Homesteading with Jackie Clay
Harvest is in full swing now
Will is busy raking and baling hay. Yes, he's late but so are most of the other farmers in our area, due to our crazy weather. And breakdowns! It's a beautiful fall day for...
Our fall weather is helping with harvest
I've been very busy the last few days, pulling in more dry beans to shell out. I'm talking about 5-gallon buckets plumb full and several of them. Thank God, my knees have been slowly...
It’s warmed up and it’s a beautiful fall day
After three nights of intense worrying about freezing temperatures killing our crops, today is like a beautiful blessing. Some of the trees are starting to turn color but I think it's partly due to...
Holy cow, I feel like I’ve been holding my breath for three days
Three nights in a row we were under a frost advisory for our area. The first two nights, we got down to 30 F, but, fortunately, it must not have been for long because...
We escaped the freeze last night!
After sweating and praying like crazy, plus pulling in six plus crates of tomatoes to seed (just in case), I went to bed, hoping for the best. I didn't even get up at night...
We hope everyone had a happy Labor Day
We laugh because we were laboring harder yesterday than usual. You see we have Arctic cold dropping down on us on Wednesday night. They're even calling for snow. Ugh! I sure hope it doesn't...
Oh boy, fall is in the air
After a week of 80-degree weather, we dropped down to lows of 36 F! Boy, were we worried it would frost. When you have 5 acres in gardens, there's no covering anything, so we...
Our sunny weather is holding one more day
We were so glad we had a stretch of warm, sunny weather. Not only did it allow Will to go over and cut a nice field of hay, but we had a special visitor...
Our wild turkeys are back
After a very bad, long winter, two years ago, with deep snow and very cold temperatures, we lost a lot of local deer and our wild turkeys. From flocks of 20 or more in...
And how does the garden grow?
Pretty darned good, despite the drought, heat, and rain, rain, rain. Some crops, like most of the corn, had to be replanted. But now the earliest is starting to tassel. Most of the squash...
