I planted more than 30 bulbs of garlic two weekends ago. I will harvest the garlic bulbs next July. My son, Timmy helped me take the bulbs apart and plant each clove. He thought it was the most exhausting work, but I told him when we harvest them next summer he can sell the garlic to make money. The thought of making money kept him planting.

Ever since we have lived on our farm, people have given my husband and I advice on how to make money. On advice of a neighbor, we decided to raise Chinese geese. We could make extra money for Christmas shopping he told us.

We let the geese free range on our property and we had goose poop everywhere. Anytime someone drove up in the yard the geese would surround the person’s car and make a large racket hissing and honking. People were afraid to get out of their car. I would run outdoors with my baby in my arms and shoo the geese away. If salesmen and religious zealots drove up, I wouldn’t shoo the geese away from their cars. These unwanted visitors usually left quickly.

Whenever I hung clothes on the line, the female geese would come and nip the clothes off with their beaks. We were constantly chasing the geese out of the yard. Butchering the geese was an all day chore. I saved their down and spent hours removing every pinfeather. I didn't make money off the geese; they were more of a nuisance.

Another moneymaking endeavor my husband and I tried was saving the neck feathers of our colorful roosters to send off to a company that made the feathers into fishing flies. Our neighbor told us, &uot;To get the best neck feathers, you have to wring the chicken’s neck.&uot;

I had never wrung a chicken’s neck before and my husband, Tom, hadn’t either; but we had butchered chickens by chopping off their heads.

Tom tried to wring a rooster’s neck by swinging it around and around out in the yard one cold day. He finally brought the rooster in the house and said, &uot;I can’t wring this rooster’s neck, see if you can do it.&uot;

I picked up the rooster and stepped outside and swung it around by its neck and it went limp. I said to Tom, &uot;There’s not much to doing that. I will cut off its head and save the neck feathers.&uot; Tom said,&uot; Good, I have the hot water ready outside to dip the chicken in to remove the rest of it’s feathers, I’m going to go catch another rooster in the coop.&uot;

I brought the chicken in the house, as I didn’t want the dog to run off with it. I placed it on a wooden kitchen chair and went to put on a warmer sweatshirt.

Tom came back in the house and yelled, &uot;Sheila, where’d you put that rooster?&uot;

I didn’t know what he was talking about. I came out to the kitchen and the rooster wasn’t on the chair where I had left it. The bathroom is right off the kitchen and Tom heard a rustling sound behind the slightly jarred door.

We looked and there was the rooster drinking water out of the toilet. I thought this was going to be as hard as doing those darn geese. Neither of us could wring those old roosters’ necks. We gave up trying to save their neck feathers and cut off their heads with a hatchet and made soup out of them

I sure hope my garlic grows well. At least I won’t have to kill the garlic to harvest it.