Things are all weird right now…

Posted on by Farmers Blogger

Hello friends!

How are we doing? We are absolutely covered in wildfire smoke here, although I’m grateful, we are not in immediate danger from the current fires, so I can deal with some smoke. The air quality has basically halted all work outside for the foreseeable future. We are also under wildfire warnings for PSPS, that is Public Safety Power Shutoffs, so if you have tips, send them my way. A little nervous to be wfh with the chance of most of the valley losing power randomly. In fact, as I write this, I am waiting to see if they are cutting us off this evening, and if I’ll even be able to get this posted. We have a storm coming in, and everyone is sorta expecting carnage.

It’s very weird to be essentially fogged in, as though it’s winter time, but for it to also be 107 degrees. We’ve had heat and air quality warnings that have been extended long enough I am totally blind to the warnings panel on my weather app. Just trying to keep everything moist and limit activity for all the creatures on the farm, two and four legged. The worst I’ve seen so far on the air quality scale is 237, but I know it’s so much worse closer to the fires.

We had to give up on the garden this year. The potatoes we planted got dug up and eaten by some critters that needed sustenance, and with the rest of it, we just decided it wasn’t quite going to work this year. Gives us time to prepare for a better attempt next year I guess. And with the smoke, probably better to keep outdoor hobbies to a minimum. I’m kinda considering raised beds too, so I can put covers on things, but that might be overkill.

I had a birthday last week. I’m 28 now, which really doesn’t feel any different than 27 or 26, although I’d argue If you compared 25 and this upcoming year, you’d probably notice the differences. Change is gradual and easy to miss, but I’d like to think I’m slowly getting better at this living thing. I had a lovely calm birthday, took a few days of paid leave and finally got a few moments to destress. I’ve basically worked everyday since June 26th, some days less than others, some long enough that they bled together, and it was a welcome change to mute all work based notifications for a bit. But boy, that productivity guilt hit hard the first day or so. I’ve gotten to catch up on some things that had gotten the short end of the stick, and got to take a minute to look at ways I could sorta fix the “hamster on a wheel” feeling that has been a staple for too long.
Speaking of that, and of the crazy work schedule and relative halt of work on the farm, I think I need to chat with you all a minute. I have been really struggling to keep up with this blog, and the stuff I have been creating for you has not been what I would consider my best work. It’s frustrating to want to do better and either not have the time or the brain space to make those things happen. It’s just really hard to want to write or edit videos after long stretches on the computer for work, and to be honest, the farm has always been my escape, and I’ve gotten to where I really don’t want to grab my phone to record things. I’m pretty tied to my phone for work as it is, and most of the time, I just want to go hug horses at the end of the day. So, we are going to make a mid-year change.
I’ve decided, for the latter half of 2024, we are going to cut down to one post a month, an end of the month recap. That feels attainable with my current life situation, and allows me to keep you guys up to date without constantly rushing to grab content, or worry that my entire update is going to be “work happened again”, or be up until 2 am trying to hit that 6 am post time because I miscalculated what week was what. So, instead of every Friday, it’ll just be either the 30th or 31st of the month. Then we will reevaluate in 2025 how we want to tackle things. I am not closing anything down, just going a little quieter for now, for stress reasons. I am hoping as things get more steady state, I can post some in between photos, maybe a shortie video here or there, but I don’t want to promise things until I kinda have a better grasp. I really appreciate the understanding.

I hate to leave things on a sour note, so I will leave you with a happy anecdote! Guess who worked out v2 of the Nellie Fly Mask? Now with snaps! Officially she hasn’t worn it yet, Ro has been stress testing it for me, and now they are maskless due to the smoke, but I am hopeful it is a solid quality of life improvement for her (and me)!
Anyways, friends, until we chat again!

Before the smoke!
The v2 mask, now with snaps!
This is the V1 mask, it’s been well loved
I said “smile for the camera” and she heard “swing your head around violently”…must be my accent
Look at how good that eye is looking! Getting there!

So, how’s July treating you?

Posted on by Farmers Blogger

Hello friends!
My goodness, was the end of June and first part of July more than crazy!

Let’s get to the most exciting part right away: We successfully pulled off my Grandma’s Surprise 80th Birthday Party! We did it! It came together perfectly, almost like we had worked on it religiously for six months or something haha.

I got up and made it to the venue way early, because I was so dang excited. Worked out though because the lovely lady in charge of the venue was there early too. I got the full walkthrough, and started setting up. That took way less time than I thought as well and it looked so cute! I took some pictures of the decor, but a lot of it was pretty personal so I will refrain from sharing more photos for other’s privacy.

Also had a funny moment while setting up, because I was in this 100+ year old building by myself for a while, and one of the things I hadn’t been told about this building is that the lights are motion sensored and timered, so they turn on and off seemingly randomly depending how much you (and your decor) move in the rooms. Queue me panic calling my dad because I am convinced the building is going to burn down because the lights are flickering on and off like crazy. I was pretty squigged out haha.

My grandma was so surprised when she got there. I have a lovely video that I will treasure forever of when she saw her brother and sister there. They had snuck in from out of town, the first time all three had been together in probably a decade, and it was a super tight fit scheduling wise, so I am so grateful it came together how it did. She was in tears for a while, so happy so much of her family could be there to have a big celebration with her!
We had SO much food! I was so convinced we weren’t going to have enough, because we were kinda conservative with the caterers but it was so much food that we had more than enough for the party, the after party (which I will get to), and I sent several dinners worth home with EVERYONE. And I still ended up eating exclusively leftovers for several days. The caterers, and the bakery that made the cake, all killed it. Turns out, it was the last catering job that the family was doing, and they had planned to close the company ahead of time, but the owner knows and loves my grandma so much that when we called they figured one more job wouldn’t hurt. I found this out after the fact and am so incredibly grateful!
After the party, which was about four hours on its own, my Grandma, with my parents’ help, took her siblings on a tour of the town and all the family haunts, which gave Christopher and I enough time to get everything home. A couple of my cousins hadn’t been able to make the actual party and asked if Grandma and her siblings were coming by my house after a while and would I text them when that happened. So I let the group text know when they all arrived, and after a bit everyone arrived for round two. The party didn’t break up until nearly ten pm this time, and the farm was so joyful with all the family and stories and teasing and good food. It was truly magical.
My only regret, and really it’s not a regret, as much as just something I want to remedy, is that my great aunt and uncle and aunt had to leave so quickly, it was definitely quite sad for them and my Grandma. So, now, it’s become my whole mission to get them all together again, more frequently than once a decade, because I can’t imagine only seeing Christopher once a decade, I’d be so unhappy.

My sweet cousin is also officially married! To her high school sweetheart, they are starting their little life together and it’s the sweetest thing. She was the most gorgeous bride, and the wedding was so lovely! Just perfect! That happened three days after the party, it was an incredibly busy weekend. It was also fiddle week, which I am usually much more involved in, but understandably, I didn’t have the time to pull anything off. I also have been just buried at work so it was honestly a stretch to get the things pulled off that we did.

To be honest, since that whirlwind weekend, it’s been mostly work. Something pretty major blew up at work while I was not reachable that weekend, and my sweet team kept it from me until I got back, even though I am the resident expert on the particular third party that caused chaos. I am so grateful they waited until I was back and didn’t message me mid party. We got it resolved, and honestly, they were totally handling it without me. I functioned more as a gut check and a safety blanket than anything, and reviewed a lot of code.

Unfortunately though, between that and the on-call shift from hades, I haven’t really been off the clock completely since. We had several major issues, and at one point I worked a 72 hour stint at the computer just trying to keep things from catching on fire. It was insane. It’s calmed down mostly for now, but we are in repair and review mode, and I have a feeling a lot of to-dos are coming out of this. I am so lucky though, I love my team, and most days I like my job (don’t ask me if I do after 72 hours of staring at database metrics though, my answer will change), so when things are rough we get through it together and come out better for it. Startups, am I right?
Anyways, hope you all are doing well! Watch a sunset for me, and as always:
Until we chat again, my friends!

Busy Busy

Posted on by Farmers Blogger

Hello friends!

We’ve had a busy few days on the farm here, but we’re finally slowly making some progress!

First of all, we are getting really close to pulling off the surprise birthday party for my grandma. Don’t worry, she doesn’t know this blog exists, so there’s no worry about spoilers. She’s gonna be so pleased.

We got the cake ordered and the photos all back for the decor. I’d say we are probably about 70 percent ready, which is just awesome. I’m really excited to see it all come together.

On the farm itself, I switched to a summer schedule at work. It took forever for the weather to work itself out, but I am now working on the farm a little in the mornings before I go sign in to work. It’s such a better schedule for me, but it only works in the summer when the sun is up and it’s not completely frigid. It’s my favorite schedule.

We got the sprinklers fixed in the pasture. And then refixed. And then rerefixed. See, we knew we had some that had gotten busted in the last few weeks, so we went out and fixed about seven of them. Lots of digging, sawing, gluing, and wondering where on earth the pipe actually was. Then we took about three hours and mowed the pasture, to give the good grasses a fighting chance against the weeds. It was very hot, very dirty work, but it looks so nice and I’m hopeful lots of those grasses will flourish. Anyways, while doing that I personally took out two more sprinklers we had to go fix. I’m very good at accidentally obliterating sprinklers. Unsurprisingly they don’t like going through the mower. But I didn’t get stuck this time, which is a first.

Then a couple days later, while troubleshooting why the pump had no pressure, we ended up blowing the top off four sprinklers. See, rerefixed.

I think the girls have been scratching on them too, they are so itchy and we have had so many broken ones this year.

We finally got the potatoes in the ground. That’s all we are planting this year, because we have had such odd weather and now are having some irrigation issues. I’m excited though. I’m going to make loaded baked potato soup and fries and chips and mashed potatoes and…I feel we’ve done this conversation before. It’s gonna be fun, plus we’re Idahoans, so we gotta grow potatoes. It’s a rule, they make you promise when you buy land. That’s the truth.

Anyways.

We’ve had a new truck temporarily join the farm lately. A little blue thing parked in front of the garage. It’s a birthday gift from some of my cousins to another one haha. He’s gonna be a driver real soon. Everyone’s been working on it, so it’s been fun to have a revolving door of cousins always out and visiting. Lots of little ones running around and playing in the sprinklers.

Joe recently got a pretty exciting gift. Eighteen whole tennis balls! I was going to dole them out one by one, but on a whim I got his attention and turned the whole bag over on the porch. He lost his mind. He’s been so funny too, every day he goes out and pulls out each one and takes them out to the yard. Sometimes he will bring one up for one of us to throw a few times, and then he will sit and chew on them. Rearranging and rolling and dribbling them like a basketball. Then when we are done for the night he helps put them all back in the little backet I bought him. I’m thinking I am going to need to keep that little basket fully stocked. He is so cute with them, and he loves them so much.

Sweet bean is currently curled up on the couch snoring like an engine, because he played so hard earlier. Being a happy dog is a full time job you know. 

Anyways, I’m looking forward to all the craziness in the next two weeks. We’ve got the surprise Birthday party and a wedding, the festival, and a few things at work; June is just going to be ending with a bang it seems. It’ll be fun!

Until we chat again my friends!

Success!

Posted on by Farmers Blogger

Hello friends!

I am happy to announce that Nellie has been vaccinated and she was such a good girl about it! You guys! 

She not only stood like a champ and only flinched when I first poked her (which, to clarify, is completely fair because I would too) and then she continued to stand perfectly ladylike. Honestly, I was more wigged out about the whole thing because, ya know, needles.

And then! I totally expected her to decide I was mean, which would have been fine, I’d get it, and it’s what’s happened in the past, but she’s since let me love on her and kiss her nose, and she’s let me love on her neck still, even checking the injection site. Which, side note, I’m getting better too I think, because it was pretty quick and I think about as painless as I am capable of making it. I’m gonna have to just allow myself a little bit of ego about it for a few days, and then I’ll get humbled by something and we will all be back to normal.

But seriously, I’m just so proud of that girl. I’ve given her a couple days off of practicing “pokes” so that if there is any bruising or tenderness I’m not just being mean. But I’m planning on casually integrating that with our liberty work often enough that it’s not a big deal next year. I’m just so so so proud of her.

We are finally starting to get things cleaned up around the farm. I’m unfortunately still battling the last remnants of being sick, so I do a little, get super winded, sit a bit, do a little, get winded, ad infinitum. But I’m helping where I can. We finally decided it was time to upgrade the trimmer situation on this farm. The last one decided to burn itself up, as did the one before that, and I finally realized we really need something heavier duty for the Jurassic weeds on this farm. So we are the proud owners of a commercial weed whacker. I just about had a heart attack in the store but I’ve actually been very impressed with it so far. And I am very pleased that a couple hours with that tool saved me about a week of hand digging thistle and weeds. So, an investment piece? Yea, let’s call it that.

We ordered some bark for my out of control garden beds too, so that will hopefully be nice for weed management. It’s amazing how quickly flower gardens get out of control. Hopefully I’ll have some fun pics and videos of the bark next time we chat, I just gotta clean up the detritus from trimming and lay down the weed guard first. I think it’s going to look nice too for the summer when we have family over and just for us, because it’s nice to have a tidy space.

The vegetable garden on the other hand is still in flux because we are dangerously close to freezing still and I haven’t gotten the potatoes yet. 

The magpies sure have gotten aggressive this year. I’ve chased them off attacking Honey for her food and Joe for just existing in the yard and they’ve royally annoyed the horses. Used to be the magpies would quietly sit on Nellie’s back in the shade while she grazed, but now they are so fussy she shakes or crow hops until they leave. Can’t really blame her. They’ve tried chasing us off the porch, but I refuse to be bullied on my own property. They’re ornery little birds. Too bad too, they’re so pretty. They’ve been chasing off the doves and songbirds as well, which is equally distressing. 

Such drama in the bird community, who knew?

Anyways. That’s about all that’s happening with us right now. I know it’s not much, but things have been just weird lately, mostly in the weather department. We are finally seeing 70s, which is amazing, but also, there have been lots of days where I’ve still been wrapped up in a blanket for work. Both my girls have not been enjoying the huge temperature fluctuations, tends not to be great on the joints.

Anyways,

Until we chat again my friends!

We had a pretty good…
…storm cell roll through…
…with winds and hail and…
…lots of thunder and rain!