We have been busy with a variety of things at Raisin Acres. My Grandpa John sent us some fig trees to plant. These trees came from his brother in Ohio and went to New York where he lives and from there made it to Tennessee, you could say they have been around. They look pretty good for all the traveling that they have done don't they? We planted the trees out front along the North side of the garden. I am hoping to harvest some figs in a year or two.
Grandpa John is 99 years old and still has a garden and a huge strawberry patch that he works in every year. He is a pretty amazing man and I can only hope to get around as well as he does when I am half his age. I remember him having a fig tree at his place in NY when I was younger. He did get a couple of figs off it but it never got real big. He would bend it over to the ground in the fall and cover it with mulch to get it through the winters.
I strained some of the oil infusions that we have been steeping on the back porch and put them into jars to use when I am ready to make salve. It's funny, I normally always make salve in the fall or early winter never in the spring or summer. Probably because we are too busy with everything else.
We sold Yoko and my dear husband drove many miles to trade her out for a beautiful little doeling. We will miss her and her quirky personality and most of all the milk she produced for us. I am in the process of organizing the goat herd and getting ready for breeding season. We still need to find a nice Lamancha Buck to be the herd sire for our Lamancha girl's. We retained Titan (Yoko's) buck and will be using him with the Alpines.
I have been clearing garden beds to plant some fall vegetables. Our tomato plants have slowed down but many are very green yet and have blossoms on them so I went through and cut them back in hope of getting a few more tomatoes into the fall. I did buy a couple of tomato plants and planted them to get some tomatoes in to the fall.
Ground has been broken on the greenhouse and the boys are digging the footer for the base it. I am so excited but also worried that it won't be done for winter use.
We have had some rain so everything is greening up and the Bermuda grass is going wild, which means I have been weeding to try and keep it at bay. We have been harvesting a few cucumbers from our newer plants.
The strawberry bed is full of weeds. We will be needing to weed and put down some fabric weed barrier before spring. The plants are looking nice and big. I am hoping to get a few berries off them this next year. The pears are getting close to ripe. I have never canned pears, if we have a lot I might try to. We will definitely be making pear butter.
We have chickens and rabbits that are needing to go in the pot before fall. We are waiting for a cooler day to do the job.
We are trying to prepare for school to start in August but I am moving slow and can't seem to get my act together. With the advent of school my thoughts start turning to fall and cooler days. With the cooler days we start baking and cooking more so I will be ordering some wheat and triticale and some other things for the baking season that is just around the corner.
I had better go, I have peppers sitting on the counter waiting to be turned into fermented pepper sauce and a whole host of other projects.
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