The Adventures of the Reese's Pieces Gang

It has been so long since I've been able to blog that I don't know where to begin. So I'll go back a couple weeks and try to get you caught up on our family happenings. I hope you will sit back, pour yourself a cup of something cold to drink and enjoy catching up on us!

When we got back from camp we were sad to find one of our little rabbits dead. The next morning the other female was found dead too. Now we have one white male. We hope to find more rabbits to bread with it once we get proper cages built.

Fathers Day was a nice day at church celebrating the dad's and saying farewell to our dear friends. Sunday afternoon U Hall called about our truck telling us that we had to travel about 45 miles one way to pick up the truck, and it wasn't available until 10:30 Monday morning. We were bummed to have to wait until after noon to start loading. My wonderful organized planning all went down the drain as the loading process began. I stepped back and let the men do the work while I continued to pack up things throughout the house. Loading the moving truck and trailer took about 8 hours. Finally at about 8 pm we headed for New Holstein.

We arrived very tired to find that the kitchen floor had been lacquered late in the evening and was still wet. We did our best to lay down boxes and rugs so we wouldn't step on the wet floors while we brought in enough blankets for the kids. They were exhausted so we bunked them all down together in Samuel's new room. By midnight we realized that we were never going to find blankets for Phil and I. That is when he remembered the blankets he had been using were located in the van at the auto shop only a few miles down the road. He drove there got our blankets and we were able to head to bed.

I received one VERY BIG surprise when we arrived at the New Holstein house. Phil had purchased a new bed & dresser set with a nice new mattress. YEAH!!! Our nights sleep only lasted until 6 am when the landlord showed up to do more work on the house, but it was the first nights sleep I've had in years where I didn't wake up with a back ache.

In the morning we found out that some folks from our new church would be coming at 9 to help us unload. The unloading process went very quickly (thanks to all my labeling) and by the early evening almost the entire kitchen was organized, plus a couple of the older kids had “settled” into their rooms.

On Wednesday we continued to settle in. One of the ladies from church who has 5 children around the same ages as ours came over after lunch with her kids for the kids to play while we worked on getting Thomas, Philip, & Nathan's room unpacked and organized. It only took us a couple hours to get the room ready for the boys. That evening Phil & I set up the beds while the kids were at their first night of VBS at our new church.

By Friday we were pretty much settled in with the exception of the school room. I have to get bookshelves for the school room before I start to unpack. Phil has to put my desk together too. Elizabeth is not quite settled yet in her room and my need some “help” from mom to get it finished.

I absolutely love this house!! If it came with a few more acres and wasn't quite so old I'd be chomping a the bit to buy it. I'm so thankful that we will be able to live here while we get our finances more stable without the pressure of another mortgage. I'll have to take some pictures to post once we get our Internet. Right now we are trying to use the Internet off of Phil's blackberry, which means it is quite slow. Phil is working on getting us phone and Internet.

The children are really enjoying our little country life. We aren't in a good routine yet but Elizabeth is faithfully caring for the laying hen chicks and the boys are getting a bit better about caring for the rabbit. There is a rope swing here on one of the large maple trees which the kids spend HOURS swinging on . This yard is so wonderful for kids!! There are trees to climb, a sand box, and the rope swing. Once the animals chew down the pasture they will be able to access the creek easier and hunt for crayfish.

This past Saturday we added another animal to the Reese Farm. Goats! Phil drove out to a nearby farm and purchased two does that were about 2 months old. The kids named them Mary & Elizabeth because they are cousins. We lost one yesterday, Mary. The move upset their system a bit causing them to have diarrhea. Elizabeth, the goat, is still with us. If she survives until next week we will work on finding 2 other goats to put with her. From what we've read, goats are best in small herds. We have a very nice Amish family down the road who keeps goats that is willing to allow us to use their Billy in January so the girls can have spring kids.

Our garden is growing well.... and so are the weeds. After 3 weeks of very little care the weeds have become quite happy amongst the vegetables. We are slowly beating them back!! Our vegetables are doing really well considering their lack of care throughout this move. The broccoli is huge and forming their first broccoli heads. The cauliflower, Brussels sprouts, and cabbage all look great too! Both the red onion sets and the ones I started from seed are doing GREAT, plus we even have some garlic growing thanks to the cool spring! We have a few short rows of carrots, two types of green beans, yellow wax beans, some pumpkin & watermelon plants, only 5 red potato plants (out of 30 sets, GRRR), 10 Yukon gold potato plants (out of 30 sets), and I think close to 20 Georgia sweet potato plants (out of 50) and a nice start on the corn. The corn won't be knee high by the 4^th because we didn't get it into the ground until last week, but it has sprouted and is growing every day! I'm really disappointed with the potato plants, but am not surprised since we had flooding rains just after planting them. Over the next couple of days we will continue to battle the weeds while getting our squash, cuc's and zucchini in.

UPDATE: I wrote this entry of events a couple days ago. Today I worked in the garden for 6 hours, Phil and the kids helped put in some time too. Our garden looks WONDERFUL now!!! I planted Summer Squash (yellow zucchini), green zucchini, butternut squash, spaghetti squash, slicing cucumbers, and picking cucumbers. Caleb helped me with all the planting which was fun! We also planted more beans. The beans Phil and the kids planted a couple weeks ago are doing well and should start flowering soon. Phil took the tiller to all the rows and all the empty beds so we could plant and get the weeds under control. We also put some nice composted manure we found in the barn on the potato plants. Every bed was weeded today. There are only a few veggies that need some fine tooth weeding. It is so nice to look out my kitchen window at the thriving garden and know that we'll be feeding our family great food this year!

Tonight we also spent some time with some of our new neighbors. They are the family that we purchase our raw milk from. It was so fun getting to chat with them for a couple hours. They are Nourishing traditions/raw milk/organic/whole foods people too. It was fun comparing “notes” on what I am learning since they have been living a Nourishing lifestyle much longer than we have. They are also on the same page as us with their research into economics and investing. It was such a fun evening which I believe will lead to a nice friendship. The kids had a great time too. They have 3 children still at home ages 18 (girl), 14 & 10 (boys) and are a home schooling family.

Oh and for those of you who are wondering Elizabeth the Goat is still with us. She is still very skinny and sickly. We hope that when we get a couple more goats this week it will help her to bounce back. This time we are getting adults instead of kids in hopes that they will adjust better to their new home.

By the end of the week we should have 2 feeder pigs too! YEAH!! I've been saving scraps and throwing them in the freezer in anticipation of our little piggy's! Phil and the boys will fence in the area for them early next week so we can have them delivered.

I'm off to bed.... if I can sleep without bothering my sunburned shoulders much!