Wishing you a wonderful Christmas! I hope things are well with you all! We are having a nice relaxing day, and spreading out Christmas to make the most of it! May the Lord bless you wherever you are and hope that you are spending the day surrounded by the people you love (or your critters!)

Well, as usual these days, it’s been a while since I’ve updated you. Let’s just say that we are knee deep in puppies! They are so sweet and we have enjoyed these fuzz balls so very much! All but one has a home, and in a few weeks they will make their way to them. I will be most sad, but then can focus on training our puppy that we are keeping, and get ready for all the baby goats that will be on their way come March. My daughter has been riding her horse here at home and it is a great sight to see after all the wait. We stay busy here, so much so that I have not sewn since teaching my class at our coop. I will be doing a part 2 class for the girls come January. So been getting ready for that.

We are in the process of setting up a farm website and I will connect these two together so that hopefully here in a few months when things get somewhat “caught up” I can update both sites at the same time, and you will be able to shop through our farm site. I will be offering my Herbal Healing Salve, Homemade Goat’s Milk Soap (and let me tell you, these are absolutely divine–and good for your skin too!), homeschool themed t-shirts from my son’s business and whatever else we come up with! We have lots of things in the works….new packaging and labeling, new products, and I hope–more sewing patterns. We are really stepping up our selection and hope by years end to have a lot of offerings. Yes, yet another endeavor…but we are just in a perfect place and at the perfect time to launch these projects, we can’t pass it up!

So maybe you are reading this and thinking, but what about the sewing? Where have you been? Are you EVER going to do anything free again? Well, truth be told, yes…I want to do that really bad! Our move a year ago has really put us in the ideal spot for us to branch into building up our farm and home businesses, and really this is where my focus has been especially the past 8 months. My goal for my life is to build up my home business enough that when my kids are heading out on their own, I won’t have to go find a job…I can stay home and do what I love doing! It is a perfect time for all of those back burner projects to become the main course. We are taking advantage of our location and actually being blessed enough to be selling out of eggs every week, selling out of salve and now working towards soap and our crop of farm animals too. It takes a tremendous amount of work and so in between schooling the kids….well you can imagine that I am just not able to get everything done.

Next, our projects include getting our on-the-farm store set up by summer, and we are in the process of applying for solar power. It’s exciting around here, never boring, always lots of work….and lots of play! We love it or we wouldn’t do it!

Life is settling in. When I think about this time last year, I was still a mess! We were sitting in our new home barely a week, surrounded by boxes, breathing a huge sigh of relief to know that we were finally home! It’s amazing what can happen in a year! So much for us has changed, and we are very very thankful for all that the Lord has given us. We get to spend time with family almost daily…and that is just a huge bonus to see the relationships grow with the kids and our family. And, my stinker of a nephew always keeps us hopping! He is a royal mess! But we love him so much!

So maybe this year I can try to accomplish more….sewing???? I hope you’ll keep checking in and I am so glad for my faithful followers who keep tabs on me and remind me that you are still out there and interested. It means a lot! You all are special people, and I wish you a very Merry, very Blessed, very Happy Christmas! May the new year find you with so much happiness that you can’t hold on to it all! Nichole, The Happy Wren

Has it really really been that long since I’ve posted???? I am shocked at myself! Well, things have not calmed down. I went from teaching my sewing class, to football for my son, to coop classes with the kids and then we’ve been kicking into high gear around the farm trying to get ready for winter! Which, it is official, we had a dusting of snow today and it’s been bitter cold the past couple of days.

I have not put needle to thread in a long while. We’ve been focused on the farm critters. Goats are now bred thanks to Jeffrey! And…..drum roll….we have puppies! Oh they are soooo cute! Our pyrs had 8 puppies a couple of weeks ago. We lost the runt a week later. He was such a cutie. I called him possom and carried him in my stocking hat with me for days. I tried feeding him goats’ milk with a syringe, but he just couldn’t do it. He died on Thanksgiving day. Then, two mornings ago, we had a roll-over incident. Mamma dog rolled over on a baby in the night and well, he’s now in heaven too. I’ve got three girls and three boys left and they are just amazing. I’ve had Maggie to the vet twice this week for upper and lower respiratory infections. I’ve slept sitting upright in a chair so she could breathe while waiting for morning to get her to a vet. I feel like I’ve had newborns in the house with all the drama. But, I am happy to report that they are all doing well now, fat, happy, eyes open and just so cute I can’t stand it. I will send pics by this weekend so you can see them too!

I was fortunate enough to be given a gift of a 12×16 storage building! A sweet friend from church offered it to us if we could get it moved. Well, we did! It is on our property and leveled. It is the future site of my new store! I plan on selling my salve, soap and other farm products as well as forming a coop to let other moms in my group sell their items as well. It is  amazing to see how God is blessing us!

My salve continues to sell very well at the Amish store. I’ve made a ton of soap this past week! Scents like Sweet Pumpkin Pie, Bergamot-Violet, White Chocolate Raspberry, Almond Cream, Island Beach Baby…..sound yummy! It’s made with my own creative recipe that I pieced together from friends tried and true receipts! All natural goat’s milk from my friends farm…it is the best stuff on the planet! Do you think I should offer to sell it on here?????

Well, pics will come. I’ve been out of touch, but life has kept me going 90 miles an hour. So much to do and only one of me! Hope you are feeling the warmth of the holiday season upon you, and the love of Christ in your life! Nichole

I’ve been sewing a lot these days…but not what you think! I have a wonderful class of 9 girls that I am teaching through a fun homeschool COOP and they are the sweetest things! I’m enjoying them so very much and wondering why in the world I didn’t do this sooner. It is amazing how much I learn from them. For instance, who would think that I would have more than a couple of lefties? How do you teach that? So we have to think outside the box a little bit. They make me smile and I LOVE that they are so excited about the class–and I get hugs too! Maybe, just maybe, we will keep this amazing art alive. If we don’t pass it on, it will be lost!

Well, on the home front, we are football and football and more football! Our team is definately suffering with injuries, but they sure play with a lot of heart. We have one more month to go and then I am hoping that our schedule will die back a bit. If you all could see the scribbles and lines and crossies and such on my calendar these days, you will see why I never get on here! We are getting more and more active in the homeschool group too and there is always something going on. It’s almost too much. I think on a good week (when I am feeling 100%) I manage much better. But overall, life is really good and I am so happy the kids are making new friends and having some fun!

I am getting more and more involved too. I’ve been doing more things with the church and am getting more involved with the children there and the ministries we have there. This is where my heart is….I see such a need with all our children and families in our church and our town. It is time to make a difference. I feel we are here for a reason. So I feel the Lord is using us and blessing us….it’s an exciting time for us!

Just wanted to check in and say hello to all you lovely ladies all over the world! What have you been working on? Any UFO’S pulled out of a box lately? Any new trends that you have picked up? I am doing small stitcheries as that is all I have time for. I have cut out my quilt completely, but put it back in a box for now. There are just not enough hours in the day. But such is this season in life.

The animals are doing well. We sold a couple of goats and a whole lot of chickens. We are getting ready to send our horse to the trainer for a couple of weeks just up the road from us. We think it will only take a couple of weeks to get her ridable and we are so happy and ready for this! We are working on many fall projects around the farm, but in all truth, the list is too huge. We are already feeling the crispness in the air. The almanac says it will be an even worse winter. My pantry is getting stocked up as we speak. We need to haul firewood that is already down, but it’s ready. We still have to get our woodstove in, that is concerning me. Things are just taking too long to get done. There are not enough hours in the day for us and hubby is working longer hours too. I keep telling myself that it will all get done! On a good note, with my folks here, they have been helping me on the inside of the house. We re-did my laundry room and mud room! We painted it, Dad made me shelves and benches. I bought new rugs and baskets. It is really sweet! Come winter, we’ll have plenty of space to park it while trying to trudge those boots and coveralls off and on.

Blessings to you all! I’m glad to see that  you are still here and reading posts. Thanks for stopping in and checking to see what is going on. I know there’s not been anything free for a while….but just my rambling (that is always free!). Take care! Talk to you soon. Nichole 

 

Last week it was so hot we couldn’t stand it! Today it has been so cool and nice that it feels like fall! All that cool air rushing in through the windows and adding to the dust on the furniture…it’s just a relief! The animals are feeling it too with all their frolicking, kicking, jumping, butting heads together playing queens on the mountain. So funny and cute.

We have started school here at home and although day one didn’t go so well (it usually starts off a little rusty for all of us), we are now rolling along and making great progress. It amazes me to see how much their heads sort of put into pockets all that knowledge that seemed so hard just a few months back. It took me several weeks to get their lesson plans going, ordering the right curriculum and adapting to MO standards. I had to go back and wrap up records/grades and file all their schooling from last year. I’ve been one busy mom (teacher). Football is here as well, so my son is playing. It amazes me that just a couple months ago he was so sickly and weak. Now he can’t get enough to eat and has color to his skin and seems so alive and well! What a blessing!

My daughter is itching to get that horse whipped into shape! So hubby is working on the plans for a round pen, among other projects that got slotted to “fall” as it was just too hot to be alive outside. She is doing well too….adjusting to her braces, writing her books, getting ready to be in a play, loving Christian music. It’s so funny to see her just change so much….where did my little ones go?

Well, as for me….I just go with the flow these days. I have my quilt cut out, but it’s been setting on my sewing table for several weeks now…..no progress. I have too much to do! But the room is pretty much completed now and I can go in and find whatever I need and work on things as I find the time. We are officially moved in now. I unpacked the last box! Farm life has sort of slacked off the past couple of weeks. We’ve got a lot to do now that fall is coming on. The almanac says this winter will be worse than the last one! In that case, we’ve got a lot to do and it will take time….and money….lots of both. Here is our list of things we have to do before it snows!!!!

Winterize the barn: fix stalls, get tarps, extra feed and that storage in place, more hay?, calves will be here soon, fix a window, fix a couple of gates, seal the roof, trim hooves, re-do the tack room walls and organize tack and med closet.

Install woodstove and then (because the chimney will go through daughter’s room/wall) make her closet bigger.

Finish up both bathrooms, which includes fixing the showers, get the rest of the wall paper off, put in new cabinets and lighting and shower/towel rods. Hang the fun stuff. Install exhaust fan/light, paint walls.

Painting: laundry room, mud room, upper hallway, finish up white in main areas of house.

Shelving/benches to be installed in the laundry room and mud room.

These are just a few of the things that need done around here…there are a lot more! We’ve been working hard, taken a little break while it was so hot, now we have to get on it and finish up. I will be teaching a COOP class for the homeschool group for the next 8 weeks. I am very excited about this! It will be great fun and a chance to share my love of sewing with another eager audience!

So that’s all folks! We’ve just been living life, hanging out at the pool, trying to keep the yard mowed and the critters happy. Really busy with church stuff too. Sorry that there’s not a lot on here about sewing, but this happy wren just has a lot going on in the nest. I hope in the next few months to get back in the swing of things and get some sewing done. Thanks for stopping by! I hope that as the kids are getting back to school and life feels more in a routine that  you are enjoying yourself….whatever that may be! Blessings! Nichole

If I had not already said this….I wanted to say a BIG thankyou for all of your prayers for my son who had surgery several weeks ago. I am happy to say that he not only fully recovered, but he got to play his entire season of baseball and now is waiting for football to start! (ok, ask me if I am ready for that……gee wiz). He is filling out, finally putting on some weight and back to his onery self! Much to my happiness and of course wanting to choke him when he gets too onery! ha! Thank you for praying for us as a family too. It had been a lot to handle and watching him waste away to nothing and suffering so much, well I wasn’t coping with that so well at all. THANK YOU! I meant to say it, and I really mean it. Prayer changes things, always. Nichole

Herb & Flower Garden

I am still here, still kickin’! Summer has taken over our family. Ballgames, swimming, family, friends. It has been so wonderful for the kids to be able to spend time with their grandparents. Now that we all live in one place, it is neat to see the relationships between all of them grow. And a break???? I don’t know what to do with myself when the kids run off with a Grand and I get to have a small breather now and then. Not in 13 years have I had that! So, I’ve been making soap, Herbal Healing Salve (which is now being sold in our local Amish store, yipppppeeeee!) and in between daily life….I am working on my quilt.

So here are those pictures that I promised forever ago! So very sorry. I think of you all the time….but life has just taken over, and it is so nice to be living. Just living “normal” life and enjoying time with the kids before the dreaded school bell rings–for all of us! ha!

 I just finished tracing off the other 64 templates onto tracing paper and am now cutting those out. All of my pieces are cut and layered, ready for sewing. I promised myself that I would do this right….and do it well. Not that I don’t always, but this is going to be something that we will treasure and use for years to come. It takes a while to paper piece each block, but really is not hard once you get the first one done and figured out. I am looking forward to working on these as I have time….but there are alot more blocks to go…so it is going to take a while!

 

My Quilt

 

driveway view

This is a picture of the view when you pull into the driveway. It really has gotten so pretty here with all the green grass and trees, the flowers. I love to see things grow and we’ve just enjoyed this time here so very much. What a blessing!

Our life on the farm has stayed busy too. We have more than 50 chickens, most of them chicks we’ve hatched through a couple of broody moms! We are selling a couple of goats at an upcoming sale, and the chicks will go at another one middle of the month. We need to money to fund other projects….it’s sure not cheep (ha!) to feed all these critters. The price of food for them (and us!) seems to just keep going up and up!

On a fun note….I got a new ride! We traded in our well worn and most loved mini-van and another car we had that was starting to show amazing age for a new van! I’ve had it a whole three weeks now, and yesterday on my way home from town, a turkey flew out in front of me! CRASH! There went the corner of my windshield!

YOU’VE GOT TO BE KIDDING? NOPE….TOTALLY SERIOUS!

And the insurance man on the other end of the line chuckled just a little bit. I told him to go ahead and get it out of his system (city boy!) and when he was done to let me know. Yeah, not every day you get taken out by a wild turkey!

That’s life….at least for us…here on the farm. I hope that this fourth of July finds you happy and well and enjoying those you love around you.

There is more to come from this Happy Wren! I’ve got some ideas brewing, just needing and enjoying this break and time with my family to catch up around here. Blessings to you and will be back soon!

Nichole

 

Ok, I’m back! I have spent the day with my sister in law this morning flower shopping (which is like second to fabric buying and just as addictive!). Then after we got home, I got to squish on my nephew a little before they left for home. I spent the rest of the afternoon fixing flower beds that got washed out somewhat after our huge downpour of rain yesterday. I’ve been working so very hard outside. I have uncovered a row of 5 Peony bushes burried under Vinca vine (hate that stuff). So I cleaned all of that out and made a wonderful place for an herb garden, which I have managed to stuff plum full of culinary and medicinal herbs. I have discovered that I need another bed! I just can’t get enough of them.

I have a bulb/iris/daylilly garden area as well. I’ve put in about 10 or more rose bushes. Rescued a forgotten Clemantis and trellised him up good and discovered today that it is a lovely shade of purple, my favorite color! I’ve moved rocks out of all the previous owners rock beds and transplanted massive amounts of flowers from my mom’s garden and then bought flats of Impatients and Coleus to put in between. I still have a long ways to go….but boy it sure is looking pretty out there! I’ll take some pics tomorrow…I know it’s been so long since I’ve posted anything pretty!

We have had a lot going on here on the farm. During my son’s recovery, I really didn’t get a whole lot done as he was in a lot of pain. But after the two week mark, that’s what set all the outside things in to motion. I needed that release I guess, something to do with all that pent up energy. But sadly, while he is better, we have another outbreak of sorts going on in the barn. We are sad to discover that our little Boy Blue, the newest addition to our family, is a carrier for a horrid virus type disease called Sore Mouth. It is a hideous cross between cold sores/chicken pox type of a virus that has attacked and now spread through all my goats, leaving them full of terrible sores on their mouths and us wearing gloves to keep us from getting it. Two of them have lost some weight as they are so sore they aren’t eating as they should be. Oh boy, we have quite a mess on our hands with this…but we know that this too shall pass and we know we will have to sell off several of our goats to the meat market, those we feel are either carriers, or are having other issues. It makes me very sad. But such is the livestock business….and we hope that this will never come back again after we get through this outbreak. So say a prayer that once it’s gone, it’s gone!!!!

On a happier note, we have chicks! We bought 4 banty chicks, 9 egg layers, and our sweet?? Azule hatched 16 chicks! Three did not make it, they pipped early…but the rest of them, oh they are so cute! In addition, this week I am purchasing 4 laying hens from an Amish friend to boost our daily egg production to give us more to sell. So we are flurishing in the chicken business at the moment. As soon as we are able, we are buying meat chickens to process for the freezer, but got to get a seperate pen set up for them.

My folks are moving up here officially Monday! We have helped them this past week to get some things done to the place. It will be so great having them close by. We could not be more thrilled! So this next week will be very busy as well. We have baseball games, a home school field day/planning event and a girls get together as well. This coming weekend is a fun herb festival not too far away and so I plan on going to that. I am VERY pumped about this! I am hoping to find some things I’ve not seen yet.

Ok….so this blog is supposed to be about sewing, even if there’s not much of that going on at the moment. I have been cutting out pieces for my quilt and have a table full of them! I still have lots more to cut, and then I need to trace more pieces as it is a paper-piecing type of quilt….oh don’t worry….there’s only like 60 more to do! UGA-MUGA. It is going to be so beautiful though.

We have company coming in June, and I still have things to do around here which include fun things too. When my friend is here, we are going to try to make goat’s milk soap. Oh! I made another batch of my famous Herbal Healing Salve and it’s selling well here, just like in Arkansas. I’m contemplating putting this in my online store, and the soap too….we are going to try to design a website for our farm so that we can link them and maybe get more business. We will experiment with fun scents like: Bergamot, CoCoBaby, Tuscan Herb, Almond, Milk/Oatmeal/Vanilla, Violet, White Chocolate Raspberry and more! I’ll let you know how these turn out….and if at all possible, will consider selling this here as well as the salve.

Well, I suppose I better go. I need to get this place cleaned up a little and get ready for bed. I could really use a shower!!!! We have a busy day tomorrow and I would like to be able to sit down and rest for a short while at least! I hope you all are doing well! We are really busy and accomplishing a lot around here, settling in and making a lot of new friends, spending time with family too. We are enjoying life here and trying to find a new normal. Summer is always a hectic but fun time for us. We have alot to look forward too and a lot to do before fall hits us again, and the possibility of another bad winter is always on our mind. This pushes us to accomplish a lot around here so we will be more prepared. One last thing…I am pleased to say our male Pyrenees pup is finally settling in and we think he might actually be a keeper (we hope!). We also think we may have puppies in the near future….we’ve already got two of them sold if that does happen. New life is inevitable on the farm.

BLESSINGS TO YOU! I’ll try to get some pics on here….thanks for being there and while I wish I had some new pattern to post for you, but I just flat don’t. There are just no creative sewing juices flowing, but lots of life to catch up on. I hope you all are having a wonderful spring and getting lots done too, wherever you are! Nichole

Well I first want to say a huge thankyou for your sweet words and prayers for my family….my son had his tonsils and adenoids out on Wednesday. All went well, and he is doing about as well as can be expected. I think we are all just on pins and needles waiting for him to finally turn that corner and he will start to feel better, but he is still having a considerable amount of pain and so we wait. It is very difficult as a mom to watch your kids suffer…and even more frustrating that you can’t do anything about it! I’m a “fixer”, I like to make things better. This is just something that time and healing will have to do…and my fussing over him is probably about to get on his nerves! I know that it will all be fine…and still I can’t help but worry. Thanks again for everything and I will get back to you all soon. I have more to update you on and would like to get some new pics on here! Love to you all! Needless to say, sewing here is pretty much extinct…as it should be…there will always be time later on. So glad you all can’t see the condition of my house at the moment! ha! Nichole

Just wanted to say hello and that yes, we are all still alive around here! I’ve not been active as my son has taken a turn for the worse and he has been continually sick for the past two months. We finally have a surgery date for next week and so I would ask if you would to pray for him to have a smooth surgery and as pain free of a recovery as possible. He is getting his tonsils out but has to be fever free for two days prior, as of right now he is not. So please say a prayer that things will work out that he can have his surgery and finally be able to recover. It’s been a lot for him and it is hard as a mom to watch him suffer so much. Thanks for being understanding. Life will get back to our normal as soon as it is able and I will post when things settle down just a bit. Blessings to  you all and thank you for thinking of us. Nichole

Well, turns out me and my computer are neither one dummies! It was the memory stick! ugh! So sorry, thanks for being more than patient. I have posted and checked all parts of Block 10 and will do the same for the Block 11 photo. I will get the finishing directions on here too. WHEW!

With that said I am taking a siesta. I’ve got to get my son well as my top priority! He’s either got to try one more round of antibiotics or it’s gonna be curtains for those tonsils! Enough is enough. Also, on top of this, I’m trying to get my herb garden and flowers in (not a priority, just sanity), and going to be helping my folks who are moving up here in just a few weeks. Meanwhile, I’ve still not finished my own painting, and need to do that. I’ve got a lot of catching up to do with my kids’ school work/grades/evaluations and such to summarize. It’s just a busy time for me. I’ll do my best to keep something going on here. If you don’t hear too much out of me, I’m with the goats!

Something fun to think about….last Saturday my daughter and I went to an Amish small animal auction. We had never been before and wanted to go really bad! We decided we would sit and watch for a long time to get the ins and outs of bidding down before we attempted anything. Well, we asked lots of questions to some nice folks next to us too, and that helped a lot! It was something I had always wanted to do, but was scared to death to do it! UNTIL….there he was. This little, perfect, adorable goat billy that I had JUST said we needed (yes, NEEDED!). We are getting ready to seperate Ernie from the girls, but didn’t want him to be so lonely! We also needed another buck to spread the genetics out. We also said we wanted one the same age as Ernie and black headed.

So there he was….Little Boy Blue as we’ve come to call him. And through the help of our Amish friend, we got him! I actually got a number, bid competetively, stayed under budget and got the little guy. He is a doll….so meet Little Boy Blue (we call him Blue as he has been so lonely without mom, he just cries for us and LOVES to be held like a little baby when they cry):

Isn’t he just adorable? Now, here is what will make you smile too…a picture of him with Ernie, now a robust and very onery young man! Yes, he is STILL on the bottle, but it is worth it for his health and manliness!

Now that makes me happy! Blessings and I will be in touch! You can’t get rid of me that easy! Nichole