It is hard to believe that it is already mid-July here in Pope Valley. One minute I am just arriving back at the farm and now I find it hard to remember life before PVF. It has been an amazing month at the farm … the thermometer is hitting the 100f mark most days, the sunflowers are blooming, the lake is warm … and Nancy and I are back at senior centre bingo. We have been working on lots of projects and having a lot of fun in the process.
The amazing grape trellis designed and built by Emmanuel (I held the other end of the tape measure) is now almost complete and looks absolutely amazing. It is such a beautiful structure made from recycled wood and is going to look even more wonderful with grape vines covering it. We just have to be patient for the next three years or so…
Whilst Nancy and Terry have been away on holiday, Emmanuel and I thought we would try and surprise them with a couple of projects for when they return. Em has made a swing out of cherry wood for the trellis ... we both hope that it will be somewhere lovely for N&T to sit and drink their Yorkshire tea in the morning. I have been working on finishing up the screen porch so that we have somewhere outside that is bug free to eat. This version is just a temporary structure so Nancy and Terry can get used to the scale next to the existing house … but it will still be great for this summer. I have been using my limited sewing skills to sew pieces of rebar into the hem of mosquito net to weight it down. I recently caused much confusion in Steve’s Hardware by demanding to see their selection of Christmas lights in July. Luckily they had the perfect ones - which I have now hung up in the screen porch and created a fairy grotto.
The last month has been also filled with ongoing smaller projects. We have finally got used to the new weed-eater and are taking out the star thistles one patch at a time. The veggie garden looks great and we have recently been enjoying tomatoes, zucinni, purple beans, kale, collard, beets, and best of all, yummy potatoes. I am measuring the watermelons daily and trying to encourage the asian beans to climb up the string wall I’ve made for them. The figs, asian pears and persimmons are getting bigger each day and fig season should be here in a couple of weeks.
Animal Farm …
Amazingly one of our chickens, Tyra Banks, survived a mauling from a pesky fox who broke into the hen house. We had a few worrying days were we thought we were going to lose her but some encouragement and extra chicken scratch seemed to do the job and now she is back to her normal supermodel self … just less a few feathers.
It has been all change in the goat ghetto. Our two little boys goats have gone to goaty heaven. It was time for the farm to just have girl goats so a family friend, Bilal, came to the farm and carried out a very peaceful and painless slaughter. Obviously I still blubbed like idiot and we do miss the little chaps but it sure is a lot calmer in the kidding pen. Lola has also left PVF. She has gone back to her old home as it turned out that she wasn’t pregnant and was becoming quite anti-social with the other goats and us. So we now have Jada and Wanda and the three ‘teenage’ kids … Greta (who looks like a little Angus cow and is rather cheeky around the alfalfa feeder), Ava (probably the most beautiful little goat ever … think bambi) … and then my girl, Penny (thinks she is Tigger and thus is just recovering from her latest injury from too much bouncing). Nancy and I have started baby goat training which involves trying to get the girls to walk in the same direction as you whilst on a lead. Let’s just say it’s early days.
They have been enjoying the beginning of a ‘goat circus’ in the kidding pen which seems to be providing them with much amusement and almost distracting them from being weaned from their mums. We now about three quarts of milk a day from Jada and Wanda as we are back to milking twice a day. Even with Nancy and I having quite the iced-coffee addiction we are still laden with milk so I have started making cheese. The mozzarella is working out great but I have just started making ricotta and it is yummy … we have been putting it on every meal we have whether it goes with the food or not.
Well that is about it from the very happy British girl for now. More news from PVF soon. x
