Welcome to Fern Valley

Here in central Alberta prime farm country,my husband Martin and I work together raising beef cattle and Appaloosa horses. Fern valley appaloosas have long been known for their quality of temperament conformation and color.I have recently rediscovered a love of writing and have published 2 collections of poetry. "Telling Tails" and Tails Trails and Campfire stories" . I look forward to a future spreading my wings as an author and as a horse woman .

Wednesday 16 September 2015

Its a wrap! (the summer that is ) many pics!

Well fal has arrived here at Fern Valley! It was a heck of a summer ,so very busy but feeling like we were on a hamster wheel , running and running and getting ... well not nowhere but it did seem to be a lot of hurry up and do the same thing over and over. 
My last big event of the summer was to fly to Seattle on Labour day weekend to attend my cousin's wedding .Whew! 4 weddings in 3 weeks, I am about out of party ! 
My dad and uncle , along with several other cousins attended and we had a lovely time. My Seattle family are some of the most wonderful people in the world, and I love to see them ,always wish I could stay longer. 
The family there is that of my dad's only sister, and he seems unable to refuse her anything so when she asked if he would sing again at her granddaughter's wedding , well you know he said yes!  
But first he sang to her at dinner on the friday night. The look of pure joy on her face is one I will never forget !
The wedding itself was a wonderful event! Done in a rustic style , at a gorgeous venue, Thomas Family farm, it was a beautiful big barn all set up for special events ! I will let the pictures speak 










 Cousin Murray whose wedding we attended last year. Ever the handsome and gracious fellow, picked me up at the airport in style! 



 Cousin Enid, mother of the bride 
 A proud and shaky Randy with his beautiful daughter Brittaini




It was a whirlwind trip but well worth it . 
Home and back to the real world where Martin and I have been busy working on a few projects. 
With the drought, hay is a bit hard to come by so we are working on some options, he found some old green feed that will double as bedding , and we are baling some grass hay into square bales from the gas well site, and also an old unused golf course. We got the well site done last weekend , he baled and I picked. Awfully glad there was only 30 to pick up! 30 is better than none but my poor arm doesn't love that type of work anymore. We have a crew (hopefully ) coming to help at the golf course, because even with the drought and the grasshoppers there will be substantially more than 30 bales! 
Also to feed these bales, and to prevent waste and loss, we use nets. But as I have mentioned my shoulder and elbow are a problem, so rather than filling the bag in the barn and carrying it to where I need  we are setting the bales up nearer to the pens and putting in these new feeders , that Martin and I have been building . We have 2 styles, one that opens more  specifically for square hay with a door in the side , or the alternative that opens at the top to allow you to put loose hay or from a round bale .






They will be mounted to the fence either with a ratchet strap, or more permanently with U bolts .
Alos this year I decided to do some canning, making Mustard Pickle, harvard beets, Giardiniera(mixed vegetable pickle ) also  Pickled Beans and pickled asparagus.



 As for the rest of the farm family, the critters are fine, My sister is finally catching up after the beautiful wedding she and my brother in law hosted here for Deanna and Adam. Mom and dad are well , coming out from time to time to visit and get the puppy love they need! 
I will wrap up for now with a few more photos








So now that fall has arrived, I am hoping to see a slow down and maybe get to horse time in .also to get out of this rut of barely blogging and get back to at least once a week and also start reading all of my favorite blogs again. Hope all have had a wonderful summer, and as always 
stay safe my friends !

10 comments:

Country Gal said...

WOW ! You have been busy . Lovely photos. glad you got to visit family and had a great time . It was fall here for a bit temp wise then the temps shot up again now it is half half and half lol . Thanks for sharing . Have a good week !

Ami said...

Makes me tired just reading about all of it. But how wonderful that you're able to go to all those family events. My gosh, Henry has grown a LOT!!

What, no Skeeter pics?

aurora said...

It's so nice to hear from you! How wonderful that your dad continues singing during special moments. Rustic venue's sure seem to be growing in popularity, it's easy to see why. Great functional feeders!! Henry has changed a lot since we last saw him, still cute as ever! Looks like he's become best buds with Winston.

kden said...

If I had to spend a day working with you, I think I would be dead by the end :) Your canned items look wonderful!

C-ingspots said...

Busy, but in a good way! I'm sure hoping for a slowdown soon as well, but you know how that usually goes. I love weddings! People are always so happy and carefree. Beautiful bride and setting. Your dad and mom look good too! Is this your usual time to start storing hay? We get ours in late spring/early summer because grass dries up and dies when summer hits. We've had a drought year too, and no snow in the mountains, lots of forest fires, loss of wildlife. It's been so incredibly sad to see. Hoping we get a winter filled with snowfall to refill reservoirs, but we'll see. Take care Sherry, we may be "as good once as we ever were", but we tend to pay for it longer. :)

Crystal said...

Looks like a perfect setting for a wedding. And ya id be exhausted after all those weddings too! The canning looks good too, i love pickles but not mustard...how mustardy are they? Hope it slows down for you and you can relax and enjoy. And I wanna know how those feeders work. I have seen them lots but never hear much after they are built.

Nuzzling Muzzles said...

You've had a lot going on. I just saw your comment on my writing blog now. Yes, I'm fine. My horse blog is set to private for a while because I'm trying to sell a horse and I don't want potential buyers to find my blog and let some story about the horse from years ago influence their decision. I also can't ride much and have nothing to write about except complaints about the weather and health issues. I recently found out that the reason why I feel like I've been hit by a truck between August and October every year is because I have widespread arthritis, which is complicated by the high heat and high humidity of monsoon season. Do you get a lot of humidity where you are at, and do you feel a difference with your RA?

Sherry Sikstrom said...

Nuzz, Alberta is far less humid than most places but any weather changes I find affect the arthritis, both eh osteo and the RA, hope you have success selling your horse, and get to feeling better soon too

Buttons Thoughts said...

Oh the wedding looks beautiful. I am sorry the drought hit you so hard we on the other hand had so much rain we could barely get the hay off I am sure the quality is way down and possibly some mold. Genius way to feed. Nice to see your canned stuff winter is coming sooner than we think. Take care of yourself and I am happy you will have time to blog again. HUGS B

BrownEyed Cowgirl said...

I for one am glad to see the end of summer. The weather has been gorgeous here and the cooler temps means a less frantic watering schedule. LOL. I have been getting in substantial horse time this last week or so and it feels wonderful. :-)

I am jealous of your canning. I put in garden stuff this year and we have been enjoying the fresh veggies, but didn't get any canning done and it doesn't look like I will. Oh well...Next year! ;-)