The roof and shingles...

Here's the roof of our small barn partially shingled this past Thursday eve.

We had mom's day early yesterday, spent it with one mum and a sister in Everett. Before we left in the AM though, I the finished shingling. Except where my OCD-self might want a few more nails on the final row. At this point though, she's water and wind tight!

My partner in all things farmy, finished digging one of our two corn patches, also before we left, breaking sod all by hand and turning soil until fluffy. Sure we could get a tiller and do it in 5 minutes, but it's nice to break a sweat as well as get up close and personal to land and soil.

Next on the barn is the siding, then painting, and last is some stall setup before the goats get access. We need a kidding area for lassie who is more pregnant looking by the minute. Obviously she took and we'll be expecting babies in early to mid-June. And we need to ensure security of our hay and grains, which we will also be storing in the mini-barn. Goats are both clever AND persistent when they want something. Miscreants!

We've been discussing how to best collect and store rain water for our garden. Right now we use some collected water in small barrels, but we're not storing near enough yet for it to really last a rain free spell. We'll be picking up, "Water Storage Tanks, Cisterns, Aquifers, and Ponds", from the library for further research. Underground cistern, or above? And how best to devise a filter system. Some very clever ideas out there. Be lovely to water completely with rain water some day. I am sure the aquifer here abouts would appreciate that.