New Addition

As discussed in the previous post, we are trading around cars and selling my truck to get a new (used) car and a farm truck. Well, yesterday we went ahead and bought a car. Our goal was to buy a small used car that gets good gas mileage to drive around and put miles on. I found a doozy yesterday in Bella Vista, this one would even make Steve Schulte proud (for those of you who know him). It is a 2000 Toyota Corolla. It was an old lady's whose husband died and she is selling some of their stuff. It was as clean as a whistle, gets 38mpg, had all the service records in the glove box, and it even had carpet squares on the floor mats so she didn't get the floor mats dirty. But here's the kicker, it only has 47,000 miles. I think we got a good deal and hopefully it will last us a long time. Now we just need to sell my truck.

For Sale

That's right, you could own your very own piece of memorabilia from the Farm of Hale. I am selling my truck. My plan is to sell it and use the money to buy a small used car (Honda Civic, Toyota Corolla) that gets good gas mileage to drive to and from work and take on trips, and to buy a older larger truck to use as a farm truck that will be able to do more. So, if any of you know someone looking to buy a truck like mine send them my way or if you know someone trying to sell one of those cars let me know. My truck is a really good truck and is in great shape.
Here is a description of my truck:
2002 Nissan Frontier XE, V6, 4x4, extended cab, 83,000 miles, auto, tow package, bed liner, running boards/bars, cruise control, CD, sun visors on hood and door windows, new tires put on last year with 30,000 mile warranty left on tires, belts changed in February of this year,
all for only $12,000

Interesting Quote

Here is a quote by John Piper that was on a friend's blog that I found very thought inducing.

"The critical question for our generation—and for every generation-is this: If you could have heaven, with no sickness, and with all the friends you ever had on earth, and all the food you ever liked, and all the leisure activities you ever enjoyed, and all the natural beauties you ever saw, all the physical pleasures you ever tasted, and no human conflict or any natural disasters, could you be satisfied with heaven, if Christ were not there?"

Biggest Surprise Ever

We had a huge surprise this morning. We were leaving for work and Spot (the cat) was laying against the screen door and wouldn't move out of the way. When we finally made it out the door laying there with spot was a newborn kitten. We had no idea she was even pregnant. She has always been a little plump in the belly area but she didn't look or feel any different that past few weeks. Here is the crazy thing... she only had one kitten. Have any of you ever heard of a cat only having one kitten? We were so shocked. The kitten is really cute (in a ugly rat-like way), it is a calico like it's mother.





On a side note, for those of you who haven't noticed, I have added some features to my side bar. There is a current animal count, video of the day, recently watched movies and my rating of them out of 5 stars, and a picture slideshow.

We are official citizens of Redneckville

Not much going on this past week. We did have a lot of fun this past Thursday. Our church went to locomotion for a family fun night and we had unlimited passes for 2 hours. As many of you know, I love to race so I rode go carts most of that 2 hours. It was a blast but I was very sore the next day. The other thing a lot of us did, that Margo and I had never done before, was ride a mechanical bull. I never thought I'd see the day but it was actually really fun to see everyone get thrown off. All I need now is a cowboy hat and boots to start wearing around. If you ever do see me start wearing those, please beat me up.






Here is our group that went.

They're Here

They are both males so when they get older I will sell them. Congratulations to Myrna at work for winning the office pool. For all of my non-work friends, we had a pool going on when the goat would have her babies. Everyone put in a dollar and picked a date. Myrna guessed right and wins $12.

Daily Bread

Our friend Brandy has started weight watchers to try to lose weight. To try to keep herself accountable she has been posting on her blog what she has been eating each day and how many points she uses. I find it very interesting to see what someone else eats during a day. I decided that just for fun I would post what I ate yesterday. I am not sure how the points work so I will just make up points according to how good the food was, the higher the points (up to 500) the better the food. I think all you fellow friend bloggers should post what you eat for a day also, just for fun.
Monday May 21
Breakfast
Sweet Tea -1 cup: 300 points
Orange Juice- bottle: 200 points
Bagel with Butter: 350 points
Lunch- at the VA cafeteria
Tea- large cup: 150 points
Pork loin- 250 points
Black-eyed peas- 250 points
Mashed potatoes and gravy-200 points
Supper- Margo is out of town so I had to cook for myself
4-5 chicken strips: 200 points
Hash Browns-large helping:350 points
2 sister shubert dinner rolls:450 points
Large glass sweet tea:300 points
Late Night Snack
2 hard boiled eggs: 250 points
2 handfuls of teddy grahams: 300 points
large glass milk: 500 points

Total Points 4500

New Home

We have a new home!!!! Now don't get all excited and get your panties in a wad. We still have the same home, we just made it look like new today. Today was the day of treating the outside of the house. For all of you who don't know we live in a log home and every 2-5 years you have to treat the logs if you want to keep them looking good and to last longer. If there is anyone reading this that wants to try to find the least possible fun thing to do on a Saturday, I highly recommend treating a log home. Here is a rundown of what we had to do: powerwash the whole house to get the dirt and mildew off, apply two coats of exterior wood toner/stain. The stain stuff is supposed to repel water, mildew and UV light which are all bad things for the logs. I applied the stuff with a sprayer and back-brushed it with a push broom. We finished the whole house today and part of the deck and it took about 7 hours. So, that leaves the rest of the deck and the shop to be completed hopefully tomorrow. The difference between before and after truly is amazing. I want to give a shout out to Cathy B. at work for letting me borrow her power washer.

Here are some pics.

This is before washing, the black is mildew stuff.


This is me applying the stain, the backpack held the sprayer.


Left is after applying stain and right is before. Amazing difference.


Here it is finished.

Oh Mother

I hope all of you remembered Mother's Day on Sunday, if you didn't go call your mom right now. For our grand celebration we had both sets of parents, my brother and nephew, and Margo's brother and his wife and kids at our house. We fished a little and then grilled and ate supper. Overall, it was a pretty good time. I just thought I would share some pics with all of you. Click here or the link on the side to see more pics of the evening.

This is Margo's family, the picture turned out really good I thought.

Beef, it's what's for dinner

Raise your hand if you like beef. Seriously, raise it and wave it around like you just don't care. I know I sure do. Today we got another addition (temporary addition) to the farm. We got a calf. Margo's dad hooked us up with a Holstein steer from one of his dairy farmers. It is still pretty young. We are going to get it big and then get it butchered and eat him. The beef we raise will be so much better quality then what you can get at the store. Anyway, we are getting closer and closer to the old mcdonald farm. We probably won't get any more new kinds of animal until next summer though. I hope you can all come see the new addition soon. We are trying to decide on a name so any suggestions would be welcome. A couple we have thought of so far are Jody and Carl.

Snakes on a Farm

Well, summer is here. You know what that means. Besides me wearing a speedo. The snakes are out. I don't want this to deter any of you from coming to visit us, but I have killed 3 snakes so far. I guess that is what happens when you live in the country. The good thing is that none of them were poisonous. I have killed a black snake, a spreading adder otherwise known as a hognose, and a milksnake. I killed the milksnake today but I got a pic before I did.

Very Interesting

Here is a quote from a interesting story Martha posted on her blog that I thought I would share (click on the quote to read the full story. "Last year, spending in Iraq amounted to less than 1 percent of the total economy — about as much as Americans spent shopping online and less than half what they spent at Wal-Mart" It gives a little perspective. I find this interesting on two fronts. First, it is interesting for all the people who complain about the money we are spending on the war. Second it is crazy how much money we have compared to the rest of the world. I wonder how much good we could do for the less fortunate if we would quit spending so much money on stuff we don't need.

Anyone got any Pitocin?

One of our goats is about to burst like a huge pimple on a teenagers head. She is pregnant and we thought she should have had her babies a week or two ago but she still hasn't. She is huge. Here is a great pic to give you an idea. It is pretty impressive actually, usually a goat is about as wide as its legs are apart.

We're Growing

We went to the Centerton Livestock Auction last night. We took three of our goats to sell. We made good money off of them but I spent more than I made. I bought some ducks and 4 goats. I am very happy with the goats. I bought 2 older nannies, 1 real young nanny and 1 young billy. I did not intend to buy the billy, I bid on it thinking it was a nanny and after I was the winning bidder I found out it was a billy. It's okay though because I decided to just keep it and use him as my billy for this year since I got rid of the other billy. The two older goats are heinz 57 brush goats and the two younger ones are boer cross. The funniest thing we saw at the auction was a mexican guy bought a turkey and to transport it home he put it in the trunk of his Honda Accord, it was awesome. I highly recommend checking out the Centerton Livestock Auction the next time any of you get a chance. Here are some pics.

Here is the goats I sold in the goat carrier I made.


The Ducks


The two older nanny goats


The young nanny and young billy (the close ones)

The Hills are Alive with the Sound of Music

Tonight, Margo and I sat around the firepit outside which is always a good time. This night was really good because there are lots of good sounds outside this time of year. It was nice just to sit and listen to the music. Here is a quick rundown of the things we heard.

Rooster crowing over at the neighbors
Frogs croaking in the pond
Frogs croaking in the trees
Dogs Barking in the distance
Crickets chirping (a sign of summer arriving)
Whippoorwill calling (a sign of summer)
Girl screaming for help in the distance (just kidding)
Owl hooting
Helicopter flying over.

It was a very pleasant evening.

Chickens

We bought some chickens this past week. We have been looking for some for a while and I finally found some in the paper for sale. We bought 13 total and they are several different breeds, all egg-laying chickens. Three of the chickens are Araucana and they lay blue and green colored eggs which is kind of cool. Anyway, I am really excited to have them, chickens are quickly becoming one of my favorite farm animals. We have been getting 8-10 eggs every day so we have been using all our egg recipes. If anyone needs any eggs let us know.

I should have been an architect

It is finished. Today, I finished the barn and I am very happy to be done with it. It all went up really well and I did not have any major problems getting it all finished. I wish I had a nickel for every time I hit my finger with the hammer and I would be rich. It does not look too bad, it's just a big silver building. We now have the capability of having more animals which is nice. I am not sure what all we will get this year, my next purchase will probably be a calf to raise and butcher in the fall. I wanted to say thanks again to all the guys who helped us put the trusses up. And I wanted to give a really big shout out to Jeremy for going the extra mile and helping me a lot with putting up boards and tin. Here are some pics so you can check it out.

Front

Side

Back (faces the road)

Inside


The Architect (notice the tuxedo shirt)

You might be Amish if......

Today was barn raising day. It wasn't the greatest day to work on it but it wasn't too terrible either. I was worried about all my measurements working out but it ended up going together great so far. I am building an open face barn and I am using old chicken house trusses that hook to a post. The lumber and tin are also off of old chicken houses, it is cheaper that way. It is 20' by 30' which should take care of most of our needs. I invited friends out to join in the fun because there was no way Margo and I could do it on our own. My friends who took me up on the offer were Todd, Zack (my brother), Jeremy, and Jonathan. My friends who did not come to help are not my friends anymore. Just kidding. I am very grateful for everyone's help because I could not have done it without them. We got the main trusses up and Jeremy and I got all the wood on the top to nail the tin to. It will take me a few more days to get it all finished. I am very pleased with it so far, not to bad for not being Amish. Whenever I get it done we can get more animals since we will have shelter for them. Here are a few pics from today. Click on the pictures link on the side to see more.

The Crew from left to right:Jonathan, Jeremy, Me, Todd, Zack


Barn Raising


Big Pimpin'


What we did today

Earthworm Heaven

A few posts ago, I talked about a new type of gardening I am trying at our farm. I thought about how to set up my garden long and hard because the best spot for the garden is an area where it stays a little more wet because it is a low lying area and there are some underground springs in the area. After discussing with my uncle who is a Master Gardener, I decided that I wanted to do No Till, Raised Bed gardening. I bought a book about it called The Vegetable Gardener's Bible which I highly recommend to all you vegetable gardeners out there. The book teaches you to use the W-O-R-D system-Wide rows, Organic methods, Raised beds, Deep soil. In theory, you don't have to ever till and you don't have to worry to much about weeds because you use lots of mulch. It is also supposed to produce twice as much from the same size garden because you use wide beds.
Here is a rundown of my garden. For now, it is about 40 feet by 40 feet but it may get bigger. My rows are 40 inches wide and the paths between them are 24 inches wide. I dug out the paths and put that soil on the beds to raise them up. This past weekend I went to the City of Fayetteville's Compost Facility. They take leaves, grass clippings and other yard waste from people and compost it. They have big machines that turn it. When it is fully composted they sell it to the public for $20 a truckload. They even test it to make sure it is safe for gardens and it gets the organic garden seal of approval. This compost is the best compost I have ever seen in my entire life. I was so shocked when I saw how good it was. I highly recommend it to anyone to use in their garden. Back to my garden. I used the compost to put on my beds to help raise them up some more and help improve my soil. I then got some free straw from the UofA horse barn. It is the stuff they rake out after it has been used in the horse stalls. It is about 95% straw and 5% horse manure. I am putting that on top for mulch to help keep the moisture in and the weeds out. After this year I will use old leaves from our place for mulch. In the paths I am using newspaper with shredded paper on top for the walkway. That will keep the weeds away and provide a mud free walking space. By the way, I need a lot more shredded paper, so if any of you have access to shredded paper please save it for me and I will get it from you the next time I see you. Hopefully an earthworm village will move in to the garden soon and they will take care of all the tilling. It is a lot of work getting it set up but once it gets going there won't be a whole lot of work to do except mulching in the fall, and planting and mulching in the spring. I hope it all works as well as the book describes and as well as the picture I have in my head. I probably won't have it completely going until next year but I will get some plants in this year. Here are some pics of the garden so far.

Pre-garden


After building the rows


After putting on the compost from Fayetteville-notice the difference in color from the normal dirt above and the compost.


And finally, after the straw.

The News You've All Been Waiting For

We have big news we wanted to share about the question we seem to get most often these days. We are having a baby. We found out for sure on Friday and we are very excited. We decided we had waited long enough. Most of our friends already have a baby or two so we thought we should join in the fun. It seems everyone these days tries to come up with a creative way to tell people but I thought it would be kind of fun just to put it on the blog. Anyway, this will mean big changes at the Farm of Hale. This may be jumping the gun but we already have some first names in mind. If it is a girl - April. If it is a boy - Fools.