Let's Dish!

Jake and I had a mother-son date night at Let's Dish! in Towson, MD. We had a lot of fun spending Friday evening preparing eight delicious meals for our family dinners. We made mouth-watering dishes like Prosciutto-Wrapped Chicken with Garlic Herb Cheese, Orange Teriyaki Mahi Mahi with Jasmine Rice, and Bruschetta with Chicken and Tomatoes, among others. It was nice to have some one-on-one time with Jake cooking in a completely stress-free environment. They did all the food prep, all the clean-up, and even provided scrumptious desserts for us to nibble on between meal-making. It was a darn good time, and it was darn-good eatin' tonight as we scarfed down our Shrimp Scampi with Linguine. I've done Let's Dish! with Sassa and also all alone for my own mom's night out. Good times! I recommend it to one and all - alone or with a friend or two.

Chef Jake in his cookin' clothes.

Us at the Warhol Museum photo booth. We used this photo as a template for Warhol-esque artwork done in the museum's hands-on workshop. It was lots of fun!

So long, Sadie

John found our barn cat, Sadie, expired in the back yard this morning. We don't know how or when she went. Sadie was our cat for only two years, but we sure will miss her very much.

har cut

This is the "before" picture of Asa. Here are the boys in North Carolina while staying with the G's. Long story, short - Asa said that he wanted a "bald haircut". He's been saying for quite a while that he wants to be bald. I told him to just give it a few years and it will likely happen on its own, but he wants it now! I didn't particularly love the idea of him sporting a bald style, but I figured that now is a good time to give him his wish - and hopefully this will convince him that maybe his curls aren't so bad afterall (he says he hates his curly hair).

I let him feel his head after the first couple of swipes of the buzzer. Shocking!

We all wanted to feel it.

I told him that this cut was his future-look. He wasn't ready for that look, so we continued buzzing away.

Here is the finished look. He says he likes it, but he quietly asked me if it would grow back before his birthday party. He says he doesn't want the kids to laugh at him. I told him that it would grow back quickly, and if it didn't he could wear a hat! He seemed satisfied with that answer.

Ka-plink, Ka-plank... Ka-plunk

The boys and I went to pick blueberries today with Jake's best friend, Emma, and her mother, Ann. BTW: Are all blueberry places called "Blueberry Hill"? Anyway, we'd never been to pick our own blueberries, however, it was Ann's fourth visit this season!

The bushes were packed with nice-sized berries, and it was really fun to pick them. Asa rediscovered his love for the berries - after a 3-year hiatus.

A great many berries never made it into our baskets, but made a detour into our mouths!

We finally stopped picking after we filled up two large baskets. We took them home and cleaned them, and will freeze half of them, and make delicious fresh desserts with rest of them. I'm thinking: blueberry-vanilla goat's milk ice cream; blueberry-peach cobbler (Ann says she has an awesome recipe), and a straight-up blueberry pie. I love the summer when all of my favorite fruits and veggies come into season!

Milking Time

Ladies of the morning. Here I prepare Ginger's teat dip after milking her.

Wake Up! It's 6:30 in the morning and time to milk the goat. Thank goodness John has made the coffee already. I had decided long ago that I wouldn't be one of those farmers who woke up at 3 or 4 or 5 in the morning to begin milking. Why on earth would you do that when you could do the same thing at say... 9 in the morning? Now I know. If any of you have ever breastfed a child (or know someone who has), you know what happens when you go too long without feeding your little babies! You get so full of milk that it feels like you'll explode, and it hurts so much! Not to mention that it's really difficult to get milk out of an udder that is beyond capacity. You can't just milk whenever you feel like it. Hard lesson Number 87. If you get out to milk at the right time, you can get a nice full udder that's easy to milk out. At this point I am milking once a day (the morning), and getting 5 to 5.5 pounds of milk. This is about 2.5 quarts. The bucklings keep Ginger milked the rest of the day, and then the little fellas are put in their own pen for the night (at which time Ginger is able to replenish her milk supply for me). After the bucklings go to their new farm in a couple of weeks, I'll have double the amount of milk each day, as I'll be milking Ginger in the evening too - the boys will no longer be around to do it for me.

foreground is Ginseng, Sycamore in the rear

Morel Mushroom Find!

Right along the bike path just a few feet from our property line I plucked these rare morel mushrooms. I've been watching this spot for a while now; last year I happened upon about 15 morels here while taking the goats out for a bit of browse. This year, I only found 3.

As a child, I remember each spring my Uncle Paul would take his seven kids to the woods to hunt for morel mushrooms. A time or two I tagged along. I found this a bizzare, yet interesting and exciting adventure. This memory jumped to the front of my brain when I spotted these just last spring in my own back yard.

My man built a milk stand!

Asa just had to be the first one to try out the milk stand!

This stand uses a platform to raise Ginger higher for easier milking by the milkmaid... and a stanchion to hold Ginger's head in place and keep her on the stand until I am done milking her. Now I've just got to get faster at milking because when she's done eating her grain, she's ready to get down off of that crazy thing.

John made the milk stand and a stool for me to sit on while milking this weekend. He downloaded the plans from the best dairy goat website ever, Fias Co Farm. Everything you ever wanted to know or wondered about goats is answered on this site. I love my milk stand!!