Spiders. So many spiders.

The popcorn and drying beans planted back in April were ready for harvest this week, so we ventured over to the farm on evening to tackle the project. Nathan pulled up all of the corn stalks while I harvested a crate full of cowpeas. After the corn was our Nathan planted a beautiful heirloom drying bean named Jacob's Cattle (or 'trout) beans. Last time I tried to grow then at Kilby Cottage they didn't do well, but that was probably more a factor of sunlight than anything else.

After those were planted with began ripping out the black, kidney and cannellini beans. Some of the bushes were loaded with pods! With the sun setting quickly, we decided to stuff the back of the Farmer's prius with bean bushes to thresh on the weekend. I totally forgot to take a photo, but it was packed to the roof! There was just space for the Farmer, Daisy, and I in the front seats. Otherwise, there was no room at the inn.

Well, we did find a little space for two cream legbar pullets that my sister-in-law kindly sold to us to replace the two roosters we gave away last week. The were nestled in with all of the beans. The girls, Edith and Ethel, are still figuring out where they fit in the Kilby Cottage flock pecking order, and are therefore a wee bit camera shy at the moment. I'll work on getting a better photo of these pretty girls another day.

So...back to this car packed to the hilt. It wasn't just bean bushes that made it into the car with us. It was also all the creepy crawlies too. ALL. OF. THEM. Before we had even made it to the end of the street I had killed one spider. Not a small one mind you. Then at the end of the next street the Farmer attempted to kill another big 'un that took three, you read that right, THREE tries to kill. Suffice to say, we were both squealing like little school girls. We didn't see any more foes, so we proceeding down the highway and the Farmer suggested we listen to something to distract ourselves from the bugs. Ironically, the only audiobook on my phone was The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up. This Prius is going to be vacuumed and deep cleaned before I ride in it again!

Now totally dark outside, we made it a good 20 miles before more multi-legged beasts began crawling out of the depths. I noticed 2 more large spiders making their way towards my side of the car where I have buckets and harvest gear jammed between my legs and a dog on my lap. So I ask the Farmer to pull over so we can deal with the new spiders...

Farmer: We're almost to our exit.

Me: Five miles is not close when there are spiders in the car!

Farmer: Good point.

We dispatched those two arachnids and discovered a stink bug that neither of us wanted to smoosh in the car. So the rest of the drive home had it flying around the windshield and in front of our faces. We kept our mouths shut hoping it wouldn't accidentally fly into unwanted places in the dark. We made it home safe and mostly sound. Then we chugged down chocolate milk like grown adults who can handle our own bugs. Sweet dreams!