Spring 2015

Spring has rolled into Okra Hill. Ashley has planted our spring garden, which includes lettuce, peas, carrots, broccoli and kale in the raised beds. 

On the other side, we'll have corn (this year Ashley is trying a new pattern, with the corn running  in short vertical rows on the far side). Potatoes are on the right. We'll also have cucumbers, okra and tomatoes here. 

Our chickens have been great producers lately. We have 16 hens and regularly gather 12-14 eggs each day. 

Notice the small box with yellow duct tape on it in the lower left corner inside the chicken house? Inside is a rat trap. A week or so ago, I went in to the chicken house and heard scurrying above my head. I saw a RAT! Eeek! So I did what any sensible person would do...I got a rat trap (this was after I fired 3 shots at the rat with the .22--I could have sworn I hit him but he ran off). 

The grass greening up makes everything appear ready for a growing season. The blackberries (on the left) have green leaves emerging. 

I pruned the grapes and the blueberries are loaded with blossoms. That's Emmet, one of our puppies we got in September after our Max, our 12 year old rat terrier disappeared. Emmet is a Mountain Feist. His best friend is Heidi, a Carolina Curr. They're great puppies/dogs--and LOVE barking at squirrels (and birds and anything else that moves in a tree). 

Happy days to y'all!

Merry Christmas 2014

It's been ages since I've updated the Okra Hill blog. My apologies! Life has been happening, as it has with you, too, I'm sure.

I created this post at Christmas and forgot to publish it. I think the chickens are eating the remains of the boys' gingerbread houses. :o)

Winter garden work (though there's not much to it, which is why we enjoy it!).

Look at the bounty of kale and collards.

Ashley slaughtered and butchered the pigs the day after Thanksgiving. We had a couple of family members and friends to help out. It was a great experience. Now the pig pen is empty. 

All that remains of the pigs (besides the pork in our freezers) is the hair in front of our shop. Their hair was scraped before the butchering began.

Ashley's shop set-up. It was a great place to cut the meat and make sausage.

It's a Grape Day for the Grape Press

We brought two gallons of grapes up to my parents this past weekend so we could try out my papa's apple cider press. I grew up seeing their press covered in dust in the basement. It was a project Papa put together but it never operated correctly until he had it worked on. My brother and I were always fascinated with it so when Ashley and I had the opportunity to try it out, I was excited. 

First Ashley sprayed off the dust. 

The boys helped (they had been riding plasma cars which explains their helmets). 

Lots of cranking...

And then the juice started to trickle out!

After one press we decided the grapes had more juice in them. 

And we were right. Two gallons of grapes gave us a little over two quarts.  

We all tried a glass of fresh muscadine juice. 

Ashley and I will probably buy our own press to have at Okra Hill since this worked so well. 

If boys make me a mama, pigs make me a farmer

The pigs are porking right along. We're raising them to 200 lbs. So far they're happy with their arrangements and doing their part to make sure we have no food waste. 

When I had my first baby, I became a mama. I feel like I've become a farmer now that we have the pigs. I am responsible for their care and am really starting to enjoy it. There's something very satisfying about going out to get their slop ready every morning and then watching them waller in the dirt. 

Okra Hill has become a farm (though still very much a hobby farm) and this mama of three boys who used to be college academic advisor is now happily a farmer. 

Speaking of growing along, our grapes are in full production mode. We grow mostly muscadines (with one random scuppernong vine--that's my favorite). 

The boys were pleased with this morning's harvest. I've made one batch of jelly and plan to do another run, plus some grape sorbet. I'm also selling grapes to friends. 

What a blessing to live this life. There are days when I gripe about some of the chores but I can't imagine raising boys anywhere else

On a related note, Saturday a young couple from North Carolina visited us because they had found my That New House blog and plan to eventually build our house on their own land. It was a neat afternoon sharing our thoughts and helping them build their dreams. 

Not Everything Is a Good Idea

Sometimes it's easy to get lost in the blogging world and think everything works out perfectly. I hope I do a decent job of accurately representing our life at Okra Hill. 

But just in case you were wondering what hasn't worked out so well, here are a few recent examples. 

We're novice pig farmers and it's definitely be a "learn as we go" endeavor. One thing we've had to figure out is how to best provide water for our swine. We started off with a large bowl, which the pigs promptly overturned. Then Ashley used his landscaper brain and created a watering tube out of a large PVC pipe, outfitted with a nipple. 

This seemed like a good idea until we quickly realized the pigs' snouts were too long to use the nipple. 

So we bit the bullet and purchased this ingenious waterer from our local feed store. The pigs figured it out almost immediately (they press their snouts against the metal plate and water fills in the blue basin for them to drink).

One of my biggest disappointments this summer has to do with this very lush green bean crop...

The green beans are so healthy and thick that they managed to block the majority of the water for the garden behind them. The okra is doing fine (such a hardy plant!). 

But the cucumbers...no, they needed water that was taken by the beans. Although we've talked about a drip irrigation system for the garden, Ashley continued with the overhead sprinklers this year. I lost out on cucumbers and pickling--but in the end, it's been a blessing. Most evenings I'm pretty tired and don't feel like canning. If I had the gallons of cucumbers like years past, I would have felt obligated to pickle them. 

The corn also didn't make. We're not sure if this was a water issue or if there were some other factors at play. 

Waylon and Ziggy were happy to help us with the corn stalks.

So instead of letting the plants flounder, Ashley went ahead and plowed them under. We learned a lesson about remembering the heights of plants as they grow and how they will impact their neighbors. The green beans and okra are still going strong, as are our tomatoes and basil. I'll try to do another post soon to share the starting of our fall garden.

A Pasture for Pigs (and Goats)

We've had our pigs for a month now. They're growing right along. Ashley transitioned them to living in the goats' pen/pasture yesterday. Although they squealed like pigs (we really could have used ear plugs while Ashley was carrying them over), they loved their new space once they settled in. 

Wallering in the mud...

Rooting up the ground...

Making their goat brothers wonder what in the world just arrived....

It's amazing watching them use their snouts. They particularly love rooting under the Hickory trees. 

Ziggy and Waylon weren't that thrilled about their new pen-mates, but they seem to all be adjusting just fine. 

Ashley put on his thinking cap and made these awesome troughs out of PVC pipe and wire. Both the pigs and goats are bad about standing in their food--the wire prevents that. 

It was a family affair as usual. 

I'd say the finished product works great!

For all parties involved. 

I'm thankful to have Ashley as my partner. There's no way we could do this Okra Hill farming thing without being a team. I'm responsible for the animals' day-to-day general upkeep (feeding, water, etc) but it takes Ashley to do the larger things like animal relocation and trough building. Although I was a reluctant pig farmer, I'm getting used to it now. And to see the girls running around in the pen is awesome. They're so happy--and pretty clean, too!

Swine and other summery things

We have officially become a farm now- two weeks ago we added two pigs to our menagerie. We're keeping them temporarily in a dog pen while we work on their larger space and feeding arrangements.  We're raising these girls for pork but we are committed to giving them a good life this summer and fall (until they reach 200!!! lbs). 

With the pigs arrival, the chickens aren't receiving as many kitchen scraps. I made sure to treat them to all the weeds I pulled in the garden this morning. 

Speaking of the garden, it's coming right along. I'm not planning to do much canning this summer because our youngest has just started walking and is proving to be like his older brothers- busy! Right now we have plenty of zucchini and squash and the cucumbers are coming along (though one type isn't doing much--to my disappointment!). The green beans have just started and we've picked about 15 okra pods--enough for supper tonight. 

I picked gallon of blackberries this morning. I'm sharing these with two friends- one who gave my boys a sack of hand-me-down clothes and the other who has worked with me at Bible school this week.  

These gladiolas are stunning!

And so are their neighbors, the blueberry bushes. 

Because this is a catch-up post, I wanted to share two other favorite things this summer- these SunPatiens Ashley planted at our front door. These are doing wonderful in the shade and hot afternoon sun. 

We also finally got around to building a bike shed on the side of the house to get the bikes off the front porch. This was a family (and neighbor) affair and we love the final product. Ashley may add a partial door to the front. He also plans to plant vines (jasmine?) to creep up the sides. 

So all in all we've had a great start to summer. I hope y'all have too.