• The majority of our fruits, veggies, and herbs are growing well.

• Farmer John planted one side of the goat’s field with a grass mix. It’s finally taking off. We’re going to let it grow a bit more, though, before letting the goats graze on it.

• A bird I have never seen at our house showed up. I believe it is a Yellow-breasted Chat. He is quite the chatterbox.

• The lavender is in bloom and I love it. I am conflicted about whether to cut it or leave it. I want to make an herb craft with the cut lavender, but I love the way it looks in the garden. So, I hate to cut it. Decisions, decisions.

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Most of August was warm, dry & uneventful. However, one night there was a fantastic lightning show that I really could have enjoyed had I not been so nervous about the trees around our house catching on fire. Here in the PNW we get thunder & lightning. But no real great show. It lasts a few minutes and moves on. This time it went on strike after strike for a couple hours straight. I spent those couple hours in awe of nature’s wonders, but also running through my mind the course of events that needed to happen when/if I notice something catch fire. Thankfully, there wasn’t a fire.

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Weather

There was a lot of rain this April. Not unusual for our area, but it gets depressing after awhile. Luckily, we did have a few nice days & the chickens took full advantage of it by taking fabulous dirt baths.

I’m fascinated by the moon & stars. I have a difficult time, but I continue to try to take photos of the night sky. So, when the Blood Moon was supposed to be visible there was no doubt I would try to capture it on my camera. I did get a couple shots of the beginning of the eclipse. But, by the time it was a total eclipse & the moon was supposedly red tinted the clouds hid it & I never saw it. Darn it! Maybe next time in October.

Sadness

April began with the loss of a dear part of our family.

Flower Beds

There was a lot of digging, hoeing & more digging going on this month.

I dug up what was supposed to be our strawberry patch & replaced the few berry plants with heather. I had a helper water the heather after I got them all in the ground.

This is not wowing, but I hoed & dug out a kazillion weeds from the flower bed in the Back Yard. It was a lot of work & I was exhausted. Maybe I shouldn’t let it get so overrun with weeds before attacking them.

There has always been a problem area in the Bird Village. We’re solving that problem by getting rid of the dirt, plants that won’t grow & weeds that grow too well & replacing them with a pond.

Gardening for Food

The tomato plants are off to a good start.

Farmer John rototilled the garden rows.

The kids planted peas.

The ducks were on slug & weed patrol in the garden. Although, I’m afraid they may have eaten the peas the kids planted.

Chicken Keeping

More chicks hatched this month.

A friend & I were vendors at our first chicken swap.

One of our Black Copper Marans is broody. We had to move her from her coop to keep the eggs protected. For the first few hours she was not impressed with the move & paced the fence wanting back home. Thankfully, she eventually sat on her eggs. Since then she has rarely gotten off them. As long as those few hours didn’t mess up the development of the embryos we should have chicks hatching any day.

Now this is what I call a fluffy chicken butt.

Wheelin’ chicken poop to the compost pile.

Aquaponics

Farmer John got the plumbing installed for the first garden bed, fish tank & sump tank. He’s still working on getting the ph & bacteria levels correct before adding fish.

We have lettuce started! The medium Farmer John chose for the first garden bed is clay balls.

Goats

It has been fun getting to learn the personalities of Sven & Olaf.

Olaf scratching his foot. Although it’s kind of a weird photo, I think even his teeth are cute. And, I hate teeth. I could never be a dentist.

Wild Birds

We’ve had lots of birds around lately. But, my favorite was the day an eagle flew over.

There are bald eagles living nearby. But, I never see them around our house. I was ecstatic when I peeked out the window & saw one overhead. So, I grabbed my camera & headed outside.

There were also a number of ravens doing some kind of dance. We often have 2 or 3 ravens around, but I never see this many.

Some how the eagle was a part of the raven dance party. I’m not sure what his purpose was. Was he just flying by & took part in the festivities? Or was he looking for dinner? Eventually, he continued on his way.

During all the raven excitement a couple vultures were circling.

April has been a busy month for outdoor projects! Yippey! I love this time of year.

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I’ve had my DSLR camera for over a year & haven’t tried taking star pics. A few nights in the last couple weeks I finally gave it a shot. I’m not sure I got exactly what I was looking for, but I did learn a few things. The most important thing I learned is that star photography is tricky. The shutter needs to be open awhile to let in enough light for the stars to show up. Yet, if you leave the shutter open longer than 10 – 15 seconds the stars are no longer round objects, but start to get streaky. And, not the cool streaky look from extremely long exposures, but an out of focus, not pretty photo. I took moon pics, too, & found them to be my fav’s.

I probably should have stayed up until the wee hours of the morning waiting for the moon to go down, so I could get the stars in complete darkness. I’ll have to try that next time.

Even if I didn’t get the shot I was looking for, the night sky has been beautiful this month.

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On June 5th, Venus crossed between the Sun & Earth for the last time in our lifetime. I was home that afternoon & was determined to snap a few pics. It turned out to be a huge pain. I thought ahead to pick up solar glasses so we could look at it, but I didn’t think about a way to photograph it. So, I googled it & found out I could use a No. 14 welders glass filter. Farmer John has a welders mask & he gave me the glass – although, it wasn’t quite a No. 14. It didn’t work great, but was better than nothing. I also tried holding the solar glasses up to the lens & trying out a variety of other items as filters. These pics are a mix-match of a variety of make shift filters & using both my cameras. I wish the sun was not just a bright white circle in the photos, but at least I can see the tiny black dot that is Venus.

THE SUN & VENUS

Top Left: 4:40 pm. This was the first photo where I was able to work out all the kinks & actually see Venus.
Top Right: 5:10 pm
Middle Left: 6:15 pm
Middle Right: 6:32 pm
Bottom Left: 8:38pm. Not only is Venus about to go passed the sun, the sun is about to go behind the mountain.
Bottom Right: 8:40 pm. The sun & Venus have now gone behind the trees. Show’s over.

MORE SKY PICS FROM THAT DAY

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