New Blog Went Live!

I will still be posting here occassionally, but please check out my new blog:

Homestead Chix

I am teaming up with farm chicks from around the country to compile all the knowledge we have accumulated throughout our time homesteading to help serve as a fun and informational how-to blog for everyone interested in becoming more self-sufficient or just simplifying life and getting back to the dirt. :-)

I hope to see all of you there!

The Real Cost of Animal Feed

We have learned an incredible amount in the past 4 months of living in the country. Things we thought we really understood turned out to be hogwash! LOL Thresholds we thought we had already pushed turned out just to be a starting point. In other words every part of life lately has felt like a re-education.

We have recently acquired several more animals in our household than we have ever had before. We hope to add even more by the end of the year. However, along with the addition of all these animals has been a MASSIVE increase in our food budget. Not having an area fenced off yet for the chickens to pasture has increased our grain and scratch bill. The addition of turkeys to our little farm has created a turkey mash bill. Not to mention the domestic animals: dogs, cats and guinea pigs!

So we have been seeking out ways to utilize our land to help offset these costs. Of course, we haven't been able to eliminate these completely...but with a little research and a few minutes tacked onto our chore time every morning we've been able to save a lot of money on feed costs and as a bonus are now giving our animals a healthier, home grown feed.

We are in the process of growing corn to dry and store for the remainder of the year to use as scratch grains for the chickens and turkeys. Something we discovered we could do right now though was almost completely eliminate our guinea pig feed! Out here in Missouri, the going rate for guinea pig feed can vary greatly depending on if you want dried veg and fruit in your feed ($8.99 for cheapest brand at Wal-Mart for 3lbs) or if you have the option to buy a bulk pellet feed ($50 for 50 lbs). Along with either option you have to supplement with Vitamin C tablets ($5 for 20 pack) and Timothy Hay ($14 for 5 lbs.). Jeesh! With three mature guinea pigs in our home this was a GIANT portion of our feed cost - more than all 4 of our cats put together.

However, the guinea pigs serve their purpose here on the farm. No, we would never eat them...they are pets! :-) However, we use pine shavings for their bedding and their manure along with the decomposed pine shavings makes for an excellent source of compost for our garden. And we have PLENTY of it!

Once we analyzed what their dietary needs really were we came up with a new feed plan and implemented it over the next week - as to slowly ween them off their old diet and onto the new. We have been using the new mix for weeks and we have seen a significant increase in their energy levels and their manure even seems to be less odorous oddly enough. The most important part is that they clearly enjoy their new food more.

Our plan consists of:

• Locally purchased bale of Timothy Hay ($5 for 75lbs.)


• Homemade Guinea pig salad every morning containing:

- 75% greens (we alternate or combine mixtures of lettuce, carrot greens, dandelion greens, and cabbage depending on what we have growing in the garden - we are able to give them bolted lettuce that we wouldn't normally eat and carrot greens that normally would go to waste which they LOVE!)

- 10 % veg (ours like carrots, tomatoes - not too many, and celery)

- 10% fruit (oranges, sliced up grapes, watermelon, old banana)

- 5% grain (rolled oats are a treat they enjoy and they keep them at a good weight)

We are able to grow all the ingredients with the exception of the oats and a couple of the fruits. However, we buy those items in bulk as our family consumes them as well and the cost is minimal. In the end we save a fortune and give them a much more natural diet. A total win win situation.

Turkey Season

I know these photos are a little graphic, but I have to share this experience with Blogworld. Out of the blue, our neighbor called one morning last week and asked if he could bring over a little prize he shot while hunting that morning to share with us. Of course we accepted, a learning experience as well as free turkey meat!







I am not sure I knew what to expect though. With all my girls right alongside me, we watched and helped (some of us more than others) him skin, gut and cut up the turkey. A young tom I am told, with beautiful feathers of which we kept and are preparing for mounting above our fireplace!



The process of gutting the turkey was incredibly eye opening. We got to cut open the gizzard and peek inside at what appeared to be gravel it had digested. Such a fascinating creature.

In the end, we filled 4 gallon sized freezer bags with fresh turkey meat. First dinner was a success! Homemade mashed potatoes covered with shredded turkey and turkey gravy. Yum! Kids said it was the best turkey ever. :-)

All work and no play...

As the saying goes. We have found through this process that it is important to take the time to enjoy this new life.

Sometimes, silliness is the best medicine in the cabinet.

Surprise Surprise

When we bought a farm we knew that we'd be starting from the ground up. Years until the young fruit trees we planted would bear fruit, another season until our berries will produce and even the end of this season until we'll be harvesting our veggies. With so much work that we have to do now and so much waiting ahead of us, it is hard to get motivated to do it all. However, when we stumbled upon these little jewels...it was a very welcomed moment. We discovered the rotting, overgrown posts on the side of the house were actually mature grapevines just waiting to be loved and nurtured. With a little bit of tlc from the hubby they are looking wonderful again. So much so that we fully anticipate fruit this year. There are 5 mature vines that we've added to our 10 new grapevines. Hopefully in the not so distant future we will be swimming in grapes!

Orchard Love

Our orchard is coming to life! As mentioned earlier, we have started the orchard with 18 fruit trees this year. Our property already had a mature pear tree as well as a couple walnut trees, but we really felt the need to start the trees as early as possible given that it will take a few years for them to reach fruit bearing age. My husband spent countless hours researching and ordering the varieties that would grow best in our area and were the tastiest.
I guarantee you there will never be a red delicious apple ever grown or consumed on this land! We chose apple varieties such as Gala, Fuji, Pink Lady and Honeycrisps. Our cherry trees are all Blackgold. The peach trees are Elberta, Elberta Queen, Delicious and White Giant. The pears are a 2 in 1 Bartlett/Crimson Bartlett and Moonglow. We planted 18 trees this year and have room and plans to double that by next year. Within a couple years we should be swimming in fruit - I can't wait!

For as cheap as they are to buy and as easy as they are to care for, anyone who owns a home should have at least one fruit tree!

Golden Girls

Even with all the excitement of getting 25 new chickies, we haven't forgotten our ladies. The hens love their new home. So far it has proven to be coyote, opossum, and raccoon proof. Fingers crossed it stays that way!
We are converting part of our barn, which had four large horse stalls, into a small animal barn. Maybe someday it will house a cow in one of those stalls...but for now, small animals! As you can see, the two middle stalls we converted first for the layer hens and the dog pen. The two largest on the sides will be for meat birds and pigs.
It is mostly finished at this point, though we do still have plans to add low shelves mounted on the walls to each side that the nesting boxes will sit on to avoid any snake problems.
The downside to our new property is we haven't been able to let them free range yet. Our property is partially fenced but not enough to keep neighboring pups away. And unfortunately bird hunting dogs are pretty popular! LOL Until our dogs get big enough to "protect the flock" I am afraid our girls will have to make due with foraging around their new and improved coop.
They don't seem to mind a bit though!

So cute....so awnry!

So as many of you know, we have recently become dog owners for the first time. It has been a crazy adventure of constant tick removal, seemingly torturous bathing rituals, wet dog smell, shoe stealing, trash attacking, sticky puppy tongues, muddy paw prints, lost puppy drama, etc. These puppies eat horse poop...like it's the best thing on Earth! They roll around and bath in it. That was not in the manual. But...they are amazingly smart and kind and sensitive to each other and to us. I love my kitties, but these puppies are squirming their way into my heart quickly. We are constantly amazed at their puppy brilliance. They, for the most part, stay on our land without supervision, collars or scolding. They get worn out and find us and sleep next to where ever we are. They use the walkways in the garden. Really, aside from the whole horse poo issue, they are remarkably smart. They get to visit the vet for the first time in their 9 weeks of life next Tuesday. We found out our neighbors' dogs have Lime Disease and we are already well aware that there are tick issues here. So we are deworming and seeing what preventative measures we can take now to avoid any health problems later. Wish us all luck! :-)

Yummy for the tummy

Bruschetta = The most amazing tasting food I have ever consumed. Shockingly it took me until the ripe of age 30 to discover this little jewel. For those of you who are aware of the wonders of bruschetta, let this serve as a reminder to have some with or for dinner tonight. If you have yet to sample this delight...try some SOON! From what I can see in in my cookbooks and on the Internet, there are a variety of different methods to making this. However, I prefer the basic method. Sliced french bread loaf, drizzled with olive oil and baked at 425 degrees. Topping is diced fresh tomatoes, fresh chopped chives, parsley and sweet basil. Add salt and pepper to taste and enjoy!

Feathery Cuteness

This little guy hangs out on the ledge around my wrap around porch every night these days. Some nights he brings buddies to keep him company overnight, but mostly it is just him. He is so calm and mellow about sharing our porch with us. I adore him! He doesn't make any noise...he just calmly watches all the chaos happening in our house around him. On occasion, Molly (neighbors dog), comes over and torments him with barks and excessive tail wagging to let him know if he were perched just a bit lower she'd be making a great game out of eating him. He doesn't really seem to care though, as he comes back every night to sleep. Anybody know what kind of bird he is? I haven't seen one like him before. Hopefully the photograph shows it accurately but he is dark blue on the top with a rust/cream colored belly and a red face.

Meow

Waking up this morning sucked. Plain and simple. But it doesn't take long to change my mood from sore and whiny back to peaceful and happy when the wind from the windows is swooshing in over me while I am still in bed and the birds are chirping like wild outside and I can hear the horses frolicking next door, having just been let out of their barn. Just the sounds and feel of farm life makes me feel good.
I wonder if everyone feels this way? Am I just a farm floozy? Sit me around a smokey fire pit surrounded by the smell of horse manure and freshly tilled soil while listening to a symphony of birds, cow moos and gunfire and I melt. LOL Well, I know it isn't just me. The cats love it here too. Every cat in our house...remember we have four....has an assigned viewing window and they are ALWAYS there. Dreaming of being outside farm cats, watching the dogs fall all over themselves, yawning and cleaning while we slave over the yard. The kitties love farm life I think even more than I do. :-)

Sunburned. Sore beyond belief. Can a body take this much exhaustion?

Something I have discovered in my short time living on a farm is, I check the weather a lot. Seriously. I check the week in advance predictions to see if we need to clear any days appointments for working outside when there is sun and the ground is dry and workable. I check the weather every morning so I know how to tell everyone to dress. I check the hour by hour updates to see exactly how much longer we have until the torrential rain will begin to fall from the sky. Lots of weather checking these days.

Today was sunny and 88 degrees. We worked hard.

Planted the rhubarb, radishes, carrots, onions and the first stages of succession planting the lettuce and spinach. We have had big gardens in the past. Really! Our neighbors stared in wonder at our beautiful rows of raised beds. We worked hard then too.

This is different.

We planted a little under 100 onions last year...ONE HUNDRED ONIONS! That is a lot of onions to a normal person. This year, we planted roughly 500. Yep. Because honestly when you start counting your crops in the hundreds...you just lose count of the exact number. Carrots, planted about 800 which we plan to thin out later to around 500.

After hours of simply mucking through the dirt, because our soil was muddy from all the Spring rain we've gotten lately and we simply couldn't wait any longer to get the plants in the ground, then shoveling walkways and hoeing the beds...this definitely goes down in my book as the hardest day of work I have ever endured in my whole life. Garden labor alone is tough but when combined with drama of family life (aka picking obscure hidden ticks off the dogs...again!, mediating kid drama between my girls, bickering with the hubby over trampoline assembly, etc.) this was a day for the record books!

We end the day on a lovely note as always - cooking campfire style, finding the big dipper, marveling at the owl hoots and the clarity of the moon tonight. We don't regret our decision to live this life. But man! I need a spa day or something. LOL

Here chickie chickie

We purchased our 25 new layers a couple of weeks ago now. They are growing at amazing rates - my dear sweet husband calls them "chickzillas". LOL Oddly enough, these girls have been the easiest to raise of all our chicks. While purchasing snap together wire organizers for my daughters room, I had the idea to use the same snap together wire system to house the chicks. It has worked out wonderfully. We tarped the bottom and binder clipped the tarp up onto the sides a bit. We can expand the system as they grown if we need to and it keep everything very neat and tidy and you can literally view the chicks from every angle. Our cats enjoy that feature especially. :-)

This year we decided to get three different breeds: Buff Orpingtons, Brown Leghorns and Plymouth Rocks. We have had huge success with our Buff's and just love their personalities. We have never raised either of the other two breeds, but I have read very good things about their egg production. Fingers crossed!

If everyone recalls, last year we had a heck of a time merging our two flocks. Egg production stopped for what felt like FOREVER. But this year, not really as worried. Our three old ladies have all but stopped laying. We get an egg here or there, but not too often. So overall, we on average are only getting an egg a day at this point. SO not enough to sustain my own families egg consumption needs much less to sell or share. So if their laying stops when we merge the flocks....won't really be a huge deal this year.

Depending on how getting our egg license goes and egg sales at the farmers market, we may get more layer chicks next year as our coop has room for probably 40 birds. But we didn't want to get too far in over our heads before we knew what to expect in sales. Overall, raising chicks this time around is a welcomed relief. Something we know how to do well finally!

Seed Babies

Our seed growing operation has finally begun. I should begin by saying that we have never grown our garden from seed sown inside before. This will be a pricey experiment if it fails completely! What we did was combine an existing metal rack we already had with another larger one of the same style we purchased on clearance at a hardware store. My wicked smart husband was able to use all the pieces to makes three connected shelving units. Very cool honey! We then added six 4' shop lights and four 2' shop lights featuring those expensive grow light bulbs. Later on, a friend told me something about those grow lights don't even produce heat like I had thought though unless you actually have them used in grow lighting fixtures. Hmmm....rookie mistake I guess. Regardless, we are making them work for what we need. We got the cheaper shop lights even and Dave used his handy electrician skills to wire them all together and only use one outlet and their controlled by two light switches. Next was actually planting our seed babies. We initially had thought we were going to plant all our seeds in repurposed plastic containers we had been collecting for months. But, this proved to be somewhat impractical once we realized we were planting 600 tomato plants and several hundred more squash, melon, herb and lettuces. So we broke down and spent a little dough on seed cell trays from http://www.greenhousemegastore.com/. In the picture above, we have several trays we haven't even started yet, we are waiting for the seeds to finish trickling in from the various companies we ordered from.

A few late nights with the whole group of us surrounding the dining room table and tracking potting soil all around my kitchen floor, and we had them in and under the lights....awaiting life to appear. We have them in our basement, which can be tricky if you aren't careful. Our first few days we struggled as we had them covered with plastic wrap (as we had read to do in EVERY gardening book I own) but we got white fuzzy mold pretty quick. So we uncovered the seeds, moved them up closer to the lights, put a heat lamp nearby and aimed at the shelves, and got the air circulating better with a fan. Within two days.....we had sprouts!! The Valley Girl tomatoes were the first to peek their little heads up. Everyday, twice a day, hand misting with a squirt bottle is true dedication to these seed babies. But every time a new one pops up, the thrill I get is totally worth all my hard work.

Lovin' the country life...

Every day here seems to contain the contents of months worth of work from our previous life. My body has literally never felt this tired - ever. Oddly though, this unspoken event happens after every unspeakably exhausting day of hard labor, the aches fade and the dirt washes down the drain and you can't wait to do it all over again the next day! I do understand that this might fade with time but I simply can't imagine that at this point.

Week 1 was building the chicken coop so we could move our girls from our old house to the farm. Our beautiful new home was hardly moved in to and was filled to the ceiling with unpacked boxes, but we had priorities here! We converted one of our 13'x12' horse stalls in the barn into a chicken pen. Drawbacks are....mucking regularly will be necessary as they won't be mobile and we will have to let them out to graze. Advantages outweighed the negatives though...3 walls were already constructed and it has a concrete pad, keeping the raccoons and coyotes out. We did however have to run chicken wire up into the rafters of the barn to prevent opossum attacks. Let me tell you, nobody's arms are built for hours of staple gunning and hammering while holding pokey chicken wire and standing on top of a ladder looking up. Not fun. But we did it. All on our own - and it is a pretty nice looking coop! We are capable of building shelter. MwahHaHa Silly but so powerful. So, in the dark hours of the night, I visited our old home and stealthily snatched each hen from her old coop and transported in the backseat of my minivan the 45 minute trek to the new farm and they each woke up in their new home. They act as if they have lived there forever and were laying eggs as usual that morning. SUCCESS! :-)

Of course, I should mention that in the middle of all this chicken coop building, we had a freak snow storm. Snow or no snow though, we needed our hens, so we took a little sledding break at the local sledding hill, built Annabeth the watch guard snow lady, and finished the coop in the snow.

Now at this point I keep telling myself that we will have breaks in between projects where we can just play around the farm and possibly get around to unpacking at some point. But let me tell you something I have discovered....I don't think that day will EVER come! LOL In between sweeping and mucking incredible amounts of mud dragged into our house by muck boots (plans for a mudroom are already in the works!) and defending our house against the evils of farm critters like the herd....yes I said herd of giant wolf spiders that emerged from our barn and when stepped on not only do not die but turn around and hiss at you or the largest farm rat that I have ever seen that mocks me from the inner parts of our pantry, the fact that we find time to sleep is truly amazing. Joy is always easily found here though, rainy days under the tin roof barn, playing in the creek with the neighbor dogs, horses wandering over to our fence line to say hi. Life is pretty much wonderful. There is a never ending stream of giggles as we all discover this new life together. Our first week here while cooking breakfast I was distracted by the bursts of laughter coming from outside, when I peeked my head out to check on the girls, I discovered that against my warnings, they had learned for themselves that our neighbors fence line was electrified and were daring each other to touch it. "Mom, I can't feel my arm!" We are so proud of them obviously. LOL

Week 2, garden starting time. We take hours and days to strategically plan our massive garden. Then we do a little farm trading with our neighbor who owns all the good tractor equipment we can't afford yet because who knew that a good tractor with attachments cost more than our cars?! So, for the bargain price of some homemade strawberry muffins and a half dozen eggs from our hens, our neighbor begins the tilling for our potato bed so we can get the taters in by St. Patty's Day. I cannot tell you how amazing it felt to break ground for the first time. The soil had a few rocks, but overall was in great condition. Horses had lived her for years before, so it is VERY well fertilized. We helped it along with composted chicken and guinea pig manure though before planting.

The day after tilling the first bed up, our garden vision was dashed with another freak snow storm. 6 inches of snowfall overnight!

But this time....we couldn't help but be mesmerized at the beauty that surrounded us. It truly feels like we are living a dream. Why doesn't everyone have this dream? LOL They must not know what they are missing.

So, while the snow is outside, we begin working inside on all the seed trays we are starting. We have around 700 tomato plants along with artichokes, squash, eggplant, melons, pumpkins, broccoli, cabbage, and cauliflower that we are starting inside on some makeshift metal shelves that my hubby has wired up with grow lights. The carrots, lettuce, spinach, onions, peanuts, cotton, corn, potatoes, rhubarb, celery, sweet potatoes, bush beans and peas we will be seeding straight into the ground outside.

Just after we got the indoor seeding started, we got all the berry plants in the mail. 200 strawberry plants, 40 raspberry plants, 40 blackberry plants. Yikes, Luckily the snow melted quick and our neighbor was able to come back and till up another portion of the garden for all the berries. They are chilling in our fridge until this weekend when hopefully we can find a break in the cold rain to do some planting.

Oh...and just for good measure...just got the shipping notification that our 18 fruit trees (6 apple, 4 peach, 4 pear and 4 cherry) have just shipped and should arrive here soon. Lots of holes to dig. I foresee sore arms ahead!

Last week we got some unexpected new additions to our farm...our three new puppies arrived two weeks early and of course before their dog pen had been built. We started at 7am and were able to finish the stall by the time we picked them up at 5pm. What a day that was! But now we have three 7 week old Great Pyrenees/Border Collie mix pups to guard our farm. Petra, Bean and Ender (named for our fave Enders Game characters). They sleep in the stall next to the chickens and have done very well with their training so far. Hopefully someday soon they will serve our farm well. Right now they are just a gigantic fuzzy food drain!

Yesterday we picked up our 25 layer chicks from the farm center. So now we have a full basement of baby chickens and baby plants and almost a full barn. I can't wait for the pigs....I think I have talked Dave into getting them sooner than planned. However, the two beehives will be here in a month, so we have to prioritize building their hive boxes first before I get to go pig shopping! Whew. :-)

New Farm

Well, we did end up finding our dream farm afterall!

Better location, better land, better house. I guess some things do happen for a reason. We are moving in this week, trying to wade our way through the endless sea of cardboard boxes. Even with all the mess and boxes though, it feels wonderful!

New muck boots are getting worn in while we clean out all the brush in the woods for burning during our nightly meals over the campfire.

The kitties are finally home as well. Minnie managed to find every miniature hiding hole in the house to hide herself in the first few days but they are now all settling in as well and really enjoying all the house they get to explore and discover.

This morning though, my girls woke up, hauled a dead tree trunk from the woods, got a fire going themselves in the firepit and burnt our paper recycling pile while talking about all their plans for our garden out back. I realized...this is truly the life. I can't picture it looking any better than this.

Self sufficiency here we come!!

Broken Dreams

So our farm - the one we already started planning our dreams around, silly as that sounds, was purcahsed by someone else today! We were 1 day too late in getting our bid in. :-(

I guess the hunt begins again...

It's been awhile.

I do realize I neglected Blogworld for the last part of 2010. Sometimes life just isn't where you want it to be though - so do you really want to share that with everyone? Well, I don't. LOL

2011 - New hopes, new dreams, new ambitions. I love the way a New Year feels. Like a clean slate to start again with. Everything we let slip to the wayside is now fresh and ready for me to triumph over.

My dear husband and I are trying to buy a farm. Yes, I said trying. We actually haven't even put an offer on our dream farm yet but in my mind, changing the title and header on my blog to "Buys a Farm" helps me feel like I am putting positivity out into the world for it to become reality! :-) I do realize that sounds a little kooky. It all started with a 3 year plan. Year 1 we research the market, take daytrips to our desired area, etc. Year 2 we begin, what we are sure will be a very long househunt. Year #3, we decide on property and make offers, negotiating a wonderful price eventually. This was the plan.

Month 1: Year 1.
We found the house of our dreams and it happens to be located on the land of our dreams. It is a bank foreclosure going to auction in 2 weeks.

Not ideal conditions.

Scramble to get financing for deal, scramble to get down payment and other monies for said deal, scramble some more for the fun of it.

Once we wrapped our head around this craziness there are one hundred million little roadblocks up along the path to owning this beautiful piece of farmland. Financing limitations, FHA appraisal guidelines, strict and unflexible auction dealings, etc. We are going into this with a hope and a prayer and maybe...if we are lucky, in February, my title will be accurate!

More details to come. But for now, I am heading to bed to once again dream about dairy goats, piglets in the chicken house and remodeling a farmhouse kitchen. Wish us good luck.

Looking up

Well...life is far from normal but we are getting close to our sweet kind of normalcy again.

The pain and helplessness of all the change that this year began with is still ever so fresh and lingers around us daily. But we are strong and have grown from all this change. Our kids push us daily to show them just how strong we are and just how much life can throw our way. But we strive to show them that even though we fall...and fall repeatedly...we will never stop getting back up and dusting ourselves off.

We are not final yet on our adoption of Kim and Alicia but our court date is nearing and we could not be any more ready! Kim is going through a lot of tough times. She shows us how to find patience and love for her and within ourselves every moment. Ckaylei is going through all kinds of emotional turmoil as well...having our family grow so quickly and losing all sense of solid ground under her feet. We love these girls though. Our girls. Our beautiful Adrian is still with us and while we don't know for sure at this point, there are signs that show she might be a permanent fixture in our lives. Dave and I don't mind a bit. Who would have thought we could fall in love with a kid that we didn't meet until her horrible teen years!

Much of the past couple months has been work related for Dave and I. My husband has managed to finally land his dream job. A huge accomplishment for him. Time to start dreaming bigger I guess. :-) I have taken over a company and am now acting as the Director. Very peculiar feeling having employees and writing their paychecks every month. I love this work I do though and wouldn't want to give it up for anything.

We also made the bold decision to start homeschooling all our girls! So I am in massive home school planning mode as I have never home schooled more than one child. Of course, I sit with my planning notebooks every night having visions of all of them speaking to each other in French and writing poetry before bed while I grade solid A papers. We will see. We start in a couple weeks!

The farm is doing great. Some a bit neglected and the other parts thriving. We ended up planting around 100 tomato plants of varying types. We still haven't finished building the post system for them though so some are laying about while others are very tall and bushy. We have still had quite a few to harvest though. I think our claim to fame this year was the strawberries though. We harvested...harvested...harvested and then harvested some more! We still get lingering fruits that pop up but for the most part they have finished for the year I believe. We have two freezers completely full of huge frozen strawberries in Ziploc bags. Overall I think Dave's new sand/mulch/dirt mixture has done very well - though we have had to fertilize far more often with holly tone, tomato tone and veggie tone that we did in the past. But we kept it all organic and are very happy with the results.

Our chix are all doing great. They have had a stellar laying year and have done us proud. Turkey is also starting to warm up finally to Buffy and Ginger - the two young pups in the flock. I will try to post pics soon.

starting again...

It has been almost 6 months since I last posted. Life looks very different from here.

Change. Every bit of my life has been sprinkled with it this past several months. Beautiful, sorrowful, painful and awe inspiring sprinkles of change that make me gasp at the obvious helplessness I posess over the shape my life will take.

Today. I love my husband. He inspires me and could not possibly feel any more like the other half of my soul than he does today.

Yesterday. Hard day. Saw my sweet girl Kim at the hospital. She is flat now.

Last weekend. Wonderful sun and warmth. My husband brought our farm back to life - it feels good. He adds all his own touches of course. Caring not as much for the asthetics of it all but more about the functionality. He started two experimental beds with a special sand/mulch/dirt mix for the carrots and onions. Planted so many we might not eat anything but carrots and onions all year if they go well. Started the new plants: Rhubarb, loads more strawberries, rasberries, blueberries and gooseberries. Making plans together for the tomatoe beds. May be the only thing I plant myself this year.....if he doesn't beat me to it. Eager little farmer he has turned out to be.

Mid April. I scour Century 21 website looking for farms on the east coast. Dave and I fight because I think he should quit his job and we should live off student loans while he pursues further education in programming and I go to culinary school. I apply to both the New England Culinary Institute and the culinary program at The Art Institute in Kansas City.

Beginning of April. My best friend breaks my heart. She is moving to Vermont. I feel dramatic - so I think to myself that it might as well be China. My children's lives will be different forever. Even though I know, with complete certainty, that in her shoes I would do the same thing...I hate her a little right now.

April 6th. We get selected to adopt Kim and Alicia. My husband was amazing in our staffing. We can't tell the kids yet. But we know and couldn't be happier today.

Mid March. My 5 year old neice and 7 year old nephew move in with us. Wonderful. Exhausting. We are now at six kids in the house. Can't handle much more.

March. My step-father, the only man in my life until my husband, died suddenly. He was 38. I spent a week in Pennsylvania with Mom. Life feels surreal. I miss my husband so much every night I can't sleep. No idea how to comfort Mom. Don't think I could be comforted in her shoes. Want to sleep for days.

February. We add a new foster kiddo to the bunch. Feeling hesitant because she is a teen. But everyone is taking well to her. She is quiet, complicated and beautiful. I think I really like her.

January. It snowed and snowed and snowed. Was awesome. We were actually "snowed in" for the first time ever in Missouri. Couldn't even open our front door or get the cars out of the driveway. Kids had the longest Christmas break ever and we loved every minute. Made more chili and potato soup than we thought any family should ever consume in one lifetime. Made snowmen. Had awesome snowball fights. Went ice skating. Consumed mass amounts of awesome hot cocoa.

Tonight. I feel like I am drifting. Not sure where we are headed right now. But I have to say, in the weeks past I have been so sad about all this change I could hardly stand the helplessness of it all. Tonight, I have hope. And maybe just the smallest bit of excitement about what this next 6 months will look like for my family.

AND AS FOR THE CHIX! They all made it through this rough and tough winter. Strong girls - just like our family.

Recap: Farmgirls don't remodel quickly!

So, this is how the past 5 years of my life has been spent. Well, in between work, homeschooling, parenting, foster parenting, cooking some killer dinner and oh yeah....farming. :-)
We've been remodeling. Now, this is not the only project we have tackled in our home - but it is by far the biggest. We had the crappiest of crappy basements when we bought this house. My husband saw a diamond in the rough though - really his fantasy basement. The dry...at least we thought at the time, unfinished raw basement. A blank canvas for him to design and play with. So, this is the story of our first house...our first major remodel and how we almost killed eachother during the process!

I will refer to the photographs in the numerical order in which they appear for reference as they do tell the story best. Photograph #1 (Day #1): This shows exactly how our basement looked the day we moved in. Or rather...where we would have liked to moved into. The previous tenant left all her...well....crap for us to deal with, along with a few wonderful presents from her cat as well in there.
Photograph #2 (Day #2): We have finally cleared out most of the previous tenants crap and made room for our own junk. I should also note here that the absence of all the crap definitely brought to our attention that the basement was FUNKY! And not in the cool way.
Photograph #3 (Day #3): We finally move all of our own crap in the funky basement. Yay! Time to forget about it all for awhile.
By the way, we have two sides to our basement as the stairwell splits it in two. The other side...mmmmm nice and finished. Well, finished in the 1980's! Check out that GIANT track lighting. And what is up with that rounded step at the door? Weird. And - not sure if you can see, but the carpet is dirty and crunchy. Yup I said crunchy.
Photograph #5 (Week #4): Time to stop forgetting about the funky basement - it flooded. So, while retiling the kitchen, I busted the water line to the ice maker and flooded the basement below. That sucked. And, as you'll notice, we almost always have baskets of laundry everywhere!! It is completely unintentional but what can I say...we have a lot of clothes apparently.
Photograph #6 (Year #2): This year we did a lot of the framing with David's mother. It was really quite funny. There was a floating wall and lop sided boxes and many adventures in experimental electrical work. Good times.
Photograph #7 (Year #3): Sooooo...we had a lot going on in those three years. Started homeschooling, changed careers....stuff! Don't judge me. So here, you can see still some sheetrocking needs to be done and more electrical work (which David is doing entirely) and much much more mudding and sanding.
Photograph# 8 (Year #5): I know! We lived with our offices in that for two years. Trust me, I lived it...I know it sucks. But look...so pretty. All the electrical and sheetrocking are done. And at this point all we were doing was staying up into the wee hours of the morning sanding and mudding in preparation for Mike the sheetrock guy, who was going to be spraying a knockdown texture on all the walls the next day.
Photograph #9 (Year #5 - 2:00am): Can you see the total exhaustion? Mud, sand, wipe, mud, sand, wipe. Ahhhhhhhhhhh!
Photograph #10: Same progress being made in the other side.

Photograph #11 (Year 5, 2 days after falling asleep in a bowl of cereal after 2 all nighters.): *Drumroll Please* Our finished Playroom/Homeschool Room.
Photograph #12: The most beautiful row of bookshelves I have ever laid eyes on. I am easy to please! We have spent the past 3 years homeschooling at our dining room table with only 1 1/2 of these bookshelves usable to us. Cramming our stuff in every corner of the house I almost want to cry everytime I see the organization now and the fact that it all fits with lots of room to spare so I can add more!!
Photograph #13: A shelf for each subject!!!!
Photograph #14: The art/music corner? Ckaylei's keyboard (which hopefully will be replaced with Ckaylei's piano if we ever find the right deal) and the toy box/bench.
Photograph #15: The crafting area. Supplies for crocheting, sewing fabrics and goodies and beading.
Photograph #16: The homeschool area. Note the table surface - we can write on it with dry erase markers! Cool. Lots of school supplies everywhere and a desk for mom to stay organized at. Oh! And don't forget the guinea pigs. The classroom pets? Either way they sing while we school. It is awesome.
Photograph #17: The partially finished office. The master bedroom is through that doorway but it still remains unfinished. We still need to lay carpet in here and get the door installed. They will be coming soon. Hopefully in 09'.


To summarize, when we first decided to remodel we drew up our designs and brought in several contractors to bid the project. The lowest bid of five we received was $21,000. Doing all the sheetrocking, framing, mudding, sanding, electrical work, networking and phone lines ourselves and only hiring out for additional cable lines and sheetrock texturing we have saved thousands of dollars. To date, we have spent $2,500. We do still have the bathroom left, which will cost around $1,500 in itself. But, you can see, we saved ourselves a small fortune by doing it ourselves. We have sacrificed sanity, precious time and many many hours of sleep. But darn it...we saved a lot of money!!