Other May snippets...

Other than our family photo shoot, I actually have not been keeping up with photographing all the May happenings... Especially as we push to get the summer gardens weeded, planted and mulched, I haven't been focused on pictures. I've also been enjoying not keeping my phone on me 100% of the time now that I'm not on call for any pending births at present (my nearly 80 page birth doula packet has been submitted and is in the hands of my reviewer at present). So here's what I've got!!

As I type this Alida, Terah and Ivy are going to go on a "strawberry spin" to see what they can find. There's a break in the rain and I was seeing a lot of red in the row the other day. The berries outside the seed cage are often bird pecked, but surprisingly we are getting a few this spring and savoring them. We also got to a local pick your own place earlier this week (our kids woke up around 6 a.m. to join!!!) and came home with nearly 50lbs for the freezer, along with savoring strawberry shortcake two nights in a row. At this point the ones we are finding here at home are an extra treat!

We've been keeping chickens in for a few days again to see if the predators can find other sources of nourishment away from the poultry at Tangly Woods - as hard as it is since we know how much they love free ranging. We are still not completely certain what happened the other day, but my mom noticed some older chicks bullying a little one. I went out to chase them off and then noticed that the smallest ranging chicks were spread out all over the place, not with their mamas and kind of hunched over and holding still. It was a strange sight to see them acting so abnormally, but without clear evidence of what had taken place that we had missed. We still aren't certain, but I did find one dead chick in the woods and are assuming there was probably a fox attack. I patrolled around for the rest of the afternoon and by evening both mama hens were accounted for and the chicks were back to their pecking and scratching about. 

In between rainy days, we've worked hard to tend to the summer gardens (and Jason has worked the hardest of all!!!). Let's see if I can remember what is now in: all the tomatoes and peppers, basil, flowers, sweet potatoes, okra, trombone squash, cucumbers, watermelon, delicata squash, collards and a few small things in the seed cage. Most seeds are up and we are doing our best to keep the slugs from decimating the new little plants. We worked together on the first potato hilling and it was ready for the second round within days - which Jason did solo yesterday. We still need to seed cantaloupe, the flour corn and popcorns, dry beans and the PA dutch squash. Some of those things are needing to wait until other crops are harvested or, in the case of corn, we've been trying to time our planting out of synch with the neighbors so we don't have to worry about our seed crossing with the GMO corn across the road. 

The first hay cutting is complete (done by Jason over the course of a week or two because of many interruptions) and provided enough mulch for the garlic, delicata, and some other areas AND to fill the little stock trailer with hay for the pigs. 

I'm savoring all the blooming things outside. I feel my heart swell seeing Nora's garden burst forth with new life and color! I love the little rose bush.

There continues to be lots of game playing in the evenings or in other pockets of time. When it's not Rook or Dutch Blitz, some combination of us are often competing in word games. Only one round of Upwords has been played, but after a meal you can often find most of us (minus Terah and Jason normally) with a device in hand doing Wordle, Absurdle, Octordle, Waffle, Sedecordle, or Duotrigordle. Yes, we are kinda hooked. There's other ones done less frequently, but we often make our way through most of these before we transition to dinner clean up and bedtime routines. 

Luca had his first sleepover at Tangly Woods since I last wrote. Hopefully the first of many and this one still with his parents close by! I took the first shift until about 2 a.m. and something felt so delightfully sweet about snoozing off and on with a sleeping baby in my arms while the night passed by. I don't necessarily miss night after night of disrupted sleep, but the sweetness and tenderness of those early months with a new little person in your life is really unbeatable! I'm grateful for any and all baby snuggles. When he wasn't sleeping, he was melting our hearts with his smiles and coos. 

In the early morning while Jonathan and Christen snagged a few more winks, he joined me in the kitchen and watched me while I did my morning burst of dishes, getting cheese started and food prep. I got Nora's little blue seat down from the attic and he seemed to find it to his liking! 

I'm still amazed at his attention span for books and how he interacts with them. 

The little people in our lives sure brighten up the world around us. I savor their fresh perspective on everything around them. The kids have returned with strawberries to share and are now back to scurrying around and playing together inside. My job now with playdates seems to be snack distributor and otherwise I'm really not needed! I've just learned that our home has been transformed into a spaceship...