The reason for the lack of entries is that Eric has been gone alot ,his dad passed away monday and he is in Wichita Kansas this weekend and we have had an explosion of babies. Some planned like the 13 3 weeks old turkeys and the ducks but a few unplanned like the goat babies and the mom hatched turkey babies. I have some pics of getting the planned turkeys and a few of the surprise goats which I'll post later. Today I'm going to show you my God given retreat. The place I go to refresh and renew and the most wonderful part is it is right here. My garden. Monday a two man construction crew is supposed to come and start building our new utility room(I'll post before and after pics) plus we had all the materials for our new 16x16 deck delivered.(everything is under the blue tarps you see in some of the pics) Here  are the pics of my wonderful garden.

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This weekend our country celebrates another birthday. I know some think our country is just awful but I love this country! There is way more right with this country than wrong. Nuff said...

Here is a quick garden update. I redid a flower bed by the front of the house. In it I planted 2 kinds of Dianthus Clavelina,Firecracker Coreopsis, 1 blue and 1 white Campanula, Armeria Thrift and White Candytuft, 2 pink 2 yellow Yarrow. I plan on putting a few perinial herbs in this bed too.It has a Peony, Astor and a few spring bulbs already planted there.

We also put down some weed fabric on the main path to the west of the sidewalk. I'll pick up the rest of the cedar chips this weekend.

This is this years big flower bed. I put a seed mulch mix on it but I have a bed mostly full of Rudbeckia. It  will look awsome when they all are in bloom! There is Shasta daisy, Batchlor Buttons and Cosmos blooming  there.

Here is the next batch of plants waiting to be planted. Our local nursery had a hail sale so I picked up a few beauties.

Here is a pic of our "New Fairy" rose. It does great here in zone 4 .

Here is this summer's pig feeder planter.

Finally, my official 4th of July pic.

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Here  are a couple of pics of the new babies. This a.m. mom decided to let the kids nurse so I am free of rodeo milking and bottle feeding...I think.... I was out in the barn for awhile this afternoon just to see if she was still letting them nurse but they were more interested in napping. They didnt' act  hungry so I'll go out later , sit for a bit and keep an eye on things. I have one bottle of mom's milk in the fridge for just in case.

It was hard to get good pics because they kept moving.I'll try to get better ones later. 

 Moulting.....it's never pretty!

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Yesterday we went to Hover's Hatchery in Rudd Iowa which is just a few miles south of us. We picked up 13 3 week old Bronze turkeys. Our Bourbon Red and Naregansett turkeys didn't hatch any young this spring. Well not yet anyway ,we have one hen on a nest. We raise all our motherless poultry on our front porch. It is just way easier for me to tend to them that way.Our front porch is enclosed with windows etc. so it is predetor proof (as long as we make sure one of the cats don't get in there). This morning we had a major surprise! One of our does gave birth to doe twins. Amazing since we A.didnt' put the buck in with her B. Made sure the buck pen was way away from the girls this winter. To deliver today she would have had to be bred in January. Impossible....well we thought so anyway. A couple of days ago her bag looked swolen and I thought maybe she had injured it kicking at flies so yesterday I checked her out up close and personal and she was in milk. I was stimied...untill this am. Last Oct. she had given birth to twin bucks and so after checking a few online goat sites found out the couldn't breed till they were 6 months so we waited till they were just 5 months to put them in their own pen. GUESS THE WEB SITES WERE WRONG HUH?????? the lil bucks were in the main doe pen so I'm sure we will have a few more surprises. When this doe freshened last fall she was not the greatest mom and had to be persuaded to let her twins nurse but after a time she was ok. I hoped her next go round she would just be a normal mom.. NOPE...I had to hog tie her to try to let the lil girls nurse. She had a fit so I just milked her out into a coffee mug then put the milk in bottles and fed the girls myself. Everytime I do this she is likeing it less and less and I get to do this round the clock for a couple of days. Happy Honey is on the road so it is just me. Whoopie....one of lifes left turns...gotta love em eh?....Well anyway here are some pics of turkey prep and poults.

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The rain has finally stopped. Here are some pictures from my garden. Please keep all the flood victims in your prayers.

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