Cold Frame and Garden Update With a Splash of Goat Milk

Remember the cold frame that the man built for me? We are finally getting greens and they are great! No bugs or slugs and easy as pie to wash which makes me want to make more salads. You in southern climes probably can't relate because you are already getting tomatoes and your squash plants are huge. We up here are waiting for peas, and it hasn't been that long since our last frost. (April first-ish?) Our last bout with snow was March 17th even though it didn't stick it wasn't what you would call gardening weather. Since then it has been windy and almost constantly rainy (really cold and wet rain that lasts all day) with just a few days of reprieve so our growing season doesn't really start until May. You still have to get the stuff in the ground in order to get anything out so gardeners here are a tough breed. Temperatures here can be as low as mid forties upper 30's. The highest so far have been barely 60. This is great for lettuce, peas, potatoes, and cabbage type stuff but not beans and tomatoes. So that is why the cold frame. I need fresh greens before June! My potatoes are in and coming up although I still have a few I haven't put in. Mainly the russets.

I am (as usual) experimenting with a technique for the peas. I love fresh sugar snap peas. I hate trellising them. It's a pain in the a$$ and the string type trellis just seems to be flimsy and falling over all the time. Not only that we have birds (robins I think) that love sprouting peas. They come down in the garden and peck out the newly emerging pea plant so that the next time I go down to the garden I find neat little holes exactly where my plants were, all in a neat little row as if they just went down the line and plucked them out one by one. So this year I think I have foiled the little buggers. Like last year for the broccoli and cauliflower plants I covered the ground with nylon netting from the fabric store. bug covers for cool weather gardens This stuff is cheap, reusable, lets in all the light and water, and the birds don't like it. heheheh. I simply spread the netting over the planted area and put in a garden stake to hold it in place so the wind couldn't blow it off. You only need to do this until the plants are about an inch tall. The birds leave them alone after that. Then you can remove them so the peas don't grow up through them.  For trellises I am trying upside down tomato cages. I'm not sure if the pea plants will be able to grip the metal on the cages but if not I will figure out what to do about that but I am hoping for pea tee pees. I wrapped the fabric around the bottom of the cages and held it in place with clothes pins. It has worked like a charm. I removed the fabric and I have lots of peas coming up. In case you noticed that some are planted in rows and some in tee pees it is because I didn't think of the cage idea until I was half way done. So this will be a real experiment with a control group. Ha!

 So here are the results!



Other than that I have been very busy baking, teaching a class last weekend and making cheese. I don't have goats anymore but I still go over to my breeders farm and buy goats milk from her. She has Kinder Goats which is what I had. http://www.kindergoatbreeders.com/ They are the best little goat ever. They are great milkers, easy kidders, and a good size for meat. They also seem to be less trouble than the bigger goats as far as escaping and taking care of in general. I guess I will have to dig out some of my old pictures and do a special blog on them. I do miss the babies and she had a ton of them. All of them friendly. I even had one that jumped into my arms. At any rate I have been making simple cheese with the fresh milk and a chocolate goat milk ice cream that my kids ate up as fast as they could get it in their mouths. Come to think of it the cheese is gone too. Guess I better go make some. I'll take pictures this time.

Happy Easter.....Eggs and Nesting Goose Update.

I finally got access to the goose nest and was able to candle those eggs. No babies inside. So I took the eggs into the house. This didn't set well with the geese. The girls went out yelling at the boys and they all walked around for awhile being very noisy talking about it. The girls eventually went back in looking for their eggs. Although I had pulled all the nesting material out of  the dog crate they were using (there were two) one of them went back inside, sat down and started pulling all the stuff back in. After sitting on the empty nest for a day  I decided I better go empty the nesting material out of the dog crate they were using and remove it. That didn't stop them. It just upset them. This morning and for the last two days they have been sitting in the nesting material together out in the open where the chickens can see them. They are determined.......and I feel bad for them. Although I haven't seen the ducks doing the tango lately I went ahead and placed two fresh duck eggs in front of the geese which they promptly tucked under their downy breast. Guess I will candle them in a couple days.

In the mean time in the house I scrubbed the goose eggs using soap and a plastic kitchen scrubby. They were so stained that they wouldn't come clean so I used a little vinegar with the scrubby and that took it off. My plan was to blow out the eggs, rinse them and then dye them with natural dyes made from stuff in the kitchen. I was afraid they would be stinky so I took precautions to empty the eggs into a zip lock back for disposal. To my surprise they weren't. So here is how I did it.

Cleaned and scrubbed eggs

Using a straw colored with ink I marked
a circle on both ends of the egg.

Using a dremmel I gently
drilled a hole in both ends the
same size as the straw. 

I used a bamboo skewer to break up
the yolk inside then using the straw
I blew out the insides into the bag.

Once the eggs were empty, rinsed and dried I started to color them. My favorite was the boiled onion skins which made a lovely orange. I also used curry and mustard mixed with water for yellow (I didn't have any turmeric but mustard has that in it) sweet cherry juice for a purple/blue, and beet juice for a pink. All mixed with water and a little white vinegar.










This morning my youngest (16)  informed me that she was expecting an Easter basket. I thought my girls were past that. Hmmmmm....but apparently not. She got down the Easter decorations and pulled out these eggs made some years ago when I lived on Lummi Island. They are made with tissue paper and a mixture of Elmer's glue and water. Kind of like paper mache' only on real eggs that were blown out.

Easy and fun project for the kids

I will keep you posted on the geese and their quest for a family. In the mean time have a great Easter!

Duck and Remodel Update

The sun peaked in and out all day yesterday and I took the opportunity to put the babies and mom outside just long enough to change the bed and water in their brooder box. One of the ducklings was shivering right away and I have to admit it was chilly but I thought they would get under mom. She was more interested in getting some scratch time in so babies just followed her around picking at the grass too. They were only out for about 5 minutes though because the sun disappeared as fast as it had come out. It was working up to a wind storm with another cold front coming in. So we got blustery weather during the night with some little power outages here and there. The three older babies will be a week old late tomorrow. Sure goes fast.
                                                                                                                 

I am thinking about temporarily reducing the size of my chicken flock and re-homing some of them. I found a home for one yesterday through craigslist. Someone was looking for a companion for her hen. The reason is I have come to the conclusion that I could do a better job of getting a productive flock that would fit in better with my preparedness goals. I love the different breeds but some of them are just resource suckers. Meaning eat more produce less. More on this subject in another blog.

The bathroom is coming along and I am happy with the progress. The man isn't. He wants it done now. He only gets two days off a week (and they aren't consecutive). He also has a real problem not having his bathroom. We have a powder room that would temporarily suffice for doing things like brushing teeth and drying hair but the only other showers are upstairs in the girls bath (and he doesn't want to go there) and up in the apartment over the garage which means going outside in his bathrobe. He doesn't want to do that either. So I think I need to get the shower ordered and ready to install and the pocket door too. The idea is for him to take a couple days off sandwiched around his normal days off. With four days off he should be able to get the door installed and the sheet rock installed over it and the shower with the doors installed over that and hopefully have the tile guy in to tile the two walls in the shower. He may have to use the girls shower a couple days but it wont kill him. Especially since they are usually gone by the time he needs it.

                     

 We do have another girl moving in this Thursday though. One of the kids has a friend that wants to stay with us until she and the oldest move out this fall. We will call her Em for this purpose. We love Em. She has been a friend for a long time and she is a great kid. Always helping out and jumping in to do things voluntarily. She went to a private college this year. It was her first year and she found out it was just too expensive.  She attended two quarters and is already 10 grand in debt because she had to take out a student loan to pay for her dorm, a requirement for first year students. Our oldest attended running start during her senior year of high school, attended the same junior college and lived at home her sophomore year and has a significant amount saved for this fall when she moves out. If she is accepted she will be attending the University of Washington her junior year and so far no debt. Em realizes that this is a better idea or she is going to have a killer student loan debt when she gets out of school. However she is already in debt and kind of behind the eight ball already. But living here over the next few months she can get some prerequisites out of the way and work somewhere so she can save up a little for next fall. Working and going to school full time is really hard.

So not only will the man need to use that shower but he has to do it with another girl living here. The problem is all in his head but we will just work around that. In the mean time I will be stripping the paint from the claw foot tub and looking for the shower.

Why be prepared? econ 101

Barton M. Biggs is a money manager running Traxis Partners, a multi-billion dollar hedge fund based in New York City. He formerly held the title of "chief global strategist" for Morgan Stanley and was with that firm for 30 years.His influence could be seen when, in 1996, some traders were surprised that India funds suddenly became popular. "Barton Biggs is there, having a look around," one trader said. "Do you need to know more?"


Biggs is also author of the 2008 book Wealth, War and Wisdom (358 pages; Wiley; January 2008; ISBN 978-0-470-22307-9). In this book, Biggs has a gloomy outlook for the economic future, and suggests that investors take survivalist measures, such as looking into "polar cities" as safe refuges for future survivors of global warming. In the book, Biggs recommends that his readers should “assume the possibility of a breakdown of the civilized infrastructure.” He goes so far as to recommend planning adaptation strategies now and setting up survival retreats: “Your safe haven must be self-sufficient and capable of growing some kind of food,” Mr. Biggs writes. “It should be well-stocked with seed, fertilizer, canned food, wine, medicine, clothes, etc. Think Swiss Family Robinson. Even in America and Europe there could be moments of riot and rebellion when law and order temporarily completely breaks down.”^[7]

I didn't write that. I copied it from Wikipedia. It can be found on numerous web sites including news sites and I included it because I thought it interesting (maybe a little scary) that a Wall Street-er would say it.  Although I don't think this will happen all at once I do think we are in for a "lifestyle correction" that will take place over time. How much time I don't know but given there is a learning curve to anything you need to learn the sooner you get to it the better.


 One of the biggest hurdles to being prepared is to know what it is you are preparing for. Whether it's peak oil, economic collapse, mother nature pitching a fit, or a pandemic.  I have to say it is pretty much impossible to convince anyone of something they don't want to believe. Until it happens.And I'm not saying the world is coming to an end in (pick a month)______ because that's kind of silly. What I am saying is change is inevitable. And being just a little bit prepared for that will make your life much easier and cost you nothing but a little time and fore thought. We have a tendency to believe that Kroger store will always be stocked and you will always be able to buy fuel (for car or home) but it hasn't always been that way and it hasn't been that long ago that it wasn't that way. We have been living in a sweet spot for enough years that our kids can't imagine things being different than it is right now. Being prepared also means knowing why something isn't working. What the circumstances are that lead up to it and the best way of coping with it......before it happens. The last post on this subject was about peak oil. Let's move on.

Economic collapse-For years we have been working up to what we call our current "economic recession". We have had them in the past starting with the first major US  panic of 1819 Followed by the  panic of 1837  and the panic of  1873 that triggered a severe international depression in the US and Europe. It was referred to as the great depression until the "Great Depression" of 1930's that we are more familiar with thanks to our exposure to relatives that actually lived through it. I suppose most of them are all old enough to be dead now so perhaps we will forget that hard won history and repeat it. The panic of 1873 is now referred to as the Long Depression.  That's not to say we hadn't experienced economic downturns before (in the late 1700's and early 1800's) but these were caused more from the Atlantic economy and foreign trade. (deep breath)

So what is different about it this time? Events leading up to it. Some that I wont even mention for fear of  this  becoming a book. But let's start with the end of the Gold Standard.  This was  a fairly workable system until Nixon decided to get rid of the gold standard and just print money. This is called fiat currency  and is the system used in the US today. It works as long as other countries have confidence in the country producing it and the government is a responsible one.  In 1971 Nixon(R) had a choice to declare bankruptcy and tell the world we didn't have the gold to back up the debt we had run up after Vietnam or get rid of the gold standard in the United States. Bankruptcy would have been the responsible thing to do but not politically expedient. That was the year I graduated from school and I remember how impossible it was to get any kind of job. (It was also pretty hard to get gas for a car too.) He chose the later telling the world the US was going off the gold standard and our currency would be the standard of exchange worldwide and anyone wanting to trade oil had to do it in US dollars. Our GDP was huge and our oil reserves well stocked making the US look like a good alternative to the gold standard. So the rest of the world went along with it. They had confidence that we could pay our debts even though we were living beyond our means.  At that time the government started printing money and the whole mess just started rolling downhill. When Nixon left office our debt was about 35% of the GDP. Ford(R) took office and nine months into his presidency US involvement in Vietnam ended and he resided over the weakest economy since the Great Depression. Jimmy Carter(D) took office in 1977 during a time of international  Stagflation which persisted through out his term.  Regan(R) took office in 1980. He advocated reducing tax rates (for the wealthy of course) and depending on a concept called trickle-down_economics leaving the people worse off than before. He is also known for deregulation. Something we are still paying for in that corporations and banks have little or no government over site leaving them to pretty much do as they wish. The CEO's like this. Perhaps the best way to understand how regulation and deregulation  works is to read this link. Then in March of 2006 congress voted to raise the limit on our debt instead of raising taxes (on the wealthy?) and spending less. Not only does this sound familiar, it sounds a lot like someone with a credit card that just maxed it out. So what do we do?  Well we simply got the credit limit raised. As a result in 2009 our debt was closer to 90% of the GDP. George Bush Sr. (R) took office in 1989 after a successful career in the Navy, graduating from Yale, becoming a successful business man, and making his fortune in the oil business. He inherited huge deficits left over from the Reagan era and managed to piss off most of the Republican party by doing the right thing and trying to reduce the deficit. Republicans wanted to reduce government spending and the Democrats wanted to raise taxes.  He lasted one term. Sound familiar? Bill Clinton(D) took office in 1993 and ran for two terms. He presided over the longest period of peace time economic expansion in American history. He worked with George Bush Sr. to pass NAFTA (which had been crafted during Bushes presidency) signing it into law during his term and was involved in Barack Obama's campaign.The congressional budget office reported budget surpluses for 1998, 1999, and 2000 during the last 3 years of Clinton's presidency. Despite his scandal he left office with the highest end of office approval rating of any president since world war II. Since leaving office he has been highly rated in public opinion polls of U.S. presidents.

Then we have George W. Bush (R). What can I say. A lot I guess but I would need to write pages and pages so it would be best if you just follow the link and read for yourself. All I can say is the same thing I said to my sister during his campaign. If this man walked into my business with his resume I would definitely file it in the round file before he got out the door. I don't need a cheerleader or a baseball player. And I certainly don't need someone skilled at bankrupting businesses. I could say "how he ever got elected is beyond me" but I have my suspicions about that too. Now this should get some of you fired up I'm sure.
Under GW we got a tax cut for the wealthy, GDP grew at average rate of 2.5% (considerably below average), poverty rate peaked at 12.7%, and the national debt increased 100% from 5.6 trillion in 2000 to 11.3 in 2008. By the end of his presidency unemployment climbed to 7.2% and kept going. In December 2007 the U.S. entered the longest post WWII recession which included a housing market "correction", sub prime mortgage crisis, soaring oil prices, and a declining dollar. To aid the situation Bush signed a $170 billion economic package intended to improve the economy. (Maybe that was suppose to be trickle down economics) Many economist and world governments determined that the situation became the worst financial crises since the Great Depression. In November 2008 over 500,000 jobs had been lost, the largest loss of jobs in 34 years. By the end of 2008 2.6 million US jobs had been lost. I could go on but what's the point. You get the idea.

January 20th 2009. Barack Obama(D) took office. If it had been me I would have run screaming in the other direction rather than inherit that mess. But he didn't. Unfortunately the American people were looking for Superman. He isn't. It will take a lot of work and time to climb out of this mess and it will take even longer since he is now bucking the republican head winds. The question here is will he last long enough to actually make a difference? Will he win this next election and be able to say full speed ahead and damn the torpedoes. Let's get'er done? Well it took a while to get here and while 4 years isn't enough 8 years may at least put us back on track to get there. But what if it isn't. Are you prepared to ride it out? Are you independent enough to live on your own without the help of society basically? Do you own your home out right, have an independent source of income and a way to feed yourself?

What I am saying is learn to take care of yourself and work towards getting your community to come together to take care of each other. It hurts no one and makes you and those around you happier in their self sufficiency. The next couple post will be about peak water and food. Hopefully they wont be as long and maybe there will be some pictures? Stick with me here. We will eventually get to what we can or should do about it.

Snow

Well after all that stuff about people going to the store the white stuff came down. Every place BUT here got it first but now we have about 6-8 inches and it is still snowing. My sister has 16 inches. And our oldest girl is stuck at her boyfriends house with her car buried in his dad's driveway. We have plenty of stuff in the freezer and pantry so I don't have to go out but it's tempting to take the Jeep for a little fun. Here are some pictures from yesterday.

We have had another 3-4 inches since. Like always this will only last a few days then it is suppose to turn to rain tomorrow. Not what I would call an emergency unless you aren't prepared a little. Power went out temporarily but we have a big 10,000 Kw Generac generator. As usual the man had to have the coolest one on the market at the time we bought it so this one "exercises" itself automatically every Saturday afternoon at 4pm to keep the start up battery charged. A power outage isn't as fun as it was when I was a kid. Most of the time we don't even notice the power lapse because the generator starts up automatically 30 seconds after the power goes out, warms up for 15 seconds and then powers up almost everything in the house. Including the washer and dryer. (Dryer is propane but has electric start up and digital stuff on it.) Most of the time we don't notice the power lapse until we see the oven display that says "power loss" and I have to reset the clock.  Apparently Generac now has a new generator that keeps the start up battery charged with a solar panel. I imagine when or if we ever move from here he is going to want that at the next place.

Geese on the back porch looking for breakfast. 

"snow goose"

The cords in the bird pasture that keeps flying predators out sagging under the weight of the snow.

No potato towers today!

Just for the cuteness factor our youngest daughter gave her hedge hog a bath during the snow storm. What better way to spend a cold afternoon than in the tub!

After a nice warm bath.