Green Chickens

OK, we don't really have green chickens. We will have green eggs soon, but that's not what this post is about. But since we're talking chickens now, here's a couple of pics of the 'babies':
You can still see some baby fluff on the rear ends, but they are mostly covered with their adult feathers now. One of the roosters is trying desperately to crow. So far it's embarrassing.


Anyway, back to the subject I intended... This is just a short update on living green. I couldn't resist showing off this use for those infamous five-gallon buckets. Yep, those are green beans behind the pile of cucumbers.
Here is more of our repurposing in practice:
Hubby finally put his walls up for the feed storage room in the big hen house. I think the old skid boards make a beautifully rustic wall. He was going to screen the top-right section, but then decided, 'Why waste screen when I have so much wood from these skids?' So he just spaced them to allow ventilation without allow chickens to pass through.

Of course, I couldn't post without including this pic of the herd I shot while at the chicken house...

This Farmer's Market... Part II

First my green speech... We try to live green. I like to re-purpose as much as I can. You'd be amazed at what I've used skids for... People are happy to have you haul them off! Free wood! A nearby bath-makeover place has skids that have five 2x4x10s each. You'll find some of those in the walls of the chicken house. We found a place that had stacks with really nice wood, not weathered and splintered. It's going on a wall in my basement bath. Whole skids make great fire-starters. OK, they're a little big for the fireplace, but outside they're wonderful. Stuff them with the important papers you usually shred, pile some limbs and logs on top, and light!

What does that have to do with a farmer's market? Glad you asked...

We have sold vegetables from our farm in the past. Selling at our local markets is not an option for hobby farmers that don't have much. By the time you pay for the permit and insurance (required) you'd have to sell an awfully lot of beans to break even! So we decided to sell our surplus right from home. We live back a long lane, so we wanted a sign at the road to advertise what we had available. I don't buy materials for projects like that. I use what I have. And what did I have? Skids!

So, here I am painting the skids that will make my sign. (Left-over paint of course.)

This is a terrible picture of me, but I had to include it as a tribute to Bob Dylan.I engineer, Hubby labors. Here he is using skid boards to fasten the sides of the sign together...

TADA! Doesn't it look nice?


Now, let's measure out some beans...

Here is our farm stand, complete with my recycled Frappucino boxes, 5 gallon paint buckets, and a $10 WalMart canopy. We couldn't survive without at least 20 paint buckets. Notice the table? Yep, recycled wiring spool. If you ask people at construction sites, they sometimes give them to you.

We also sold corn, tomatoes, and whatever else we might have ripe that day. It helped pay for the seeds for next year's crop. That's really all we want... free food!
Well, there you have it... our own farmer's market.


To see more farmer's markets, check out Squirrel Queen's challenge.

This Farmer's Market... Part I

This is my first herb. I planted this beside the new steps to the pool. Ali and I love to much the onion chives in the evening while sitting on the steps looking into the woods. Yum. I plan on adding garlic chives to the other side of the steps. This is where we 'buy' our fresh eggs. It will take eating the eggs for 200 years to really break even on the deal.

Here's a sample of the eggs. Notice the twins in the background?



This is our vegetable garden. Well, I should say, this is Hubby's and his dad's garden. You remember the old saying, two's company, three's a crowd?
These first rows are FIL's white half-runners. Yuck! Strings!

Aw, aren't the baby zucchini cute!

From left to right: FIL's beans, whole row of tomatoes (I don't know how many varieties this year), Hubby's beans (Kentucky bush beans - no strings!), sweet potatoes, and corn. Across the back, climbing the fence, are cucumbers.

The zucchini would be in the bottom of the picture if I hadn't cut them off! I see a stray plant next to the corn. The gardener's bench marks the spot where Hubby left off picking beans.

This raised bed is away from the garden so the melons don't mix. These are Tennessee Muskmelon. My FIL told Hubby about them a few years ago. I went online and found some heirloom seeds. They get long like a watermelon. The best I've ever eaten!

I tried to find some babies, but they hide... So here are some blossoms, and if you look closely... Do you see it? I'm soooo excited! It's a honey bee! While I was holding the blossoms, it came and visited them. (Stupid camera won't let me capture 'the' moment.) I saw another one this morning on the clover! These are the first honey bees I've spotted this year. Our area is one of those you hear about where the bees are disappearing. Seeing them made my day!

Back in the garden... Here are some of the bush beans yet to be picked. I like them young and tender. FIL likes them to get big beans inside. So we pick some early, some late.

Well, I must have reached the maximum for photo uploads on this post.

Check out Part II for the actual market...






To see more farmer's markets, check out Squirrel Queen's challenge.

Grace in the Garden

Since I'm still 'under the weather' (I wonder where that expression came from) I don't have any new news to blog about, so here's a farm-fresh oldie but goodie...

Gotta love that Gracie (Grand #3).

She was trying to be a farm girl and bring in

a bucket of corn and green beans for dinner.

She is quite the drama queen!