Some hints of Spring

Oh the weather outside is delightful! Highs near 70 yesterday and supposed to be that way all week. I had to take the row covers off of my cabbages and other cole crops. i love this kind of weather and it always makes life seem more bearable when you know that spring is just around the corner. Of course, February and usually the beginning of March can be really tricky like that. Lovely, beautiful weather and then right back in the throes of old man winter. Let's just hope that the trees don't start putting out blooms only to have them frozen off again. I remember my grandfather's pear tree and the aggravation that the tree and the weather caused him. Apparently, each year this pear tree was tricked by February's little hints of spring to come. Each year at the first sign of nice weather it would load itself with beautiful blossoms. And then each year it would lose those blossoms to those end of February freezes that we get every single year. My grandfather tried talking to the tree, but it really didn't seem to do much good. The tree was always so excited at the prospect of spring the it just couldn't seem to help itself. Grandaddy never got a single pear off of that tree even though he babied and petted it and begged for it to wait just a little longer. Sometimes I feel like that pear tree. It is so hard to be patient and wait just a little longer for true spring to get here. I remember one of my first garden failures was thinking that I could go ahead and plant my warm season crops. I did and they died. So I truly have to force myself to wait. Fortunately, I learned about cool weather crops and now I can get my hands dirty and have plants that love this weather. I also have plenty of garden work to do to get ready for everything else. The cabbages, broccoli, cauliflower, spinach and lettuces are coming up nicely under their little row covers. The wattle fence around their section of the garden is doing a good job of keeping the ducks out of that area, so far so good. Since that was my first attempt at wattle fence building is isn't very pretty and I keep having to make adjustments but that is what this life is all about, learning to do something better or different. Sewing has been put on hold for a bit while we get the garden in order. I try to do a little sewing at night, but don't seem to get very far. I am truly exhausted in the evenings. The girl's are too as they are spending a good amount of time outside also. The little one was so exhausted last night that she fell asleep while I drew her bath water. After her bath and supper she spent a little time cuddling and talking with me and then didn't put up much fuss when I tucked her into bed. She "worked" very hard yesterday as we burned off some yard trash and worked on the wattle fence. I am really praying for a good garden this year. There is something about a summer evening sitting in my garden chair looking at the beautiful plants. It makes all the hard work worth it. The baby bunnies are beginning to pop out of the nest and nibbling at mama's food. They are truly adorable little critters and it is a good thing to see them out of the nest. The hens are really ramping up egg production and we are getting about a dozen a day now, provided we can get them before the cats do. That usually means going out to collect the eggs very often during the day. We have one chick from out hatch so far. It hatched out a couple days early. We had another egg hatch, but it fell in the water and drowned. Unfortunately, that is one of the hazards of having a homemade incubator. The other eggs were due to hatch yesterday, but they didn't. I am really hoping they will. They all looked viable the last time that I candled them, but you never know anything can happen. I am hoping that my Australorps will think about going broody soon. They did last year and it was a nightmare as hens started fighting over the nest. Even the reds decided to not be outdone by the australorps and wanted to be broody too. The result was broken eggs, too many eggs etc. etc. We got one little chick and the chicken killer cat eventually got that one. Chicken killer cat is now gone of course so maybe this year will be better if we can catch a broody quickly before there are too many eggs and she is competing with the other hens. I don't want too many of them going broody, but I would like to have one or two hatch out some chicks. Anyway, I am rambling. I hope you all are having a great week and some lovely weather for a change. Blessings from the farm, Kat