Open House July 28th

Just as a warning, this post will be lots of words with few pictures!!

 We think we're finally ready to announce some big changes to Wild Rose Pastures. We purchased our current 40 acre farm about five years ago, and at that time (as many of you know), our family politics situation for moving to Ryan's family's farm was difficult. However, in the five intervening years that has changed and we are planning to move to the family farm over the winter. We are not intending to leave any of you high and dry, and especially our Ames and Des Moines customers will be even closer to us! We intend to either continue our business with Pella customers unless the future buyers of our farm have similar philosophy and products to our own and our customers would rather move to working with them.

  That being said, we have a small amount of beef that will be available shortly, and we are having an open house for both that beef and to show our farm to anyone who might be interested in purchasing it. Our open house will be Sunday, July 28th from 10AM-2PM. If you would like to put "dibs" on any cuts of beef, we will hold it for you until 1 PM unless you specifically tell us you are coming after 1. We are only selling by the cut, and pricing can be found here: http://www.wildrosepastures.com/beef.html

First come/reserve, first served! While we can also bring beef to the normal pickup points, we will prioritize people who are willing to come get it on Sunday. If you can't do so, perhaps we can help you find a friend who can! Unfortunately, we are currently sold out of chicken and our lamb isn't ready yet, but we should have a few dozen eggs for sale. Or if you just want to bring the kids, see the farm, and come hang out, we'd love to see you!

PDF directions to our place can be found here:

http://www.wildrosepastures.com/Directions%20to%20Wild%20Rose%20Pastures.pdf

Or the website version here:

http://www.wildrosepastures.com/maps.html

We don't recommend you follow your smartphone or GPS directions! There is a dirt road east of us that the smartphones LOVE to take you down and get you stuck!

If you are interested in buying our farm or know someone who might be, this open house is for you too. It is a 2 bedroom, 1 bathroom house originally built in 1868 but remodeled all the way from studs in 1999. It has a three season sunroom built in 2005 that is roughly 300 square feet. The main house is 1.5 stories and about 900 total square feet. It has a very nice kitchen (the previous owner's wife insisted on it!) and modern wiring and plumbing. It is on rural water, the septic was new in 2005 and was just cleaned out a couple months ago, has a one car garage, and has a root cellar poured in at least 1910. We get DSL internet from the local phone provider for a fairly reasonable price (no dial-up or satellite!). We just put down new carpet in the living room, and the house is in good shape. We put a new roof on in 2012.

 The house sits on a 2 acre plot (handy for financing reasons because you can finance the house itself with anyone without worrying about an Ag loan) with two other major outbuildings on it other than the garage. These include a divided shop with concrete floor and a closed-in lean-to with a dirt floor. Just off the 2 acre plot line there is also a brand-new large chicken building with a concrete floor and a carport for a tractor. All three buildings have power. There is also a well that we put in in 2010 that has 3 hydrants and a frost-free Cobett waterer (that thing is AWESOME!). There is also a small orchard with peaches, cherries, serviceberries (Juneberries), and apples already producing. Pears and hazelnuts should start producing soon as the trees are young.

  The thirty-eight remaining acres are mostly pasture. There is a wooded draw down the center of the property, which is decent but not amazing for hunting ground. The south pasture has been improved over the five years from having chickens on it and also has some clover. On the west there are about 13 acres of tillable land, although it is very sandy and is currently in pasture because it is not very productive when cropped. There are native prairie remnants on our hills because they have always been too steep to till. Native plants include big and little bluestem, indiangrass, compass plant, bush clover, and lead plant. 

  Here is a Google maps picture of the place with an outline where the property lines are. For locating it, you are best off going to https://maps.google.com/ and typing in "Wild Rose Pastures" and we should pop up in Reasnor, IA. We are a 20 minute drive from Pella, a 25-30 minute drive from Newton, and a 45-55 minute drive from Des Moines. We are on gravel, and it is either two or three miles of gravel to get to us depending on which way you go.

  We also have plans for an addition to turn the house into a 4 bedroom, 2 bathroom house that we would be happy to share with you if you would be interested.

  We are asking $245,000 for the house and land together. We are not looking to sell them separately at this point. We would like to stay here until November to finish out our growing season, but could possibly work something out if there was a reason or a need to do so. 

Please help us spread the word, and I'll try to post more pics mid-week as we get this place cleaned up enough to sell! I will also keep you posted on our journey to move a FARM and two young children (are we crazy or what?!?).

Computer, flooding, & shoe quilt

 Greetings! As always, I apologize for the lack of posts. This happened a couple of weeks ago, which made posting much harder:

Stupid computer. Either way, I miss my laptop. 

We had some flooding this spring, this is a picture of the road to our place. Our farm did not flood at all, this is just the first gravel road you take to get to us. I just had to take an alternate route to work for about two weeks. Typical Iowa spring!

I have a friend who loves shoes who is new to the Pella area, so I made her a quilt for her cubicle. I came up with the paper pieced pattern myself, and it has a quote from Marilyn Monroe embroidered on it: "Give a girl the right shoes and she can conquer the world." It suits her perfectly! Everyone asks me about the shoe fabric; I found it on fabric.com by searching for "shoes," and then I colored in some of the shoes pink with fabric marker. 

I'm going to catch up on the kids a bit for the rest of this post. When the tulips were blooming in Pella I took them out for a bit of a photo shoot:

 And as usual, I'm badly behind on my gardening. Sigh. But H likes to help! She's actually all about trying to help, which is very sweet. 

 She's also started to get that whole not-so-camera-shy-toddler thing going on. Luckily she hasn't picked up the super cheese ball smile yet! Maybe she won't...

 Little Z is growing well, and crawls like a pro. Here he is at his grandmother's band concert, she is playing clarinet in the Ames Municipal Band this summer. 

 And here he is at a friend's house, looking contemplative. 

 And now he's banging on the keyboard and I have to get H dressed, so I have to go! I will try to post more very soon!

Chores & Grafting

Ryan went out of town last weekend on a much-needed break, so that meant I covered farm chores for him. Contrary to popular belief, I don't usually do much with farm chores. Just when necessary. Ryan is Mr. Farm Chores. 

I realized we don't usually blog about the day-to-day, so here is "How to do farm chores," Janice style:

1. Get oats from the shop. A staple bucket is about the right size and handy. Keep an eye out for the skunk, he lives there and is currently too smart to be caught. But he stays on the other side of the building...

2. Get a sled of hay. If you're lucky and you're just covering one night, the hay fairy already got you a sled. If you're unlucky, pull apart a big round bale or a small square bale until you have a sled of hay. 

3. Offer the oats to the sheep. This is a distraction. They will try to knock you over to get to the oats. Be strong! Stand firm! This is the sheep version of the "feeder rage" we see in broiler chickens.

4. Pour the oats into an old chicken feeder. Deploy distraction!

5. Go get sled full of hay and dump it into the feeder. The feeder is a farrowing crate turned upside down, and it works really well. Lamb babies are already getting big!

6. Watch lambs eat. This year was much better than last year for lambs, we have around 20 and our mortality rate was closer to 10% instead of last year's 50%+. I'm not sure what happened last year, but either way this year was better. 

7. Roll eyes at the building chicken. All other chickens were moved to the new building, but this one stayed behind. She cleans up oats the sheep leave behind and generally has decided she doesn't want to leave. She doesn't like change. 

8. Get water for the sheep. Carry it back, cursing its weight, and try not to spill it on yourself. 

9. Fail.

10. Go up to the brooder and get the laying hen chicks some feed. Unfortunately, none came out so that you could coo at their cuteness. Laying hens stay cute MUCH longer than broilers. This year we have Black Australorps. We've shown this brooder hood design before, but I have to say it is AWESOME! We are not checking the brooder temperature every couple hours with this thing, they can regulate themselves. 

11. Close the door for the adult laying hens. 

12. Check on the adult laying hens. This is our new building in service, and it's been quite nice. Check that they have water and food, since we now collect eggs in the morning. 

13. Hello gals! We mostly have buff orpingtons right now, with some red stars and other miscellany mixed in. 

And then chores are done! Ryan worked very hard to make it easy for me; the cows have a hay bale in a bale ring and access to a waterer that is hooked to the well and manages itself. They'll be grazing soon, but spring has been late this year so they are still eating hay. 

Ryan also took a grafting class recently, which has been a new experiment. 

We have a couple of grafted apple trees hanging out in the bathroom where they can get light, but not direct light. That pretty, healthy growth you see on the one in the foreground? That's the root stock growing. Sigh. The graft does appear to be taking as well, though. Have you noticed I can't seem to take a picture of the interior of our house without a kid toy showing up somewhere? I have. 

I have been productive quilting-wise, but it is currently all for gifts that have yet to be given and so I can't share yet! I will share after I give the gifts.

As for the kidlets, little Z is growing well and as he should. In this picture, he has recently discovered the joy that is feet. I just LOVE the moment when babies find their feet; H did this too. It is the world's greatest toy! And it's right there, at the end of my leg! Whoa!!
Z can now reliably roll over front to back and back to front, his next step is crawling and he is determined to be mobile as soon as he can manage it.

H is still doing really well as a big sister, although she's trying to find ways to play with her little brother. Here, she is adorning him with post-it notes while he ignores her. She is almost three, and is full of all the drama and discovery that comes with being a three-year-old girl. 

And so, life goes on!

Lambs, Brown Green Baby Quilt, & Easter egg hunt

It appears I am on a once-a-month blogging schedule, but I guess that might just be the way it is right now! I like every two weeks when I can do it, but life's a little busy for that.

We have our first lambs of the season, I think the first was born on Wednesday. They are, as lambs always are, very sweet.

We have two single lambs out of two first-time mothers, which is the way it should be. First time mothers who twin frequently lose one or both, and so far we would rather have healthy singles. Yes, that is a Tidy Cats bucket in the background. A friend and customer of ours generously donated a bunch of them, and we use them quite a bit for various things (in this case, water for this lamb and ewe). Buckets wear out fast around here, and are kind of stupid expensive considering it is just a BUCKET!

I also had a friend of ours have a baby in the last week or so, and I decided he needed a quilt of his own. So I whipped up a quick stash-busting Anita's Arrowhead for him; many of these fabrics I am thrilled to finally give a home to. My stash is small, but it's still too full of fabrics that aren't actually big enough to do much with. I secretly dream of working toward a stash made up of decent quality fabrics with a balanced color scale.I also find that I reach for my tone-on-tone colors the most, like Moda Marbles and other blenders. I think that a little bit of print goes a long way, and I like the look of more pure colors best. Anyway, here's the quilt I made!

I've also started putting blessings on the labels of my baby quilts, and I really like what it adds. This one says, "May you have the hindsight to know where you've been, the foresight to know where you are going, and the insight to know when you have gone to far." 
And yes, those are my toes in the bottom of this picture. I should have stopped long enough to crop it, but I didn't. Lazy me.

Since today is the Saturday before Palm Sunday, Pella had its Easter Egg Hunt for kids. Now, not to be a fuddy-duddy, but in my day they still bothered to put candy into plastic eggs for the kids. Each one was a discovery: "Did I get good candy, or is this one a tootsie roll?" Alas, now they just scatter the candy on the ground and let the kids go at it when they say "go!" I guess this way is a lot less effort, and as a parent I don't have to figure out what to do with all the plastic eggs or feel bad throwing them away.

H enjoyed it anyway, and thought the whole process was pretty neat. And yes, I was That Mom. You know, the mom who doesn't have a cute Easter basket that's just the right size for gathering candy? The mom who totally spaced the whole concept that an Easter basket might be needed for this activity and emptied a grocery bag that happened to also be in the truck to serve as a makeshift basket? Yeah. That was me. Good thing she's 2 and won't realize that I was That Mom this year. I'll try to do better next year!

Z is growing well, and I snapped this picture this morning of a onesie my sister-in-law made for him

It has a bunch of stats for a Level 1 Human, and it's very Geek Chic. He's growing well, though has a cough (we all do, I'm on week number six of this thing) and is still a very calm baby. In this picture he just had his diaper changed, which is his absolute FAVORITE activity in the whole world. This kid just loves his diaper changes.

On a last note, this is my plea to the universe to decide it is spring already here in the Midwest. As I type this on the 23rd of March, it is the warmest it will get today at 37 degrees F, cloudy, gray, and nothing at all is green. Please spring, we need you!! Last year we know you were too early, but now you are too late!

Calf, Mikasa Pure Red, Snow, and Rolling Over

Winter on the farm is not a terribly active time, although there has been a little bit of news. One of our youngest heifers apparently took a little longer to "catch" than the others, so she just had a calf a couple of weeks ago. Ryan and I together got her into the lean-to, she was fairly cantankerous about it. It was the right decision, though, because she had her calf about 2 days after we got her into the barn, and the nights were definitely typical January cold! Ryan thinks it is a bull calf, but it's hard to get close enough to tell. Neither of these cows have the characteristic belts of the Belted Galloway, which we were told would breed true (liars!). Genetics is a funny thing.

Other than that, the farm has been quiet. We don't have chicks yet; we don't usually get them until late March. 

In quilting news, I think I told you we went to a friend's wedding in October when I was 8 months pregnant. Well, being 8 months pregnant and with a toddler, I did a terrible job of bringing a gift (as in, I didn't). So while I was on maternity leave, I went and looked up their china pattern, which is a pattern called Pure Red by Mikasa:

Then I made a small wall hanging to match it for their dining room. I used fusible applique with satin stitching on the edges, and I hand embroidered the stem. 

I'm happy with how it turned out, and I hope they like it. It's about 18x24 inches or so, and it's in the mail as of last Wednesday. 

With winter comes snow, and with snow comes sledding! So H got to go sledding for the first time, and we have a very hilly farm. 

Ryan called me out to capture a little video.

At our next snow, H and Ryan did it again, and he recruited a little help with the sled.

We also brought a little snow inside for her to play with without getting so cold and having to be bundled up.

Little Z is also growing well, and rolled over for the first time today!

I went back and looked, and H rolled over at 4 months, almost exactly. Z is 3 months old two days ago. I might have a mover and a shaker on my hands!

Hawk, Quiet Book, Grow Chart, etc

A couple of weeks ago, Ryan came in from chores with a "You'll never guess what I caught in the raccoon trap." After many guesses, I was unable to come up with this guy:

Yes, that is an angry hawk. We were using a dead chicken as bait, and apparently this guy walked right in. It is illegal to shoot these in Iowa (possibly in the U.S.?), so we took him up to Ames with us and let him go. Hopefully 50 miles away is far enough that he won't find his way back! 

I've also been getting back to crafting and quilting some, so for a recent trip to California to visit my dad I made Hazel a Quiet Book. Some of these pages are more applicable when she's older, but I thought I'd take a shot at it nonetheless.

This page is for weaving

This one is for tying shoes and fastening overalls

This one is for counting beads (her current favorite page) and lacing

The back of the lacing page and braiding

Shape matching (her second favorite page) and a maze. The small pocket on the jeans holds the shapes when they aren't matched up. It's hard to see the maze, but there is path stitched in two pieces of fabric that a glass bead can travel through.

Close up of the maze so you can see the path.

I used almost all materials that I had on hand (I bought a lace for the lacing page, that's it), and the cover is from a leg of Ryan's jeans. The tan pages are also old jeans of his, actually. When I buy that man jeans, I'm really just choosing fabric for future projects. I've also made a slip cover from them and a couple of quilts. 

But back to recent quilt completion. I bought a Goodnight Moon panel online a few months ago because I couldn't resist it. I love that book! All I did with it was quilt it, no piecing or applique or anything. 

Yes, that is a green paint stain on my carpet that I forgot to photograph around. Toddler.

Close up of quilting.

I also finished Hazel's grow chart. This is custom fabric I designed on Spoonflower, and I really feel the quilting added something to it (but that's hard to see from this pic). 

Lastly, I made some tutus for my nieces for Christmas, so of course Hazel needed one. Here Nermal has found the tutu and is happily nested in it.

Lastly, some kidlet pictures. Here Hazel is decorating our Christmas tree with Daddy. Again, Ryan pulled a seedy looking cedar tree out of the pasture. When he first pulled it in, it was 12 feet tall and we decided it was a little big for us. So we hacked the bottom off it until we had something more like 7 or 8 feet tall. 

And Zane before we gave him a haircut. Yes, we cut off his hair at about 4.5 weeks because it was already threatening to become a mullet!

Since we had our first snow of the season today, Hazel had to try on Mommy's boots. Is it just me, or does this really make her look like a manga or anime character?

I think it makes her look like the main character from Final Fantasy 9. She even currently has the right hair!