A new addition to Prairie School Farms

 Welcome our newest alpaca, Javier!

A few days ago we heard from a student who lives a few miles away from us.  He had a baby alpaca that was an "add on" to his purchase of some guard llamas for his goat herd.  He wanted to know if we wanted to buy the alpaca.

We thought about it and decided he would be a good addition to our little farm.  We were leaving for vacation and asked if they would hold him for us.

Our vacation was in Canada which meant we had a long drive there and back.  We drove the last five hours of the trip this morning and then found out that we needed to pick up the alpaca today - change of plans!  Our original plan was to catch up around the house.

Because of the change of plans, we decided to cut some corners.  Instead of going to borrow the trailer, we planned to transport him home in the extended cab of our pick up.  Armed with a layer of old towels and a blanket, we thought we could make it work.  Some of our alpaca friends have told us they have used their minivan to transport alpacas, so we could make it work, right?

When we arrived at the farm, we found out that he was a little bigger than we thought and not halter broke.  In fact, we found out that the last time they caught him, they had to rope him.  Let the rodeo begin!

After a little bit of running around, we were able to catch him and fit him with a halter.  We made a halting, running and jumping walk to the truck and then loaded up.  We said a few prayers that he would cush into a sitting position as we had been told alpacas typically do in moving vehicles.  Thankfully, after the first half mile, he found a comfortable sitting position and we made it safely home.

Once we got unloaded, we made another running, jumping and halting trip to the pen.  All of the other alpacas were very curious about the new guy.

 We got Javier settled in with some water,  hay and food.  His companion in the small pen is Blue - our ambassador animal.  They were getting along great after a few minutes of getting used to each other.

 

We think he is going to fit in very well here.  Our goal is to have him halter broke within the week.  Can we do it?

All the other boys are still really curious. We will introduce him to the bigger pen after a little more time in the small pen.  I am also thinking it will be easier to catch him in the small pen for halter training. Or, we can put him in the big pen and just chalk the catching time up to our cardio workout for the night.

Feast of the Fields

 We enjoyed a fantastic evening at Feast of the Fields, a farm to fork event held near our home.  We had heard about the program for a few years, but always had a work conflict.  This year, the schedules worked out perfectly and we were able to enjoy the evening.

The menu featured Kansas products - foods and wine - deliciously selected and prepared by a local chef.

We enjoyed a cocktail hour with appetizers and wine.  We then were seated at long tables to experience a four course meal. People came from everywhere.  We were seated by people we knew, someone from Indiana and couples from Kansas City.

 The chicken coop, lean-to and barn were all limestone. This building was the old chicken coop.  We loved the metal work on the barn door and the violas in the window.

 The large limestone barn was the site of the dinner and we waited to be seated just outside.  Before dinner, we enjoyed the beautiful weather - cool and low humidity - with Kansas wine, appetizers and music from a trio.

 The little touches all around the barn ranged from rustic to...

 

elegant.

 The sunset shining through the barn door was magical.

Overall, we had a great night with wonderful conversation and out of this world food.  I would highly recommend attending this annual event.

Plant geek: What do you do with an afternoon off?

 The weather for the past week has been spectacular in Kansas. It is so rare for us to have temperatures this cool in May.  We are also experiencing low humidity which is simply a miracle.

The spring weather also has me anxious to do some serious house cleaning and to work on the garden and flower beds.  We have a pretty good start on the garden and last Sunday was one of those all day cleaning days.  There is still so much to do!

I had been thinking through my schedule and discovered an afternoon with no appointments.  I went ahead and decided to take some vacation leave and see what I could accomplish.

It happened that the weather was super - sunshine and a cool breeze.  The blue sky and white clouds were stunning.

My first order of business was weeding in the garden.  Weeding isn't necessarily fun, but with a beautiful view and great weather, it's not so bad.

 I enjoyed seeing what was growing and loved thinking about the possibilities ahead.  Our potato plants have the tiniest of buds.  (I am a huge fan of these little flowers.)

 I was also glad to see that our rabbit prevention system worked for our broccoli.  Our broccoli plants were rabbit food until we put up this crazy contraption.

 My weeding continued to a couple of flower beds around the yard.  The clematis was blooming!  And, I am sorry that I didn't give it some attention earlier because a lot of the growth was trailing on the ground instead of around the support of the old school bell.

 One of my favorite sights in both leaving the house in the morning and coming home at night is the violas by our cellar door and the pansies by the front door.

 This deep purple clematis is near our garage.  It's never had better blooms.

 The irises are blooming in this amazing rotation - first, the white flowers and then it's just this chorus to different colored blooms.

 And, the columbine is beautiful again.  This color is "old fashioned" to me.  It makes me think of my grandma and how much she would have liked these blooms.

So, on an afternoon off, a plant geek works a little and geeks out over whatever is blooming at the moment. I am also saying many prayers of thanks for the blessing of beautiful weather.

After the storm

 We had a wonderful thunderstorm tonight - amazing lightening, rumbling thunder, and a lot of rain.  We had a few pieces of hail, but nothing too severe and no wind.

After the rain stopped, we were amazed at how light it was outside, though it was nearly 9 p.m.  We decided to get a better look by venturing out.

The entire yard was washed in this amazing light.  I did nothing to edit these photos, just tried to capture what we were seeing.  Unfortunately, my photography skills are inadequate to get great photos, but you get the idea.  Coupled with the sunset, the sky made for a really pretty backdrop.

 Our backyard and the hill beyond looked so lovely.

 

Our wildflowers in the bed next to the driveway were especially striking in the light.  I enjoy seeing these flowers this time of year and appreciate that they are so hardy.  We get to appreciate their beauty without having to fuss over them - a must with our busy life.

So, tonight, we are thankful for the rain to keep our yard and garden growing, a beautiful thunderstorm that was powerful, but not damaging, and the lovely light to help us appreciate our little acre.

A perfect night for a run

We went for a run tonight and it was absolutely perfect.  The weather was beautiful - not too hot, not too windy.  The sky was a pristine blue with puffy white clouds.  The scenery was beautiful - classic Kansas farm ground and pasture land on all sides of our gravel road.  The icing on the cake was meeting a really neat couple who were driving by when we stopped at our turn around.

A side note:  You should know a few things about our run.

We took off on a three and a half mile run.  At about the half mile point, I asked my husband if he had gotten a run in earlier in the day.  He said he had and I asked how far.  He responded that he had run to Westmoreland and back earlier in the day - six miles!

I have always told people that he is a superhero.  The superhero council convened and told him that he needed to marry a mere mortal to diversify the gene pool and he picked me.  Who else runs almost nine miles a day?

Further evidence...we ran a little further and I said how glad I was that my knees weren't hurting tonight.  He responded by saying it was the opposite for him, as his knees were really hurting.  He thought it might be from the strength training he did the night before and the 2,000 jump ropes he completed.  Geez.  I don't stand a chance of keeping up.

Along the run, he did something that I love and tease him about all the time.  I call it lies cross country coaches tell.  He will often tell me positive, encouraging things that aren't quite true.  He will tell me that it is the last hill or that we don't have that much further to run or that we are almost finished with the run.  He is a cross country coach and I hear him yell these things at his runners and we all know they aren't quite true.

This was the perfect run.  And, it just got better.

At the T in the road, we planned to stop and turn around.  My husband asked if we wanted to walk to the south for a little ways, but I told him I just wanted a quick rest and then to run back to the house.

We saw a minivan approach and instead of taking the turn, they slowed and drove towards us.  We got a little nervous since we were in the middle of nowhere and did not recognize the vehicle.  We sometimes see some characters driving around in our area.  We have some stories.

The van approached and we saw an older couple inside.  The lady yelled at us and asked us if we were lost.  My husband responded by saying that we weren't and he asked if they were lost.  The lady said that she thought we were someone else and they said that they had land a little further north and west of us.  We explained that we lived down the road in the old Jenkins school.  She lit up and told us that she attended school there in the 1940's and she had always wanted a tour since it had been remodeled.  We offered our phone number and told her to call us the next time they were in the area and we would show them our place.

She told us a great story.  She hated the high windows in the school because if you need to trace anything, you put the paper up to the window and because the windows were so high, you had to stand on a school desk to reach the window.

We told her that we had photos of some of the classes from the 1940's that were a gift from another neighbor.  She told us that she wore her hair in pigtails and would have been about 10 to 11 years old.  We decided that if she contacts us for the tour, we would have her sign the back of the frame with the photos of the school and students with her name and the year she attended.

The couple told us that they met on a blind date.  My husband told them that we met on a blind date, too.  They laughed.  The guy asked my husband if he was drunk and when he learned he wasn't, the guy laughed and said that he was when he met his wife!  All laughed together and wondered if being drunk or not impacted their decision to go on another date.

I loved that when we asked for some paper and pen to pass along our number, they used an old calendar.  Have you seen those adhesive calendars that are advertising for local businesses with the pull off calendars?  She pulled off a page and said she thought she would use it because it was from December 2012.  This reminded me so much of my grandparents.  They always had those calendars stuck to their dashboards.

We really hope that they call us and we get to visit with them again.

Beautiful Kansas sunrise

My favorite time of the day is the morning. This morning was especially nice to see that we had a break from the heat with a nice slow rain.

The colors in the morning sky were the second gift.

My favorite way to start the day is in our new addition watching the sunrise just behind the hill.

This is why we live in the country.

Beautiful.