What to do, What to do...

Summer break is in full swing here. I have to admit, I am always really ready for them to get out of school, but never prepared to have them here all day long. I have this mental list of all of the exciting things that we could do during the summer, but finances always stand in the way. So, this year we are doing the newly popular "Staycation".

We are only about 20 minutes from Statesboro, GA and there is a water park there. We could go for a great day of fun there for only about $40. That is about the same price as a trip to the movies. We are also directly in the middle of Savannah and Augusta. So that opens up new things for us to do. I know that the Science museum in Augusta is fun, we have been there for a birthday party before. There are so many wildlife parks around here too. National parks are another choice. The kids and I really would like to go camping for a while this summer, but with this being the busy season for my husband's job, he won't get to go. ( He's an A/C man.) I really could sit here all day and make a list of things for us to do. When you sit and think about what is around you, it is amazing to see all of the things we tell ourselves that we will get to and never do. This year, I plan on leaving our marks around this area. We need to get out and enjoy the places that make where we live home.

So when someone asks you what you are doing this summer, tell them you are getting outside to see all of the hidden treasures that your neighborhood has to offer.

On a related note, a friend of mine on facebook was talking back during our Spring break that he was GEOCACHING hunting... I didn't know what that was so I googled it. Turns out, that GEOCACHING is an online community that finds hidden treasures around your area, using coordinates, gps and other little things. You should really check it out. I had a hard time learning the lingo, but maybe you could fair better than I did. It is a way for people to get out and see their towns and have fun doing it. I have to say, it was very interesting learning about this. For more information you can go to www.geocaching.com

So, we have lots to do this summer and we can do all of this (HOPEFULLY) without breaking our budget. We'll see how things go. I hope you are enjoying your summer vacations so far... and for the rest of you that haven't started your summer vacations yet, start making your plans now. It will be here before you know it.

Bless ya'll,
Jamie

New and Exciting News!

So, Just as I am getting on the ball with keeping my blog updated, my computer decides to take a vacation. So, thanks to some really great friends, they gifted me a "new" laptop. We are up and running again. Thank God!! He is so good to us.

Alright, where to start? Well, my newly turned 4 year old son decided to teach himself to ride his bike with no training wheels. I was working in the garden and he yelled "Look at me mommy" and there he was riding by me. He is so cute. I could just squeeze him.


We had started taking the chicks outside in the mornings when we get home from taking the girls to school. They love being in the sunshine and scratching around the yard. They never venture outside of the side yard and never got into the garden, so I didn't mind. One morning about 2 weeks ago, my son and I took them outside to play and we came back inside to have our breakfast. We do this every morning and the chicks always stay where they usually play. I went out about an hour later to check on them and there stood a huge, and I mean HUGE rotweiller dog. Let's just say that my heart dropped into my stomach! I shooed the dog away and then went looking for my chicks. They were no where to be found. I stated crying and immediatley called my husband. He said to go get the Cheif of police, their office is just accross the street. So, I loaded up my son and sped to the police office. ( WARNING>>> This story gets very country beyond this point!) I ran into the office and the chief was having his morning coffee with the mail man. The mail man looked at me and said, UH- someone is coming and she ain't happy... I yelled... A big ole rottweiler just ate my chickens!! He said, alright I'm on my way. He followed me back to the house and long story short, he knew who's dog it was and he went and got him. They came back to the house and the man paid me $60, yes $60 for my 3 lost baby chicks. I couldn't believe it. We were heartbroken, but my son and I loaded up again and went to Statesboro to buy new baby chicks before the girls got home from school. We bought 6 new chicks and only spent $13 of the $60. We weren't able to get a new rooster chick, they didn't have any. Instead we ended up getting 6 girls. Then, again... we lost 2 of them. 1 died in the cage, we don't know why, and 1 got loose outside when we were cleaning out the cage the very next day. Oh well, we still have 6 others... Yes, I can add... I was hoping that you would catch that. When my son and I returned home from getting the new chicks, the 2 girl chicks that we had, had come out of hiding. We did lose our rooster chick. He was eaten by the big ole' dog. So, we had 8 girls all together, but now down to 6.

My daughter, Lilly pulled her first tooth the other night. She was determined not to lose it at school. She pulled it herself and was too proud. Earned her $10 for that jewel. I told her that she could start pulling mine for that kind of money.

The garden is looking so good. It is growing up a storm. It is funny the amount of people from town that have come over to look at it. The other night, there were 5 people here looking at it at the same time. Just this morning another of our neighbors stopped and said to let him know when my squash is ready. The pastor from the church across the street came by about a week or so ago and said that I was the talk of the town with my garden. Well, at least they are talking about my garden and not about me as a person right!! I think it's funny the things people get all worked up about these days. I am glad that people are taking notice though. My next door neighbor who has plenty of space for a nice sized garden and says that he just doesn't have time to do it, even planted 4 tomato plants... that's right... I am wearing off on folks around here.... so you might want to look out!

We also have another newbie here on the homestead... Marley. She is a ?Chocolate lab puppy. We don't know how old or if she is a full blooded lab or not, but we love her just the same. She loves the chicks too. She will sit at their pen and bark at them. She only wants to play with them, but they peck her through the fence anyway.

Speaking of the chicks again... my loving husband has a new nick name... The Chicken Whisperer. He can go out and stand next to the bigger chicks pen and they will fly up and roost on his shoulders. He literally has to tuck them in at night. If he is out there and doesn't come to see them, they get out by flight and come to him. It is too funny to watch. I wish I could get a good picture of it.

We only have 1 more week of school and I can't wait!! I am tired and I, I mean WE need a break. I hope we are able to do some fun things this summer.

I am not well versed in how to properly upload pictures so that they will be in the right order. So, these are the pictures... hope you like em'

Bless ya'll,
Jamie

Making progress.

Well, that didn't take long now did it? Yesterday the husband and I put together a compost pile. We had some left over fence material from where we planted the peas. We staked it on a 4 ft. radius. We wrapped the fence around the stakes and then tie strapped the fence together. It seriously only took 20 minutes and we were done. The husband started laughing at me as I was dumping all of the kitchen scraps and leaf piles into it. Look, it doesn't take much to please me these days. Any progress made is making me happy.

We had my father over for dinner last night. He was very excited for us with all of the progress we have made since the last time he was here. He even got into the spirit of homesteading... he kept walking around the yard mentally planning where he would put several things. (OH, over here you should put some fruit trees and here you could put the rain barrels and oh, I've been thinking about the chicken coop design...) I just smiled. I love him. He is leaving for 4 months next week for work. So, I will definatly be excited for him to return to see the garden at harvest time.

I've been looking on craig's list for fence material and wood to build the coop with. I emailed several people that had privacy fence for sale pretty cheap. I am really hoping that someone answeres my emails soon. You never know, someone might even say "come get it, I am tired of looking at it"... well, one can hope right?

Alright, I need to move on to my organizing of the house this week. I have several piles of laundry to do and get put away... the never ending saga. The children's rooms need to be put back together too. I did get the kitchen done, somewhat yesterday. We'll see what kind of progress is made this week. I am determined, finally.

Bess ya'll,
Jamie

Homestead pictures... Finally!

The garden.

The peas.
The peas have a fence to vine up as they grow.
We have 2 trees out front that we didn't know what they were. We think, after much research on the internet, that they are some kind of pear tree. Hopefully they are not Bradford pears. We want them to be common pear trees that we can eat the fruit of. See the little pear like fruit starting to take shape?

My garden goodies, this is carrots and turnips, cabbage, and lettuce. The leaves have just started to change shape.
My garden from the front. Every row has it's own plant. The kids helped me make the row markers. We used popsicle sticks and foam sheets and just wrote on them with sharpie markers. They are holding up well.
My tomato sprouts. They have just stated to show through the dirt.
The tomato bed.

The onion bed.And of course our little chicks. Jacob, Lucy (aka Lulu) and Rainbow. The kids named them, can't you tell. They are Golden comets. Jacob, the cockrel will be white as a rooster and the girls will be a copper/penny color as hens. According to my research, these are fast maturing chickens and we should have eggs within 3-4 months. I can't wait. We are starting to plan the coop and will start building that soon. The children are most excited over having the job of collecting the eggs.

We have done a lot around here in the last few weeks. As you can see we have a lot more to do. We only have about 10 weeks to get the coop built. I have been calling all of our family and friends to see if they have any spare scrap wood that we can use to help cut down the cost of building materials. We want to build this as "green" as possible. And let's face it, it doesn't hurt to save a little money either.

I am striving to fill my freezer and pantry with "reserve" food by the end of summer. Also, we want to start a compost pile. We walked the yard this morning to plan where everything will go. We are getting an old moving truck body from my dad for storage. We have been using it at his house for almost a year anyway. He wants to clean up the yard, so he is planning on having it brought to us via tow truck soon. We can really use the storage too. Here is my list of things to do in the next 10 weeks. It looks like a lot, but really some of these things won't take much time to get done.

1. Fill freezer/pantry with reserve food.
2. Build coop for chickens.
3. Get truck body moved here and looking decent. Needs to be painted.
4. Get compost pile started.**DONE!! Yeah!
5. Harvest garden and put up veggies- canning or freezing.
6. Plan the fall garden, get seeds.
7. Have house organized and keep cleaned.
8. Get something done about getting electrical done in kitchen so that I can get a dishwasher installed, finally.
9. Somehow keep my sanity during all of this.
10.rework the family budget- We want to be living on only 70% income by the end of summer. We want to save 30% for future.
11. Change the way we think about money. We want our money to work for us, not us work for our money. If the money we spend doesn't come back to us in one form or another, we won't buy it. (ie: I would rather buy a fruit tree for $15 instead of going to the grocery store and spending $15 on 10 apples. Why do that when you can have all the apples you want from your $15 tree?)
12. Get the list ready for what fruit trees we will be adding to the property this year. Start setting aside money to purchase them.
13. Get rain barrels and have plumbed to water the garden with.
14. Change the way I run our kitchen... (ie: make sure that I keep all food scraps for the compost pile, and not let the children raid the food whenever they want.)

So, as you can see the next 10 weeks or longer will be full of hard work and lots of determination on our part. We (I) want to be as close to self sufficient as we can be by the end of the year. So these next several weeks will mean a lot to that goal.

I would love to know if anyone out there has any other ideas about being more self sufficient on a small scale. I'll keep updating the garden pictures as it grows.

Bless ya'll,
Jamie

Goings on around the Homestead.

Well, I haven't had time to think let alone take any pictures. The kids went back to school this week. They were on Spring break last week. They are doing a lot of work this week, getting ready for their yearly standardized testing (CRCT). They come home so tired, but still have homework to get done.

We went strawberry picking yesterday after school. We came home with quite the bounty... 23 lbs of berries. I have frozen 5 gallons and we have a big bowl of them in the fridge for the kids to snack on. It's a good thing that they don't charge us for the ones that get eaten in the field.

We got the garden planted and looking nice. I am getting imapatient. I guess that is normal for newbies to gardening. I am anxious to harvest already. The kids are getting antsy too. They helped me tremendously getting it ready to plant. They all argue over who gets to water it. What is it about a water hose with children?

The baby chicks are doing great. My son and I went yesterday morning to get them a feeder and a waterer. We also picked up a 25 lb bag of starter scratch. We also got a dog kennel from my dad to put them in. They seem to like having more space. The kids ask to take them out every afternoon and I let them for a few minutes. The chicks have started trying out their wings. They are also very fast. When we let them out, they run around so fast, the kids get a kick out of watching them.

We had a death on the homestead this morning. My husband went outside this morning to go to work and the cat was laying outside the door, stiff. We don't know what happened to her, but there was no blood. I wonder if she didn't get bitten by a snake or something. Hubby took her to work with him in a box to bury her there. We didn't want the children to see her and he didn't have time to bury her here this morning. I was also worried about vultures coming to perch. We are sad to lose her. We haven't had her that long. She was a stray that took up here, and we loved her. She was a cuddly thing, never had a cat that liked her belly rubbed. I wonder if she didn't think she was a dog.

So, that is all that has happened here lately. Hope everything is going great where you are (Becky, seems you are the only one that reads this) and have a great day/week/month.

Bless ya'll,

Jamie

Giveaway notice... I love these!

So, as you know, we received a gift of 3 baby chicks last night. I read a lot of farming blogs so I knew right where to go to seek help with them. I went to the "Life on a Southern Farm" blog, and she graciously answered my questions for me. She is having a giveaway this week. Chicken nest boxes that her husband (aka Farm man) builds himself. The giveaway is for a double nest box. I am really hoping I win, but I wanted to let you know about it too. Even if you or I don't win, they have great prices for these nest boxes, so go check them out.


(I am not so bloggy inclined, so I hope that this link works, if not, go to www.georgiafarmwoman.blogspot.com)

Good luck
Jamie

Baby Chicks!!

EEK!!! I have been after my husband for several months about us getting some chickens. We only have a half an acre with our house, and we also live within the city limits, but there is no rule against chickens. And think of all of the free eggs honey... This has been my arguement. His arguement was that we really don't have the room, or the money to build a coop. Well, our neighbors don't seem to have a problem with us having chickens. Actually, they surprised us this afternoon with 3 baby chicks for the children to raise. We got 2 hens and 1 rooster baby. Right now they are in a box in our laundry room, all cozy with a lamp for extra warmth and chicken scratch and water. We'll have a couple of weeks to figure out the coop, but until then, the kids and I are in baby chick heaven. As soon as I take some good pictures of our new babies, I'll post it. Until then, I will be surfing the net to figure out what type of chickens they are.

Bless ya'll,

Jamie