There’s a rosemary plant hiding under the barrel, rock and large clump of dirt, lol. It will be a miracle if this plant makes it through this extremely unbelievably cold, long winter. That sprig of thyme will though…
A single egg
but fear not! There’s a traffic jam at the nesting box. More are on the way!
I turned around and here she was, patiently waiting her turn. This chicken reminds me of my oldest daughter, she’d be doing the same thing.
It does my heart good to see them waiting at the door again.
Check out the blog post that we photographed and wrote today at Bass River, Inc. These gardener/bloggers are awesome!! We’re growing things and staying warm! Michele
I’m amazed by how happy this little collection of herbs makes me. Remind me to bring them in (or have a friend deliver a pretty metal bucket at Christmas Time) next year. xoxo Michele
After spending the last couple of weeks inside their coop our girls have finally decided to venture out to see what’s going on in the world.
It helps that after enduring snow, ice, wind, rain and extreme cold it’s 55 degrees today.
In all our winters of chicken keeping I’ve never seen them just refuse to come out like this. They sat inside for weeks. Here we are watching the skaters last weekend.
Of course things like that nice heater and fresh peppers to eat may play a part in their decision.
Sheba looks like she’s trying to remember what it was like to be outside.
Our little white hen and one of our pretty cochin look a bit shocked too.
Ever the lady, the little red hen stays out of the mud and just goes with the flow.
I think she knows something that I don’t.
I love her eyes. Wish that beak had focused a little bit better, but we’re a work in progress here.
I still think she’s the one who’s in charge (not everyone agrees). If she is, she just made her nine sisters spend three weeks in the house watching the wind blow.
Free at last!
Here’s the reason for the sudden venture outdoors… everything is melting including the pond. Hopefully the warm weather will last just long enough to smooth out the ice so it can re-freeze and put the skaters back in business.
How are your chickens doing this winter? Are they laying any eggs? I’ve been BUYING free range eggs.
I think we need to do some daylight therapy or something.
said my brother-in-law on the phone the other day… “think about it Michele, it’s all dependent on the weather, it all depends on if it rains or snows and if it’s warm or cold, it’s just like gardening, your always waiting to see how it’s going to go.”
He’s right, it is just like that. Michael and the kids worked hard to cut back the vegetation on the pond this fall.
It looked like this when they started. They cut and sawed and dug and moved everything out to create a nice big space for the rain to fill with water. Then we prayed for rain. It took awhile but now…
we have a skating pond. They’re spending hours out there having a ball!
Hockey is a very big focus…
This guy lives for the sport.
My little girl is more of a figure skater but she was keeping up with the stick pretty well today.
It does my heart good to look down and see this.
I took pictures and cheered them on. The afternoon sun warmed me up and gave me energy…
so I could climb back up this hill…
and head inside to look over seed catalogs and think abut the gardens ahead. While I’m doing that I’ll keep hoping and praying for ice friendly weather.
Last January I wrote a list of resolutions based on Pioneer Woman’s post about New Years Resolutions. She and I made our lists starting with the first letters of the word “resolution”… For this year’s list I thought it would be fun to use the word “GARDEN.
Here’s what I came up with:
Go to the New England Flower Show in March.
Arrange a New England Garden Blogger’s Day here in Salem for sometime in the spring.
Dedicate one hour, three times a day to my home garden.
Expand my reach here at The Salem Garden. I’m thinking about connecting with some garden product lines and changing my look a little bit.
Notice the little things as much as possible, and take photos of them.
Yes, this is a very garden related list, but won’t it be an amazing year if I can accomplish some of these ideas?
–I’m aching to get to the Flower Show this year and the NEWFS garden has been on my list forever. I just have to make time and do it!
–I’ve been thinking a lot about how nice it would be to connect with other garden bloggers in person and I can’t really find any type of gathering here in New England. What do you think? Leave a comment or e-mail me at thesalemgarden@gmail.com if you have thoughts about getting together. It could be simple, low cost and fun!
–Now that my kids are a little bigger and we’ve settled in to the working mom situation I want to get back to my home garden with great focus. I may not make it out there three times a day but if I try to I think I’m more likely to succeed. My biggest obstacle is that once I’m out in the garden I don’t want to go back inside.
–I’ve been thinking about adding some things and changing the format here at The Salem Garden. We’ll see if that comes together in 2014.
–I see so many interesting views and details in my travels that I want to slow down and document with my camera. If will be great if I can, although there’s usually several people asking me to stop taking photos and keep up the pace, please.
Here’s last year’s list:
Rest more, I’m on the run (if not actually running) a LOT!
Eat healthier snacks (yesterday my 18 year old son said “stop making cookies mom!”)
Sleep soundly
Own every decision
Live in the present
Use my camera everywhere
Take my kids to the beach once a week (even in winter)
Increase my blogging skills
Owe no one
Next fall, plant some hellebores, I keep wanting to do that!
This was a pretty subjective list but I must say I did pretty well. Not so sure about resting and sleeping, eating healthier is always increasing, I have to remember to take my camera, blogging is coming along and with such a large family the budget is always a bit of a challenge. I still have some loose ends (like those darned hellebores) but overall we’re on a good track.
What does your list look like? Share in the comments, or feel free to comment about mine. 😉
I was thinking about writing my own review for the year but WordPress composes and sends me this one and quite honestly, I like it. It’s fun to read about my top posts and how much traffic I’ve had and where my views come from with these nice graphics and photos. 2013 was quite a year. There was lots and lots of change and adjustment and re-grouping and figuring things out around here. Sending first children off to college isn’t easy, nor is returning to the workforce after seventeen years, or experiencing a terrorist attack, but I did all of that. I’m hoping that 2014 will be full of amazing gardening times and fun family experiences, and maybe some really good posts here at The Salem Garden. Thank you all from the bottom of my heart for reading and for all of your love and support. Your all wonderful! xoxo Michele
Here’s an excerpt:
The concert hall at the Sydney Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 18,000 times in 2013. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 7 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.
We have patiently waited for our Brussels Sprouts (Organic Rubine Red) to be ready to harvest. Just in time to fulfill the Irish tradition of serving sprouts for Christmas, our Rubine Red sprouts were ready to be picked this week! I was thankful that my husband had gone out into the garden while it was still sunny. We had our first hard frost this week, which gives everything a lovely crystal look, but is cold to be harvesting vegetables!
My husband enjoys cooking, even more so when he doesn’t use a recipe. So I can tell you that they tasted delicious, but I can’t give you an exact recipe! He boiled them for a few minutes with some rashers (similar to Canadian bacon), and then baked them in the oven while the turkey was cooking. They looked pretty too, being rather purple in color. I know that earlier in the…
I wish I could say that I have more, but this poinsettia is my only bloom.
It’s a beautiful color. I love a pink poinsettia.
It lives on the tippy top of our big organizing cabinet in the foyer, far from our cats’ reach.
Here’s the garden this morning. We had about five inches of snow overnight, which turned to rain and slush and is now in the process of re-freezing. Yay! Not really.
If only ice could be considered a bloom.
Click here to read all of the warmer climate posts on May Dreams Gardens and some creative northern climate posts as well. It’s amazing what a difference a few degrees if warmth makes, along with a positive outlook.
See you later sweetie pie.
The Salem Garden 