Sunny Days, Cool Nights, and Work Getting Done

Its been a busy few days getting caught up with some chores that have lagged and starting the fall chores. The weather in Southern Missouri has been beautiful with highs in the 70s and low 80s, low humidity, and cool nights in the upper 40s and mid 50s. The leaves are changing, night comes earlier each day and the migrant birds are starting to head south. The weather forecast fir the next week is sunny, warm and calm.

We have a bumper crop of Black Walnuts this year and they are getting $12.00 for a hundred pounds shelled and we have allowed some friends to come and harvest as we have 12 or 13 Black Walnut trees and as lame as it sounds, its just too much work for the gain in our opinion and if you have ever tried to pick the nut meat out of those shells...thats not worth it either.

We are still harvesting some tomatoes, peppers, herbs, Fennel and the cole crops in the fall garden are coming on strong. We also continue to harvest black eyed peas as they dry on the vine, the bird house and spoon gourds are curing on the vine awaiting first frost and we will probably harvest the sweet potatoes soon. I dont really know why our garden produced so much this year when we are in the middle of a prolonged drought and have had record breaking heat but we are pretty satisfied and we have a well stocked pantry and freezer to get us through the winter...and with the prices of food now days thats a good feeling.

So here are just a few pictures of our activities.

View from our back patio through the grape arbor to Judy's place; its very peaceful.

And of course Bandit is ever present. He may as well have his own fan club since so many people ask about him.

Yes we hang out laundry, thanks for asking. We even have one of those old fashioned clothes pin holders your grandma had.

None of this greenery existed a year and a half ago when we moved here. We planted the Summer Sweet, grape arbor, banana trees etc and they have all thrived through the past year and a half of record breaking heat, cold, rainfall and a couple near tornados.

We touched up the paint for the winter but the brown on the garage and house addition (not the stone) will eventually be a light green about the same color as the propane tank.

Cant get much more pastoral than this. Having a big yard is nice because we like the look and have lots of room to play, mowing is not so fun.

We feed a little grain to the cattle once a day to keep them happy and to get them to come to us.

We have come to find the various bugs here to be highly interesting if frustrating at times. This guy was on the Castor Beans and eating leaves which are highly poisonous to most animals (and humans).

Thelma and Louise are getting large and run about 850 lbs now. We found them at the second wood lot hanging out by the pond.

Staining the pole barn poles is more for wood preservation (even though its pressure treated) than aesthetics but we do what we can to take care of our stuff and besides...it was very relaxing.

And to show I am no chauvanist, we work as a team on everything and I took my turn as well.

I am a perpetually happy person but Holly says I tend to scowl all the time in pictures so here is a smile...what you see here is contentment with life.

Yesterday we got hit by the Counter-drug task force flying in National Guard helicopters looking for Marijuanna growing operations. They actually came in low and slow and I didnt get a good picture because I was waving like an idiot (all those years flying in helicopters and I still cant figure out how they fly)...nothing to worry about here but they did bust a grow operation not too far from here.

Maybelle is now out in the upper pasture and exploring. We found her today hanging out with Thelma and Louise and got this picture of her playing in one of the farm ponds.

Why dont you leave out pop cans? Bees.

Holly harvesting the black eyed peas. We let them dry on the vine, then shell them and pop them in the freezer to keep them from molding.

This is our second harvest with one or two more to go.

The horses have been hanging out a lot in the new pasture and eat a lot of carrots we cant seem to deny giving to them.

But as you can see from this picture of the ponys, they do a number on the pasture as they eat everything down to the ground and actually pull plants up by the roots. We still need to fence in this pasture and cross fence to give it a rest.

We all cut down the corn stalks and tied them in sheaves to place into shocks for more drying before putting it in the barn for the cattle this winter.

We have two corn patches, harvested all the corn we wanted for canning, left some for the deer and other animals, and still have a good amount for silage.

I actually did do some work here cutting the stalks but using the back injury to get out of some of this work was handy. We were glad Chris had the day off from work to help out.

We will put this up in the barn in a week or so..

Along with this one from the other corn patch.

And finally, if your not against vaccinations, dont forget your flu shot..flu is already showing up in Southern Missouri and we got our shots already.