We’re headed to the Florida Folk Festival this weekend, where we hope Mirin can help Willie build his usual chickie with wood and palmetto fronds. Here’s a short clip of Star nursing her piglets – so much cuteness!  They always fight over the bottom nipples for some reason.

 These are jumping spiders, but we like to call them “Florida Tarantulas” because they look so ferocious.   Notice the iridescent green fangs?  It was living on the same post as the matriarch roach that I wrote about a bit ago.  Incidentally, I haven’t seen them lately! This is one of our pecan trees that  has…

We finally got the Dudley Farm dent corn in! I’m not sure if I’ve talked very much about my plans for this corn this year.  Dudley Farm is an old homestead that was turned into a park.  Ethan’s grandfather actually helped work with Sally Morrison before it was a park.  Ethan worked there for a…

Over the weekend we had Rose’s daisy scout troop out for a farm tour.  The girls had a blast playing in the pit and on the hammock.  We’ve had an unusual coldish snap lately, and it was beautifully, unseasonably cool and pleasant on Saturday.  The weather was perfect and dry, not unlike southern California.They got…

A couple of weeks ago, Ethan thought he had noticed Star and Bee in heat, and he thought maybe we should get feeder pigs again this year for next year’s pork.  But on Friday when Ethan went to feed the pigs, Star did not show up to eat.  He went looking for her, thinking that…

  Can you see Mirin in the tree? Isla didn’t actually tree him – he was climbing it anyway. Yesterday we had torrential rains, and this morning was very cool –  especially for May!  Rose had to look around for a jacket for school.  It was only 55 F, but after 89 degree weather, it…

The first sunflower is blooming!  The garden is finally looking like a garden, not like a pile of hay with bits of grass sticking out.  It is always encouraging when it gets to this point.  The marigolds are blooming, too, so there’s a little color out there. The garden is going in bit by bit. …

We found a little mouse in the barn!  He must be eating the spilled oats.  He (or she, I suppose) was so small.  It could jump shockingly high and tried to climb a tree to get away from us.  We let it go, of course, after we took a picture.  It was so cute.  I…

Whew, I’m so glad it’s Friday!  It’s been a tough week.  All our extended family has been unavailable lately and Ethan’s work was threatening to send him out of town for an unknown number of days.  It’s been so long since they asked him to travel, but it is always like that – not sure…

Summer is here, with all of the usual heat and humidity.  It’s still just early summer heat-and-humidity, of course, none of the late summer 95 degrees and 100% humidity that we can look forward to. I am excited about summer vacation.  Home schooling is a huge time and effort commitment, and I can’t wait to…

 We all had a blast at the Morning Meadow May Fair over the weekend.   It was at the Little Orange Creek park where Earthskills was this year.  It has become one of my very favorite parks.  There are beautiful oak trees every where, and an old cemetery from the 1800’s that the park is restoring. …