Earth Works

During the rainy season last year we had a moderate flooding problem as the seasonal creek jumped its banks and swamped part of the yard. Granted the the rains of last winter where pretty epic at times, but I don't want to have that much of the back yard under water again. So as a solution I decided to rent an excavator (mini backhoe) and dig out the creek and enlarge the duck pond. Sam, Sam's Dad and myself worked from sun up to sun down to get done in one day. In the end we moved many tons of earth (no exaggeration) and got the creek cleared to about 3 feet wide X 2 feet deep. The new duck pond was a little bit of a learning process, the perspective from the cab of the excavator does not give you a good idea of the depth you are digging to. So the old duck pond was maybe 10 feet X 4 feet and 3 feet at the deepest. I was digging a much larger pond but nothing outrageous, or so I thought. I realized my mistake when I thought I had dug out a thigh to waist deep pond about 15 feet X 10 feet, to show me the size Rosie jumped into the pond I had dug and the depth was about to her shoulders around 5 feet deep. So the new EPIC POND is in the area of 25 feet X 15 feet X 5 feet deep. I hope the ducks and geese like it........

Pop goes the mead cork

Happy Autumn..... it was 113 here today. It's 8:30pm and it's just starting to cool down, we're finally down to the high 80's. As it's been hot... I just had a bottle pop its top. I heard the pop and put on shoes to go check out the noise. Luckily, it only popped the cork and didn't harm the bottle. I dutifully drank some of the ginger mead and then corked it with a note stating that it's for Rosie. I hope none of the rest pop. =( I'd like to share some of the bounty before I get completely hammered.

Heat Kills Brain Cells

At least that is what my cats are telling me. It was in the 100s again today and the cats let me know that they were not amused.

Ghost soap

Angelica has anti-bacterial properties so I decided to blend it with cinnamon for a lard soap. But apparently it was also used by native americans to sprinkle around the house prior to moving in so that the ghost would leave.

I love multi-purpose items. I thought I was just making some anti-bacterial soap but apparently I was also making soap that will ward off ghosts... I love it.

The images with clear plastic are some molds that Jed ended up getting for me as a present. =) We were able to used them at a soap making class in Santa Barbara and they worked out pretty well. The little ovals say 100% natural and the big square one is a bunch of little bars with the shape of the goddess on it. I think those might end up as presents for people. I couldn't find the little plain oval one that I wanted so I just left the rest in a big block. Hopefully this will last us another year. I was going to see about going to Food4Less for more pig and cow fat to make more batches of soap. I was going to see about starting to make our own laundry soap, not that we use much, but it would be nice to be able to control what goes into it. That and I'm sure the pigs would love all that extra cow fat as a snack.

Kim-chi

Kim-chi is a vital part of our food source at casa de deranged. We.... usually when I say we I really mean the royal we since I end up doing most of the food prep... back to the post... We ended up making up a batch earlier this summer, but found that we did not make enough with two big pickle jars full of kim-chi. We ended up finishing a jar in a week and that was just too depressing. So we've started up another two batches of kim-chi so that Sam can take some home with him and so that we can have more kim-chi for the winter. The process starts off simple as you just have to rinse out the cabbage and then apply salt to every leaf, add heated water with salt, and then finish it off with some more salt. This takes out the moisture from the leaves. We prepped eight cabbages for regular batch (red) kim-chi and I'll see about starting the second batch today as the cabbage did a fabulous job of releasing its moisture so far.

Jammin!

As the berry season is ending we thought we'd try out some more jams. Jed has also seemed to go through all the blackberry, raspberry, and strawberry jams we had around the house so we thought we'd try out making jam with honey so that I could eat it as well. We ended up making a sample batch of honey strawberry jam and it turned out delicious! It has a slightly sweet tart flavor to it and its consistency is that of preserves more than of a hard jam or jelly. Since that was a big success and because I was able to go through two jars and two loaves of bread in two days I thought I'd make some more. Lisa also invited me over to her place and we ended up making grape and strawberry jelly. So far so good! And today I was able to make a batch of raspberry jam and another of strawberry jam. I still have another 3 batches on the way so that we might have enough jam to last us a year if not a bit longer than the first batch. I'll see if I can find any more blackberries in season or figs, and I just heard that blueberry jam was really, really tasty as well. We'll see what we'll mix up next.

Recipe for "sweet harvest jam" from honey.com

4 cups of fruit
2 cups of honey
1 packet of low sugar/or home made pectin
juice from 1 or 2 lemons

Smash fruit to consistency that you like. Add pectin and fruit to a pot that you can boil your jam in. Turn on heat and wait until it's a full rolling boil. After a minute of boiling then add honey and lemon juice. Bring back to a boil and boil for 5 minutes. Then pour into prepared canning jars, put into hot bath and soft boil for 10 minutes. Take out of hot bath and let cool on window sill or appropriate surface. Ta-dah!

Bread Oven - Another project done

The bread oven is finally finished and we're able to use it!! I was thinking about setting up fire up days so that we can have a set day to fire up the bread oven and have a full afternoon of baking and hanging out. As we learned in our first attempt of baking bread in the oven.... it cooks quickly. We put in three loaves of rye in for about 15 minutes and they were already burnt by the time we pulled them out. So we'll have to only leave them in there for about 10 minutes or just start checking at 5 minutes. We could probably start off with pizzas to try it out and then bake and bbq the afternoon away. I'll post the days if anyone is interested in joining us so that you can take bread home. Even after the bread and the corn were done it was hot for hours and we could have baked many more breads in there. We'll have to also try out some naan and other breads to see how they do. =)

Happy Equinox!

The full moon came up over the trees as Jed and I were feeding the animals. It was gorgeous and the day seemed just about perfect. The temperature is still in the 80's and it's supposed to be in the 90's if not 100's this weekend. =) This means that all of my sun loving plants should get a longer chance of life and we might end up with more food. I was able to walk around and take some images of our baby plants and some of the not so baby plants. Enjoy!

Scythe

As many of you know, Rosie and I have a passion for history and as such we often look for the more traditional approach to our homestead. One of the things we do (with few exceptions) is keep our power tools to a bare minimum. We find that hand tools are effective, affordable, practical and most importantly fun to use. So when Rosie was clearing the grass and weeds from between the raised bed gardens I thought I would shoot a little video to show just how effective a scythe can be. Having use a electric and gas powered weedeater in the past I can tell you that the scythe is quieter, lighter, cleaner, more precise, safer and easier to maintain and fuel. Of course the scythe Rosie is using in the video is not your hardware store special, it was ordered from a specialty scythe dealer who makes their scythes in the European fashion. I can strongly recommend Scythesupply.com for your scything needs, they sell custom made scythes of the highest quality. The scythe in the video was purchased as part of a "Scythe Outfit" which included a scythe, peining jig, whet stone and carrier. Really, if you need to cut grass or weeds seriously think about switching from a mower or weedeater to a high quality scythe. Oh and sorry in advance for the video being sideways, our cheap-o camera has a narrow view and turning it sideways offered the best angle.

A new pig

So I was at work the other night and there was a knock on the door, Rosie had come to visit me. Since it is a little bit of a trip down to my station from home I was kinda surprised, but pleased, she had made the trip. Turns out Rosie math strikes again, my lovely wife was down in the south county to buy a new little pig. Yup our TWO pigs have become THREE pigs. Really I don't mind, we are looking to slaughter one of our grown pigs in the near future and we did not want the remaining pig to be lonely, so we had talked about getting another pig to keep'em company. She (our new oinker) is a little skiddish but is starting to eat out of our hands and is getting more and more friendly. I was a little concerned about how our other two pigs would deal with a new arrival, especially one so small. So I end up sending a majority of my day off building a new pig pen, attached to but separated from the other pig pen. Well it seems my worry was needless, the moment the new and old pigs saw each other they started talking up a storm (the oinks where flying back and forth) and the only problem seems to be that the big pigs don't understand why they can not get closer to the new pig. So as of now they sleep leaning on their respective sides of the pig fence so that they can touch as much as possible while they sleep. As soon as the new pig gets a little bigger (to avoid any accidental damage from a big pig rolling on her in its sleep) we plan on removing the dividing section of fence and allowing the piggies to mix.

Turkey on the roof

I was working in the garden the other morning and I could hear the turkeys calling. I could tell they were close by but I couldn't figure out where they were. I then looked up and found that the turkeys really enjoyed jumping on the roof to come visit me.

Finished house projects

As I posted before, the living room is finished and now the master bathroom is finally finished!! Yaaay! Here are some images. I've also added some other random images. =) Not all of are the bathroom.

Attack Turkeys

I am sitting in the living room having my morning coffee. As I look out the window I see a gray feral cat staling threw the tall grass, no doubt in high hopes of pouncing on one of our small animals. Before I can get up and walk out doors I also notice 3 turkeys, heads low with extended necks creeping up on the cats flank. The turkeys walk, wait no, stalk threw the grass quietly. There is a predator in their teritory and they are going to "deal with it". Then a jump, a flurry of feathers and the sounds of a very unhappy cat. A gray feral cat leaps back over the fence, eyes the size of its head and the thought no doubt running threw its mind "WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT!!!" Now the turkeys walk the perimeter fence, back and forth like good sentries eyes alert for more hostiles.

Ever watched the raptors in the movie Jurassic park? I think they where based on turkeys hunting feral cats.

Projects

I really need to be able to finish a project before I start new ones... I also need to realize that this is our house and thus we will be able to work on it for many years to come. I do not need to finish all the house projects in one go. =)

That being said, I'm currently working on the bathrooms. I finished the base for the bathtub, ripped out the vanity and am about to put in a wall sink. I got to take out the vanity today and I'm waiting for the plaster to finish drying so that I can paint the wall. Then I'll go ahead and mount the new sink, put in the new faucet and we should be on our way to being done with the master bathroom. I'll have to make sure to paint the floor, mount the mirror back up and see if there is anything I need to change before I put the side boards on the floor and call it done.

Done is beautiful. I look forward to being done with at least one bathroom so that I can think about starting on the other. The guest bathroom will have a new vanity with the Native Trails sink (classic in antique) with a Brizo faucet. We'll then be able to put in the cast iron bathtub and put up the tile on the bathroom wall. We'll have to take out the insert we have in there right now, but there won't be any tears shed for changing that out. I didn't get to take pics of the destruction of the master bathroom, but I'll see about posting some images of what it looks like right now and after I finish. =) Yaaay,

Cycles - noticing trends

It's September... and it's 102 outside right now. Last year we noticed that it was in the 110's at the end of Sept and I was guessing that it would be the same this year. What does this mean? It means that all the gardening books I could ever read are all off since my seasons are nothing like what they describe in the books. If I was to keep it to say.... summer and have that be from the end of August through the end of Oct then we can work on that. I think I have to shift all the seasons so that I can be sure that I'm planting things at the right time. We have our freezes early in the year all the way through May so I would not be able to plant any of my heat loving plants until way after that. As soon as Aaron and I set up the greenhouse I think I'll start some of those crops in there until the soil heats up enough for me to be able to put them out. Or I can just see what plants do best in our environment and only keep exotics in the green house. We'll see.

Nonversation of the day

Squeee!!! I found some clover growing in the front yard. Yaaaaaay!!! We'll see if any of it will grow in the back.