~ May this Day ................................................

Bring you Bright Blessings !

JoyceAnn

~ Nope , I'm not MIA , It's Spring Break ~

Curious J and Little Froggy are on Spring break this week , so they've been staying with me. They keep me busy , I haven't had much computer time and when I have had time , I've been to give out to think much less write. But thought I would let everyone know I'm not MIA (LOL) and share some scenes from this week.

We've made caterpillars .............................

Birds ..............................

and frogs.

We've picked dandelions and violets.

Gathered eggs .....................................

and talked to Jazz and Joy.

Hope you've had a wonderful week. I'm looking forward to the weekend, the weather is suppose to be cooler , we've had summer temps this week.

~ Many Blessings ~

JoyceAnn

A Few of My Favorite ....................................

Scenes from Easter Sunday

My Aunt made this cute bunny cake for the kids.

Little Missy with her Dora basket.


Little Time found an egg.


Little Froggy digging deep for his egg.

Curious J and Little Miss Sunshine on the hunt.

Little Froggy doing the bunny hop :0)

~ Many Blessings ~

JoyceAnn

~ ~ > Happy Easter < ~ ~

May it be Blessed with Peaceful Happiness !!

JoyceAnn

Good Friday and the Goats !!

Left ~ Jazz / Right ~ Joy

I'll be busy today , cleaning , gardening and watching the goats (LOL). But I wanted to wish everyone a Happy Good Friday , hope it's Blessed for You.

~ Be Blessed ~

JoyceAnn

~ ~ Spring Cleaning ~ ~

I've been busy the last couple of days , it's time to finish my Spring cleaning. I sure do wish I had completed it in the colder months , but things came up and I put it on hold , so now I'm back to cleaning. I spotted a small patch of mold in the bathroom and thought I would try to find a natural remedy instead of bleach to take care of it. While I was searching the net for info on natural mold killers , I found this great info about making your own natural cleaning kit. Thought I would share this link , it has some wonderful homemade formulas for your Spring cleaning needs. Click here ~ http://www.care2.com/greenliving/make-your-own-non-toxic-cleaning-kit.html ~.

I'm out of my pine oil and need to make more , but I had plantain oil on hand , so I've been using it to polish the furniture with. I have used vinegar to clean my windows for quite a few years now , but I think I'm going to try that formula and see how it works. I plan to put together a cleaning kit like that one soon , it's pretty neat.

~ Green Blessings ~

JoyceAnn

~ ~ Goats and Violets ~ ~

( Jazzlyn )

I didn't get a chance to blog yesterday , it was a busy day. Grocery shopping was at the top of the list yesterday and now that it's out of the way , it's on to better things. I did have a chance to pick-up a few broccoli , cabbage and herbs while I was in town. Dh bought potatoes the other day , so we'll be planting in the garden this week.

It's been a long wait , but we finally got our future milking goats. I decided to get Nigerian Dwarf Goats , we got 2 females this past weekend. I got young goats so they would grow up around the Grands , it'll be awhile before we have milk. My girls and the grands came over yesterday afternoon to see the goats , of course they all fell in love with the kids. Curious J said "aww " when he saw them and Little Froggy eyes lit up , he said " Sheep " , we all got a laugh out of that. Little Missy loves them and wants to let them out to follow her and Little Time wanted to pull their ears , the kids didn't like that and they bellowed out and let him know(LOL). I've been pondering names the last couple of days. I've decided to name them Jazzlyn and Joyelle , but we'll call them Jazz and Joy. Jazz has more black and Joy has more white , so they're easily identified. They're so precious and I know we're really going to enjoy having them around.

The violets are in full bloom , I harvested a bowl full yesterday and hope to gather another bowl today. I'll be making jelly tomorrow , if I get enough gathered today.

~ Many Blessings ~

JoyceAnn

~ The Weekend ~

Little Froggy and I headed out to feed the chickens early Saturday morning.


He fed the guinea also.


It's all gone (LOL) !




Time for some fun !

Getting started .........................

Weeeee !!

Time for a little scoccer :0)

We picked a few daffodils before going inside.


Hubby and I picked up our future milk goats Sunday afternoon. I'll post more about them tomorrow. But I just had to show a pic , they're so cute.

Hope Your weekend was Great !

~ Blessings ~

JoyceAnn

~ Blessing ~

May This Day Bring You Wonderment !!

~ Be Blessed ~

JoyceAnn

~ Awww ~ Spring ~

I think Spring fever has set in , my thoughts are all over the place , so much I want to do and so much I need to do. I finally found a background for this blog I'm satisfied with , I've changed it several times over the last few days. I really like this egg background alot. The tulip tree and daffodils are in full bloom , they're beautiful this year.

I've been washing and hanging the clothes out to dry , a couple of weeks ago I made this clothespin bag. I had seen one made out of a little girls dress in the Lehman's catalog and thought I could make one of those. But I couldn't find a dress to my liking and since I don't have a sewing machine , a little hand stitching would have to do. I found this little pair of coverall shorts and went to work. I sewed the bottom up and simply tacked the straps above the button closure to hold them in place on the hanger. It works great , I just undo the button closure and it hangs down so I have easy access to the clothespins.

Dh cleaned the ashes out of the wood furnace yesterday , so this morning I gathered a bucket and spread some out in the places were the chickens dust bathe. I read a tip in Country Side magazine that said to put ashes under the straw in the hen's nesting boxes , it's suppose to help prevent lice. I thought it might work just as well to add it to the places they dust.

Two of the hens seemed pretty fascinated by the ashes , they kept pecking around in them , then they finally settled down to dust.

Monday I put a new roosting pole in the coop , this hen seem to be afraid of heights yesterday morning. She wouldn't fly down , she kept pacing back and forth , she would stop , look at me and cackle , then pace back and forth again. After awhile she finally decided to jump down to the roost below and then down to the floor , Silly chicken (LOL).

So , do you have " Spring Fever " yet ?

~ Green Blessings ~

JoyceAnn

~ I've Been Tagged by Art From My Heart ~

Bet you're wondering why I have a picture of a Christmas ornament on my blog. I've been tagged and the game goes like this ..........

Rules:

Open the first file in your picture folder.
Scroll to the 10th photo.
Post the photo and tell the story behind it.

Link to the person that tagged you.
Tag five more people and let them know.

I made this Christmas ornament a few years , actually I made quite a few of them. I sold some of them and gave some to friends. You can see Marie's tagged photo and read about it here ~ http://mariesegal.blogspot.com/2010/03/i-have-been-tagged-by-moonwolf.html ~. I found it interesting that her photo was about Christmas too.

I'm tagging anyone that would like to play , it's pretty interesting to take a peek into the past and see what you were up to at that time. So click on your first picture folder and scroll to the 10th photo , post a story about the photo and let me know because I would love to read about it. You don't have to tag anyone else unless you want too. I'm " It " and I'm changing the rules of the game (LOL).

Thanks Marie , I enjoyed playing tag !

~ Be Blessed ~

JoyceAnn

~ Hard Day's Work ~

Yesterday started out with a beautiful sunrise ,

after my coffee and a little blogging , I went out to feed the chickens. Just as I was getting ready to start raking leaves , that little hawk came flying in and landed in a oak tree near the dog lot. I wish you could have heard me hollering at that bird and making boom , boom sounds like a gun (LOL) , hoping to scare him off. I think it worked , it flew away and I didn't see it anymore yesterday. Of course it probably thought I was a
" human " loony bird :0)


The chickens enjoyed the freshly plowed garden while I was mulching the garlic. I bet there was some good " grub " in the dirt.

Between raking , mulching and picking up sticks I dug a few day lilies and planted them near the pool deck.

I picked up and dumped about 3 loads of sticks in the hugelkultur bed ,

loaded up some rotted wood and started filling in the bed.

It took about 6 wagon loads of leaves to mulch those two rows of garlic , this was the last load.

I finished the mulching , but didn't get as much done on the hugelkultur bed as I would have liked. I was one give out Nana , ready for bath and bed afterwards. It was a hard day's work , but I'm glad it's done.

~ Many Blessings ~

JoyceAnn

~ * ~ Wild Onions & Eggs ~ * ~

Yesterday , I cooked up some wild onions with eggs just like my ancestors have always did this time of the year. It was a ritual of the Cherokee people to cook wild onions and scrabbled eggs to celebrate Spring's arrival. Making them with fresh eggs really gave them a better flavor , so umm umm good.

Dh mowed/mulched our leaves the weekend , so today I plan to rake and mulch the garlic with them. I mulched the garlic back in the Fall but the winds have blew most the leaves through the woods. I'll probably work on the hugelkultur bed too.

What's on your agenda today ?

~ Spring Blessings ~

JoyceAnn

~ Dawn ~

The signs of the dawn are seen in the east and the breath of the new life is here.

Tahirussawichi

Pawnee