You Are Never (Ever) Alone!

There is one thing that is certain... there are no shortage of spiders here on the farm.  It's not that we see that many of them, but there is always evidence that they are here. 

 Yesterday, while walking the horses up to the pasture in the early morning light, I couldn't help but notice this spider suburb.  

There were hundreds of little sheet webs hanging from the skeletal remains of last summer's wildflowers.  traps set to catch unsuspecting insects passing through their neighborhood. 

Another curiosity that I have noticed is how, when we walk around the farm at nighttime with our headlamps pointed at the ground, we see lots of little sparkling eyes staring back at us (even from the trunks of the trees).  On closer inspection, we see that they are the sparkling eyes of spiders watching from a distance.

See?  No matter where we are... we are never alone!  There are actually, on average, 50,000 spiders per acre of green space.  Most spiders have eight eyes, but some have fewer - that's a whole lot of eyes watching your every move!  The good news is...spiders eat pesky insects like flies and cockroaches and in turn provide a rich food source for birds and reptiles.  Isn't this an amazing world?

Another observation we have made (with the aid of our headlamps) are the huge numbers of nightcrawlers that appear after dark.  As soon as we shine our headlamps on them, they zip right back into their tunnels.

Did you know that worms breathe through their skin? Amazing!

Yesterday was pick-up day for our first Azure Standard order.  I was directed to be at a local fairgrounds at 1:45 to help unload the truck.  There were about 40 people waiting in their cars when the truck pulled in at exactly 1:45.  Within 15 minutes all of the orders were unloaded and distributed.  I now have 25 pounds each of hard white wheat berries and hard red wheat berries.  I also ordered a small bag of un-ground rye.

I will be grinding my own wheat and baking bread with Friday.   I have read that using half and half hard red and white wheat produces the best loaf. 

(long-term storage solution)

I will let you know how it goes.

This week I made a batch of herbal mineral bath soak using the last of Summer's dried calendula petals, rosemary, and lavender buds.  It smells divine.  I can hardly wait to use it... a hot mineral soak at the end of a long day!