Up in the city, not at the farm

Im in the city at my j-o-b.  Someday, I hope to work only 3 days a week and be on the farm the other  4 days.  Its a good goal.  I am fortunate that my hubby holds down the fort at the farm during the week.  I get to spend Sundays and Mondays hanging out with the animals.  Right now I am kinda happy to be at work cause it is a bit cooler than the old farm house. 

I know that the animals are doing well this morning.  The spoiled goats are getting ice water all day long, as well as the chickens.  We did decide that the horse needed a new home as she was not very conducive with the baby goats.  We were scared that with her spunkiness she would end up trampling a baby goat.  So we found her a new home and she is getting the attention she deserves. 

The heat index has been so high latelly that my chickens went on strike when it started.  I am hoping that they are just finding a nice shady spot to lay their eggs in.  We have not gotten eggs for about two weeks.  Hopefully this weekend, I can get post put in to give them a little enclosure outside the coop again.  I used the t-post for something else, isn't that the way it always goes.  Im trying to get hubby to build a three foot tall by twelve foot long enclosure, but he is worried the goats will try to stand on it.  So we are looking into other options.  Hope to figure that out this weekend as they do not need to be free ranging all day long, because of the egg loss.

Photos around the farm

Around the HOT farm

So we finally got around to naming our farm, no its not the HOT farm. Although the 109 degree temp today is what could cause us to name it HOT farm.  Anyway, we named our farm M&R Farm.  After much thought, we just used our intials.  They both stand for my first name and maiden name.  Plus my husbands first name and sir name.  So it works. 


Two of the mamas should be having babies anytime...based off my best estimates.  Also the way they are showing signs.  So hopefully babies will wait til the end of the month when it hopefully cools down.  But we are prepared if they are born tomorrow. 

The garden is growing, but I do not have the greenest thumb.  So far we have yellow squash, tomatoes, potatoes, some peppers and maybe carrots some day.

Tired of all the rain...its so wet

Its pretty wet around here these days.  Apparently Gran says that the water table is low here.  We need to figure out some remedies for the stall and goat house cause they are so wet inside.  The ground in them is gravel and then we put pine shavings on top.  Thinking of bringing in more gravel, which we need for the driveway too. Im also planning on opening up the stalls big side door tomorrow to dry it out a bit, if the weather cooperates.

On to better things, we are now getting 7-10 eggs a day from our 22 mature laying hens.  I have been told that production should be better.  So I am trying to figure out why they have slowed in production.  Going to clean out the coop on Monday once I send the ladies out for the morning.  This will help me see if we have any shells and also, might help with their laying.

The goats and horse are doing well also, just know that they would like a drier place to sleep.  So like I said we will work on drying out the stalls tomorrow and Monday also.

Long time no blog.

So my computer crashed awhile back and is still not running great.  I am able to get on the other computer now.

Our New Fire Pit

Walkway from front porch to the mailbox.

Anyways, we have been busy around here.  This past Sunday afternoon, my hubby and I went out and collected rocks, some flat and some larger ones.  We had been discussing having a fire pit in the side yard.  My kids love campfires and I thought this would be a great way to have one anytime we wanted.  So we got rocks for that purpose.  While we were getting those rocks a couple lightbulbs went off and we thought, we could use these large flat ones to line the walkway to the mail box from the front porch.  The original plan for that was just pea gravel and landscape timbers.  But the flat rocks look alot better. 

The other thing that has been going on is we got our first egg.  Although the egg was cracked, we did get an egg.  I am very happy because it has been 25 weeks and 4 days...yes I was counting.  I have some Giant chickens that are just about 8 weeks old that I am waiting for them also.  So this time I will know to wait just a bit longer than 22 weeks.  We also added white light to the coop.  Before I had just a heat lamp with a red light bulb in it.  So it was a bit darker.  So the chickens were not getting the daylight hours the needed to lay.  I am going to get a timer for the white light so that it will come on at 4am and shut off at 9pm.  That way we can maximize the daylight in the coop.

Our 1st official egg

Today I am making amish friendship bread.  I let my starter sit for a couple extra days, so I am hoping it still comes out.  Its in the over baking right now.  Smells lovely around the homestead today.

Garden in

So the seedlings I started didn't work out.  I waited til after first frost and my second cousin could come till the land.  Fortunatelly he had done it in the fall, so I was pretty quick and painless. 
Anyway this morning, I woke up with the sun and planted most of our veggies.  I have to get tomatoe starters later this week and put them in.  But so far we have potatoes, carrots, beets, lettuce, spinach, radishes, squash, cucumbers, peas, beans, corn, watermelon, honeydew, strawberries and possibly pumpkins.  I will also plant three more rows of corn in a couple weeks, to keep the crop coming through the summer. 

I also was able to wash and groom the horse yesterday.  We finished the stall and goat house.  My sons cleaned up and have been helping with our front fence.  I hope to have it done sometime this week as our dogs need the excersize area. 

Awww Spring Finally

So now I am back from vacation and did a bit of work this past week.  I was finally able to get to the farm today and get more things done.

So far, we planted three trees and a blueberry bush.  The trees are peach, apple and dwarf cherry.  I hope they do well.  We have a big storm coming through but I put them in two days ago, so I hope they stay rooted.  I didn't put any tree stakes in, so keeping my fingers crossed for that one. The blueberry bush is in the front of the house in the "flowerbed" area.  I will not be putting in a flower bed anytime soon.  I actually plan on getting some more berry bushes planted in that space, but for this year we are starting with one.  Hopefully it does well also.

Yesterday I was able to pick up some bedding for the stalls and the chicken coop.  I had planned to clean the coop out today but we were working on the stall.  We got the door finally cut out and put back in.  I love it.  I also love that Ryan is so very handy.  I don't know what we would do if he wasnt.  I am way to impatient and use way to many nails, screws, boards what ever to accomplish the same thing.  So he makes it functional and very nice looking.  I tell him that he should sell some of his projects but he said that is not why he does it.

I now have three pregnant does.  Yeah, very proud of my little nubian/boer cross buck.  I was worried that he would not breed until the fall and I would have to wait til next spring for my milk.  I still have one doe in milk, she has a 12 month old doeling, who thinks she still needs to nurse.  Fine by me but I really need to get back to milking to bring her milk back in full force til a month before she has her babies.  My mission for this week, is to get her on the milk stand daily, even if it is just to feed and check her out.

Finally, my chickens are now 5 months old plus the 1 month old chicks.  I should be getting some eggs soon I think, it has been about 20 weeks and they all seem to be doing quite well.  They free range during the day and then get layer pellets at night once they are back in their coop.  I am needing to get some gravel or something brought in due to mud issues we have going on.  Apparently the water table is very high here, so you dig a hole and its already wet.  Not sure how to figure out the drainage but I will soon.  But for now my goats, horse and chickens play in the mud....the kids too.

That is all for now. 

It is hard work

No one ever promised you a rose garden.  Some famous guy quoted that about the Marine Corps.  Anyway, its been tough this week working and trying to keep up on the farm chores.  Fortunatelly Ryan handles most of the stuff during the day.  We have one goat in milk that we are milking once a day.  I am trying to figure out how to keep that in the schedule.  Ryan doesn't know how to milk yet.  He will be getting a lesson tonight around 8pm, when I get home. 

I am leaving for a womens retreat tomorrow for the next 9 days.  Whew, it was tough for me to give up and go.  Yes, I did say give up.  I have to give up alot of control over things to go on this trip.  I have to give up a week of work.  I have to give up milking and spending time with the kids, to recharge myself.  It is odd in the past 8 yrs I have only went somewhere by myself once for about 9 days.  But that was to go see my mom, so I was still with family.  It will be tough to let go for 9 days and only focus on me.  I have to set a standard of how much texting and calling I will do when on this trip.  I am always connected.  It is hard not to be connected. 

So I will leave with this picture of our little barnyard this morning. 
I will be back posting after the 28th. 

Kansas Patriot Guard

I am not sure if I have ever written about this on here.  I spent 8 1/2 years in the Marine Corps.  My husband spent 10 years in the Marines.  My little sister, just started her 4 years of service this past summer.  My grandfather was a Veitnam Naval Veteran and I am not sure how far it goes back, but military service is in our blood. 

This morning, I road with my Step mom and aunt, little brother and sister to a funeral for a fallen Naval brother in arms.  The Kansas Patriot Guard was creating a flag line to protect the family from protesters of the funeral.  I will not post the name of the organization that was protesting as I do not want to give them the "honor" of advertisement of their group.  Regardless, I was given a flag on a large staff and asked to stand tall and proud along side 200 plus other people.  The respect for our fallen comrad was so wonderful, I was brought to tears on a few occassions.  I saw veterans, babies, families and fellow military members, line around the funeral home. 

I pray that our presence, even at this sad time in their lives,  brought some peace to the grieving family.

Time Change, Snow, and goats feet

I worked most of Saturday, so my weekends are Sunday and Monday now.  Of course there was the time change and then the weather decided it wanted to hang out with winter some more.  So I awoke at 5am, but it was really 6am.  So I got up and started on mount laundry.  After starting the laundry, I ran out and did morning chores.  While doing morning chores I noticed a few things, one being that for some reason the chicken coop door was loose and no longer staying completelly closed.  So I knew we needed to get the door fixed with a latch. 

So I came in and had breakfast. 

After breakfast, I went out and fixed the door latch. Got the baby chicks set up in the big coop with some chicken wire to keep the big chickens out of their area.  Next, I worked on the  milk stand for the goats.  The head gate was not holding the goats properlly. So I went to Fias Co Farm website and adjusted my milkstand just a bit.  The headgate now matches theirs.  Although I still need to tweek it with the feed bucket.  Not sure but for some reason mine sits way to low and it makes milking difficult.  I am thinking of attaching it to the barn wall and just setting up that way.  Not sure.  Always a learning experience here on the homestead.

After I finished the stand, I started trying to figure out what is going on with JarJar one of my milking does, who I thought had dried up.  The other day I noticed her 1 yr old doeling was still trying to nurse. All the more reason to bottle raise your babies.  She also had some redness in her utter when she climbed up on the fence. I put her up on the stand to see what was all going on.  She had some flaking on the udder and was engorged.  I milked her out and cleaned the udder really well.  I have done research on mastist, but she does have a fever or hot udder.  So we will be continue to monitor. I looked at her hooves also.  I trimmed the hooves of two of the goats.

Then starts the rain. I went inside and created dinner.  Woke up to snow this morning...um where is Spring.

Daytime Job and Farm work

Yesterday I started my new job.  My commute to work is 50 minutes one way.  Fortunatelly I do not have to be at work til 10am and am headed home no later than 6pm.  Obviously, being on the farm, I have to do chores.  So we are working on a system to get the chores done in a timely manner, so I do not feel as though all I do is work and come home to work.

Ryan did great yesterday making sure things with the kids went well.  I did make it home by 5pm yesterday as it was the first day of work.  Once it gets busy though I know I will be later in the evening.  I am fine with doing the morning set of chores.  I get up with the kids at 6am anyway and don't leave for work til 8:30 or 9:00.  So I have time to feed and check water.  Overall the morning chores minus milking take about 30 minutes to complete and that is so I can spend some time with the animals. 

We are currently down to 4 goats, 1 horse, 22 chickens and 15 chicks, plus 3 dogs.  The snow is gone right now and the horse and goats have a big round bale they are working on.  So they get feed in the evening and water is checked morning and evening.  The chickens get fresh water morning and evening, plus grain.  The dogs all get fed morning and evening, plus fresh water.  Right now it isn't much.

I am also spritzing my plant seedlings twice a day.  Some have already popped up through the soil.  I hope they will fair well.  So far its marigolds, broccoli, califlower, and corn coming through. I plan on Sunday to plant the peas and corn in the garden, if it dries out enough for my cousin to come work the ground.  I would like them in the ground before I go on vacation next weekend.

After the spring really sets in the work load on the farm will increase to garden working, possibly milking, egg collecting and general clean up.  Summer time will require extra watering during the day, the goats are picky about dirty water so we have a small trough that if need be we will drain out and refill with fresh water.  The warmer weather also brings into account new projects.  We need to lay floor in my boys' room and paint.  Then we will move the boys into one room together.  My daughters room needs painted and we will move her to the front part of the house.  After that we have a college exchange student coming to live with us in the fall, so her room will also need to be painted.  She has lived with us before and is like family.  We will also be putting in the window a/c's this summer again as I think we faired pretty well with them last year.  We did buy a new thermostat for the house and that may help the regular a/c run better, but we will have to test it on a hot spring day.   Otherwise we will stick with the window a/c's one more summer and then with work will be able to get the new central air unit next fall.

So lots of things going on but hopefully we will get in the groove with all of it soon.  Off to day two of the new job.

Harder than I thought...

So today was the day for our nigerian dwarf goat to go to freezer camp.  Our help arrived an hour late so that put us way behind schedule.  I want to post that there will be no pictures posted of the process.  I can put a link of how we did it on here but I did not want to take pictures.  Link will be at the bottom.

So our help came over with a 22 rifle.  We captured the goat and brought her into the back of the barn.  Ryan said his peace to her and then he left.  He is the softy here on the homestead and that is okay, I don't mind my sensitive cowboy.  After Ryan left my help and I got the goat into position and that was that. 

Ryan came back in and we used a tpost to hang the goat.  Then Ryan skinned the goat, which took a bit longer than I expected too.  After that we figured out how to get the guts out to put it nicely.  Then we began the butchering process. 

I applaude good butchers cause I have no clue how they get the good cuts they do.  We ended up with alot of roast type meat, stew meat and meat I will later grind up...once I get a grinder. Regardless, we have meat.  It will taste good however it is cooked and it will feed my family. 

The size of the goat we had, would diffinatelly not have been worth the $75 set price to butcher the goat.  I think we would really have to rethink the process if we ever choose to do it again.  That said....Im not very good at killing my own food.  I know also that it took an emotional toll on Ryan as well.  We are new to all this but a deer is very different than an animal you have had on your property for months.  We shall see how we fair with chickens.

For anyone who wants a detail and graphic description on how to butcher a goat here is a  link (GRAPHIC WARNING)

Home Butchering LINK

Free Range Chickens, baking bread and homemade stew

Today is beautiful 50 degrees.  It started early this morning with frost.  Sundays are the days I get the paper and donuts for the kids.  This was a tradition my dad did when I was growing up and I try hard to do it for our kids.  I only get the paper for the coupons and I know there are alot of free ways to get coupons.  I clip those online too.  But this is a little treat for the kids, so we try to do it.

After we went to the store to get the donuts and paper, my hubby and I came home to hang with the kids.  I then decided to put some stew meat in the crockpot with veggies and will either make mashed potatoes or put them in soon.  Haven't decided yet...although the kids like mashed potatoes.

After that, I hung out on the web a bit.  Then I decided homemade bread would be outstanding with the beef stew.  So I researched an easy recipe online and started it up in the bread maker.  I used to make our bread for the week every Sunday.  So I am thinking I will start this again also.

After all that, the weather was just too nice to be inside.  So I left the bread machine and crockpot to do their work.  I went outside and decided it was time to see if the chickens would free range without getting into trouble. So I let them out for an hour and it seemed to work out nicely.  So I took down the makeshift chicken yard and let them go.  Now they are foraging bugs for protien and I know in a couple weeks once they start laying my eggs will be tasty.

Our total acreage that is now fenced in is 3.85 acres.  I have 5 goats, 1 horse, 23 chickens, 3 dogs and 15 new chicks on our little farm. 

Bread just beeped, so I am off.  Have a blessed day.

Freebies

Tomatoe Seeds FREE HERE 

Free Vegetable Garden Guide from BURPEE

Free Beekeeping Guide BEES



Seedlings

I have a brown thumb, I admit it.  Yet I still want to have veggies. I recieved my first seed cataloge and that tended to start the whole ball rolling.  I picked a bunch of veggies with Ryan.  The only thing he didn't like was beets. I plan on pickling some of the beets and feeding some to the Goats.  I am growing some of the stuff just for the animals. 

Anyway, I got 360 spaces to start seeds.  I am also going to use some old canning jars in the garden over the seedlings to keep them safe from deer and rabbit til they are well rooted.  I have some two liter bottles also I can uses if I don't recycle them for chicken waters.  I haven't decided on that.  Hopefully I will start seeing seedlings in about 10 days.  

I plan on taking a picture every three days.  Right now its just dirt. So nothing interesting to report or show on them just yet.

and on this farm....

Its been a busy week around here on the farm.  We put up 1800 feet of fencing, installed three gates, deep cleaned the stalls, recieved 15 more chickens (chicks) and have been nursing the livestock guardian dog back to health. 

First we worked on the fence.  What I was hoping would only take a day or two took four.  Im ambitious when it comes to things I think we can do.  As I said the other day we set corner post on Saturday.  Got the truck stuck and had it pulled out on Sunday morning.  Sunday it rained all afternoon, so we rested.  Which I believe Sunday is a day of rest regardless, so that is what we did.  Monday we started bright and early.  Stretched fence.  Learned that we did need tension wire, went to get that and some sticks to twist it.  We bought 9 gage wire and that stuff is tough.  Stretched four corners and had to go buy some more wire.  We worked til dark and I was tired and hungry.  So we came in with two corners left.  I know I am  loosing a day in there somewhere, but we finished up on Wednesday afternoon, after a couple trips back and forth to the farm store. 

The southwest corner of our fence.  My son is out with our livestock guardian. We also have to move our clothes line pole but I wanted the fence inline with the stalls which are directly north of this corner.

We then let the animals out, they were quite impressed with the new surroundings.  Our horse especially, ran a bit and kicked up her heals.  Our smallest goat hasn't been with the herd much so he is needing to learn his place is with them and not us.  Hopefully he outgrows the "pet" phase.  He is our only billy, so I need him to be social with the ladies.

I deep cleaned the stalls yesterday and left it open all night to dry out, I hope.  I am currently waiting for the sun to come up so I can go out to check out how everyone did last night in there new surroundings.  Hopefully all faired well and no one found any weak spots in the fence.

We also got 15 new chickens that are supposed to be larger chickens than my last group.  Our neighbor ordered too many and offered us to buy some.  We got them at a great price so I brought them home yesterday.  They are three weeks old, so still in our brooder.  The temps are supposed to drop down again tomorrow, so I will have to see how they survive.  I think the neighbor might have been keeping them a bit warm because they are slow to feather out.  The picture below is what they are supposed to look like grown up.  We only got pullets (females), they are brown egg layers as well as meat chickens.  I like dual purpose animals.  Our chicks are not as small as the ones in pictures and have feathered out.  I plan on getting some more pictures around the farm today. 



Our livestock guardian has some hot spots on her legs that have gotten pretty bad.  We got her free and she seemed fine until the next day.  She had ear mites and fleas pretty bad.  So we started treating for the mites, which are still an issue.  Now with the hotspots I have her on an antibiotic and still working on her ears.  We are also giving her meds for the fleas.  Apparently the neighbor said the flea population is horrible around here.  Which we knew last year with our inside dog. 

Fencing

Yes we are still discussing fence around here, at least for a few more days.  Who would have thought.  We bought our stuff on Wednesday to put the post in.  Well Thursday, it stormed horribly and even gave us more of the white stuff.  Yuck.  So the ground was really wet.  Friday, I had class in the city for work.  So I drove up there and it was still pretty nasty weather and cold.  We also had a friend that was going to come dig the post holes with a tractor, that was unable to make it.  So I checked the forecast and it looked as though Saturday would be a good day to get the post in and cemented.  I ran to the store to buy a manual post hole digger and handle for the pick ax thingy. So, came home and started in on the post.  Was happy for the rain cause the ground was soft. We put in 36 wood corner and gate post. After we put those in we hadn't had enough for the day, so we put in 120 tpost.  Now, its a waiting game til the cement cures.  Hopefully by tomorrow after noon, Ryan will feel that it is set enough to put in the cross beams to the corner post and then we can stretch the fence and run electric fence.   If not we plan on going out to my great cousins and borrow his Kubota, to move some junk piles that I am pretty sure the goats don't need to get into. 

We did have a bit of excitement yesterday while putting in the tpost.  There was a soft spot in the pasture and Ryan was driving the truck around with the trailor.  We got stuck.   He went and found someone to help pull us out.  That guy got stuck too.  So tried to pull it out with another persons smaller vehicle that didn't work, so they went and got someone else to help.  Got the helper pulled out but our truck sat til this morning.  We had a friend come over with a tractor to pull us out.  We then got out in about 2 seconds.

Ryan and I are both feeling muscles from the work on the fence yesterday, but I still want to get tons done.  Not sure what I can do, but I am sure to find something.  Until then, I put a pot roast in the oven, did some laundry, and of course blogged.

Nesting Box Giveaway

Nesting Box Giveaway Farmman is giving away a two hole nesting box.  Click the link to enter to win. 

I would love to get a few of these for our chickens, although I have built our nesting boxes.  Hopefully our chickens will start laying soon.

Good weather equals alot of work....RAIN SHOWED UP (edited)

This week has been a whirlwind.  Between getting things ready for work and purchasing fence supplies, I have been busy.  We also worked on the farm truck which is still being weird, but working. 

So bought all the fence supplies for less than $2000.  I had not measured correctly the first time, so Ryan and I went out to measure it again, this time with a 300 ft tape.  This was very helpful and made an accurate measurement.  The total distance we came up with was much less than my original.  So I am happy.

We are supposed to dig post holes this morning.  Fortunatelly we have a friend with a tractor and auger. So for $100 he will be coming by to dig 44 post holes for us, for the corner post.   We decided on tpost for the fence line.  Hopefully those hold up as well as the post we used before.  I think we will use the left over wood post we have for the chicken coop, to put them closer together and make that tighter.   The chicken coop fencing has been bugging me since I put it in with tpost.


We won't be putting any post in the next two days the weather is looking aweful.   I was looking at what else I could do since its raining.  I ordered seeds the other day, hopefully they get here this weekend so I a can start them.  Im really looking forward to trying my hand at starting our own veggies.
Here is what we ordered that was shipped today:
1 TOMATO DELICIOUS PKT/G


1 ONION BUNCHING EVERGREEN WHITE PKT

1 BEET PERFECTED DETROIT PKT/G

1 WATERMELON CRIMSON SWEET PKT/G

1 SPINACH TYEE PKT

1 RADISH CHERRY BELLE PKT/G

1 OKRA CLEMSON SPINELESS 80 PKT.

1 CABBAGE GOLDEN ACRE PKT

1 SQUASH SUMMER EARLY PROLIFIC

1 ONION HYB YELLOW SWEET SPANISH

1 ONION GIANT RED HAMBURGER PKT/G

1 CUCUMBER PICKLING SASSY HYB. PKT.

1 LETTUCE HEAD ROMAINE PKT.

1 HONEYDEW DOUBLE DEW HYBRID PKT.

1 CAULIFLOWER SNOW CROWN HYB. PKT

1 BEAN BUSH JADE PKT

1 BROCCOLI GREEN MAGIC PKT.

5 SEED-STARTING TRAY (EZ GROW)

1 BRUSSELS SPROUTS ROYAL MARVEL PKT.

1 CARROT SUGARSNAX PKT.

1 PEA GARDEN LINCOLN PKT./G

1 CORN SWEET SUGAR BUNS PKT.

1 PEPPER SWEET BELL MIX PKT/G

75 Degrees and SUNNY

Today was pretty productive.  I got up at 7am, got the chores done in record time and started researching what might be wrong with the farm truck.  Yesterday we got a new battery for it cause the old one was swollen and leaking something.  Brought it home, tried for 45 minutes to start it and finally got it started.  My husband drove it about 10 miles and it cut out 3 or 4 times, but he thought that it just need the cobwebs ran out of it.  Well I tried to start it this morning and it was doing the same thing.  So I let him sleep cause he went to bed at 5am.  I did some research and had a list of things to check.  

He woke up and tried 3 times and it started.  So we decided to take it to the parts store to run a diagnostics on it.  Turns out it was a fuel pump relay, very easy $20.00 fix but only cause we bought an air filter also.  So we went to lunch and came back home.

Once we got home, we let the horse out.  She immediatelly took a mud bath.  Then the boys and I deep cleaned the horse stall.  We had been doing deep bedding for the last month, so there was quite a bit to shovel out.  I need a new tire on the wheel barrow, so they used 5 gallon buckets to carry the bedding to the second compost pile at the end of the chicken pen.  The first compost pile I put in is on the wrong side of a building and doesn't get quite the amount of sun it needs and is too far from the garden.  I had only taken out about 3 loads to there so it was okay.  Next weekend, I plan on cleaning out the chicken coop. 

After cleaning out the stall, I laid down some fresh pine shavings and have to say that they are much better than the straw.  Cheyanne kept trying to eat the straw and it was heavy plus non very absorbant.  So hopefully the pine shavings are better.  I will pick up some more tomorrow to keep on hand and also use in the chicken coop.  All are still very good for compost.

We brought the horse and the billy goat back to their stalls.  While I was doing all this Ryan was fixing the door on the farm truck, it needed new pins and bushings.  I helped a bit with that, but not much.  I finished up the evening chores early.  The only thing left is to bring the chickens in and our house dog back inside. 

The kids picked up the house a bit when I came in.  I really wished they had played outside in the great weather a bit more.  But I guess I wore them out in with helping get stuff cleaned up. 

So now I am off to make some chicken, brocolli with cheese and rice for dinner. 

Have a wonderful Sunday.

Windows open

This morning during chore time, I was in a short sleeved shirt.  Ahhh, is all I can say.  It feels like Spring out there.  I hope that the weather continues to stay nice.  I am tired of running the heater and feeling all cooped up. 

During chores our horse, Cheyanne was a bit spunky.  I know she knows it is nice out, but her paddock is still a muddy mess due to the snow run off.  Hopefully it will dry out today. Although we are looking at getting some wet weather on Sunday and Monday.  I would let her in the paddock but she rolls.  I was thinking of calling the neighbors and seeing if she could run in their pasture today.  Our plan is to get the fencing up around our pasture within the next two weeks.  Although 4000 feet of fencing is going to wear us out.  I have the count of how many post holes we will be digging and so not looking forward to it.

All the other animals are quite happy about he weather too.  The goat paddock is a bit muddy on one end, but they have a higher spot on the other half of the paddock to compensate.  We have four goats in the paddock and one kid still in the barn, soon it will be just three total.  I am not sure if we will be selling off one of our girls or what.  I do know for sure one of them is our meat goat.  So we just have to decide when to do that.  Not looking forward to it but if we don't do it soon she will start loosing the weight we put on her. 

The chickens have now learned to go outside and have been doing so on a regular basis.  At first only a few would go out but today I put their scratch out in the yard so they would have to go out to eat.  I am still awaiting our first egg, still two more weeks to twenty weeks...but I was hoping someone would lay sooner.  Guess they will do it when they want to.  They are all turning into beautiful birds. 

I hope everyone has a wonderful day as I sit her with my window open, knocking out all the winter stuffiness. 

Book Review: You were made to make a difference by Max Lucado

This book is a teens rendition of the popular Out live your life book by Max Lucado.  It gives real world ideas for teens to grasp the concept that there are bigger things in life than there own little worlds.  I read it and felt that it was a very powerful tool to hand over to my pre-teen.   It shows how to get involved in the community and do one random act of kindess a day by making you actually feel something from doing those things.  It allows teens to realize that they can do something at this point in their lives when many times they feel hopeless to do anything.

Wonderful and flowing structured book with a great therory behind it.

Mandi

Eggs and a surprise CSN GIVEAWAY



Well I am not ready to sell eggs just yet.  My hens have not even started to lay eggs yet.  They are 13 weeks old this week.  They are all quite beautiful.  We have 22 or 23, not sure cause they all move around when we try to count.  My husband and I joked last night that when we open the coop up in the morning, one of us should stand outside the coop and count them.  The other one would herd them out of the coop. 

Last night I took their heat lamp away.  I plan on getting a timer for the lamp, so it shuts off around 9am and turns on around 5am.  I am not an early rising farmer.  All my animals have adjusted to the feed schedule of 8am.  They are healthy and happy so that is good.  I was reading somewhere about people who farmed and had jobs.  It was stated that alot of people do the earlier morning animal tending due to having to do work else where.  Come to think of it, I bet the reason farmers tended to the animals so early was to get out in the fields before it got to warm or so they would have enough daylight to get everything done.  Its easier to tend to animals earlier than it is to drive a tractor around a dark field.  Although, I do remember my dad driving his tractor in the dark field a couple times.  I think bad storms were coming the next day or something.  Anyway point is, I don't get up at 5am for anything any more.  Even the dog has learned to hold it til 6am when the kids get up. 

All that being said, I researched our approximate daily egg collection based on 22 chickens.  We should get 11 to 12 eggs minimum a day.  My husband laughed when I said that.  But the thing is for a family of 6 that is only a few eggs per person a day.  If I choose to bake, make deviled eggs, fry eggs, or any other cool recipes then that is plenty.  Now if we start getting two dozen a day, then I will have to start looking into selling them.  As I said right now we have 22 or 23 chickens, we could get another 25 this spring as layers.  We are also planning on getting 25 meat chickens, to see how we can stock the freezer with chicken.  So at some point I will be selling some eggs.  So I did research on storage and how to sell them.  

To sell them the easiest thing to do is put a sign out front and talk to people.  As far as storing them, eggs can keep up to one month in the fridge.  When collecting the eggs we would just put a date on the carton. So for now I am currently saving up cartons.  Although I buy 18 pack cartons of eggs right now, I will switch to a dozen egg carton soon.  I do know of some neighbors that are willing to save their egg cartons and I plan on sharing some eggs with them.  

So now, its just sit and wait.  The hens are currently 13 weeks old.  They will start laying anywhere from 17 weeks to 22 weeks old.  Hopefully closer to 17 weeks.  As you saw in my previous post, I feel that they need to start earning their keep.  

 NOW, for our surprise giveaway. CSN Stores.com has everything from books, furniture, appliances, to swingsets.  Check out this link http://www.swingsetsandmore.com/ and you can gain an extra entry by commenting on what you would love to have from the site linked above.  The winner will recieve a $15 Gift Certificate.

Must live US & Canada. (CSN ships to those countries.)

Does not cover any shipping costs but you can use it on ANY product from ANY one of their sites.

All entries must be made by 2/28/2011 and winners will be announced 3/1/2011


Have a great day.
.

  WINNER LIZ



Check out this Giveaway on Pioneer Harvest Women

At the risk of more people being able to get in on this, I am posting this giveaway.  This is a beautiful custom kitchen aid mixer that I am drooling over this morning.  I have been reading Pioneer Harvest Woman's blog for about 6 months now.  She is in Oklahoma, so that makes us neighbors right?  I find her blog very interesting.  She was from New York, met a cowboy and the rest is in her book...Black Heels to Tractor Wheels.   I saw the book the other day at the store also and thought of getting it and probably will sometime in the next two weeks or so.
Here is the link, go ahead and enter to win, its easy:
http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2011/02/special-edition/

Fence, fence and more fence

So I marked out the fence area this morning.  So far, I have learned that I am out of shape.  I trasped through 4000 feet of snow.  Snow is worse than sand and I got my monthly work out marking off the fence.  Next we need 4000 feet of fence for this project.  I am hoping that this is good enough for 3 goats and 1 horse.  We will still leave the current two paddocks that are already set up, so we can feed the goats and horses seperate.  This will also allow us a pen for the billy goat once he is older.  This also will allow us to use the square footage in the back of the barn for shelter instead of our current 3 sided shelter set up.  Im sure this will make the goats happy during the winter and even once its hot in the spring.  It will also make it a bit easier for me to feed all around in the winter time cause I will not have to go out in the snow to feed and water.  I will have the hose set up to reach both the horse and the goats water inside with just a change in the hoses. 

As far as the pricing of the fence here it goes:

Goat field fence                 $240 a 660 ft roll, need 6 rolls                                       Total  $1440
Fence Post                       Treated 8ft landscape timbers $3 267 post                     Total    $801
Line Insulators for 2 strands of hotwire                                                                   Total   $150
Corner post                     3 per corner,  36 post (for gate too)                                Total $288
One 16 ft gate                                                                                                       Total $70
One 4 Ft Gate                                                                                                       Total $50

We have poly rope for the hot wire.  We will need horseshoe nails also and I don't have the price on those.

                                                                              Total Project estimate    $2800

That should be the end of the fence ordeal once we get it put in.  We may also buy a auger to put the post in.  We will be putting other wooden fence around the house for the kids to have fence.  It will be more decorative.  The plan is to make a wood plank 4 ft fence around the house. 

The fence will be unpainted wood but set up like this.  We may also put some rabbit fence on the back side of it.  We have a problem with neighborhood dogs coming into the yard.  We have a dog also and although I seriously doubt the 110 lb Malamute/Husky mix will get through the plank setup, I still would like to keep the littler neighborhood dogs out.   To build this fence (at a later date) we would need the following:

8ftx1inx4in planks

Landscape timber post

Driveway gate x2 

               

Global warming???

Im not complaining cause today was b-e-a-utiful.  We were able to let Cheyanne out and she was frisky.  She worried me running through the snow the way she did.  At one point she ran, slid and rolled all at once.  Talk about giving a person a heart attack, I don't know what I would have done if she hadn't jumped right up.  So she was able to hang out in the paddock.  I personally would not let her run in a pasture right now, I could see her falling and hurting herself jsut cause she is young and silly. 

Next we let our buckling out with the girls.  Although he doesn't like to be in the pasture with them.  He is so funny, more like a dog than a goat.  He whined the whole time he was out there and stood by the fence waiting on me.  He is only 5 months old, so I guess that is why.  He is still a baby.

While they were both out of the stalls, I took the time to clean up.  It was great only having to wear gloves and a sweatshirt.  Took me less time to clean out the stalls, so that is nice.

We also got our seed cataloge today.  Picked out all the veggies that we want to order and also seed starter kits.  Hopefully we will be able to make our order here in the next week or so.  I plan on starting them in the extra room in the house.  Maybe even make a little green house or warm box.  Im still researching the options, but I have the space either way.

Tomorrow, we hope to be able to get Cheyanne back out.  We plan on getting the farrier out also to work on her feet.  I know many people work on their horse hoofs themself, but I have no clue and she can tell that.  We also plan to finish up the stall to have better doors as soon as the weather turns more springy. 

I know I am totally getting my hopes up that the snow is gone for the Spring, but I know that isn't the case.  I know it can snow til March and be yucky for quite some time.  But I am hoping that within the next 6 weeks it is done.

Have a great weekend.

Homesteading

Homsteading, is the art of using your home, - farm, small-holding, house or flat - as a resource, to make and save you money.

It is a self sufficient, self reliant, organic, green and sustainable lifestyle that allows you to decide what your future will be.

The basic principles can be applied in any home, anywhere.

The goal is to achieve a measure of freedom from dependence on others, and can be as simple as growing a few organic vegetables and being more frugal, to complete freedom from bills, credit, and a regular 9-5 job.

After living completelly relient on resources of the city for the past few years, we decided when we moved home to become as self sufficient as possible for our family.  Currently for our family, this means Goats for milk and meat plus chickens for eggs and meat.  First thing I have learned, if you get a goat that is already in milk do not stop milking her.  Although my doe had a doeling that was still weaning, I am sure that her milk has dried completely up.  So now we have to wait til she has another baby to get milk from them again.  Although this is fine at this time, milk prices keep going up and at almost $5.00 a gallon that is a bit steep for my budget.  So we try to keep milk purchases to a minimum.  Our does ran with a buckling for a few weeks, but I am pretty sure that he did not mate with any of them.  So we may trade someone for a doe that is in milk or sell our doe to get one that is in milk once spring comes.  I currently have 2 alpine nubian cross does and one is only a year old. 



One of our does checking out the fresh bedding.

The second thing I learned, if you order chickens from the hatchery at a couple dollars a piece, it cost as much as finding full grown chickens in the long run.  So I thought it was a great idea to get 25 chicks in the fall and raise them up.  They cost $2 something a piece, then food to start out was $12 something every two weeks.  Well a couple months in food is $13 a week and still no eggs.  So now they are not paying for themselves still.  So if you take into consideration of $56 in chicken feed a month for 5 months, that averages the cost of each chicken to be about $15.  Well at the small animal swaps you can get a full grown chicken for $10.  I know there are pros and cons to this as well.  You may not know what conditions the chicken lived in before or there temporment.  For meat chickens the hatchery works fine cause you have them at the most 12 weeks, then they go to freezer camp.  But for layers which is the most sufficiant way to get your chickens?  Our chickens should start laying finally mid march by that time I will have put roughly $300 into my chickens.  I am also down to 22 chickens vice the original order of 25 due to predators and lack of knowing what I was doing.  So 22 chickens, if half those chickens lay one egg a day it would take some time to recoop my expenses plus further cost of feed.   I would have to get a minimum of 4 dozen eggs a month to justify having the chickens.  That is without selling the eggs and just using them for our family.  If I choose to sell the eggs at $2.00 a dozen, then 4 dozen eggs would cover feed cost.  I am hoping that the egg production of these 22 chickens is more than 4 dozen a month, which is what we would want just for us.  Any extra would be sold.  We also have to take into account loss of eggs due to dropping, stepping on and pecking from the chickens. 

So all in all, coming into this whole homesteading thing, I jumped right in both feet and might have made some minor mistakes but we hope to have it figured out come spring so we are just a bit self-sufficiant.

My goal for next fall is to have canned veggies from our garden, milk, cheese and eggs.  I currently am working on bread recipes also.  We will also have some meat in the freezer and the ability to only stock the pantry of dry goods such as flour, sugar, salt, and spices.  The rest of the items we will attempt on our own. 

Disliking snow again...

View from my front door at the begining of a blizzard

So we left Kansas in 2008.  There were many reasons why we left.  The biggest was forclosure on our home, we could have struggled again to pull it out, as we had done 12 months before.  Yes, we had already spent $20,000 the year before and pulled it out.  The second reason we left was due to 14 days without power due to an ice storm.  Finally I have a disorder that causes me to ache and just over all feel like crap in the cold.  Regardless my mom had a vacant home that she was willing to let us move in to.  So we packed up and moved.

Now this past July we moved back home to Kansas.  July was a good time to move.  It let me get settled in before the cold reminded me why I hate snow and such.  Yes snow is pretty but the cold drives me batty.  I don't want to be complaining.  We have a wonderful home and great farm animals.  I truelly enjoy all of it now and seriously would not trade it for anything now.  Even complaining after sitting home all last week because of snow drifts and snow days.  The kids went to back to school for two days and another snow day today.  

I am thankful for my dad coming over to clear of the driveway for us.  We are being smart and parking the car at the edge of the drive so that we can pull out. 

I just pray that we survive the snowfall.

This is my chicken yard...they can't make it out of the coop

Motivation

In the past week, I was cooped up in the house with three children who became wildly stir crazy about 12 hours into the first snow day.  Now, I am glad that they made it to those first 12 hours.   Because one more day of their stir craziness might have made for mama to be a bit peeved. 

Anyway, all these wonderful ideas of baking bread, cookies, and hanging out playing board games were in my head.  I even got all the supplies knowing the snow was coming.  I would be lying if I told you we did all those wonderful things.  Nope I kicked back on the couch with the kids and spent the weekend watching movies and playing video games.  We did make snow ice cream.  

I read on facebook many families going out and playing in the 3 to 5 ft snow drifts and sledding.  But since we moved from Florida, I have no sled, nor the proper winter attire for my kids to spend more than 5 minutes outside in the snow, before I start fearing that they would be sick.  Now mind you, I know as a fact that as a kid, I stuck some socks on my feet and my regular winter coat and some clothes on and out I went.  But for some reason having my own kids has made me a weiny and parinoid that one of them will get sick...Again.

So if any of you out there see my kids and ask them if they played in the snow, dont be surprised when they give you the sad puppy dog face.  Oh bet I have evidence that they  finally did play in the snow on Sunday when it was actually 32 degrees and they were able to make a snowman...little one but still a snow man.  They also helped shovel snow off their grandma's porch.

Kids shoveling snow at their Grans house.  Just across the yard from us.

As far as the motivation part of this story, I was very unmotivated to bake bread and make cookies.  I have noticed my lack of motivation in other areas in my life to.  Fortunatelly today, I have started the first step towards kicking the lack of motivation out.  I am eating a bowl of oatmeal to motivate my diet.  I am getting ready to go to the new salon to set up my room.  I am up out of bed to feed the animals at a reasonable time.  I got my taxes done yesterday. I am truelly seeing the motivation.  I will keep you posted on the motivation to work out or find a gym to work out at. 

The animals faired well in the blizzard 2011.  I was worried about our working dog as she wouldn't go into the shelter, so she started to get a bit of frost bite on her elbow area.  I pulled her into the garage and bunked her down with the buckling.  That has seemed to help it heal quickly.  We got her for free and she wasn't in the best shape, cause she just ran with the animals.  We vacinated her when we did the goats and then wormed her also.  She has had an ear issue we have been treating, so I hope we can fix that up cause otherwise she won't be much of a livestock guardian.

We will be trying to break ground on the new fencing at the end of the month.  Need to fence in 2 acres of the property by mid April per the city council.  We are doing the whole property.  So I know it will be a bit pricey, cause its going to be goat fence.  We were going to try horse fence or do part of it goat fence and part of it just regular 3 lined poly wire.  I think I am going to try to resell a roll of the poly wire cause we wont be using it and I have 6000 ft of the stuff on one roll.

The Does in their little huts.

Menu Plan Monday

Monday
Beef and Brocolli, rice and egg roll

Tuesday
Chili and crackers

Wednesday
Pizza

Thursday
Pork shoulder roast, potato and carrot

Friday
Chicken, seasoned rice and peas

Saturday
Steak, rice and green beans

Sunday
Beans and cornbread.

Winter Weather Advisory

When we moved from SE Kansas a couple of years ago it was cause of a crazy ice storm and being without power for 14 days...within the city limits of a larger college town.  I had to put the last part in there because we are now living in a very small town of less than 100 people back in SE Kansas.  Although I am likely more prepared as I have a generator.  I am still not prepared for loss of electricity for that many days.  I also had not planned to get groceries til tomorrow morning.  Obviouslly the big Mart stores will be open no matter what the weather.  The issue I have is I have to get out in it.  YUCK. 

On the good front of all this, I got the goats extra bedding down.  They have a full hay holder.  I will only have to run out the warm buckets of water three times a day in 15 inches of snow that they are calling for.  I put extra straw down in the chicken coop, the inside goat pen, and the horse stall.  I also put extra hay rations out for everyone and moved some square bales closer to the horse stall, so I don't have to lug those through the snow. 

The chickens are out of their coop right now and there is no sleet or snow coming down.  Once it does, they will be put in.  The goats have a tarp wind block to keep out the snow out of their warm beds.  I think they will appreciated that.  So everyone should be good.  I plan to do evening chores just a bit early today, just in case.

As a family this weekend was really nice weather, so we soaked up some good ole sunshine and excercise.  We also spent some quality time with friends that we had not seen in quite a while.  I appreciate the chance to sit back and laugh about all the crazy things we did as kids.  Plus we were able to cut loose and sing silly songs at the top of our lungs and hang out with our girls on Saturday night.  It was very fun to see our daughters hang out and hit it off like the best of friends.  Because my friend was and still is one of my best friends.  We look forward to much more girls nights in the future.

The boys also hung out all weekend.  I think my friends son was in a state of bliss because he was allowed to play video games to his hearts content.  Although we did ask them to play outside which they did  for a bit.


Another weekend over and back to Monday.  I don't mind except for all this snow that is predicted.

"Heatwave"

I was able to get out at 7am this morning to start chores, after a hot breakfast. :D After feeding everyone, I then moved Cheyanne our Mare out to the corrall.  Then I let our buckling out to run with the girls.  Finally set up the solar panel for the electric fence, hopefully that helps.  I really think we are going to need to reset the grounding rod, it might be in the ground too far.  I also think the water bucket for the girls has a crack somewhere, cause it seems to loose water.  I will be going back out in a bit with a new water bucket for them.  We use 30 gal rubber maid containers for water troughs, tires with bottoms attached for feed and then I have a hay manger made for the goats. 
After all that I went and cleanned out the stalls for our Mare and our buckling.  He stays in there most of the time because I am not sure he is ready for the winter because he was born in October.  He is very well behave and trained not to get out of the fence due to the electric fence.  
So all the stalls are ready and all the animals are quite happy today. 

The bunnies hopped into town

So last night we went and picked up two adorable bunnies that needed a home.  These wonderful cuddle bugs were just what the boys had been looking for.  When we moved into the "new" house, my oldest son Casey asked if he could have a bunny.  I thought to myself, oh another pet that I will have to take care.  So for the past three months I had been monitoring Caseys duties of taking care of our dog Nemo.  Casey gets up every morning 15 minutes before the other kids and takes Nemo out either for his walk or puts him on his 100ft run line...depending on the weather.  If its raining, snowing or any other yucky stuff Casey walks him.  He then feeds and waters him.  Then does the same thing when he gets home at 4pm.  So needless to say he has been taking good care of the dog, so he got a bunny.  But that bunny had a friend so his little brother got one too.
My dear husband built the bunny condo last night cause the enclosure we had originally would be fine for one bunny but not two.  When my younger son gets older and more reliable we will build him one too.  But these two are bonded bunnies and we really can't split them up.  Good thing the boys play together all they time anyway.  Also there is a big enough age gap between the boys that I will not be left "holding the bunnies" when they graduate high school.

Morning on the farm

This morning the chores started around 7am.  The first thing was feeding Gyro (the buckling), yes that is his name.  He is still taking 20 oz of milk each morning.  Afterward, Cheyanne and I had a little bit of time to hang out and I put some new bedding down in her stall.  Thinking she is going to want to run in th epasture today.  Someone left the chicken coop open last night so something got one of the chickens. I will make sure it gets closed tonight.  Finally the goats got their warm water in their trough, yep the girls are spoiled. Then I went back and took Cheyanne her two buckets of warm water. 

After the farm chores, I came back in the house changed and then did some work around the house.  I put two new shelves in the kitchen.  Moved the dining room table. Swept up the living room and dining room.  Then put a roast on for dinner.  Now kicking back and relaxing til evening chores.

But before evening chores the boys are getting suprised with bunnies.  I found them from a friend for free.  She is giving us all the stuff needed for them, I just have to pick up feed on my way home.  Hopefully they like them.  Casey has begged for one since July.

Cheyanne the loan horse on the farm.  Staying out of the snow.

Maddy the livestock guardian and goats.  Cherry is the little goat up front.  She is an Alpine/Nigerian doe (meat/milk goat).  Her momma is eating in the back, Becca.  She is a Nigerian doe, who is a meat goat.

Chickens checking out the snow.  Only a few were venturing out this morning.  We had a total of 27 chickens, now we are down to 22.  Something got into the coop last night and got another one.  This is what happens when someone forgets to shut that little door.

Milk from our milk goat Jar Jar.

Gyro our only buckling

Hanging out in her little goat house.  There are three of these but they prefer to sleep two a piece. Moms and daughters. 

Pictures added