Indiana Springtime

WOW! Can you believe it is May already?  Where does the time go? We are having such a pleasant spring, a normal spring, sunshiny days, cool evenings, a bit of rain, a perfect combination for all to enjoy.  The forsythia went into bloom almost three weeks ago, they just started losing their beautiful yellow blooms this week, the lilacs are in full bloom, as is the crab apple tree, and the fruit trees. The grass is a vibrant green, the  trees are leafing out, the skies are blue with puffy clouds, it is truly idyllic.

Spring is a busy time for getting the gardens ready and planted, tidying up flower beds, mowing the grass, and the myriad of other chores that suddenly need attention. But oh how wonderful to be outside to feel a gently breeze, to smell the damp earth, fresh cut grass, and blossoms galore.

We have started planting the gardens, I finished putting the first one in on Monday,  I have carrots, snow peas, peas, kohlrabi, kale, radishes, purple onions, and a couple of rows of flowers, cosmos and zinnia, I am looking forward to all the green shoots that should appear in ten or so days. Yesterday evening Dave tilled a small area in another garden for our grandsons, as they want their own vegetable garden and  want to plant corn, carrots, onions and squash, lots and lots of flowers and a rose bush!  I think I can accommodate most of their requests, they are also going to have romaine lettuce as I ran out of room for it in the first garden.  Dave will get the other gardens ready for corn, tomatoes, green beans and peppers.  I would like to get a lot of cucumber plants going this year as I want to attempt pickles and it takes having a lot of cucumbers ready at the same time and the only way I can figure to do that is to plant a lot of cucumber plants.  We have never made very good pickles, they end up too soft, I like a nice briny crunch to a pickle, we have not even come close to achieving that.

In a week or so the first of our steers, Beef, will head off to be processed, we had hoped to get him in this past Monday but it was not to be, so he had a reprieve and gets to enjoy the springtime weather until the May 20.  Noodle is not as big as Beef, so we will take him in towards the end of July.  We will be glad to get the steers processed. Because of the drought last year the cost for corn and hay skyrocketed, during the winter it was not uncommon to find hay selling at $10/bale, it has now dropped back to around $6.50 which is still high considering before last summer a bale sold for around $3. The price of corn went insanely high too, it will be a relief to our budget when we no longer have to buy hay and corn each week.

On Saturday we had some unexpected visitors, Dave pulled into the driveway and came upon a peacock and peahen standing by our van, he called us on his phone (don't you just love cell phones? How did we manage without them?), so we all ran to the living room window to look out and see the visiting couple.  Mr. and Mrs. Peacock stayed all afternoon and all night, they kept walking to the barn door as if they expected someone to let them in. When we left for church on Sunday morning the lovely couple were heading over to our neighbors property and we have not seen them since, the peacocks I mean, not the neighbors :)

I have been reading some super good books recently, one I am particularly enjoying is by Mary Ellen Beachy, Women at the Cross - I highly recommend this book. Each chapter focus on a woman from the bible, Mary, Elizabeth, Mary Magdalene, Dorcas,  and unnamed women such as the woman who was healed by reaching out and touching the hem of Jesus' garment. Each chapter includes inspiring stories about modern day, ordinary women, who truly live the gospel to best of their ability. I am finding the book very uplifting and encouraging, I read half a chapter in the morning and the other half in the evening and I am now most of the way through the book and know that I will just start over because it is simply that good.

 The more grandchildren we have the harder it is to get everyone to look at the camera and smile at the same time. Patrick had just woken from a nap and did not want his picture taken, and Alivia was fussy because she needed a nap.  Anyway the goal was to take a picture of the four grand babies modelling their splendid knitted hoodies that my mom, their great grandmother, had made for each of them for Christmas.

Well that is my little update today, I will not let such a long time pass between posts, I can't believe it has been two months. Looking at the picture in my last post I can tell you that I sure don't miss the snow.