Milking Stools

I was tempted to make the title of this post, "Stool Samples," but I thought better of it.

Each morning and evening when Tricia and I go out to milk our cows, we sit down. It is one of those jobs where "sitting down on the job" is a positive thing and not a disparaging comment.  When we first started milking, we simply turned a 5 gallon hydraulic oil bucket over and sat on that.  It did the trick.  After we had milked for a while, I figured that we better get a little more professional.  You can't just plop down on a bucket and be taken seriously in the milking community.  Sitting on an overturned milk crate was out of the question since it caused an affliction I call "waffle butt syndrome."

I shopped around on line and couldn't find anything cheaper than $24 including shipping for the old-fashioned style 3-legged milking stool.  There had to be something else to sit on that we had around the place that would fit the bill.  The photo below is the seat that Tricia has been sitting on for about 7 years.  Not that she has been sitting down for 7 years consecutively. let me rephrase that.  This is the seat that the milkmaid sits on when she milks Daisy.

The Easy Chair

The top of the chair has been worn smooth over the years.  Although you would never confuse me for a carpenter, I built this seat and it has lasted over the years. Years ago lightning struck a tall pine tree in my parents' yard.  It was a pine tree that grew straight toward the heavens and had few limbs.  My Dad had the tree taken down and a gentleman with a portable sawmill came to his house and cut up the old pine into lumber.  Dad dried it and stacked it in the shop at the farm.

The pine smelled rich and aromatic, like opening a bottle of Pine Sol.  We used some of the lumber to build my kids a nifty tree house that had a zip line coming off the second floor and an observation deck with a pulley and a rope where you could pull up a bucket full of whatever you wanted.  I used some of the leftover pieces of wood to build the chair that Laura Lee, Russ, and Benjamin would sit on up in the tree house.  Unfortunately, the wood wasn't treated and we didn't paint it and after 6 or 8 years, the tree house rotted and was dismantled and burned.  It lives on in our memories, though. Surprisingly, the chair didn't rot and I rescued it and repurposed where it now lives on as the milkmaid's chair.  And a fine chair it is.

A second life for the tree house seat

My chair has an equally storied past.  Here she sits in all her glory.  Behold my milking seat.  This, in its former life was a rocking chair.  The rocking chair that Tricia sat in with each of our three kids when they were babies, nursing them, singing them to sleep, and nurturing them. One day, as things always do, it broke. One of the curved bottoms of the rocking chair broke.  What good is a rocking chair that won't rock?  It was too hard to throw away the chair that rocked our babies.

Well, I pulled the arms, the back and the curved bottoms off of the rocking chair and it was transformed into a serviceable milking seat that is leaps and bounds better than an overturned five gallon bucket.  Pretty?  Nah, but it is a chair that does the job and also evokes fond memories of an earlier time in our little family's history. 

Off my rocker?  Nope.

My milking chair, unlike Tricia's has an ever so slight indentation where your bottom comfortably finds a home for twenty minutes each morning and night.  It's surface is spacious and expansive, allowing for future growth - although hopefully that won't be the case.  

Flying Milking by the seat of my Pants

It is sort of poetic, in a way that a chair previously used to give milk is now used to get it.  Funny how things change.  I think there's a lesson in there somewhere.  In a disposable world, if we look hard enough, we can always find uses for things that would otherwise be thrown away.  When you think you're at the end of your useful life, don't give up.  Reinvent yourself.  Keep on keeping on!

It's Seed Starting Time

In fact it is almost three weeks later than I normally plant tomato, pepper, and eggplant seeds.  Those seeds take longer to germinate, so usually on January 1st, I plant those seeds ensuring that the seedlings will be of good size when I transplant them directly into the garden rows.  We were vacationing around the first of the month and to be honest, I've kind of been dragging my feet in not getting the work done.

This weekend the weather was absolutely beautiful.  The stellar weather was just what I needed to get some chores completed - planting seeds was one of them.  I lined a tray with some little plastic seed pots that I saved from back when I used to purchase my plants.  Then the next thing that I do is mix up a bleach/water solution and spray the little plastic containers.  The idea here is that the bleach will kill any disease on the plastic that may weaken the germinating seeds or young plants.

Sterilizing the seed pots

Then  I fill the seed pots with some seed starting mix.  It is light and easy to work with and doesn't seem to pack.  That is important when separating the seedlings to re-pot later on.

Filling the seed pots with seed starting mix

I'll get my seeds out and plant two seeds per seed pot.  I'll plant the seeds on either side of each seed pot.  I use an old plastic fork to smooth out the soil and cover the newly planted seed with seed starting mix.

Planting 'mater seeds

I plant 12 different varieties of heirloom tomato seeds.  Each row in the tray is planted with 2 seeds. This means that if all the seeds germinated, I would have 12 seedlings of each heirloom tomato varieties.  The germination over the years has held constant at around 95% each.  Once finished planting all the seeds I enlist Benjamin and his friend's help in watering the soil over the newly planted seed. Hopefully this will help provide moisture to the seed and spur germination.

Watering the freshly planted seed

I also planted 6 different varieties of peppers and two varieties of eggplant. Benjamin and his friend were eager to help and I was glad to have them lend a hand.  I was teaching them that you wanted to simulate a rainfall - not too light, but not too heavy either.  My grandfather helped get me involved in planting a garden and hopefully I can help pass on a love for the land and growing things and these boys will "catch the fever" and pass on that love to their kids, keeping the cycle going.  Savings accounts are paying less than the rate of inflation and many companies are cutting dividends or cutting people.  It is nice to know that investing time in your kids is, in a sense, a solid investment with solid returns.

Simulated rainfall

When everything is planted, I put the two trays of planted seed on top of the freezer in our utility room.  For some reason it stays nice and warm above the freezer and this helps raise the soil temperature and assists in helping the seeds to germinate.

Warming the soil

I'll also cover the soil with plastic wrap.  I find that this holds the moisture in the soil and that definitely helps with germination.

Covering the try with plastic wrap to lock in soil moisture

One more thing I do is that as I plant, I label each row with the seed variety.  You can figure fancy ways to label the seeds.  I normally look for a quick, cheap way to do the job.  In this case using a Sharpie marker, I write the seed variety name on a strip of freezer tape and place it on the side of the container to denote which seeds are planted on each row.

Labeling the names of the seeds

Now it is just a waiting game.  I keep the soil very moist each day by spraying water over the soil and then re-covering with plastic wrap.  Then I check the progress each day.  Once they start to sprout, we'll take a deeper look at the different varieties I've planted this year along with the germination percentage for each seed variety.

Can you take a little off the top, please?

When it is cold outside, it is nice to have a thick, warm coat to wear.  For animals, it's no different. During the winter, the cows grow think winter coats.  It doesn't get exceptionally cold around here, but when it is raining AND in the thirties AND with a stiff north wind blowing, you can tell that the cows are uncomfortable - even with their winter coats.

It is unfortunate that the livestock shows are always in the January - February time frame.  That's generally the coldest time around here.  Livestock shows mean that we have to pull out the clippers and give the animals a shave.  They don't enjoy it and neither do we, but it's gotta be done.  This is Amy our 15 month old Jersey heifer.  Her thick, luxurious coat is about to be shaved off.

Amy's winter coat

She feels so warm and snuggly.  Amy and her mother, Rosie, grow thick coats. Daisy, our other Jersey cow, doesn't grow a thick coat at all.  We're only bringing Amy and Rosie to the shows this year, so Daisy will get to keep her coat for the remainder of the winter.

Let's start clipping

When I got home from work on Friday, Tricia had mostly shaved Rosie, so for Amy, it was my turn. I oiled up the clippers and turned them on.  They are kind of noisy and we notice that the closer that we get to the animal's head, the more jumpy and uneasy they get.  That's why we start on the end.

Clip, Clip

We put a little hay and some alfalfa pellets in the trough and clipped Amy's head to a lead rope tied around a post so she wouldn't go anywhere.  It's not a bad job, just a slow one.  You simply rest the clippers against the skin and push upwards.  Long tufts of hair will fold over leaving a smooth, clean-shaven look that makes Amy look sleek and aerodynamic! 

In the Barber Shop

When we're done, all of Amy's coat is gone.  The judges at the livestock shows want the animals clean shaven so that they can assess the animals' lines.  A full coat can hide imperfections.  Of course my barber job leaves imperfections as well. Sometimes, if the animal gets a little too jumpy, I've actually cut their ear by mistake, causing some bleeding, but nothing serious.

All done

Just like at the barber shop, once we're done, the floor is littered with a lot of hair that we'll need to sweep up.

Lots of hair on the floor

I mentioned earlier that when we start clipping close to the head, they don't like the sound or vibration one bit and they start acting up and moving around.  We have to get their halters off in order to shave their head, so one little trick that we do is use the nose clips.  The nose is a real sensitive area.  When we put the nose clip into the cow's nostrils, they immediately respect it.  That's the reason that you see rings in the noses of bulls sometimes.  With the nose clip in, you can lift her head and get the clippers all around her ears, eyes, nose and mouth.

Tricia with the nose clips on Amy

Amy looks totally different now without her winter coat.  She's a nice looking heifer.  

Amy Lou

This afternoon was a beautiful afternoon and we were able to get out in the pasture and pretend that we were the judges as Benjamin walked both Amy and Rosie around and set them up.  They have to be checked in at the Jefferson Davis Parish Livestock Show tomorrow night beginning at 6 pm with the actual livestock show taking place on Tuesday morning at 9pm.

Goat in the Henhouse

During the week it came to my attention that we had an intruder in the hen house.  It wasn't a predator - only a trouble maker.  Annie (our hopefully pregnant Nubian goat) was seeking refuge from the torrential rains and resulting mud and cold temperatures.  In so doing, she broke down one of the boards that I had nailed to keep her out, and she entered the hen house.  If that was all she did, it would be fine, but she pushed her luck.  She jumped up into the laying boxes and stood in them.  The nesting boxes are built to hold the weight of hens and their eggs - not goats.  Of course Annie went right through the bottom of the nesting boxes, breaking out the wooden bottoms.

Broken Nesting Boxes

Here's the culprit.  She doesn't seem to act like her conscience is bothering her for her transgressions, now does she?

The hens aren't really laying a lot of eggs right now, but it is important to fix things and keep them in good repair.  When the weekend came and the weather was nice, I gathered Benjamin and we got busy.  First we cleaned out all the old hay mixed with chicken droppings and filled buckets with it. I'll take this to the garden and scatter it out over the rows so that it will produce some fertilizer for the Spring vegetables. We do this a couple of times a year as replacing the bedding helps keep the eggs clean.

Buckets of fertilizer

Then I repaired the boxes by nailing bottoms on them.  We gathered fresh hay to use as bedding or nesting material to line the boxes and placed them in the boxes.

Fresh hay in the boxes

If I was a hen I'd rather lay eggs in a clean nest.

Fresh brown egg

Finally I had to fix the entry door to the hen house, so that it permitted entry to the hens, but exclude entry of Annie the goat.  All I had to do is nail another wooden slat across the door and all was set.

Closing the gate for Annie

It took a little while to get everything repaired, but finally we had the job done!  I hate to pick on poor Annie.  Her momma died less than a month ago.  But her shenanigans have got to stop!

Little Orphan Annie

Repair and maintenance is an on going process, never ceasing.

Taking Inventory

Taking inventory is one of those things that I do once a year.  It's not a glamorous task nor one I look forward to, but one that must be done.  Usually a night like last night is the perfect time for it.  We've gone almost a week without seeing the sun.  It has been overcast, muddy, chilly and gloomy.  Any outside activity should be avoided at all costs.

Last night I chopped some lighter pine and put it in the fireplace, added some oak firewood atop it, and crumpled some old sales circulars underneath the grate and lit it.  In no time the resin in the lighter pine erupted in flame along with black smoke. That lets you know that it won't be long until the oak will be crackling.  It also lets you know that it is important to call the chimney-sweep after 'fireplace season.' Although lighter pine assures a quick start to your firewood without natural gas, it also assures you that your chimney will have a thick black coating of pitch that will need to be cleaned out.

Once the fire was providing some heat, I went out into the garage and opened the freezer and removed insulated envelopes of seed that I store in the ice maker that no longer works.  There will be people that will tell you that a freezer is a horrible place to store seed due to the moisture content. They're probably right.  I've stored seed in the freezer in sealed envelopes for years now and haven't noticed problems with germination, though.  To combat the possibility of loss, I do diversify my seed storage and store any seed that I save from crops that I grow in a drawer in a cabinet in the house.  I place the seed in old vitamin containers that are moisture proof and don't allow light in.

Even though I like to keep good records, I like EVEN MORE the act of planting!  So, I am negligent in adjusting my seed inventory downward based on the seed that I plant each Spring and Fall.  Maybe I'll start this year...  (There's a saying about a road to somewhere that's paved with good intentions that comes to mind!)

Segregating the Seed by type and age

Back in high school accounting class, we learned the concept of FIFO.  FIFO stands for First In, First Out.  That is a good methodology to use in managing your seed inventory as it assures that you'll use your oldest seed first and will keep your seed inventory rotated and fresh.

I lay out all my seed by seed type: Melons, Beans, Peppers, Corn, Greens, Lettuce, etc. Then I carefully write down each variety I have in each category and the number of packages of seed.  Yes, this can be done using Excel or a computer program, and I've done that in the past.

Taking Stock

Now, I will inventory my saved seed that I store inside as well, but once I have the entire seed inventory written down, I'll compare that with my planting records from previous years to determine which additional seed I need to order to meet the needs of the upcoming planting season.  I'll make that list of needs and then I'll pull out the seed catalog and place my order.

2015 Seed Inventory as of January 14, 2015

Looking through seed catalogs is an enjoyable experience and I'll generally order some new items to try that I don't have in current inventory.  While not as fun as the act of sowing seed, taking inventory is a necessary task of a prudent grower that enables you to ensure that you are prepared.  Come to think of it, taking inventory is a critical part of the entire human experience that helps us determine whether we are prepared in any number of ways - physically, mentally, and (most important of all) spiritually.

Kicking Steak up a Notch...

The night before Laura Lee and Russ headed back to college, we decided to have "Steak Night." Tricia will put some nice steaks in a super-hot, black cast iron skillet with some butter and in no time at all we'll have an enjoyable meal.  We never use steak sauce and are just content with the flavors of butter, salt and pepper.

Occasionally we like to add some zing to the steak, though, and tonight we made a Chimichurri Sauce.  Chimichurri is a green sauce for grilled meats that originated in Argentina.  We picked a cup of fresh Italian parsley from the garden and 1/4 cup of fresh oregano leaves from the patio.  I also chopped up a medium white onion.

The base of chimichurri

I put the parsley, oregano, and onion into the food processor along with some ground thyme, one clove garlic, one piece of stale bread, 1/8 cup of red wine vinegar, 1/4 cup of extra virgin olive oil, salt, pepper and Parmesan cheese.

About to mix it all up

We put the top on the processor and chop it all up.  It's as easy as that!  Using a spoon/spatula we put it all in a serving bowl and bring it to the table after tasting it. It has an "herby," zesty, flavorful pow to it. 

Completed Chimichurri Sauce

I take a serving spoon and place a large dollop of chimichurri on top of my steak. 

Freshly made chimichurri atop my steak

I find it really enhances the flavor of a good steak.  We don't make it all the time, but every once in a while we'll mix up another batch of chimichurri to liven up the taste buds.

Wide Open Spaces

Who says you can't teach an old dog new tricks?  This old dog admittedly learns things slowly (at a snail's pace), but I've learned a few lessons in parenting over the years, especially as it relates to teenagers.  One of those is this little nugget: If you are trying to elicit conversation, never, ever ask questions that are answered with a yes, no, or a grunt or a shrug.  Always ask open-ended questions, specifically those that require some thought.

Sunday afternoons after church we always enjoy a good cup of coffee and some chocolate or a homemade piece of pie or cake.  It is during those times that we'll either open up the calendar and discuss events that are coming up in the next week or we'll just talk and enjoy one another's company. This past Sunday was no different, but a question was raised and answered that made me do some thinking.

To start off the conversation, I asked a simple question to the family.  I asked, "What are some of your best memories?"  If I'm being 100% honest with you, this was a self-serving question.  In an age where we are competing for our children's time against cell phones, netflix, ipads, and laptops and more often than not losing in that competition, I wanted to direct attention to the fact that we have had fun and made good memories.  I say it is a self-serving question because maybe I asked it in order to get some sort of reassurance that we have made family times special.

We went around the room and discussed remembrances of family vacations over the years, funny things that happened, and all different memories in the three different houses we've lived in over the years.  It is interesting that no material good that we purchased made the list.  There was one answer that seemed so far out of left field that it has made me really think about its meaning for a couple of days. While my thoughts aren't fully developed on the subject, this is the best way I know to describe them:

When asked to list a really good childhood memory, Benjamin answered, "I remember when we moved in to our house here on our five acres and it was before we put the fence up that separated the pasture from the house and you could run free and not have to worry about stepping in poop."

A time before fences...  Wow.  That is one of Benjamin's good memories.  Why is that?  I think I know why.  My theory is that everyone has a little boy inside of them that longs for wide open spaces.  Room to run.  Freedom from the encumbrances that tie us down, dampen the spirit and dull our dreams and aspirations.

Image Credit

I think what Benjamin is saying is that he was happiest when he experienced the freedom that existed before the fences.  Aren't we all? Once fences are constructed, movement is hindered and those very fences tame the beast.  They thwart curiosity, limit adventure and set hard boundaries on exploration and fun.  Why is it that when we become adults, we erect fences when we all have an innate longing for freedom?  Oh, I know why I put up the pasture fence.  I didn't want our cows roaming outside of our property lines and I didn't want predators to get into the pasture and eat our chickens.

We are quick to conform.  We join the rat race.  We dutifully go to a job each day and live within the voluminous procedures, policies, laws, guidelines as set forth by the government, audit, IRS, our employer.  I fully recognize that laws prevent us from anarchy, but there is a point, and I think we're past it, upon which we're not truly free anymore.  We're constrained.  We're fenced in.  And we're straining against it - constantly.  Can you feel it?

I think man was made with a deep longing for freedom.  You can try to squelch it, but the need for self-determination will keep bubbling back up.  Now, freedom always carries with it responsibilities. In exercising our 'freedom' lots of times, we end up building for ourselves prison walls that are pretty darn well close to impenetrable.  You might remember the 'fences' that the Pharisees erected that proved to be a great impediment for the Jews.  I believe the key lies within this verse:

1 Peter 2:16 says "Act as free men and do not use your freedom as a covering for evil, but use it as bondslaves for God."

If it seems odd that the verse tells you to act as free men while being a slave, that's because it is!  But we must understand that He is the Author of freedom.  In serving Him, we can experience the freedom that gives true and lasting joy.  Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.

Benjamin's desire for wide open spaces is a God-given attribute, one that should be encouraged and developed.  As his earthly father, my goal is to give him the freedom he desires while at the same time, providing direction, teaching and mentoring he needs.