Last Weekend in January, 2021

Woo, what a weekend!

I'm gonna count Thursday since I haven't posted since then and because that's the day I went to pick up chickens. We got eight chicks to restart our flock: four barred rocks, two Rhode island reds, and two buff orpingtons. All heritage breed laying chickens, because I want them for egg production. At the store they said the barred rocks are more likely to go broody, so that's why I got four of them. I'll get a rooster from some friends when the girls start laying.

Friday was exciting too. After getting off work I got home and got to work on the yard and garden. That's gonna be a theme for a while. The yard needs a lot of love. We picked up some seeds at the store, including some grass seeds and some chicken forage seeds for the back yard. The spot above the top Swale is gonna be my chicken forage area, up where I don't go very often. The grass is going to be for making a lawn out back. We tore down the pallet tower and burned it in an effort to clear up space and make a little lawn. We got some Kentucky bluestem grass that's a good hay grass, so while Melissa gets the lawn she wants, I'll be able to harvest hay off of it for the rabbits. We'll be getting a bag mower this year so I can collect grass clippings. That's free rabbit food.

Then Saturday was the big day. We all woke up early to get to Sam's Cub Scouts pinewood derby race where he got second place in his age group with what I suspect was the only car that was whittled entirely by the scout. After the races, we headed an hour Northeast for a multi-community seed swap. The man scouts, DFW GSD, and dfw freedom cell all came together on a group seed buy from the Great American Seed Up, a group formed by Greg Peterson who also does the Urban Farm Podcast. They really do put a lot of stock in community food autonomy over there, and when he heard what we were doing, we picked one of the folks in on the buy to go on the podcast and talk about what we're doing. We figured we'd send our farmer that organized the buy.

All those seeds for $40!

The seed swap was only half an hour away from a soap shop that Melissa has started liking, so we stopped there got ake advantage of a sale they had before stopping on the way home for supper. We stopped at a nice hometown restaurant and splurged a bit on a big meal with dessert. The kids were awesome, and I count the day as a whole to be one of the best days out we've had together as a family. Here's a few pics:

You can see farmer Sam in this one being consoled by Melissa. He was petting a goat and it rubbed against him harder than he wanted, causing him great distress. He claimed the goat charged him, but it was just a friendly goat wanting some love. Supposedly Sam was deeply distressed that I didn't kill the goat for charging him, opting instead to encourage him to not run from the goat but to push back and nuzzle him some.

The running of the chickens! Since Tommie was carrying a bucket (of eggs), the chickens could think of no other sensible option than that he was carrying treats! So they followed us out to the electric poultry netting. It was a good time on the farm for the seed swap!

Sunday morning we had sausage and eggs for breakfast and headed to church. It's been too long since we went to church, and we're getting back in the habit now. After church I got straight to work on the garden, moving mulch to the beds and establishing new grow spaces. I moved eight loads myself and two with the help of my friend after he got there. About half of my mulch pile is now distributed around the yard, and there's still plenty of space to use more. I distributed fourteen blackberry bushes to a couple community members, and now I think I have a manageable number of them, especially after I get spaces set up for them. I think I'm going to plant a couple of canes on the shady side of each of my mature trees out front, each in a bed of mulch with a couple of comfrey plants. I need to plant a lot more comfrey. We're entertaining the idea of a big group buy on comfrey cuttings.

My tote cart is about a yard when filled to the top, so I distributed just over five yards of mulch

After my friend left Sunday evening, I got a couple hours of quiet time with Melissa to talk about some adjustments we'll be making to our budgeting and homeschooling projects. We've decided to shift around what our school year looks like, taking extended breaks from schooling in the spring and fall when the weather is awesome, rather than in the summer and winter when it's too hot or cold to really enjoy the time off. On the budget, we're anticipating setting up infrastructure and feed costs for pigs and chickens, so the grocery budget is moving around to accommodate that. We're also going to be buying jars more freely because we want to can more crops this year. Melissa wants to focus on pickles and pasta sauce, so our planting this year will reflect that. Those are two of our biggest expenses for canned goods, so we're looking to replace them with home grown yums! I'm so excited that Melissa is on board to do all this, she's adding some real direction and focus to my scatterbrained gardening style. This is gonna get exciting. :)

Welp. It's Monday morning. Time to get off work and head to the house. It's cool getting to write at work during my breaks. It's giving me a better appreciation for what I've got here. Hopefully I can keep it up.

Love from Texas

Nate 💚