It's really happening!

Ok, so I suppose I tell you this is the point where there is no going back.

As I said this past weekend when we were packing up all our belongings and putting them into the cargo trailer that it just seemed like we were cleaning up and moving around, but the stuff just got real....

Going......

GONE!!!

Awww, just look at those pretty apple trees. I'm still not over their demise. Now I have a pit in my stomach as we wait for the heavy equipment to be moved and and they begin construction on the basement.




When we drove away to come home again the sky was dark and ominous. Seemed like I wasn't the only one worried about the situation.  Not that the weather can really tell how we feel, but it sure seemed that way. By the time we got home 7 hours later there were rainbows here and there and I felt a little more comfortable. Still though. If something were to fall through,  yikes.




Instead of focusing on that I'll try to look forward to seeing the construction progressing and knowing that our future is being secured. Yes. That is what I need to focus on. As soon as I know the work has began. Should be by this weekend so at least I won't have to wait long.  We'll be going back in 3 weeks to check on things and hopefully I'll be able to show you the gigantic basement then. The builder seems to think they'll have the walls in by then, and be working on pouring the footer. I'm more inclined to think that there will be a hole in the ground. But, either way progress should be made and then it will get exciting!

See you soon!

Barbie~

Moving forward

Remember the post about plans for retirement and what order i'm doing things in? You know the one in 2013 where I was working on extra income in retirement, or this one in January that said we would wait to build until after we saved enough to do it out of pocket? Well- you can throw all that out the window.

We had been worried about the possibility that somehow someway that property would not be available to us when we wanted it. So, we looked around at a few other properties and even put an offer on one that connected with the current property. That didn't pan out, but something else did. A decision was made, an agreement was drawn, we started making payments and  and now...GULP. Now we are in contract to build our retirement home...

WHA???  Yup. It seems kinda crazy to me after all the careful planning, but here's the deal. This secures the property for us. This means that we are paying $500 a month now to have it built and until we take over the property, but then again every time we pay now it's less that we will have to pay later. Home building costs are going up and not down- no matter how you look at it. Building supplies themselves are going up even though property values had lost so much value.

Does the $500 a month hurt - well DUH. Of course it does. Especially since we now have a driving teenager that is going to need a car next summer to get to his COLLEGE classes. Um - yeah this is tough. We are swallowing a lot of hard pills, but looking toward the future with this project  is just as awesome as looking at the past and seeing what a wonderful man my child is now becoming.

The hope here is that we will have the property already paid down by half or more before our (hopeful) retirement date looms close. Then, once we sell our home we'll use the proceeds from that to pay it off entirely and we should have enough to traverse the hunger gap between our retirement date and the time that we start taking payouts from Social Security. (God willing it's still around then.)

WOWSERS. How exciting this is. We've already sold the trailer, and in 2 weeks we will be moving out. Scary. I'll keep you posted on the progress. The crew is supposed to be out July 15th to start the basement! Basement and back porch are not shown on the drawing - sorry! You'll just have to imagine it there. ;-)

See you soon!

Barbie~

Well now.

That's interesting. Turns out the duck that was starting to quack? Is still quacking... but it is most definitely a boy.  It's head is now starting to turn green as well. None of the others quack or anything close to quack. He's an oddball in more than one way.

Well, the green shows up well on my phone. Guess I'll have to try to get a different picture of my fine fellow this week to show you better. He is well into his adult molt now and in about 2 weeks will not be recognizable

from this bird. His chest is a deep dark burgundy already, and there are a few of the darker colored feathers coming in on his back as well. It's odd that his first set of feathers was so light and now his adult feathers are filling in so dark. Then again this one has been nothing but odd.

 I've truly enjoyed watching them mature and now that I know they are all drakes I have begun the elimination process as to which birds are in the running to stay, and which three will be making a long trip to Alabama. The drake pictured, while beautiful - is a trip maker. The lightly marked juvenile feathers are an issue for me. (See the other in the background, much darker)

It's remarkable how alike they are and yet how different. I can tell them apart by their feathering to some extent, and the sounds they make are truly different as well. Unique and the alike at the same time...well except the one who thinks it's a girl.
 While I'd like to breed to the standard of perfection, that standard doesn't specify the darkness of the bird. I prefer the darkest coloration available to help them hide and blend in to their surroundings. They will be on a large pond and the darker they are the fewer predators will take notice. (See the one with almost no brown in the middle? His lighter coloration makes him stand out.)

OK, yes I chopped the ducks head off - metaphorically, but better this way, than physically - no? ;-)

I just love the patterning on these guys. Look at that purple/blue wing speculum.  Beautiful.

I'm excited to be adding to the flock next weekend and I can't wait to show you pictures of the new little ones. But meanwhile the drakes are starting to change so rapidly I'm afraid I won't be able to pick out the one I've decided to keep for breeding when I introduce more into the flock. 

SO. As a solution I've decided to mark the one that I feel will suit my needs best. Of course once they have completed their adult feathering this could change, but as long as there is nothing glaringly wrong with him as far as breeding standard and coloration goes I am going to be keeping the one that tries to rasp or honk, but can't seem to make a sound. He's by far the best bet for a pet in my neighborhood. Nearly silent and non-flying are great attributes to have around here!

Once I started looking around at ways to mark my birds I realized that there were not a lot of easy and painless options out there. So, I found these...

They are almost like keyrings in that they are looped over themselves, but they are fairly flexible plastic and should be easy to get on or off the bird(s). I want to mark the one that I am keeping now, but when I release them on the pond in Alabama I don't want it mistaken that they are just some random birds. So the ones we take up there will be marked before they are let out of their enclosure. By marking their legs any person (poacher, trespasser) will know that the birds are not wild game. Not that it would stop everyone but the area we are in up there? It's got a pretty good honor system going. If a neighbor was to see someone with my duck it would be questioned and reported. Livestock is super important to life up there and the vast majority  of people farm for their way of living/feeding their families. I realize that if the birds do manage to settle into a nice lifestyle and keep away form the predators that they might some day have ducklings and I would have no way to mark them and that's OK. I figure that if they are able to produce a new flock then that's awesome and more than I ever expected. I'm just hoping that they  live the first year or two out without any major incidence. It's be so nice to see the family group all together up there when we go fishing and such. <3

Off to fill up the waterers...again.

See you soon!

Barbie~

Harvest Monday 6/23/14

Welcome back to Harvest Monday!

I am unfortunately still dealing with thievery and nastiness in my garden. I am ready to turn it all under and wait until fall to start again. That is a sad day, indeed. All of my harvests this week were wild ones...

Blackberry season is upon us. The blackberries at home? GONE. The berries are all gone and one of the plants was chewed through. I'm not happy with that, but I was thrilled to gather a few handfuls like this for desserts. No cooking or prep needed, just pop 'em and go!

This harvest however, well it needed quite a bit of prep work. My son is learning how to filet and how to prep pan fish. This guy was too large for a pan fry, and needed to be filleted. But he was part of a stringer that ended up being a wonderful dinner for 5. :-)

Ah, yes this also took a lot of prep work. all the meat on the right was from a regular rack of ribs, the meat on the left is all wild pig. YUM... this was all smoked on Saturday and what you see here is after 9 of us were finished. My fridge is full of leftovers now and that makes for easy meal prep this week. :-)

Thanks for stopping by. Don't forget to go by Daphne's Dandelions. She's got the scoop on what's happening in gardens around the globe.

See you soon!

Barbie~

Growing, and busy.

We've been rather busy this last week or two. There was a quick trip up to the property to do a little work, and to check on the status of the herd up there. There was also a certain sometwinnies birthday to plan. This weekend will be fun for them, for sure! Not to mention the preparing the garden for fall planting, and getting the first set of seedlings in the ground. The main garden is still under quarantine though.  *pout*

But, right now I wanted to stop by and tell you about our herd. We've been managing this herd for 8 years now. The first couple years we didn't really know what we were doing. We tried, but our main objective was just to lower the hunting pressure and allow the herd to come back onto the land and get all cozy. The poaching that had gone on before us was intense and I'm pretty sure not even the squirrels came onto the property. Not to mention it was mostly barren with a few pockets of hardwoods. the second year we had the fields planted and all the trees planted and as they grew the herd slowly moved back in. At first only for foraging and the herd was very small. We didn't harvest animals for the first 3-4 years. Then we started noticing the deer were finally staying year round without fail. They visited the same places, and we saw the same deer time and again. But, the bucks - not so much. They are typically travelers anyway and wary. But, as the newer generation of deer matured those bucks tend to hang around more. Other bucks start coming in more because the herd size is growing so the does need mating...all good stuff. Last year the herd was finally large enough to not only meet the demands of our meat requirements, but my brothers and my uncles as well. This year?

Our herd?

 Our herd is growing in leaps and bounds!

The fawns are numerous and we even have a set of twins!

Last years fawns have sized up nicely (top photo all the way right) and this years are beginning to lose their spots and all are healthy and happy.

 

Along with these shots we had plenty of turkey (some with the turkey and deer at the same time) and other wildlife as well. It feels great to know that we've completely changed this land. The deer that used to be here were very thin and the fawn population by this time of the year was very low if any due to high predator pressure. Turkey were non existent on this property as well. This year? I fully plan on a true turkey Thanksgiving dinner.

 

And? I. Can't. Wait!

 

See you soon!

Barbie~

One picture.

That is what I managed. One picture while we were there. Don't get me wrong. I got a picture of a couple of those peaches. I got pictures of my kids playing inside. But, I was never able to yank out my good camera and get outside with it. The one time it did stop raining.... OK it stopped three times total, but I swear to you we used ever one of those time up for something better than pictures.

The first time it stopped raining we took the kids fishing. They hadn't been out of a car or a house in 2 weeks. They needed it. We had about an hour at the pond before it started raining again and we tried to wait it out until the thunder started.

The second time was just for fireworks. Sometimes, I'm quite positive God plans these things. The kids were SO very upset they weren't going to get 4th of July fireworks. We told then we would have them whenever we could even if we had to wake them up in the middle of the night. The rain stopped at 8pm and started back up at 10:30pm. There is nothing that says God's Plan better than that. Amen.

The third time was the last day and we ran around like little chickens on the ATV's gathering up all of our gear and making sure everything was done. But, since we were out and running around I did manage to snap a shot of one of the main reasons for this trip. One of our hunting shacks is starting to rot. Well. Inside it's fine. It is a wasp attractant, but it's fine. The legs however are starting to rot. Rather than trying to save the shelter by sawing off the shooting house and then supporting it on the outside with new 4x4's and having it not be as stable as before we decided this one would be taken down. This main field is the one we take the kids to most often after all and we wouldn't want to risk anyone getting hurt. Here is the new structure next to the old one:

 

It took 3 days in the rain to build and raise, but considering it comes in large pieces and could have only taken a single day without the rain - EH!?

 

The new structure is a lifetime structure. No rotting wood, no worries of wasps getting inside while we are away and building nests. No owls, either (that's another LONG story and kinda funny) But along with all that the best thing about this? The ladder to get into the stand isn't straight up and down like the other ones. It's more like a tall stairway. EASY for the kids to climb. Going down is a bit harder, but going up is a piece of cake. Makes it easier if you are carrying something, too. ;-)

We weren't able to get the old one down this trip but we will soon. It will go into the burn pit and be our winter camp fire wood. We just have to remember not to roast marshmallows over it. It's pressure treated so that would be a no-no! We thought about turning it into a playhouse for the kids but the wasps are ALWAYS in there. I thought about a hen house, but dragging it all the way to Florida? Uh- I don't think so. It will be 10 years before I need one here on the property... at least. I don't know that it would or wouldn't last that long but meanwhile it would be an easy place for wild animals to hide and make into homes. So, it will have to be destroyed. What a shame. It makes me sad.

OK- so that's enough from my mouth.

See you soon!

Barbie~

Harvest Monday 7.8.13

Guess What? It's STILL July! <3 and I'm still in love! :-D I just can't help myself.

 

This week brought peaches. Not Florida peaches, not Georgia peaches but the first of the peaches from the bare root trees I planted in Alabama. I'm proud to have them, but I could have had more if I had been greedy. When we first got there it was raining, but not hard. I picked 2 peaches, we divided them and then I went out immediately and got 2 more and did the same. It was just enough to satisfy our sweet tooth for dessert that night.

 

 

The next morning it was pouring and on the way from one cabin to the other we each grabbed a peach and munched our way across the lawn. Unfortunately the wind had picked up over night and knocked off a lot of the peaches as they were all just about ripe. But the winds continued and the rains were not about the quit that day. We were sequestered inside and I thought I would go out and gather the fallen fruit to make a cobbler once things calmed down. I should have gone out into the storm - or just gathered them all off the tree when we first arrived. By the time I managed to get out there hail had moved through and damaged the fruit so badly and then the continued rain just washed the rest of the fruit off of the pits. There was nothing but pits and mush left. What a sad state of affairs. There was a good 20 peaches that were wasted. Granted these peaches were small as the tree is small and it held a lot of fruit, but they were bursting with flavor!

 

The rest of the newly planted trees (year and half old now) did not produce any fruit. They weren't expected to. Added bonus if they did but it wasn't expected. Peach trees just seem to mature faster for some reason. But, I'm so glad that they are planted and really growing nicely. They all came out of dormancy and are growing wonderfully. The apple trees are healthy, the plum tree looks fantastic the peach trees obviously are doing well. It's especially good that the plum tree is doing good. The ancient one that we have been depending on that is up with the pecan trees? It didn't come out of dormancy this year. It appears the lichens that have been growing all over it have finally zapped the last of it's strength. Most of the wood is brittle now and there is not much chance that even with the removal of the lichen growth that the old tree could survive. It will be removed when we go back in the Fall. There is a quick trip planned for September, but it's much too fast for that project. The diseased wood will need to be burned to be properly disposed and we wouldn't have time. Better to leave the tree in place for the time being. Besides saying goodbye to an old grandmother tree which will be difficult I guess this means we'll also have to make a decision on what type of plum to replace it with. We had hoped that the plum we planted would cross pollinate with it, but now we'll have to purchase a second tree to pollinate the first. There are wild plum trees in the woods but pollination would be spotty at very best as the home site is much higher than the surrounding woods and the pines have grown so much that they would block most of the pollen from getting through.

 

Oh, and that leads me to a whole other huge post on decision for the property. Unfortunately the rain didn't let up the entire time we were there so even though a LOT got accomplished there isn't a lot of pictures to share. :-(

Um, and I have to decide if I should get rid of a bossy hen that is picking all the feathers from another hen and making her miserable. She's grabbed me more than once, too. The kids will be sad, but new chicks would be good, right? *sigh* Decision time here, too.

See you soon!

Barbie~

To blog or not to blog?

Sometimes I have nothing to say. Other times I have so many topics to cover it's hard to know what to talk about.

Sometimes I shy away because I'm unsure of how to go about cramming so many things into the blog. Do I talk about this child today? That child? Work? Garden? Traffic? Weather? This craft? That thing I'm doing? Trip I took....

 

And because I can't decide my blog sits here and gathers dust. It makes me feel sorry for it. Can a blog do this you ask? Yes, it can. Guilt inducing blog syndrome. It exists. I think. At least in my mind it does, therefore -surely it must! LOL.

 

But seriously. There are so many times that I think to myself that I should put this on there, or that on there and never get around to it. I chide myself that I don't have anyone interested in knowing those details of my life. But, that isn't really what it's about, is it? It's about putting it out there and getting it out of my head and into the world. So, I'm doing just that. I'm going to try to get better at putting this project or that on the blog. I do notice I tend to put the more annoying things here so I'll start with my most current annoyance and work my way out from there.

 

OK so some random things, I know I complained about reader problems. I've found my solution. Spurred on by Granny's post I kept searching until I found the right reader for me. I really dislike the name of it, but that is not something I can do anything about. It's called FeedDemon. I'll post about it later today.

 

I also took my kids to the audiologist/ENT recently. I know I've talked about their special needs before. But, to me they are just my kids. I hate the label and I only think about any of the issues that any other them have whenever I am faced with this issue or that. I was faced with another one of these issues at this last appointment. Well, I suppose I should say I knew about the issue, it was just thrust up in my face and left to dangle there. (joy) 2 out of my 3 kids have hearing issues. It's no secret. I actually thought that this trip may have resulted in my oldest getting a hearing aid. I expected it. But, they didn't do that. Instead they said the same thing that they've been saying the last couple years. 'Come back next year and we'll probably fit him then.' I walked away feeling someone confident with this as I have heard it now for a while. Off and on since he was an infant really. But this time he was diagnosed with a severe hearing loss, not moderate or mild any longer. The doctor had explained that because his loss was almost entirely in the high range it wouldn't affect his speech hearing that much...THAT MUCH? As a teenager taking high school courses just a little is too much! So the more that I think about it and the more research I do the more upset I become with this decision to wait yet another year.

I'm going to seek a second and possibly a third opinion. I want my son to have the best chance for success. I don't want him to feel different, but I do want him to be able to understand those around him and not have to be embarrassed by that. He can always grow his hair out if he wants to hide the hearing aids, right?

Someone feel free to chime in here. I feel so torn on my decision! Teenage angst or better hearing? Wait another year until he's past his 9th grade and already settled into a High School? ARGH!

 

OK, so then I've also got this little sewing project I did. I turned this skirt that was way too short into something usable by  teiring it with the bottom of a shirt that was too small... smart way to reuse clothes if you ask me. :-)

 

See the extra layer I added? It fits my long legged girl SO much better now~

 

My beans are sprouting that I planted last weekend, it's raining outside, and I've got some other projects in the works as well. Some really major ones. We've got a really big garage sale coming up in 2 weeks. After that you'll see the big projects start. We're moving the kids rooms all around.

 

Rich and I are also starting to look at house plans for Alabama. We can't do anything yet, but we are looking. Trying to settle on what would work for us and give us the flexible space we may need for kids coming and going from college and what we may need in our retirement years as we don't want too much space then. It's rather interesting trying to get the right mix of space! The main reason we are doing this now is because of how much of the homesteading we are doing ahead of time. We've been planting a few trees each year trying to get the orchard planted, the blackberry brambles are in place now as well. We want to  put in the shed that we will eventually turn into the chicken coop and  start working on the areas that will be fenced in and... well you get the picture. Unless we know roughly where the house will sit we can't continue to do too much more work with permanent/semi-permanent structures.

 

See, I told you I have too much to talk about. I still have only scratched to surface. So, I'll try to blog more consistantly and try not to let the Harvest Monday post be the only post throughout the week.

 

See you soon!

 

Barbie~



Long winded

This post could be very long winded so instead I'm going to try to stick to just showing you as many pictures as I can and staying out of it.

 

The trip to Alabama:

Click me! Where is Waldo?

 

Got it?

*SHEW*

 

Well... it was a whirlwind. The kids had an absolute blast, and we were nonstop from the get go.

 

The peach and apple trees I planted last year are doing wonderfully. They were blooming well and had grown in nicely. Hopefully this last cold snap didn't kill off all the buds from the peach trees. I don't expect apples so it wouldn't bother me if they were killed off. But, the peach trees are perfectly capable of bearing a few peaches this year.

 

While we were there we: hiked, biked, hunted, shot skeet, fished, rode the trails, moved the containers, finished the shooting range, and in general went from sun up to sun down. It was lovely. It was only 3 days... LOL

 

This weekend we should be finishing the second tall garden. I can't wait to fill it up with seeds and plants!!!

 

 

See you soon!

 

Barbie~

 

Thankful trip

Now that was a wild trip!

We went to Alabama for 8 days. Maybe it was 9 days... I'm losing track now. We did a lot of work. Got the tables set up that we made out of the old metal pallets. (I forgot to take pictures, AGAIN- but I had good reasons, I promise!) Took down a third of the old barn. Reinforced a third of it and the largest and most dangerous part we will work on during the next trip. Over Christmas. We will travel back for the largest trip of the year. We always try to spend another 10 days during that time but this year we will spend a full 2 weeks. There is much to be done.

This trip was wonderful The weather was very cooperative. It sprinkled all day off and on once and it was cool but comfortable every. single. day. That is just weird. Usually we roast in the afternoon, freeze at night roast again, etc. But this trip was perfect. 

Until we got home. But that is a story I'll save for in a few minutes. The first night there we saw some of our herd of deer and knew that all was well. All of our hard work during the summer is paying off and it IS worth the trouble to both keep the deer on the land and keep them OUT of the crops. Some times it seems like an epic battle of mending fences and rethinking ourselves and our plans. Wanting to give up and either go for the crops or the deer. Both are easy enough but together it's hard to do both. Not to mention the pigs (wild) on the land that need to be controlled.

This year something is different than most years and I think it's due to the weather, but I'm no expert. The rut (mating season) has started much earlier than in previous years. Most years the dear don't begin until late December and into January. Not this year! The deer are already showing signs of rutting. Thanksgiving night I harvested a doe to find out she was in full estrus! The mating season really did change this year. How strange. The next night I had a buck stalking the area where the doe was at. He was a prime buck, and he was left to carry on his genes. A younger buck that was developing split tines was taken for our freezer.

(Time for a whine. Tune out now if you don't want to hear it or see pictures of dead deer.)
I'll save the pictures for last. Because now I'll tell you what was not so perfect about this trip. We came home after a week of working and harvesting to find our house looking in roughly the same shape it appeared in when we left. We unpacked the few things we bring back and forth. When it came time to take showers that night we flipped on the heater.... Uh... well - we TRIED to flip on the heater. It didn't work. We have two so we went downstairs to flip on that heater instead... it wasn't working either. :-( Oh no! Bad timing! I have a space heater I use occasionally so I pulled that out and put it in the bathroom, warmed it up a bit, got the kids ready started drawing a bath and the water ran and ran and ran. But, it never turned warm. That's odd. I washed my hands and the water was warm, so I went to the sink. Sure enough the water is warm there. I turned the water in the tub all the way to hot and.... dribble dribble dribble.... DOH! NOTHING! So I went to the next bathroom, same thing! OMG I feel like we've been sabotaged! At least we have one shower that is working. But - Grrr....

Our DRYER is out, too. So now we have clothes that desperately need washed, no way to dry them we are all taking turns in 1 shower using the hot water heater that already wasn't working right....

WAHHHH!!!!! Oh, and to top it off something had a try at my poor Dusty. When I got home and checked on her she had a bald spot and small cut on her throat with LOTS of feathers missing there. It looks like an animal tried to grab her by the throat. I hope she sliced it open with her claws!

OKOK, It isn't THAT bad. I have space heater for the bedroom so we are not freezing at night. I do have at least one operating bath tub. But, it feels pretty awful. LOL. It felt worse that night as we were finding everything of course. Now that I've had a day to realize the world is not ending and I can actually operate this way (Once I get my clothes clean) I'm feeling a lot better. But what a rough way to come back to the house, huh?

Promised dead deer pictures - here is what we are so thankful will be filling our freezer and our bellies this year:

Pictures of the buck will be forthcoming. Because it is the first buck I harvested my husband feels the need to put it on the wall. What exactly is it with men and hanging animal heads on a wall? BLECH! Why not just mount the antlers? Oh well. I could not convince him otherwise, so I'll show you the photo of him all prettied up when we pick him up from the taxidermist. My girls want to get in the picture, too.

So tally this trip 150 pounds of meat $3 a pound = $450 ++(Venison in stores and on menus runs much more but I would never pay for it!) ( minus - A/C bill & plummer yet to be determined. LOL)
We give  30-50+ pounds a meat per trip to my brother who is on social security and has no other income. It helps with his income then at the end of the year depending on what meat is left in the freezer we will divy it all up and give him more. This year looks plentiful so we will have more to give and we are thankful for that.

See you soon!

Barbie~