do... and what NOT to do! Caleb's hive did great and he got just under 40lbs of honey. Our three hives did pretty good (considering they swarmed) ... we got almost 50lbs. (about 3 gallons) It tastes really good! Now for breakfast the boys want toast with "homemade honey" on it! :)

Here is a little look-back at the whole bee experience. If this video really uploads and works I'm going to be totally amazed and very proud of myself because I never can figure these things out!! Be sure to turn your speakers on... (if it works!!) :)

The Big Trip (Part 6 I think)

Okay I have seriously dragged this family vacation out waaaay toooo loooong! :) I gotta finish and post the other **exciting things** happening in our lives! :)

September: school starting + soccer season + canning peaches/pears = ONE CRAZY MONTH!!




Carlsbad Caverns, New Mexico

These caves were awesome!! The inside rooms were ENORMOUS!!! It was nice and chilly down there.



800 feet below the earth they have a restaurant built into the rock. It's kinda crazy! Looks like something from a sci-fi movie.











Below is the entrance to the cave. The night before we hiked the cave, we watched 250,000 bats fly out of the opening at dusk. It looked like smoke swirling up through the air.

The Big Trip (Part 5)

OLD TOWN ALBUQUERQUE

After our "awesome" camping spot in Nageezi, we headed to Albuquerque. Coming into the city, it looked like Phoenix... lots of newer tract houses way out in the desert.

Old Town Albuquerque was really fun. We had a picnic lunch on the grass in the town square, walked around and looked at the shops, visited the RATTLESNAKE MUSEUM and saw a video of a cobra eating an antelope (won't eat again for one year!) and enjoyed a snow cone. Albuquerque is more than 300 years old!


This old cannon was a hit with the boys! They each posed individually for several shots on it... but here is a group photo.


We drove to the Albuquerque Temple for a quick visit. It is really beautiful! The grounds were very nice, of course, and the flowers were gorgeous! It is neat to see all the different temples. What a blessing to have them closer to so many people!

The Big Trip (Part 4)

Nageezi, New Mexico (where??)

On our way to Albuquerque we were all ready to get out of the car.... so we pulled off the road out in the middle of nowhere -- somewhere near Nageezi -- and set up camp. The boys thought we were the luckiest people to have found such a cool spot.



The hill formations were really fun for the boys to climb. They were entertained for hours!
















There was an oil derrick not too far away. We heard the click click click all night long.



The sunset was GORGEOUS! I took a half-dozen pictures because it kept changing from shades of red to orange to pink.






The effect on the mountains was so pretty! They were all ablaze!!






Of course, the best part is roasting marshmallows around the fire.



Cute little baby Anne loved crawling all around in the dirt. I was hoping she would be walking by now so she wouldn't be so dirty every time we camped. Oh well!