Stepping Up, Freezer Problems, Riding Horses
It’s cooling down especially at night. I’m sure we have plenty of hot days left, but a hint of fall is in the air. Amy and the kids delivered meat to Knoxville families on Monday and came back to the valley Tuesday morning.
We emptied out 4 more chicken shelters Tuesday evening for processing on Wednesday. Down to moving only 6 shelters through the field everyday now. Wednesday was the lightest processing crew we’ve had in a couple years, but we got it done. I did the killing and scalding. Canaan and Hasten (mostly Canaan) took care of the heads, feet, and feathers. Amy, BellaJane, and Sheri did the eviscerating, while Hallie stepped up to handle the QA (quality assurance). It was a long day, but not as long as we thought it was going to be. Everyone worked hard and got it done, putting 260 chickens on ice in 2.5 hours. We cut up over 70 for parts, halved over 30, and packaged the rest as whole birds. Shout out to my mom for running the scales and labeling during packaging that afternoon.
After getting everything cleaned up and making the other farm rounds, Hallie and I borrowed horses from my brother and went on a horseback ride. I used to ride all the time growing up, but I hadn’t been on a horse in years. It was the highlight of Hallie’s week for sure. Maybe the highlight of mine too.
With the end of chicken season around the corner, we’ve been trying to stock up on chicken inventory for the off season. Our freezers are getting full. Juggling freezer space throughout the year and keeping up with beef, pork, and chicken inventory is a never-ending challenge. If you want ORVF chicken in the winter months, we might have some in the winter, but we might not. The best way to secure your pastured chicken is to either stock up and fill your freezer this fall. Or you can join the chicken herd shares, where we save it for you in our freezers and you get it each month.
Speaking of freezers, selling locally of course requires regularly managing inventory and working in freezers, but this week I had to do some irregular work on one of the walk-in freezers themselves. The heat tape on the drain wasn’t working, so the drain pipe froze solid and burst. The freezer was working fine and keeping everything cold, but the condensation was being emptied into the freezer, building up mounds of ice. My track record for trying to fix things like this usually ends in me making matters worse. With this one, so far so good. I replaced the drain, heat tape, and insulation, and it appears to be draining like it’s supposed to. Removing the built up ice was a challenge. As I would remove chunks of ice from the freezer, Hasten and Wren would use it to “build an igloo.” Carter would use it as popsicles. Ha.
Other than that, more of the same. While mowing the cabin yards and around the barn, I’ve been listening to some Leo Tolstoy short stories. Here’s a few quotes from “Family Happiness.”
“I loved him as much as ever and was happy as ever in his love, but my love, instead of increasing, stood still, and another new and disquieting sensation began to creep into my heart. To love him was not enough for me, after the happiness I had felt in falling in love. I wanted movement and not a calm course of existence. I wanted excitement and danger and the chance to sacrifice myself for my love. I felt in myself a super abundance of energy which found no outlet in our quiet life.”
“I wanted, not what I had got, but a life of struggle. I wanted feeling to be the guide of life and not life to guide feeling.”
“And I do well to want an active life rather than to stagnate in one spot and feel life flowing past me. I want to move forward, to have some new experience everyday and every hour; whereas, he wants to stand still, and to keep me standing beside him.”
“It was as if some unforgiven grievance held us apart, as if he were punishing me and pretending not to be aware of it, but there was nothing to ask pardon for… My punishment was merely this, that he did not give his whole heart and mind to me as he used to do. But he did not give it to anyone or to anything, as though he had no longer a heart to give.”
Have a good week.
Will