Farmer José invites you to check out some of the things that are growing around here.

Cucumber plants.... about 70

Watermelon plants.... about 32

Tomato plants... about 200

In this picture: carrots, green onions, swiss chard, green beans, and cabbage

This is one of our two corn fields. Dane spaced the corn out so that we could plant beans and squash between the plants. This past week after two full weeks of hoeing Dane, Elijah, David and the Lima boys, Ricardo, Lucas, and Matias finished hoeing it and the girls planted lima beans next to the corn stalks and about six different varieties of summer and winter squash between the corn plants.

We also have about eight canteloupe plants growing, about a dozen okra, and about twenty voluntary sweet pea plants.

Last week in the larger field that Dane had finished plowing, he, his helpers and the children planted potatoes, corn, and black beans. We still have more potatoes to plant and the areas that didn't get planted we will plant, Lord willing, the rest of the miscellaneous seeds that we have left.

Our bell pepper seeds never sprouted, so I replanted some last week - we will see what happens. We either planted too early (they like really warm soil) or they are not tolerant of the soil conditions in which we are trying to grow them. The egg plant seeds never sprouted either, but we likely won't replant those this year. Furthermore, some pest decided to eat up all of our lettuce seedlings, so we hope to replant them in the coming week.

On to other things.....

One of our chickens laid an egg prematurely last week - it didn't have a shell. But it was still just an egg on the inside. Our neighbor joked that it was fine to eat, but we'd never get a chick out of it.

The man who makes yokes in our area, Mr. Hector Dos Santos, made and delivered a yoke for our two young bulls that Dane hopes to make oxen. It is beautiful and Dane looks forward to having time to train them.

Dane also cut down two dead trees yesterday morning and made these stairs to get up into the second story more easily. He hopes to begin laying the floor for the second story this next week. Anyway, the stairs turned out really nice and eventually we will use them to get into the attic from the second story when Dane builds the staircase on the outside of the house.


The children really have enjoyed going up and down the stairs. We have had to keep a close eye on Farmer José who also likes to go up and down because at this point there is nothing to go up to - just rafters.

I forgot to mention in my last post that the new boxes that Dane gave our three bee hives were almost full of honey two weeks ago, so Dane prepared some supers and Elijah and Abigail painted them. He put them on the week before last and the bees are already working to fill their new additions. How exciting! Dane is making plans for a harvest soon.

Dane also prepared two nucleus boxes and put them out in the forest in the hopes of attracting two more hives. Honey is a high demand product in these parts and it is hard to come by. We haven't been able to find any in the store for about three months now. The local ag extension office has a coop that will extract local farmers' honey and bottle it and put the individual farmer's name on the label for a small fee. Until we aquire all the necessary equipment, it sounds like a great deal for getting our honey processed.

We are so very grateful to the Lord for all these blessings. We pray that we are good stewards with the things He has entrusted us with. Furthermore, we pray that the Lord sees fit to bless us with fruit enough for ourselves and for our neighbors.

Have a great week.

Jessica