Recent photos and the winter routine

I just uploaded the most recent batch of photos from the camera so I figured it was time for another blog post. I took this one of the pantry a few weeks ago to document the season's canning efforts before I cut into them too much. The shelves hold jars two rows thick so there is actually at least twice as much as you can see here. I have jam, pickles, relish, ketchup, paste, whole tomatoes, salsas rojo and verde, BBQ sauce, chicken stock, and chicken pieces here. It was definitely my biggest canning season yet.


Here is the winter setup for the hoofstock. The carport in the foreground was our summer shelter for chicken processing, but soon we will build a stanchion into it and it will be the milking area when Chloe calves in early March (hopefully). The carports in the background are for hay storage. We keep the animals in this area overnight and for feeding and watering, but let them out during the day into one of the larger paddocks so they can get some space. We currently have 18 sheep and 5 cattle. The area where they are fed, watered, and kept overnight will be gardens next year. No manure spreading for us, thank you very much.



And we are now finally getting the greenhouse built! It is going to be 64x24 feet and we hope to have it ready for early Spring crops.



This was just pretty so I snapped a photo.


We filled the pond in the front yard for the first time and invited the geese and ducks for a swim. They LOVE it!!! Unfortunately they have been digging into the sides and collapsing them so we need to rethink it a bit before we invite them back, but for a while it was great goose and duck TV out the front window.


We have an abundance of lamb meat this winter. Here is a nice souvlaki that I made with some lamb sirloin recently (cooked on the grill, just in the pan for serving).


Other than that we are in a holding pattern at the moment, and grateful for our health, friends, and family.