It seems that I never think to post until the last day of the month rolls around!
We have been so busy this spring! Numerous projects have kept us outdoors this year: especially the revamping of our vegetable garden. We replaced one raised bed and my dear husband built two new raised beds designed to have a trellis running between them. We also redesigned our garden beds into wide planting “neighborhoods” rather than single long rows. This is a new idea I got from a companion planting book. More on that later!
It has been a long cool spring. This year we have not had spikes of eighty degree weather. Lots of temperatures in the sixties and low seventies, which is just fine by me! We have had a couple of frost scares, including one for tonight, but I am hopeful that we may actually have some fruit on our peach and apple trees this year. Of all my lilacs, only one bloomed, but I have treasured those blooms with their amazing scent, and brought one small bouquet in to the house. I made lilac honey with some of the blossoms.
I have developed a new appreciation for the humble dandelion this year, thanks to an herb of the month box from The Herbal Revolution. The first box focuses on dandelion. The book included in the box has a recipe for dandelion lemonade which is so easy and just wonderful. I am making a quart every two or three days. It is such a nice way to get all the essential nutrients of the dandelion. They have a wonderful herb farm in Maine and a great website. http://herbalrev.com I am letting the feathered ladies out almost every evening to free range in the garden while I pluck plump yellow dandelion blossoms. I also made a tincture with the dried root included in the dandelion box. Next month’s box features nettles. We had pasta with nettle pesto (frozen from last year) a few days ago. Pat is the nettle guy and we are looking forward to nettle season in May. I picked enough violets to make violet syrup which is a real treat, and I made some violet flower essence as well. A friend brought us a lovely bag of morel mushrooms the other day too. We fried those delightful mushrooms up and enjoyed them right away. I have looked in vain for morels in our woods for the past two years, so I was grateful to receive some from a friend. Thanks, Leah!
The big news for April is that our dear older hen, Buffy, turned eight years old! I used Melissa’s recipe from http://tillysnest.com to make a birthday cake for her. I decorated it with plain yogurt, strawberries and mealworms. The cake was real hit with the hens. So we celebrated all their birthdays and Buffy was nice enough to share her cake. Buttercup is five, and Maisie and Daisy are two.
The little chicks are growing up fast. They are still in the basement, in a puppy playpen, but have enjoyed a couple of afternoons outdoors. I have named them all and I am hopeful that I truly have all pullets and no roos. Their combs are still small and very pale at six weeks. I have not had that kind of luck in my two prior broods. Tinkerbell and Rosie Mae are about the same size now and are fully feathered out. Rosie Mae is the friendliest and always flies out of the playpen to sit or pretend dust bathe in my lap. Tinkerbell is not as friendly. The other two have not completely grown their tail feathers. Dandelion is smaller and pretty fiesty. Tansy is probably the largest chick of the four and is very friendly. I have read that you can’t really tell about roosters until one starts to crow, though. So I will keep you posted.
I hope everyone enjoyed April as much as I did. I am looking forward to May planting and putting my young chicks out in their grow out coop.
These things are all silver linings on which I chose to focus. Spring is a good time to look for silver linings. What are yours? Please comment below!
Under A Hen's Wing 