More Upgrades to our homestead

We have begun a few more upgrades at the same time.    Since we are increasing our meat chicken count, we are moving our meat chicken yard to the back of our chicken coop.   This will allow us to have a larger area.    So we had to do some tear down of the existing fence

 

This also happens to be where the greenhouse is going (Project #2).   We had lots of help!

My wife helps to instruct on saw usage while I’m working on the frames

Fun with Framing

Steady now…steady

What would we do without the 18V Dewalt?

Walls are Up!

Trusses

This is all we could accomplish on the greehouse before we could call it a day.  We were supposed to get a storm that would dump about 14 inches of snow.   One time when I’m glad the weatherman was wrong.   Ok, the trusses and shelves were next and then the plastic.  We’re ready now the real work starts.

Shleves are up and gravel is laid

 

Finished!

 

 The last project we’re working on is the Pig and Turkey areas.  My children worked hard on clearing out all of the overgrowth, trees and debris to make room for these 2 new animal additions this year.  Pictures to follow

The Chickens are coming the Chickens are coming

 

Well Spring has finally sprung on the FamilyPlusHomestead and we’re in full swing.  Every year we come out of the gate ready to hit the road hard and fast.  I’m hoping we can maintain the momentum this year.  We’ve already done our trash pickup, stick pickup and general toy pickup.  In addition, we’ve made the preparation for our chickens and turkeys to arrive.   As I mentioned in a previous post, we had some issues with some high flying chickens and a curious dog.  We’ve decided to restock the layer and meat chickne base as well as add some turkeys to the mix.   Recently, we were staying with friends on the way back from a trip out East.  He mentioned that old refrigerators make great storage for animal feed and why don’t I use them for putting the baby chickens in.  They are already insulated and are quite large so that’s what we did.  Here’s his idea in action.

 

 

We removed the doors off of each Fridge or Freezer and then laid them down.   You may be asking yourself, where did you get all those Freezers?  We have been frequent contributors/shoppers on Freecycle.   Those appliances usually only have a little life left in them.  When they died, we moved them our to our machine shed….until now.  Rather than paying $40 per appliance to have them hauled away, we’ve been able to use them for a good purpose.  

 

Our chickens are doing great! 

Rhode Island Reds

 

Buff Orpingtons

 

And last but not least our Broad-Breasted Bronze Turkeys

Broad Breasted Bronze Turkey

 

Glad to report all are doing well and we haven’t lost any of them 2 weeks into it.   I’m also keeping a log book this year so I can keep better track of food/water consumption as well as growth and production.   We have about 4 meat chickens that never made it to the butcher block last year as well as 4 layers.  These are continuing to produce good eggs, pictured here with some happy egg harvesters.

Upgrades on the homestead

Part 1 of the homestead upgrades – The Chicken Yard.  We were consistently having issues with our chickens getting out of the yard.  The first 4 yrs we lived here, we did not have issues with the chickens getting out.  Then we added some new breeds and tripled in size.  Parts of our fence were small enough that some of the chicks got out and the rooster decided he needed to protect them as well and flew over.  Once he did that the some of the other hens decided they weren’t going to be unprotected and next thing you know I had a host of free ranging chickens everywhere.  The problem with that is that most of them hung out in the horse barn, eating the grain, dog food, cat food, whatever they could find; not to mention the presents they left behind (if you know what I mean)  I see why dogs are meant to eat dog food.  Anyway, I thought if my son would just put them all back and we block off the fence to keep the chicks in we’d be fine.  Unfortunately, the taste of freedom was too much for them and they begin flying over our fence and then I found out also, that my son had been throwing them back over the fence (further boosting their flying confidence).  I know you can clip/pull out the flying feathers.  Just seemed a little inhuman to me.  We’re trying to keep everything as much as possible as God designed it.   Here’s the finished product after the 3rd snowfall:

Egg yields were good this year.  Here’s a sampling of the differences in Egg sizes as compared to a white store-bought XL egg.  The far left is a double-yolker.  We had a chicken that was always laying double-yokes.  The middle one is a normal single yolk and the far right is the white store-bought egg (obviously)

Fresh (non-caged) Benefits

Favorite Seed Companies… Mine and Yours!?

try www.seedsavers.org

also: www.rareseeds.com

What do you like?  Please share your favorites…

Why Heirloom Seeds are so important

From Mother Earth News:
Heirloom vegetables, fruits, flowers and herbs are varieties that have remained popular with home gardeners because they grow well and taste great. Loosely defined as plant varieties that have been grown for at least three generations (and sometimes for three or more centuries!), heirloom food plants are varieties that have been selected for their flavor, resistance to pests and diseases, and other traits important to home gardeners. Unlike modern hybrids, heirloom seeds are open-pollinated, which means they will breed true and can be saved by the gardener from year to year — an important consideration for food security and self-sufficiency. Also, heirloom seeds are never genetically engineered.

Christ-Sufficient Lifestyle

As we have started getting serious about our homestead journey, I’ve begun the process of researching blogs.  I have to be honest that I’m continually amazed and disappointed at the use of the term “Self-Sufficient”.  As a follower of Christ it is my understaning that everything good comes from the father(James 1:17); and apart from Christ we can do nothing.  We have never been nor will we ever be sufficient by ourselves.  I feel there is in an important distinction to be made.  Our goal of homesteading is not building big barns and storing for ourselves, but that by more closely depending on God and his provisions, that others may see and glorify our father in heaven(Matthew 5:16).   Christ is sufficient in all things, we are not.  I don’t know about you, but I don’t like to begin things I know are destined for failure.  Self-sufficiency is destined for failure.  I prefer the Christ-sufficient lifestyle.  As I finish this post, my only concluding thought is that I pray that these thoughts taken from scripture would encourage you as well as ring in my own head to humble me and remind me daily to see God’s goodness in all things he has for His children.  For His word says…And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.  So whether our harvest is great or small, our efforts seem wasted or productive, we are to be confident that the result is for our good.  Who knows what we need more than He does?  Who has to power to give more than Him?  What more could Christ have done for us?  I gladly say that I am fully dependent on Christ and His victory at the cross.  I am thankful that I will never be self-sufficient.

What would you do first

We have the land, unfortunately we have the debt tha goes with it. Due to our very large family and the economy as a whole, moving is probably out as an option. We want to become God-sufficient in how we prepare. I’m wondering out loud, what is the first thing you have done or websites you have visited that have helped you to decide what order to become less dependent on the world’s systems.

His thoughts on growing season of 2008

Well the growing season has passed since the first entry of his perspective was posted.  After a heavy season of rain we really ended up with a very small harvest including a few buckets of apples, 2 rows of lettuce and some green beens.  This was primarily due to mass quantities of rain prior to and after planting.  I would have had better success growing cranberries with how marshy that area was.  I believe we are going to need to rethink our strategy of gardening and use raised beds next year.  One of the other real challenges was getting the garden in due to time constraints.   Seemed like whenever we were available it rained.  When we were gone, it was beautiful.  To support our family, I’m still working about 45-50hrs/week.  Add in some other activities with all the children as well as account for broken lawnmowers, weeds, etc. and we have a serious time crunch.  We’ll have to look at investing in some more tools to speed up the jobs in the short run.  It is true that we do what we make time for.  It’s near impossible trying to live a lifestyle of homesteading and children in sports.   Sometimes the time is gone and I wonder what I spent it on (similar to money).  This is our 5th growing season on our homestead and I can’t help but feel some frustration with growing more weeds than sustainable food for a 5th year and yet my mind still grows excited about the thought of actually growing a garden next year.  I will spend every extra moment I have this winter fixing all of the lawnmowers, tractor and skidloader to prepare for spring.  It may be that long before I post again.  Until next time, may you find God’s blessing rich and abundant …

Picture from Above

is our farm in January of 2008.  We’ll be posting more farm pictures soon.

Her Introduction

Exciting.  We are going to start this blog to share about our journey into homesteading from very differing points of view.  Introductions: me, a city slicker, mid thirties,a mom, college educated, raised by a woman who not only didn’t do much cooking, shopping or gardening but who didn’t teach me how.  I’ll save his intro for him.  We are a large family with both biological and adoptive children. We live in Zone 5 and we homeschool. 

GP (God’s Peace)

Her