It’s been a challenging week. Last Friday my son broke his elbow at school, which necessitated an ambulance ride to the local hospital. Then, he had another ambulance ride to a Boston hospital that has a pediatric orthopedic surgery department. They gave him pain killers and a temporary cast. A few days later we had a consultation with the surgeon and a new, temporary cast was put on. Yesterday we were back at the big city hospital for the surgery, which was more difficult than expected.

My husband and I were sitting in a waiting room, in that sort of dazed, anxious stupor that one has in hospital waiting rooms, when Steve pulled out his laptop. He nudged me and pointed at the screen. There was Pip, standing up, yet soundly asleep, leaning his head on Caper’s furry belly. Pip had a look of serene happiness on his face and a a beauteous smile on his lips. We smiled too. I joke that Caper and Pip are “useless” – after all, they’re boy goats. Lawn ornaments. But the truth is that they’re very good at their job, which is making everyone that knows them smile. I needed them yesterday, and they sure earned their keep.

I snapped the sprouts off of the plants

and gave the stalks to the goats. By all the shoving, burping and leaf-grabbing, you’d think the boys were starved. But, look at those round bellies! Those goats always have full stomachs.

But, look who’s watching! Candy wants cabbage, too.

Okay, girl, here you go. Thanks for sharing with the hens.

This is what I harvested.

I’ll show you in another post how I cook Brussel sprouts.

It was in the low twenties this morning. A hard frost is pretty when you know it’s going to warm up later.

This is why the growing season is over.

I’ll bring the Brussel sprouts in later this afternoon. It’s said that they taste better after a frost – if that’s the case, they should be delicious!

About half of my hens started molting back  in the sweltering days of August. Remember when Lulu looked like this?

Well, she’s back in full-feather, looking beautiful.

But she’s still crazy.

The weather has turned. There’s frost on the ground in the mornings, blowing winds and a chill damp to the air. You’d think it wasn’t the best time to molt, but a half dozen chickens are running around part-naked. Here’s Blackie in the wind. She looks a tad cold, doesn’t she?

But, this time of year does have it’s comforts. Now that the growing season is over, I let the girls into the flower beds. The dirt is warm, loose and inviting. It must feel really good on those bare patches of skin and the itchy, emerging quills. Look closely and you can count six chickens crowded into this spa. There’s plenty of other spots to dirt bathe in, but the chickens like to do this together – despite the downside of having dirt kicked into one’s face by a neighbor!

I’m not worried about the molting girls being cold. They have patches of sun to laze in, there are plenty of remaining feathers to fluff up and insulate their bodies with, and at night they roost together  – looking rather like a moth-eaten feather blanket hanging on a rack, but warm nonetheless. By the time it is brutally cold, they’ll all have on their toasty-warm feather coats and I’ll be jealous of their comfort while I do my barn chores in the mornings.

My garden is about ready to be put to bed for the season. Some beautiful zinnias remain.

The only vegetables left are the Brussel sprouts

and the turnips.

They’re cold-hardy vegetables and can handle the hard frosts we’ve been seeing in the morning. I’d planned on leaving the second  crop of carrots in a few weeks more, too, but was surprised today, to find them wilted, so I decided to harvest them. However, when I went to pull them up there was nothing but tops! No wonder they were looking so sad. They’d been eaten by an unknown burrowing animal. I even found the tunnel holes in the raised bed. Too big for chipmunks. I’m guessing that a relative of Bugs Bunny did the damage. I fed the tops to the goats, who were happy to get the greens.

I’m ready to take a break from gardening, and was all set to clean up and leave things until spring, but then I found three double-paned glass doors at the town dump. I couldn’t resist. I tidied up a raised bed, planted carrots, lettuce and turnips,

watered, and covered them up with the doors. Voila! Instant cold frame. All I have to do is add a board at the end to keep the cold wind from blowing in.

In a couple of weeks, the trees will be bare, I’ll be wearing a winter coat, and there will be green sprouts in the garden. It’s a nice thought. I hope they’ll be ready to harvest before the furry thief discovers them.