After our two mini vacations, we are back.  I had to work Saturday, and Tom had the unenviable task of burying Brown Sugar. He got attacked by wasps in the process as well.  Not a good homecoming.

When got back home Sunday morning, I had to wear an N95 mark due to the smoke.

It felt like our enjoyment of summer was done, and we were ready for autumn.

I did get to see the babies growing up.

On our trip, Tom had bought some hot peppers from my favorite produce stand near Naches, The Little Red School house.  I am thinking that the smokiness might help the drying process.

On Sunday the smoke got particularly bad.  It made a red sun.

I was able to watch the Seahawk preseason game replay on Sunday.  Wally joined me.  I finally have my couch-cuddling cat!

Unfortunately Monday morning’s smoke was even worse.

The various squash are doing quite well in the old pig pen.  Unfortunately the donkeys are just now starting to eat the squash leaves.

For two days now I had only been able to count 4 black turkeys were there should be 5. They are hard to count sometimes as they scatter quite a bit, but now I was concerned.

I searched the fields and found what looks to be the feathered remains of a black turkey as well as two red chickens and a black and white chicken.  I initially assumed it was eagle kills.  But then I noticed, after I cleared the nettles, that there were holes under our fencing with apparent trails underneath.  So it may have been coyotes instead.  Eagles don’t usually kill multiple animals in a day, but I am not sure how many days these kills occurred over.  So I didn’t want to take any chances and moved pallets over the fence holes.

Hopefully this helps.  Plus I will shut the barn doors at night and reactivate the pasture camera.

Meanwhile Tom built a new shelf for his cider making.  The old site has a leak in the roof.  So until we make a new roof, we needed a new space.

Last evening we took break from farm stuff and went for a dinner and a movie.  We ate at the Trumpeter Public House.  Here is the relatively new totem pole outside.

We had some time so we went to the Revival Lounge for cocktails.

And then we headed to the Lincoln theater to see Oppenheimer.  This is the organist prior to the movie.  The movie was good but a little long.

Today was back to the farm yet again.  I noticed there are still barn swallows nesting.

I noticed some red feathers in the water tub for the chickens and sheep.  I am hoping this is not another causality of our predation, but it doesn’t seem like enough to be so.  I hope not.

Today was a fruit day for me.  I started with picking some blueberries.

Then I picked some tomatoes.

Then some golden egg plums.

Then 15.5 pounds of blackberries.

Tom pressed 20 gallons of cider today.  I just finished destemming 5 pounds of elderberries that I picked (with help from Al and Tom) at the cabin.  We are definitely back on the farm and doing the food prep it requires.