Update from around the farm and other projects, Part 1

 This is our back garden, we've planted it this season with onions( white), mini pumpkins, Indian corn and cabbage.  The corn came up spotty so we replanted the places that needed replanting and pray they come up quickly.

 These are the raspberries, transplanted last Spring, when we thinned out the main patch. So far so god they all look healthy and even are blooming and have small berries on the canes, YEAH!!!!

 These are the strawberries we transplanted and filled in with new bare root plants last summer, praying for a bountiful crop, they are just beginning to bloom and all are everbearing :o)

 Left side of the main garden, you can see our red onions, Walla, Walla onions, lettuce, Swiss chard, kale, radicchio and farther out are the pole beans, cukes, cantaloupe, bush beans tomatoes( wall of water around them) and finally broccoli. Everything is slow coming but now that we've warmed up it's growing much better, PTL!!!!

 Okay no looking at all the weeds, I could just say it's portulaca and we eat it, and it is but we don't eat it, it just needs to be hoed out. Seems Cortney and I get a few rows looking good and it rains, just enough to get the bindweed to growing. If anyone has experience with this gardeners nightmare you can sympathise. It's truly a never ending battle and by the time we start canning and preserving  it pretty well takes over the garden*sigh*   We had a bountiful crop of asparagus this spring, we ate it 4-6 times and I shared it with my brother and neighbors. Plus included a bag in our 3rd week basket for our CSA customers, they were all thrilled!

 Not many flowers yet, and I'm ashamed to admit my flower beds are a mess and most likely get reworked for a Fall planting in hopes of beautiful flowers next year*sigh*  There just isn't enough hours in the day, nor enough of Cortney and I to go around, LOL!!!!

 This is right at the end of our driveway and it's absolutely beautiful this summer!!!  The taller plant in the far background has beautiful yellow flowers that are about to open as well.

 Phlox in a mess of a weed bed( can no longer call it a flowerbed the bindweed and other weeds have absolutely taken over, I shamefully admit this *sigh*

 My pink tea roses are just beginning to bloom, as are the purple bells, usually they are almost done by the end of June.

 Another weed bed, I'm going to dig out the perennials and then weedwhack the rest, till and keep it till until Fall, then seed for a Spring crop for 2012, or so is the plan*wink*

 Montana has been facing some fierce storms, thankfully these all seem to follow down the Pryor Mountains , skipping by us. This is truly a blessing as many of these  storms have had hail as large as baseballs and winds into the 85mph range.

 Here is a close up, it's building and as your can see is FULL of moisture, scary!!!

 Here is what we saw and took comfort in God's promise, we've certainly had our share of rain, the month of May we had a total of over 9" above our normal yearly rainfall totals. What worries me is that we won't get anymore and we certainly don't want hail!!!!  We've also been under two tornado watches, with 5 tornadoes( EF-0's) touching down in and around our areas( within 40-75 miles of our farm.  The river is VERY high and the snow pack in the mountains is STILL at 90% of normal and with our temps rising into the high 80's and 90's F it's melting off to quick. There is worry of flooding but we pray daily it won't affect us. 

 In other news, this is a project my Dh has been working on at his outside the farm job. The owner contracted them to build this small cabin to be hoisted via a crane onto his above ground foundation.  As luck would have it, it was a beautiful day with no wind. The crane operator's skills were amazing!

 The cabin was placed in one fell swoop, so to speak*wink*

 It only needed to be adjusted on one corner and just 1/2", which Mike and his crew did with the use of our old Farmall M tractor.

That's my Dh( Mike) on the tractor, it all went so well, they all were amazed and very happy to have it up and in place. Now the rest of the job can be completed. It will have a covered front porch area and the insulators and sheet rock contractors are due in later this week. The owner is very happy with the work being done. I'll get more pictures as they progress. BTW, this is just up the road from our farm, so it's nice to have Mike working so close, he can come home for lunch and is home by 5:30 pm :o)

I'll get more photos of our animals, hay crop and Cortney's surprise and post it maybe by the end of the week, keep checking back. :o)

Wonderful, Crazy and wild weekend!

Yep, it wasn't just the typical run of the mill Father's Day weekend for us. You see my Birthday was on Sunday too! The weekend started off with Cortney leaving early Friday afternoon for a B-day party at a friends. They had a great time,and even though it was only in the mid to low 60'sF that didn't stop them from swimming in a pond and even challenging each other on the zip line dropping into the pond. She didn't get home until 11pm. Mike and I took a more relaxed approach to Friday night and snuggled on the couch, watching an old western; Steve McQueen in "Wanted Dead or Alive". It was actually a series and we watched two episodes before dosing off to sleep on the couch.*wink*  Saturday morning I awoke to a beautiful bouquet of wild flowers in a vase that Cortney had gathered while at the B-day party, those and a card were left for my B-day on the kitchen table, very sweet and touching. :o)  She again was off and running only this time with her Uncle and his girlfriend, to the local motorcylce hillclimbs. It started at 2pm and she was home around 11:30pm. She thoroughly enjoyed the day and got autographs from almost all the riders.  Mike and I went to the city and did some pawn shop hopping, looking for some work related tools and other treasures. Sadly none were to be found, but we enjoyed the trip and the search. Mike took me out for lunch and then back home to care for animals and relax a bit. Out of the blue Mike says lets go! I said, " where?", he said, " It was a surprise!", so we cleaned up and headed out. Turns out we went to a movie, which was fun and a nice break from all the work we've all been doing around the place and on Mike's outside job.  At midnight Mike gave me one of two of my B-day gifts( get your minds out of the gutter*wink*)  here is the first one, isn't it beautiful!!!!  I was shocked, he typically isn't so romantic, just shows there is always room for change; and let me tell you I love it!!!!( the necklace and the change, even after 27 yrs he can still knock my socks off*wink*)

Here is the second part, which he gave me Sunday morning after breakfast. Didn't he do a fabulous job of picking such beautiful necklaces?  I'm still floating on a cloud!

 Here is a close up( above), it has tiny diamond chips inlaid around the stone and it's so delicate.

Cortney then told us she was taking us to lunch in the city, for Father's Day and my B-day. We let Mike choose, as Saturday was my special time with him for my B-day. Mike picked Applebees and we had a wonderful lunch. I knew then after a call or two on the cell phone that he and Cortney were up to something, finally they confessed they'd invited my brother and his girlfriend over for a BBQ and a movie.  The evening was filled with good food and great conversation. In getting to know my brother's girlfriend we truly have so much in common, and we laughed and laughed at Cortney and my brother telling about being lost at the hill climb. Cortney kept saying, there were so many people, millions it seemed, LOL!!!  All and all we ALL shared and had a wonderful weekend, I personally, was sad to see it end, of course I never like to see Mike go back to work. I'd much rather he could be here more, but we still need a paycheck of sorts until we can get his hydraulic repair and CSA garden businesses off the ground, then he can come home to work, which I'll love and so will Cortney!

Praying your weekend was filled with many blessing and wonderful memory making moments, Ours sure was!  BTW age is just a # to me so I'll share, I'm proud to be 46 yrs old! LOL!!!!

I do have updated picture of the gardens and what we've been up to around the farm and will try to post mid week, keep checking back *wink*

Homeowners foreclose on Bank of America, yep you read it right!

I was doing some catchup reading in my email and came across this and it just made me giggle and see a spark of hope, that people are beginning to fight back!  I would have loved to have been there to see this whole thing go down in person, it's about time, " We the People" take back the power from the Banksters!  Enjoy :o)

Homeowners foreclose on Bank of America


Wednesday, June 08, 2011 by: Neev M. Arnell

(NaturalNews) In a role reversal that would bring satisfaction to many a struggling American, a foreclosed couple foreclosed on a Bank of America branch last week.

Warren and Maureen Nyerges, of the Naples, Fla. area, bought a home with cash in 2009, yet in 2010 Bank of America tried to foreclose on them. It eventually took a court intervention to remedy the situation. (http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way...)

In December 2010, a judge said that the bank wrongfully tried to foreclose on the Nyerges home (http://www.digtriad.com/news/waterc...) and ordered the bank to pay the couple $2,500 for the attorney fees resulting from the mess. But months later, the bank still had not paid up.

The Nyerges hired a lawyer, who pursued a levy, and Friday, June 3, it all came to a head. The lawyer came to the local Bank of America branch with the sheriff, the media and a moving truck.

"I'm either leaving the building with a whole bunch of furniture, or a check or cash or something," the attorney, Todd Allen, said.

Sheriff's deputies entered the branch shortly after 9 a.m., and presented the bank manager with a court writ and the choice familiar to so many former homeowners in America: Pay the money or prepare to lose possessions.

Allen ordered the deputies to take photocopiers, desks, computers and whatever cash was in the drawer to settle the debt. The bank manager on duty was "visibly shaken" he said.

"Having two sheriff's deputies sitting across your desk and a lawyer standing up behind them demanding whatever assets are in the bank can be intimidating, but so is having your home foreclosed on, when it wasn't right," Allen said. "They've ignored our calls, ignored our letters, legally this is the next step to get my clients compensated."

The Nyerges submitted multiple pleas for the money owed directly to the bank many times.

"I talked to branch managers, I called anyone who would listen to me," the couple said. "And I wrote a certified letter to the president (of the bank). No response, nothing."

After about an hour of being locked out of the bank, the bank manager relented and handed Allen a check for the legal fees.

"As a foreclosure defense attorney this is sweet justice" Allen said, because this situation is just a symptom of a larger problem.

Sources for this article include:

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way...

http://www.digtriad.com/news/waterc...

http://moneyland.time.com/2011/06/0...





Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/032642_Bank_of_America_foreclosure.html#ixzz1OmWpBpd2

We're returing from the land of neverending grey and rainy days (photo heavy)

Yes folks, we've had grey and rainy days for so long now that  when we woke this morning to this we were ever so blessed!

Welcome back Montana blue skies!

                             Our tomatoes are ready to be planted in the greenhouse

                       This temperature was at 6:30am, it's supposed to be almost 70F today!

 The garden seems so behind and we're actually very thankful that everything seems to be germinating and doing well, especially after a week or more of truly being under water. In a weeks time we received over 10" of rainfall. There has been major flooding all around us and the river we are on is extremely high and we've not even begun the snow pack melt  It's been in the news HERE, many of the towns flooded are within 10( Joliet flooding) to as far as 100 miles(Hardin) from our location.  Tomorrow and Friday are supposed to be wet again, this won't help. It seems as if we are now to get a few dry days followed by a few wet days. Flooding is a concern as is being able to get the remainder of our garden planted*sigh*

                    Raspberries are doing well, but the strawberries are yellow, and don't look good at all.

 This is lettuce it's been planted since mid May and this is all the taller that it is. For a week or more it was submerged under 4-5" of water, so we're just glad to see that it survived!

 Garlic is looking good as are the weeds! LOL!!!!

 Thankfully we've been able to support our CSA members with salad crops from the greenhouse, while it's been wet and cold outdoors it's been a pleasure to work in the greenhouse!

 Tomatoes are scheduled to be planed in the greenhouse tomorrow and the eggplants are waiting their transplant as well, we however did manage to get our peppers planted. Our second crop of radishes will be ready for harvest this week for our CSA members. The green onions are about done, they are getting to big and almost a woody texture, so we'll sub in herbs and other crops such as Rhubarb and Asparagus!

 A shot of some Late Flat Dutch Cabbage we have in the greenhouse, as well as some of the "HOT peppers.

 Chives are doing well with the moisture levels

 Raspberries coming along, now we need to work on cleaning and thinning them out a bit. :o)

                         Our Freedom Ranger meat chicks, we've only lost one and they are ready to be butchered, maybe this coming weekend, if the weather is nice. It will be nice to have fresh chicken in the freezer again, all we have right now are stew hens.

 Take a look at this BIG Roo! I'm betting he'll dress out 6+ lbs and the blessed thing is that he's able to walk, run and even flit about, not crippled like some meat breeds would be at this point.  We've found a breed and we're sticking with them.

 The tulips are just now beginning to open, Irises are a few weeks out yet I'm betting.

 This is NOT supposed to be a water garden, the soil is so saturated it won't drain off, we'll have to drain it by hand this afternoon. Poor chives are still growing, amazing!

 Lilacs all around our area are thick and beautiful this year, as are all of the fruit trees in bloom! Praying for a good apple crop this season, we're running seriously low in our pantry.

 Poppies about to bloom, it will be nice to have some color and it's right outside one of our bedroom windows

 Worked on cleaning up herb beds and flower gardens yesterday and here is proof, LOL!!!!

 The fire pit it full, now to have a fire and roast some Marshmallows :o)

When it was raining I made good use of my time indoors and mended a pile of clothes I had, including 6 pair of Mike's jeans which I patched in several places. Working with metal roofing and construction is hard on clothes.  Anyway I felt good about getting some much needed projects done.

We have 12 poult turkeys and all are doing fantastic( even in the cold rainy weather). I'll get photos of them ASAP!  Ginger and Angel( our goats) are doing great and their kids will hopefully be going to their new homes this weekend.  Ginger is giving us 2-3 qt. of milk a day and we're still sharing it with her wether, although he is self weaning and eating more hay and grazing more. :o)

It's going to be a busy few weeks so our posts will be limited, sorry, but we have to get thing planted and catch up around the yard and gardens. I miss not having more time to visit your blogs and to even reply to your comments, but as I always say; "Life Happens" and we take it a day at a time here on The Never Done Farm!  :o)

Blessings to each of you this week, we're praying for sunshine filled days and more energy to get more things done! LOL!!!