Town House Homestead Tuesday.

The weather for the last week has been challenging for getting work done outside. Heavy rains for hours and mud up to your ankles. I need so much to clear a bed for my garlic, but it may be a few more days. While it rains I've been working on my seed inventory and saving what I can from my harvests. So far things look okay for spring. 

A nice hard frost moved in last night. Our neighbors had their lawn mowed, just as evening set in, and the shorter grass made it look like snow.

I spent a while yesterday getting my delicate plants inside and harvesting the beans and peppers that were as close to ready as they would be. I will now start pulling the plants and prepping for spring. Baby steps. I cut the zinnias and put the heads aside for more seeds, and saved this bouquet for some added indoor joy.

Work is slow on the shelves because of the extra help we get from Hunter. He's such a devil dog. He needs time with us outside to just play and run, but I'm hoping that he'll learn to be out much longer by himself. I work with him every day repeatedly to get him where he needs to be. The rails will be up for sure this weekend and then we'll decide the length and design for the shelves. From there it will be getting them cut and stained. I can't wait to finish unpacking. It's been a year and a half already and I'd like to see some of our holiday decorations out. 

Finally the stairway to the basement is getting a face lift. My daughter kept using the leftover paint in the tray, she used to paint the living room, to clean up the dark panelling. We have gray paint left too, so the steps will get done. I like it so much because now when the lights are on it's bright and safer for me. What else is there to do when the rain outside is so heavy. Keep building home equity of course.That's what's been going on this past week at the Town House Homestead. It doesn't seem like much, but oh it is. Thank you for stopping by and have a great week. Share your bounty and love.

Town House Homestead Tuesday

Well let's talk about activity and being busy. So much has gone on that I'm going to make it simple and mostly one liners if that's possible. 

Another find on this lovely half acre piece of the earth has been this peach tree. It's growing through the fence and has just a few peaches, but we'll see what happens. My daughter came across it when she was walking Hunter. 

I dehydrated sweet potatoes for Hunter so that he'd have some healthier chews. The teething and tooth loss has made him a little sick, so we've been trying to make things easier for him. Puppy kibbles are a bit hard so we've been adding some chicken broth to it.

I had a healthy harvest of garlic. As hoped I got 34 heads from the 36 cloves I planted. There are two braids hanging in the garage to dry well for the next few weeks.

Beekeeping has been a real trial. My daughter's first attempt at her own, and the hive split, which is normal. They swarmed to the dead apple tree about twenty feet from the hive box itself, and about eight feet off the ground. We watched it happen and immediately contacted another beekeeper and he came with his daughter to rescue it. 

This is Max doing his first swarm collection and what doesn't show in the pictures is that this is during a very heavy thunder storm.

Close to two hours later when the rain was letting up, Max and Brianna had the box filled and sealed up for transporting, and so far so good for them. Unfortunately one week later the rest of the hive swarmed to another tree 35 to 40 feet up and could not be rescued, but again I saw this swarm happen, and 24 hours later watched the swarm leave the tree and fly off into the sunset. 

This was the best picture I could get of the second swarm. We are sad, but the hive is still active and we will inspect to see if there is a third queen. You never know. 

The long neglected and dying apple tree was taken down. Emily and I needed to release some stress so in a couple of hours we had it down and mostly cleaned up. The future of the stump is still being decided.

One kids trash is a dogs treasure. Our friend Richard brought Hunter a kiddie pool. With a little duct tape repair it holds enough water for Hunter to play in. 

The gardens are growing. Weeds and all. The rose bush in the back I transplanted from a very shady corner of our lot and it is so happy. Blossoming on a daily basis. A bucket of mint and a bucket of lemon balm are almost ready for a good harvest, and there are Iris and spider wart in this corner. Much more growing and lots of planting to go this fall with bulbs. The front flower beds are growing nicely too and we'll have stronger plants to split next year to keep going. 

Everything has to look messy and old before it looks clean, new, and young again. The shed has been cleaned out so that a new floor can go down and new doors built. For now everything is in the pollination garden area that has not been planted, waiting for the new work to be done before it can go back in. 

We gathered all the landscape timbers that came with the property and stacked them in the back yard. These will become two raised beds. One for raspberries and one for blackberries. 

And here he is, the most curious puppy on earth, who stuck his face in front of the camera while I was trying to take a picture sitting down. Don't know what I was thinking. We're learning to work together. Hunter is five months old and completed three obedience classes. Some successes and a lot to work on, but he's still a baby as I am told, and he will get it. So that's how busy we continue to be as we build this half acre homestead. It is paying off in wonderful ways and we couldn't be happier. Lots more to do this summer and getting ready for winter, but even though time is passing quickly, we have accomplished a lot in 15 months. Thank you for stopping by for a visit and have a great week.