IN COMPLETION

Just to complete the blog Janice entered this morning, I am adding the pictures she had not taken yet. This first one is of our newest baby born this morning of Daisy, a little buckling of 11 and 1/4 pounds. He is a big boy and already eating well. We actually took three pictures of him, but he is a wiggle worm, so two of them were blurry.

Then there is Flash who was the instigator of the freedom movement this morning. Looks pretty proud of his accomplishment doesn't he.

And of course Dancer had to egg him along in the escape attempt, and just to have some fun.

She is looking pretty satisfied with herself also.

 

Tonight we go to the local Bee Keeper's Association meeting, Should be interesting. Janice and I have both read the books that came with our new Bee Hives, "Backyard Beekeeper", and liked it quite a bit.We now have everything needed to start, except the bees.

 

My Morning.......

Let me tell you how it went this morning. First I thought it would be like usual, fairly easy morning. You know, do the chores and sit and have a cup of coffee and read the blog. WRONGGGGG. I went out to feed the horses and Mr. Houdini opened the gate, this was expected because he had been practicing for some time, I just didn't realize how close he was to succeeding. This morning was the morning and he was a very happy camper and Miss Dancer was just following along like usual, and like most horses they like to play games with me, like run away when mommy comes. Well they meandered through the yard and when I was trying to catch one they took off up the right of way. They did that before and it was very hard to catch them so we used some dead trees and put across the right of way for a temporary fix. This temporary fix stopped them this time and Dancer decided she better come peacefully. She let me catch her and I put her in the pasture. Mr Flash wasn't having any of it and was still playing games. I finally got him in the pasture with Dancer because he wouldn't leave her behind. OK got the horses taken care of next on the list the goats. Went into the barn and things were different. Ms Daisy was no where to be found. Finally realized she was by the back door between the stall and milking area. Guess what BABIES. Wasn't prepared for that. Now I have to clean out in front of the stall so I can open it, get some clean straw in there, find the heat lamp and get that set up then get momma and baby in the stall. OK got that done, got the rest of the goats fed and then went back into the stall to make sure baby ate. Gotta get the colostrum in them as soon as possible. Momma is so good, she let me work with new baby boy. I needed to clean out her teats, as they were plugged with dry milk. Got that done and got baby boy eating. At least he knows where to look. Now baby and momma are taken care of and on to the chickens. Not to bad there except guess what. Out of water, so I need to walk back to the house get a bucket of water and walk back to the coop, fill the waterer and walk back to the house. Not too bad, but after a 10 mile hike after the horses and running for the goats I think I got my exercises for the day. Now I am going to sit back and drink that cup of coffee I had sitting and waiting for me and take five before breakfast. I will post some new baby pictures later for all to see. Hope you have a good morning.

THE BEST LAID PLANS

The best laid plans of mice or man, as the saying goes, we had planned on moving a couple of apple trees today. well those plans are changed due to weather conditions. I got up a little after 9:00am this morning and this is what greeted me.

Too bad it was really nice the last few weeks. As you can see in a comparison to the Filbert Catkins picture taken a couple of days ago and the one I took this morning, things are a little different.

Janice went out and measured the snow on the driveway and was able to push the tape measure in eight and a half inches, with maybe another half to one inch of hard stuff under that to total about nine inches. Looks like we are not in Kansas any more Toto!

 I suppose I really can't be too upset as we usually get our last snow around April 1st. Keeping that in mind we still have a couple of months of winter coming.

We usually get our last frost about May 15 or there abouts, time to sit in by the fire and keep warm. Just as a side note we have received our Honey Bee Hives and other accessories, but the Honey Bees won't get here until about mid April. We have received our Mason Bees and they are out in their little house.

 

 

A Good Start

 

Today was a beautiful day. The sun was shining and a bit of a chill in the air. All in all a great day. As you can see , everyone was in the lazy mood today. The sunshine felt reallllllly gooooood.

 

 

Although we have been working our butts off. We have been adding the compost that is broken down to all the gardens, as you can see. The herb garden below looks so good with the fresh compost.

 

 

The rest of the gardens are beginning to look like they're ready for planting. Now it is just a matter of waiting for the weather to cooperate. It needs to warm up a bit and then I can put the plastic on the frame in the center garden you see below. This helps to extend the growing season up here on the mountain.

After we moved the Granny Smith apple I raked the soil around and got it as level as I could for now. I think the blueberries will do better this year. They will get better sunshine with the apple tree gone.

In the center garden below, I added a couple of old railroad ties to the ends to enlarge the garden area for planting. and you can see that we started putting the compost that is a bit fresher around the trees.

The herb garden is looking a bit scraggly but when the rhubarb starts to grow and the rest of the garden comes alive this area looks beautiful and full.

In the garden area below we still need to put more compost. We haven't quite got all of the compost in the area's that need it. Hopefully this coming week we can finish it. Although it is suppose to start raining again. Hope it holds off.

After composting my Honeyberry bed below I put some plant stakes around it with some fishing line attached to it to help keep the deer from eating them this year. We hope to get berries from them this year. We have had these bushes for three years now and no berries. Thank you DEER.

Below you can see that the fruit trees got there share of the compost. We would like to try to get the grass to come in a bit thicker this year. We think that this would be good pasture for the horses. 

The last garden is looking pretty good and ready to go.

We did some meandering around the yard today and got to enjoy some of the beauty here.

As you can see, my Lenten Rose is beginning to bloom. This beautiful flower blooms for a long time. I really enjoy it.

The wild Huckleberries are beginning to get a little bigger, they should be producing soon.

The pear tree in the yard is starting to break bud and should be blooming soon also.

The filberts have had the catkins on them for some time now.

They are such a wonder to look at.

Tomorrow we get back to it. We still have a lot to do before the growing season really kicks in.

 

 

 

 

A LITTLE CLOSER

Did some more work on the area above the rock wall today. Presently I think I have the excavation work done, now I need to grind some stumps and replace more soil. When you live on the side of a mountain You have to make flat areas for gardening.

 The picture below has arrows showing two stumps buried That need to be ground along with the obvious one in the next picture after the next one. Hey what do you expect this used to be forest.

 The stump below is a big White Cedar stump that Janice and I spent two or three days and many saw chains cutting down just to get the wall put up. We also had it ground once before, but not enough. The area along the back of the excavation, where the dirt bank is now, we are going to put up another stack block wall

 The picture below shows the path going down from the driveway to the Greenhouse, Lawn, and area I have been working on. This area will hold some raised beds for garden and a few fruit trees.

 This shot looking down the driveway shows my enormous dirt pile, looks like two, the dark pile of finished compost we are now putting out, and the chip covered fresh manure composting at the end.

Another project later will be to dig down the driveway, removing the high area, so water runs away from the house when it rains, but that is a whole other project, Thank the Lord we have the little Tractor, Loader, Backhoe.



SMALL WORLD

I have been working on my family tree now going on three years, and the one thing I have learned is this truly is a small world. I learned that my Great Grandmother on my birth fathers side of the family was a Downer. This is weird because there was a Judge living here with the last name of Downer. It would be interesting to know how we are related.

 

Another little anomaly is that one of my 11th Great Grandmother's, Baroness, Lady Margaret Dixon, 1485-1550 along with the continuing line of that family at least down to Jonathan T. Dixon, 1873-1944, my 12th Great Grand Uncle. And here where I live is a family with the sir name of Dixon, Related, probably, but I don't know how.

 

Something a lot of my current friends don't know is that my name at birth was Donald D. Merritt and remained Merritt until May 27, 1963 when my brothers and I were adopted by Edward C. Hausmann. The Merritt family name has had many notable persons throughout the history of this Nation. The first Merritt's to arrive in this country, arrived with the Mayflower Party, not sure of the ship. After arriving in Plymouth some of the family surveyed and settled Rye township, Westchester County, New York State. The Island on which the people working at Cape Canaveral live is Merritt Island. Some of the first settlers to Oregon were Merritt's going to Portland and Canyonville.

 

Other interesting facts I have found is that my 5th cousin 3x removed, Brig. General Wesley Merritt, served in the Civil war with General Sheridan. Wesley Merritt along with Elon J. Farnsworth and George Armstrong Custer were all promoted at the same time skipping three ranks from Col. to Major General. Unfortunately General Farnsworth didn't survive the next battle he was in.  In the above picture Wesley Merritt is seated on a chair at the right, George Custer is laying petting the dog.

 In the above picture, Wesley Merritt is seated at the middle right, with General Sheridan with the big beard. I Read that General Merritt was one of only three Officers present at the surrender at the end of the Civil War.

The above picture is of Wesley Merritt when younger. After General Custer was wiped out, General Merritt was placed in charge of the Indian champagne, and was the first commander of the Buffalo Soldiers. There used to be an Army base at San Francisco California named Camp Merritt After General Merritt.

The above Picture is of Brig. General Wesley Merritt after he served as commanding general in the War of the Philippines and acting Governor, and completing his career as Commander of West Point for five years.

Other interesting facts I have found are; I am related to most if not all United States Presidents, although I currently only have six of them connected in my family tree. The six that are currently connected are Presidents Abraham Lincoln, Taylor, Madison, Polk, Ford, and Obama. Interestingly, President Polk, my 2nd cousin 6x removed Admitted Oregon, California and Texas to the United States.

 

Virtually all of my family lines were founding fathers, including David Tasker Reese, who signed the Meklenburg Declaration of Independence.

In conclusion I would STRONGLY urge everyone to search out their family trees, not just for the interesting people you find but some of the really great stories and I think you will find this is truly a small world.

Am I bragging? Well maybe just a little especially since I didn't know these things a few years ago.

ABOUT HALF DONE

Janice and I got the chipper hooked to the back of the truck today and started chipping the leavings from all of our pruning this spring. there was a lot of pruning as we had neglected getting it done for at least a couple of years. We had piles of brush sitting all over the place, but then what do I expect with over seventeen fruit trees, the Kiwi's, the Currents and Josta Berries, and the Blue Berries, oh, I forgot the Filbert Trees. It's going to get worst I just planted fifty more Filberts into hedges this year.

 This stuff will go very well in the compost pile.

This is about a half of the pruning's that needed to be chipped. We plan on moving the truck tomorrow in order to finish. After we get the chipping done we need to spray all the trees and berries with Lime Sulphur to try to stop any fungal issues. We had some pretty bad fungal stuff going on last summer, which didn't help the fruit production last year

MAKING HAY WHILE THE SUN SHINES

You have to get done what you can in between storms, So Janice and I have been working our back sides off, Mostly Janice. As you can see from the first picture I started digging down the area between the Filberts and the River Rock Wall. While doing this project we moved the Bartlet Pear back against the bank at the back edge of the driveway.

 I will have to replace some soil back into this area, but want to grind three stumps, remove rocks, and mix in a liberal amount of Compost also. We intend on putting a stack block wall along the back to cover the raw dirt edge by the filberts, almost all the way to the greenhouse.

After moving the Pear tree and thinking "hey not too bad of a job it has a good chance to survive." we decided to move the tree that was supposed to be a Yellow Delicious, but turned out to be a Granny Smith, back just over from the Pear we had just moved.

 Dig the tree out, being careful not to dig up the drain field!

 Dig the new hole, big hole!

Install tree in new location. Unfortunately I scuffed up the apple more than I did the Pear, but I hope they both survive. We are planning on lining the back edge of thee driveway with fruit trees. We have several small trees in pots in the greenhouse. About five Freedom Apples and one more Asian Pear.

Well looks like all went well, now to see if they survive. My eldest son DJ moved a large Apricot from here in Gold Beach clear over to his yard in Grants Pass, and it survived well, only time will tell.

They look pretty good in their new locations. As if this wasn't enough work  We (Janice did Most) also pruned all of the rest of the fruit trees which had been neglected for a couple of years, and the Kiwi which thought it needed to make up time for being in the pots so long, last year



FINISHED

I have finally finished the flower picture I was embroidering. I started it last winter and got a ways on it then Spring sprung and I had other, more important stuff to do, like work in the yard and garden. Growing our own stuff is always more important and more fun. Especially if you like to dig in the dirt like I do. Anyway, back to the picture. I picked it up again this winter and finally finished it just after the first of the year. It was fun to do , but I still have to build a frame for it and get it framed and hung. Don will probably do most of that but I enjoy wood working also and will help where I can. Now that it is finished I can start on another project. I will probably pick out something and get it in my sewing basket and ready for winter.

I think this kind of stuff is slowly going away. It use to be women and some men really enjoyed doing this kind of stuff. It was common and now the computer age is here and our children are more involved with electronics than hand work. I wish I could get my grandchildren involved with it but they too are more involved with electronics. Maybe some day they will want to learn.

ERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRG!!!

I have been trying to add a picture to a post that I have wanted to get posted and for some reason Google won't pick up the browser to let me add a picture. I don't know what to do. I have tried to send a feedback comment to google and they will not respond to me. If anyone else has had this problem could you send me a comment and let me know if it can be fixed. I don't know what else to do. This is very frustrating.

STARTING THE NEW YEAR OFF

We are now well into the new year and I have been getting ready for the spring planting. I have already started the pruning of the trees and still have quite a bit more to do. I started a list of TO DO things and am already starting to plane for my garden. Last year I just planted stuff in the garden just because I could. This year I am going to concentrate just on the foods that we like to eat and can. I don't have a lot of garden space that gets a lot of sun so I have to be careful as to what I am going to plant, so I have started a new garden journal and am going through all of my garden seeds to pick out what I want to plant. I also found on line a "when to start your seeds" plan and am going to try to stick with this to see if it will help me get on a regular program.
I know that we will still have lots of rain and maybe even snow coming this year but I can get my seeds started in the greenhouse. I need to start moving the compost around to the garden beds that I am going to use and getting them ready for planting. The greenhouse is the biggy for me since we don't get a lot of heat here.
Mostly the cooler weather crops do better here. I can grow some of the longer growing season crops but have to use make shift covers to protect the plants until it does start warming up. This usually works pretty well, although when the wind blows, and it does blow quite hard at times, it will blow the cover off and I fight it every year. I wish I could come up with something that would work better. I am still working on that. I have a few ideas but not enough time to do everything so I will make do with what I have for now, at least until I have a few minutes to spend on my ideas.
I really love gardening and being outside. I would rather dig in the dirt than clean my house. I can't go outside, even in my nice clothes, without getting dirt on me some how. Don laughs at me sometimes because of it. That's OK, he does it too.
We have lots of plans for this year again, seems like we always do but not enough time to do them all. I would really like to start some new raised garden beds with covers on them for growing. I have plans, that my son Jon drew up for me, that I would like to build this year but Don needs to dig down the area that I want to put them.
Well I guess we will do what we can and leave the rest for the next year as usual. I will try to keep you up on the progress as we go this year.
Happy gardening to all. Try it you might like it.

ANOTHER TRIP TO CALIFORNIA

We are down at Janice's parent's home again. This has been a very good trip thus far, When we arrived Martha was not doing much for exercise, but now She is walking around the kitchen holding onto the counter,

Last night Martha let go of the counter and stood alone, also walking over into the dinning area.

 Martha then walked out to the front room, but wait she sat at the piano and played pretty well. Needless to say this was very encouraging for all of us.

We were all ecstatic at Martha's progress while we have been here, she has done soooo wellllll!!!

I had a dream...

Last night I dreamt that it snowed and everything was white and beautiful. Well guess what, when I got up this morning there was white stuff all over the ground. It did snow and is still snowing. Mind you it is only a skiff of snow not the full bore 10 inches deep stuff in my dreams, but still snow. Everything is looking so beautiful. I really do like the snow, it is really getting me in the Christmas mood now. The trees are starting to turn white and it is starting to look like a wonderland.
I took a few pictures and wanted to share them with you. Maybe I will take more later if it snows enough to really change the scene. Hope you enjoy them.

 

As you can see, it was rather early this morning when I took them and was still kinda dark outside which turned out OK cause when the flash went off it caught the flakes as they were falling.

Merry Christmas everyone.

Tis The Season

Well Christmas is again upon us and everyone is out doing their last minute, whatever needs to be done, chores. I don't have the Christmas spirit this year like I usually do. The world is in such turmoil that it makes it very difficult to enjoy the season.
To me Christmas this year should be a time to look to our Lord and Savior for help and guidance in our lives and the years to follow, to thank God for what we have and ask him to help heal our nation. I have always believed in our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and have always known that he is here with us always. I can't explain why I feel this way it has just always been.
People in our world try very hard to deny Christ and have been doing so for generations. Have you ever wondered why they haven't succeeded? I think because God said he would spread his word throughout the world and he has. What God says will happen, will happen. They will never succeed in stopping that no matter how hard they try.

Since the weather has gotten cold, wet and windy I have started to pick up my embroidery work again and have continued the picture that I started last winter. I have posted a picture of how far I have gotten in the Hobbies section of this blog if you are interested in seeing it. I am also going to start going through all of my Christmas Cd's that I have purchased over the years and start listening to each one to see if I want to keep it or not. Maybe this will help put me in the Christmas Spirit. I promised my mom and dad that I would bake some Pffeffernusse cookies and some chocolate chip cookies and send them some, so next week will be baking week. I really like the Pffeffernusse cookies, they are spicy and remind me of some cookies that I had when I was a small child. The recipe is in the recipe section of my blog if you would like to try them. I have a beautiful nativity scene that I put up every year and will be getting that out also. I usually put it on my piano in front of me to enjoy.
I have so much to be thankful for and love my family very much and wish each one a VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS and to all who look at this blog I would like to say the same.
May God be with each one today and always.

A LITTLE TARGET PRACTICE

Well Thanksgiving has come and gone. This year we had the company of our youngest son, Jon, his son Robert and Lady friend Tanya. I believe we all had a good time with lots to eat and much more to be thankful for.

 A couple of days we drove down the road and did a little target practice. I only took pictures the second day when it was only Jon, Robert, and myself along, I had forgotten the camera the first day when we had all gone. Anyway Robert is nominated as the bird getter for the family now. He, Robert, was really hitting the clay pigeons, much better than any of the rest of us.

We also went to my friend's property to use the range the city police use, and I forgot to take pictures shooting the .270. There, we shot two boxes of high powered rifle ammo. My rifle is finally starting to group well (it's pretty new and just getting worn in). Jon needed to do a little adjusting of his scope, but all in all everyone shot what they intended. Robert likes the .270's pretty good but prefers one with a good recoil pad.
The next day Robert and I went to the basement and I taught him to reload rifle and shotgun ammunition.

As an addition, after shooting a couple boxes of ammo through my 270, it's finally starting to group well. This being said I have started to work up a good loading for this rifle, Went to the store today and they didn't have the powder I needed. Oh well, Sooner or later....