Tuesday, March 31, 2009

SPRING!

Spring is in the air, and I'm sooo excited about it! Trees have buds, bulbs are popping up EVERYWHERE. I have been picking flowers from the yard to bring into the house and the birds are busy building there nests and chatting about it. I LOVE waking up to the birds singing a morning song!



We have been busy! We went to my parent house for spring break and had a wonderful time! On our way home we drove though the gorge and saw SO many windmills, it was AMAZING!



Okay folks, now lets get down to business.......Spring planting.....what have you done? How are you improving your soil? This is a picture of the "organic matter" I added to my onion patch. I put in some extra egg shells and coffee grinds for nitrogen, which feeds the plant. I LOVE getting my hands dirty!




When I was done.....I had wonderful rich soil, you can't see in the picture but their are tons of worms in this soil.


I have started my tomato's, broccoli and basil. This weekend I will get my peas and carrots in the ground. I ordered my seeds online from www.grannysheirloomseeds.com they have GREAT deals and online help and tips, check them out!



Some women get excited about new clothes, jewelry, a new car, yadda, yadda. These things are very nice, however, when I saw what my hubs made for me this last weekend, my heart skipped. I was so excited! This is the beginning of our NEW chicken tractor for the "free range" chickens we are adding to our farm. We will be butchering them in 9 weeks, we ordered 50 of them from the Jefferson feed store and they will be here on Friday. I have already sold 18 of them! I'm excited and nervous about this, as you know butchering is NOT fun, however it is our goal to have food freedom and to help others do the same. This is a heavy burden, and reading more about the way animals are treated in commercial poultry factory's, the living conditions and the digestive failure's people are experiencing from eating tainted meat, I know folks are looking for a healthy alternative.




The best thing about this is that it was all free! The old canopy was left here from the previous owner and the wheels came from some old wheel borrows the hubs found in a dumpster. The kiddos and I are going to paint it with rainbows and flowers. This will be the chickens "happy place" before they.......well.......die.

We have to make one more so that they have plenty of room.


Speaking of chickens.. Have you gotten yours?

I have a new friend, she is totally crazy, (like myself) but very smart in her quest for a healthy life. Check her out at theelliotfamily@blogspot.com. She has been making chicken stock with her mail order chicken heads! YES! Mail order chicken heads... hey Nina I'll have 50 chicken heads in June.... I can make you a great deal, like buy 1 get 49 free!



This is our Turkey flock, they are heritage turkeys, Bourbon red and Silver slate. This picture is for the sis... I wanted her to see her thanksgiving dinner!




SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL ORGANIC FARMER!












7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hmmmm...not much happening in the garden - it's still covered with A LOT of snow! My tomatoes, cabbage and peppers are coming up nicely though in my kitchen window sill.
I'm planning to order my chicks any day.

Tammy said...

Dear Farmgirl;

How exciting. I too love it when my husband brings me something unique instead of clothes, jewelry, etc. Just wanted to let you know that the tractor needs to lay flat on the ground otherwise critters may get in it and destroy your flock. Couldn't quite tell if it was possible from pic. Also chickens raised in a portable shelter are known as range chickens not free range because they are not totally free to roam around. It is not a big deal to me but someone may ask you about it. Anyway, if you make a nice profit this summer off your first few batches of chickens and want to move up, check out the shelters at www.easy-garden.com. Good luck this summer and Happy Eating. Yum yum!!

Tammy

Amber Strehle said...

I want that pretty brown one..without the feathers of course:)

Lateda said...

Fancy Jewelery, and Clothes and new cars..icky smicky.

Chickens... CHECK!
Placenta... CHECK!
Old rusty truck canopy made into a FREE range chicken hut...CHECK!
(Music...da ling ding ding ding...)
Hands Dirty... CHECK!
Chicken heads for stock... what??

PUKE IN my mouth.. coming out...
CHECK!

The Librarian and The Reading Specialist said...

Checked out the granny heirlooms site, amazing! Thanks for the referral. Another site to check out-motherearth.com (I think).

Wendy Girl said...

Loving it is all I can Say.
Got the package.
Love the honey, Yummy Yummy.
I will have to take pictures of my garden for you.
Thanks a million.

Elliotness said...

OOh! My garden, lots of herbs, savorys and balms. I am growing tomatoes this year, as well as peppers and cucumbers....we will see what decides to sprout out of that home-depot dirt. No wormies here, just a pot of rotting produce scraps on this crazy girls patio.
Thanks for the plug! Send those heads my way!