As you would know if you followed us on Instagram, we’ve had the mama ducks with their babies in the garden for about 8 weeks now.

for the most part, it’s been really great. However, there has been a catch that we now have to deal with.

You can watch the full Duckdate here:

Overall, I’d say this has been a great experience. Learned a lot. Still love the idea of ducks in the garden.

But, until we can heighten the current beds, they really should only be in the main garden with supervision.

You’ll want your garden beds atleast 3 feet deep if you want to reap the full benefits of ducks in the garden space. They DO keep slugs and bad bugs down. They DO eat weeds. But, they WILL eat your lettuce, beet greens, beans, broccoli, basil, and more given a chance.

We will be setting up the 2nd duck house behind the garden as planned. And we will be finishing the greenhouse/hoop house. My hubby will then be making a series of portable garden beds that are extra tall for inside the greenhouse so the ducks can still mingle in and out of the greenhouse at will without being “tempted beyond what they can bear” with having too easy of access to things.

We’re also working on rehoming the extra drakes we have so we can start moving our baby drakes to the barn. We have several little boys that are fully feathered and need moved out to reduce crowding and allow them to form a Batchelor flock to grow out on pasture until they’re ready for slaughter.

This is part of being a farmer, we try new things, learn from them, and adapt. If we really want something to work, we’ll find a way. Or, if it’s just not working, we reevaluate our plans and adapt to what would work WITH the nature of the animals involved in mind. Don’t try to force nature to conform to your standards. We find much more peace when we work with nature and use the experience to learn more of the balance God has placed in nature.

Sometimes, friends go through really hard times. Sometimes, those hard times seem to last a VERY long time. And sometimes, those hard times seem to just be one on top of another for a while.

But, God promises to be with us, and NEVER forsake us, during the hard times. Especially if we are obeying him and holding firmly to him and his covenant.

I did these photos as a gift for our friends that just couldn’t seem to get a break for a while. But now things seem to be calming down for them, allowing them to catch their breath, and find their rest again.

Blessings my friends! Your babies are SO beautiful!

I ran my own photography business before I got married. I continued to do photography the first couple years of marriage. But after baby #2 was born I felt like it was just too much when I needed to focus on my babies.

Well, fast forward 8 years… and it would seem that YAH (God) has chosen to reopen my old photography business. No, for real, it’s been all him.

I got a new camera this year purely intending it for my own enjoyment.

I shared a few photos of plants and my kids and a few friends on Facebook just to share a little of the fun I was having with my new toy.

I quit selling jewelry online over a year ago, so I haven’t had much for “extra spending money,” and hubbies work has been slow again this year. So I was starting to think if maybe there was something I could do to add to our finances from home. But didn’t think too much about it as we’ve been very busy on the farm, and I’ve had the Lord telling me to “Bloom where planted” in this season of life. So just been focusing on being content with where we’re at and building our farm dream as we can where we are, because this is where we’ve been planted, so this is where we’re gonna bloom at this time.

Well, a bit later I was asked for a price quote to photograph a friend’s wedding. And I was contacted by a distant cousin about having some couples photos done for an anniversary.

Now, I’ve got 1 photo session done, 2 more getting on the schedule, 1 wedding for sure this year, and may have another wedding for next year! I still haven’t actually done any advertising and am just now publicly sharing some photos from my first paying gig!

I always considered my old photography biz to be part business and part ministry. And this new biz is looking to be exactly that way already. I can minister to people, encourage people, and give them an art to bless them and their home.

And without further ado…

Heres some photos for this beautiful couple celebrating 3 years together!

We just love being submerged in nature. We don’t care much for the cities, too crowded, too much traffic and crazy drivers, too much noise… doesn’t typically smell very good either.

We love that we live close enough to the cities that we can do our shopping and get things we really need as needed, but far enough out we have some privacy and enough space to create a sanctuary for ourselves.

Our girls catch butterflies and moths. We can visit the local wildlife refuge any time. Recently we’ve been watching the barn swallows at the refuge, and have gotten to see their babies peeking out of the nests.

Our most recent trip we got to watch some frogs avoid capture by the swallows. We saw a teeny-tiny frog not much bigger than the eraser on a pencil peeking out from behind a blade of grass. Then all of a sudden that itty-bitty frog gets knocked off his perch by a swallow, and he dangle for a moment by 1 leg, and he stays perfectly still in this position until he’s certain it’s safe to move to a new spot.

We get to watch the mama ducks raise their young, and same with the goats.

It’s fun to watch these animals go about their day. They don’t know what the future holds, can’t say that they really think about it too much. They just live for that moment. Sometimes it’s a fleeting moment, a close call, they could lose their in that moment. But once the moments passed, the adrenal has settled, they move on. They could literally lose their life at any given moment, but instead of hiding, they still go out to find food, find a mate, raise babies, clean themselves, do a little sunbathing… they take pleasure in simple things, they don’t let the scary stuff hold them back from living and thriving where they are.

I feel like YAH (the LORD) has been telling me more to observe these small animals and how they live. They don’t fret and worry from day to day, they just go about their life and live it.

HE knows we need food and clothes, He knows what the future holds (good and evil), we know nothing really. So we put our trust in him, every day, we live for this moment, and enjoy wherever we are at today.

it’s so easy to get caught up in everything that goes wrong during a day. But if that’s ALL we focus on, how will that grant us peace and help us do better? Absolutely learn from what went wrong, but don’t keep living in that one bad moment. The moment is past, move on. We shod be dwelling on the good that happens each day, focusing on the progress we’ve made or special moments we had.

observe the animals, their life may have flashed before their eyes in a close encounter that could’ve ended their life, but then… they move on, almost as if it never happened. Something happens, be alert, deal with the situation, then drop it and move on. There’s no need to keep revisiting a moment that only causes stress and trauma.