Wednesday, July 23, 2008

Make Hay When The Sun Shines!

Our newly planted Italian Rye field is a pain in the ARS!! This stuff is waxy and with this humidity it is not drying well at all. We re-raked the first section today and tomorrow the other section will need to be re-raked. Winchester has been raking while me and Remington have been running back and forth with food and water and checking on the moisture content. We borrowed the Venne's thing-a-ma-giggy that tests moisture for crops and hay. Way coooool! This is really been invaluable for this rye.
Jeff is out baling the first section right now. There is a nice breeze this afternoon, so I hope this has speeded things up a bit in the drying.
Winchester is going white water rafting up near Duluth with the Scout Venture crew tomorrow. Rem and me planned on going but we just can't with the rye needing to be re-raked. Such is life on the farm. Sigh...ya gotta make hay when the sun shines!
OMG are we covered from head to toe with peat. The ground that the rye is planted on is peat. It is itchy and permeates to every nook and cranny on your body. I'm sure this is another reason why this rye isn't drying well. The moisture that peat holds is amazing. Well of course we know that...that's why I add peat to my dirt for starting seedlings. DUH!!!
Ok off to fix something for supper. Then I've got to get out into the garden to weed tonight for a bit. It's getting away from me again.
But that's subject is for another post.
Summer Blessings,
T

Thursday, July 17, 2008

Sultry Summer Day Musings

Ohhhhh what a wonderful day of wild crafting. Christine and her kids came over today and what fun! We found self-heal which was like finding treasure in a treasure hunt. We picked lots of nettle, yarrow and some red clover. We found some mullien too. I have the mullien flowers and the flower heads infusing in Sweet Almond Oil. Tomorrow I'll go back and pick leaves so I can dry them. I'm so glad Christine knew about the leaves. I have only used the flowers for earache oil. Maggie has been reading up on herbs and is a wealth of information even at her young age. I can't say it again...what fun! It was very sultry and hot today. It rained for just a short bit early evening, not like the thunderstorm I thought we would get.
Me and Jeff went down to the rice paddies and moved the rakes to the next field I will be raking tomorrow. I won't be going to the farmer's market obviously. But gotta make hay when the sun shines.
Found another tick on me. Ick! That's two today. We are spoiled around here with no ticks. The chickens really take care of all the bugs in the yards.
Bright Summer Blessings