I don’t know if there will ever be a great time for me to jump back into this blog, so I decided to just jump. I did not intend to leave off recording our happenings for such a long period of time.
Then I had an idea that I would back-date several posts and still record some of the things that have happened. That might have been good a month or so ago, but too much time has now gone by to do that with any continuity.
I have many pictures that I wanted to gradually post as I catch up on everything, but I have been foiled in that plan, too. For some reason I can no longer upload pictures to photobucket the way I used to, and I have not yet found another photo hosting site that will work with my computer. I never have fully embraced the technology of the 21st century and now the computer age may be passing me by...
Now on to the short update:
I have not really blogged anything since February, when there was snow on the ground. Now it is June and we have been having near record high temps for the past 4 days in the mid to upper 90s each day, and there is no end to the heat in sight. What a difference 3 months can make!
March at the Pure Water Hollow Homestead was of course dominated by the arrival of our newest blessing, Timothy. He will be three months old next week and he has grown so much. He is already about 20 pounds and can hold his head up by himself. Everyone here has been loving him and pitching in to help take care of him. He has truly been a wonderful addition to our family and a tremendous blessing!
Those piglets that were born in February all sold the same week Timothy was born. All kinds of people wanted them even though they were only 5 weeks old, and in just a weekend we sold 16 of them! We wanted to keep three for ourselves, or we could have sold them, too. I must remember that spring piglets are in greater demand than fall piglets, and therefore should probably be priced higher, but the $400 they brought in has been helping with the feed costs for our 2 sows, boar and the other 3 pigs. The three that we are raising for the freezer are 4 months old now and weigh about 129, 136, and 155 pounds based on their measurements.
April and May seemed to be pretty busy around here with getting the gardens tilled up and planted, the spring cleaning, getting the mowers and weedeaters working, working on our goat lot, and taking care of a newborn. We planted more vegetables than we have ever tried and tilled up more ground than we have in the past. I still do not have a tractor, so we have done it all with a tiller. We enlarged the goat lot, almost up to the ridge, so the goats now have an abundance of food that they are loving. All 5 of them are doing fine, even the crippled Tiny Tim (we are trying to call him just Tiny now) which the vet thought was not going to live very long over a year ago! We also rebuilt the chicken lot, enlarging it quite a bit (they are now giving us plenty of eggs again), and completely rebuilt our grape arbor for the seeded concord grapes, and made a new trellis for our seedless grape vines. The grape arbor is about 30 feet long, 8 feet wide, and 6 feet tall and the vines are hanging off the end and will touch the ground if we let them! Our Genesis colonly of honey bees are doing well and this last time we robbed them, Matthew put the suit on and helped Lisa get the honey. She got a neat picture of him in the suit with the smoker!
It has not been all work and no play, however. We opened up our pool on May 31st (the river) and the children have been enjoying wading and swimming and splashing in the cool water of the shoals.
This first week of June has been a hot one, but I have been in the gardens with the hoe most mornings. Our beans have had a lot of trouble and we need to re-do them and the corn on the river bank is very small (I am wondering if they get enough sunlight to do any good). The potatoes on the river bank are looking great and are blooming now and the tomato plants are forming little green tomatoes. Some time I will list all the vegetables we are trying to grow this year. Many of them are first timers for us, so we don’t really know if they are doing well or not.
June this year is also camp month for the children. Mathew goes next week, Christina and Simon the week after, and Erica and Matthew goes to another camp the following week. We are going to be working a bit short handed arounded here for the next three weeks!
I think that pretty much does it for my short update. So much has been happening it is just impossible to try and recapture it. God continues to be good to us and we are enjoying living life here at Pure Water Hollow! I will try to journal a bit more often again, to better record things for the memory book. If the updates are slow in coming, however, it is probably because I am hoeing, or reading, or mowing, or watering, or building, or swimming, or feeding, or hiking, or hoeing, or watering, or fixing, or feeding, or napping, or hoeing….
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4 comments
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mountainmama on June 10, 2008 at 6:42 am
I had missed your posts and I am glad you are back. I do understand about spring busyness, I have not been able to do much posting either.
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sheryl on June 10, 2008 at 11:55 am
I was tagged by vicksmom and now I am tagging you. Go to my blog and read what to do.
I have been missing your posts. I know this time of the year it is hard to get on here and post. I haven`t been on here much lately. I am so glad to hear everything is going good for you all. Sheryl
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CandyFoote on July 1, 2008 at 7:57 pm
Have a happy 4th of July!!
Candy
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Schatzi on July 4, 2008 at 7:09 pm
Thanks for the update on your family life….you all seem very busy and so we are thankful for any updates that you give us….will check back again shortly…Happy Fourth of July.
Connie
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