The Vegetable Stand

The little vegetable stand I set up out front has been a great success so far! I'm really surprised at how much money it makes. I'm even more surprised I've never seen anyone stop there. Weird.

I put the sign back up on Saturday. David's dad brought me some great wooden quart (or half quart?) containers, so I've been using them to sell the tomatoes. I think it works much better selling them as a bunch rather than individually.


This morning I harvested stuff and put almost everything on the stand. I kept a few squashes, the not-so-perfect tomates, and all the jalepenos (I'd like to make something with them) for us.

This is what it looked like when I left at 8:00 AM. When I got home, I'd sold 2 baskets of tomatoes, 3 cukes, 5 yellow squash, and all but one of the white patty pan squashes. I think total, the stand has brought in about $25 in two weeks. I used some of the money to buy a new chicken feeder and waterer for the broilers!


Oh, and remember that little baby black bird I had? Well, I called Tri-State Bird Rescue to check on him, and sadly he had to be euthanized on Saturday. They put a pin in his broken femur, but he was too stressed out and ended up injuring himself further. Poor little guy.




Remember that old sugar sack I found from my thrift store trip?? Well, I finally framed it and hung it on the wall! I really like it. It's almost the exact color of the wall. I'd like to paint the room (the mud/sun room), but I'm not sure what color.

5 Months Young

I'll just start by saying I'll never love another dog as much as I love Scooter. It's just simply not possible for any other dog to possibly be as wonderful as he is.

I somehow feel like I'm cheating on Scooter if I say how great Elmer is. Like Scooter will somehow know I'm blogging about Elmer. And I also kinda feel like you (yes you) will think I've forgotten about Scooter if I post pictures of Elmer.

It's stupid, I know. It's just how I feel.


Ok, back to Elmer. He's just over 5 months now, and he really is a great dog. He is so very sweet. He loves to be close....sitting on your lap, leaning on you, it doesn't matter as long as you're touching him.


He really tries hard to make us happy.


Yes, he's still a puppy and does puppy things, but for the most part he really does try to be a good boy.


And he's so cute.


And he was nervous because I was taking pictures of him.


Here's to the second best doggie in the world.

And it's worth it to click on the pictures to enlarge them.

Around the Farm Yard.

I'm calling it a farm "yard" because it's really a yard that I wish was a farm! Ha!

I let the dogs out this morning and it was so nice and cool out so I decided to take some pictures. Plus, I feel like I've been short-changing my blog lately, so I wanted to update some things.

First off, the baby bird made it through the night with flying colors! I brought him to work with me and fed him at least every hour. That little guy could eat! I made few calls and now he has been taken to Tri-State Bird Rescue and Research! I met one of their volunteers half-way yesterday to make the drop off. I'll call them in few days for an update. Hopefully the little guy (or girl) will make it!


The rogue chicken gang made its way to the front yard this morning. They were being pretty social.

This is the usual group. It's the 4 sex-link hens, the Light Brahma (the white one), Cogburn, and his girlfriend.


This is Cogburn's girlfriend. She is no bigger than a pigeon and cute as a button. Cogburn is a ladies' man, but he spends the night with this girl in the shed. I guess they like privacy away from the chicken coop. She needs a name. Any thoughts? It's got to be delicate and dainty like she is.



Of course Cogburn has to strut his stuff for the camera. He gets darker and darker every day. I don't really notice the change until I look at old blog posts. Don't tell Cogburn I told you this, because it'd hurt his ego....but the other night he'd snuck in with the broilers, and when I grabbed him to put him outside, he screamed like a girl! Seriously, it was the funniest shrill squawk ever!



Jack had to come over and see what I was doing. He's been outside for about two weeks now. He loves it.






Caught in the act! Those darn tomato thiefs are at it again! I can't really do anything about it until we get the fence up.



Look! Baby watermelons! There are lots on the vines, and they're about tennis ball-sized right now.


This is the hen I traded with my coworker for one of the Buff Orpington Roosters.


The flowers in front of the garage are looking good!



I set the broilers up outside last week. They seem to love being out all the time now. I can shut them in the kennel when it gets dark and let them out during the day.



What are you lookin' at?! This picture cracks me up!


The broilers are almost 4 weeks now. They're getting big!


Jack followed me to see what I was doing.


And of course Tucker.


Look how big their feet are!


There is one little broiler that loves to follow me around. I have to watch where I walk or I'll step on him.





These birds are professional eaters. They frequently lay in front of the feeder and just stuff their faces.


The free exotic chick is growing up too!



I love this picture of Jack.


And I took this one of Tucker so he wouldn't feel left out.



Oh, two more updates.

1. I've made about $12 so far with my road-side veggie stand! Not bad for not much work.

2. When articles online tell you to pen up your guineas so they can get used to a new area or they'll run away, it's a good idea to listen to them. I haven't seen the guineas since the morning after I got the two new ones. Oops.

Geese anyone?

A few weeks ago I got an Etsy conversation (like a private message) from someone telling me she'd used one of the items in my Etsy shop for her blog post! You can find the post here. Thanks SmuTopia!

So I was in bed last night around 10:30, reading my book, when David's brother, Joey, called me. He said he found a baby bird in the bed of his truck and wanted to know what he should do with it. He said it had feathers, so I thought maybe it had fledged and landed in the truck. Since he had trash duty the next day, he couldn't leave it in his truck. I told him to bring it over and I'd figure out what to do with it.

The bird was much younger than I thought....and it had a broken leg. :-( We brought it inside and I made a splint out of pieces of popsicle sticks.



I gave it some warm water with karo syrup though a syringe. He (we're calling it a "he") drank a good bit. I also fed it a small amount of canned cat food, mashed up and mixed with some water. He seemed to eat a good bit of that also. I think he was pretty hungry.

I told Joey it was a pretty stressful thing for a baby bird to have a broken leg, so we'd see how he did. I told him don't be surprised if he didn't make it though the night. We put him in a bowl with some bedding in the bottom and covered him with a washcloth for the night.

Imagine my surprise when I lifted the washcloth and found him staring at me with his mouth wide open waiting for breakfast! I gave him some more of the cat food, and found a cricket to mash up and mix in it. He gobbled down breakfast.

I put him and his bowl in a box covered with a towel and brought him to work with me. He started peeping again like he was hungry, so I fed him some hard-boiled egg yolk mixed with water.


I've emailed a wildlife rehabilitator to see if there's anyone in our area that can take him. If he didn't have a broken leg I'd go get some meal worms and raise him myself, but I don't feel comfortable with his broken leg. Hopefully I'll get a call or email back soon. I'll keep you updated!



The past two nights I've been at our county fair. Wednesday night I worked at the booth we set up for work. That's pretty boring work. You just hang around the booth and answer questions and talk to people.

Our work usuually serves the pork BBQ dinner on Thursday nights at the fair, so last night I spent about 3.5 hours putting hamburger buns on peoples' plates. I don't mind helping to serve dinner, because you get to see a lot of people and chat with them. It is a good reminder of why I like living in a small town/rural area. Everyone knows everyone (well, I don't know everyone, but I know lots of people now). My job is in agriculture, so I deal with the farming community on a daily basis. Pretty much everyone is very nice and I feel like I know more people in this county (where I've lived for almost 5 years now) than I do in my home county where I lived for 23 years.

This is the only picture I took that I liked. I didn't have much time to get pictures, but I made sure to stop by the animal barns. These piglets were so cute! I really would love to have a pig. David told me he'd consider getting one, but maybe not until next year. Sounds good to me!

Now there are three.

Shortly after we got Waldo, the guinea, I posted an ad on our local Craigslist for a guinea hen so he could have a companion. A week or so went by (maybe it wasn't that long, but I'm not the most patient person), and I figured nobody was interested in selling me a guinea hen. Monday morning I got an email from a lady not far from us who said she had lots of guineas! I called her and we chatted for a few minutes. I was telling her about my chickens, and I asked her if she was interested in trading anything for the guinea hen. She mentioned she'd like one of my buff orpington roosters as a trade (which by the way, all of those buff orpingtons turned out to be roosters!). I love trading!

We met her last night and she was very nice and had a TON of guineas. What a funny scene...guineas running all around and making funny noises! She even had a bunch of baby guinea keets....so cute! I decided I'd like two of the guineas, since she had pretty colored ones, so she managed to catch two for me.

Guineas are very hard to tell male from female, so you really have to listen to their voices because they make different sounds. A male makes a one-syllable sound, and a female makes a two-syllable sound. Males also have slightly larger combs on their faces.

I suspect the darker of these two guineas is a male, but I haven't had much of a chance to listen to him yet. If he is a male, that's ok. I think they'll all get along fine. I was mainly concerned with having at least 2 guineas so they wouldn't be lonely.





So I went to open the coop this morning and Waldo was hovering right outside the door (he doesn't roost in the coop, he prefers the trees). He heard the two guineas inside, and he was really worked up!

I opened the door and everyone started coming outside. Out comes the first of the guineas and Waldo is trying to find her though the mass (small mass) of poultry in front of him.

Finally he spotted her and he took off!



"Oh my darling, where have you been all my life?!"



Finally the third guinea found them and they all went off together into the clump of trees.



And pardon this blurry picture, but I thought it was funny. Tucker (the cat) loves the chickens. He tries to stalk them, but he never really tries to chase them. He's enamored by them.

It's hot!

It was really hot today. Like 100* hot. Luckily I get to work in the AC all day, but I worry about David who is outside all day. I got home and decided that since I sat in the AC all day I needed to do a little work. My sister inspired me today with pictures of her renovated garden, so I decided it was time I got off my hump and did some work too. I pulled out the stalks from the first corn planting, since I harvested the ears last week. I got stung by something...twice. I don't think it was a bee, because the pain didn't last as long as a bee sting, but whatever it was it hurt.

After I pulled out the corn stalks, I decided it was time to pull out the beans. They've just about stopped producing, so I pulled out the rows of yellow and green beans. I was tempted to pull out the cukes also, because they're just about one. Luckily for them there were a few cukes not quite ready to pick. Their time will come though...


Here's the before pic:




And here's the after pic. I still need to till up the area and replant, but it looks a little better. I think I'll plant some more beans in that area. I still want to pull out some squash plants, but I'll get to that another day.





It felt strangely good to work outside in the heat. Made me feel like I was doing something. Of course, the shower afterwards felt even better!


I decided to put some vegetables out by the road to try to sell some. I set the stand up on Saturday. I had a big sign that read "Fresh Veggies" and had some prices on it ($.50 for cukes and squash), but a storm came in on Saturday night and blew it down. It wasn't damaged, but I need to re-hang it. Devin is really excited about the stand, and gives me regular updates. He came in yesterday and proudly exclaimed that we had money in the jar! Woo hoo!! I counted it....all $.12 of it. Haha! I guess someone wanted some cucumbers and thought that was a good donation. Hey, it didn't really bother me. At least someone ate the cucumbers instead of them going on the compost pile.



Today I had a little more luck. I got $2! If I keep this pace up, I'll be rich! I think I'll put that money in the chicken feed fund. Those suckers eat like there's no tomorrow.

I refreshed the stand's contents today after the garden work. I added another patty pan squash, some tomatoes, cukes, and peppers. Hopefully I'll sell more tomorrow!



I'm not sure if I'm better off to put the sign back up with prices, or just let people make whatever donation they want. I guess tomorrow will have to be signless, because I didn't put it back up yet.