The Gift of Family

We had a family gathering last month. Our three children, their spouses, and their children camped with us for 2 glorious nights and 3 days on our family's back 80 acres. There were 11 grandchildren ( 2 are now adults and one is in the Marines) . We hiked, played games, sat together around the camp fire, and some of the family went fishing. I cannot adequately express my love and thankfulness to God for His abundant blessings, His gift to us of our family, and that we're still able to get together in spite of distance and life's busyness. Praise Him !

( The picture is of our youngest son and his son, our youngest grandchild, heading off to go fishing.)

Grandkids !

"Grandchildren are the crown of old men, and the glory of sons is their fathers." Proverbs 17:6

Our New Herb Garden

 This is a sphere our daughter-in-law, wife of our youngest son, welded. She welded this sphere out of horse shoes our son removed from horses to replace their worn horse shoes. Every amazing item our beloved daughter-in-law welds is composed of used horse shoes she has to clean of rust and dirt before she can even begin to create her works of art. There is a whole lot of hard and very dirty work involved in simply making the horse shoes usable in her horse shoe compositions.

 My husband built the pergola in the background last year. This year he made an herb garden. The main feature of our new herb garden is the two spheres welded by our daughter-in-law, and the herbs.

 We are going to mount the spheres on tree stumps from our woods, soon.

 The herb garden also borders the driveway and our front yard. The sidewalk divides the herb garden from the front yard and walkway from the driveway.

 My old cat Miss Marple likes to sun herself in the new herb garden.

Even more is going on in the back yard and gardens. Our deck was rebuilt last year, we are in the process of making an outdoor kitchen/cooking/eating area now. Life in this part of Washington is coming to terms with the high and dry summer heat and learning to live with it and love it.We will have a covered eating area near the barbecue and smoker.This corner of our new (replaced) deck is where I've placed pots of herbs and flowers that will be moved later when our outdoor kitchen is done. My new chicken house is the building seen here in the background.

Life here has been glorious, we're so happy and blessed to live here. We're enjoying the many blessings of being near our sons and their families and also, now that we're retired , we're enjoying and appreciating the ability to set our schedule and time for ourselves. ( Hey, if we want to take a nap or just kick back and read a good book, we can !)

We have made many changes to our new home and farm for the better. We've improved our pastures, made vegetable and herb and flower gardens. My husband has invested much time and money in making our bee yard better for the bees and for increasing our honey production. Our poultry yard provides more eggs than we can use, but we're able to share the bounty with family and neighbors. My sheep have increased beyond my wildest dreams simply because sheep really do thrive on pasture ... amazing ! My husband and I love our new home more than we could have ever anticipated and I am thankful beyond what I can express. God is so good !

I Have An Incubator & I Know How to Use It !

Ducklings, chicks, quail, and hopefully soon pheasant, all incubated and hatched in my new incubator. Here is one of many ducklings I hatched out this spring.

My new incubator ! It monitors the temperature and humidity and alarms go off if either deviates from the settings that provide the most success for incubating and successfully hatching poultry , quail, and pheasant.

Ducklings emerging from their eggs after 28 days of incubation.

These are the parents of my ducklings ~ they are purebred Pekin ducks.

Here are 3 of the many ducklings I hatched out of my incubator. All have now been sold to families desiring ducklings as pets or egg layers.

I highly recommend this book for anyone who wants to incubate and hatch out their own poultry.

Spring Has Arrived, Mostly

 The tulip bulbs I planted in pots last year are ready to bloom, but all the plants I have to put in flower beds and decorative pots are still not planted. We've had below freezing temps overnight the last few days. The water in our fountain was ice, and some tender plants left outside froze. ( It was 22 degrees Monday night.) As you can see, these plants are still waiting to be put into pots.

 I bought these herbs 3 weeks ago on the first warm sunny day. I was so excited to begin planting my herbs. They've been growing quite well in an over-the-sink colander for now.My excitement over warmer spring days was short-lived. Oh well, it has been convenient to snip them off for cooking right here in the kitchen.

 This is my husband's honeybee shelter. The winters here are extremely cold and were not kind to the bees we brought here with us from our previous home. With the deep freeze and the hordes of yellow jackets and bald-faced hornets that reside here, our first hives were devastated. My husband works hard to get our honeybees to thrive here, and that includes not only shelter from scorching sun and freezing weather, but some insulation in the hives and feeding them over the winter. ( You can see this honeybee shelter from our front porch.)

 This planter is made of old hive boxes my husband would have burned if I had not begged him for them to use as planters. He is working to eradicate any disease that compromises our bees and these are old and well-used hive boxes.

 The hive box planter is in front of our aviary which can also be seen from our front porch.

 Here is a picture of the honeybee shelter and the aviary, both in the front yard, in full view of our front porch. Beyond the aviary and honeybee shelter is our front pastures, then the gravel road that runs in front of our home, and beyond the road are hills, mountains, and woods.

 Our front porch. My husband is currently working on the flowerbeds in front of our home. When we bought our home the beds were planted with very hardy roses . The roses grew large and wieldly, and the thorns proved dangerous while pruning the roses and weeding the flower beds. We transplanted the roses to a place they could grow and big and wild as they're able and I am so happy with how my husband has chosen to plant our front flowerbeds. I will post updates soon.

A box of annuals I am waiting to plant. According the the weather forecast I should be able to plant them all next week. ~ " Then God said , "Let the earth sprout vegetation, plants yielding seed , and fruit trees bearing fruit after their kind , with seed in them, on the earth"; and it was so." Genesis 1:7

Quail~

 Last summer I bought about 20 Coturnix Quail. They live in our aviary with the doves and pigeons. The quail occupy and lay their eggs under pine & fir boughs on the floor of the aviary .

Quail eggs are extremely nutritious. "Quail eggs are incredibly nutritious , and even more nutritious than a full-size chicken egg !  Quail eggs are higher in iron,folate, and B12." ( Quoted from article written about quail in the Spring 2019 'Backyard Poultry' by Amy Fewell .)

My husband has been making tasty treats with my quail eggs. In a week or so I will try to incubate the eggs to produce a new generation of quail for our home because quail have a very short lifespan of about 2 years and my quail are almost a year old.

 This is a picture of our aviary taken in February. We had snow until this month. We still have snow in our woods and some of the lower hills. Our aviary is in our front yard and we can view it from our windows and the front porch.

The quail share their side of the aviary with my white ring-neck doves and 1 Frillback pigeon. The other side of the aviary houses 2 pairs of Frillback pigeons and 1 pair of King pigeons.

Easter Blessings

 We celebrated Easter on Palm Sunday this year. Our sons and their families are celebrating with their other grandparents on Easter but thankfully they were able to be with us last Sunday. Easter is our Christian celebration of the resurrection of our Lord & Savior, and truly is celebrated by us with thanksgiving and praise all year long.

 Our home is very small , but the size does not limit us to sharing meals with those we love and care about. We just bring out the portable buffet table and set it up in the living room.

 I set the table with the china my Aunt Ruby and cousin Christine gave me. It was Aunt Ruby's china for many years. She celebrated her 100th birthday in 2017.Ruby's daughter Christine threw an amazing party for her mother, and Aunt Ruby had all her "faculties" and was able to visit with her many loved ones and friends. ( Aunt Ruby has since passed on into eternity and I remember her as a very special blessing in my life.)

 The china pattern is Spode's "Rosebud Chintz" from Copeland, England . I have the teapot and gravy boat too !

 There were only 5 grandkids here for this year's Easter egg hunt.My husband hid the eggs all over our front pasture. I suspect the older children in this picture won't be hunting for Easter eggs much longer, but the youngest little guy in the picture, our youngest grandchild, has a blast hunting for Easter eggs. ( When did our grandchildren grow up so fast ?)

 Easter Eggs !

"I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in Me shall live even if he dies,and everyone who lives and believes in Me shall never die."  Jesus ~ John 11 :25, 26

It's That time of Year Again ... Lambing Time !

 Our oldest grandson was here visiting us over his spring vacation. I can't believe our very first grandchild is old enough to drive himself here over the mountains and far away from his home to visit us and help us out, but he is, and he did. He has helped us install the fencing around our pastures amongst other labor intensive work projects at our new home. Here he is holding newborn twin lambs.

 A new lamb learning to nurse. ~This is Miriel, one of my Jacob Sheep ewes. She also gave birth to twins , both ram lambs ( boys). Thus far I have been very busy with lambing time, and also incubating and raising my new laying flock and also raising 100 fryer / broiler chicks for our freezer. Until mid-June I am going to be one busy lady tending new lambs, chicks, and hopefully my geese and ducks are successful at hatching out their own eggs. We'll see. Spring has definitely sprung and the snow has almost melted around Laughing Dove Farm.

Thus far I have 11 new sets of twins and a set of triplets. I have 5 more ewes left to have their lambs and I am very thankful God has allowed all of my lambs to be born healthy and they're thriving. God is so good to me , beyond anything I deserve. Praise Him !