Hen fruit x 3!

Over the past week we've been getting more eggs! Our hens are starting to lay more and more, which is, as you know, completely and utterly fan-freekin'-tastic! Now both of our AustraWhites are laying everyday, one egg a day. One of our brown egg layers has been laying one nice, rosy brown egg a day and today...one more started laying! Whoever it was, I feel sorry for her. The egg was HUGE! OUCH! It had been broken by one of the hens stepping on it (it was in the middle of the coop floor, so understandable) and had a double yolk. Not something you see everyday! I'm thinking it is probably one of our partridge Brahma girls, but it may take some stakeout time to figure out exactly who is laying what. I'll keep ya posted. This is exciting!

Crazy/wonderful life

One of the things I don't generally talk about, at least blog-wise is much about our personal life here at Saudafell. We are fairly private people, or used to be anyway, and sharing our family situation is something I generally shy away from on the internet. But, with the farm and our family so intricately connected it's hard not to share something once in a while.  From what I've written so far in our blog, most blog readers can infer we have a large family. What is not common knowledge, and what I usually don't share often, is that we got to large-family size fairly quickly - we've only been married for 3 years and have 5 kids, 2 years old and under. We had high order multiples (yes, 4 babies at once) early this year, who are now nearly 6 months old. We have a 2 year old as well who has recently decided that her roll in life is to do everything contrary to what I'd like her to do. And we are beginning to farm. Some people would think we're nuts. Our family, at least some of them, have told us flat out we're crazy for even trying to take on more right now. Some days I honestly think they're right. Why would someone, especially ME (aka Mommy) want to take on a cow, sheep, chickens, dogs and land maintenance to boot? The answer is simple - because we want to. Because it's something to break up the responsibilities of the day. The time it takes to care for the livestock provides a very, very necessary break from baby duties and laundry and dishes. It's cathartic to scrub out a stock tank. It's a fulfilling experience to get fresh, pastured eggs out of a nest everyday. Knowing that our livestock helps to take care of our family provides a small measure of security in a very insecure world. And who wouldn't want a living, non-gasoline using, self fertilizing lawn mower? Honestly, it is pretty awesome.

Lately, both of us have felt like we're being swallowed up by life. Taking care of a toddler alone is a task. Throw in 4 newborns and most people would scoff at the idea that it's even possible to do it all without losing your mind. I can attest that it's possible to do it, and come very close to losing your mind if that's all you do all day, every day. Non-stop. I don't think many people can put themselves in our shoes, but can relate to a point. It's hard to fully comprehend the full scope of what it's like to care for 4 newborns at once. Only a hand-full of people blessed (or cursed...yes, sometimes it feels like a curse) with this many kids all at the same time can fully understand what a struggle it is everyday to just keep your head above water. We have good days. We have bad days. Some days I win a battle, while the kids win the war. I'm at the point now that I need to just pull back from many things that have been in my life for a long time - consistent church activity, some of my strongly held convictions, old routines, and old habits - to fully focus on the 6 most important things in my life: my husband, and baby A, B, C, D & my toddler. I've had so much pent up guilt, resentment and more guilt over what I haven't been able to do, and I finally admitted to myself - I can't do it all. No one can keep up with that pace. No one. If I can care for and nurture 5 kids all day, feed and water livestock, gather eggs and brush a cow down, I call that an accomplishment for the day. What neither one of us can do anymore is live up to outside expectations and pressures. We need to take care of ourselves and our farm. Everything non-essential will be there when we can get to it. Everything else can wait. With all this unrest and busyness in our lives, farming gives us an outlet. It provides something for both of us to do besides babies. Something we can do together, my husband and I. Our land and livestock have a symbiotic, almost spiritual quality to them - we take care of each other, and in turn we both benefit from the arrangement. While I feel like life is kicking me squarely in the head, I never feel overwhelmed when I can get outside to breathe in some fresh air, shovel manure, listen to a rooster crow and talk to the hens. It's almost as though time moves slower. It's an escape from one reality into another, only separated by plywood, plaster, siding and chain link.

My girls haven't let me down!

Lately, I've had the feeling these hens were holding out on me. I was nearly convinced they were stashing their eggs away in some secret nest and one day I'd find about 100 of them in some cubby-hole somewhere. Today I even reorganized our catch-all goat shed in hopes that I'd find something. The shed now looks 100% better, and I even discovered we have goat hay mangers & a couple of tiki torches stashed in there...but, alas, no eggs. The entire time those nosy hens were nonchalantly watching me, while casually scratching away at the ground 5 feet away. I thought I was onto something. One of our Rhode Island Red hens was looking very guilty yesterday when I walked by and saw her on the wood pile. Turns out, my paranoia was unjustified. Two more of our hens started laying today in the cow manger. When I went out to collect one egg I was surprised with 2 more - one brown speckled and one dove brown egg. Aren't they glorious?

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times...

Our hens would say it's the latter. Our Rooster, Mr. Roo (creative, I know), says it's downright awesome. A barnyard full of single ladies, and they're all his! My poor girls. He won't leave them alone. It's all crowing, chest beating (if he had a chest to beat, I'm certain he would, in a heartbeat) and mounting our hens. He's downright mean about it sometimes. Our hens will be missing their back feathers after a few months of this. Geesh. He is quite good at keeping the hens all within his line-of-sight. He is doing his job with keeping them in line and safe quite well. He escorts them into the coop at night, too. His vigilance actually came in handy the other day when a gigantic barn owl decided she wanted chicken dinner. No chickens were lost, and all were safely rounded up and escorted into their coop for the night. At least we'll get chicks out of it in the spring, but seriously. Our yard is now a chicken sex den. I guess it could be worse.

A tale of a silly cow

This morning started out thoroughly uneventful. Babies crying, toddler screaming, husband looking half comatose, my hair defying gravity in a few spots and one eyeball sort of sealed shut from being half asleep. You know, the usual. Then, just as I am sitting down to feed a famished baby, I see a disturbing sight out the window. Come to think of it, that window is pretty notorious for me seeing disturbing sights out it. Maybe I should just keep it shut. Anyway, there is the cow. Eating chicken feed. No, eating sounds too casual. There was the cow HOOVERING chicken feed, is more like it. I tell my husband what she's doing, who then asks me who was the last person to get in the chicken feed. We both shut the container religiously to keep a munchy cow and sly sheep out of it. If we don't, they know. Somehow, some way they KNOW. So, something was fishy. I put a baby down, get dressed and run outside to see how the heck the cow got in the chicken feed. Then I see it - one very busted, splintered feed storage container with a 500# cow eating as fast as she possibly could before I took away her loot. She knew what I was going to do. Cows are way smarter than people give them credit for, seriously. She was determined to get into that feed, pushed it over and rammed it with her head until it busted. Dang cow. The poor, splintered container is in the chicken coop and now I have a very put-out cow. The sheep tried to get in on the action, but she kept chasing them off. It was quite the sight. I'm sure I added to the specter with me wearing a pink floral bed jacket, gravity defying hair, one sealed eyeball, flipflops and capris. I hope my neighbors were inside with their blinds shut, 'cus that was one embarassing way to start the day.

Catching up!

For the past few weeks I've been on an internet-free vacation. It got to the point that I finally had to cut the internet off, at least social networking and checking anything but the news, just so I could get things done. It's amazing how much time can be wasted on the internet just checking blogs or the news and most especially on facebook. Though I don't think I've gotten many projects done, I have been able to focus more on my kids which has been huge. The quadruplets are now rolling over and wanting more play-time, which means less sleepytime and more work for me! Add a 2 year old to the mix who is getting VERY jealous because her rival nemesis' are taking up more of mommy's precious attention.... and pretty much every hour of my day until they are all in bed is swamped. My husband is very literally amazed that I can keep my sanity. So am I!

As an update:

The cow is now completely feeling better. Cow patties abound. She kicks up her heels frequently and annoys the crap out of the sheep. She is pretty hilarious. Most of the day she spends out in the pasture either chewing her cud or eating the tall grass and conspicuously spying on the neighbors. Another thing I never knew before owning a cow - they are NOSY. Holy cow. Like nosy old lady who watches everyone out her front window kind of nosy. If ANYTHING and I mean ANYTHING is going on, she's got one eyeball trained on it. She's observant, surprisingly so actually. Whenever anyone goes out to the corral or barn she is the first one there hoping for A) grain or B) A scratch on the head - in that order. One of our neighbors came over and helped us fix the busted irrigation sprinklers so we can irrigate our pasture to lengthen the amount of time before we need to start digging into our new hay stores. Turns out he is a retired landscaper, so he has all the equipment for sprinklers, etc.! Score!

The pickled garlic was a huge success! For the first few days it bubbled like sauerkraut and had to be 'burped'. I basically sacrificed a canning lid and just poked a hole in it so I wouldn't have overflow onto the counter if I forgot to 'burp' it. The garlic is surprisingly good. Very mildy garlicky and salty/tangy at the same time. It'd be great in a vinaigrette  or put over a salad. I may make more. We still have a whole jar of it - a whole jar goes a long, LONG way. So be forewarned.

And finally...I am so ready for the fall. This hot weather is really kicking my trash. And I think the sheep and cow and chickens and dogs are all ready for it to be cooler too. If anything it'll cut way back on the fly and wasp population (I have a new found hatred for both of these annoying little wastes of carbon-based life), and allow more out-of-shelter time until the rain and snow come in. I say, bring it on!

Hen fruit!

One of our hens FINALLY started laying - one of our AustraWhite girls. I was starting to get worried. We don't check the inside of their coop more than a couple of times a week, mostly just to check their big food trough. They are out from the morning when we open the coop, to dusk when the rooster shoos them all in for the night. The entire day they're roaming around our property eating bugs, seeds 'n grass to their little clucking delights! So, one night I opened the their coop to do a head-count, and WOWIE! 2 eggs sitting neatly on the floor bedding. The next day, nothing. She changed where she wanted to lay her eggs. I guess that's one of the downsides of having pastured, free-range hens. For over a week I looked and looked, only to find her hunkered down in the cow's manger, of all places. 8 eggs in her little straw nest! All of them were still good (there's a simple way of checking them that involves the egg, a cup of water and seeing whether it floats/doesn't float). She lays one egg a day and man...they are delicious! I feel rich eating these eggs. The yolks are so golden that it's almost a burnt golden orange color, instead of the supermarket yellow yolks. Definitely worth the wait! Now we're just waiting on our other hens to start laying! I saw one of the black star hens staking out a nest box today, so I'm thinkin' she's getting ready to start laying any day now. We really need all of them to get started on the laying...we go through A LOT of eggs here in our house. At least 3-6 a day. Come on girls, momma wants a quiche!