Everything other than the new baby!

As Jason and Terah are sizing up onion sets (giving them more room to spread their roots before planting outside), Kali is working on getting popcorn ready for seed testing and Alida sitting beside me absorbed in a book, I'm going to try to share briefly the non-baby updates...

We had the occasion to dress up earlier this month when we attended our first indoor wedding for who knows how long. Alida enjoyed the occasion to wear the dress my mom wore to my wedding that now fits her. How did that happen?!

When not wearing wedding attire, Jason has been doing a lot of digging and soil moving. He occasionally had a little help (I cannot take credit for even one shovelful!). The main digging is now done, but the project is a bit stalled as spring bears down upon us!

One of the things I'm savoring about not being on zoom many mornings first thing onward is that Jason and I are reading more out loud together over hot drinks to start our day. After I did a first read of Jes Baker's memoir (Landwhale), I promptly started reading it again to Jason. We plowed through (or groaned and laughed through) that one and now are making slower progress through Sabrina Strings' Fearing the Black Body. Learning and feeling so much... Here Jason is enjoying some homegrown buckwheat grits with just a few of the MANY eggs we are enjoying these days.

We've been trying to block some full days for farm work together and one recently was a tree felling day. It always feels sad to take trees down, even if they need to come down for various reasons and we'll use them for various projects and to heat our home. And I'm always very grateful when we are able to take all down without incident. 

Then some random things that make me smile. Jason cleared a hill FULL of multiflora rose. I made sure I was busy with other things that day. The chickens are having fun with the exposed soil. The ducks are not impressed that one of their hiding places from Kali is gone. 

Why do I love the look of laundry drying on the line so much? It was a gorgeous day and so I did rugs and towels and used every line and every clothespin!

I'm having fun learning to use the chipper. Again with less screen time, I'm able to devote some time to learning some new things around home. This is a job I could enjoy doing more regularly. I also enjoy cleaning out chicken coops and putting in fresh bedding. 

St. Patrick's Day came around again and I had to make sure I was wearing something green all day (even if is was just a green pipe cleaner made into a ring). Alida beat us all with green on every article of clothing and additional adornments. It was also a good excuse to make homemade green noodles for pesto pasta. And we topped off our green meal with Smiley's mint ice creams!

It is that time of year where we start to photograph our food on a more regular basis. I know they look pretty much the same every year, but after that first spinach and violet pickings, we just have to get a photo of the first spinach salad. Many more of those on the menu in the days to come!

The gardens are beckoning! We spent all day yesterday in the inner garden - weeding/thinning the overwintered spinach patch and then applying compost, path clearing and redistribution of soil, wheel hoeing, clearing weeds, and leaf mulching. Such satisfyingly visible progress! 

Alida and Terah harvested a bunch of turnips for our first round of roasted turnips.

While I don't need to photograph the pigs' food, I do like to photograph feeding time. Maybe I already shared one of these photos, but I get such a kick out of watching the chickens line up to get any little scraps that fly out of the pigs' mouths and close enough to snag through the fence. Lilly is the only chicken brave enough to go in with them. 

It's time to go eat some popcorn, so I'll end with my favorite picture that I took recently of Terah's turtle shell about to burst forth with new green growth. Welcome spring!