We have finished baling! Ran a bit late this year, our neighbor farmer told us waiting to bale after the first of september wasn't such a great idea, the weather isn't very reliable he said. But never the less, we were blessed with a week of perfect baling weather!
In the past we've done large round bales, but then whenever we wanted to put one out for the animals, we had to get the help of our other neighbor farmer to haul it out there with his tractor. So this year someone had the idea of making square bales (really, they look like rectangles to me) Well, we have this little stream that run through the southern pasture, and that made it impossible to get the large bale wagon thing up there to the north pasture, so instead we hauled all 250 bales in 6 separate loads on a little 5'x10' trailer. Let me remind you that each bale does weigh over 50lbs. That was saturday, and now, on thursday, I think I can finely say my back is no longer aching. I'm just glad that it was decided to quit at 250 and make the rest of the hay into the larger bales, I guess we made about 50 of them, so if we
had done it all in the smaller bales, we'd probably still be out there, and I think, I might have dropped dead from exhaustion.
But! It is done, and now they are all tucked inside the loft of our white barn, and we will be able to easily break one open for the animals anytime we need to this winter.
Plus, they're fun to climb on as you might have noticed.
I don't think we've had a actual frost yet, though it does get pretty chilly. But just in case, in the evening, we cover everything with plastic.
A mixture of salad greens.
Turnip greens.
Lettuce.
More lettuce.
We have a larger white truck that has always been called Smokey (a very descriptive name), that was considered a boy. So the younger children decided this one must be Smokey's girlfriend.
Rosie is her name. Named after Rosie the riveter. We always name our vehicles.
Abi told Blu not to paint her, she likes her just the way she is. And later Blu told me he thought some bullet holes would look cool, but I'm fairly sure he was joking.
Everyday Blu works on her a bit more.
I expect he'll get her up and running before we know it. Plus get a course in car mechanics.
We have finished baling! Ran a bit late this year, our neighbor farmer told us waiting to bale after the first of september wasn't such a great idea, the weather isn't very reliable he said. But never the less, we were blessed with a week of perfect baling weather!
Daddy, looking quite nice in his historical attire.
And me in the my very own dress that I made!
Abi was the one taking these photos of us (she is not used to my camera). And well she kept taking what were to her hilarious photos, we tried to not laugh with her but as you see here we failed.
And here we are again, trying to look like we are having a nice conversation. Though I don't know why Susan is giving me that funny look.
Susan had dressed in an outfit of what would be a lower class woman, maybe a laundress. And here she is I suppose waiting for her husband to come home after a long days work, as you can tell by the smuts on her apron.
And Susan again. That dress looked quite nice on her.
And Blu, also looking quite fine.
Here you can see his whole outfit.
And the three younger girls. They spent their day (when they were not playing ball or dancing) doing some sketching, chatting with the other girls, eating ice cream, wandering around and checking to see if the soldier at the bake house was done with the bread yet.
Whenever I go camping, I usually wake up at the crack of dawn, this trip was no exception. But I did get to see a wonderful sunrise.
Here is Blu and Abi, slapping mud. I wish I had thought of taking some photos of the rest of the house. It's going to be beautiful.
We have read all kinds of books on doing this stuff, even watched a video about it, but nothing beats actually getting you hands in there and trying it out yourself.
Blu had a very good time.
And Abi, one of the best mudders there.
And here is me and Blu, smoothing out that mud.
And me. They had provided gloves for everyone to use, but Abi and I soon had those off, bare hands seemed to do the best job. I had been afraid the mud would dry my skin out, but after two days, other them my knuckles getting a bit scratched up, it wasn't to bad.
