Thankful for Rain!

My poor little mint and lavender starts were suffering in the hot sun, despite my occasional watering under Tim's concerned watch (if the ground is THIS dry, how much water is left in our aquifer?) The potatoes we planted before leaving for fishing looked as if they hadn't grown an inch since I saw them last and several plants were missing - wilted away to nothing. Hopefully the thunder and lightning means a few days of good rain to bring everything back to life. The goats and chickens were looking desolate in their dry, dead yard.

Speaking of chickens, chicken butchering is starting to seem like a normal activity around here, so much so that I think I didn't even mention it! This was our third round of juvenile rooster elimination, and we've learned a few lessons along the way.

1. Neighbors like you better when you kill all the squawking young roosters and I get to sleep in past 6am! It's great to only have one.
2. Being sneaky in the barn helps: I slipped in just after the chickens went to bed, before it was so dark I'd need a flashlight to see or a gun to fight off the rats, and quietly stood in the hen house waiting for the young roosters to ignore me and go back to sleep. To catch them, I put my hands on their backs and wings and stood still like that for a minute before picking them up. This way they didn't scream and flap about waking everyone else up. They went very quietly.
3. Feed: My process involves separating the death-row chickens from the rest of the flock 24 hours in advance and locking them in the small sandy run with only water to clear out their digestive tracts. It's a good idea but it means that a) I have to really commit to killing them 24 hours before I do it, with no backing out because we are tired; and b) I have to get the whole rest of the flock out of their house and around to the yard in the morning, then reverse the process at night. Last time there was a lot of catching and chasing and herding and frustration and a few bent feathers. This time I made a little trail of feed going out the hen house door and around to the gate (locked Tilly inside the house away from the action), through two sets of gates and into their big yard. After laying the trail with a big pile of food at the end (better lock up the goats somewhere away from that too!) I stood back and in about 10 minutes, the big red rooster led his girls along the trail, no problem. In reverse worked just as well. It helps that I was withholding food from them inside their house to try to encourage the rats to relocate, thus creating very hungry chickens.
4. Prepare: The night of the butchering, I neglected to really make sure we were set up well in advance. It turns out the painting crew over the summer removed some of my butchering supplies and I got a little desperate racing around finding the missing parts in time to hopefully be done by midnight and in bed sleeping soon after. Now our deck is beautifully painted and clean AND set up for butchering with things like a leg loop hanging from the beam for plucking and hooks around for hanging lights and other tools. The all important head-bucket-with-lid was located and we were ready to go before it was all the way dark (see above about rats and holding flashlights in my mouth).
5. Wait until they are all the way dead: Catching the roosters for the final time went like I said above. In the dark I held their backs and wings for a moment before picking them up. Sleepy eyed, they hardly made a cluck. Up at our butchering station I tightly swaddled the rooster in a black towel (hides bloodstains), and tucked him under my arm or between my knees and slit his throat over the main artery. The first two times I broke their necks and chopped off their heads a bit prematurely, this time I waited for that final shutter of life leaving their bodies, then removed their heads. As a result, the process was that much calmer, no fighting, no perceivable pain or discomfort, just very sleepy roosters transforming into dinner.
6. Control the feathers: This time around, we were much more prepared for the pile of sticky, wet feathers we accrue. Instead of having a deflated garbage bag near-ish and feathers everywhere, we lined our large 55-gallon curb-side-sized garbage can with an equally large bag and were much more successful at catching all those feathers. 
7. Package whole: In an effort to expedite the process as well as use the meat better, we elected to leave all the chickens whole this time around. Once all five were plucked and gutted and rinsed we brought them into the house, gave them one more rinse and scrub, and Put the whole bird into an 11" vacuum seal bag - they fit! With their wings and drumsticks tucked in tight to their bodies, they look just like commercial chickens, ready to be thawed, soaked in a sugar-salt-herb brine, rubbed with butter and baked. Delicious! 

In other chicken news, I discovered the secret of the missing eggs. I have 20 hens and was only getting about 6 eggs a day - suspicious. Before I left I was getting 10 eggs a day and now there are three more girls that should be starting to lay. Up in the hay loft above the goats, I pulled the tarp off the bales just to be sure, and lo, there were all the eggs. About 60 eggs ranging from very rotten to a hen mid laying when I interrupted. My neighbor, Linda offered to take all the eggs and mash them with garlic and onion for her own special deer repellent. 

On the goat front, I have a nice new bit of fencing up for them, but despite the shock they keep slipping through! They'll do alright staying in their yard and grazing the tall grasses until they see a person walk by and then their fear of the electric fence dissipates as they go running for affection. It's nearly time to breed again, and then they can start being useful and contributing members of the farm instead of just taunting tails for Tilly to bite at.

The goats had another admirer this week. Our friend from middle school and high school came down from Alaska on a work trip and took a day off to see us. Emily Thorpe, now Emily Bordelon, is expecting her first baby in another 6 months and we had a great time catching up and showing off the farm after so many years! We really need to work on our tour guide routine before she comes back as we fell a little flat on our presentation of the island, "um... there's a bowling ally in Oak Harbor, that's like 45 minutes from here, um... there... is... a market! on Saturdays! that's fun... but not today... You wanna go see the wild show bunnies at the fair grounds?" We can do better.

Having a visitor was a nice relief from my farm chores for the week: removing all the ivy from 5 trees and installing a new kitchen sink.

Nearly more ivy than tree it would seem. Last year's test tree seemed to be a success with my method of removing all the ivy as high as I could reach and hoping the rest would die and fall off - it did and hopefully these ones will too 

The kitchen sink project was an educational opportunity, proving myself as a strong independent woman and all. What probably would have taken a plumber only a couple hours took me three days with daily phone calls to Dad and sending labeled photographs to explain why I couldn't just unscrew the parts. But if we would have called a plumber, the plumber wouldn't have wiped out all the spiders and dust and mold and painted the inside of the sink cabinet to make it a usable and relatively pleasant space. I am very proud of my beautiful new sink. Hopefully it won't even leak!

While I was doing all that, Tim has been working on his own ATF approved projects; brewing beer and trading out foreign for domestic parts. He even brought me a baby hop plant to add to our garden.

Now it is time for Tilly and I to go to Search and Rescue practice while Tim monitors his brewing and waits for Joe and Roni to come by for the weekend.

All for a shower

Woops, forgot we left our tree in the middle of the road! You can see the power lines coming off the pole on the right side of the frame and running along the ground. Large tree hung up in the wires.

At the crack of dawn this Saturday morning, Tim was up and getting our house running. The order of the day: to take a shower. The first step of course was to get Grandpa's freezer connected to the generator so we could leave guilt free for the day for more parts. After letting the animals out, getting the generator going and running extension cords to Grandpa's tv, the internet, his heater and freezer and lights, we were free for our outing. Only a 40 minute drive each way, we headed north to Oak Harbor, also providing the perfect opportunity for some reconnaissance work.

This does explain why our power is out! And knowing that it is like this and worse all over our island! Evidently, the fire department chop up the wood and leave it stacked on the side of the road - at least when there are cold winds that knock out all the power, free firewood is in surplus.

Our power allegedly comes from the north, from Classic Road, so we went to see what was holding up the flow of power and make our own estimate for when we might be back on. To the south, we had already seen a large tree pinning down the power lines and are confused how anyone that direction can have power. If that was the not-so-bad side, we wondered what might be in store for us ahead. As we drove towards Classic Road, power lines alternated between running along the ground and trying to hang on to crooked power poles. More large trees lay on our lines, and the down power lines wrapped around our street sign; and then we got to the 'Road Closed' sign. I guess this was the okay stuff! We parked and took Tilly for a walk to scope out what could be worse. Are power poles supposed to be slanted like that? A power line and tree lay across the road, solving the mystery of why no through traffic was allowed. As we surveyed the scene, the power company drove by, looking to be taking pictures and surveying the damage themselves. Though there were a few orange cones by the hazards, no work crews were anywhere near the three large breaks we identified, or anywhere else on our road. We took Resort Road and continued north around the closed Classic. The residents of Resort Road had the advantage of some sections with underground power lines, but where the lines came above ground, both their power and phone were severed. We have been very lucky to still have our phone when homes all over the island are without even the ability to call for help.

I would say those three roads are all out of luck!

With the damage surveyed we confirmed, 'yes, our power will be out a while longer and it is worth taking action to resolve on our own now.' We passed at least 5 large line-fixing trucks heading south as we neared Coupeville - a good sign for us and our south-end neighbors! Though of course we are not high on the priority list and they were not heading for us. At Home Depot, everyone else had beat us to the good supplies for generators and extension cords. The Saturday afternoon after the wind blows out most of the power in the county is probably a little late to stock up on supplies, but we were able to find most of what we needed and got the last plug end from Ace before heading home.

This road is closed. All the roads were covered in branches like this - I don't think the city truck with the snow plow came down this road...

Through amazing skills and talents Tim was able to get our generator hooked up to the well pumps to re-fill and pressurize the water tanks, then connected the generator to the house for light and tv and all the other luxuries and amenities that power provides. Grandpa asked about the hot water heater, so we fired it up and the generator made no complaints. While the water heated, I made use of the propane oven to make some pizzas and got roaring fires going in both the upstairs and downstairs fire places to thaw our fingers and warm the house again. The upstairs fireplace is amazing and blew 500f air into the room soon after getting started, quickly turning a few logs into heat for the whole high-ceilinged, large-windowed open space of the house. The downstairs fireplace isn't nearly as productive, but after removing 10 gallons of ashes, there is a huge improvement in the heat output. With warm houses, warm water, lights, and full water tanks, by after dinner we were finally able to have a hot shower! Delightful what we can do in a power outage.

..Probably because of that. Power lines running across the road, large branches and trees down... And up there at the top of the pole something doesn't seem quite right. Many of the poles have crooked cross arms or the whole pole is leaning significantly. Just a little wind caused a lot of trouble here on Whidbey!

All was dark and quiet

Yesterday, was that only yesterday? we feared we would have to cancel our helicopter flight due to high winds, but fog ended up doing us in first. As darkness came, so did the winds. Gusts up to 69 knots knocked whole trees onto the power lines all over the island and Washington. Three large branches came crashing down, narrowly missing my car and landing right where Daniel and Amanda's fancy new car had been parked only days earlier. Our power flickered and by 8pm, we were in darkness. An early bed time with stories by flashlight made for a fine evening, but when the lights weren't back on by morning, I started worrying about our freezer and the well, both very power dependent. I dropped Tim off at work and borrowed a very nice generator from Tim's kind boss to get the freezer cold again. Driving to and from his work, streets were impassable as firefighters with chainsaws worked to clear paths through the fallen branches. Most of the stop lights were out down the length of the island and spots of power were sporadic and small. In early afternoon, the city truck fitted with a snowplow finally reached our road to push debris to the sides. At quitting time, lights still off, I picked up Tim and headed to the mainland Costco for a new, super-duper, score-of-a-deal generator picked out by Dad and Grandpa headed to his friend's house to kick back with TV, light, heat, microwave, water... all the luxuries power brings.

Convening back at the house, Tim and I moved our little borrowed generator from the freezer to off the edge of Grandpa's porch to get his heat and lights back on in his room first thing so he could settle in for the night, then got to work hooking up our new generator. Eventually it will have a connector straight into the power box to directly power the house, and probably a second cord for powering the pump house intermittently, but for now we have it set up on the patio with some extension cords running to the freezers, our room, and Grandpa's room. Oh yeah, then there's the internet. The internet and the booster for our cell signal also require power, but Tim had a clever plan. Surely I must have a picture? No, maybe tomorrow. Tim has built a box of very high quality, large batteries for such occasions as this, so for as long as the batteries hold out, we have the wonders of internet!

-This message sponsored by Batteries: keeping you lit up when the wind blows it up.

Miss Muffet

Exhausting work this masonry is, and this farming is! I had a vision of a beautiful brick patio completing the illusion that something about the barn was level, and finally completed my project. I estimate it took me about 15 wheelbarrows of concrete bricks and another 10 wheelbarrows of sand. My sand pile (left over from leveling the floor inside the barn) is slowly dwindling as I cart it off for projects. Also, I now can't go to Ace Hardware without all the employees looking at me with horror. Over two days, I made quite a few trips back and forth until they were worried they would run out of bricks, though I've been their only brick customer this week, and I even made Tim stop for 50 more bricks on the way home from work one day. Though the dream was to have a level patio on the barn, I would call this 'level enough'. Doing any sort of precise work with 14 chickens, a pig, a puppy, and Esther the Very Helpful Goat watching doesn't end up so precise and trying to lock Esther out of the way made the crying unbearable.

Speaking of goats, our regular island milking goats we've been collecting milk from each week are all alone this week so I get to milk them nearly every night! They're production has been drastically dropping off and it's quite a drive, and they are sort of disagreeable goats - I think having lots of different people taking turns milking them has made for uncomfortable udders and nerves; but we do get free fresh goats milk which is a wonderful thing to have access to. I believe the way the laws are written, I can't even give my milk to my extended family or friends (legally) unless I am licensed as a commercial dairy processing facility, but if I am the one milking the goats, I can drink it. The laws are a little bit ridiculous it seems, especially compared to egg laws which have no regulations if you have less than, I think, 1,000 birds?! I've gotten rather off topic. My point was, I am milking nearly every day this week while the owners are out of town, so I have decided with so much milk, I had better learn to make cheese!

My recipe comes from Carla Emery's 10th edition of the Encyclopedia of Country Living who in turn got the recipe from a woman named Mary Simeone who was pregnant living in a tent on a mountain with two goats and a husband. She calls the recipe "Basic Farm Cheese" and it is a a recipe meant to say, "if someone can make cheese in a tent on a mountain, 9 months pregnant, surely I can do it in my well-equipped kitchen!" I like this recipe because it doesn't call for cultures (which must be special ordered) but only rennet (which you can find on the top shelf in the grocery store in an old little box that says "junket", up where no one bothers to look, near the other baking supplies - like cheese cloth! Though don't bother asking anyone at the grocery store if they carry rennet, they will ask what it is and when you say "salted baby cow stomach", they will tell you they are quite certain they don't carry it).

Basic Farm Cheese:
- Take about a gallon of milk from your favorite milk-producing animal
- Heat the milk to about 86f (double boilers help)
- Add the rennet (I think I added twice as much as I should have... oops)
- Let sit 20 minutes
- Gently stir curds and whey for 2 minutes (I don't think I was gentle enough! I don't think you're supposed to let it all clump together... but it was so much fun to play with! The milk looked like a fresh container of yogurt, then I stirred it and saw all the grainy looking curdles, then they all kept globing together like a playground game of 'blob tag'. Now it looks like cauliflower. But the curds are yummy! This is as far as I've gotten.)
- Slowly double boil to 102f
- Remove from heat, cover and let sit one hour with more gentle stirring.
- Put the curds in a piece of cheesecloth to strain out the whey and hang up the cheesecloth bag of curds for 12 hours about (over night for me). Use the whey to make bread (to be done tomorrow).
- Day 2: put the cheesecloth bag of curds into a mold and press. She suggests using a headband or belt around the middle and weights and flat plates and such. My plan is to use my spring-form pan very cleverly and press in that metal ring with space for whey to leak out around the bottom.
- Press all night (or day - again about 12 hours I think. She started the recipe in the morning and I am starting it at nigh as that is when I milk) then let air dry in a cool place (the fridge) turning frequently for a week or so as it forms a hard rind.
- Dip or paint the cheese with wax. I am generally getting my cheese making supplies from the New England  Cheesemaking Supply Company who has special soft cheese wax, though crafty paraffin will do just fine. Hang in a cool airy place to age for 2+ months. According to Carla Emery, the aged cheesemaking process is a good substitution for pasteurization as the cheese bugs kill the other bugs (and if it's not a success, I think it will be rather apparent.)

Chicken Mysteries

Today, as I was making scalloped potatoes from our very own garden's potatoes and garlic, and the goat milk I milked, Grandpa called up to let us know one of the chickens was on the wrong side of the fence! Tim managed to heard her back into the hen house with not too much trouble. This evening when I went to check on the chickens, there were yet again not as many as I expected to see. The first time I looked around and counted less than 14, I looked up and was shocked to see some on the 6 foot high loft! How on earth did birds who make a big fuss about hopping up a couple feet manage to get all the way up there? But I accepted it, and tonight started my count with the loft. About 2 in the loft, 2 more on top of the nest boxes, 3 on the roosts where they are supposed to be... but that's only 7! Then I looked up and was utterly shocked by the site 10 feet or so above my head! I have found the rest of my chickens, though the secret is hardly solved. I wonder if they will continue sleeping up there as they get older? It is convenient having hens who can get in the loft as I have had to hide their food up there so the goats will stop breaking in and stealing it.

Other accomplishments this week:
- Grandpa picked 3 beautiful red tomatoes from our garden.
- I picked 2 gallons so far of black berries.
- Tim is still enjoying his job.
- Tilly is learning to do calm obedience work outside around the farm animals rather than race about biting (hopefully her ball) and stirring everyone up.
- I trimmed Tilly's nails and Oliver the Pig's hooves! It went much better than expected and no one cried much.
- All the garlic is now picked though it needs to go somewhere better for proper storage.
- Claire (our property-owning neighbor) and I took a pair of trimmers to the vegetative mass around the stairs. We had a great time chatting and working, though we tried not to go too crazy when we knew Neighbor Jim (her husband) would be coming by to inspect.
- Jim and Claire and Grandpa and Dee and Tim and I took the city bus and ferry across for a special dinner at Ivars.
- Tim has done an excellent job organizing his shop and labeling where everything goes. I helped by sorting all the bits by size and shape.
- We plumbed the barn! By plumbed I mean ran hose with various fittings and valves and splitters here and there.
- All of the chicken breasts have been eaten. Now I need to learn to cook (and eat) wings, drum sticks, and a whole lot of chicken soup. Breast meat is a little easier to eat than all those lungs and hearts and tracheas and feet...

It's beginning to feel a lot like a farm around here

Nothing says "farm" like bucking bails of hay 9-feet up into a loft while the chickens and pig watch with apparent amusement and curiosity. 

First off, Tilly was spayed last Friday, which means a 10-day demotion from 'farm dog extraordinaire' to 'indoor dog who must lay on the doggy bed on the floor and try not to cry'. We've made it to day 5, half way through, and she is beginning to perk up, meaning beginning to be a lot less complacent about the demotion. As hard as it is to keep her calm and leave her out of all the fun, I'd much rather have her throwing her bone in the air all night long than waking up early to stand in the middle of the room and cry inconsolably for hours. It's a strange thing to do to the pets we love and I am so glad not to have to spay any goats ever.

Speaking of goats, today is goat day! Last night, after Tim got home from his first day of work as an official, registered, apprentice electrician, Nancy and I elected to give him some quiet time and took off to milk Tadd's goats. It's been great getting fresh milk once or twice a week and I am getting much faster at milking. On our way home from milking, we picked up 12 bales of hay from Claudia's farm. Hay is heavy. This morning, all that lovely hay that was so nicely strapped into the back of the truck had to be moved by little wagon and hand out of the truck, down the hill, across the yard, into the barn, and up about 9 feet into the hay loft, and then across the 4' crawl space to the far corner of the barn. I am really quite proud of my full, beautiful hay loft now and feel tempted to sleep up there tonight. Freshly whitewashed and filled with new hay, this is the cleanest it is likely to ever be.

Oh, a note on whitewashing! Tim and I yet again got busy whitewashing, this time the goat half of the barn, and now it is looking... much brighter, significantly better, and cleaner, though perhaps if the smell and the chemical burning sensations weren't so bad, we might have done a little more careful and through of a job. Next time!  I decided to use a "wet on wet" application method for the whitewash this time, which means I power-washed the barn, then immediately set about applying the whitewash to the wet walls. I really enjoy power-washing. It's similar to vacuuming in a way; all the yuck vanishes as you move back and fourth across the space. Unfortunately with power-washing, a lot of that yuck gets sprayed back at me and I was very glad to be wearing fogged up goggles that didn't allow me to see too many details of the contents of what was flying about in the air and spray around me.

My recipe for whitewash: Mix 1 part salt, 3 parts hydrated lime, 4 parts water, a little old goat milk. Let sit over night. Rub on damp walls with sponge. "It's not paint, and it's only a barn!" http://fiascofarm.com/recipes/whitewash.html

I figure people have been whitewashing for hundreds of years, so although you should always wear proper eye protection, a mask, rubber gloves, long sleeves, etc, I have yet to notice any severe harmful effects from working with it. Getting some on our recent sun burns (from watching the Blue Angels air show in Seattle) was a little tingly, but nothing a shower didn't cure.

So I am taking my lunch break midway through moving 3 cubic yards of sand and gravel from the tarps where the dump truck delivered it to the floor of the barn, then I need to finish building a divider wall in the corner of the barn for goat food storage and a milking station, then clean up all the construction materials, bicycles, and other non-edibles from around the yard, and aim to meet Tim at the goat lady (Molly)'s house to pick up our goats at 5pm! Another busy day on our farm! 

Crabbing

Since Tim got home a mere two days ago, we have been busy! It feels like what happened yesterday must have been a week ago. I am getting tired! But life is so happy and good here, and all the busy is the fulfilling and fun and interesting kind of busy and not stressful or wearing.

This morning (was it only this morning?) we drove to Ace with Tilly, picked up the buoy to comply with local crabbing laws, then set out 200 feet of line from the high water mark to low tide and threw the pot in. Hopefully tomorrow we will be having crab for lunch! Also this morning at Ace, I picked up some curved cinder blocks to outline my brick work for the goat doorway. The concrete bricks should also help wear their hooves down a little.

A little later, our family headed up to Oak Harbor for some shopping: plastic roofing to continue improving on our pig habitat, a plastic folding table for chicken killing, and a second battery for the screw gun. We stopped in at the fro-yo parlor to meet up with the friend I met on my way up to Bristol Bay nearly a month ago, then made the rounds at all the thrift stores looking for particular picture frames, speakers for the 1970's radio transceiver Tim has been working on, and drawers for my crafting room.

Heading home, we dropped off Tilly, checked on the other critters, than headed out again to meet up with our friend Fritz from Juneau, his son, Joe, Fritz's girl friend, Joe's band, and our new neighbor and long time friend Nancy. Joe and his band have been touring across the country playing bluegrass music all spring and summer.

As dinner wrapped up, I got a call from Tadd from the Unity church who has goats in need of milking. Tim and I headed over for a tutorial on the goat care to be their temporary milkers over the weekend. I figure the more practice we can get before taking on our own goats, the better.

Three boys, 14 girls, and 12 chicken dinners

Tim is home! What a delight! Back to napping and dinners together. After some napping, perhaps some work on the lawn mower or truck, perhaps some tours of goat farms, perhaps some chicken butchering. 

And with Tim came this little guy, formerly referred to as "The Pig" but now affectionately called Oliver. My dear brother Daniel made the big decision that perhaps his little guy would be better off in the sunshine on a farm for a while than in an apartment and Oliver is so grateful! So far the biggest problem with having a little pig is trying to take pictures since he likes to crawl in my lap and get too close to the camera. Also, Tilly is a little too excited about The Pig to be ready for a proper introduction, but we'll get there. The chickens are also exciting for a puppy but they don't compete for lap space in quite the same way. Oliver and the chickens, however, seem like a fine match. This Sunday is going to be the big "Back to Bristol Bay" chicken butchering extravaganza, which will make sharing space between 12 chickens and a pig a little more reasonable.

Oliver and the mini barn. (One quarter is a little nest box full of bedding which he seems quite happy about. Nice and warm and cozy. Also, a special port for a heat lamp. He has an almost finished run that will clip on to the outside in a secure sort of state, though sharing the chicken run and the big yard also seem pretty good. 

Both today and Saturday, we have appointments to go look at some goats so I better get busy finishing up the barn! I've framed in two doors and a new wall for the barn, and the next step is to finish cutting the windows, whitewash the inside, and maybe change out some of the compacted manure for fresh sand - it looks like the previous critters made use of the sand floor idea too so that's good to see. 

Murders and walls.

I heard a murder of crows make the most dreadfully murderous noises today, enough that I looked up to see what was killing what as they flew over the house.

My pitch fork sounded a beautiful pitch as it knocked against something on the way out of the shed as I went to pull up half the garlic (33) before any rain might come down tonight.

I built a wall! I am most proud of my wall. I've built plenty of pet housing in my day, generally single quail or gerbil or such sized, but never a human sized wall, with framed in doors and everything! I've watched quite a lot of walls be built, generally by my dad, but my role was usually "watching is helping" with occasionally holding an end of the tape measure or something. To build a wall entirely on my own with no advice, no help, no supervision (except Grandpa from his porch, and Tilly and the Chickens taking turns with the yard)!!! I am so very proud. And to make myself extra proud, nothing on the barn is square or level - nothing except my wall! My wall which fit into a six-sided hole perfectly, and is square and level despite the surrounding barn being neither. My oh so beautiful wall. Currently it is framed and in place but not covered in plywood or siding and no hung doors yet, but it will almost be a shame to cover such beautiful 2x4s! I am reserving pictures until after Tim comes home so as to not give away that moment of reveal.

In other news, Nancy has arrived! Nancy and Bailey (dog) have arrived as Tilly was most excited to have a new dog playmate. So excited, in fact, that she fell right off the dock and into the lake. Surprised wet puppy! It is so very easy to get sidetracked by my Tilly, but really we are so excited to have our lifelong friend, officiator of our wedding, mom-extraordinaire Nancy as our new neighbor! After a year of anticipation, the day has finally come where I can walk over for tea and pie in the evenings. Her husband, Butch, and their snake will be joining the neighborhood a little later.

Meanwhile, in Juneau Alaska, Tim took Brother Daniel and Amanda out in Dad's boat to pick up the crab and shrimp pots. It looks like they brought a good catch home and had a feast with the parents. Dad just had surgery on his ankle and is thus banished from the boat or any other bumpy rocky excitement for a while. Tim only has a couple days left in Alaska and then he will be back home with me for the first time in two months. Tilly and I are greatly looking forward to his return, though Tilly's probably going to lose her good spot on the bed when there are three of us again. While we wait for Tim to come home, Tilly has been perfecting her trick of leaping into my arms on command so when Tim comes in she can leap into his arms and cover him with kisses, though she'll have to wait her turn.

Pictures added to previous post!

And perhaps more pictures still to come. We'll see.

Currently I am sitting in the lawn, another beautiful evening with the chickens and Tilly. I've been continuing to labor away on my barn projet: yesterday it was cleaning out all the garbage from the barn, including tearing the insulation (aka rat nesting material - heavily used) out of the walls and sweeping cobwebs from the ceiling. I filled the truck entirely with the large chunks of stuff from this barn cleaning project, plus filled a garbage can with the small stuff. This morning I took it easy, focusing on digging the doorway level - instead of indulging in the slope of the hill like it has been. I also got the "barn broom" out and started going after some of those cobwebs on the walls and ceiling. While cleaning out the loft of the barn, I finally figured out why there is a strange little window cut between the chicken barn and main barn! There were two windsurfing sails in the loft there which are nearly as long as the barn, and the only way to get them down was to carefully thread them through the opening into the chicken house and over the heads of all the confused hens, then feed in back out into the main barn section and out the door! With that, the last odds and ends should be out of the barn, though I'm thinking that whole loft either has to go, or has to be relocated about 6 feet. Where it is now makes no sense and blocks light and is inaccessible. Unfortunately, everything on this property was built with nails, so disassembly is a bit of a pain. After staring at the loft and disassembling with my mind for a good long while, I gave up and headed to Oak Harbor to dump the dump load at the dump and pick up five large bags of mixed alpaca fleece from the woman I helped with her loom this winter. I am thinking there will be a very long alpaca rug running down our hallway when Tim comes home and helps me set up my loom, after the goats are (hopefully) settled in the barn.

More on the Bay after still not enough rest

Bristol Bay! Everything about my trip was beautiful and wonderful! For years, Tim has been telling me about Bristol Bay, trying to get me ready for the day I would go along, and I was bracing myself for a dusty, dirty, scary, windy, ugly place and stormy weather. When I got the call this summer to pack my bags and get on the soonest flight I could, I didn't have time to worry and was only delighted to be on my way to see my husband and do something exciting for the summer.

After ice cream in the sun with my parents in front of the Greenbank store and racing to meet the shuttle at the ferry terminal, I met a lovely Whidbey girl who also lives with her grandpa, who also has a dog, who also loves hiking, and who is also a Star Trek fan. Her and I and two other young folks camped out at a table at SeaTac all night laughing and telling stories waiting for our early morning flights. On my flights, my seatmates were terrific, and even the TSA agents were superb and friendly. On arrival in Naknek, I was met by a taxi full of friendly, chatty, courteous gentlemen and was brought to my temporary home for the second night of my journey. On the porch of the Leader Creek Fisheries office, I ate my canned oysters and watched the tide come in and go out. Two of us lost crew members took turns napping on the comfy couch and waiting for any news of a tender (large boat) coming by to drop off the fleets catch and pick us up to be brought out to the fishing grounds. Early the next morning, my fellow crasher took off for a tender and left me with the couch to myself. I walked to town and got some amazing pizza, visited with all the lovely office ladies, knit a hat, read, and then stayed up late again the next night listening for the radio to announce the arrival of a tender dropping off fish and heading out to Nushigak. While I waited, the lone office drone on the late night shift and I did xtra-tuff ballet and decorated binder covers for all those important forms and such. Finally, the call came and I made my way down the wobbly line of floats and on to the tender with my backpack and rain gear and pizza.

My oyster-eating spot on the Leader Creek porch and a view of low tide in the creek.

The tender boat I found myself on turned out to be a man and his daughter (my age), his son, and one other crew member. The daughter kindly gave me the top bunk in her room, and in the morning the captain explained things about the boats and Bristol Bay and such as we radioed the m/v Whiskey Creek looking to meet up and drop me off. My anticipation and excitement grew as that wooden top house came into view and the m/v/ Whiskey Creek tied up to my tender in rough seas. Waiting for a pause between swells, I jumped from the large, stable boat onto the small rocky one with my backpack, pizza, and fishing gear. The guys tossed my bag into the cabin and I slipped on my rain pants and gloves as we got busy changing the nets on the boat with fresh nets off the tender. As soon as we cast off from the big boat, we dropped our net in the water and made a quick but huge set, drifting towards other boats and the boundary line and having to quickly real the net in. As the guys picked fish, they tossed them to me and I kneeled on the deck ripping gills and counting fish, sliding hatches open and closed, to keep the same number of fish floating in each of the 14 refrigeration bags.

As soon as one set was picked (the gill net back on the reel, out of the water, and fishless), we made another set (put the net back in the water to catch more fish), or ran to another area to set again. Between each set, I hosed off the deck to remove all the scales, slime, blood and guts. Around midnight, we took the boat load of fish back to the tender to unload and clean up for the night. Once all the bags were emptied, washed, and rehung in the clean fish holds and the deck was given a last rinse, we anchored up for the night, feasted on potatoes or rice and fresh salmon, then slept for a few hours before waking early to get back at the fishing. Eventually I made time between sets (while the net was hanging in the water soaking up fish) to actually unpack my bag and say hello to Tim, Joe, and Woody. I also cut up some old foam and made myself some very awesome knee pads which made my job much more pleasant.

Another important fishing skill is napping between sets. My favorite in-rain-gear napping spot was behind the captains chair until I was banished for being the stinkiest crew member in the fleet with fish blood soaked into the linings of all my gear and rotting. The price of having a job that involves sitting around in pools of blood and occasionally spraying yourself in the face with more blood. The boat was properly pink and glittery after a good set.

While Tim and I were busy in the far north, life went on for our farm. Grandpa and Tilly walked the beach, the first rooster began to crow, and Mom and Dad built a beautiful, sturdy fence around our lower yard. When I finally got home from fishing at 2am on the 11th, I couldn't fall asleep until I had walked the perimeter of the fence, running my fingers along it in the dark with delight.

Since getting home, I had every intention of relaxing and recovering, but there is simply too much to do! First off, I had to let the deer into the garden for some midnight snacking by forgetting the gate after all Grandpa's careful care. Luckily they didn't nibble it all up, but we may be short a few beets. I had just been thinning and weeding and making us some lovely beet greens (which turned out rather badly the first time and then not enough the second time) when I forgot the gate. Fortunately my nest box building went a little better.

Since coming home to my wonderful fence, Tilly and I have been spending an hour or so every evening sitting in the grass and watching the chickens as they have a little time in the newly expanded yard. Each day they are getting less timid and coming closer to our cozy spot where Tilly chews bones and I read about chicken butchering. After continuing my research, I think I have settled on a new method for my butchering which is more like how I took care of all those thousands of fish in Bristol Bay - holding them and talking to them and gently petting them as they bleed out (well, maybe a couple of those fish went that way...). I will link my favorite demonstration video here: Part 1 - Butchering and Part 2 - Dressing. So far, one of my three Marans (dark egg laying) is happily crowing but not too loud or too often, and none of the other chickens are! Surely there are more roosters in the bunch, but even a week after he showed his true colors and tune, the rest are still clucking. I am wondering if his shear masculinity is putting the others off. If there is no rooster, one of the hens generally steps up to fill the role, so perhaps if there are bunches of roosters and one is clearly filling the role already, the others remain more androgynous? Like the honey bees and ants and such with their queens? Hmm, from my very brief research, it looks like roosters can live together as long as it's not coed, or else they fight over the ladies and harass the ladies to no end. Expected I suppose. When the hens start getting harassed, or more roosters start to crow, or Tim gets home, it will be time to freeze the birds.

If there were other things I thought of mentioning, I am now far too tired to remember. Sunsets are still glorious here. The days are sunny and hot... Oh! In that hot sun of the day, I have been working hard trying to clean out the barns. The barn here has three sections: Main Barn (to be Goat Barn), Chicken Barn, and Shed Barn. The Chicken Barn is still in good shape, I removed some garbage, empty feed bags, odds and ends. When it gets time for chicken killing, I will give it a good cleaning before the roosters 24-hour lock in pre-butchering (to hydrate and starve them to empty their digestive systems. Hopefully it won't be so hot when the day comes! But also not too cold or wet as the girls will have to be locked out...). So with the Chicken Barn done, I moved on to the Shed Barn. It was rather gross and cluttered. By gross I mean spider webs, smells of rats of the past, garbage, toxic things... So I removed everything, raked the gravel and such about to make it level and clean and fill in the gaps leading suspiciously to the chicken run. Then I followed some of the wisdom of the internet and got about organizing everything back into there, with good wood and power tools going back to the shop, and piles of empty garbage badness going into the back of the truck. It is now looking quite nice in there, and by my measurements there will be a cozy spot for the 'lawn tractor' to just fit to the inch, and a convenient place for the wheelbarrow. All the shovels and axes and gas cans are also living there now. So with the two smaller barn segments clean and orderly, I opened up the main compartment and took a look behind door number three. I took a few items out that needed to go to the shop or shed, and then thought about what a pain it will be to drag all that garbage out of there. I gave up quickly and decided to take measurements and draw plans for its finished glory and get back to the dragging of garbage uphill tomorrow some time. My plans for the finished thing include installing about three windows, building a little milking parlor/storage area section and turning the front wall into a wall with two (smaller) doors instead of a falling apart mess that doesn't currently reach the ground thus provide much security for locking critters in. I am quite pleased with my plans, though I may still have to think a little on the installing doors on a hill bit... There are options!

Sunsets like paintings, turning my room pink.

Back home

It took Tilly about 20 seconds to curl up next to me and fall asleep once I picked her up and brought her home from the puppy sitter. It is good to be home! We have a lovely new fence built by Mom and Dad around the yard here, ready for Tilly, goats, or chickens. I had an excellent time fishing. We caught plenty of poundage, and now I am ready for a nap. Pictures and details to come.

Pitter patter of tiny feet

How can I think of anything else when they're so cute? You know you can click on the pictures and make them bigger and a slideshow, right? Anyways, I know you all are holding your breath waiting for more pictures of the chicks and care about little else, so without further ado...

We had been doing our best to enrich their environment in the boxes in our house...

...but the peeping persisted and late-night squabbles, until it was time to go to the big house!

Isn't is lovely out? Spring is marvelous! The whole property is in bloom and we've been walking the beaches every day. So lovely to be here!

So, Tilly diligently followed me as I brought two chicks at a time to their new digs.

With the help of a few worms, they were soon racing around the room like mad 

(as seen here - lead chicken has worm, 12 or so chasing after at top chick speeds).

You will note the excellent job Tim did building a barricade around the door for easy entry and viewing, and the excellent job my staple gun and I did on those chicken wire windows.

They look pretty happy to me! At 10 days old they are already roosting pretty well.

Other doings... mom stained the deck! And we had an excellent dinner of corn on the cob (which the chicks appreciated), local oysters, and yummy mushrooms and asparagus. Pretty much shopping (for all those wood shavings you see above and their super cool new food bowl to be altered as they get larger) and staring at the chicks took up most of the day. I think we are still tired from all that burning.

Another room loses the dust

Again, like yesterday, I feel everyone who sees this picture of this couch really aught to be much more impressed than they likely will be. This morning, this room was covered in boxes, and now you will see the organized shelves of camping and ski gear in the closet and the couch has been relocated. I am thinking of hanging more things on the wall tomorrow. One thing did go up on the wall today.

Sunday

I feel like this photo should speak for its self, though I realize logically that is an unreasonable expectation. We've been cleaning! We have been undertaking the massive cleaning operation that is recovering from a month of visitors, a month of doctors visits, two months of living out of a suit case and living in a construction zone with everything we own in one room, two months of all our stuff being in a storage unit in another state, a week or so of frantic packing/cleaning/moving out after putting it off until the last second to try to have some security about our future. That's all in backwards order of course. Our home has gotten more and more ours, more and more livable, every week since September 1st when we arrived. The above picture is our pantry closest to the kitchen which we finished installing shelves in today and got kitchen things, emergency things, extra things, and recycling things all organized. Tim came up with a brilliant plan to move the two couches and foot stool out of our room and into the living room and move the couch and chair from the living room into the back bedroom with the projector and sound system and set up a little home theater in there as well as making two usable guest rooms in our house instead of a storage room and a futon in the glass living room. I am surprisingly excited about this plan and got busy unpacking boxes and hanging up artwork. I'd say the back bedroom there is about half way cleaned out from its previous storage-based existence.

Oh! I almost forgot! This morning, as with most Sunday mornings, Tim and I ducked over to UU where there was a guest speaker from out of town who had great readings but not particularly resonating things to say for us. After the service there was smoked salmon and ginger cookies. As we were milling and socializing, I saw a familiar looking head across the crowd. I have a bit of a history of not recognizing or misrecognizing people, but this morning I put reluctance aside and presented myself. "Are you Gordon?" the man said yes and I quickly introduced myself and that my parents were friends of his when he lived in Juneau long ago. I don't think I've seen this man since I was about 10 years old, but somehow I recognized him out of context and all else. It was great to catch up with another ex-Juneauite and he said his family currently have two milking goats who are bread ever year or two and the little girls are given away and the little boys are eaten. They've also had chickens and turkeys and pigs and ducks in the past and have a beautiful garden. I think they may be an excellent resource for us, particularly when it comes time to have goats and follow suit with milking and breeding and eating.

I normally try not to talk about the future, but just this once I want to give a little summary of what we have planned. Mostly because I am very excited for something in March.

The Future:
This week - Ariel continuing to meet in-home nursing patients.
Next week - Tim will hopefully be at 80%-90% on the hand front and ready to start working on Joe's boat.
Next month - Ariel begins the Master Gardeners program (hopefully) and Joe comes back to help finish up the boat.
March - THE BABY CHICKENS COME!!! (hopefully) Also, Alice will be in and out in March and April.
May - Ariel must be finished with Masters in Teaching and ready to apply for more relevant work.
June - Bristol Bay is looking like it might have a winning fishing season this year.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!! and a summary of this last month of holiday business and many visitors

It's been a busy month with family family family! 

Mom, Dad, Daniel, Amanda, Dan, Joel, Min Min, Alice, Brother Tim, and Krista all spent some time at the house in the last month, plus we got to go to Aunt Beth's pre-Christmas party and see even more family, and a few trips up to see Uncle Loren. Christmas day, Tim and I flew down to Tuson, Arazona to meet up with the Childers family for a couple days before heading back up to the Honeymoon Bay family gathering in time for New Years.

I left off on the 19th when Daniel and Amanda took Tim and I for a day at the Seattle Zoo where we saw lions and giraffes and hippos - oh my!

Lion

Giraffe

Hippo

Tim and I befriended the birds

Amanda took lots of good pictures

There was an enormous spider on display NOT behind glass

This most impressive man called all the penguins by name

A giraffe crossed the street while another ate things from the ceiling on the other side

There were some big cats and dogs

Daniel sized up a dragon

Someone kept careful watch over us and his sleeping pals

It was hard to tell if the signs were sarcastic...

Daniel and I decided we would stay and join the exhibit.

Jumping ahead to the 21st, I was driving home from work when my road was blocked off and detoured. Nichols Bros finally finished the top half of the ferry they'd been working on and were ready to send it away on the barge to meet up with the bottom half and be put to work. They wait for high tide, then block off the road and roll the whole structure across with the aid of large cranes, trucks, and the like. 

I found someones driveway to sneak down to try for a better picture of the launch to show Tim in case he missed the spectacle.

While I was snooping through their yard, I noticed they have an awesome living fence started - something I hope to eventually try out.

While I was taking my time to get home from work, the rest of the family was already out on the porch with a great view to watch the boat parts cruse by.

The view from the porch

Christmas Eve dinner on Whidbey

Christmas eve, we had an excellent dinner with the Whidbey family and had a little White Elephant present exchange where Amanda got to open almost all the presents since hers were so good that everyone kept steeling them. Tim and I spent most of Christmas Eve day driving to Seattle and back for another physical therapy appointment. Tim worked extra hard as we had less that a week between appointments and he wanted to be ready for the next step before our trip and break in PT. 

After Christmas Eve dinner, Tim and I packed a few things for our trip in the morning to Tuson, Arazona to see his side of the family and the largest Childers family reunion in history. Tilly got all ready to go hoping we might ship her along, but as we were only going to be gone for about 3 days, it seemed like a lot of extra hassle and expense to bring her. My family graciously accepted responsibility of her for the weekend and she carried on playing in her boxes all the same. 

Christmas dinner on Whidbey (Tim and Ariel replaced by Joel and Min Min)

We had an excellent Christmas breakfast and opened presents with my family before driving to the airport, leaving the car for Joel and Min Min, and flying to Tuscon for Christmas dinner with the Childers' with another round of White Elephant gifts and some unconventional toasts.

I am happy to be one of four new women to the Childers family in the last year including Joe's wife, Roni, Matt's girlfriend, Paula and their daughter, Denali. 

Matt and Denali

In addition to getting to know the excellent Childers family, we also got to know a little about Tuson by heading out to their Desert Museum where we found incredible animals, plants, and minerals. Raptors flew low over the crowd, cacti promised not to poison us, and we bumped in to the Bosworth family (minus Adrienne) from Juneau.

Joe decided to take his trailer home and giant truck on a road trip to the family reunion, so Tim and I finally got to see his place and had a bed to sleep on with hot chocolate in the morning. Hot chocolate in bed has got to be the best perk of sleeping in the living room and makes it a very appealing place to be. 

Before taking off back to the far contiguous North West, we went out to one final dinner with the family, then drove Grandma and Grandpa back to their place in Las Vegas. All in all, a very fun trip and good family to have. Joe has made an excellent ambassador for them for the last 5 years.

Back on Whidbey, Brother Tim and Krista came for the night before New Years Eve, then headed back to Seattle as our family celebrated with fireworks, sparking cider, and movies on the big screen Mom and Dad gave us for late Christmas. The family was a great help ever continuing to improve our house and spent their last night on the island helping us put of light fixtures and shelving. Tim's shop is now looking particularly spectacular with an antique moped, freshly repainted, sitting proudly in the center waiting for spring and breaks.

I must include my mom's list of everything she could think of that Dad and the rest of the family did during their three-week "vacation"

• Collect and haul to transfer station 1,000 pounds of leaves (thanks Daniel and Joy!)
• Replace kitchen faucet (thanks Dan!)
• Repair dryer and remove pocketfull of very battered change (thanks again Dan!)
• clean out gas stove lines
• fix hole in entry floor
• add non-stick mats under all area rugs
• paint and install handrails to downtstairs (thanks Tilly and Uncle Dan)
• install light 10+ light fixtures upstairs and down (thanks Daniel, Tim, Ariel, Joel)
• Refurbish wood stove, put in new piping, stoveblack, polish windows and brass, clean out several pounds of nails and ash
• Unplug main shower drain and fasten drain screen
• Replace shower curtain and bath mat (thanks Joy and MinMin)
• Clear several alders on slope to vastly improve the view (thanks to three ladders, pole saw, chain saw, and careful placement on the bank)
• Install blinds in library and downstairs master bedroom (thanks Joel for installing the other four!)
• Adjust all blinds for length (a tedious process!)
• Replace downstairs bathroom shower rod
• Install downstairs bathroom closet doors 
• Install fan timers in upstairs and downstairs bathroom
• Clean windows downstairs
• Fix multiple outlet covers
• Fix oven light
• Install under-counter lights in downstairs kitchen
• Install 4 shoplights (Yay Daniel and Tim!)
• Design and install shelving systems in upstairs bedroom and 3 downstairs closets
• Also supervised completion of:
• Repair of flooring in downstairs bathroom
• Installation of internal jacks for internet and phone

It is good to come from a family of such busy, helpful, productive people!

My parents and Daniel and Amanda headed back to Alaska last Saturday (the fourth) and Tim, Grandpa, and I got busy resetting the house for Alice's arrival the following day. 

We did spend a little quiet family time walking the beach between guests. We've now discovered the many joys of Double Bluff beach, one of the many fabulous dog parks of Whidbey Island.

I don't think I actually took pictures in the last week while Alice has been in town, so I'll summarize among the pictures of our lovely afternoon at the beach while we were trying to exhaust Tilly in preparation for Alice's arrival.

Unfortunately, I had a lot of work all week while Alice was here. Tim and Alice spent time taking Tilly to parks, shopping, working on our lion puzzle, and hanging out. We had some wonderful dinners at home and out, and yesterday I had the day off from both jobs to spend with Alice and Tim. I now have a second job working providing in-home care to patients in need through Island Home Nursing in addition to my previous job cleaning kennels. My busy and exhausting work life had to compete with all the family visiting for the last month, but I think both jobs are going pretty well.

Today, Tim had double doctors appointments scheduled, so Alice and Tilly hung out with friends in Seattle while Tim and I went to Harborview Medical for a couple hours. Tim now has the "green light" to do whatever hurts and doesn't work to his hand until it gets better - thinks like passively stretching and straightening and stretching his fingers, playing with magically hardening playdough, and moving one finger at a time. Instead of a protective splint for sleeping in, Tim has been fitted with a new straight fingered brace for eight hours of unconscious passive stretching. I'm still rooting for this week being the week he gets to start doing some work again, but we'll see how he holds up with this new phase of physical therapy.

Alice stayed in Seattle with friends for the night and a shorter drive to the airport in the morning and Tim and I have been relaxing in our quiet, empty home eating home made french fries.