Missing Willow Farm

Gigantic green eggs are normal around here, but we found this weird tiny little brown one in with the others.   That’s a U.S. quarter for a size comparison.  I’m sure it’s just a tiny chicken egg but it made us wonder if a dove or a quail snuck into our barn and left us a present.

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Chicken dinner.  Those chickens we got last Fall ended up being mostly roosters.  We’ve been enjoying wobbly adolescent crowing noises until I discovered our tiny banty chicken Nugget cowering in one of the nests.  She had been almost pecked to death by one of the roos.  That meant it was time to bust out the scalder…  The last time we had roosters, we just kicked them out of the henhouse.  With the run of our entire farm, they managed to wander into the big pasture and got eaten off by our guardian dogs.  We decided we’d rather eat them ourselves.  Processing day is Jenna’s favorite day on the farm.  She gets to stare at birds all morning, and receives the occasional liver treat.  I love watching Jenna watch the birds.  Thankfully Nugget is healing, and we’re having fried chicken for dinner tonight.

Summer gets formula everywhere!  She’s very slobbery when she eats.  It’s probably why feeding time usually attracts the dogs, goats and cow.   Goat formula smells just like baby formula.  I wonder how much difference there is?

….when they sleep?

Beatrice finally had her lamb, a real cutie!  She was getting pretty rotund.  She had a little ewe, we named her Victoria.  Her offspring, like last year’s Eugenie, are being named after British royalty.  Beatrice’s mom came from another farm and was named 602.  I like our naming convention much better.  🙂

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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…