Naked Gardening Day

Hey, anybody notice this was the first Saturday in May? Hurrah, it's worldwide naked gardening day!

This morning started out beautiful for it. Sunny. Warm. But it all went downhill. Over cast. Cool. Occasional drizzle. So instead of trying to get some sun where the sun doesn't normally shine, I opted to spend some time in the flower garden trying my hand at drawing. Too chilly to do it naked. But this is what I was playing around with........

Mango

I'm not much of an artist, but I can draw a decent mango or pineapple. And besides, it's fun. 

Back in the Saddle Again

Ok, I need to force myself back in the habit of blogging. First it was the farmers market that kept me away, simply because I was devoting all my free time to creating it. Then along came coronavirus and boom!......no more market. But my free time got gobbled up trying to set up schedules for checking in on many of the now housebound seniors, bringing them supplies, picking up their medical prescriptions, hauling their trash to the dump, etc. Right about now I've settled into a routine and once again find that I can have time for myself. Whoopee! 

This past week I'm back to farming. Whipping this place back into shape going to be a long uphill battle. Weeds moved in and thrived. Crops got picked but neglected. Perennials could use some cleaning up. Everything is crying for mulch. Hee, hee, hee, hee --- I'm in my glory......the plants need me! 

While I'm gleefully back to farming, I haven't picked up the habit again of blogging about it. Evening comes and for some reason my interest turns to other things -- creating a new soup, playing puzzle games. I even dragged out the sewing machine and mended clothes. Egads, next thing you know I'll start housecleaning! This coronavirus lockdown has caused me to go insane. That must be the answer because housecleaning and I aren't known to be bosom buddies. (By the way, I scrubbed the kitchen floor last night.)

So this is my first post back in the saddle. I'll start taking photos of the farm tomorrow and give everyone an update. 

Surprise!

Guess what just came out of the woods.

I had no idea that a hen has been sitting on a clutch of eggs. Looks like she has 6 chicks. 

Sometimes around here I get surprised. 

Homestead Update

It's been a miserable week. Cold. Wet. Gloomy. The downside of creating soil on this place is that it's now muddy! When it was mostly lava rock and grass, puddles seldom were a problem.

I haven't been able to mow lately. When it's been dry enough to mow, I've had other more pressing tasks. And when I finally get home, guess what..,..it's raining. So I've only managed to get a little bit of mowing in, just enough to feed the hens some fresh grass. The girls have had to make do with other greenery, such as sweet potato and comfrey. As a result my growing areas and the chicken pen are begging for grass clippings. For now they will have to make do with bamboo leaf litter instead. 

I was scheduled to replant the pallet boxes this week, now that I've harvested the bean seed out of them. But that's on hold because of the excess wet. And the farm schedule says that I should have planted peas, pole beans, and bok choi this week. Nope...none. Foul weather is something that has to be either accepted or dealt with. For now, I'm just accepting it and waiting it out. 

Earlier today I checked in the pipinolas that I planted at the new bamboo trellis. Both pipinolas took and are growing multiple stems. I'm actually surprised that they made it. In the past I've had pipinola rot due to excess moisture. These two pipinolas are both white ones. Whenever I get around to building another trellis, I'll plant that with smooth green ones. The green and the white ones taste the same to me, but the white ones look nicer in mock apple pie. The green ones look nicer in veggie stir fries. 

The first plant. 

Another downside of all the gloom is that the solar system is complaining. I've needed to run the washer and dryer, so without sun I have had to run the generator. I'm glad we installed a generator to charge the battery bank when needed. This past week it was needed! I actually have the generator charging the batteries and the washer (or dryer) running off the other side of the generator at the same time.....two birds with one stone theory. It works for us. 

The second plant. The white thing on the right is the starter pipinola. 

With weeks like this one, it's apparent why we don't have solar hot water. We really don't have consistent enough sun the have solar hot water, thus we have propane hot water on demand. I've heard several people here say that they have had to turn on the electric hot water back up because the solar wasn't making hot water. Yes, deciding to use a propane hot water heater turned out to be a good decision for this location. 

Since I'll be occupied with a spay clinic all day tomorrow, I bet the sun will come out. 

Thanksgiving Day Meal

This year is much like past years around here. Half the folks bearing smirky grins ask me if I'm shooting a feral turkey for dinner. The other half, cringing at that thought, invite us to a variety of get-togethers, I suppose in hopes of sparing that neighborhood turkey. I just have to chuckle at the reputation I have. 

So what's for dinner? The buffet up at the Kilaeua Military Camp. All you can eat turkey dinner with all the fixins. Yum. 

Most folks see this holiday only as a day off from their jobs and the opportunity to pig out. I probably am the oddball because I really do contemplate how fortunate I am and am thankful. As a kid I was forced to say grace before digging into Thanksgiving dinner. Of course as a child, you didn't really mean anything that was said. You just wanted grace to be over so that you could go fill your plate. But now as a senior adult, I pause a minute to feel a wave of sincere thankfulness wash over me. There is so much to be thankful for that it's dizzying. Oh life has its problems for sure, but by and large, I'm happy to be alive and have what I do. 

So on this thought, I would like to extend wishes to everyone for a peaceful day. And thank you for listening. 

Busy Weekend Approaches

Just a heads up. The next 3 days are jam packed with things to do. So I won't be blogging, although I'll still be alive. One of those many activities will be going to see Rocky Horror live play. Eat you heart out guys! It's gonna be crazy insane fun. 

Just a Newsy Letter to Friends

All is well. At least I think do. No disasters have announced their presence to date. I've just been busy and haven't had time nor desire to blog. So what have I been up to? 

... Harvesting. The sweet peppers produced lots of peppers, most of which had to be processed for the freezer. I managed to use some for trading in order to conserve space in the freezer for other things. The tomatoes have been going strong, although the plants have been battling various fungal diseases. To date I've harvested 53 pounds of assorted tomatoes. They have proven to be a good trade item. The pineapples have been ripening in dribs & drabs, giving me 1-2 a week. And the bananas are coming in on the average on one bunch a week. Usually they seem to ripen in groups, giving feast or famine. But this year they are spread out better. I'm not sure why. The veggie gardens are doing their thing, producing enough onions, assorted greens, root crops, beans and peas, and pumpkins to satisfy our needs and those of neighbors and friends. I didn't plant too much because I knew I wasn't going to be ready to be selling the excess. Selling is something I have in mind to do later, after the farm and house projects are more under control. 

... Roof. The roof project is slowly coming along. The problem is that we have to work around the rain. As soon as the roof gets wet, it's too dangerous to keep working. Slipping off a wet roof is definitely not in the plans! So far we are about 3/4 of the way done. 

... Woodstove decision. We decided to take out the woodstove for now. We've hardly fired it up in the past 3-4 years. Yes, it's getting warmer here every year. We'll store it away for now, but keep it handy should the winters get colder again. This means that we are putting on the new roof sans chimney. Having installed the chimney before through the metal roof, we could always do it again. No big deal. Of course this decision probably means that we will be experiencing 40° nights this coming December. Hahaha. 

... Woodworking project. Got the little table finished. Worked on it a little here and there on the rainy days. I'll be posting photos of it soon. I think it turned out pretty good. 

... Mowing. Yes, lots of mowing. I needed the clippings for mulch. Plus the grass is growing a lot due to the rain and warm weather. I still need to do some more mowing because the place is a bit shaggy looking. At least the mowing is keeping me in decent physical shape. 

... Medical tests. Been spending a few days visiting various doctors, mostly for preventative medicine tests and vaccinations. Most of the results have told me just what I already know-- the body is getting older and wearing out, but is generally in acceptable shape. I still have some endoscopy results pending, but other than that I think I'm through with doctors for quite a while. Let's hope, at least.

... One of the farm dogs has an inoperable tumor, obviously cancerous. We agree that he's too elderly and emotionally fragile to subject him to extreme procedures. So we are spending quality time with him, keeping him happy and comfortable. It is emotionally draining to see such a good animal ending its life early. 

... Pick up truck. The truck I purchased in June has proven to be a problem child. Unlike a real child, I can ditch it and get another without being arrested-- so I did. The transition failed twice and after replacing bits and pieces, the suspicion is that it was an electronic problem. I didn't like the sound of that, so I traded it back to the dealer. It cost me a few thousand, but I felt it was worth it. I didn't wish to deal with a recurring electronic nightmare. So I got an identical truck, hopefully without the transmission problem. 

... I cleaned out one of the house catchment tanks, and ready to tackle the second. Using a swimming pool vacuum head and hose, I set up a siphon and suck up any debris and silt that accumulated on the tank bottom. Our tanks are situated so that the siphon method works. I'll suck the worst of the debris out one day, let things settle for a day, and repeat. While I have the cover off the tank I'm also treating any rust and repainting the tank. So it's a several day project. It's been 10 years since we last did this. Most of the debris on the bottom of the tank appears to be volcanic ash and dust, most likely due to the now defunct eruption. We're still seeing ash building up although not badly. The winds blow the surface ash around. So it's an ongoing issue. 

... Rock gathering. No big news here. I'm always picking up rocks for the rock walls being build along the driveway. But I've been digging out a shallow hugelpit that I made 10-12 years ago, harvesting the organic material for my pallet boxes. When I got down to dirt level, I kept going in the spots where there were no big boulders. Yes I'm crazy. Perhaps I am a reincarnated gopher. But anyway, I harvested numerous 5 gallon buckets of dirt to add to my gardens plus lots of rocks. If I piled all the rocks into 55 gallon drums, I'd say I have 3 barrelfuls. To me, that's a lot of rocks, considering that they are all hand dug and carried. So now I've ended up with a bigger hole than when I started. It gives me a nice pit to use as a bio trash pit, hugelkultur style, for organic debris from around the house area. 

... Once again I volunteered at the Advocats spay/neuter clinic. And I have a KARES clinic coming up next week. 

As you can see, I'm keeping busy. Somewhere amid all this we take time to watch moon rises, sunsets, take beach walks, and take dogs to play dates with their canine friends. I can't complain. 

Triple Banana

Here's a weird one.......a triple fused banana.

View from one side. 

It's not uncommon to have two bananas fused together. I don't get one in each bunch harvested, but I see a few each year. But this is the first time I've gotten a triple. 

View from the other side.

It's always fun to find oddities. If you grow things long enough, you'll see quite an assortment of weird stuff. 

On the end you can make out 3 blossom scars. 

By the way, hubby and I ate this one for breakfast, it was delicious.

Totally normal inside, except that there are three of them. 

Relief From Work

Here's something different to feast your eyes on...............

Work was becoming far too serious, so it was time to lighten up. And one way to do that is to let one's artistic heart out to play. So grab some dried tree branches, peel off the bark, sand them down, and cobble them together. Wallah!! A clothes tree! How about that! A few coats of polyurethane spiffs them up nicely. 

View from the other side. 

Ok, it's not a masterpiece, but it is fun. Heck, the price is right and it can always become well seasoned kindling in the future. This particular gem will reside on my side of the bedroom. I've already hung my bathing suit on in hopes of finding it easier next time I'm looking for it. Don't ask me why, but for some reason I can never find the dang suit when I need it. Hope this helps. 

Gifts of Friendship

I'd like to take the time to acknowledge some good friends who have sent me friendship gifts. Yeah, I'm an old sentimental fuddy-duddy. Probably has to do with being old. 

Gifting for me has to do with bonding, be it with one's friends, community, or whatever. Gifting doesn't have to be physical items. It can be a helping hand, an ear for listening, a chat over coffee, keeping someone company, a friendly hug or touch. Hubby and I are believers in gifting. But sadly it makes it harder for me to understand the hatred, selfishness, and aggression I see the world suffering from. Perhaps if we taught children to gift, as adults their lives might be better. Sigh. .......... I'm getting off track. I'm not a preacher, and anyway, the people who should be listening, won't. Sigh again. 

So to acknowledge my friends and say thank you from my heart........

From Missouri, 2 local tshirts. Yup, I'm the t-shirt wearing type.....just a carryover from my teenage years. Hubby claimed the black one as his, and I eagerly laid claim to the yellow. So far I've managed not to ruin it, so I can still wear it for "good".

From New Jersey, a tropical plant to add to my landscaping. This happens to be something I could keep bonsai'd, but I don't know if I'm up to it. I'd rather plant it in my secret garden and feature it in a "friendship garden". That way I can remember my friend every time I walk by.

From down the road. I actually received this quite a while ago, but it's so cool that I wanted to document it in my blog. The broken piece is from my own garden area. For real! It most likely came from the McComber or Lorenzo family who lived on this property years and years ago. Their house is long since gone, but my friend found this bit of broken plate while digging in the garden here. She tracked down the original type plate and framed it. It now has a place of honor in my living room. The pattern is amazingly appropriate. 

Mounted in a shadow box, it hangs in my living room. 

From Alaska.... one neat baseball cap. Since moving to Hawaii, I've become a baseball cap wearer. Never wore one before coming here. But the tropical sun is too strong for my unprotected eyes. Sunglasses and I don't get along too well, but baseball caps do fine. This particular cap is really nice. Actually it's the best one I've ever had. Can a baseball cap be considered "dress up"? 

From up the mountain, dinosaurs!!! Yeah! I'm a dino-kid from way back. As a child I wished I could have had a miniature stegosaurus as a pet. I never lost my fascination of dinosaurs, though it took retirement to ditch my "mature grown-up" image and start indulging myself with dinosaur toys. I now have over 30 dino toys and love having everyone of them. It's not uncommon to have a store 
checkout person ask if I am buying it for my grandchild. Grandchild?? Hell no, it's for me! 

This fella resides on my truck dashboard. 

Quick Update

First of all, I'm alive and well. Things around here are ok. I've been too occupied to blog. In fact, I've been too occupied to work the farm much at all. For the past 10+ days, hubby has been having a bit of a stay-at-home vacation. Ah-ha.....now you know why I was occupied .......a hubby under foot all day. Ha,ha,ha,ha. Worse than having a flock of bummer lambs! But to give credit where it is due, he did try to be helpful at times. 

Over the next few days I'll catch ya'll up to date on farm happenings. 

Stacking Functions? Yeah, the Su Ba way!

"F" asked to see examples of stacking functions on my farm. So, how do I take interesting photos of this? A pipinola vine growing up a tree trunk? A sheep pooping on the grass? Rain dripping off the barn roof and into a holding tank? Not very interesting, eh? But as I was hanging out my wash this morning suddenly I was hit with a thought.....bingo! I've got it.

A handy though unconventional wash line.

Our solar panel rack also functions as my wash line. It might look silly, but it works. The rack keeps most of the rain off the clothes. 

Quite truthfully, I didn't really plan it this way. It just came about out of necessity and procrastination. I keep meaning to build a solar dryer for the clothes, but I haven't gotten around to it yet. It just isn't high in my priority list now that I'm using the solar panel rack. 

Sneaky Donkey

Donkey pulled a fast one on me. But with some McGyver-like thinking, I avoided disaster and saved the day. 

For the past many months, Donkey (now known as Don Quixote) has been in the front pastures up by the road. Multiple times a day people go in & out through the gate. Donkey watches, never makes a move. Just watches. Up until now. As usual, I climbed out of the truck, opened gate, went back into the truck to pull through. Donkey no longer waited. As slick as an ell, she slipped through the gate past me and headed down the road. Yikes!!!!!!!

Without a second's delay, my mind whirled into high gear.........what sort of food or treat to I have on me to entice her with? Do I have a leash or rope? Will Donkey be friendly or go bezerk-o returning to her feral ways now that she is loose? I quickly determined I hadn't a blessed thing edible in the truck, but one of the cat feeding stations was beside the gate, which was close by. So I grabbed a jar of dry cat food and headed to intercept my wayward beast. Luckily the green grass along the roadside caught her interest. She'd grab a mouthful, then take a few more steps. Stop for another bite, then walk on a few more feet. The grass was slowing her progress down. So calmly but briskly walking on the opposite of the road, I was able to get ahead of her within 30 feet of her wayward journey. I shook the cat food jar, catching her interest. She almost took the bait, but decided to walk on and eat more grass. So I walked ahead again, offering the handful of cat food to her. She allowed me to come up within 3 feet of her before she said, "Nope, not yet." Off she trotted to my neighbor's driveway entrance. Luckily a tall weed caught her attention. I let her grab a big mouthful before again approaching and offering cat food. Now her curiosity was piqued. She checked out the offering, found it to be acceptable, and began munching. Carefully without being obvious, I sidled alongside and rested my arm around her neck. Gotcha! 

Ok, what next? I needed to lead her back. At this point Donkey had totally lost interest in the cat food. She knew she had been had. But her training about halters and leading kept her from pulling away from me. Good donkey! She had learned her lessons well. Now, if only I could lead her in some fashion. But I had nothing.  No rope. No string. No wire. Only the clothing I was wearing and a jar of cat food. Getting her to follow the cat food wasn't working, and believe me, I tried! So I had a very big dilemma on my hands and not a soul in shouting distance to call for help. Plus of course, my cellphone was sitting in the dashboard of my truck. Bad luck. Big sigh. 

I tried using both hands to act as a halter to guide her home, one on her poll and the other under her chin. Nope. I tried the poll and nose position. Still nope. Donkey refused to take a step. Looking over what I was wearing, I noted croc clogs ( no laces), shorts, t-shirt. The thought crossed my mind that I could take off my t-shirt and make a halter out of it and just pray that no car came by. Oh, oh, oh. I just remembered....Today I'm wearing a shirt that's on the small side, so I wore a bra. Most days I don't bother with one (one of those things you do when you're either very young or quite old), but today I wore one because of the tight shirt. Ah-ha, I'm saved!!!! Keeping one hand on Donkey, I slipped off the bra and made a makeshift halter. Donkey accepted the idea and docilely allowed herself to be lead back home. Disaster avoided! Relief! I was one very thankful and relieved person. Of course the bra is ruined, stretched beyond recovery. But it served me well, may it rest in peace. 

World Naked Gardening Day

Hey, ya thought I would forget, eh? Heck, I don't need much of an excuse to get naked. And gardening naked is like getting two birds with one stone. Naked & gardening. Bingo! 

So somewhere up by the house, so not to offend the eyes of some neighbor or tourist, I will be participating in the worldwide celebration. <<<<<<<😜 very, very big grin 😆>>>>>>>>

Ooo, those white feet never see the sun! 

Finally Getting Back to Work

I've officially declared myself "well & fit". So it's back to work, the kind of work I enjoy. I get no pleasure in sitting in my chair and reading or napping all day. I was often called lazy as a young person growing up, but I look back and think, how wrong was that? I was active. I did things. Perhaps (actually, no perhaps about it, it is true)  I never liked housecleaning, sewing, ironing, and cooking, but I was involved with all sorts of other things. I travelled miles on my bike, built tree forts kid-style, ran and explored the local woods, rode the unbroke ponies down at the local riding stable, haunted the local libraries, rode the bus to downtown Philly to spend the day in a museum. No, I wasn't a lazy kid, I just wasn't the happy homemaker type. I ducked out of homemaking tasks as much as I could. And now as an adult, I'm still active and doing things. 

So tomorrow I get back on schedule. I've got fences to fix, gardens to till, manure to harvest, container boxes to make. And lots of seeds to start sowing. The atv cart needs repair----perhaps it's time to think about getting a new one. I need to finally get around to repairing the driveway, so I need to order a gravel delivery. And it's the time of year to add a few more fruit trees, so I need to get holes dug, which is no easy task. Plus I've been talking about taking down those pallets that I had lined the pig pasture with, way back when the piglets were breaking out. No pigs in that pasture anymore. It's going to be used by the sheep and goats. So the pallets can go. Did you notice there's no mention of housecleaning? 

Yup, there's a lot to keep me busy. 

Improving Health

Being sick when you're the only farmer on the place is a bummer. But happily I don't have any pressing need to be getting something done asap. So far all the animals are being checked regularly. That's enough. I'm getting lots of sleep, giving my body an overall rest in the process. So many of my aches & pains should be gone at the end of all this. That's a plus. My main regrets are missing out on 2 spay/neuter clinics. I was too sick to attend. 

My fever disappeared today, so being the stubborn hardhead that I am, I moved compost into a new grow box and planted it with taro that I'm moving out of the main growing beds. The effort covered me in sweat and was exhausting. I retreated to the recliner for a nap. Guess I'm not well yet! But then, the coughing, sore throat, laryngitis, and clogged up ears sort of signaled my lack of good health. I did learn something today that was surprising. I've totally lost my sense of smell. Wow. Couldn't even smell an herb bouquet of rosemary, mint, and basil. So that's saying something! I hope my "smeller" gets back working again. 

Thanks everyone for the well wishes. Looks like I'm on the mend, but who knows how long it will take. I'm impatient to get back working again. 

Sick

Sick is something I seldom do. But today I'm sick. Fever. No appetite. Cough. Chest mucous. Mental fog. Want to sleep. 

So what happens on the farm when the farmer's sick? I still tend the livestock.....but that's it. If it doesn't have 2 eyes, it doesn't get attention. Thus this is the time when I resort to using commercial feed. Out come the bags and scoop. Everybody gets fed and they treat it as though it's a grand birthday party. The love it. It's something different and it brightens their day. 

I hope to feel better quickly, but my gut feeling is that I'm going to be down for 1 or 2 more days at least. I'm quacking myself, treating the symptoms. But still, I suspect this isn't going away overnight. 

Hawaii Motor Vehicle Kiosk

This has totally nothing to do about homesteading, but I just wanted to let other Hawaiian car owners know.

Just by dumb bad luck, I ended up using the new DVM kiosk in Safeway to renew my truck registration today. Wow, it was a breeze! Done in 2 minutes! Only cost me $3 more (service fee). Well worth the $3. 

I needed to run up to Kona for other errands and figured on swinging by motor vehicles to renew the truck registration. I hate wasting time at that office, but I had procrastinated too long to get the job done via the Internet. So I bite the bullet and figured on waiting in line. But surprise........the office was closed! Prince Kuhio Day. Drats. Now I was gloomingly looking at having to drive to Hilo on Monday with an expired registration. Oh well, sigh. It was my own fault. 

After mulling the situation over, I recalled that John had mentioned over coffee at the coffee truck in town that he had tried the new DVM kiosk in Safeway. He praised it to no end. So on my way home I went into search mode. Found the kiosk. 

I followed the easy instructions on the touch screen and within 2 minutes I had my new registration in hand, along with the sticker for the license plate. Wow! 

Transition

I haven't been posting anything lately because basically I haven't been doing anything new. The homestead project is gradually transitioning from the developmental stage to the functional stage. Projects have been getting completed. All my field fencing is in. All the pastures fenced. All the needed compost bins built and in use. Most of the hugelpits created and planted.....though I can always find more pits to fill on this 20 acres. Most of the gardens created. The driveway finished. The barn built. The house almost done. Etc...etc...etc. Much has slipped from creation to maintenance. That's just fine, but it makes for a dull blog. 

Since my last post, I've been busy with the same old/ same old. I planted 12 more pipinola, 17 pineapples, and two banana trees. I put in 250 more onion plants and have leeks coming soon that I can add to the gardens. I've been emptying and refilling compost bins. And adding material to the margin gardens along the driveway, having completed another 17 foot long section (that's where the pineapples are going). 

This weekend I got the second quarantine pen completed for new piglets, lambs, or whatever. Nothing is living there at the moment, but it's nice to have it ready just in case it's needed. 

Then there's the routine maintenance that always needs doing...... greasing the numerous locks and hinges around the farm, repairing rusted spots along the fences, repairing the driveway gates, treating the rust on the catchment tanks, cleaning water pumps, completing the fix on the utility cart wheel (I had used wire to make a temporary fix. Now I got the correct washers and cotter pins.) 

While I really enjoy creating and experimenting, I'm not the least bit disappointment that much of that is completed. It's about time that I have the opportunity to make this homestead into a functioning farm. Some people might see that as boring, it as work, but I see it as satisfying and fulfilling. 

Strange Oranges

When you grow enough of something, you're bound to discover some of Mother Nature's mistakes. Here's some funny oranges.......

 

This looks very much like a heart to me. 

And this one looks like a weird smiley face.