I wish I could schedule the iris blossoms to coincide with the fireflies and the firefly party. Usually, by the time anyone comes for a visit, the iris have already finished, so we are the only ones to enjoy them. Brandon and I have checked a few big things off of our spring-time, pre-party to-do list, including a new chicken coop door and replacing the sand in the pool filter.
The coop door is now easily latched, so while Brandon and I are on our up-coming trip, the chicken sitters (hi, Mom! hi, Kathy!) won't have to struggle to close it.
The pool filter required one hundred and fifty pounds of new sand! Before the new sand could go in, Brandon had to use the shop vacuum to suck all the old stinky sand out.
It took a while to remove the old sand, as he had to keep emptying the shop vac when it would fill, but the filter sand was changed, the pool cover was removed, the pump is working, and we dumped a fortune's worth of pool start-up chemicals in the water, per the lady at the pool store's advice. In three days, the pool will be officially opened! Now, if only the sun would shine...
Brandon is keeping the mowing under control and I've been working to weed the herb spiral and tidy the greenhouse. It's nice to have a party deadline to encourage us to tidy up. We've been moving all the old lumber, bricks, fencing, and other building supplies we've piled on the concrete slab near the greenhouse. It's been a handy place to store things for many years, but by finding new homes for all that junk, we now have a conveniently paved surface near the smoker that's less of an eyesore.
We bought some square bales of hay so while we are gone it will be easier for someone to feed a flake of hay to the goats and donkeys without using the pitch fork. You can see a few of the rose bushes that we transplanted to the front of the workshop barn in the photo above. These get full sun, and they've lost more leaves than the bushes planted in the shade.
I'll only be away from home for a couple of days, so it shouldn't be too hard for someone else to hold down the fort. If you ask Brandon, the only critical thing that needs to be done is to feed the dog - he thinks the rest can fend for themselves. I'll be glad to have someone there to open and close the chicken coops, because my roosters fight if they stay closed up together too long, but I can't leave the doors open at night because of predators. I saw a skunk run under the wood pile one night last week.
It's also good to have someone there in case one of the little goats gets their head stuck in the fence. It hasn't happened lately, but I think a trapped goat could perish in the sun if no one was there to notice.
And someone needs to gather the eggs. We have so many layers right now that the eggs start to pile up in the nest if they aren't collected every day. The sage is blooming in the herb spiral. Sage and oregano survived the winter and look good already. I'm hoping the basil and holy basil will come back from seed. The milkweed is doing very well, and threatens to dominate the spiral.
I plan to fill everyone's water bowls and hay baskets before I leave, so the animal chores shouldn't be hard to do. The garden may need to be watered. Now that the trip is on the horizon, and we've made such good progress on our list, I'm looking forward to traveling with Brandon and leaving all those hungry animals and thirsty plants for someone else to worry about!
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