St. Elmo market

 This is my booth at St. Elmo market. I am sure loving my little soap boxes me and my husband made. They are so easy to load up now and take up very little room. Why didn't I think of this sooner?

This is the other table with kale, dandelion greens. jelly, dryer balls and my pottery.

It was a nice evening for market this time. No rain. But cloudy and a nice breeze. Lots of people came through. I sold a lot of things this time. There were a lot more vendors too. That always helps when there are a lot of canopies up. So a good day for me.

Making...

 feta cheese and soap boxes today. I actually made this cheese Saturday, but cut it up and added chives and garlic and covered it in olive oil today. It is SO good! I am bartering with a friend for her brand new sisal rug that she found out she's allergic to, so I'll take her some today. And have some for us.

And last night, I thought up these cute little soap boxes. A friend gave us a stack of pallet type wood so these are free. I went ahead and cut enough for 10 boxes. They will hold 8 bars of soap and stack on top of each other with enough room that the soaps won't touch. Pretty cool, right? And all free.  They will take up less room too. I love them. So rustic looking. I also thought I'd get some chalkboard paint and paint the front of the box, so I can write the name of each soap, instead of using a piece of card stock. My market neighbor the other day was worried about my little name tags. So I think he should be happy with these boxes.

                                        Doesn't this look so cute? I love it. Just plain ole boxes.

                                          I love how they just all stack on top of each other so nice too.

Mushrooms and bees

http://modernfarmer.com/2016/04/can-mushrooms-save-honeybee-food-supply/

I just found this article on face book. Sounds really interesting.

I shaved my goat...

yep, shaved the whole goat. I just thought it would be easier to see ticks if she has any more. I think she likes it too. She must be so much cooler.

That's a goat kid leg behind her. I just thought it looked kind of strange.

She had a whole lotta hair. I had to do one side on one stanchion, then move her to the other one to do the other side.

This is her before. Very hairy girl. I always called her my hippie goat. I can actually see her udder now when she walks. Before it was hidden behind all that hair.

I've always shaved their udders and under the belly and legs, but never the whole goat. It took awhile to do. And she was so good. I'll do some touch ups in the morning. The shears were getting hot.

So the swelling from the tick is gone and she's doing well. I was worried about her today while I was gone. But she was fine when I got home. I put more plantain salve on .That stuff is good!

Ticks!

This morning, on the way to the milk room with the does, I noticed Olga's rear end. It looked like there was something on her vulva. So when she got on the stanchion, I looked closer and saw a darn big huge grey tick. It was horrible. I got it off and washed with alcohol. Then I put some of my plantain slave all over the swollen area. I hope she'll be ok. I probably really need to shave her. She's got such long hair ticks think she's a dog.

So I guess I'll be checking the goats for ticks from now on.

Just wanted to post this to warn everyone who does have goats to check them regularly for ticks. I hope Olga will be ok.

Chicks outside

 I finally put these 6 chicks outside in a crate in the coop with the big  chickens. They haven't gotten out yet through the bars. They tried a few times but didn't make it. I just hope they don't get scared and get stuck. They are growing so fast though. They should be fine. Then in a few weeks, I'll let them out f the crate. Maybe.

It was so cute, when I first put them in the crate. They've not seen dirt yet, or even been outside. So as soon as they felt the sun, they started laying down and fanning their feathers. Then started throwing dirt all over the place.

This is going to be a big ole flower garden I hope. I planted all kinds of seeds, like borage, calendula, cosmos, stock, celosia and some others. On the left are 10 little  places where I put those seeds. Then all down the left side is zinnias. I am watering them every day. No signs of anything yet.

I also planted a row of buckwheat with some sunflowers in that row too.

Sunday I took the grand kids to the mall for awhile. We saw this car with fries on the hood. We waited for some birds to get some. I got one in this shot. It was too funny. People walked by and just laughed.

These kids are growing so fast! Isla and Astrid are 7 weeks old already. Rika and Sorren are 5 weeks. I really need to sell them, but them I'll have to milk twice a day.  And I don't want to. It's nice having the kids, so if I don't want to milk, I don't have to. And they are so stinkin' cute!

Started mowing and got a flat tire on the little front tire. A pain to fix. And hubby's foot is a mess again. I wanted him to stay off his feet for awhile, but stuff keeps happening around here. It's been 9 months so far that we've been working on his foot. 9 months! Good grief, I am wondering if it will ever get better.

Mining bees

 This is just a little post about these pretty awesome little ground bees. I don't have them here in my yard. But Mrs. T does. And she has some new people that mow her yard now. And they have a few teenage boys that are afraid of bees. But these bees are not aggressive at all. I stood right in the middle of them for a long time, taking pictures of them, and they never bothered me at all. I did some research on them because the new yard people wanted to spray them. I said NO! And I found several really good articles about these bees. Here is one of them that's got good information about them.

http://honeybeesuite.com/let-mining-bees-be/

Just in case others are wondering what they are. They are NOT yellow jackets! These are good bees, who mind their own business. They are simply too busy!

So I hope this will help someone else who's got them all over their yard right now. They will not be around for too much longer.