Rainy, rainy day

I am so glad I worked outside the last few days. The temperature has dropped, and it is wet, soggy and miserable out there. The only creatures that enjoy this weather are the ducks, who wander about, soaking wet and splashing happily wherever there's a puddle. Well, at least Mother Nature is taking care of watering the seeds, the onions and the potatoes, saving me a little work.
So today I will turn my attention to inside stuff. You know, the usual....laundry, floor washing, etc. But at the end of the day I will have my long simmering spaghetti sauce to look forward to. Might even be the perfect day to bake some bread.

Lazy Sunday

I'm not going to lie: after all the physical type of work I've been doing around here for the past two days, I'm not very ambitious today. I've done the feeding and the watering, and wandered around making sure the fence around the garden is working and there's no chickens able to get in, but other than that, I've been enjoying another warm day largely on the porch. My crock pot is cooking Lazy Day Lasagna for dinner - a perfect dish for today. I feel like I should be doing something more useful, but hey, we're not called human doings. So today I am a human being. Just being is enough sometimes.

One of my Rhode Island Reds in the nesting box. I don't artificially light my hens throughout the winter, so with shorter days come fewer eggs. But since it is spring, the girls are laying prolifically! Pickled eggs, anyone?

It's finally warm enough for the kiddie pool! Here is Fred mid-splash. That is one happy Muscovy duck.

The newest crop of kittens...just almost four weeks old and just out of the basket for the first time today!

Warm days, busy times!

It's been a busy few days here at Rustic Farm. Suddenly, the temperatures have soared to around 80 degrees, making me think that summer is here. Of course, it's not, and I know it will get chilly again, but it sure motivated me to get things done around here, like cleaning out the chicken coop, planting some perennials, and getting those spinach and lettuce seeds planted and the seed potatoes and onions in the ground! I got some hostas yesterday from my sister in law, and really had no good place to put them. So, voila! I used some old bricks for edging, filled it up with topsoil and had a new hosta bed within an hour or two.
And now, I'm enjoying a cold one out on the porch with my computer. The cats are having their afternoon naps, the dog is at my feet, and the chickens are dust bathing out back. Life is good.

Welcome To Rustic Farm!

Welcome to the farm! This is the blog of Rustic Farm, where my husband had been living solo for 14 or so years. Then, along came city girl me! And things have never been the same....
It all started when I arrived with my Border Collie, named B. Nowadays, our critters include six cats, another dog (poor B is gone now), twenty or so hens, one rooster named Ernie and two Muscovy ducks named Fred and Beaner.
Why Rustic Farm? Well, everything around here is old, or unwanted, or second hand somehow. For some strange reason, it appeals to both of us in different ways. For instance, the dog was rescued from a shelter, one of the cats came out of the bean field one day and decided to adopt us, a few Leghorn chickens fell off the truck on its way to the "soup factory," and hey, my husband is 13 years older than me, ha ha! Hubby has a salvage business. He is living proof that one man's trash is another man's treasure. I think the only brand new thing in our farmhouse is the couch we bought after we got married.