Sunday In Pictures

I'd like you all to meet Zsa-Zsa.
100 % French Angora.
 Sherman's wife....due mid July
with little fiber bunnies :-)
I did buy a 90 % German Angora
baby also -- sold to me as a wooler (no papers).
I won't be breeding her till this fall or next spring.



Sherman is 1/2 inch away from being ready to shear.
Don't you just want to feel it?
I bought a new-used carding machine and
can't wait to blend his color with a forest green
dyed alpaca/wool blend.  .....ready to experiment!

On a side note....Zsa-Zsa was the first girl that Sherman
ever bred.  He knew just what to do :-)
....and I got an education on how rabbits "do it".
They fall over at the end....very weird to see!!!



Our multi-family garden.
4 of the 5 kids are taking care of their own small gardens here.
A-hem.....my part of the garden is NOT in the foreground :-)
In the back is the sweet corn for everyone.
My husband plants and tends it.
We have a saying around here that the corn needs to be
"knee high by the 4th of July".  Well, this year it
is already waist high and starting to tassel.



The pumpkin patch is on the plot of land
 that the pigs cleared last year.
The kids (adults) are competing to see
who can grow the biggest pumpkin.
Rabbit manure has been in high demand!
(We may be ready for pigs again next summer.
This worked excellent for clearing
quack grass without spraying.)



So....my husband and I were trying to figure out what
made this track in the garden.  I thought maybe
a bunny.  He then informed me that it would have had to
been a 100 # bunny to make such a deep impression. :-)
Did we do it with the hoe? --- couldn't duplicate it.
It's about 3 inches wide and 4 inches long.













(I think it's the heel of a boot/shoe.....but who's?)
.....dr momi

Need A Funny Caption

What's your caption for this week?

Last Week:

Can't talk right now. I'm kinda busy.

Last week's caption is by Marilyn.

Thanks so much for playing!

Other captions were:

It's not easy to breathe and eat corn at the same time! :)

By Lois over At:

From Lois' Hand

"I just love it so much...I think I'll kiss it!"

By Jacky over at:

Dicky Bird's Nest

'I'm going to eat this corn like a typewriter.'

By Kim over at:

Life at Golden Pines

Ah, do we have dental floss?

By Dog Trot Farm over at:

Dog Trot Farm

                                       num,hm,uh-ohg.yasho,ieo,num
                                                           By judy


     This is a picture of my grandson Brayden.  He really enjoys his corn on the cob :-)  "Can't talk right now.  I'm kinda busy." was the perfect caption Marilyn.  He is all business while he's eating it. :-)  His mom just informed me his new saying is "I can't, I'm busy" everytime they asked him to do something lol!

     Loved all the captions, they keep me laughing!  And, I so love all the comments even when a caption isn't popping into your head. :-)

.....dr momi

Weird Egg

The egg is hard like a regular shell.
Weird.
Layed by a 4 year old hen.


(special thanks to my hand model -- niece Anna :-)

.....dr momi

Need A Funny Caption

What's your caption for this week?

Last Week

"Don't look down! Don't look down!"

Last week's caption is by Marissa over at:

Life On Our Mountain

Please hop over to her blog and check out the pics

of her beautiful cat Luna. So-o-o-o cute!

Other captions were:

"Now if I can scrunch a little bit more to my left...yep, that's it.

I don't think they can see me.."

By River Bend Farm over at:

RiverBend Farm

                                         'Me's big wildcat! RARRR!'

By TexWisGirl over at:

The Run *A* Round Ranch Report

Do I look like a cat or a squirrel?

By Kim over at:

Life at Golden Pines

"I just LOVE this tree I'm hugging."

By Lois over at:

From Lois' Hands

you may have escaped Tom ,but you Jerry are my next delicious

meal, if only I could lift my other leg around here ,

"darn that last can of tuna mom fed me......"

By judy

     "I KNOW I got up here all by myself but PLEASE help me get down!!"

By Candy C. over at:

Lazy J Bar C Farm

                                  "No, I'm not stuck. Why do you ask?"

By Mama Pea over at:

A Home Grown Journal

This is a picture of a friends cat.

We were doing a "photo shoot" and Putters was being silly :-)

.....dr momi

My Favorite Flower

False Indigo

Lasts long as a cut flower.
It has beautiful purple pods in the fall
for dried arrangements.
It's foliage makes a beautiful "green"
with any other flower arrangement.
....and last but not least,
it grows in zone 3!

.....jean

Canning Salmon

     My husband and son came home with a nice catch the other day, so it was canning time.   We (as in the girls of the family) love canned salmon.   A pint jar can become salmon patties or salmon salad in short time.  All the bones just "melt" after it is canned and it becomes an excellent source of calcium.

     Salmon must be canned in a pressure canner.  At my elevation I canned it at 10 lbs. pressure for 100 minutes.  Only 1 hour west of me the elevation changes and it would have to be at 15 lbs. pressure.  Always know your elevation when pressure canning, the elevation changes the temperature at which water boils -- and therefore the safety of your product if not done with the correct pressure.




I use variations of my mother-in-law's recipe.
1/2 tsp. salt
2 TBL. ketchup
1 TBL. oil
Sometimes I just leave the oil and ketchup out.



My husband does all the prep work with the salmon.
He fillets, skins, and chunks it all for me.

 Pack the jars tightly with chunked salmon.
Leave 1 inch headspace.
DO NOT add any liquid -- it will make it's own juice.





It never looks all that appetizing after it is canned.
BUT IT IS GOOD!
Only 2 medium size salmon gave me 11 pints on the shelf.

 .....dr momi

Linked To: Homestead Barnhop #65
Linked To: Carnival of Home Preserving #15

Need A Funny Caption

What's your caption for this week?

Last week:

I will do ANYTHING for that liver and bacon you're making.

Last times caption is by Lois over at:

From Lois' Hands

Please hop on over to her blog and check out all the

wild flowers along the Ohio River....I totally enjoyed it!

Great caption Lois!

Other captions were:

"Please, Lord, please, please, please let them notice me when they

get home. I promise I'll be a good boy and not get in the

garbage or tear anything up."

By RiverBend Farm over at:

RiverBend Farm

"What do you think? I don't think my double chin is very

noticeable at all if I sit like this."

By Mama Pea over at:

A Home Grown Journal

                                 "Oh please.I'll be a good boy,I promise"

By Rebecca



                                          For meeeee pleeeaassee

By Fern Valley over at:

FernValley Appaloosas

Mom, where the heck are my Depends?

By JP over at:

A Quiet Corner

"Where is that beautiful light coming from?"

By Candy C. over at:

Lazy J Bar C Farm

Please feed me!

By Sandie over at:

Chatty Crone

                                               "....I am sitting pretty."

By Jacky over at:

Dicky Bird's Nest

"I got to wee"

By Doc over at:

Menagerie Manor A Gardener's Diary

This is a picture of our golden Billy when he was a pup. 

 He can still do a great "puppy-dog" look to try

to get whatever people food there is!

Thanks for playing Need A Funny Caption everyone!!!

.....dr momi



Bee Inspection

Neither one of my hives is doing all that great.  They sure started out all gun-ho.  Lots of bees going in and out.  I thought *finally* I'll get some honey.  Then slowly there were less and less bees.  I left my sugar water out until we had at least 3 -- 70 degree days with lots of dandelions blooming, just like I was told to do.  Within 2 weeks of stopping it,  I started up again -- just because I had no idea what was going on.  My thought was.... must call local bee expert Mike.

Before I could call him, he called here -- checking to see how my bees were doing.  His 47 hives have done the very same thing!  They started out all good, and then a real slow down.   He said by now we should be putting on a second super on the regular hive, and we're not even close.  His advise was to keep the sugar water out yet. (yeah, I did something right.  :-)

There are live bees and we will get some honey, just not the yields that are normal.  The interesting thing Mike said, was that the bees that overwintered here are going hog wild!  There are so many of them that they are swarming and their honey yields are way up!

To me that rules out pesticides.  (At least in this case.)  The bees that over-wintered (not mine) and the bees we got new this year from California, are all collecting the same pollen.  The bees that over-wintered did get that warm March weather to get going before April was so cold.  We truly are thinking it is weather related.  The bees we bought had to go through a colder spell before they were really established.  (....and was the queen bred before being shipped?)

I wrote all the above before I checked the bees late Friday afternoon. (2 weeks since the last inspection)

After the hive inspection Friday.....down to one hive.  The traditional hive had a 1/2 cup size ball of bees all huddled in the corner, with no brood ready to hatch that I could see.  I'm too much of a rookie to know if the queen was in the group -- but I do know there were not enough bees to sustain the hive.

I expected to find the same in the top bar hive because there were still very few bees going in and out. 


This was the first bar with comb on it.
They had this built very early...I thought great, no bees.
But...look close, there is brood hatching.
(A really bad picture, but there were no do-overs)





Imagine my surprise when this is what I found between
the second and third bar.  Live healthy bees!  Yeah!





There were this many and more bees on the third bar. ....and on
the back side of the comb more brood ready to hatch.
This is not a lot of bees for this time of year.
But.....I still have a hive trying to survive!  :-)

(Check out my bare hand so close to the bees.....I
do believe I have lost my fear of the bees.
This is a good thing if you are a bee keeper :-)



.....dr momi

Linked To: Homestead Barn Hop #64