In the garden... summer squash

Can you guess what we did this weekend?  If you guessed "worked in the garden" you are right... you should reward yourself with chocolate! 

We planted 9 white squash (some people call this patty pan squash), 9 zucchini and 9 luffa.  These are plants that I had started with my homemade seed starting pots.  They were all getting their first set of real leaves and were looking good.  I had started some yellow squash seeds directly in the garden about 3 weeks ago and they are looking good. 



We planted a milk jug with about 100 small holes in it and planted the squash around it.  We'll fill the jug with water and hopefully that will keep the water off the leaves.  We also mulched with leaves. 

 The yellow squash, white squash and zucchini are true summer squash and the luffa can be eaten small as a summer squash or allowed to grow big like a winter squash. When it grows big you can dry it out and that is where you get the luffa sponges you buy in the bath section of the store.  We are growing them to turn into sponges, we've never done that before, I'll let you know how it goes. 




This is our first harvest last year.


Here's what I've learned about summer squash over the years:

• Squash do just fine direct seeding in the garden.
• Plant in hills (this helps you know where your seeds are!)
• Plant 3 seeds per hill and then thin if needed.  (If you make your hills large enough you might not have to thin)
• Keep well watered, plants will live for a long time with not much water, but either they won't produce any fruit or the fruit will be hard.
• Harvest when the fruit is small - no longer than 6-8 inches, this will keep the plants producing but once you let a fruit mature the production will slow way down. 
• If you plant transplants, plant a few seeds too.  That way you'll have older and younger plants. 
• Do not water the leaves, just the soil

Pests and Problems

• Vine borer - if all of the sudden your beautiful plant dies, you probably have a vine borer.  Look at the base of the plant and see if some little bugs have bored (drilled) their way into the stem.  I have heard that you can scrap them out and if you catch them early enough the plant will survive.  I have not had much luck doing that.  This is part of the reason for planting seeds with transplants.  If we have vine borers, we pull the plant and burn it. And we still have our young plants growing. 
• Squash bugs and cucumber bugs - you will find these in the flowers.  Squish them.
• Squash bugs lay their eggs on the underside of the leaves (they are orangish colored).  again - squish them or if you just can't do it, pull off that leaf and burn it. 
• Powdery mildew - is a white mildew that will attack the leaves of squash, melons and cucumbers.  It is caused by too much moisture on the leaves and is spread by bugs.  We try to cut off infected leaves and burn them.  Last year we had a hard time with this and are changing the way we water to hopefully avoid it this year. 

Harvesting and Storing
Summer squash is best eaten fresh, in fact we eat it almost every day during the summer.  If you want to store some for later you might try freezing it after blanching it.  I've never done this because we do not like mushy squash.  We have frozen grated zucchini without blanching it to use in zucchini brownies.  Last year we dehydrated some to use in soups during the winter.  They were not very pretty, but they tasted great. 

My favorite book on bugs is Howard Garrett's Texas Bug Book an amazing book with tons of pictures and rememdies. 

"By the way...

...you have 6 bags of bananas in the freezer!" 

This is what I heard after a friend put all my freezer items back in the freezer when we moved. 

"Well, yes, I do." I agreed

"What are you going to do with them?"

"Make the yummiest banana bread ever"

You see we love bananas but not when they start to get brown spots on them.  One or two is okay, but the more spots they get, the longer they stay on the counter.  Sometimes, I can sneak them into smoothies, but I usually put them in the freezer and make banana bread muffins.  I make it every week or two, but sometimes when life gets crazy, I just don't get around to it and wind up with tons of bananas in the freezer.

We are getting ready to take Christian to visit a college and so I'm making snacks to take with us and to take to the family who is keeping our other children.  We got this recipe years ago from an elderly neighbor who my children used to call the "Cookie Granny" because she always (like every day) gave them home baked cookies.  I've tweaked it some by using freshly ground whole wheat pastry flour and adding ground flax.  It's another great filler upper for those teenage boys. 

Banana Bread
1 3/4 cup flour
1 cup sugar
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. baking soda
1/4 cup plus 1 Tbsp. buttermilk
1/2 cup oil
2 eggs - beaten
1 tsp. vanilla
2 mashed bananas
1 cup nuts (optional)
1/4 cup ground flax seed (optional)

Preheat oven to 325 degrees.  Grease and flour loaf pan or muffin pan.  Combine flour, sugar, flax and salt.  Combine baking soda and buttermilk.  Stir in buttermilk, oil, eggs and vanilla into dry ingredients.  Mix well.  Fold in mashed bananas and nuts.  Pour into pans and bake 1 hour 20 minutes for loaf and 20 -25 minutes for muffins (or until top is golden brown).

If only her ability to help were as great as her desire to help

If you are just beginning to grind your own flour or are interested in the nutritional benefits of it, my friend Kara has an excellent series on grains.   If you can't find grain locally, you can order from Honeyville Foods and only pay $5 for shipping.

This post is linked to Tasty Tuesdays. 

Craft Hope in Haiti

A couple of months ago I came across Craft Hope.  I'm not really sure how I found it, probably following links one night when I couldn't sleep.  I love the tag line of Craft Hope which is spreading seeds of hope one stitch at a time.  This really goes along with our motivation to teach our children skills like sewing, home improvement, cooking, etc.  We want them to have these skills so they can be a blessing to others. 

So, we participated in Project 11 - birthing kits for  Konbit Sante in Haiti.  We made bags from our stash of fabric and then bought some flannel to make the blanket.  During the planning time, Phoebe had a friend over and they picked out the fabrics.  It was fun listening to them deciding what they would want if they were the mom or the baby. 

As we were working on this project we had alot of discussion about the difference between our lives and those in Haiti.  Not just us girls.  This project touched all our hearts as we began to realize that something as simple as clean string or and alcohol swab can literally save peoples lives.  It has led us to contemplate what God would have us do when we are made aware of a way we can help others.  Not only giving "things" to people, but also our time, like talking to the girl on the street who has a "Please Help Me" sign instead of just assuming she is pan handling. 

And although we (as in our family) cannot make bags for all of the women in Haiti, we can make a few.  We pray that God will use these simple bags to make a difference (both physical and spiritual) for the people of Haiti.

Some of the supplies that will be in each bag



Receiving blankets ~ 36inches square flannel with a narrow hem




The bags are just simpled lined tote bags that are big enough to use a diaper bag



Contents of safe birthing kit:

1 small bar of soap (updated 1/16/2011)
1 piece of clean plastic sheeting (3 feet wide by 4 feet long)
1 piece of clean string, 24 inches long
1 packet alcohol wipe
1 set of sterile latex gloves
1 packet (or travel container) Purelle
1 handmade tote bag
Optional:
receiving blanket–36 inches square


This post is linked to Made By You Mondays and Craft Hope

{this moment}

{this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. (Soule Mama)

::this week::

This week, we are...

...completely immeresed in our regular outside of the house activities

...counting down the days until summer

...catching snakes in the garden (and in Mom and Dad's bedroom...yikes!)

...reading Debt Free U and No More Dreaded Mondays  in preparation for going to college (reviews to come next week)

....learning to hang on for dear life

... memorizing lines and getting costumes ready for Drama 

...praying for a dear friend who is in the hospital

...enjoying the chicks getting bigger

...having friends come over to play

...trying to make sense of the turmoil in the Middle East

...antipating the yumminess of the dewberries that are setting fruit all along our fence line

...dreaming about new spring and summer clothes to make for the girls

...reminded to be thankful for all that we have as we pray for those in Japan

....celebrating being 11

In the garden ... tomatoes

We spent Saturday working in the garden and mowing the yard.  Unfortunately for them, my boys don't get paid to mow our yard and it is by far, the hardest yard they mow.  They do it because they love their mama... and because they like to eat, have clean clothes, have a warm roof over their heads... you get the picture! 

Most important on Saturday's list was to get out tomatoes in the ground.  They have been growing pretty good in their homemade seed starter pots but they now have their real leaves so it is time to plant them.  Because we love tomatoes soooo much I went ahead and bought a four pack of Celebrity tomatoes.  They are quite a bit bigger than the ones I started from seed and this way I'll have some maturing quickly and some a little later. 

We also planted 9 cherry tomato plants, 9 yellow tomato plants, 10 heirloom plants (I don't know exactly what ones, because I forgot to label the seeds we saved) and 15 Roma plants (mainly for sauce). Our thought is that if we plant a variety and give them plenty of water, surely some of them will produce what we need.

                                                         Celebrity tomato plant from store

We mulched them with leaves we've been collecting and I sprinkled crushed eggshells around each plant to hopefully keep the crawling critters off of them.  I've heard it's no fun crawling over eggshells. 

Over the years, we have staked tomatoes, used cages from the store, made out own cages and now are using some huge square cages that hold some kind of square plastic container for a petroleum product.  (We don't use the plastic container, just the cage.)  The one that worked the worst was the cages from the store, they just are not sturdy enough.  The cages we made out of fencing worked great, except that they were expensive to make and really time consuming.  Staking works fine, but you have to keep up with it and make sure your stake is tall and sturdy.  We use these big metal cages and I plant 6 tomato plants in each one and use twine to keep them upright. 

Here's some things I've learned about tomatoes over the years:

• When you plant your transplants, bury them all the way passed the seed leaves (the first tiny set of leaves)  all of the little hairs on the stem will grow into roots.  This will give you a sturdier plant.
• Tomatoes like fertile soil but not too much compost, you'll wind up with beautiful full plants and no fruit.  You want the plant to put its energy into making tomatoes, not a big bushy plant
• Prune of "suckers" - these are the leaves that grow between the stem and the main leaf branches.  This will keep the plant from getting too bushy, it also encourages 1 main stem for staking and it reduces shading which helps the fruit to ripen and prevents disease
• Water the soil and try to keep the water off the plant
• Keep the plants consistently moist.  If you let them dry out and then water you will wind up with a lot of cracked tomatoes.

Pests and problems:

• Tomato Hornworm - this is a huge green Caterpillar.  It is the color of the stems so it is kind of hard to see if you are not looking.  These caterpillars turn into beautiful moths, so it kind of breaks my heart to squish them, but we love our tomatoes, so we squish the tomato hornworm.
• Stick bugs - this is a crazy looking bug that is grey and looks like it has a shield on its back.  And when you squish it, it stinks... hence, the name.  These bugs will suck the juice out of the tomato and the tomato will rot.  So go ahead and squish him.
• Blossom end rot - this is when flowers that should turn into fruit, don't... they just fall off.   There could be several reasons for this, soil is deficient in nitrogen, phosphorus or potassium, extended heat wave, too wet or too cool at night (not a problem for us).
• Beautiful plant but no fruit.  Okay this is going to sound crazy, I'm not sure where Carl heard this from, but it works... shake the cage, whack the plant with a tennis racket a few times or whatever it takes to stress the poor plant out a bit.  It'll think the end of the world is coming and get busy making fruit.  Really!!

Harvesting and storing

• Harvest when the tomatoes are red (although if you have birds pecking them, you might want to harvest them a little early and sit them in the kitchen window sill)
• Harvest when they are green for Fried Green Tomatoes (yummmm)
• We eventually can most of our tomatoes but we don't want to be canning all summer long, so I...
• Freeze them.  Cut the belly button off (the part the stem is attached to) and then put them in a ziplock bag.  When they are thawed out, the skin will just peel off, no need for blanching. 

Resources

All You Can Eat Gardening Handbook

Texas Organic Vegetable Gardening

feeding hard working boys

Spring has officially sprung here!  People are calling the boys to mow their lawns and so they are mowing every Friday morning.  It will make for a somewhat hectic week until we are done with some of our outside of the house activities for the school year, but it is a great way for them to earn some money to do some of the things they want to do. 

Not only do they gain spending money, but they also gain an even more amazing appetite.  So what's a mom to do when she has three always hungry teenage boys... and needs to stay within her grocery budget?  She makes "peanut butter treats"  (warning... these are NOT low fat or low calorie, they are full of fat, protien and carbs...just what hungry teenage boys need!)

Peanut Butter Treats
1 cup peanut butter
1 cup powdered sugar
1/2 cup milk
2 cups raisins
2 cups rolled oats (not instant oats)
1/4 cup ground flax seed (optional)

Mix peanut butter, powdered sugar and milk.  Add raisins, oats and ground flax seed.  Drop by spoonfuls on wax paper.  When hardened (not super hard but no longer gooey) store in airtight container in refrigerator. 

Notes:  I usually only use 1 cup raisins instead of 2.

What abou you, how do you feed really hungry guys?

Linked to Tasty Tuesday

zippered pouches

For the vast majority of our marriage, Carl and I have used a "cash" only system for budgeting our money.  It works well, if we don't have the cash for something we just don't get it or we save until we do have the cash for it.  What I haven't done so well in the past is staying in budget in each catagory each month.  (I say "I" because I am the spender and Carl is the saver, but I've gotten better over the years.)  It is just too easy to swipe the debit card at Wendy's if we are out running errands late and then by the end of the month realize I've overspent on "fun". 

This year one of my goals is to stay on budget in each catagory.  We've done the envelope system at times, but I have several issues with the envelopes...you can't put change in the envelope, it falls out  and, more importantly, they're ugly. 

So, inspired by these zippered pouches  and this post I made some cash pouches for each catagory that we spend actual cash on.  I stamped on the catagory name, but you can print them on the computer.  You can iron fabric to an 8 1/2 by 11 piece of butcher paper (to the shiney side) and run it through your printer just like cardstock.  I cut the fabric 5 1/2 by 8 1/2 inches and used a 7 inch zipper. 

So far, it is working great, I can put my change and reciepts in the pouch and, more importantly, they are cute.

What about you, how do you stay on budget?

Linked to Made by You Mondays

{this moment}

{this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. (Amanda Soule)

::this week::

This week, I am...


 ...enjoying my second cup of coffee

...listening to the birds singing their morning songs on our front porch

...missing Gabriel, who has been at a boy scout leadership camp all week

...excited about picking Gabriel up this afternoon

...needing to get a couple of loads of laundry washed and hung before we leave

...smelling lemon scones baking for breakfast, compliments of Soule Mama

...thinking about our upcoming visit to a college for Christian and all the college/scholarship type work in our near future

...seeing the beginnings of blooms on our blueberry bushes

...sad that my camera is not working ~although it might be user error

...happy that I have a camera on my phone, not the best pictures but pictures none the less

...sending mixed messages to Esther (aka Miss America who loves lipstick)

...feeling very thankful for this amazing life that God has blessed me with

Wishing you a very thankful and blessed Thursday.

In the garden...starting seeds

I mentioned earlier that one of our gardening goals is to keep our garden going all year.   In keeping with full disclosure let me say that we have never been able to eat from the garden exclusively for a year, but we have that goal. Some years we do pretty good and some years we don't do so good, part of that depends on where we are living and the condition of the soil.  But a bigger part is knowing when to start seeds and keeping it watered.

Because there is such a cost difference between buying transplants and buying seeds, we rarely buy transplants.   But I'm also impatient and don't want to direct seed everything in the garden.  So I start some seeds on my front porch at various times of the year. 

There's a couple of things to keep in mind when you start your seeds.  First, you probably need to start them earlier than you think.  And you absolutely have to keep the soil moist so that the seeds will germinate.  The weather where we live is really crazy, our winters are very mild then we'll get arctic cold fronts in February, we have short springs and autumns and very long, hot summers.  If I wait until it feels like spring to start seeds, it's too late and I have to start the seeds in the garden or buy transplants. 

I have tried various methods over the years of starting seeds, this year I'm using a couple of frugal ideas.  I have gotten several plastic containers (the kind that salad and spinach are sold in) and we've been saving empty toilet paper rolls.  I cut the rolls in half and filled them with seed starting soil and put them in the containers.  We plant several varieties of tomatoes so I wrote on the side of the roll what variety was planted.  I was concerned that it might wash off as I watered them, but it didn't.  I watered the seeds really well and put the lid on the container.  This creates a  mini green house.  When the plant touches the lid, remove the lid so that the leaves don't get soggy.  When I plant these in the garden, I can plant the whole roll and it will compost down. 

                                                            Roma tomato seedlings

When we ran out of toilet paper rolls, I used old transplant packs from some cabbage and brussels sprouts that I bought this past fall.  First, I washed them out with dish soap and a little bleach.  Then filled them with seed starting soil and put the seeds in, one per compartment.  I watered them well and put clear plastic wrap (saran wrap) over them and secured it with a large rubber band.  This will keep the soil very moist so that the seed will germinate but when the first leaves appear and touch the plastic, the plastic needs to come off. 

                                                              Cucumber seedlings

I've learned over the years to always write on the container what I planted, you'll see it written on the plastic wrap, but I also have it written on the seed starting container.  That way when the plastic comes off, I still know what was planted in the container.  It's amazing how similar broccoli and brussels sprout plants look when they are small.   

Since I am able to start my seeds on the front porch instead of under grow lights, I don't need to let my plants "harden off".  If you do start yours indoors, you will need to put them out on warm days for a few hours and bring them back in at night until the nights are warm enough for them.  I've never had to do this so I really don't know what I'm talking about, but apparently, if you live north of us...which is about 95% of the US... you probably want to learn more about this.

Happy gardening!

Whole Wheat Waffles

I probably shouldn't admit this, but my poor husband has to fend for himself for breakfast.  Even if I'm up when he is getting ready for work, I can't ever get it together enough to make a hot breakfast for him.  So here's our routine, every couple of weeks I make tons of waffles for breakfast one morning and we freeze the extras for Carl for breakfast.  It probably won't win me any wife of the year awards, but it works for us. 

We have 3 waffle irons and usually all three are used, the Hello Kitty one just gets used for waffles we're eating that morning.  It's funny which boys will eat the Hello Kitty waffles and which ones won't... and why. 

Here's the recipe:

Whole Wheat Waffles
7 cups freshly ground whole wheat pastry flour  (I grind 5 cups soft wheat berries to get this)
8 tsp. baking powder
2 tsp. salt
4 Tbsp. sugar
12 eggs (separated)
1 1/2 cups oil
6 cups milk

Preheat waffle irons.  Separate the egg yolk from the egg whites.  Put the whites in a bowl to beat (or use a stand mixer and beat the eggs while your mixing the other ingredients).  Mix the dry ingredients in a very large bowl.  Add egg yolks, oil and milk all at one time.  Mix until there are no lumps in the batter.  Beat eggs until stiff if you haven't already done so.  Fold the egg whites into the batter.  Cook in waffle irons. Cool before freezing. 

Notes:  Be sure to fold in the egg whites, don't beat them in.  This will make the batter light and fluffy so your waffles will be light and fluffy.  Also, this makes a huge amount of waffles - about 25 9-inch waffles.  If you have a smaller family try these measurements:  1 3/4 cup flour, 2 tsp. baking powder, 1/2 tsp. salt, 1 tsp. sugar, 3 eggs, 7 Tbsp. oil, 1 1/2 cup milk. 

Enjoy!

Linked to Tasty Tuesday

~ county fair ~

Our county has its Junior Livestock Show and County Fair in February.   In years past (in another county) our three older boys raised rabbits one year and turkeys for two years.  We didn't have much success with them but it was fun.  While the Livestock Show is definately the main event of the fair (although, the carnival is a close second), there is also the craft show.  Almost every year some of my children enter items in the craft show (or family division).  This year Gabriel, Phoebe and Benjamin entered handmade item.  (Christian and Josiah are turning in to fuddy duddies!)

And here they are...

Gabriel made a beeswax candle with the beeswax he purified and he turned a salt shaker on the lathe. He recieved blue ribbons for both of them.

Phoebe made this dress for the Renaissance Faire this past fall. She used Simplicity Sewing Pattern 4940 and combined two of the styles. She won Reserve Grand Champion in her age division. (She also placed 3rd in the elementary group at the Renaissance Faire.)

Benjamin entered a necklace and earring set that he made for me for Christmas. And he received a blue ribbon for his work

It's amazing to me to see how creative all of my children have become over the years.  And even though, it means that I have pockets of messes here and there and a huge lathe on my front porch I wouldn't have it any other way.

in the garden...

Several years ago I began compiling information about gardening in our area and putting it into a notebook.  I listed each item we grew on its own page and when I would learn something new about that item I wrote it in my notebook.  In the back of the book I had planning sketches of our gardens for each year with a list of the varieties we planted and how well (or not) they did.  It was a great book. 

was?

Yes, was!

You see, it somehow got mixed in with the newpaper and in a frenzied moment of cleaning up before our small group arrived, a child, who shall remain nameless to protect the guilty, emptied the newpaper bucket into the burn barrell.  The crazy thing is that we don't even burn our newspapers, I save them for using in the garden.  But it was a frenzied moment, and so my garden notebook and my brand new Eat Your Yard book that I was taking notes from were burned. 

So, although I'm in the process of starting over with a new notebook, I thought I'd also post my garden information here each week or so.  Just in case...

Gardening takes up quite a bit of our time, but we love it.  Well, maybe we don't love all it, but we love eating from the garden.  In our area, it is possible, with a little work, to keep a garden going all year.  That is our ultimate goal. 

From the fall, we still have lettuce, spinach, cabbage that got a late start and brussel sprouts that I thought was broccoli.  (Apparently, I need to start reading more than just the first 2 letters of words!)  We also have a bed of green onions that are going to seed to replant themselves and storage onions and garlic that have been growing all winter. 

For the spring, we have already planted one bed of corn (around Feb. 15th), started tomatoes, basil, cilantro, squash, zucchini, luffa squash, cucumbers and green beans in trays that will get planted in the next few weeks. 

We are trying out some new ways (at least new to us) of keeping our garden watered, I'll let you know how they pan out.  Last year we really struggled with powdery mildew on our squashes and cucumber leaves, we're hoping to not have that this year. 

Cinnamon Toast Cake

We woke up this morning to a very bare refrigerator.  Just a few days ago you could hardly open the door without something falling out, in fact, Sunday something did fall out on me.... twice.  I guess that is how it is with teenage boys!  So what do we do when we have no eggs, no oatmeal, very little milk and no cold cereal.  We make cinnamon toast cake!

Cinnamon Toast Cake
2 cups whole wheat flour
1 cup sugar
2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. salt
1/2 cup oil
1 cup milk
1 tsp. vanilla
butter
cinnamon sugar
Heat oven to 350 degrees.  Combine dry ingredients, and wet ingredients and mix well.   Put in a 9X13 pan and bake 20-25 minutes.  When done, spread with butter and sprinkle cinnamon sugar on top.  Broil for just a minute - don't let it burn!!!

Notes:  this is the real recipe, but as usual I fiddle with it.  I usually use pear butter (which we make every summer, it is similar to applesauce) instead of oil and then I cut the sugar by about 1/3.  Also,  I use freshly ground whole wheat, if you're using store bought whole wheat you might want to use half whole wheat and half white flour.  Also, when it is under the broiler, it can go from not done to burned very quickly, so keep an eye on it. 

Enjoy!

This recipe is linked to Tasty Tuesday

spring is in the air

We have had such a beautiful couple of weeks, it's hard to believe that just the 2 weeks before that we had severe freezes going on.  Those freezes did quite a bit of damage to our plants.  I only cover the garden when it freezes, the other plants are on their own.  I know, I should do better, but I only have so much time and so many sheets. 

First up, mowing the section of the yard that grows like crazy. (I wonder why it does that? hmm.)  It's hard to tell from the picture but the grass was thigh high so Gabriel decided to get out his handy dandy machte to hack it down.  People questioned why we would give our boys machtes for gifts a few Christmases ago.  Well, you never really know when you might need one. 

Phoebe and I worked on the flower beds, we're moving our Mexican Petunias to surround the oak tree.  Our plan is that if we can get enough "gardens" in our yard we won't have to mow as much.  Since the boys mow all spring and summer long for extra money, it is really hard for them to mow our lawn too. Then we get thigh high weeds! 

Along with mowing, Josiah had the honor of trying to catch our black hen who is notorious for getting out of the pen.  Some in our family call her "Blackie" and some call her "stupid".  I'm not saying who...

Esther occupied herself by moving rocks from where I wanted them to where I did not want them and back again.

Christian worked digging up around the oak tree and mowing. Carl tilled up another bed in the garden.  We planted corn last week and it is already about 3 inches tall.  Our garden is doing really well, we still have lettuce and spinach, the broccoli and cabbage are growing well and the onions and garlic are doing great. 


When I looked out the window Monday morning, this is what I saw...sheep,in my back yard!  At first I thought they were goats and all I could think of was them eating all of my garden!  They tracked through part of it, but didn't do much damage.  We spent about 30 minutes trying to get them back across the street to their home.  Even Rascal helped, he was a pretty good sheep dog.