I thought we were busy before, but we seem to be extremely busy now. Oddly enough though, we feel as though our family time has increased. We do not have a TV anymore, and no “smart” electronic devices for the kids. Now our most normal time is spent with our whole family outside with the plants, animals, and the fire pit. Although much of the time is filled the kids riding around on their toys or playing with the chickens while mommy and daddy work on chores and projects, it feels great to be all together.
We started composting our own fertilizer with egg shells, banana peels, and other organic materials. But now with the cow manure coming in (or out) we just can't keep up. We will either need to start giving it away, or taking it to our new property for our future plants.
We started off milking the cow for a few weeks with Sheyda doing all of the milking by hand and me holding and feeding Peach (our cow) so that she would sit still. We have a system down now where Sheyda and I use a cow milking machine. It is still a lot of work, and can be very frustrating, but it is what it is.
Chickens have proven to be the easiest. They walk around all day and eat food and bugs, drink water, and explore. The worst part about them is when they manage to get into Sheyda's garden and eat her plants. Other than that, they pretty much entertain themselves and they even put themselves to bed at night.
We now have 3 dogs. Chance our oldest is still doing a superb job at protecting the house. He likes to lay down all day, but when a stranger comes around he is at high alert and wants to kill whoever is out there.
Rae is our German Shepard. She will soon start training on protecting the home and the family. She usually always goes with us in the van when we go out.
Willow is our Great Pyrenese, a livestock dog. He is supposed to be very independent and bond with the animals. He should grow to be very protective of all he watches over. The school kids love him and call him 'Willow Pillow'.
Our whole family now wears mud boots. That is our regular footwear now, in our yard, and out in public.
We have used a couple of systems for keeping Sheyda's tropical plants warm. We have wrapped them in incandescent Christmas lights which works well. This winter we made a large canvas room housing about a dozen trees. It has a heater inside which keeps it nice and warm.
We have slaughtered 7 chickens. It would have been 8, but Willow ate one of them. Rae actually killed another one, but we got it quick enough to prepare. Chickens are not difficult to prepare, but they are a little messy. We always say a prayer beforehand and thank the chickens for their lives. They get so big that they no longer seem comfortable day to day.
It is always easy buying chicks. They are a little more work when they are young. They need to stay contained because their temperature needs to be regulated. As they don't have a mother hen with them, we have a heater to keep them warm. But as always, we need to keep them warm, fed, and clean.
Our garden boxes are a little overkill in that they are very sturdy, which also means that the wood purchased ends up being a little expensive. They need to be made with untreated wood and they need to be sturdy enough to last the amount of pressure from soil, water, and plants on the inside. I'll try to post the blueprints that we made for ourselves.
We no longer buy milk (we go through at least 6 gallons a week), butter, whipped cream, bread, green beans, and fertilizer.
Sheyda is currently aging several pounds of cheese. Our chickens will begin laying soon and then we will no longer need to purchase eggs which we also go through so fast (Isaiah can eat 6 eggs for breakfast). We slaughtered 7 chickens and we are still deciding if we will do it again. If we do, we will probably slaughter enough in one day to fill the freezer for a year. It is a lot of work in small amounts.
Our trelleces are also very sturdy as we hope that eventually grapes, kiwis, or other plants will be hanging off of them. We got some ideas, but in the end we made our own blueprints. I will try to post them.
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