Graduation Requirements for College-Bound Homeschoolers

Lots of homesteaders also homeschool their kids. We actually started homeschooling long before we ever moved to the farm. Personally, I just prefer having my kids at home, in an environment free of bad behavior from teens that adults have come to see as normal, unruly or violent kids who think it’s “cool” to be in a gang, and similar experiences. I just don’t see where that’s a beneficial environment for a child to learn.

In any regard, for those of you who also homeschool, I’ve posted a reprint of an article I wrote earlier this year regarding graduation requirements for homeschoolers. For those who need the info, it’s not always easy to find. I don’t have every state listed, but there are several, as well as links to resources to learn more about other states. If you have something to add, by all means leave a comment below & help other homeschoolers find the information they need to get their kids ready for college admissions.

State Requirements and Expectations

Legally, homeschooling graduation requirements vary by state. According to the Homeschool Legal Defense Association, only three states, North Dakota, New York, and Pennsylvania, have specific high school course requirements for homeschoolers. Other states simply outline how long parents must continue to educate their children and general achievement criteria. Most state requirements fall between the ages of 16 and 17, while others cover children up to 18. The following are just a few examples of state regulations regarding homeschooling high school students.

Colorado

Colorado has no specific homeschool graduation requirements. However, students must maintain achievement test scores above the thirteenth percentile in order to continue exemption from compulsory public school attendance. Attendance requirements apply to children between the ages of 6 and 17.

Georgia

The only regulations or homeschooling graduation requirements in the state of Georgia cover compulsory attendance. Homeschool students must attend instruction for a minimum of 4.5 hours per day, 180 days per year, until age 16.

North Dakota

North Dakota requires homeschool students to complete four credits each in English, Math, Science, and Social Studies. Social Studies must encompass one credit each of North Dakota studies, world history and US history. Additionally, students are required to complete .5 credits of health education, two PE credits (.5 credits per year,) as well as one music credit, one fine art credit, two credits of a single foreign language, and two credits relative to technical or career education.

New York

New York also requires specific credits for a homeschool student to graduate high school. These include four English and Social Studies credits, two Math, PE, and Science credits, as well as 1 fine arts credit, .5 credits in health, and three credits of electives chosen by the homeschool.

Pennsylvania

Pennsylvania has homeschool graduation requirements as they relate to specific courses completed. However, these are not as extensive as North Dakota or New York. Students must simply complete four English credits, three Math, Science, and Social Studies credits, and two arts and humanities credits.

Virginia

Virginia has no specific graduation requirements for students enrolled in home education programs. However, state statutes stipulate all children who have reached their 5^th birthday by September 30^th and have not yet reached the age of 18 are covered under the state’s compulsory attendance laws. There are no course requirements, although students must achieve scores above the 23^rd percentile on standardized tests to continue in a home education program.

College Admission Recommendations

There is no doubt that some colleges are friendlier toward homeschooled students than other colleges. Few colleges have specific homeschooling graduation requirements, per se. They do, however, expect upcoming freshman to have completed certain college preparatory courses. These courses would be listed in the student’s homeschool transcripts. Some colleges will also require additional SAT testing or other documentation of a student’s ability to work at collegiate academic levels.

CollegeBoard and other college prep sources recommend homeschool students ensure their portfolios include the following, with Advanced Placement Program courses taking preference over standard course programs:

Four years of English, including literature and creative writing
Three years (minimum) of advanced Math, including Algebra, Geometry, Trigonometry, and Calculus
Three years (minimum) of Science, preferably advanced courses in Chemistry, Physics, Biology or Earth/Space science
Four years of Social Studies, including US History, US Government, World History, and Geography
Arts, Humanities, and Foreign Languages, including at least two years of a single foreign language and two years of arts or humanities such as art, music, theater, psychology, or sociology

Resources

Home School Legal Defense Association, Laws by State: http://www.hslda.org/laws/Summary_of_Laws.pdf

CollegeBoard, Home-schooled Students and College Admissions: http://www.collegeboard.com/student/apply/the-application/56.html

It’s Almost Time, Already? Fall Garden Plans

Before we talk about gardens and fall plans, I gotta take a minute to send out a heartfelt, bittersweet happy birthday wish. Today would have been Frank’s 43rd birthday. While I don’t wallow in former special days like our anniversary (although this year being the 20th was a little tough) or birthdays, and certainly not more unpleasant historical dates, I do make sure I take a second every year to pause in remembrance.

So, with that said, Happy 43rd Frank. Wish you were here so I could tease you about loosing hair and gaining candles. I’d love to see the look on your face as you walk the farm yard. I wonder what you’d say. (Other than “Oh boy. Here she goes again with another idea.” lol. )

Now…on to the topic at hand…my plans for a fall garden.

As I check my garden daily for watering needs, pests, and just to see how all my goodies are doing, I’ve started thinking about what I want to plant after this round of edible yummies are done. I’m glad I started thinking early. In sitting down the other day to start planning what I want for fall crops, I realized many of those crops need to get in the ground by August in order to make it to maturity before the first frost.

Here in Georgia, we get a pretty late first frost. According to the Old Farmer’s Almanac, we get our first frost sometime between the second and third week of November. (The Athens area is the second week, Savannah’s the third week – and our farm is smack dab in the center between Athens and Savannah.)

Counting backwards so everything is harvested before the first frost (or ready to mulch over for winter) that means a lot of what I’d like to try should be in the ground as early as August, no later than September.

Yikes! That means I better get a move on…August is only a month away. Since most of our local garden shops, feed & seeds, and garden centers only really focus on seeds and seedlings for spring, I need to pick a seed supplier so I can order what I want to plant for our first late summer/fall garden. If I wanted to go big scale and plant acres and acres of stuff, well then, the feed & seeds could probably get what I need…but we’re not ready for the big leagues just yet.

On the list of possibilities for our fall garden:

Broccoli
Argula
Bibb lettuce
Chicory
Escarole
Radicchio
Radishes
Carrots
Garlic
Leeks
Onions
Garden peas
Potatoes
Spinach
Corn
Cucumbers
Sage
Thyme
Chives
Bay
Maybe more tomatoes in containers to be moved to the laundry room if the weather gets too cool too soon.

Some of our choices aren’t necessarily fall crops, but they are cool weather crops. Given the longer, warmer season here in the South, I’m hoping we can sneak in a few more traditional spring crops once the summer heat starts to ease off, but before the cold sets in. The worst that can happen is they don’t do well and I can note that for next year.

Some of what we’re planning on planting (such as garlic) will get mulched over for the winter and harvested in the Spring/Summer next year. I can’t wait to see how everything turns out this fall. Our spring garden hasn’t been a resounding success, but it’s been a wonderfully fun and adventurous learning experience. Gardening and just digging in the dirt has become a wonderfully relaxing, even therapeutic hobby for me.

Some nights, I doze off with visions of a packed root cellar, bunches of herbs drying in the kitchen, rows of canned goodies lining my pantry, and wonderful dinners with all sorts of garden fresh yummies. Granted, I have to convert the basement into a root cellar, build the pantry, and learn how to can before those visions become a reality…but at least we’re taking the first steps by learning how to garden.

What about you? Are you planning a fall garden? What do you have in mind for it? Any previous experience or things to keep in mind you’d like to share?

Chickens, chickens, and more darn chickens

Raising my first batch of baby chicks has been an interesting adventure. I’m lucky in that I bought 6 unsexed chickens from our local feed & seed and didn’t wind up with all roos. 3 Australorps and 3 Rhode Island Reds. Turns out, we got one of each rooster and 2 of each hens.

The Australorp rooster seems to be the alpha. The RIR rooster regularly gets his tail feathers plucked out almost as fast as he can grow them in. Since Big Blackie, as I’ve come to call him, seems to be the most interested in protecting his little harem of hens, I imagine the Rhode Island Red rooster will end up dinner at some point.

I’ve started letting them roam in the garden for an hour or so each day. They love that! The girls line up at the edge of the coop as soon as they see me reaching to lift it. Mike and I have fun chasing them down after their play time to get them back in the coop. I’d love to just let them run, but they’d destroy the garden and one of our cats has taken a fancy to the idea of a fresh chicken dinner. Yikes!

I need to finish the coop so the girls have nesting boxes to lay their eggs. I also need to figure out when to remove the roosters. I’m hopeful that I can just let Big Blackie roam the farm & do what roosters do, but I dunno how well he’d fair against cats, dogs, and other preditors. I guess, at some point, we’ll just have to take our chances and see. I like the idea of a few chickens just having free reign to roam the farm.

Everyone was being camera shy while I was snapping pictures. They kept huddling up together under the roof, rather than coming out to be photographed

A View from the Garden

In just a few more weeks, I suspect I’ll be drowning in fresh produce from the garden. I took a look around the other day, and man are things starting to sprout goodies!

The corn is lookin’ really good. After not growing much over the last few weeks, it seems several of the plants have shot up in this last week. I’ve increased my watering time early in the mornings, or late in the evenings, before or after the heavy heat of the day. That seems to be making quite a difference.

Little ears of corn are starting to pop up

Next door to my corn, the watermelon vines are going into hyper drive. There are a few little melons starting to make an appearance here and there. Right now, they kind of resemble those watermelon gumballs you sometimes see in the little gumball machines. Hopefully, by the end of July/early August, we’ll have garden fresh watermelons ready for munching.

The potatoes seem to be doing well too. I’ve stopped mounding them over, so now I’m just waiting for them to stop flowering and the greenery to die off. Then we’ll be ready to dig up some taters. I started with just a 5lb bag of store-bought potatoes that we let develop eyes. I’m curious to see how they fair and what we’re able to harvest.

Next to the potatoes are my cucumber vines – the only two out of 6 that ever sprouted. One is languishing, but has a few baby cucs sprouting. The other vine, I swear it seems to grow 3 or 4 inches a day! We picked the very first cucumber from the vine yesterday. Probably should’ve let it ripen a little more, as Josh said it was a tad bitter to him. The big vine has at least 6 baby cucs sprouting at various points, so I hope we’ll get quite a few before the end of the season.

The first round of tomato plants have produced 2 dozen tomatoes from just two plants. I had to pull up one of the original three, as it was showing signs of late blight. The two remaining plants keep showing up with tons of blooms, but they just don’t seem to be able to make it through to forming maters. Perhaps it’s the heat. I know that watering the garden longer seems to be increasing the number of blooms, so I’m still holding out hope for a few more tomatoes from the big guys.

I found two well established, nice & tall Big Boy tomato plants at our local feed & seed the other day, on clearance for $3 for the two. I don’t know if they’ll do anything transplanting them this late in the season, but I’m hopeful. They’ve been in the ground for a few days now, and so far (knock on green wood) they seem to be doing okay. A few little blooms on them too – already there when I transplanted, and still lookin’ healthy. Fingers crossed – I’d like more maters for a big batch of sauce.

And finally, my beans have sprouted nicely. I originally planted two kinds of beans on either side of the lettuce – one lima & the other pole beans. One side never sprouted, (and became home to my new tomato plants) and the other seems to be doing well. I’m just not sure which beans I planted on which side…so if anyone can tell if these are limas or poles from the little leaves, I’d appreciate the heads up. I think I planted the limas on this side. (Note to self: next year, remember crop labels.)

Oh, and my granddaughter (Raydin) planted a little flower bed in the garden. They all seem to be doing rather well. They’ve spread out a little, and have bloomed several times in a nice array of colors.

How to Dry Home Grown Herbs

I have herbs coming out of my ears it seems. While some stuff in the garden doesn’t seem to be doing so well, other stuff is exploding – especially my herbs. So naturally, since I have more than I could ever use fresh (and I need to trim back the plants to encourage healthy growth and nice shapes to the plants) I’ve started drying them.

I can’t begin to tell you how wonderful it is to be able to walk out the garage door, open the garden gate, and start snipping stuff to spice up dinner. Even nicer that for recipes (like homemade spagetti sauce) where dried herbs are a little better, I get to use my own stuff.

So far, for my rosemary, basil, parsley (the non-curly kind) and oregano, I’ve found the best way to dry them is just using paper bags. I don’t know if it’s the Georgia heat that helps dry them so fast this way (and with such good flavor) or what, but I’m loving the easy-schmeasy style.

It’s really simple. Before I turn on the sprinklers in the morning (after the sun comes up and dries any dew that might be on the ground) I snip a bunch of whatever herb needs snipping.

I bring it into the kitchen, label a plain brown paper lunch bag with whatever the herb is, punch a few holes in the bag, then put the bunch inside the bag (snipped ends hanging out of the bag just a little.) I take a generic ponytail band and wrap it around the bag/herb ends like a rubber band.

Once I’m sure the band is secure (but not cutting into anything) I just clip the end of the bag to a little piece of ribbon I have stretched across one of the kitchen windows. In about two weeks, all the herbs are nice and dry.

If, by chance, I forget to snip before I water, or if it’s been raining, or for whatever reason the herbs are wet when I bring them in, I’ll hang them without the bag for the afternoon to give them time to dry out. (Otherwise, I’ve been told, they can grow moldy while they’re drying in the dark bag.)

So far, everything I’ve dried has been wonderfully flavorful – with a natural herb smell you won’t get from a spice jar at the grocery store. Each bunch I dry seems to be just right for the glass spice jars I have. (My mom or my mother in law – I forget who – gave me a nice glass & chrome spice rack she never uses. I just dumped out all the old spices, ran the jars through the dishwasher and Voila! Perfect spice jars for my home grown herbs!) I think the only bunch of herbs that I’ve dried that didn’t fill a jar was rosemary – that took 2 paper bags of dried stuff to fill.

What about you? Do you grow herbs in your garden? Do you use them only as fresh herbs, or do you dry them to use later? I’ve found that for spagetti sauce and similar stuff, I like the dried herbs better. Basil and parsley, even when I snip them very small as I put them in the sauce, still wind up looking like little bits of wilted spinach mixed into the sauce. Maybe if I had a food processor I could mince them up smaller, but the stuff I’ve dried works just as well & tastes just as yummy – without the wilted spinach look.

Learn Something New Everyday…

Folks who’ve known me for any length of time know that I have a truly black thumb. I’ve never been good with plants – ever. So my thinking that starting a farm was a great idea is simply evidence of my unwillingness to accept defeat.

Although in the past I haven’t been able to keep even the simplest, hardiest, ignore-worthy cacti from dying, I am determined to overcome my black thumbedness. As such, this year’s garden has definitely not faired as well as I had hoped, but I have enjoyed some successes. Most importantly, I’ve learned a lot about growing stuff. I’d say my black thumb has gone from pitch black to more of a wilted brown.

Late Blight on My Tomatoes

For example, my tomato plants have done fairly well until recently. There’s evidence of late blight on two of the three plants, and one completely succumbed just this morning. Had to yank it up roots and all when I found several green lil maters on the ground, lookin’ rather peaked. I had hoped the blight would advance slowly enough to allow the tomatoes already on the vine to mature, but obviously that’s not happening with the one I yanked up.

The other two plants have bad spots I’ve removed, but they’re still flowering and the greenies already on the vine aren’t lookin’ too bad. I’ve already picked more than a dozen nice ripe maters and made a batch of homemade sauce – which was divine! (I grabbed a few off the vine a few days ago and whipped up a batch of seasoned puree to use as a based for the next round of sauce.)

Birds Like Onions? Really?

I planted white onions that were doing beautifully…until the birds came along. Thanks to the fencing, we’ve had no issues with squirrels, deer, or any other critters using my garden as an all you can eat buffet. However, there’s not much I can do about the birds. For whatever reason, they picked my onions as their favorite. I came out one morning to find every one of my onion plants toppled over and pecked at, save one lone survivor.

I didn’t know until nearly two weeks later when I started turning over that section to plant something else that the onions could still develop without their upper parts. Not as much as they would normally, but enough that I accidentally dug up a basket full of little pearl onions. I left them on the kitchen counter to dry and have been dipping into those whenever I need a little onion flavor in a particular dish.

Bolting from Heat & Humidity

The radishes and iceberg lettuce I planted have been sittin’ in the ground for weeks, doing nothing. I noticed flowers on the radishes back a couple of weeks ago, but didn’t realized what that meant. I pulled a few plants, hoping to see nice little red bulbs on the end, but nope. Nadda. Just long, boney lookin’ red roots. I had thought that perhaps because the seeds were old, they weren’t doing too well. Same with the lettuce. Lots of nice deep green leaves, but no heads developing. Obviously, I must have missed a step, not watered enough, maybe watered too much. I certainly didn’t plant too late as I started both the radishes and the lettuce indoors back in early February.

I wasn’t sure what the problem was until Thursday morning, when I noticed pods on the radishes. I broke one open & saw seeds, so naturally I looked up how to harvest them so I could try again some other time. Lo and behold, in researching the best way to harvest the seeds, I found the answer to both my radish and lettuce problem.

We’ve been hit with a very, very early summer here in Georgia this year. Temps started hitting the mid 90s back in early May. Normally, those temps don’t become the norm until mid to late June. May is suppose to be an average of around 85, without the brutal humidity just yet. Not this year. As such, both my radishes and lettuce, known for being cool weather crops, went straight to seed. Do not pass go. Do not collect $200. It’s a process called bolting, brought on by high heat and humidity. Ah-ha! So it wasn’t me…it was Mother Nature who did in my salad fixin’ stuff.

Cooking and Herbal Bliss

My herbs, on the other hand, have absolutely thrived! My basil plants are HUGE and require near daily snipping to keep the flowers at bay. (Much to the pleasure of the bunnies who get all the clippings each morning.)

I’ve already harvested basil twice, plus some parsley and rosemary that I’ve already dried and put up. I’ve snipped fresh oregano for immediate use several times. It’s wonderful to have fresh herbs straight from the garden…nothing like leaving a pot simmering on the stove while I walk out to the garden to snip a little of this and a little of that. Yummy!

And In the Rest of the Garden…

My cucumbers are finally starting to vine, after likewise sitting near dormant for several weeks. Alternatively, the watermelon and corn seem to be doing just fine. And the limas I planted just a couple of weeks ago are (so far) doing beautifully. So, like I said, a few successes, a few failures, but I’ve learned a lot already this year. I’m looking forward to planning my Fall planting schedule. I hope that by next Spring I’ll have overcome a little more of my black thumb so that next year’s garden can be bigger and more successful.

What successes and failures are you having in your garden this year?

Bird Brains and To Do Lists

Wondering where I’ve been the last several weeks? Hmm…drowned in to-do lists for work and farm projects. Take a look at today’s to-do list and you’ll see what I mean:

And that’s just general to-do’s – it doesn’t include all the 4 million smaller tasks involved in each item on the list. In fact, most of it is farm or household-related. I already know I have “work” work to do, so I don’t necessarily need to list that stuff. Of course, I actually do have a running list of writing work, complete with deadlines and detailed task lists, but that’s another post for another blog.

While the blog may have been silent, life here on the farm certainly hasn’t been. In fact, this past weekend, my favorite partner in crime came out to the farm to help with a project that’s been on my list for nearly two weeks – building the chicken coop.

Mike and I picked out a simple design several weeks ago – long before I actually brought home the chicks. But when it came time to actually build it? Well, let’s just say Mike and 95-99 degree temps and high humidity just don’t make good companions. So instead, I called in reinforcements.

Actually, I only called in reinforcements to keep the beer iced down while I tackled a few things on my enormous to-do list for the farm. But…you simply cannot lay out lumber and map out a building project in front of a guy who does this stuff for a living and expect him to stay on the sidelines. It just doesn’t happen. He was already mentally preparing to take over before his truck tires ever touched my driveway, texting ahead to ask about my choice of fasteners, if I had all the materials I needed, etc.

Who am I to interfere with a professional, right? So, when he spotted nothing more than 6 reclaimed 2×4 studs, a 25′ roll of chicken wire, and a couple of boxes of galvenized screws and wire staples…the questions started, the mental gears began turning, and before you know it…

When I mentioned building a chicken coop this weekend, he envisioned a house on stilts…something with a roof and floors and lots of framing and siding. I think the limited materials laid out on my office porch threw him for a loop. When I showed him a picture of the A frame chicken tractor I had in mind, those gears in his head kicked into hyperdrive. Measuring tape in hand, he was off and running before I had a chance to say a thing.

We still have a few finishing touches to tackle – like a cap for the tin roofing on the enclosed end, a trap door at that end for access, access at the front to get to the water jug and feed tray, nesting boxes inside, wheels, a pull handle, etc. But the frame is there – the chickens can’t get out and preditors can’t get in. Since we were running out of daylight, he left those finishing touches for Mike and I to finish on another day. I think we can handle that.

So, the chicks are happy with their new home. They aren’t sure what to make of all the dogs barking, and those big monster dogs that keep coming over to the coop, stickin’ their noses against the wire, trying to figure out these little chirpin’ hoppin’ things with stick legs are (and if they’re edible.) Both Zeeva and Santa are facinated with the chickens and seem to be leaning toward wanting to chase the chickens around – they look like such fun to chase, after all.

I think I might have a couple of roosters in the mix. There are 3 Australorps (the black ones) and 3 Rhode Island Reds. I think I have one of each rooster. We’ll see as the weeks progress. But I’m almost positive that my solid black Australorp is a rooster – he’s already taking on the alpha status, pecking at the other chickens. And his legs are huge and grayish black, compared to the speckled hens with their pale, skinny legs. I think I might have a roo amongst the Reds too – his crest is turning red, he has no tail feathers yet like the other two, and he’s getting red lines along his jaw that the other two aren’t.

Only time will tell for sure…

1st Harvest – Batches of Basil

Horray! The garden is already ready for its very first harvest – a small batch of basil. I noticed the plants had started to flower, so it’s definitely time to snip off some fresh basil for the kitchen!

It’s a little hard to see in the photo, because the sun was shining so bright yesterday morning, but there are a few little buds on the top of my largest basil plant. You can see one of the little white ones towards the center. They say not to let them flower, lest the leaves turn bitter. Then again, I’ve heard some folks say that their plants won’t stop flowering, no matter how many times they snip off the buds, with no discernable difference in the taste.

I’d rather not take any chances, so I trimmed and snipped flowers, buds, and anything that looked like it might want to flower. I also cleaned up some of the lower leaves that were looking a little worse for wear. Once I cleaned things up a bit, I started looking for nice, true green leaves to harvest. I plan to use them for pesto, so I wanted nice leaves that would freeze well.

I didn’t take a whole lot in terms of harvested leaves. I figured between trimming the bottom leaves and snipping off flowers, I had taken off quite a bit. They say no more than 1/3 of the plant, if you want it to continue to grow. I don’t even think I took a quarter of the plant, but still. Why take more than I need right now? I may go back in a few days and harvest a bit more. First, however, I want to give the plants time to recover from the clipping and see what they do. I’m going for bushy, thick plants rather than tall slender ones, so I kept most of my trimmings to the top.

Not a bad first harvest, considering I only have two plants and most of what I trimmed was tossed to the rabbits. (I didn’t want yellowed leaves, or leaves with holes for my pesto.)

I’m just tickled that stuff in the garden seems to have survived long enough to make it to any kind of harvest. In fact, the basil plants were some of the ones we weren’t sure would make it. They looked kind of sad and droopy a week or two after we transplanted them into the garden.

I can’t wait to see what else sprouts in the coming weeks. The tomato plants are beginning to tower over the wire cages. Funny, they were barely up to the second ring of the cages when I came home from New York just a couple of weekends ago. Now they’re towering over the cages and sprouting the little yellow flower beginnings of what will be tomatoes in just a few more weeks.

Of the six cucumber hills I planted, only three sprouted. One of those sprouts shriveled before it barely started. The other two seem to be doing well enough, so I turned over the four dead mounds and dropped in potatoes instead.

I replanted the Danvers carrots that never took off – let’s see if Round 2 does any better. If these don’t sprout, I’m going to assume the batch of seeds I bought are too old. That happens. Stuff sits around in seed packs for who knows how long before it ends up in the ground.

I also planted the next round of iceburg lettuce. The first batch seems to be doing well. Round 2 ensures we’ll have a continuous supply of lettuce for salads, bunny treats, etc. I just planted them a few days ago and already we’re seeing tiny little lettuce sprouts peaking out of the beds.

The corn, watermelon, and more marigolds are all in the ground now. Just a matter of waiting to see what sprouts.

All that’s left now is to build the center raised bed in the garden for beans and such. I hope to get to that this weekend, while little Miss Raydin is here for her visit. She can play in the dirt while Grandma builds the beds and schleps dirt into them.

I can’t wait to see what’s growing come this time next week. I love watching stuff I stuck in there grow and turn into something for the kitchen. It’s like a slow motion magic show.

Meet the Mutt Farm

I talk a lot about the dogs we have here on the farm. They really are a bunch of characters, I tell ya. Each one has their own quirks and oddities, usually of the comical and pathetic variety.

But since I talk about them so much, I thought perhaps introductions were in order. After all, they’re somewhat the main attraction around here. They are, indeed, the ring leaders of this three ring circus we call a farm.

First, of course, is Zeeva – my best fuzzbutt friend and constant shadow. You’ve seen her pop up in posts before, especially since she just became a first time mom. Normally, she lives her pampered puppy life as an indoor dog. Unfortunately, now that her pups are quite mobile and rather vocal, indoors is just not a good idea…in my opinion. Zeeva doesn’t agree. She’s really NOT happy with her current, albeit temporary, accommodations.

In fact, if you come within site of the puppy pen, she’s sure to voice her outrage at being relegated to life as an outside dog. How dare we treat her like…like…well, like a DOG! Nevermind her obsession/addiction to sticks. You can’t even say the word stick, without her barking to go outside and play fetch. It’s really becoming a problem. We’re considering counseling, perhaps some rehab, and a few Sticks Anonymous meetings.

Zeeva’s bestest buddy and fellow house dog is Santa Paws, a loveable, yet hard-headed mutt my oldest daughter convinced me to keep for my youngest granddaughter, Alexis (a.k.a. Princess Fancy Face.) You’ve seen Santa before, in other posts – usually sitting next to my oldest granddaugther, Raydin (a.k.a Sweat Pea.) He’s stubborn as a mule, bearing a striking resemblence in personality to Eeyore. Favorite activities include chasing anything with four legs smaller than him, including the cat…yet, he’s scared to DEATH of Zeeva’s puppies. Go figure.

Outside, in the front yard, we have Santa’s brother, Stripe – so named because he was one of a set of nearly identical twins aptly dubbed Stripe and Gizmo. Stripe had a white streak down is nose, while Gizmo had none. As pups, Stripe was evil while Gizmo was one of the sweetest of the litter.

Now, however, Stripe’s a goofball. He likes to play tough guy and scare the FedEx lady. What she doesn’t know is that he really IS all bark and no bite. If she would just take a step towards him, he’d run like the great big chickenshit that he is. Funny, he used to bully Santa something awful when they were pups. Now Santa taunts and bullies him…taking a big chunk out of Stripe if he dares to come near any of us while Santa is outside. Favorite activities include “singing” along with the truck horn and avoiding his doghouse at ALL costs.

And finally, there’s Ollie – so named for his coloring. As a small pup, he looked like he was wearing a tux. Since we’re just a few miles down the road from Harlem, GA – birthplace of Oliver Hardy - we thought Ollie was an appropriate name. Josh used to own Ollie’s mom, until she disappeared when Ollie’s litter was barely 2 weeks old. Josh bottle fed the pups, desperately trying to help them survive. Ollie is the only survivor, so naturally I had to let Josh keep him.

Don’t let the picture fool you – he might look vicious, but what you can’t see is how he was bouncing, flopping, wagging, and yelping the whole time I tried to take his picture. He’s dumb as a box of rocks, but he loves people – any people - anyone willing to come near him gets him so excited he’s not sure if he should fall down and kiss their feet or jump up and lick them all over, so he tries to do it all…all at one time. He’s also the deadbeat Dad of Zeeva’s pups. We’re contemplating going after him for puppy support, but he’s too dumb to remember his own name, so I doubt he could hold down a job. But he’s cute and sweet tempered.

That’s It? That’s All You Got?

Most of the country has already heard about the devistating storms and dozens of tornadoes that struck the South this past week. The news is littered with stories of destruction and harrowing tales of survival from Tuscaloosa, Cullman, and other places in Alabama…not to mention north Georgia and other parts of the southeast.

My parents live in Meridianville, AL…a small rural town just on the outskirts of Hunstville. Some of you might have heard on the news about how the National Weather Service had to abandon their office in Hunstville in the wake of the storms and tornadoes Wednesday. Those tornadoes destroyed the main power feeds from Browns Ferry that supply power to Huntsville Utilities and other areas of north Alabama.

My parents lost power around lunchtime Wednesday. It wasn’t too long after that I started getting text messages from my folks, letting us know they were okay. The house was fine. They just didn’t have phones or power, and cell towers had been destroyed, leaving them with spotty, if any service. Throughout the night, my Mom sent periodic updates via text, trying to conserve the battery life of her phone and work around the lack of service most of the time.

Luckily, it seems everyone made it through the storms relatively unharmed. My neice further south was fine. My sister in law and her family in Huntsville were fine. My parents were fine. Old high school friends and former classmates were all fine, barring a little damage here and there.

Thursday morning, attention turned homeward as the same storm front eased its way east, towards Georgia. The boys and I had moved Zeeva and the puppies back inside, anticipating some bad weather. Late Wednesday night, early Thursday morning, as the storms started rolling in, Josh and I made a mad dash through ice cold rain to gather up the rabbits into pet carriers to bring them inside. Outdoor dogs were brought in and sectioned off to various parts of the house.

We battened down the hatches and hunkered down for what we thought would be a rough early morning. Before dawn, the winds were howling, the rain was beating down on everything. It looked like the storm would be a dozie. Around 5am, I contemplated moving my truck way out into the front yard, away from all the big trees around the house. I opened the front door to a down pour and decided, eh…I have full coverage.

All in all, it was nothing more than a good thunderstorm. Nothing major. No power loss. No wind damage.

I walked the property not long after the rain stopped and the danger passed…just to make sure we didn’t have any issues anywhere. This is the total extent of the storm damage here.

I saw that one small, obviously rotting branch and thought to myself “That’s IT? That’s all you got? One downed limb…seriously? After all that wind…all that damage just 24 hours before?” Don’t get me wrong. I appreciate the severity of the storm front and the havoc it wrecked on the folks back home. It’s because of all that damage that we really anticipated a more threatening storm. Luckily for us, it seemed to have petered out before it got to us. Thank Heavens.

Before breakfast, we had sunny skies again. I was able to move everyone back outside, out from under my feet. Thanks to the storm, I didn’t have to water the garden Thursday morning. Thanks to the storm, I didn’t have to hose off all the mud on my truck. We were lucky. We’re not in Huntsville, where officials say it could be 4 to 5 days before power gets restored.

Makes me wonder if we should move installing a whole house generator a little further up the list of remodeling to-do’s…just in case. If we had to go 5 days with no power, we’d be toast. Here, no power means no water, since the well pump is electric. We can make do with a lot, but no water for 5 days? We’d be in trouble.

Keep good thoughts for the folks who weren’t as lucky as us. Say a prayer for the folks who lost loved ones. Count your blessings if you, like us, are the lucky ones after such a terrible storm. I know we will.

Hexemaus Farms

Adventures in Homesteading