Yesterday was a day of two halves. In the morning is was wet and miserable – with rain drops so fat and heavy that it seemed to come in monsoon proportions. But the ground was already overflowing so the new rainfall just lay on the top of the lawn, with only the tips of the as yet un-mown grass poking through a sea of mud and water. I was so yucky outside that I slow cooked a pea and ham soup, filling the house with warm aromas of winter.
Then I gathered together all my supplies and sat at the kitchen table and gently and lovingly sowed my tomato seeds for the season to come. For me tomatoes are the epitome of summer. A summer veggie garden without tomatoes doesn’t actually qualify as a summer veggie garden – it’s just pretending to be a summer garden. So I savoured the moment. Sowing tomato seeds evokes such pleasant thoughts of all things hot and sunny. Without wanting to wish my life away – I can’t wait for the sunny season and having a garden full of flourishing plants.
Once I had finished tucking my seeds into warm seed raising mix, I looked out the window and all my summery thoughts evaporated. It was still raining. I needed to take my seeds out to the greenhouse – in the rain. So this was the ideal time to put in to place a plan that had been rattling around in my head for a long time. I gathered up my hoses and irrigation stuff, headed out to the greenhouse and set to work.
Using cable ties I secured irrigation hose to the top shelf and then installed some mister nozzles and then connected them all to the tap. Much to my surprise – it worked! Now I can water my seedlings in the greenhouse, by just nipping around the corner of the house, and I won’t even need to get wet! Awesome! This description of the installation doesn’t even begin to do it justice – but that’s OK because I videoed the unfolding drama and excitement and loaded it onto You Tube, so you can watch it by clicking >HERE<
Then the second half of the day kicked in. The rain stopped and the sun came out. I’d like to say the place dried out – but I think we need a month of Sundays for that to happen. It was time for the next exciting thing of the day. So we jumped in the car and drove to a motorway service centre a little way further down the country and met a man we’d never met before who gave us the cutest bundles of fluffy joy!
We now have in our wee menagerie one cat, 2 goats, 1 rooster, 4 chickens, 5 baby chicks and TWO TINY BABY LAMBS! The lambs are only 4 days old and are the sweetest things. They are destined to become champions at the hands of Tim the Helper and the Joeyosaurus. We are expected great things these wee teams at the school Calf Club event in October. This is something that country schools do here in NZ and such great fun. The kids compete for cups and ribbons for various animal rearing skills and if they are lucky then they get to go to the next round of competitions at the inter-school Group Day.
The lambs are the cutest little things and as yet the drudgery of the late night bottle feeds and the frustration of yet another successful escape from the chicken coop to the veggie patch, and the nagging to getting the kids to spend time training them – once the novelty wears off; has yet to kick in. It is Day Two and having lambs is the coolest thing about living in the country in the spring – apart from having tomato seeds in the process of emerging from the soil.
Come again soon – there is never a dull moment around here!
Sarah the Gardener : o )
What a lovely post and full of the hope of spring…its still freezing cold but the sun is shining here in Tasmania. Today we lost one of our duck but hopefully she is just broody as the other one (her sister) is fretting without her. Your lambs are lovely and a great lesson for your children as well because there is nothing like having to look after animals warts and all to make children realise the lessons of responsibility are important NOT negotiable 🙂 Glad it fined up in your neck of the woods…wish it would rain here! It has been a particularly dry winter and they are talking about hot hot HOT for summer. Totally not Tasmania and totally not me! I take my cues from you and so its tomato seedin’ time on Serendipity Farm! 😉
HI there. I would happily send you some of our rain. I am getting so tired of having to wade across the lawn, and despite my best efforts the mud is working its way into the house.
I always get that sick feeling in my tummy when one of the chickens don’t come back – unless it’s Brandy because she is super sneaky! I hope your duck comes back!
Its great for the kids to have animals to be responsible for, especially in these days where the lure of a screen – any screen – is a very strong pull! Keeping the lambs is also part of a school competition, so they learn that sustained hard work pays off. We will have the lambs for about 3 months before we have to give them back.
I sometimes wish that we only had our chickens for 3 months and could then give them back! We now have 29 of them (including a rooster) and they are rendering Serendipity Farm a bit of a quagmire as we let them free range. I wonder if we could “borrow” some sheep to eat our grass? Great idea! I agree with you about the screens. I find myself mesmerised by them on a regular basis and its been a fair while since I was a kid ;). We have silty river soil just barely covering rocks and clay so I know what you are going through. Luckily we have a steep block and most of our water heads south but now we just need to work out a way to channel it back into the ground without digging swales (too many rocks) so that it works for us and not for the Tamar River! Love your blog and reading about your struggles. It makes us feel like we are not alone in trying to weather the odds 🙂
This was great – hubby watched the video with me, as he just put a similar system in our greenhouse. But since we had to use the materials on hand to build it, he thinks it needs another coat of paint inside before he does a misting system. So, until we find that REmissionary linoleum and pain the wood part of the walls, we’ll just have to do drips. But we SO enjoyed watching the video!
Oh, and the lambs are so, so cute. Reminded me of when I was 10 and got a baby lamb (uhm…redundancy! ALL lambs are babies! 🙂 ).
Hi there. I’m pleased you enjoyed the video. We had heaps of fun. I have discovered that in order to “mist” I don’t need to turn the tap on too far – otherwise it becomes a bit of a maelstrom! The boys think they are going to hang out in there, in the heat of the summer, to cool down.
The lambs are just the cutest. I always forget how small they are. I like to think ‘baby lambs’ are the tiny new ones, because it doesn’t take long before the soft fragility disappears and they become big and boisterous lambs – but still very cute.
Cheers Sarah : o )
Hi Sarah the gardener! Love the system for watering your seedlings. We were talking in the weekend about getting a little frame thing so we could sow our own seeds. It’s magic eating food that has started off from something so small!
Interesting regarding the hoses. Friends gave Iggy and me a generous supply of garden vouchers when we were married six years ago. (A fantastic gift!) I think they thought we’d buy a stunning patio pot or a tree. Instead, Iggy bought a top-of-the line non-tangling hose. I think kind thoughts of our friends whenever I water the garden and Iggy loves them to bits every time he washes the car – he doesn’t have a David Brown to love.
And as for your boys and the lambs – gorgeous. When my kids were little we hand reared two orphan lambs for farming friend. One was Roger because he was bald like my first husband’s boss, who was Roger. The other was Shishkebab, for reasons that I did not explain to the kids.
Hi There. Starting things from seed is so cool with the bonus of being so much more affordable than buying seedlings or even veggies from the supermarket for that matter.
If you do get a wee greenhouse then the best advice I can offer from my experience is make sure it is well secured to something. Tied down or bricks in the bottom as I can assure you there is nothing more heartbreaking than having all your seeds and seedlings up turned in a big gust of wind.
We’ve still got too much city in us yet, as we cant bring ourselves to eat our “pets!” I think this is where we are going wrong – we are naming them and not calling them “livestock”!
Cheers Sarah : o )
What is it about lambs that makes them so cute and photogenic ! As you sow your tomato seeds I’ve just started picking mine……
Hi Claire. How cool would it be able to pick tomatoes all year – or would that take a bit of the magic out of growing them and eating them fresh in summer?
That’s the best thing about having a garden is eating seasonally – something the world seems to have forgotten. – Having said that I have attempted to overwintered some tomatoes in my greenhouse!
Cheers Sarah 😮 )
The lambs are adorable…And we have tractor-envy…;-)
They are the sweetest wee things. Not quite sure what we are actually going to do with the tractor – I think we need implements! First on the list is a slasher / mower. Cheers Sarah : o )
Lambs!
They are so adorable!
It seems so strange reading about you planting your seeds with such anticipation while we’re busy harvesting our vegetables. The world’s a wonderful place!
Christine
Hi Christine. I love reading about gardening in our off season – it keeps me motivated and excited when outside all I can see is rain and a sea of mud! Hopefully I can repay the favour and have harvest stories for you to read when you are starting out your new seasons seeds.
Cheers Sarah : o )
Lambs =D
If it helps your worry at all, when I was a child we had lambs every spring (small flock of 9-12 sheep) and the bottle feeding of any bummer lambs never got old for me.
Hi there the lambs are still very much gorgeous creatures. Despite having to go out in the wet and cold to do the evening feed – I’m still glad it is an opportunity the kids get to be involved in! Cheers Sarah : o )