Gang Aft Agley

Kiaya and I uncovered a coyote den, at least thats what we think it is, we are going to try and find out if its occupied. If it is we think we shall set Keigan up with a tent and a telescope to watch, as long as he doesnt come back eating mice, we will be ok. He is getting set to be Kansas’ own Farley Mowatt, with his taking care of the wounded animals. He swings between growing up to be an ice cream maker, and a naturlist( his own words) I suspect if we don’t keep an eye on him we will soon spot all sorts of creatures in his pockets. I have already caught him giving frogs a ride from one area to another.

All gone at this point.

At some point I have run across poison ivy, again. 2nd time this summer, though I am getting better at containing it. It seemed like a yearly ritual for me while I was younger to get Poison Ivy from head to toe. They called me the Calamine Kid.
I have discovered that hot showers, strong soap and rubbing alcohol or apple cider vinegar poured on it seems to help. S makes a nice mud mask for it, but we cant locate half of her products right now, we know they are in those few boxes we haven’t touched, but it always seems that something is more important to do. Benadryl lotion smeared on at bedtime helps while sleeping. The worst place I have it right now is at the base of the little finger and ring fingers, though it doesnt seem to be spreading anywhere else, and most patches are gone at this point.
No one has taken care of the back portions of this property for quite a few years, and the poison ivy has started to take over large portions. I came across a patch the other day that was 15 feet wide and long enough that I gave up trying to go around it. The sunflowers in the south field manage to dwarf that patch though. When I get the tractor going I will return and mow it down. Some of it was up to my waist in height. We have been told that Llamas will take care of poison ivy for you, but we haven’t had a chance to pursue it. We would have to fix up some of the outbuildings to give them shelter, and figure out a way to wake up more than an hour before work, though I expect the kids could take care of them till the novelty wears off.
we have been advised to use roundup to remove the poison Ivy, but we both refuse to ruin 25 year organic areas for a little ease, so will continue looking for a way to remove it organically.

Goats were tried previously and seemed to prefer everything else more than the poison ivy, so Goats are out.

Keigan and I turned our hand to making fresh yogurt, I remembered seeing the recipe in Laurels Kitchen It is extremely easy to do, now that we have a stove with a pilot light. Laurels Kitchen is a great cookbook, something we refer back to constantly, adapting the recipes to fit the ingredients we have on hand. Our Yogurt never fully solidified, but was the consistiency of Kifir, a yogurt drink. The boys were quite disapointed that it was not strawberry flavored from the start, but a spoonful of Jam changed that, though I dont think I have any converts to my yogurt. S and I tried it with a bit of real (canadian) maple syrup, that was a real treat, and I suspect our syrup stash will start to diminish quite rapidly.
Somehow the morning slipped away from us, while we cleaned house and organized our many belongings. We were told that 5 moves equals one fire, if that is the case we are moving wrong, as we have so much stuff that we are trying to cram into this house. Friends have told us that the house is quite large, which doesn’t help much, cause it means we are not getting rid of our extra stuff quick enough. Though we have started throwing out items that we carefully packed and now look at and wonder why. The hardware to a stereo cabinet we have not had for 10 years was succesfully thrown out. Anyway as I was saying the morning slipped away from us and I had to rush Keigan off to his volunteer work. This last year Keigan has been volunteering at an animal rescue facility, mainly injured birds. He has had a chance to feed Horned Owls, Screech Owls, Barn Owls, Bats, Kestrels, Red Tailed Hawks, Crows, Robins, turtles and a fox. This week because of the rain he sorted through meal worms (what a fun job).