Just bits & Pieces

Good Evening everyone!

there is so much I want to write about but decided first you need to see where I was in New York.  so this will be mainly pictures of the Farm where I spent just over 12 months.

 

Moving in day to the 1 bedroom trailer that would be my home while here, the kitchen table was set up so that I could look at the mountains you see every morning while I drank my coffee & woke up.

 

 

 

 

the Farm was sorta divided in half by the road so I was on one side with only a barn within 50 feet & a tractor shop just down the way.  On the other side was the main farm that had the milk barn, Hay barn, a loft barn, cow barn & Main house.  The orange cones are where the cow alley way was for the cows who were in the pastures behind me to come to the main farm side to be milked each day. So I got to enjoy watching them come by each day & listen to them talk to each other.

 

part of the milk barn, it was huge with a small milking parlor as they call it up here

 

The property went way back past this barn behind my trailer & I never did get the time to go up & check out this old barn, but loved the view

 

This is the barn right next to me that the cows went through each day & it had a closed walled stall that I made into a chicken coop for my kids...aka chickens.  I brought the plastic greenhouse with me so they would have a place to hang out when it rained or snowed.  It didn't last the winter cause I did not know I would be battling winds so bad that everything would get torn up or blown away.  after one big storm I went out at 3 a.m. & found the greenhouse upside down on top of the doghouse & I am sure it would have blown into the pastures if not for the plastic netting I had up to keep away the hawks

I got there at the end of September 2012 & was pleased to see how everything was turning oranges & reds for the Fall.  The weather was wonderful so I was able to get quite a lot done outside before the 1st snow came.  The side of the barn that you can see was completely blocked with old grapevines, weeds & bush like weeds as well & took about 5 days of work to clear it so you could even see this side of the barn.

 I had no idea there was even an old broken barn door there until I got the grapevines off.  I ended up with a pile nearly 10 feet long & 3+ feet high of grapevines I cut & pulled from this side of the barn.  No one had messed with this barn in years so it was definitely a jungle as you can see.

 

It seemed that the whole farm was like this so I definitely did not have my work cut out for me!

 

but the 1st job was getting the kids settled & safe so I worked on the inside of the stall putting plastic up on the walls & floor, then laying out hay for bedding, egg laying areas, heat lamps that I knew they would need this winter because the wind shot through the barn plus found a great heavy old wood ladder that made the perfect perch for them that I set on top of hay bales.  The coop ended up being about 12 foot square inside so I was able to put two 55 gallon barrels of their feed in there plus extra hay bales that would stay dry to use through out the winter for them.  I had brought a lot of my 4 foot tall fencing from home so I was able to give them a good large run area that the greenhouse fit into plus a heavy duty doghouse & a good size gate.  I must say I was very happy to get them settled so they could run around & check everything out.  I was able to see them from the kitchen window & with them being so close it was nice to be able to get out there fast if I needed or just to tend to them.

 

I will try to get on here every week & down load more pictures since I seemed to take over 1000 while I was there so I have lots to share with you.  Yes most of them are of the kids but I did try to take some of the things I was working on.  I wanted to before I close share one last picture, its the last one I took before I left Oct 12th & the trees were near the end of their color changing & thought it was something I wanted to remember.

 

Until next time have a wonderful chicken day!

 

M' & crew