I went out to the garden to pick beans and whatever else might be ready to harvest.  The sunshine and blue sky added to the warmth of the task.  A occasional breeze added to my comfort level.

While in the garden I heard the birds chirping and singing.  Occasionally I heard a distant goose honking.  The endearing sounds of the farm surrounded me.

Near the garden is a fenced-in area suitable for our growing chicken population.  I could tell that the cocks were maturing.  Every few moments one of the fifty young roosters experimented with his new found ability to croak out a song.

I got my harvest and enjoyed the new sounds in our farm yard.

As they grow, the roosters’ melodies well grow in confidence and volume.

I have a question for you.  How would you like to wake up to 51 roosters greeting the dawn every day?

Well, that is life here on Heritage Farm.

If you would like a card featuring a rooster, see our store.

photo credit: USDAgov via photopin cc

On our dairy farm, we drink raw milk.  It is delicious!  When the milk comes in, the cream rises to the top of the pitcher.  We skim off the cream.  This happens regularly.  Sometimes the cream sours in the refrigerator.  So, I make bread often just to use up the sour cream.

I have come up with a recipe.  I alter it according to my whims and to the contents of my cupboard.  Salt and sugar amounts may be altered.  You can try adding a favorite spice.  Spiced bread can be shaped into buns.  (I like cardamom.)  Buns can be frosted.  Mmmmm.

Home-made Bread

1 tablespoon yeast, scant
1/2 cup warm water
2 cups sour cream or water
1 tablespoon salt
5-6 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons shortening (or 1 T. lard)
1 egg, beaten (opt.)
5-6 cups flour

Combine yeast to 1/2 cup warm water. Let the yeast soften.

Meanwhile, scald sour cream (milk, water or potato water).  When scalded, add salt and sugar.  (You may substitute some of the sugar with an equal amount of molasses, if you like.)  Add shortening or vegetable oil.

Let the water mixture cool enough so that you can hold your finger in the liquid comfortably.  (If it is too hot for comfort, that is your clue that it will kill the yeast, so wait till it is cooler.)  Add cooled, yet still warm liquid to the yeast mixture.

Here you can opt to add a beaten egg to the liquid.  Mix well.

Add 5-6 cups of white flour.  (I use a wooden spoon for stirring while I add the first 4 cups.  Then when the stirring gets tough, I take off my wedding ring.  It is time to knead the dough.)  Knead dough till it feels elastic.  With experience you will learn the right texture for making a soft, high-rising loaf of bread.  (You don’t want it to be too dry because the loaf will be hard-to-rise and, therefore, short and hard after it is baked.  Nor do you also don’t want it to be sticky.  Add enough flour till the dough easy to shape into a large ball.)

Place the ball of dough into a large greased bowl.  Grease top side of dough.  Let rise till double in bulk.  When risen, punch dough down . Shape dough into 2 loaves and place in greased loaf pans.  Let dough rise again.  Bake at 350° F. for 25-30 min. (or till when tapped with a fingertip it sounds hollow.)

When hot from the oven, I brush the crust with butter which makes a soft crust after cooling.

photo credit: Wenda Grabau
photo credit: Wenda Grabau
photo credit: Wenda Grabau

Sweet corn ripens at this time of year.  We enjoy it on the cob and off the cob.  Our freezer makes a home for the corn till we use it later in the year.

If you have not had the joy of preserving sweet corn in your freezer, let me show you how it is done at our farm.

1. Choose ears that have filled out ears.  Don’t wait too long or they can get mature and starchy and lose their sweetness and tenderness.
2. Shuck the ears.
3. Brush off any excess silk remaining on the ears.

 

 

4. Drop the ears into boiling water.
5. Time them for 5 minutes.

 

 

 

 

 

6. Plunge the boiled ears into very cold water for quick cooling.
7. Repeat plunging into fresh cold water if the heat is still in the corn.

 

 

 

 

8. Drain corn.

 

 

 

 

 

9. Cut the tops off of the kernels.  A household knife will do, but there are special corn knives, like the one shown in the photo, that make the cut in one stroke.

10. With the flat blade of a knife, pull up on the cut kernels to scrape out the creamy milk of the corn.
11. Discard the cob.

12. Package the corn in freezer bags.
13.  Fill the bags only 1/2 full.
14. Squeeze out excess air before sealing.   Seal bags.
15. Press the bags of corn to measure about one-inch in thickness.  (If food in the bag measures over one-inch thick it will add to the time when the food will remain warm in the freezer, thereby allowing the any germs present to reproduce increasing the chances of spoilage.)
16. Label the bags with the year that you are doing the preserving.

17. Place the corn packages near the wall of the freezer for fastest freezing.

Now your sweet corn is ready and waiting for your use this winter.  Enjoy!

photo credit: Wenda Grabau
photo credit: Wenda Grabau
photo credit: Wenda Grabau
photo credit: Wenda Grabau
photo credit: Wenda Grabau
photo credit: Wenda Grabau

Unloading and storing the harvest is another job.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The wagon comes equipped with a hydraulic lift that enables it to tilt up and dump the grain onto the elevator.

 

 

 

 

 

The elevator may be a noisy tool, but it beats shoveling a crop by hand into the granary.  The paddles act like “moving steps”.  Each paddle raises the precious seed up to the hole in the granary’s roof and deposits it into the bin where it is stored for later use.

That is how this part of the harvest is done.  I hope you enjoyed visiting as we put up the oat crop on Heritage Farm.

photo credit: Bretta Grabau
photo credit: Bretta Grabau
photo credit: Bretta Grabau

Oats lay in the swathe for a few days to dry the miscellaneous weeds and to await a day when the weather is right for combining.

Our neighbor has two combines and brings them both to get the job done.  Having the two work together makes the job a speedy one.

 

 

 

The combine picks up the straw and oats from the swathe and separates the oats from the straw.  It leaves the straw in the field for us to bale at a later time.  The combine has a chamber that hold the oats until it is full.

 

 

 

The oats are unloaded by an auger and put into a wagon.  My husband takes the wagon to the farm to unload and store it in the granary.

photo credit: Bretta Grabau
photo credit: Wenda Grabau
photo credit: Bretta Grabau

You would think that a Big Day would be something special like a wedding or going on a vacation.  But for this farmer’s family, the Big Day is the day before we leave for a vacation.   Things that ended up on the docket:

1. Schedule a job interview
2. Shop for car
3. Test drive the car
4. Buy the car
5. Talk to our insurance agent
6. Get groceries
7. Write a birthday card
8. Stop at Post Office to mail the card and gift
9. Make transactions at 2 banks
10. Gas up the van to avoid losing that time tomorrow when we leave
11. Go to machinery shop to to solve problems for lawn mower battery
12. Return books to library
13. Eat fast food supper in the car on the way home
14. Visit my husband’s sister
15. Borrow her ice chests for the trip we are about to take
16. Return home to prepare the car for the trip
17. Buy used table saw for Son-in-law
18. Repair saw
19. Wash the saw’s table
20. Test saw
21. Fix table saw guide
22. Milk cows
23. Sand rough spots on a table saw’s table
24. Gather dill from the garden to bring on the trip
25. Save one rooster from being slobbered on by the farm dog
26. Round up 5o runaway chickens for half an hour
27. Resume sanding table saw
28. With air compressor blow clean another saw
29. Sand rust off the van
30. Paint its rusty spots
31. Pickle green beans
32. Tidy the house
33. Do laundry
34. Change linen
35. Round up water jugs to be used on vacation
36. Bathe
37. Pack

We left for 5 days.  We arranged for farm helpers to stay on the farm in our absence.  We kept up with the garden harvest.  Preparing for the time away gave us a truly big day.

By the way, the trip was definitely worth it.

photo credit: Foot Slogger via photopin cc
photo credit: BarelyFitz via photopin cc

I hope you had some oats today.  They are nutritious and valuable to the eater.  They can be of benefit to the grower, too.

1. In the early spring, my husband works up his land to prepare it for the crop.
2. He secures the seed.  This year we used last years’ seed which was saved for this purpose.  (Those oats are fertile enough to grow in our field this year.)
3. He has an old oat drill that has served us well for many years.  He maintains it well to preserve it.
4. Seed that he will put into the drill for planting must be cleaned.  We would not want to plant weed seed and chaff.  So we get the fanning mill out of storage and clean the oats till my husband decides he has enough for planting his fields.

This year the weather challenged farmers to the limit.  Oats are planted here in mid-late April.  However, the snow and ice left over from a May 2 snowstorm stayed in the fields so long that they could not be worked up and planted till many days later.

Oats are left alone to grow till they mature, which in most cases is in late July.  This year it is mid-August.  We watch the oats grow like grass for many days.  The green in the field is beautiful.  As the seeds form, they go through a “milk” stage.  The milk hardens into a seed; the green plants and their seeds give way to hues of light green and then golden.  When the weather permits, the seeds can be harvested.

In our case, our neighbor swathes our oats.  The oats are dry at this stage.  The stems are golden straw.  Yet a few weeds that have mingled with the crop are green at the cutting.  Therefore, for safe storage’s sake, the weeds must dry, so they do not make problems as they go through the combine.   They, along with the straw, will be baled and stored in the barn.  A wet, fresh bunch of weeds could get hot in the barn and start a fire.  For prudence’ sake, the swathed oats are left a few days to dry in the sun.

Our neighbor returns a few days later to combine the swathed oats.  Combining  separates the oat from straw and chaff.  From there the oats are deposited in a wagon.  My husband unloads the wagon load onto our elevator which drops the oats into the storage bin.

Now you know some of the work a farmer does to supply you with your breakfast of oats.  Enjoy!

photo credit:Wenda Grabau
photo credit: Wenda Grabau

When our kids were very young, my husband had some time to make a creation for them.  As you can see from the picture, it is an elaborate sandbox.  It is my husband’s own design.

It comes with a roof for protection from sun or rain.  They sandbox itself is off the floor so the kids don’t have to sit in it and get dirty.  But kids being kids they still manage to get some of the sand in their hair occasionally.  The sandbox comes with shelves for storing toys.  The doors shut with a latch in order to keep rain and weather from adversely affecting the toys and the shovels the kids use.

You will also notice that the sandbox is set on blocks.  It is moveable.  When the children were young, I did not want the sandbox being too far from my house.  I wanted to supervise the children at close range.  So my husband placed it just a few feet from our front porch.  Now our kids are grown so it is moved to a nice arbor area for other children who come for a visit to play in.

It is definitely a favorite spot to play.  I am so glad my husband made it.  It continues to get used when company comes.

Photo Credit: Wenda Grabau