Sugar Sweet Farms 2011

 This year Sugar Sweet Farms went nowhere fast....or so we thought. Even though James and I gave up on the idea (besides tomatoes), Mason and Char didn't. They found a bunch of seeds (from last year) and planted them ALL in a small planter in our front yard one day while James and I organized the garage. To our wonder and amazement, it actually took off! James calls it "square inch gardening" and we are sure that it will be the next big thing in the green-thumb industry. I am just hoping that they planted a pumpkin in there at some point. A Halloween without a home-grown pumpkin is just not the same.

 L: Some tasty peas. R: Sunflowers!

Our boys standing by their winning crop.

Almost time!

Somehow this made sense to Mason, our helpful little chap

Sugar Sweet Farms is almost ready to get started and we Siegs are pleased as punch! We had big plans to blow all of our past Summer crops out of the water by getting a bunch of starts ready way in advance. Sadly, it wasn't meant to be as they either froze or were ingested by a certain dog of ours. Anywho, there is just one more big cold storm coming our way this weekend and then we will plant to our hearts content! Hot dog!!!!

In the meantime, we have started getting things ready for the big planting day. We rototilled the back forty (okay fine....the forty feet by two feet farm lot/strip of dirt by our driveway). This year even Mason and I took a turn behind the wheels! Ooh-HA!!!

While we did the the back breaking labor, Char cheered us on with our Sugar Sweet Pig mascot (the ugliest item sold at the local dollar store. We bought two as Mason was smitten).

James started some more seeds and we can't WAIT to see them grow! Just a couple more days!!!! To get us even more in the mood, I went out and bought the cutest pig weather vane known to man (Okay, I guess I can't tease Mason anymore about his pig purchases) and made a sign to keep it company. Every time I look at them I get even more excited. I love this time of year!

Every farm needs a weather vane, right? We got this one from the collectibles section at D.I.

*****This blog is going private this weekend! If I don't have your address, just get it to me before them!*****

Chicks, chicks, CHICKS!!!

Even though we had a rough go with raccoons and chickens last year, we decided to start fresh with a new set of baby chicks. When we got there, there were so many cute varieties that we just couldn't decide. So we got six. One for each of us plus two. Six cute little friends to welcome into Sugar Sweet Farms. We just LOVE them! As cold as my heart can be, I must say, chickens are so much fun!

Even little Charlie got caught up in the wonder of it all. He named his Milk, after the most beautiful thing he could think of. As you can see, they became very fast friends.

As of now, they are staying warm and safe in an outgrown dog crate (Gunner is now 10 months and 76 pounds so he was kind enough to share). When Spring officially stays, we will build them a little raccoon safe coop in our backyard.

****More happy news is that we now have WORKING INTERNET!!!! Hot diggity-dog!

Close but no cigar

James got an unfortunate phone call this morning. The man that was going to let us keep a cow on his property backed out. James asked him repeatedly if he really was okay with James raising a cow at his place and he repeatedly said that it was totally fine with him. However, this obviously changed once he saw that it was really going to happen after James and Bryce built a pen for the little calf. Oh well. What do you do? I guess Sugar Sweet Farms will have to wait a little longer before James' dream comes true.

On the plus side, at least we didn't buy our calf yet. That was going to be today's activity. However, we did have a ball getting all the milk replacer, bottles and feed for the little guy and that in itself was a treat for my honeybun. James was thrilled and grinned the entire shopping excursion! Even Mason seemed to get a kick out of it. He knew some big adventure was under way.

So even though the calf raising dream didn't come into fruition, at least we got to pretend that we were the real deal for a day. That will have to do for now.

Still Sugar Sweet

I cannot express how pleased I am to be hitched to such a handy fella! It is only June and we have already been eating radishes (well, we picked them and promptly gave them away. More fun to grow than eat, I guess), snow peas (for our Thai food addiction) and oodles of lettuce. Today we pulled up our carrots. What fun!

Looks like we'll be eating a lot of carrots for the next while. We've already tricked Tommy and Aria to come over for a Sunday carrot feast. I'm not sure how excited they are since yesterday I was washing our lettuce in front of Aria and found a slug and a bug in the mix. We like to make sure out guests get lots of protein. Only the best for our guests!

Speaking of Sugar Sweet Farms, I should mention that my farmer/husband has landed himself a dream come true! This past Monday we were helping put down a garden for our singles ward and he found out that our ward clerk has a very large orchard and property less than five minutes away. James started joking about getting some livestock for the ward to raise and keep them there. Before I knew it, all jest was gone and Brother Davis (a saintly name in our house)told him that if he would be responsible for it, James could raise a cow on his land! James was and is elated! I am too. Not only do I love to see him SO HAPPY at the prospect of raising his own fatted calf, but this means I don't have to worry about him sneaking one into our own small backyard. Hot dog!

James had just taken a big Bio chem test. Picking carrots was his little relaxing break before he had to head off to work.

Mason already feeling overworked and underpaid.

Pregnant woman waddling

James, with his harvest of radishes...too bad we don't really like radishes....

I am now 18 weeks pregnant and feeling mighty fine...in a pregnant sort of way. I had been running my entire first trimester to fight off the morning sickness. However, as soon as I started feeling better and after I strained my calf, I have been living the sedentary life of grandeur! I tell myself this is okay because I waddle after Mason all day long (Isn't that aerobic enough?). In fact, I waddle so much so that I decided to jump back into fitness to strengthen my stretching muscles.

There certainly are some perks to perpetually living the student life. Since James is going to school, I get a free pass to BYU's swimming pools and have decided that swimming laps and aqua jogging (woot!) would be the way to go. To start up my fitness fun, we Siegs stopped by to get my pass activated this afternoon. The plan was for me to run in and take care of things while James and Mason stayed in the car.

Students were milling around while I climbed heftily out of the car. Their presence only invigorated me more and I thought, "I'll show you what a pregnant woman can do!" With that I bolted across the lawn and up the front steps.... pretty much the definition of fitness. Then I heard a familiar male voice booming behind me.

"Slow down, Baby, you're not wearing a helmet!"

Thanks for the reality check, James.

*****Thanks, everyone, for joining in on the giveaway! Mason and I are getting more and more excited to see the results!!*****

Sugar Sweet Farms 2009

All week long James has been busy studying and taking tests. All in all, fairly high stress for my honeybunny. Since he has been working so hard, we thought it would be nice to make today a special day and spend time together doing whatever he pleased. Out of the oodles of options, he, of course, picked to go get a bunch of manure for our garden so that we could go ahead and plant. Now, before you judge too harshly, let me point out that Martha Stewart, the Queen of Classy, said that manure is the way to go. So, with that in mind, I guess this photo below is about as classy as they get.

The Kings of Poop Mountain!

Yep, that is a large pile of manure. And yes, my men couldn't be more pleased.

After James slaved away loading up at the farm, we brought the party home. Mason snoozed while we spread out our precious manure and mixed it into our dirt. Well, "we" actually means James.
While he was doing this:

I was enjoying some of these Summertime sweets in the shade. I didn't feel one ounce of guilt. I am really bad at growing things, I'm pregnant and James LOVES gardening.

By the time our sleepyhead woke up, we were ready to plant like the dickens. We planted James' pre-sprouted corn, beans, tomatoes, pumpkins, yellow squash, watermelon, cantaloupe, cucumbers and onions. This is in addition to our previously planted peas, lettuce, peppers, cilantro, carrots and potatoes. So really, if anyone has a hankering for anything fresh and sugar sweet, come on over later this Summer.

On a side note, after we finished and Poppy went off to work, I popped Mason in the tub for some major deep cleaning. Usually he swims around like a little guppy but this time he kept asking (in gestures and toddler talk) for me to join him. Normally I would stand my ground (since he just points and laughs at me anyway) but as I needed a bath too, and he was so endearing, I jumped right in. This was a bad idea. After a couple minutes of shampoo fun, I noticed a very dark submarine toy skulking under the water. Then another and another. To my horror, I realized that my little boy had just pooped in the bathtub for the first time! I was warned that this day would come but I had NO expectation of being IN the water when it did! Yuck!!! I wonder what Martha Stewart would think of that? Maybe we're not too classy after all. D'oh!

Poppy's Garden

I have mentioned before that James has quite the green thumb. This whole summer we have enjoyed the fruits of his labor. Sadly, now the frost has come and so ends the growing. Not to worry, we have harvested enough to last us for a while. Here are the last shots of his pride and joy.

My men and their jumbo pumpkin

Mason enjoying some corn

Our new centerpiece.I think Martha Stewart would approve.

Poppy's Garden

James' dad is the most amazingly gifted man with his hands and makes everything he works on look beautiful. James' mom has an incredible green thumb and can grow anything. Taking this into account, it doesn't really surprise me that James picked some of their interests and talents up. He is very handy and he LOVES to garden. Nothing is more relaxing for him then when he can come home and water his garden. This year we (I say we VERY loosely) dug up the dirt along the side of our driveway and planted all kinds of fun things. Now we have tomatoes and sunflowers taller than I am! I am so impressed with what James can do because I have never actually been successful at growing anything. Last night we had our dinner in the back of the truck since James and Mason were already out working away on our crops.

The proud farmer!

I make things look even taller.

Mason and Layton kept each other company in the back of the truck while their poppy worked.

Our future hick!

Yo Ho, Yo Ho, A Pirate Life For Me!

Last Saturday Mason got so excited that he flailed his arms while sitting on my lap. This is not unusual, but him scratching my eye was. James was away at his GRE class and I figured it wasn't anything too bad, so we went on a morning jog and just pretended nothing happened. We happened to jog past the student health center and since my eye was still giving me sass, we headed in, jogger and all. An hour later we started a jog again, except this time with a lamo pirate patch over my eye (I was hoping that I would get one of those stylish black pirate patches, but no luck. I guess it IS after memorial day so white is in)! I laughed all the way home because of how dorky we looked. Don't worry though, I only kept it on till that evening (long enough to run all of our errands and look even cooler) and my eye is doing just fine.

This is proof that motherhood is glamorous.

reenacting the crime

So, if having his hand up a cow didn't impress you, here is a picture of James shoveling a bunch of composted manure for our garden! Yep, we are gross. His garden is all done though. I think he is so handsome....even when he is shoveling poop!