Brief moment

Brilliant streaks of pink cloud spike the sky
as I amble down the hill with my three legged dog.

As we return, the pink now dulled, floats below folds of heavy greying clouds.
Venus radiates beneath a bright crescent moon.

We trek up the hill as Venus drops towards the horizon then shatters into splits of light.

Our two cats meet us at the end of the stone wall,
they turn and travel with us up home.

Caprine Cadre

Thu milking Hillary with help from Seth

We are so happy to have a new group of friends and helpers on Harmony Hill.

Carmen, Seth, Thu and families have been enjoying the farm, learning to milk and making it possible for me to travel a bit knowing everything is in good hands.

Elisha flies down the hill

Thu's palm on Carmen's belly a few days before baby Liam was born

^

Goat Milk Ice Cream a la Carmen

Carmen and Vicki are two new friends and neighbors who answered my shout out on Craigslist for Goat Milkers for Harmony and Hillary while I am in transition traveling to our Day Valley Home.  Vicki has raised her own goats and studied animal husbandry at Washington State University.  Carmen will be giving birth to her first child at the end of the month and wants to have pure fresh goat milk available for him.

We have been gathering for milking and enjoying each other's company.  Yesterday Carmen taught us how she enrichs goat milk  for ice cream, with white chocolate and extra egg yolks.  Goats milk, while creamy and delicious does not separate like cow milk and hence no cream.  I am allergic to cow products I cannot have cow cream in my ice cream.  Carmen created a solution.

Carmen at the stove stirring custard mix

Carmen is a talented creative cook who believes in using high quality organic ingredients.  She adapted two recipes she found on line one for BASIL ice cream and the other for Cherry Vanilla.  The results of both are rich, smooth, creamy and taste amazing.

Vicki watches and listens after cracking and separating eggs with Micheal

Basil, sugar, and goatsmilk in the blender.  Unexpectedly delicious combination.  The strong fresh green flavor of the basil creates a wonderful contrast in ice cream.

smiling after just a taste, waiting till it freezes!

Who's minding the Farm? Hannah, Sasha, Sarah and Allen

While I am in Los Gatos staying with dear friends, training with Uly at American Sporthorse Center, and exploring the area for our eventual move, Allen sustains Harmony Hill with the help of three International beauties
Hannah Middendorf from Germany, Sasha Sudakova (Александра Судакова) from Russia and Sarah Janner from France.

Hannah, Sasha and Peg

Sarah

Sasha on Uly

Hannah and Uly

Sasha knows her way around a kitchen!

Thanks Allen!

Jacob & Miranda (Goose)  Quad rides and rifle lessons

Cool Pool Cats

Candy display from outdoor Mexican Market, Fridays in Lindsay

. Viva La Musica

Horses try to peek into the bathroom

They work hard for six hours and then relax by the pool.  Hannah rode North with Uly and the trailer and was a great help as she has been for her whole visit.

Sasha and Sarah covered things while we were all gone.  Sasha is an excellent cook.  She has made cakes, cupcakes, stuffed squash and Borscht!  Sarah arrived with gifts of a beautiful scarf, large picture book about France and Channel #5.  She is sweet and shy and a hard worker and quick learner, good with horses and goat milking.

Allen has taken them to the Lindsay Market, Three Rivers for ice cream and drum circle.

They saw the murals in Exeter before I left

I hope they all know what a pleasure it has been to host them and how much they are appreciated.

Synergy and Abundance Getting pickled with some good women

rebecca's basket

pickled cherry toms

Four fine women gathered to share the surplus of their gardens and knowledge of ways to use it.

Colleen was a flurry  chopping a huge zucchini mixed with onions, peppers and tomatoes and setting to brine for two hours.


Then to the stove simmering the many good things from her over flowing garden.  Karen had been volunteered to teach us and brought her knowledge, canning supplies, and garden goodies.   She had the secret of refrigerator pickles.

The morning moved quickly timed perfectly, while we waited for one thing to brine or cool we started on another.  I had the least knowledge in the group but brought a recipe for pickling cherry tomatoes and a huge bowl of the sweet little red beauties.  I had also wanted to ferment Moroccan Lemons for many months and finally got the chance.  Rebecca, another powerhouse of a woman set to mashing while I cut and salted.  After a month of brining we will each get to sample them. 

  We  left with beautiful bottles of relish, tomatoes, pickles and lemons.  We shared extra veggies and canning supplies and the beauty of bringing something to the pot and all leaving with so much more than we came with.

refrigerator pickles

Karen's hands, Colleen and Rebecca

"Your steed awaits you M'lady", Shaun Smith

@the River w/Ben Davis

It was a great treat to host Shaun Smith a fitness and conditioning trainer from Great Britain and former line backer with NC Panthers.  He may have been the tallest, strongest, and nicest man I have  met.  He helped so much in less than a week lifting, chainsawing, carpentering and removing lug-nuts that even a pneumatic drill could not loosen.  He helped Camille with the horses but left before I could get him atop one.  He informed me my horse was groomed and saddled with,

"Your steed awaits you M'lady." 

He liked country music and we saw two rocking country bands perform; The Lo-cash Cowboys and Dos Okies with part of the Fifty Buck Band.  He had some fine French food and deserts at Monets and a wonderful dinner at the home of the Chef, Fred Embert.   He explored the Indian Bath tubs and River in Three Rivers with Jen and her boys, traveled to Morro Rock and the Sherman Tree with Camille before he headed North to explore more of California.

Sweet Camille de Chambery

Camille came bearing gifts from the  village of Chambery .  A picture book about her lovely home town, some beautifully wrapped nougat candy, and Givenchy perfume.  Horses were her passion.  She was able to ride Cabarina, attend a drill team practice and play at Pas de Deux which they call "Carousel" when two or more riders practice patterns and designs together.  She rode three different horses while here.  She is studying horticulture and came on a 5 week internship.  She planted beans, we volunteered helping restore native plants in the National Park and she worked at our local French Bistro "Monets" to practice her english and add some French ambiance.  Camille enjoyed yoga, trips to the Flea Market and Friends meeting with Sal and seeing the Big Trees with Shaun, trips to the River with Jen and Hospital Rock.

A Claire Light shines on Harmony Hill.

It was our good fortunate that Claire Cohen and her partner Paul took a break from thru hiking the Pacific Crest Trail from Mexico to Canada to stay with us.  Paul (trail name Charlie) is  a former zookeeper,  a man of many skills who is the most widely traveled adventurer I have ever met.  He stayed a couple of days before flying back to the UK to see his Mum.  Claire stayed a bit longer than 2 weeks.  She was a competent goat milker, horse handler, and cockroach wrangler.  She attacked each job with vigor and efficiency from scooping poop, harvesting goat food, collecting seeds, planting trees, to pulling weeds.   Claire is a silversmith and puppet maker.  She made the Chickens in the wonderful movie CHICKEN RUN and many other well known movie characters such as Wallace & Grommit.

Claire sewed a beautiful embroidered vest for Turkey to protect his feathers when it gets a bit cooler. 

She mended the horse fly masks, repaired  a chair with baling twine made a summer curtain for the front door,  crocheted a scrubby with baling twine, and taught me how to make felt with Llama hair.

We had great fun together at the  Native plant nursery in the National Park, Cattle Round up, First Fri. Party, Bunko, and  Kayti's Yoga class.  She rode three different horses, Twister at the Cattle Round up, Paint at Drill Team practice, and Cabarina at Harmony Hill. 

making felt from llama wool

 Our friends were captivated by  stories of her travels and adventures.  She left us better than she found us.  Allen and I will miss her but be following her PCT adventures on her blog

http://chippingalongwithcharlie.blogspot.com/2013/05/mile-650.html.

Berry Picking

 Picking blackberries in Lemon Cove with Edible Garden Club of Three Rivers followed by breakfast @ Harmony Hill.

Pictures by Janet King

Harmony, Hillary and thier new roomate

The Chick who thinks he is a goat

Charlene Maworera

@Kacey Fansett's Water Color Class

Charlene Maworera  a HelpXer extraordinare,  was with us a little more than two weeks.  Smart and hard working.  Here on political asylum from Zimbabwe, she has lead and is leading a fascinating life.  A warm, compassionate and helpful person, she has shared much about her family and culture. We will miss her.

Martina Schurmann was a farmstay guest from Germany who stayed for 10 days. We enjoyed painting with Kacey Fansett at the First Saturday art event in Three Rivers.



 

Double Luxury, Onions and memories

Allen asked for an onion with his eggs so I went to the garden and pulled two beautiful red ones.  I chopped and shredded the green tops and admired the shiny deep purple bulbs.  It is a luxury to bring them from the earth to the pan and enjoy their vibrant beauty  The double gift being that everything I pull from the Earth also releases a memory of the visitor or helper who planted and nurtured it

I recalled Kyung Ho from Korea and the day we volunteered at the Sequoia Riverlands Trust sorting acorns.  We found the small red sets among the acorns and he planted them in the pond garden.  The chickens dug them up after he left and the beautiful Isa replanted them and built a net cage to protect them.

I thought of her each time I watered them and watched them grow strong and safe. I  thought of her as I sliced them and remember they were also watered also by Chris, Makenzie, Ruth, Andrea, Grace, Sarah, Miceala, Tianna, Nicole and even Farid who left in the dead of the night.  Each visitor and helper has poured a little love on them and I remember them all with thanks.

Nicole Preziosi

The gift of Nicole:

I do not know what drew this beautiful spirit to our farm but she came at just the right time.  Huge blue eyes, wide open smile, cheerful, curious and hardworking.  Always on the look out for ways to be helpful.  We shared an interest in Weston Price, Nourishing Traditions and an allergy to wheat.  I made her stinging nettle tea and gave her some goat milk body scrub   She let me try her homemade coconut oil toothpaste which I will attempt to make soon.  We watched a video about fermenting Moroccan lemons, enjoyed roasting veggies and making quinoa among many other things.  Her first week it was just the two of us. She milked the goats, groomed the horses, gathered goat food, tended the garden chipped and chainsawed.   I put a french braid in her long auburn hair.   At our Health Club she gave the boys a run for their money playing in Pick up Basket ball games.  The second week we were joined by Farid Pitussi, a Frenchman who has been in Australia a year.

She taught him about the horses, goats, chickens and other chores relating to watering garden, weeding and chipping.  On her last day they painted the fence at Allen's office and she pointed her car, Mr. Magoo, North bearing lavender  and rosemary bundles, headed for some fun with her friends on the way to more farms and eventually Alaska.  We were happy to be a stop on her journey.

Thank you Sarah, Chervil

Thank you Sarah Smith for pointing out the Chervil in my garden growing among the stinging nettle, miners lettuce and mustard greens.  Another lovely gift from the Garden Goddess.

Chervil is a delicate culinary herb used frequently in French cuisine. A member of the parsley family, chervil has a mild flavor with hints of liquorice or fennel.

Chervil leaves are delicate and curly, somewhat resembling carrot greens. Because of its delicate flavor, chervil is used in salads and soups, where it will not be overpowered by the other flavors. Used it on roasted vegetables today putting it in towards the end so it crisped.  Delicious.