Made a banana cream pie today from scratch

Prairie Progress

My prairie project (15,740 sq/ft,1/3 of an acre) started back in May when I sprayed part of the front yard with Round-Up. I did a second spraying in July and a third in September. On September 17th a tree guy came and dug 4 - 30' Maple trees for transplanting to our church in Wautoma. During the first week of October and on October 13th I dragged the plot. On October 14, with the help of my brother Phil, Uncle Rick & Neighbor Harold; using about 20 bushels of sawdust as a carrier we seeded the plot with Short Prairie Mix for dry soil from Prairie Nursery of Westfield. The seed mix has (2) grasses, Prairie Dropseed and (21) flowers. After the seeding I rolled the area, the seed will lay dormant over winter and hopefully next year we will begin to see results. It takes up to three years for the prairie to mature.

A little Corny

Canned 22 pints of corn relish today

It's for the Beans

Although today is nice 70's the early part of the week was for the Beans 90's and humid.  I would much rather have 60's - 70's.

Yesterday was for the beans also, I stopped at the farm and picked 2+ ice cream buckets of Green Beans that my brother Phil planted in one of his many gardens.  I nipped, washed and cut them up last night and canned them this morning.  My goal was to get 16 pints and that's exactly what I got. Since we are usually in Alaska this time of year we don't get to can as much as we would like to. Thanks Bro!

A definite rain mark where the last storm passed across the front yard.  No, really this is the area that has been sprayed twice now with Round-Up with one more spraying (if needed) in preparation of planting a prairie flower/grass mixture sometime late October/early November.

July 8th 2016

July 4th 2016

I walked around the property today and took some pictures.  There are quite a few black raspberries I could pick, we'll see how my time goes.  There are a lot of things I would like to get done before coming back to Alaska, mostly weeding, weed-eating and some mowing.  I found a few maintenance issues I want to address as well, such as replace the bird feeder as the top has been broken off, replace the thermometer batteries and I already replaced a bathroom florescence.

Little Fisherman

Mom repainted this little fisherman made by Grandpa Klemp, today he came to fish our pond.

Trails Planted 05-04-2016

I thought I had some before pictures of our woods trails after the logging operation last fall, but I guess I don't, they were tore up and rough to say the least. After 6 hours of Bobcat work, disking, dragging, planting and rolling they are in much better shape. Thanks to brother Phil for help planting; "Game Changer Clover" (Crimson Clover, Wizzard Canola, Yuchi Arrowhead Clover, White Clover Fixation Balansa Clover) and Kentucky Bluegrass, Perennial Ryegrass and these Fescues; Creeping Red, Firecracker, Jaguar, Screamer LS and Quest and Birdsfoot Trefoil. Now we need some rain to make them grow.

Valentines Day Visitors

We haven't seen turkeys for months and this afternoon about 2 :00 p.m. we had these visitors.  They seemed hungry and were picking up seeds under the feeders.

Firewood

Our wood pile from logging operations