Feathered and Ready To Explore

The girls are growing!
We keep calling them our babies but really they don't look much like those fuzzy little fluff balls we had anymore :) Their feathers are fully in and they are growing more inquisitive every day. You can see them eyeing up the outdoors when we come in to feed and pet them so I think we're going to have to get their yard finished. Some of the fence needs mending and a layer of fish net needs to be hung over the pen to keep the hawks and eagles from swooping in and taking any. We definitely don't want what to happen!

So while they're waiting to be released into the grassy wild we've been feeding them little dandelion blossom treats and they love them.

So much in fact that they fight over them *grin*.
One will get a flower in its beak and then another will swoop in and snatch it away and this goes on for a while until we drop in another for them to squabble over :)

My daughter on the other hand mesmerizes them. I think I have mentioned in another post that she is like the chick whisperer and it never fails that they flock to her :) Every time she picked one up it would just tuck its beak into the dandelion blossom and hang out. Talk about taking time to smell the roses.... or dandelions in this case *grin*.

She's been taking on a lot of the responsibility of feeding them to and heading out in the mornings on her own to fill their feed dishes and talk to them. It's so cute :)

Oh and I wanted to let you know that Hubby made it safely home Monday morning!! I waited up until 2am for him to get here and it was so nice to have him back. I got the play by play account of how the whole accident went down from him blowing the gear in his tug, to calling out on the radio in hopes that someone might be near enough to help him out and getting no response, to him waiting till the last possible moment to decide to cut his tow loose as he waited hoping that it might hit the beach and hang up on the rocks so that he could save it, and finally how he threw out the anchor which I thought would be a done deal and it was over but no he wasn't sure if it was even going to hold him!! Thank goodness it held or he would have been smashed to bits on the rocks through the rapids like his tow.

We enjoyed two days together as he rested up and slept after so many sleepless nights and now he's gone again. All thoughts of danger pushed out of my mind as we count the days until he returns again :)

Hugs,
Rosina

Green Pastures and Rainy Days

I can't believe how green everything is getting around here. It just seems like the fields grew knee high overnight! We've moved our personal lawn mower up closer to the house to *grin*. Before we take Bee down to the bottom field he's making the rounds around my house. I love waking up to him mooing in the morning and having him close so we can scratch his ears and of course try and avoid those licks he loves to slather us with :)

Our baby chicks are growing at lightening speed to. Believe it or not I haven't taken any photos of them lately. I must be slipping! They've pretty much got all of their feathers now and are quite the lively bunch :) I'm still getting the kids to pick them up and hold them as much as possible to keep them from becoming to skittish around us. My plan is that as they grow bigger we'll be able to take a few of them each day out to the garden with us this summer to let them scratch around and eat bugs :)

While the chicks are thriving, my garden could use some work. I feel like I'm terribly behind all of a sudden. I know that planting time for us has just begun but for some reason I just can't get it together *grin*. The soil is tilled and ready to go but we spent our week of sunny weather camping and now it's raining again :( I can just see my dad shaking his head and saying you never waste a sunny day! Travel and visiting is best saved for those rainy days *grin*. Wise words but I guess I could use hearing them again since I just did the complete opposite LOL.

I guess I'm just going to have to put on my boots and get ready to be soaked!

Hugs,
Rosina

Ugly Duckling Syndrome

Our girls are growing so quickly!
They will be three weeks old on thursday and as you can see they are definitely much larger than those little fluff balls that fit perfectly into small hands only days before :)

The kids thought they looked a little bit like ugly ducklings today *grin*. Their fluffy down is being replaced by feathers and the transition is so interesting to watch :) This little girl must have felt small today as she kept stretching as tall as she could!

We brought a couple of them into the house today and set a towel down on the living room floor so that they could roam around a bit. They really seemed to love my daughter and gravitated straight for her...

She's like the chick whisperer *grin*, and the boys were just a tad jealous of all the attention she was getting LOL.

It's a little bittersweet to see them maturing so quickly but then again I am really looking forward to all of those fresh eggs!

Hugs,
Rosina

Seedy Saturday

Seedy Saturday.... the unofficial start to spring *grin*.

I must say it was mighty spring like today in the comox valley :) The sun was shining and it actually felt warmer. Maybe it was all in my head LOL. My morning didn't start out all that spring like as we scraped thick ice off of the car windows and fought our way up to my mom's house through the icy ruts of snow that had formed over the last couple of days.

At 8am we were all packed into my car and slip sliding our way out of the yard when I came across actual parts from underneath my car frozen into the humps of snow in the driveway! I'm always worried that something is going to break off as we scrape and skid along the icy snow in the winter and it finally did. My dad had a good look underneath and couldn't see anything seriously damaged as it was just part of a rock guard underneath. Phew, nothing to to bad but not good either.

So back into the car we went and once we finally hit the highway the car started to shake and lump along the pavement. My heart sank. Something was wrong with the car. We limped it back home slowly fearing the worst and had good old dad check it over again *grin*. The final verdict... my tire had frozen solid in the position I had stopped in last night so that when we drove on the pavement it was round three quarters of the way and the last quarter way around the tire was frozen straight like a board!

In all my life I have NEVER had my tire freeze flat on the bottoms in the snow and ice. My cousins in Ontario who experience -30 or lower temperatures have talked about it before but here on Vancouver Island!? It was like some crazy dream LOL. By 10:30 things were thawing and my tires assumed their regular round shape and off we went *grin*.

Spring, you can hurry up and come anytime now! LOL

Just after noon we finally arrived at the seedy saturday :) In past years we've been there right at 10am and the lineup to get in is HUGE, but this year it was actually nice to just walk in without having to wait. Although we did miss out on all of the interesting and unique potted plants that would have been available for purchase for the opening hour.

Inside was an entire room filled to the brim with organic seeds, fruit trees and bushes, rhubarb and strawberry plants, seed potatoes, garlic, mason bees, honey, gardening supplies, informational displays, seed swaps where you can bring your seed to trade with others for new veggies or flowers you don't have and so much more.

At one of the tables my youngest who was with me got to watch a batch of mason bees emerge from their winter cocoons. So cool!! They were very docile as they came out so they let us have good look inside the jar without the lid :)

At other tables we got to sample Jerusalem Artichokes, crack hazelnuts with fun little wooden screw type nut crackers and at one table M even found one lovely lady that happily fed him cookies while I browsed the seed racks *grin*.

I picked up quite a few different tomatoes for canning this coming summer, a great assortment of sprouting seeds for fresh sprouts, beans, peas, and I even purchased a giant block of Oyster Mushrooms so that we can grow our own mushrooms. I can hardly wait to see them start sprouting up! The fellow said it should take about 2 weeks and we'll be able to start harvesting them :)

I think we were there at least a good hour browsing and shopping but I could have spent much more time. They host a series of workshops throughout the day as well. This year's topics were seed saving, the zero mile diet, mason bees, healthy soil and more. One of these days when all of the children are old enough to be left home I think I'm going to take advantage of the seminars :)

Have fun at a seedy saturday near you!

Hugs,
Rosina

Bumper Crop of Beets

My mom has an AMAZING vegetable garden every year and this year she has a bumper crop of beets. Of course she is more than happy to share her vegetable wealth with her daughter LOL.

So this morning after feeding the cow the kids and I walked over and brought our wheel barrow along with us *grin*.

My mom and I plucked out beets by the handful and my dad cut off all of the beet tops. Dad's getting out of the house more now so it was great to see him doing something he enjoys :) By the time we were finished there was heaps of beet tops that are going to be a wonderful treat for the cow tomorrow morning....

and plenty of beets to take home and cook up! I boiled up 2 big canner loads this afternoon. I just love how easy they are to prepare! After they are cooked their skins just pull off like butter and tomorrow I'm going to chop them all up and make pickled beets. SO GOOD.

Beets freeze really well to so I'm going to get a couple more canner loads sometime this week and get them frozen up so we can enjoy them all winter long :)

~ Rosina

Garden Update

We are finally seeing some rewards from all of the gardening we have been doing :)

Our broccoli has just exploded this last week with the few days of hot weather we finally got and of course the whole lot of them just happens to be ready at the same time *grin*.

So we've cut all of the larger crowns off and left the side shoots on so that they can grow and provide us with many more harvests throughout the summer.

My peas are not doing to bad but still no flowers. I hope that they will perk up!

It's actually not un-seasonally cool here this June but my beans are definitely not liking all of the wind and rain :) Can you believe that most days we are still running around in our heavy winter coats?!

I'm very excited about my leeks! They are doing really well after being transplanted and I can't wait till they grow big enough to try a few :)

My tomatoes are doing fantastic in their hanging planter bags!! This one is my 'Window Box Roma' and it is covered in lots of little baby romas.

Here's another one of my hanging tomatoes, this one is 'Rocket' and it to is just loaded with little tomatoes :) So far my cabbage isn't forming any heads yet and I'm really not sure what happened to my beets and carrots but it looks like I'm going to have to do some replaning :( The birds have been particularly bad this year eating all the seeds and green shoots so most have been lost. Oh well, I must look on the bright side and be very happy with what is coming *grin*.

How does your garden grow? I'd love to know *grin*.

~ Rosina

Lettuce Munchers ~ Outdoor Challenge Day 14

Nothing beats munching on a big leaf of lettuce fresh from the greenhouse :)

We walked up to my moms and raided her greenhouse *grin*. She always has a patch of lettuce growing year round for salads and plate garnish...

But today we weren't the only ones munching on the lettuce! As we checked the leaves we picked for baby slugs and other creepy critters that might be hanging out in the lettuce patch, we discovered a bunch of baby aphids. I don't think they would harm us if one of the kids had accidentally ate one but I definitely had to be quick to get my hands on M's leaf before he popped it straight into his mouth LOL. Thankfully everyone's lettuce was clean and they were able to munch away like bunnies :)

Do you have photos of your children enjoying the outdoors? Visit The Great Outdoors Challenge to join in the fun and you can also visit other participants and see what sort of nature fun they have been having by clicking on the names below :)

~ Rosina

Fellow Nature Players:lisa, sanders, angelina, phyllis, sarah, christie, jennifer, debbie, dong dong, denise, luisa, joy, stephanie, cori, alex, dawn, kristen, catherine, becky, christy, ruth, kari, courtney, branflakes, jessica, renee, haiku, brynn, amy, clemencia, sherry, leslie, lise, renee, anet, jenn, marina, amy, ella, marcia, karen, beth, julie, kyndale, kelly, lizzie, eileen, ag, mari-ann, cindy, robin, nicole, debbie, julia, anita, lisa, jenn, montessori, marita, jeannie, hallie, mandy, kangaroo, andrea, joey, carmen, teena, stephinie, gidget, elizabeth, emma, rosina, saminda, melissa, katie, becca, atouria, barbara, ariella, missy, elizabeth, sarah, eileen, lisa, stacy, jennifer, tulsileaf, lisa C, morticia, angela, rana, jamie, lisa c, luz, charley, heather, valerie, kirsten, rachel, annie, kendra, beth s, lindsey, michelle, megan, renee