Hay Season

To some people, hay season means runny noses, itchy, puffy eyes, and allergy medication. To others, especially those around our area of North Idaho, it means something entirely different: longer than long days, short nights, dinner - when it should be bedtime, little to no family or personal time, and "vacation" time off work so you can get the hay up.

I counted (at least) four different kinds of hay in this handful

"Getting the hay up" is a science in and of itself. It involves constantly checking the weather, checking the ground to see if it's not too wet, cutting (swathing) the hay at the perfect time, fluffing the hay while at the same time not letting the sun bleach it, checking for slugs (which, I learned to my embarrassment, are not pests but, rather, wet hay), and then baling the hay and hoping your equipment doesn't break down (which it more than often does). Wet hay is bad to bale. Very bad. Like, it can burn your barn down "bad." Yes, WET hay can burn down a barn.

This wet green grass I turned over is what they call a "slug"

I love my farmer friends. They are dear. They are the salt of the earth. They work so hard and require so little. They start at sun up, pause for a prayer followed by lunch, and then back to work until sun down. They will do anything, for anyone, at any time - even when it is inconvenient for them. Hay season defines these hard workers and shows their amazingly awesome character of selflessness, integrity, honesty, willingness to serve, humility, patience, responsibility, generosity, and much more.

 Loading five tons of hay

My neighbor swathing our hay on his day off (of his regular job)

To top it all off, they are teaching my son these traits and giving him life-long lessons that I pray he will use to better his life and the life of his future family.

Here, Robert can be seen fixing our fence line... 

He didn't know how to do this a year ago.

Thank you, God, for farmers.

That's me on the an accumulator helping friends with their field.

I can't believe they trusted me :)

Independence Day Weekend

It's a hot one here in North Idaho - about 90 and climbing. I'm LOVING it! We have the A/C going so when I'm outside getting overheated I can come inside and cool down. I don't feel rushed to get outside and be outside every single minute like I did when we lived in Alaska and there was a nice day (MAYBE 75 degrees) during summer.

Our hay will be cut in the next few days so Chey and I took a walk out to our upper pasture to get a few pics before it is cut with the swather.

We had a relaxing and fun Independence Day weekend. Spent it eating, barbecuing, setting off fireworks, and four-wheeling with friends. We also had fun around the fire pit roasting marshmallows and making smores.

Lake Coeur d'Alene in the distance

Plummer down below

Our grow-out cage for our market (meat) rabbits is almost complete. I'm building it from the ground-up out of scrap wood so I'm excited it's shaping up into something that resembles a rabbit hutch.

Hope you all had a wonderful Independence Day Weekend. 

Skeet

Skeet and his baby brother, Timber

Life on the farm...

I simply have TOO many hilarious and fun stories to tell about our daily life on our hobby farm. Stories that take too long to describe via a short Facebook post. Experiences such as our first try at incubating chicken eggs or stomach-tubing a sick goat.

Even our day-to-day life seems to be full of excitement and wonder - so we think other people might enjoy it too. I also want to encourage others that if we can do this SO CAN YOU!! :)

I'm going to start journaling our days. Hopefully, every day.
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Our meat rabbits, Lilly and Daisy had their kits a few weeks ago and we've enjoyed watching them grow. Daisy was a first-time mom and it was still chilly at night so six of her nine kits (short for kitten) perished shortly after birth. Her remaining three are growing beautifully and we will most likely use them for Cheyenne's 4H market rabbit project at the North Idaho State Fair in August.

We have recently added another dog to our mini-farm bringing our total (and final) dog count to three. Timber is 12 weeks old and is the full younger brother to our 1-year-old dog, Skeet.

Our four cats are busy catching mice, moles, voles, and other little critters who sneak around tearing things up. I have put huge bells on their collars because they were catching so many birds this spring -- I even saw Atilla catch one of my beloved hummingbirds! They haven't caught birds since they started wearing the bells...at least that I know of. 

We have a mule named Sugar Magnolia that we are borrowing for the summer. "Maggie" has been teaching Cheyenne by giving her the confidence needed to learn how to properly ride a horse. She's 20 years old and a perfect project for Cheyenne. Lexi, the horse we purchased and kept for almost a year, was just too much horse for Chey.

Our first experience raising meat chickens went well. We purchased 15 of them in May and six weeks later they were ready to eat. We decided to pay $3.50 per bird to have them butchered, processed, and packaged. Next time we'll try it ourselves to see if it's worth saving the money.

I've also had my experience with skinning a rabbit. We had a beautiful holland lop pass away several months ago and I decided to make a memory of him. His fur was gorgeous so I'm attempting to tan his hide and make a hat.

Haying season is in full swing and our son, Robert, is back from a three week mission trip to rural Montana. He hit the ground running this morning back to work as a farm hand. I filled in for him a little while he was gone. It's hard work! But rewarding, especially when the weather is nice and you can get a tan at the same time. :)