Missing Willow Farm

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

It’s time to plant peas in our outdoor beds.  First we need to restring the fishing line that keeps the deer out of our garden.  They got every single pea plant I put in last year before we figured out the fishing line fence magic.  Luckily, we planted peas back in December in our interior greenhouse garden bed.  I’m making cheesy pasta with leeks, mushrooms and peas for dinner tonight.  Yum!

Jenna shows her lambs who’s boss.   They’re kind of ignoring her because we didn’t give her a command to move them for us… yet.

Always curious about bottle feeding, Milos stops by to sniff the formula and closely watch the proceedings.   Maybe it’s because she gets fed before him.  She cries and jumps and is generally a cute little tripping hazard until she gets her bottle.   She’s taking less and less formula which is good.  It means she’s grazing and eating hay like a big girl.

Special order from a local gift shop (my first).  I was asked to make some of the goat milk soaps that I sell at the farmer’s market.  I had to milk Hermione to fulfill the order.  The big fuzzy ones are Soap in a Sweater.   For you crafty peeps, they are a core of almond scented goat milk soap wet felted with roving from our sheep and dried off for a few days.  The heart is crafted separately then needlefelted on.  They are crazy labor intensive.  You can read that as expensive.

Jessica shares her spot at the hayring nicely.  I think she’s digging down for tasty morsels and the sheep are taking advantage.  If the sheep and goats would stay off of the hay, it might all be tasty…

Hanging out in their own mini-flock, this year’s lambs are an adorable united force on the farm.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

If you’re anxious for fresh veggies from either your garden or the farmer’s market, you could consider growing sprouts.  I found sprout seeds when I was cleaning out a kitchen cabinet that we’ve had forever.  I put a tablespoon of them in a pint jar, covered them with the green sprouting lid in the photo (although you could just as easily use a piece of pantyhose and a rubber band) then rinsed and drained them every time I went to our kitchen sink.  Just over a week later, we had crunchy sprouts for salads and sandwiches.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

With a bottle baby, we find ourselves out in the barn in full dark to give her the last feeding of the day.  It gives us a chance to have a peek at where everyone beds down for the night.  About half of our sheep and goats share the barn.  The remainder are near (or in) the hayfeeder.  The chickens huddle together on their roost.  This is the one time we can pet each and every one of them.  We have a few that squat down when they see us wanting to be petted, the rest usually run away.  The dogs are on the job.  They greet us at the gate to make sure we’re friends then go back to their posts on opposite sides of the pasture where they can see everything that goes on.  Good dogs.

Nymeria proves her sister isn’t the only cute kid in the barn.

Sheep get rounded up for grain on a beautiful snowy morning.  When Jenna was convalescing, we had to do this task ourselves.  Needless to say, there were mornings when a sheep or two missed out on their breakfast.