Egg Season has started

With longer days, egg season has begun.  We have chicken and goose eggs for sale.  Email or call for details

A Snow Day

Heavy wet snow

We got our first significant snow fall of the season - the most moisture since last August.  

We are pretty excited to see this blanket of snow.  

Ken believes if we continue to have temperatures in the 30's it will melt from below and the frost will come up.

Get out the snow shoes!

The First of the season!

Today

The goose eggs have begun!

Growing chicks

Two days old

Chicks grow so quickly!  They hatched just over a week ago.

From this...

Fluff balls

Nine days old

...to this. 

Check out the wings!

They are growing wing feathers!  

Soon they will be gawky tweens.

Weaving Merrily Along

I am slow and steady like a turtle.  I love to weave.  But there I am slow, too.  I choose patterns that take more time.  I had a rough realization today.  I get sad at the end of February as I realize winter is winding down and I still have many enjoyable tasks I had hoped to accomplish this winter.  It is the same in August when the days get shorter and I realize summer is coming to an end.

Here is a photo of the third rug on the loom.  I hope to complete this one and start another tomorrow.  Thanks to everyone for the positive feedback and encouragement.  I will keep at it!

Sprouts for Poultry

While Ken is at the organic conference, I am taking on his chores.  One is to sprout grain for the birds. Grain comes in a complete little package and once sprouted, that grain has more nutrition.  Ken has had a tough time finding grain that will sprout.  Grain that is not viable has less nutrition. Once grain is broken or ground it begins to decay.  Grain that has been ground a long time becomes rancid. Ground feed from grain that doesn't sprout has lower nutrition.

In the old days farmers sprouted grain for livestock and poultry.  I have seen plans for sprouting grain for cows from a book published in the early 1900's.  Ken's and my grandfathers  ground grain once a week for their animals.  Now we buy feed of unknown age and viability for our animals.  This does not seem like progress. 

Currently we are transitioning our animals away from soy as we read more and more of its adverse affects.  It amazes me as the chickens have picked through their feed leaving the soybeans as long as I can remember.  Soybeans are a relatively new addition to feed.  Soy was added as a protein source as corn became grown for volume not nutrition and its protein dropped dramatically. 

Pottery Progress

Drying bowls and platters

Ken is winding up the throwing and trimming part of pottery making.  He forms a pot, trims the bottom, lets the piece dry slowly, and then bisques it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Teapots and more

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Bisque is to to fire clay to the point it will not return to mud.  Ken has found that using a bisque firing enables him to make lighter pottery and have less breakage in the final glaze firing.  

Botanical prints and trays

Once pots are at this point, they all need to be glazed and stacked in the kiln.  For our large kiln that holds 2,000 - 3,000 pieces, the glazing and stacking requires about a month.