Wordless Wednesday - That Was Then, This Is Now

~Tell

Spring in the Hollow

In spite of a few snowflakes the other day, I think Spring is here! Let me show you around our front yard...

Here are some of Mom's Daffy flowers. They used to be planted all in groups and rows, but the landscaping a few years ago bulldozed them, and now they pop up everywhere.

These white blossoms are from our pear tree in the circle drive. The tree will have so many heavy pears that the limbs bend all the way to the ground. If our piggies get out of their pens, they head straight to the tree. They love eating pears!

This is Dottie, our Silver Penciled Wyandotte hen. She lays brown eggs.

Here are two of the guinea hens. I have not plucked a guinea hen yet because they are very good at flying.

These are the Blue Andalusian hens, and of course, Dottie is peeking at the camera again. The Blues don't like the hen house, so they roost in trees at night. They lay white eggs.

Here is a quick look at a Production Red hen. I think she was in a hurry to be somewhere else. See ya!

This is the view out our front door where the pickup is parked. And Dottie again. Methinks she is wanting a blog of her own.

Yes, the grass is greening up nicely here and the weather is warmer. I'm ready for spring!

~Tell

Arch Enemy

Mom decided to take advantage of my digging skills, and together we planted some seeds under the arch. Usually we just hang bird feeders from the arch, but now we think it's time to grow some vines there. We mixed morning glory seeds with moonflowers. The morning glories are supposed to bloom early in the day, then the moonflowers bloom in the evening. This should give the hummingbirds something to hum about all day long.

Then we found out that Dad absolutely, with a pea-purple passion, hates morning glories. Well, I don't know what a morning glory ever did to him personally, but he can't abide them at all. He said he spent too many hours as a boy on the farm, weeding those stinkin' morning glories from the crops. Turn around and they were right back in the field, choking out the peanuts and corn and making a mess of things. He said it's hard to kill a morning glory vine, and left alone it will take over a field in no time.

We found this out through a lively discussion with friends, and most of the people in the room felt the same way. Oh, was Mom ever squirming in her seat! She didn't want him to know that she'd planted a whole bunch of them buggers right in the middle of the circle drive.

But nothing happened. Day after day, we checked and found nothing growing under the archway. Whew! What a relief. Mom never had much of a green thumb anyway, so no surprise there. Until this week, then a tiny, spindly green vine sprouted up overnight and entwined itself up the side. We didn't even notice it until it bloomed.

It doesn't look like either a morning glory, or a moonflower, so it's a mystery. It's a relief to see that it doesn't look as dastardly as we thought it would. This morning, Dad stopped and looked at it. We held our breath until he remarked about how pretty it was and asked what kind of flower this is?

Mom's pleading ignorance. I'm not telling, either.

~Tell

Spring Has Sprung, The Grass Has Riz...

Spring seems to have sprung overnight here on the farm. Snow one day, sunny the next, and then came the flowers. After all the bulldozing and terrace remodeling around the house last year, we weren't sure if any of the daffodils would come back. Suddenly they were everywhere, though not where we remembered planting them. That's okay, though, we live on a country farm and things grow wherever they want to pop up.

The big yellow flower is a daffodil (but you probably already knew that). The smaller white flowers with the tiny lavender stripes are called American Beauty. Grandma-Great used to call them Good Morning, Spring. They are one of the first wildflowers to bloom and are so small that they are easily overlooked. Still, they are one of my favorites since they are early bloomers. Did you know that Native Americans used to eat the tubers from these flowers? Wow, I'll bet they had to dig a whole lot of them to make a meal.

Leo and Cedric, the resident goats, have decided to stay on our farm after the show season ends. Their job will be grass mowing and weed eating, so I guess you could say they are in the lawn maintainence business. Here is Leo, ready to begin his first day at the new job. "Hey, open the starting gate! I'm hungry!"

Clover seems to be the favorite right now, but soon they'll eat everything in sight, including the dreaded poison ivy that grows around the tree trunks, and also the sumac that grows near the clothesline. Yuck, how could anything eat that and not swell up and die? They love it though, and it doesn't hurt them at all. God made them tough, I guess.

So here's a view of our yard in the springtime. The goats are happy, the chickens are happy, and all's right with the world. Springtime is the best time!

~Tell