pictures...

pictures...
if you know me, you know that i LOVE to take pictures!  and if you don't know me and you visit here often you will probably soon learn that i love to take pictures. i love to take pictures of anything, i' not picky.  but i really enjoy taking pictures of nature.  something about it just speaks to me.  so i thought i's share some of the latest that i captured around our farm.  i hope you enjoy them as much as i enjoyed taking them.

fuzzy caterpillar.

beautiful grasshopper.

not one of my best phots, but i thought i'd share the snake in our garden.   i do NOT like snakes at all!

pumpkin.

can't help myself with grass and morning dew.



crape myrtle flowers.



our dryer... used the machine one  maybe 5 times this year.



something about snails... they interest me.

more dew on grass... simple things in life.



simple beauty...



between the ducks and the farmer sons, i'm grateful that i caught this one.

how cute.

saved this bug's life.  it was swimming in the duck pond = certain death!

til next time,

farmer mom



shadows, dogs and ducks. plus a cat...

shadows, dogs and ducks. plus a cat...




farmer dad and i.. farmer sons pics soon



the barn... it is not the hilton hotel of barns, but it is sufficient for night time



aunt beru... she is 1/3 the reason of why farmer dad and i met





anakin... can you tell that we are star wars people?




amidala... our smallest dog



wompa... a young pup

 

the big girls....batman and robin



farmer son 2 duck... batman

farmer son 1 duck... robin





miney

 

the baby ducks... they should start laying eggs on or around  7/27/12





more baby girls



midnight... the greatest cat ever!

til next time,

farmer mom







our largest egg, EVER...

our largest egg, EVER...

have you ever seen a duck egg this big?  thank you girls it was delicious!

here are some duck egg facts for you to ponder...

• duck eggs' body and structure retain moisture better then chicken eggs- making them ideal for baking
• duck eggs can last up to 6 weeks in the refrigeraror, but if you have any doubts place egg in a glass of water.  if it floats- then it is bad.  if it sinks it is good.
• most people with allergies to chicken eggs CAN eat duck eggs
• the harder shell gives duck eggs a longer shelf life than chicken eggs
• anything you use a chicken eggs for- you can use a duck egg instead

nutritional value (per usda sr-21)

18% daily value protein

63% daily value b12

9% daily  value b6

9% daily value vitamin a

15% daily value iron

36% daily value selenium

130 calories

71 mg omega 3 fatty acids

please join us for a demo and tasting at fresh pickins in lafayette louisiana on june 30, 2012 at 10.  hope to see you there. 

til next time,

farmer mom

 our sources: local harvest.org, ehow.com, usda, livestrong.com, and caloriecount.about.com

sign langugage...

sign language...
i thought that i would share some FREE sign language sites.  i have to say that as a mom it makes me teary eyed when other people know how to sign, even just the alphabet, and are able to communicate with farmer son 2. it's always fun  to say " she/he knows how to sign too!" then i see the smile on his face.  it's nice to know that you aren't alone.  know what i mean?  i love going to the store and the cashier sees us signing and they sign their name.  good for you, keep it up!   it really does make a difference, not just to me and my family but to others too.  we get a lot of people asking questions when we are out and i feel it's my job to share the message, so to speak, about sign language and to be that encouragement for them to start or continue.  so, if you have a moment and want to learn something new, i would highly recommend checking out these sites.  and you never know when you might be able to put a smile on someone's face.

the sites are:

• lifeprint.com
• aslpro.com

if you check them out, please let me know what you think.
til next time,
farmer mom

prometheus home school institute...

prometheus home school institute...
so we have taken a short break from school out of necessity. just too much going on and i didn't want to be deemed officially crazy. but i have to admit it feels good to be getting back into it.  the last few days farmer dad has taken the guys and given me plenty of time to get things ready for school again.  we have decided to put the growing farmer sons on the same page.  farmer son one can read and farmer son two can sign. so we are putting them together and going to swap.  farmer son two will learn to read and farmer son one will learn to sign.  not to say that farmer son one doesn't know or use signs because he does , but i'm talking about signs.  not just daily conversation signs.  know what i mean?  so i'm excited about that.  i'm using the ordinary parents guide to teaching your child to read. i love that book.  it explains everything so clearly and makes it easy for me to teach. this might sound bad, but im learning things that i've never know.  since both farmer sons know their letters and their sound we are going to start with lesson 27 with words- am, an, at.  then we will add to it.   i have my words on cards ready, complete with the sign on the back.  to clarify, we are using see, signing exact english,and not asl at the moment.  for now that works better for what we are trying to achieve and in the future we will switch to asl.  they are not the same,  just so you know.  with our reading program we are going to start saxon first grade home school math.  don't know if that is the exact title, but either way i'm excited about it.  that program is very clearly written and thorough.  it's exciting to be able to educate our little farmer sons and feels good to be building a good foundation for them to build their future education and then lives on. i read  in a book something about how my job as a teacher right now is to be placing pegs in their mind, for them to hang information on later.  what a great thought!  i really enjoy the moment when you see them get something.  their little faces light up.  it's priceless.  these are the moments in the future that i will miss and i know it.  trying to embrace it.  so the prometheus home school institute will start up again on monday the 25th.  ready to see the growth and change that they will both make.  will keep you updated with our progress.
til next time,
farmer mom

simple things in life...

simple things in life...

it's the simple things in life that i love.  here are a few... i love waking up early, (well not really but after i'm up, then i love it.  that initial part of getting out of bed is always really hard.) but when i wake up early i have the early morning moments to myself and my and my thoughts.  that is nice.  i love it when i go outside and the morning dew is still on the prairie plants that we don't cut down or better yet, there are the beautiful webs that grace us in the morning.  sparkling with the dew.

.

i love the moments when i am a witness to something that i would normally miss.  like a snail crawling along, determined to reach its destination, wherever that may be.

i love it when flowers blossom.  nothing is like a flower.  if i would change my name, i would change it to flower.  i love the beauty of a flower and the versatility of it too.  it can become a fruit that we can eat.  it helps the bees make honey.  it can make nuts. should i continue?  how amazing is that?   i love it how the growing farmer boys pick me every flower possible so i can place it behind my ear.

 

 i love the colors that surround us.  they are every where, you just have to look for it. different shades of purple, blue, brown, red, green.  it's awesome!  i love making shadow shapes with the boys.  that never gets old.   i love taking pictures.  i could walk around for hours snapping pics.  truth be told, since i got my digital camera, i have never deleted a picture.  i have them all.  discs full.  i love it how a picture freezes that moment in time.  to be remembered later.  

i love growing our own food.  the other day we harvested our first two potatoes EVER! that was so exciting.  that started with a little potato that i forgot to eat then the eyes grew so i stuck it in the ground.  1 potato made two.  can't beat that. 

my list can continue, and i'm sure at some point in the future i'm make a new different list of the simple things that i love.  what  about you, what are the simple thing in your life that you love?

my first post...

my first post...

it all has to start somewhere, right?  and this is that moment.  welcome to fleur farm! 
this is our journey as we officially start our farm  and the life that goes with it. because we are so much more than a farm, we are a family. 

meet the family:

we are a family of four people: farmer dad,  farmer mom, and two growing farmer boys 13 1/2 months apart.  now 6 and almost 5. o my. four dogs: aunt beru, anakin, amidala, and wompa.  one cat: midnight, and twenty seven ducks: eeney, meeney, miney, mo. melba, shirley, petunia, irene. batman and robin.  gilligan, the skipper, the professor, mr and mrs howell, mary ann, ginger. clementine, padma, bluma, posie, viola, flo. wonder woman, bat girl, superman and flash.

on the farm front we specialize in cayuga duck eggs that our girls give us daily.  i am grateful for their ability to do this and for the nutrients that they provide for our family and others.  to be completely honest,   i was never, and i mean NEVER, a bird person.  something about them simply freaked me out and scared me in some way.  but one day i gave farmer dad an organic gardening magazine issue that i got from some wonderful woman from freecycle to read when he had time at work,  and the next thing you know we were getting 10 baby cayuga duckling for valentines day.  they are good forgers, not noisy, and friendly.  plus good egg producers.   it has grown from there with 17 more ducks (snow white, ying, and susie didn't make it).  they are so easy to take care of, and interesting too. i have now definitely overcame my anti bird thing  and cherish our girls.  after spending some time with our 10 originals  we thought,  why not get more and sell their eggs. we would be  teaching the guys  about taking care of animals and running a business, plus contributing to the house hold income.  i'm sold.  count me in.  so here we are today.  starting to sell our beautiful girls eggs. 
  
on the home front, i am a stay at home mom, wife, and home school teacher.   i have always been with our guys.  it was important to both farmer dad and myself that i stay home and raise them.  i'm so grateful for this.  every moment, i am there.  i comfort them when they get boo-boo's, guide them when they need good direction, laugh at the funny things they say and cry over the bitter sweet moments when i realize that the time is going WAY, WAY to fast.  i'm here all the time  and i wouldn't trade it for the world.  i was meant to be a mom! honestly speaking  i was anti homeschooling, before we had kids.  but then having them i couldn't see some other person educating them or spending all that time with them.  i wanted to.  call me greedy! our guys attend the promethus home school institute where they are following classical education.   i'm learning as i go as they are, so that is fun. it's nice to have the ability and flexibility to change things as we go.  i'm learning to go with the life that we're given, not to dwell on what was or could have been, even though there are those moments.   our youngest farmer son was diagnosed with  sensorineural bilateral  hearing lose in 2010.  since then we have found out that it is progressive and we are preparing for the day when his wonderful hearing aids  no longer work for him.  right now we are learning as many signs as possible.  it's amazing to see him pick up on new signs instantly and be able to communiate with us better and us him.  nothing like learning a new language and meeting a whole bunch of  new people because of it. 

 i'd like to document and share our journey as we officially start our farm. but not just that, because there is so much more.   i want to share our life and moments in it as we home school  our two sons and learn and grow with them.  from teaching the youngest farmer  son to read and teaching the older farmer son to sign and i would really like to share the random moments that are completely bizarre.  like the dead mouse  we found hanging in the tree or this other little guy swimming in the duck pond. stuck.  cold and shaking. it seems like there is never a dull moment.

 so welcome.  please join us on our journey