August Garden

 

Late summer garden

August-! The summer is flying by, and we've already started doing distinctly non-summer activities, like shopping for school supplies. Strange to already be done with that task, but the kids begged me ("For once, Mom! FOR ONCE") to take them early, rather than late. They wanted to see the full array of folders, pencil cases and locker gadgets that all the other kids get to see... what's available to those whose mothers don't postpone and procrastinate.

They would never admit it, but come August the idea of school is exciting. They want to think about it and prepare, and having the right number of pencils on hand is key.

Indian corn

Meanwhile, Jon and I spend a lot of our free time managing the big gardens we planted. It's fun but time-consuming, this time of year. We have one in our backyard, another at our neighbor's, greenhouse plants to water, and field corn in a back field. Everything's organic so there are lots of weeds to manually keep in check. I've been concerning myself mainly with the garden in our backyard. The kids help weed and water at the greenhouse.

Besides weeding, it takes time to pick, wash, and preserve the vegetables. Busy, busy, busy!

So what do we have right now? Well, the cool weather crops are done, for the most part... rhubarb, lettuce, asparagus, radishes, and strawberries. We're still getting peas, but those are winding down. Now we're getting tons of cucumbers and beans. We also have potatoes, carrots, beets, broccoli, egg plant, onions, garlic, and peppers... probably others I've left out, as well.

I picked the first ripe tomatoes today :).

Have you ever seen how those heavy tall corn stalks are anchored to the ground?

We have Indian corn (the colorful, non-edible kind), and it's probably 13 feet high. Some of our sunflowers are even taller. Sweet corn and sprawling vine vegetables like pumpkins, squash, and zucchini are planted at the neighbor's, this year.


We don't use any chemicals on our garden... no weed killer or artificial fertilizer. So far we haven't had to water... the natural rainfall here is enough. Jon adds compost to the soil every year and we rotate where things are planted. He's been experimenting with different kinds of mulching techniques. The garden in our back yard has slightly raised beds with good drainage. It seems like the soil gets better each year. When we first started gardening the soil would get a crust on it that cracked. It dried into hard clumps, during dry spells. Now the soil is darker and has a loamy, soft texture. It's full of living things, including worms.

Beans climbing up a pole

We don't have a fence around the garden, and so far we haven't been forced to build one. Each year we lose some leaves, vegetables and even whole plants to bugs, deer, or other hungry "guests", but only once has the loss been significant (the year the raccoons ate all the corn). For the most part it's been a little here, a little there, with more than enough "left behind" for us.

The enjoyable part about gardening is seeing what happens. You don't have to be in control of everything. Of course you learn over time what works and what doesn't. But with good conditions, a garden is forgiving. You can have a crazy week and ignore it, and still go out later and find food. Sometimes I see bugs on the leaves... oh well. I leave them, because I don't know which are "good" and which are "bad". You don't have to know everything to start a garden.


It's such a primal thing, growing food. We weed in the early evening, when it's shady and cool. The kids like to act grudging about it, but they don't 100 % hate it... we talk. Sometimes we listen to Emma's music. It's a simple pleasure to sit on upside down buckets and touch dirt, feel wind, hear bugs and birds... everybody working. Nothing needs to be said. When you're done you can look back with satisfaction at a neater-looking row.


I think of our good soil and growing conditions a lot lately.

Cabbage

Our best ever crop of broccoli

We tried different types of sunflower this year

tomatoes!

Our gift to the birds and bugs

First year we had apples on this tree! Jon planted it about 5 years ago.

My herb garden. Empty section is where the dill was.

I was about to go into a long ramble, there, about how long it takes to develop good topsoil (over 100 years), and how casually it's being ruined to dig sand mines (topsoil doesn't stay "alive" when it's scraped off and piled for a long period of time). But I will spare you all that and give you the short version (which you have already read, so relax).

 

Enjoy the rest of your summer!!

 

Ode to the Heroic Last Days of a Smart Chicken

Smart chicken

In the beginning we named them all: Ulga, Blackie, Goldie, Chicken Jane. We celebrated their individuality and unique characteristics.They were like little walking lawn ornaments / personalities to us; they clucked and cooed their way around the yard, eating bugs, "fertilizing" our side walk, and gifting us each morning with the best fresh eggs you can imagine. To a couple of Eau Claire transplants and hobby farm wanna-be's like me and Jon, the whole chicken enterprise seemed fun and ridiculously easy. I can't remember any problems, the first few years.

Yeah, well. Turns out that was mostly luck. There were several big holes in our benevolent free range chicken concept: 1) Chickens don't always stay in your yard. How do they know where your yard ends and the neighbor's begins? And 2) chickens taste, well... like chicken. They are darn tasty to foxes, raccoons, weasels, bird dogs and a host of other critters who called this place home long before we ever did.

Either she wanted to come inside or she was looking at her reflection, for a friend :(.

So we learned to fortify our coop. Concrete block or heavy stone along the base. No gaps in the fencing. Secure roof on top. Sealing the coop was a trial and error process with feedback being "The chickens are alive!" or "This pile of feathers here. Where's Chicken Jane?" Letting them out later in the day, so the free ranging was a shorter time span and mostly confined to those hours when we were home, seemed to help. Key to everything was (and is) locking the chicken coop door at twilight, after first ascertaining that the chickens are safely perched INSIDE the coop.

We got better at keeping chickens alive. But without consciously discussing it, as the replacement chickens came and "went", we stopped naming our chickens.

Still, of late, one chicken had distinguished herself. She was unusual enough for us all to spot a difference. For one, Teddy was afraid of her... she like to be around people and didn't care for his territorial yippy-yap, in regards to us. She was the one the other chickens had left out of their little clucky-cluck club: the maverick... younger and leaner... slightly scruffy. Who didn't care which places were official bug hunting grounds for the older chickens... She knew there would be beetles and worms in the fresh dirt I was digging up, and that I would let her get at them. Smart Chicken.

But four nights ago there was an incident. We forgot to shut the coop door, and apparently raccoons got in. Jon woke to frantic chicken distress around 11 am. His recovery effort led to one survivor: Smart Chicken.

My garden companion

After that, in the evening, come twilight, Smart Chicken would disappear, not returning to the coop (that site of carnage). We couldn't find her new hiding place. We'd walk around the yard, calling, and wouldn't hear a peep (usually chickens coo back). We'd leave the door open, just in case, and wondered if she'd survive the night. The raccoons were still around, as evidenced by the upset food they'd leave behind in the unlocked coop. But for three legendary nights, Smart Chicken quietly survived the night terrors. My affection and interest in her grew. I was determined to celebrate her exploits in this blog.

Then last night. RIP, Smart Chicken. The boys (David and Michael) heard cries in the yard. We searched, but she'd vanished. We have not seen her yet today.

Other chickens have come and gone; they will continue to come and go in the future, too, since we are determined to have more chickens. But this is the one I feel worst about; I really do. I think it's because I identify with her a bit. Like Smart Chicken, I'm okay being on my own. I can be brave and smart. Definitely I am on the scruffy side; the other chickens (I mean, people) don't necessarily think I'm cool, but I get by just fine.

Smart Chicken's story reminds me that while I will successfully go my own way for awhile, in the end, my fate will be an ordinary one. One day I will be here; the next I will be gone. Such is the human condition.

So anyhoo. How do you segue from THAT to ordinary pictures of random summer happenings? Not sure, but here goes...

Like a bunch of happy chickens who act as if our lives will never be touched by foxes or raccoons, we've been going on busily with our lives. That includes a trip to Kentucky to spend more time with Susan, Jay, and baby Oliver. We also attended cousin Peggy Linskey's 4th of July reunion and watched fireworks at Phil and Jill's on Lake Holcombe. Right now we're enjoying a visit with David.

Here are the pictures, in no particular order:

Library volunteers

Boat ride

Kissy faces at the fair (and my finger)

Helping Alicia at her yard sale

Family reunion at Peggy's

Puppy at the fair

Uncle Chuck and Aunt Jane's 50th Anniversary cake at Peggy's

Aunts Irma, Margaret, and Lorely, with Dad and Uncle Chuck

Phil and Jill's cottage on Lake Holcombe, where we watched fireworks

Leila and Oliver

Michael and Jackson

Susan carrying Oliver on an outing

Oliver spending time at an outdoor water park

The little family

David and Logan joined us in Kentucky

Could his little face be more expressive??

A meal with Jay's parents

Looking like his daddy, here, I think

Leila can ride without training wheels, now!

David eating pancakes and eggs Emma made him

Sisters having a playful moment

David at Grandma Jane's

David and his Aunt Ann

Nephew Joe's daughter Lauren and Leila beading necklaces

With Grandma Jane

Surprise visit with Kelsey and Evie!

neat little outbuilding on Luke and Kelsey's property

I apologize if parts of this blog had a morbid tone. This blog is driven by my desire to stay in communication with family and friends, but it has a secondary purpose of allowing me a forum for writing. That secondary purpose kind of took over today. I had a strong compulsion to write about Smart Chicken and honor her life :).

Visits With Laurie and Don

I thought maybe it'd been a month since I last posted... now I see it's been TWO. Oops. Hopefully you haven't been forlorn without me ;).

My sister came over for a visit this weekend. Laurie's my only sister, seven years younger than me, and has become a good friend in adulthood. 

Laurie and Jon at Emma's game

We have a lot in common but we're not exactly the same. A few of the differences? Well, unlike me she never forgets a birthday. People receive their birthday cards from her in a timely manner, and there's none of this calling them the day of their birthday (or several days later) and saying lamely, "The card is on the way," as I am bound to do.

Emma and her Aunt Lulu

She has a school teacher's relatively high standards for kids' behavior. She notices when they are trying to cut corners or evade a consequence. I am likely to either miss the whole thing or be a big sympathetic softy at the first sign of a hurt feeling.

Miss Pitty Pat (aka Mama Kitty)

Another big Laurie-Lisa difference that comes to my mind right away is that she is more of a snazzy dresser than I am. She wears cute shoes and purses and even SKIRTS (no one is making her wear the skirts, either-!). I have seen her tie a gauzy scarf around her neck and pull it off. She is a huge animal lover who will sit somewhere else if her dogs look comfy on the couch, whereas I like animals but am in no hurry to pet them or be licked by them... and definitely they are not getting my chair.

Anyway, you get the point. We're different.

But we have similarities, too. We are both kind of artsy, we both like having long psychological talks over cups of coffee, and we both like getting good deals on interesting little pieces of home decor. 

So it will come as no surprise that some of our visit included shopping. Here are a few of my random finds:

A sassy little pepper shaker

This dark and quirky Easter bunny plate...

A perfume bottle snail for my cosmetic shelf

Laurie's hobbies include quilting and photography. Here are a few of the pictures she's taken recently:

She photographs her husband Mark's restaurant food (he's a chef)

The prettiest flower in my yard right now. What is it?

Fancy camera work

Don't zoom in on this one or you'll see all the weeds

A highlight of the visit was taking Laurie to one of Emma's basketball games. I hadn't seen Emma play in awhile (Jon's the kids' "sports manager"), so was surprised to see how good she's gotten. She'll be a freshman this coming school year and already they have her playing varsity. Telling you that sounds like bragging, because-- well, it's flat-out bragging. But understand that in context: Laurie and I were both so PROUD of her. Emma's doing something right now that would have been an audacious fantasy of ours back in high school, if it had even occurred to us. Let's just say that the Bragg kids were not known for their athleticism.

The freakishly long arms in my DNA have been passed on to Emma and found USEFUL, finally.

Seeing Emma all tall and strong and confident-- a good sport, alert, and comfortable in her own skin... it was very good to see.

But if I keep on being wordy I won't be able to finish this blog tonight. And I have more good pictures to post.

We went to Rhinelander a couple of weeks ago, while my brother Don and his family were there. Don, Hope, and their three kids live in Arkansas, so seeing them in Rhinelander was a rare treat. I felt like it was a good quality visit, though unfortunately 13 year-old Kenny had broken his foot in five places the day before (freak exercise bike accident-!).

Big grubs found in the firewood...eww

These kids like walking in Dad's woods as much as their aunts and uncles do

Beth Bragg, Firewood Stacker

Mom showing a quilt she's about to give someone

At least Kenny could sit around the campfire!

Kids on Grandpa's retaining wall

Peace and camaraderie

The woods that will always be in our hearts :)

I will close with some miscellaneous pictures from the last month or so. We have our vegetable garden planted. Samantha the baby cow is now large enough to no longer be in our back yard-- she's up at Johnne's in a pasture, where she can jump and run and play. We're down to only four egg-laying chickens because we gave most of our chickens back to Johnne (there was just no keeping up with that many eggs), but we have a dozen "fryer" chickens that we have been raising from chicks. As the name suggests, they are our future chicken dinners...

Happy Anniversary, Mom and Dad

The April birthdays: Grandma Jane, Leila, and Jonathan

Jonathan's Michael's best chess challenger

Putting Jackson to "work" shucking corn!

Leila reading to an audience at school. She did great!

Leila in pitchball

Playing the outfield

Have a wonderful summer!!!!