A Small Life

Farm Tour Slideshow

2012-01-22T10:42:00.000-06:00

I just put together a little slideshow at GrasWerka's site-help to remind me of green glass and a clean house!

Baby It's Cold Outside!

2012-01-03T12:21:00.000-06:00

Elegant patterns on the coop window-chickens snug inside

Real Wisconsin winter is upon us, no more Mr Nice Guy! The forecast was calling for negative single digits last night. I've got the puffy down coat and -40 Carhart bib-overalls hanging in the hall. Instead of just turning the light off in the chicken coop at 9pm, I switched them over to a red heat bulb for overnight. Chicken popsicles are not my favorite flavor. While the cold is dangerous and difficult to deal with, it is also heart-stoppingly beautiful. As I crunched back to the house in the night, the stars looked so close, so bright, they just crowd the sky. The half moon created shadows and made the snow sparkle. The house ahead of me was lit up with warm yellow light, my loved ones inside. Sigh...this is why I'm here...

Wolves?

2012-01-02T19:24:00.000-06:00

Wolf in the Pasture? Got me thinking that I am not the only predator on this farm!

First Prepper Step

2011-12-15T22:53:00.000-06:00

Well not really first step, there are the chickens, wood stove and the passive solar house...
Today I bleached/cleaned 4 Reliance water jugs (7 gallons each) and filled for drinking water. I also filled (but didnt really clean) approx 30 gallons worth of water for the chickens. Soon we will have snow (this being Wisconsin in December) and then I will have a built in supply of water for non-drinking purposes. So at 1 gallon per day per person we are set for a short term emergency. More if I drain the water pressurizing tank. It's a small thing but makes me feel proactive!

American Preppers Network

2011-12-14T09:19:00.001-06:00

Things are calming down around here. The business is sold, I have some work lined up doing hourly relief veterinary work. We close on Mom's house next week. Christmas stuff is (mostly) done. I am starting to 'play' with my art again. (I realized if I called it 'getting ready for the Show'-I would freeze up and be unable to be creative-so I PLAY with paint and pencil). I was almost ready to kick back and eat bon-bons with a good book for the rest of the winter :) Then my blogger friend Ruth had to start talkng about SHTF preppers...oh...right... I was going to be prepared, that was in our original list of goals for moving out here. Damn it! No bon-bons for me.
We wanted to be prepared for emergencies short or long. Prepared for that winter icestorm. Prepared for peak oil. Prepared for shortages of food at the grocery store. ~~Prepared for Planet X~~ Scratch that -if planet x comes we are all screwed and that's that.
Small things first for me- my truck needs a new battery. Bleach and fill those water jugs in the garage. Check the flashlight and battery supply. Be sure to have at least some cash on hand. Check my lamp oil/kerosene and wick/mantle supply. Matches. Diesel for the tractor/snow blower. ~~Build a Faraday cage to protect electronics from EMP strike~~ Whew...
I joined American Prepper Network, they seem sane. I have so many questions about everything from installing a handpump on the well to how much food to plant to how to protect my money from inflation. (No I will NOT buy any stupid gold but maybe some cows...)
What can you do to protect your family from an extended streak of mother nature on the rampage (or widespread civil unrest and martial law)?

Protests- Public and Private

2011-10-31T14:13:00.001-05:00

I'm angry. Very angry. I've progressed from oblivious to skeptical eye-rolling into 'what the hell are they thinking' and now into f#cking angry. Angry enough that I need to channel this into something or it will eat me.
I am mad that my government values corporations above people, I am angry that there is a 99%, I am angry that GMO's are not labeled, I am angry that I do not have the (fundamental) right to healthy food -even if i grow/milk it myself. I am angry that more people aren't angry. Maybe I just have too much time on my hands. Maybe I should be shopping online instead of reading Joel Salatin, the Complete Patient and the Food Renegade.
We have been privately protesting in our own way for a while now. Consumer disobedience, free range kids, GoodWill and used cars. Then we stepped it up; moved out of town, quit my job, learned how to can and grow my own food even if we might not be allowed to actually eat it (over my dead body-really, try to stop me).

What else can I do to protest what I feel is wrong about our country? The snide comments on Facebook are getting nowhere. Move my savings out of the big bank and into a local credit union this week as part of the national movement. Call Madison and file a complaint against Judge Fiedler's ruling (oh wait he resigned and is now working for a firm who defends Monsanto) okay call and ask politely for him to be disbarred. Call my state representative yadayada

I'm just angry :\

postscript: i spoke to the Judicial Commission and Lawyer Regulation offices yesterday and have their complaint/greivance forms online...but do i have the conviction to actually file against Fiedler? it is scarey to DO something.

Lettuce Alone You Nasty Frost!

2011-10-24T14:01:00.000-05:00

Just a quick post on our farm site about my first attempt at extending my growing season. We are having regular frosts overnight, but no snow yet!
Also a link to a microgreen tutorial at You Grow Girl.

I will be posting on the farm site more regularly, but keeping this site up for my occasional rantings/ravings/mumblings. I dont really think the farm site is the right place for that and I do like the anonymity of my Small Life!

The Local Economy

2011-09-30T10:30:00.001-05:00

I posted last night on the local food economy on my farm blog. Thank you Robert of Roberts Roost for getting the juices flowing on that one!

Guilty Pleasures?

2011-09-15T20:00:00.000-05:00

ooh that sounds naughty doesn't it :)
We had a hard freeze last night and will have another tonight. Bye-bye garden. I am feeling a bit guilty about this but this is one death in the family which I am happy about. It is a signal to slow things down, another item off my list. No more feeling bad about the 5lb cukes lurking under the vines or the green zuchinni canoes. I can grow the stuff but I am not so good about using it. The rest of my family does not enjoy vegetables. I am also embarrassed to say I have still not learned how to can- i dry and freeze and do refrigerator pickles but there was so much waste in the garden. Even pigs will not eat overgrown summer squash or cukes! I think next year I will plant more herbs and less unpopular veggies. I will stick to early tomatoes (no more than 5 plants!), carrots, beets, beans, greens and sweet corn. Now to deal with the 60 lbs of onions drying in the garage, the 2 shopping bags of semi-ripe tomatoes and 10lbs biggish cukes! The carrots, potatoes and beets can stay in the ground until I am ready for them

D is for...

2011-09-11T07:17:00.000-05:00

(sorry Judy -i stole your theme!)
D is for depression. I am finally just owning up to it. I suffer from depression. It has been a chronic problem, but episodic. I certainly have a genetic predisposition-all members of my immediate family have been on meds for OCD or depression. I poo-poohed prescription meds; didn't need them-not me! My thought was if your life was so off kilter that you shouldn't be medicated into submisssion-fix the problem (lifestyle, stress, etc) not the symptom (depression). Sort of like having to give confinement animals antibiotics to survive the horrid living conditions. Probably not a very PC way to think. I mean we are being taught that depression is a 'real' disease, just as real as diabetes or heart disease, right?
But here I was living the life of my dreams and I didnt want to get out of bed, I didnt want to do anything except eat sweets and sleep. Stupid chickens, stupid pigs, stupid kids-what do you want from me- just LEAVE ME ALONE! Wow.
I have a theory about my depression. Yes it is 'real', but like diabetes and like heart disease there are things I can do to lessen my likelihood of disease. I believe my fragile brain chemistry is strongly affected by what I eat. This is sort of a 'chicken or the egg' thing for me. Are uncontrolled sweet cravings a cause or an effect of my depression? I am choosing to believe that I have some control over this situation and if I can restrict my carb intake (especially at the beginnings of my period) that my brain chemistry will be more stable. I have given myself a month to work on the problem in my own way. If I am not successful I will seek professional help and a rx.
This is what I am doing: omega 3 FA supplements, St Johns Wort and siberian ginseng. The first 2 have beed shown helpful in treating depression, ginseng for a self-diagnosed qi deficiency. I am also being careful about carbs. The paleo-diets are attractive to me intellectually but very difficult in practice-i dont know what to eat if not bread, pasta, potatoes. Equally important for me is to stop my procrastinating ways; pay bills on time, etc. to reduce that internal stress- i usually have a dozen things in my head to feel 'guilty' about because I havent done them yet. Most are small easily remedied things. My plan for this week is to write them out and remove them from the internal chatter.

The Wall

2011-07-29T21:48:00.003-05:00

...I have hit it and hit it hard! I have gone from suburban professional to local food producer and i know now that i have stepped out of the frying pan and into the fire!! We just rounded up our 75 meat birds and taken them to the processor, the 12 pigs have only 5 weeks left with us, the second batch of meat birds are in the brooder-2 1/2 weeks until they go out on grass. My 8 layers are reliably giving us 3 1/2 dozen eggs per week and there are 25 baby layers growing up in their tractor on pasture. The three calves are trimming the pasture down nicely and are VERY low maintenance. My (human) girls are in piano lessons with a flurry of ortho and MD apts coming up. My garden is growing like crazy- we have had lots of rain and heat- i can almost find the cukes between all the pigweed :). Dad has been wondering if I will come over to pick raspberries- and i really want to but... I.CANT.DO.THIS.ANYMORE!!! I (mistakenly, naively thought staying home would be bucolic, idyllic, just like all these other blogs I read) Not so much.
If we are to be a income producing farm, I need to do something much much differently. Or I need to just be a homesteader and produce enough for my family. I cannot farm like a hobbyist.
I love love love it out here. I love caring for these creatures. I love seeing animals acting as nature intended. I just cant do it for 12 hrs a day 7 days a weeks, etc etc.
balance balance balance- i'll let you know when i find it!

Couple Quotes

2011-07-10T09:53:00.001-05:00

This deficit stuff is getting to me, I have no faith in our elected leaders. I have some mature savings bonds I have been hanging onto. I will be cashing them in next week and using the proceeds to buy a pressure canner. I have more confidence in my garden and myself than in my govt.

"When you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing; when you see that money is flowing to those who deal not in goods, but in favors; when you see that men get rich more easily by graft than by work, and your laws no longer protect you against them, but protect them against you… you may know that your society is doomed."
–Ayn Rand

"I place economy among the first and most important virtues, and public debt as the greatest of dangers to be feared. To preserve our independence, we must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt. If we run into such debts, we must be taxed in our meat and drink, in our necessities and in our comforts, in our labor and in our amusements. If we can prevent the government from wasting the labor of the people, under the pretense of caring for them, they will be happy."

- Thomas Jefferson

It's All Just Stuff

2011-05-15T21:08:00.002-05:00

I was working with my sister today to clean Mom's house. I was thinking about what a person leaves behind after they leave this life, it is such a nebulous thing. I wish I were a more eloquent writer...I cannot explain, but I was left with the resolution to DO more to positively affect people and acquire LESS stuff. The stuff does not last; it ends up getting sold off or boxed up and given to charity. It is the things we do for other which are lasting. An individuals actions ripple, echo and spread in ways which are truly lasting.

Those Damn Hens!!

2011-05-08T20:44:00.002-05:00

Spring is really here! A whole weekend of 60's. Enough sun to pink my cheeks and make me a REAL red neck! The hens are really enjoying the grass and bugs as well-they have freee range of our place during daylight. They also helped themselves to a tasty salad consisting of my pepper and tomato seedlings! In hind sight it was not a great idea -but i thought i would treat the tiny seedings to some out-of-doors, you know just an hour of cloudy afternoon. I came around the corner of the house to find the birds having a snack!! Uggh, some of the tomatoes will survive but every pepper was nipped off. Now this is Northern WI and I still have time before anything can safely go out--time to start some more seeds tomorrow :)

Cutting Ties

2011-04-23T06:49:00.006-05:00

It has been an emotional couple of weeks. I am completely 'out of the closet' about leaving the practice with both clients and staff. It is such a relief! I am torn between doing a goofy happy dance every time i think about leaving and the sadness of leaving my client-friends behind. I have quite a few really special relationships built-up over the years. I have been talking to those special people the last few weeks as they come in -to let them know what is going on. It has been heart warming, without exception the response has been 'good for you!' What a great bunch of human beings!
On the other hand my business partner has not been so great. Locking me out of our business software program, not paying me the first quarter's management paycheck. I final told her how unacceptable that was, I was such a wimp with her, but yesterday I was ready to walkout and hire an attorney if she would not cooperate. I almost caved but in the end she will not be shorting me. One small battle won! I am trying very hard to be calm and professional-I would like to salvage a professional relationship with her if possible. Career wise it is a small community and it just reflects poorly on both people if we resort to petty crap.

Deadlines (and Luck!)

2011-04-23T06:49:00.004-05:00

Nothing like a deadline to get a family motivated...we annually host the Easter Dinner for our extended family. It is never a lavish fancy meal, usually a little more lighthearted and casual. One year I made blender drinks and made everyone wear loud shirts and fake flower garlands; I forget what we actually ate... :) In a burst of adrenaline I realized spring farm season, Easter, and the end-date for the construction loan were all on the horizon! Whoa, were did that long WI winter go? We have been puttering along with finishing the trim work on the house. Since we do not (yet) have a garage, my earlier excuses revolved around cold temps and stain fumes in the house. The house sat unfinished all winter-no doors, no trim, nada! It has been a flurry of activity around this place. Trim, doors and casements stained and hung. We will not be 100% complete by Sunday-no closet doors yet and a special order door for the laundry alcove has just arrived but it looks more like a real house now! The general messiness of a new construction site long hidden by snow has also been cleaned up.
I am also re-doing our laying hen's tractor, they need to get out of the shed/brooder so I can get it ready for the new laying chicks (10 leghorns, 5 welsummers, 5 new hampshire, and 5 golden buffs) and 75 freedom rangers which will arrive in 3 weeks. I will pick up the feeder pigs in 2 weeks. Another first-first time pulling a trailer with the truck. DH says as long as it's a straight line I should be fine :P
I have 2 more weeks of my regular work schedule, then I will go to one day/week for the rest of May. By June i will be a full time stay at home Mom/grazier! I am constantly amazed by how things work out for us. I feel like the luckiest person. I have to remember how hard we have worked to get here. Does a person make his/her own luck? IDK, but I feel peaceful, content and energized at the same time-no looking back with regrets!

I Did the Deed

2011-04-06T21:24:00.004-05:00

Yesterday I did it. Really, really did it. No going back. No someday. It's now. I handed in my resignation letter. Part of me wants to do the happy dance and shout out loud, but another part of me feels bad for 'jumping ship'. I find my self mentally saying goodbye to many of my favorite clients-wanting to give them big hugs and thank them for allowing me to care for their beloved pets.
I have shared my story with a few people outside my immediate family, it has been so rewarding to hear their enthusiasm. One friend, who taught art lessons for my Mom and myself told me 'this is the BEST thing I have heard all week!'
I have suddenly been released from the inertia of all the drama in my life lately, and I've got work to do! Tomorrow I will 1) stain trim for the house -needs to be done before we can make the move from construction loan to mortgage, 2) meet with the USDA grazier for our county -before the federal govt shutdown :) 3) start garden seeds -i know seems late but we can have frosts into June here. 4) order chickens -no wine before-hand this year, damn it, it is a business after all!

Goodbye Winter...

Hello Spring,

and Mud Season

quiet on the blog...

2011-03-21T20:41:00.002-05:00

turmoil in my real life. I have been pretty quiet here lately, it seems the more I have going on in my life the less i blog. So here it goes...
I am in the process of selling out my portion of the veterinary clinic. It is not going as expected. Despite the bumps in the road I am determined to see it through.
GrasWerka is gearing up for our first year with two batches of freedom rangers, for a total of 150-200 birds -not quite sure yet of the exact number :), 15 berkshire hogs on pasture, a big ol' garden.
Our workshop/garage will go up this spring. Hurray! Right now we are a 1440 sq ft house and a hen shed on 20 acres of mud :p Talk about tying to fit 10 lbs of sh#t into a 5lb box !
Last and certainly NOT least, my mother passed away at the age of 67 just 3 weeks ago. It was a suprize to everyone who knew her, and has thrown me for quite a loop. I am missing her so much, but each day is adding to the healing processs. She was far from a perfect person, but i hope she knew how much i loved her and appreciated all she did for our family ( i think she knew!)
I think this post will be pretty quiet for a few months, but i hope to get back to regular posting this summer. I need to let you all know how things turned out !!
I will close with a quote recorded on a scrap of paper I found tucked into the edge of Mom's dresser mirror- i think it was meant for me :)
'Yesterday is what it was, all we have is today and tomorrow... It's up to us to live our lives to the fullest, to not give others the power to decide how happy, how satisfied, or how fulfilled we're going to feel. Too many of us aren't living the life we want because we're living someone else's dreams, or we're chained to debt, or we've committed to things that our heart just isn't in and now we feel trapped, or we've allowed others to steal our joy. Each day comes bearing its own gifts. Untie the ribbons!'

Bread Snob

2011-02-01T20:14:00.008-06:00

I have officially become a bread snob. This winter I began baking my own again after the camper adventure. This weekend I resorted to my back-up bread maker for a quickie loaf :) Yuck! Like sawdust. I'd rather buy store stuff.

Largely irrelevant now because bread is a thing of the past for me. After several weeks of very low carb diet-no bread, pasta, rice, or potatoes- I ate some of that yummy homemade bread--what a stink! I have discovered that my system really just does better without the carbs. I don't know if the gas was the gluten or just a dearth of GI bugs to handle all the carbs.

I am back to low carb/no gluten now. Anybody have any good spelt recipes?

GrasWerka Family Farm

2011-01-27T22:53:00.003-06:00

I have started our farm web site-pretty primative and only one post so far, but I gotta start somewhere!

Healer Heal Thyself

2011-01-22T06:10:00.003-06:00

I have (re) started the first step in what I hope will be a long and wonderful learning experience. North American Institute of Medical Herbalism has distance learning available and I am ready to learn. Their First Course in Medical Herbalism contains 2 disks, a kit of 15 herbs, and a journal to record impressions on taste, energetics, and effects of each herb as you experience each one. I purchased this last winter but didn't get too far. I listened to the lecture on Vitalism last night. I need to listen again to really let things soak in, but his description of medicine as a balance between tradition and experience, between scientific and intuition was a huge relief to me. He also talked about healers needing to have the insight and faith that goes along with healing yourself first; being able to recognize the vital (the difference between a crunchy carrot and a wilty one!), having the insight to recognize a healing crisis when it arises and the confidence to guide someone past the crisis. I accept that challenge for myself; to remove the barriers which are keeping me from being the extra crunchy carrot :)

I am also working on our farm website at wordpress-more info when it is presentable to the public!

revived

2011-01-06T08:53:00.003-06:00

Ohhh aren't they beautiful?!! My hens are gifting us with 5-7 eggs daily and it gives me joy!

The last couple of months have been pretty hard for me, but I feel better now, a little more in control. The craziness of moving out of the old house, making the new one a home, the holidays, and changing my career path have been enough to get my anxiety and depression tendencies all stirred up. After Christmas I was sick-layed out on the couch for 4 full days, very uncharacteristic. But my body knew what it was doing. I required rest. I am now feeling brighter, renewed and ready to take the reins again.

If I am to be a full time farmer this summer (and beyond??) i need to begin working on my number one tool--ME. i am 40 and 50lbs overweight, my joints hurt (duh), and am well on my way to becoming a diabetic if i don't take responsibility for my own health. If i wish to do half the things we are dreaming about i need to be stronger, more flexible and generally healthier. So i am on it, details forthcoming but lets just say it's a Primal approach.

I need help with farm names- we were calling ourselves GrassWorks-but that is the name of the state grazing network-confusing if we wish to grow and be a 'going concern'. So another idea is PastureWorks Family Farm (kinda dry), or the german gras werka (verka) translation of grassworks which makes sense from an intellectual point DH is very german and the german immigrants held a belief of land husbandry rather than exploitative approach to the land. Ive been playing with Hxxx's Field of Dreams which tickles my fancy--but is 'field of dreams' an untouchable copyrighted phrase? IDK Any input appreciated!

grim

2010-12-22T10:13:00.003-06:00

Sort of a disjointed rambling kind of post. I have been lurking around the bloggosphere for the last couple weeks-lots of ideas in my head and im gonna purge it out today!

I'm not sure when I became so grim. I have always been on the serious side: a hard working, eye on the ball kind of gal. But (I think) I used to have fun, be spontaneous and silly and...JOYFUL. I don't remember how to relax and enjoy and just be.

I am either working or avoiding. I may look like I am cuddled on the couch ENJOYing a good read, but I am really AVOIDing something I feel I should be doing. Since I have decided only I am responsible for my life's story and am acting on that belief in other parts of my life- -this too needs to change. Strive for balance-spend part of my days JOYFULLY embracing my family's needs -dishes, homework help, groceries, etc but then also take care of my own needs; I need to laugh, I need to create art, I need to be able to relax in my own skin. I have a literally never-ending list of shoulds in my head, to find peace and joy I need to push them out the door. I am always telling my 8 yr old that she can choose her attitude -sounds like good advise for me too!

Talking to one of my employees yesterday, I said something like 'i could go home and sleep for a week!' She looked at me and said well why don't you? you never take a vacation. Hmmm why don't I? because i only work 3 days a week -isnt that vacation enough? just to stay home and putter/nap-that doesnt seem valid somehow. asking for help-asking my co-workers to cover for me. sounds like guilt and self worth issues are stopping me, that and $.

I need to stop listening to the news on the radio--recession, national debt, unemployment, economic collapse, gloom and doom. Then add working with clients every day with sick pets and no money; we are broke, please fix fido, we have $100 to pay you but then we can't buy groceries for the kids. No wonder I am getting burned out! I am getting mean -not like sadistic mean, but stingy and miserly mean- the opposite of abundant.

Unless you have balance like a ninja, dont go snowshoeing in 3 foot drifts with out a walking stick! I took a day off work today (yay me!) and went out for a snow day! We have all this beautiful snow (maybe another 6 inches yesterday?). The long grass in the slough creates the most wonderful drifts. Unfortunately I am not a ninja, and down I went-flat on my back shoes wedged under the snow crust, no walking stick. I flopped around, not able to use my arms to get up through the deep snow, finally I had to unstrap the shoes to get up. Not a pretty moment. But I am smiling now!

Blizzard

2010-12-13T18:43:00.003-06:00

Our first real winter weather. A much different experience than in town. The little tractor just was not up to the task of a 900 ft driveway drifted shut with waist high drifts, thank goodness for neighbors with heavy equipment. :)

Swimming in Stuff

2010-12-07T07:12:00.002-06:00

Good News:Our house in town has a renter for the next 6 months. What a relief! They can pay the heat bill and worry about shoveling, and oh yes pay a large chunk of the mortgage. Bad News: she is moving in this weekend. We spent all of last weekend sorting and moving the dregs of our household. The stuff we CAN live without but somehow have decided that we need anyway. Our little house is not prepared to store so much detritus. But it is done, all that remains is to spend one day this week boxing the few remaining things to charity and pictures from the walls, clean up after myself and be sure the appliances still work, whew!
Then I will start holiday preparations! January will be tax stuff and figuring out how to deal with the boxes of stuff lining the walls in my house. I can't wait for February!
Other stuff...the hens are up to 5 eggs a day, leghorns started first, now the rhode island reds are joining in. The coop is pretty cozy they seem to do well with no heat source even when it is 5 degrees overnight.

I will never win mother of the year

2010-12-01T08:28:00.006-06:00

but I think I do a pretty good job. However, I am worried about my youngest. She is 8; smart and charismatic with a very warm, cuddly, happy to please personality 98% of the time. The other 2%...she is angry, in rage even. Stomping around and nothing is right, complete refusal to do something mundane-like brushing teeth even in the face of a punishment -loss of computer time, etc. It then ramps up to 'i'm stupid, no-one cares about me, you're mean, you hate me, i hate me, i wish I were dead', she even accused me once of wanting to kill her! These episodes are usually triggered by homework help, bed times or a rushed getting ready for school, but I hate to say it -these are just about the only times we are actually requiring something of her.

She is an extrovert living in a household of introverts and I feel like I cannot give her the warmth that she wants...(NEEDS?). The other part of me really resents being manipulated by this behavior. Do I try to be something I am not? Can I meet the needs of this 'needy' child, or do I let her find her own way to meet her needs?
I am feeling sad and guilty.

The Answer..

2010-11-19T20:07:00.009-06:00

...to my little riddle is that I did it, made one of those big decisions. Borrowing this quote from Judy's blog (fullfreezer)
--Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony."
-Mahatma Gandhi
I have taken a step towards harmony and happiness. The meeting was with my business partner- I informed her of my desire to sell my share of the practice back to her. I will work my normal schedule until school gets out-then I QUIT.

I began this blog when I realized I wanted something more (actually less) from my life. Less hurry-more meaning, less junk food-more slow food, less debt-more time.

For the past three years I have been a dichotomy, living in two worlds, bread earner- bread maker, business owner- TEOTWAWKI-er (that's not a word but you understand!), six figure income- goodwill shopper, suburban during the week- country by weekend. No wonder I'm nuts lol.

We took a step in the right direction by moving out of town onto our 20 acres of grass. But a house in the country is just a bigger lawn and a longer commute! Now what? Our goals center around two themes: 1) to spend more time -good time- with the girls, to shape and teach them in a positive way 2)to become more self reliant as a household, both from a food and energy standpoint but also income. We wish to build this 20 acres of grass into a thriving pasture based farm, not only producing food for us but an income to see us into 'retirement'. I had posted once about 'when i retire' and this farm is our retirement package.

One of us needs to be at home -to be here for the girls and to be the farm person. We went back and forth but it came down to biology and health insurance. I could embrace the business and its income to become the 60 hrs per week single bread-earner while DH nurtures the farm and the kids. He has the organizational skills and the muscle for farm and running the affairs of house and home. But it didn't feel right to either of us-I was freaked out and trapped by the idea of being the sole income earner and DH was not comfortable with the nurture role and chauffeuring girls to extracurricular activities.

We then 'tried on' the gender roles of male income earner and stay at home/farm mom. In addition to making sense on a number of practical levels, it 'felt' right. I can sell my % of the practice and pay off a number of large bills (student loan, vehicle)to make the income drop tight but do-able and have capital to invest in our retirement/farm. I still have in-demand skills as a DVM for relief or other part-time work if we need the income, whereas DH's income from the manufacturing sector is not so portable. He also has insurance benefits. I priced out very basic, very high deductible health insurance at $800 per month for our family. We have fallen back to genetic programming but that's okay with me, nature is too big to fight with!

I am a little worried about my body holding up to the rigors of farming. I am 40. I am overweight. I have carpal tunnel and a crunchy knee. Self sufficiency is about being responsible for yourself. I am high with the idea that my life is MINE to shape as i wish now -no shoulda's or oughta's. From here on out it's in my hands. My health is no different, time to take responsibility for that too.

Some fall pictures of our grass

Next Post: the winter coop (or my first attempt at building something with power tools)

Signs of Change

2010-11-17T06:43:00.003-06:00

I have a meeting today.
My heart is in my throat
butterflies galore
giddy
a secretive smile on my lips
scared
what if....

Any guesses about my meeting today??
Hint -the meeting is NOT an OB/GYN apt :)

Scarlet Runner Beans

2010-11-11T20:41:00.003-06:00

Last year was my first rasing beans for dry beans. Perfect crop for me-get em growing pick what-ever green beans you need and let the rest go until fall. I got even lazier this year and let the pods dry on the vines, I didn't pick them until the green leaves were so wilted and brown that the pods were much easier to find and pick.

My daughters picked scarlett runner beans from the catalog for their long vines and pretty red flowers.

They were pretty and bonus! -edible beans. The dried beans are huge and quite striking. I have to say the skins are tougher than the others I have grown but still good to eat!

Pretty and functional (and saved for re-planting next year!)

Winter Coop Construction/Meet the Hens

2010-11-08T05:58:00.007-06:00

This Wisconsin fall has been amazingly mild. Lucky us-lucky hens. They are still in their tractor on pasture-it falls into the 20's overnight but back to the 40's and 50's in the day. No snow yet.

Our plans and construction budget have changed form the original (many times) so instead of a garage with chicken coop added to the back we have a 10x16 lofted shed.
The shed will be partitioned to have a 4 1/2 ft x 10 ft insulated chicken coop on one end. We will use the other portion for storage -think rabbit and chick bedding and food, snow shovels and snowblower!

Yesterday has a work at home day for us. I felt very competent going to the big box store and successfully loading and strapping down wood and insulation in the bed of the truck. DH and I got the partition wall up and the 1 inch foam insulation glued in place -everything but the ceiling! We will put up 'milk board' for interior walls and paint the floor with a couple coats of porch paint. Run a cord for lights, chicken door and perches deep bedding and good to go!

The chicks:

Araucana-the under dog in my pen-pastel colored eggs

Rhode Island Reds-light brown eggs -shy

Welsummer-fearless! chocolate brown eggs

Leghorn-white eggs -heavy layers

Traditional Chinese Medicine

2010-11-07T05:50:00.003-06:00

I spent Friday locked in a fancy hotel conference room, my brain a quivering confused mess. The topic was An Introduction to Traditional Chinese Veterinary Medicine. I have read up on TCM, have a superficial understanding of qi, shen, yin and yang. I was still overwhelmed by the complexity of this body of knowledge. If this is something I wish to pursue, it will not be done lightly!

An idea which struck me during the lecture was that TCM theory and practice was developed through thousands of years of observation of cause and effect, of associations which mirrored nature, observation of function. I do not believe there was much dissection or autopsy going on through these years-but there certainly was a lot of observation of relationships, harmony and function. It seems that science is becoming sophisticated enough to 'prove' TCM is valid. Acupuncture points can be located by measuring the electrical potential of the skin-they are areas of decreased resistance. Anatomically they have been shown to have a unusually large number of nerve fibers and blood vessels. Still no luck in measuring Qi though!

I thought this was a very nice analogy: if disease is a mountain, you can approach it from the east or the west. Sometimes the path from the east is quicker than that from the west or vice-versa. I would love to be able combine both 'paths' in my approach.

Love Those Leghorns!

2010-10-30T06:08:00.002-05:00

We have eggs! Our layers are nearly five months old and I was beginning to ownder if we would have eggs this winter or if the short photoperiod would delay onset of eggs.
The hens are in a chicken tractor which was remodeled from last year-we boarded up a few of the nest boxes since it seemed like the previous inhabitants only used 2 for eggs and the remaining as toilets :) It appears they can still squeek into those boxes and yesterday i discovered a leghorn sitting on a dozen eggs in there! I did a little dance in the field! Several were cracked but all the rest were beautiful inside and out! The girls and I had a pan of scrambled eggs which bordered on orange.
A little more about our laying hens: hatched on June 6th and purchased from My Pet Chicken-what can i say ... i wanted a few of each kind! We ordered a dozen and although they were supposed to be all hens we ended up with 2 roosters. The order was 3 each: rhode island red, leghorn, welsummer and araucana. My selection process was simple -cold hardy birds with pretty eggs. The leghorns of course are white, reds are light brown, welsummer a deep chocolate brown with speckles and the araucana are the easter eggers. Sadly one araucana chick died early on and another is a rooster. My crew consists of 3 leghorns, 3 welsummers, 2 rhode islands and one araucana.
They are still on pasture in the tractor despite some cold weather (down to 20 Thursday night) and doing well. We are working on their winter quarters now-partitioning off a 5x10 section of the shed and insulating it. We were originally going to house the 2 rabbits in their as well-we'll see.

Revolution?

2010-10-24T20:54:00.004-05:00

Just a Sunday evening musing- slightly tongue in cheek? You decide!

I just finished re-watching Braveheart with my girls. I get so immersed in the imagery and emotion of a saga like that-all that idealistic passion. It is easy for me to get swept away--then add hairy men in kilts and well, who can blame me? :)
It had me thinking about things worth fighting for; family, freedom of (or in my case FROM) religion, personal liberty. Unlike the movies we do not have a clear cut villain to go to battle with. A different kind of villainy, a slow erosion of personal freedoms, a kind of golden handcuffs for a very privileged society-the bad guy is? Who? Big Business? Our own government? Apathy? Ourselves? Multiple choice -all of the above.
I think the local food, self sufficiency, voluntary simplicity movements are all forms of mini-revolutions. We are not painting our faces with blue woad and lifting our kilts at the enemy, but being subversive revolutionaries because it's a subversive kind of war.
I heard somewhere (Stoney, chime in if there is a name or source for this)that it only takes a small percentage (17% ?)of population to change their opinion/actions and the rest will follow-I dub it the Sheeple principle. Think of this the next time you wait until you have cash to buy (or refrain entirely), bake your own bread, buy grass fed local beef -or grow your own chickens. YOU are a revolutionary!

PS

Role Reversal

2010-10-21T05:08:00.004-05:00

My DH and I have been wrestling with 'a big life changing event', yep another one :) Our farm/homestead/home business goals will/are require time and considerable effort. For this to have a chance we feel one of us needs to be working at home. Home to be the primary child caregiver, chauffeur, etc. Home to be the household manager, bookkeeper, etc. Home to be the chicken/turkey/(beef/goat?) wrangler. We have tried DH working full time and me working 50% with only partial success. Being a small business owner/partner-I find work encroaching on those days off-filling in for emergencies, fielding questions from staff/clients; my days off are never a sure thing. We are both professionals and good at our work; DH is finding his job frustrating and unfufilling, while I have days of intense pleasure (they PAY me to do this?!) alternating with the dread (I can't fix this pet, too many people want too many things from me)of high responsibility and caretakers fatigue.
We are both finding ourselves stressed out because we cannot do a satisfactory job at either our home or office jobs, and feel that the solution is for one of us to be the income earner and the other to be the home and farm manager. The original assumption was for me to stay home and Tom to work. We are each inclined to fulfill our 'gender roles'; he as income producer and I as caregiver. This would mean me selling my portion of the business to my partner and thereby having a nice but not earth-shattering amount of cash. We could pay off my student loan, buy a tractor and put the rest into a college fund. Nice, right? I have been sitting with this idea for a while and it makes me selfishly very happy but hearing voices. Voices that wonder about selling a business which is profitable even in this economy, that wonder about the stability and longevity of DH's employers. The projects we have at home now require a skill set that are not my strong points -carpentry, post holes, fencing-and oh yeah-organization!
So, as much as it makes me want to kick my feet and have a tantrum :) I need to explore what happens if I work full time and DH stays home. It means no cash to buy a tractor or finish the workshop. We will need to come up with 2/3 of the workshop's price tag by next June to fulfill our construction loan (could work with tough budgeting -or a SOLD house!) I have a lot of untapped earning potential and money wise it might cash flow for us. We need to find health insurance since DH's employer carries that. What else...is Tom willing to do dr and dentist and orthodontist and lessons. Is he willing to pay bills, to return library books and go grocery shopping? Is he okay with being Mr Mom? Am I okay with the responsibility of being the sole bread winner-scary!
As I think things through I am excited by having energy to put into the clinic. I am pulled in too many directions now and have been a jack of all trades, master of none lately. We have so many great things about our clinic-if I can take control of our/my direction instead of being the passive receiver of what comes my way...
I am so thankful to have this outlet for my internal dialogue. I am at peace with this option if some of the details can be worked out. It is not what the selfish child in me desires, but the thoughtful adult looking out for the needs of her entire family (herself not the least of all).

back into the swing of things

2010-10-14T22:34:00.002-05:00

I enjoyed reading Sharon's post on whole-life re-design and i would like to nail down some definable, measurable goals for myself and turn some of these pie-in-the-sky dreams I have for our farm into something closer to a mission statement. I am too easily distracted and will end up floundering around without goals and accountability. I am a disco ball instead of a laser light!

I am finally feeling as if things are reaching a certain equilibrium, a routine. I am seeing room for improvement! Too much time in front of the TV, not enough time one-on-one with each other. In some (small) ways I miss the enforced closeness of the camper. If I could get rid of the TV I would (except for movie night!) In a small open house it dominates our energy every evening. I am struggling to find routines for the household chores, bill paying, self care, etc as well as being flexible and responsive to the girls needs, work needs, ug. This is our chance to shake things up and focus on the simple and lead a deliberate life.

Some fun things...in early November I will be taking a course at the UW-Madison VMTH called Introduction to Traditional Chinese Veterinary Medicine. I feel this is something of a declaration for me. After 12 yrs of practice I am ready to go my own way. If our small animal clinic is not receptive-that's okay with me.
Another fun thing -now that i have internet again i was able to look up scarlet runner beans-they are edible as well as really pretty-i need to go collect those pods for dry beans! Sauerkraut needs to happen this weekend-the cabbage at the foot of my bed are starting to smell weird! **or is that the laundry-i better go check :)

I'VE MISSED YOU GUYS!!

2010-10-01T11:31:00.004-05:00

Where to start? I've been gone from Small Life so long...the house is up, we are no longer living in the camper (yay), we successfully raised and marketed 120 Freedom Ranger meat birds and the girls have adapted well to the small school. We have 9 nearly 4 month old egg chicks on grass in their tractor. Their winter coop will be up sometime in the next month...(think warm thoughts for us in WI). Our house has not YET sold, although I think we have it at the right price now and have had 4 showings in the last 2 weeks (fingers crossed!)

Overall the move is a positive one; I love the space, the views, the sandhill cranes calling and the geese migrating. Now the struggle will be to make this life different from the previous one-not just a longer commute and a bigger 'lawn'. Is 'GrassWorks Family Farm' a business, a hobby farm or a homestead?

We (I) am still struggling with work/professional issues. Sell or don't sell the business, work for the local clinic part-time, local relief work, stay at home? It sure is nice to have options, but choices make me crazy! If GrassWorks is to be a business then we need someone to be home. As I write about it the choices seem clear (but then I pay bills and come to different conclusion!)

I am writing this at a WiFi connected cafe on my 'going to town' errand day. I hope to have internet at home soon but for now the posts will be sporadic.

What do you want to hear/see more of? Questions, suggestions welcomed otherwise I will continue to ramble and diary our progress.

Houses old and new

2010-07-04T16:37:00.004-05:00

Too much to do, not much time for keeping up with my blog. I haven't been doing much online except checking the radar-feeling pretty exposed in that camper I guess. The chicks are 3 weeks old and happily (?) in their tractors on the hill. I am relieved to have them out of the coop.

Wild Ride

2010-06-14T20:06:00.002-05:00

We are officially living in our camper. We have moved our bunnies to as shady of a spot as we have. The two house cats moved out today! They are not exactly pleased about the new outdoor accommodations, but I think they will adjust. (now we hope to avoid a run in with a coyote or hawk.) Both batches of chicks are doing well The layers are a week old already-their little flight feathers are growing in and they run around the pen trying to fly! Both Tom and I are finding it very rewarding to be nurturing these little ones.
Today I had to go to work for a partial day and Tom met me in town to sign paperwork for the construction loan! Our contractor even broke ground today, digging down along the perimeter of the house to pour concrete footing for the frost wall.
Life in the camper moves at a slower pace. We don't smell as good as we did in town, and we are tired often. We remarked tonight that it is a different kind of tired-not a fried brain tired but rather a body tired mind happy kind of tired. I like this kind of tired SO much more.
I have all these pictures i would like to share- unfortunately the internet connection out here is spotty so i will hope that this will publish NOW...

Gut Check

2010-06-10T22:11:00.004-05:00

I had a moment today. We were in our weekly Dr's meeting this morning and my partner was talking about farmland her husband purchased from a farmer in foreclosure. This is(was) a large landholder and ALL his property is in foreclosure. The parcel they purchased was 560 acres and a cabin on a lake! I had an immediate sinking feeling. 'what am I doing, rejecting that path?' Accumulation of property and power, isn't that the goal? It took me a couple hours to process the emotions that discussion brought up for me. I was such a relief to get back home to my girls (**and my CHICKS). My carefully nurtured plans tend to fade to a poorly defined image when exposed to the values of normal society. This is a big part of the reason we chose to buy property in the boonies. I WANTED the girls in a different district, I WANTED to NOT be so close to work that it was 'business as usual'. I need physical distance to help me preserve this vision and not make it too easy to turn this 'small life adventure' into just another house with a really big yard.

We are on the right path and this is a good thing because tomorrow is D-day. We sign the construction loan and move rabbits and cats into their new home. The 130 meat birds should arrive tomorrow. The 12 (now 11) egg layers have been in the basement for 2 days now and growing like mad. They will join the Noah's Ark-like procession tomorrow.

The Future is Here!

2010-06-07T21:08:00.003-05:00

The girls last day of school is tomorrow and then our adventure truly begins! Our house had its first showing Sunday (they are coming back with their parents to look again next wekend!) and another showing tomorrow evening. The 142 chicks arrive at the end of the week -130 freedom rangers (the reason behind that exact # lies at the bottom of a wine bottle-never shop for chickens with a credit card and an empty bottle of wine!) and 12 laying hens-3 each of white leghorn, easter-egger, rhode island red and welsummer. I agonized over the laying hens-and ultimately picked for winter durabliity, laying ability (duh) and egg color. I ordered the layers from My Pet Chicken to avoid having to buy a large number of a single breed. I am a bit nervous about the chicks, but there is a first time for everything-go for it!

We begin living in our camper more or less full time at the end of this week. Until the house sells we have the option of coming back here for showers, laundry or as a stir-crazy escape hideout if needed. Tom and I are having a very hard time sleeping in the camper bed. It is big enough-although maybe too soft after putting the memory foam pad on top. Perhaps it has nothing to do with the bed and everything to do with a lack of background noise, or that we are sore from the extra work. Whatever the problem is I sure hope we resolve it quickly!

I am giving up on the homemade bread and yogurt (and homecooking in general) for the time being. Once we get a routine down I may be able to pick those things back up. Right now I am struggling with the transition from camping cooking to everyday cooking. I cannot live on grilled hamburgers, brats and foil dinners for the entire summer. We used the camper oven to make muffins and it worked great-6 muffins at a time!

The girls are enrolled at the small rural school. I have such mixed feelings about this. To go from 450 per grade to 30 is a big change. Some good, others not so. I am most concerned about Erin -our 12 yr old. She just finished her 6th grade year with straight A's in all AP classes. 96% in math, 100% for science last quarter, now she will be in regular classes and I am afraid she will be bored to tears. I need to find some enrichment material she can do at home. The time may come when I can home-school but not for a year or two.

The garden is thriving, now that we have had a little rain. I still have some transplants to put in. I was waiting until I could be around daily to water (or cover!)

I promise to remember the camera next trip out so you can have some visuals to go along with my descriptions! And sorry for all the ranting before this-I am going to remove most of that post to protect identities!

Personal Responsibility

2010-06-03T19:28:00.005-05:00

My business partner and I did a very hard thing today. We confronted an employee about theft, fired her, then escorted her (crying) from the building. I am one part madder than hell, on part betrayed and two (or more) parts feeling very bad about the whole thing. We have had inventory problems and small discrepancies in the petty cash off and on for a long time. We chalked it up to mistakes, forgotten receipts, miscounts, etc. Hanlon's razor- 'Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity'.
(content deleted-hickchick)
I am sure she will continue to play the victim in her life. Poor me, look what the bad world did to me. I wish people would take more personal responsibility-as in 'I am where I am in my life because of the choices I have made' Enough rant, maybe I can let this go now.

It's Official

2010-05-26T07:45:00.003-05:00

The house has a big bright real estate sign out front! I found our MLS listing yesterday-it's officially for sale...

Other things are happening too, 9 days of school left for the girls. Two weeks until our 130 Freedom Rangers and 12 laying chicks arrive. I am giddy and tired. We have a three day weekend coming up -we are going to need every minute of it I think. We have building projects (bean trellis and chicken tracotrs), possibly moving some rabbit cages out to the farm (we have 2 sets so the buns can stay at home in the back-up cages until we move), and taking stock of what we need to do to prepare for chicks. Oh yes I also work Saturday morning 8-12 at the far away clinic-so tack an hour driving to either end of that. That's okay-I can buy alot of chicken feed with those wages :)

Recovery and Discovery

2010-05-21T15:09:00.002-05:00

Thanks for the public (and private)words of support. There should be a law against stressful news at certain times of the month :)
I think my biggest stress was in putting myself 'out there', pushing my comfort zones a bit. You see we do have the money to do this (I knew there was a reason for driving an 8yr old Saturn!), I just didn't think we would be called upon to have to use it. I was assuming we could have our comfortable cushion to sit on.
I AM breathing again and thinking things through rationally again. Tom and I will do a little brainstorming about how to proceed -the construction loan has a 12 month term, so we can continue to save and accumulate money as we go through the next year. Perhaps the garage will get built this fall? Perhaps we get another bid for the garage, with us doing more of the work? I'm not sure what we will come up with , but there is nothing like a campfire and a couple Mike's Hard Lemonades to help you think outside of the box.

uggh

2010-05-19T08:04:00.003-05:00

I want to vomit. I have too many things weighing on my mind. This is no way to live. The bank called yesterday about the construction loan. The assessor (appaiser?) valued our future home at $187,000. That is basically an evaluation of what our property would sell for in the current market. Problem is, the market here has really tanked. The bank will loan us 75% of the assessed value or $140,000. The estimates we have collected to build a 1400 sq foot house, 2 car garage, mound septic, well and to run electric out (1,000ft!) is 175,000. That is a big difference.
Do you remember that post about 'when i retire'...well we need to decide if that is all talk or will we put our money where our mouth is. Last night talking it over with DH and a bottle of wine it seemed pretty obvious- we do it, but I am worrying this thing to death (that's what i do). Time for a little yoga and then I will transplant my little tomatoes and see how things feel then.
Oh yeah, I also had a post on HWW about technoloy and commuting.-see side link to HWW

Not For the Faint of Heart

2010-05-14T08:04:00.004-05:00

Did you know that the bacteria living in and on you would fill up a half gallon jug? In fact there are 10 times MORE bacterial cells in our body than human ones (good thing they are very small!) The article from Scientific American is here.
Pretty cool stuff-but I am funny that way. Our bodies function more efficiently with these little helpers, in fact 40 of our own genes have been found to be bacterial in origin.
I throw antibiotics at pets evry day...maybe I should be looking deeper. These dogs are not suffering an antibiotic deficiency, something else has allowed the pathogenic bacteria to gain ground. Or maybe not. Just food for thought.

Weekend Work

2010-05-10T08:56:00.003-05:00

We had a cold weekend, and frankly we were tired so we had a convienent excuse to NOT spend the weekend at the camper. Brrr...3+ inches of sloppy wet snow. I was happy to be in a real house! We spend Sunday at the land. The weather was perfect-very little wind, sunny and 50-60 degrees. DH installed the board walk in front of the camper along with the 10x12 'patio'. Everything is constructed with treated wood in 3'x10' sections so we can use at the house this fall. I am happy to have a spot out of the dirt and mud this summer. We put the 'patio' at the back end of the camper-we will put our deck table and chairs out there along with the umbrella for (a bit of) shade. The camper also has an exterior shower on the back so we can 'hose-off' on those really sticky days.

DH planted his open pollinated sweet corn-I forget the weight -but it was approx 1000seeds. I think it is a little cool for sweet corn, but even with a low germination rate and deer/coon/bear predation we will have alot of corn!

My day was spent in the garden! Yay me! I put in 10lbs of seed potatoes-I ended up with 3 25ft rows ( i must have cut them into smaller pieces this year) About half were the leftovers from our winter storage. I have pictures to help me remember row spacing etc for next year:

We hill the old fashioned way so I think I am still going to wish for more room between the rows...
I also put in two more rows of peas, a whole bed of beets and a row of radishes. The dandelions are taking over the rows and sides of the raised beds. I took the hoe to their tops and that felt very good! I know it will not help long term so next weekend i need to bring stuff for row mulch-I was thinking brown paper shoppping bags covered with lawn clippings. I also need to come up with bean trellis ideas. DH has too much on his plate and after all -I AM HANDY TOO!
The kids entertained themselves -playing 'tennis' on the tractor road:

(we are going to need more balls!)

Look What I Did!!!

2010-05-07T09:08:00.002-05:00

I am so proud of myself-look what I did!
Our dishwasher kicked the bucket a long time ago and we just didn't replace it. Bah! Modern conveniences-who needs 'em. As I prepared our house for sale, I decided it was time to have a functional dishwasher. I had a bad experience at our local big box appliance store, so I trotted down to our locally owned appliance store (who also will deliver AND take the old washer away). I paid a little more but I feel better about spending where more money will stay in our community. The sales person offered to put me in contact with a plumber who could install the thing, but he said-'they are pretty easy to install -if your husband is handy he would have no problem'. I thought, he is handy -but SO AM I! It took a couple hours and 1 trip to the hardware store for a new fitting and hose but it works and is not leaking. I keep checking to be sure!
It's a small thing but it is giving me a sense of competency, of 'non-helplessness'.
In other news- the paperwork is all with the bank. In another 2-3 weeks we should have a building loan.
I am having moments of 'what the hell are we doing' as I work on our house-I am 'remembering' how much I like it-the yard especially. Then we go out to the camper which is parked in a bare field where the wind never stops blowing. I have to remind myself that I cannot have livestock in my pretty yard, the trees, shrubs and flowers will come in time(along with hot running water).

VS

My blogging will continue to be very sporadic--keep checking back though

Dragon Eggs

2010-05-03T21:44:00.002-05:00

What are 'dragon eggs'? Well you will have to go to Homemakers Who Work to find out!

Kris

Chickens, Worms and Permaculture

2010-04-29T20:35:00.006-05:00

I am lazy. I don't want to work any harder than is absolutely necessary. After seeing how beat-up my Dad got in his first couple of years of country living I am trying to learn from his experiences. How to work WITH natural systems and not fight with her so much. I gotta face the facts; me VS mother nature- she's gonna kick my ass every time! So how to set up our homestead in a logical, aesthetic manner which will work with our local ecology ? I need to use my brain not my puny biceps. Permaculture is the answer.
I am not going to lecture about permaculture design or theory here because frankly I don't know alot about it in practice. What I am concentrating on is the idea of using natural laws to achieve your desired ends. For example we plan to raise chickens, both for meat and eggs. Chickens want to be chickens, they want the scratch around, eat bugs, tender greens and seeds and poop (alot). How can I make this work for us?
I found Harvey Ussery's website, the modern homestead, in which he describes his season extending/poultry housing/worm composting hoop house. This is something I would like to emulate on our homestead. The basic premise is a plastic covered green house with laying hen housing at one end (and maybe rabbits as well?), the remainder of the hoop house is garden space for extending garden harvests. The twist is large worm bins dug into the center aisle of the garden space-lined with cement block and covered with heavy duty plywood. The worms eat pony poop or other waste, the chickens eat the worms, the chickens provide some heat and CO2 for the hoop house plants. The winter chicken yard outside one end of the hoop house is garden space covered very deeply with old hay. The deep mulch/deep litter protects the soil from becoming a wasteland of packed down clay, allowing the chickens to turn the deep litter into a living compost by the time the pasture is ready to take them in chicken tractors.
We are 2 zones colder, but I think we can work around this by making the worm bins deeper and using a plywood cover with insulation attached to the inner surface. Putting the rabbits in there is interesting too-they waste so much hay-I bet the chickens would enjoy what the rabbits spill!

Water is another concern for us. Northern WI is experiencing several years of below average rainfall, while the southern 1/3 of the state gets flooded. Will this be a continuing trend? I think yes. Our soil is very heavy clay so it is good at holding on to moisture it has received but how can I spend less time watering and more time smelling the lavender? Our property gently slopes toward the south. We plan to capture every bit of rain water from the roof of the garage and house and put it to use for us. Rain barrels located on the higher ground of our property and the garden, small fruits and orchard located down slope could provide me with a slow trickle -perhaps a system of drip irrigation? I would hate to run the electric well pump for watering all the time, and what if the electric is out? Call me paranoid but I am hoping for the best while preparing for the worst. This is a home I will live in until I die, and perhaps my kids will raise their kids here as well. It seems foolish to not build in some redundancy into our homestead.

I am working on permaculture 'Zones' as well. Zones can be thought of as concentric circles classified according to intensity of human intervention, on-site energy and resources management or physical characteristics. (ugg sorry I pasted that definition!)-Just common sense stuff. Zone 0 is the house, zone 1 is the area immediately adjacent to the house-containing things such as cold frame, greens garden or herb garden, compost site- things which require frequent attention. Orchard and main garden would be zone 2, etc all the way out to zone 5 of no intervention wild area. (judy if you are reading--chime in here about your perm. class -what text are you using?)

moving day

2010-04-26T08:09:00.005-05:00

Not out of our suburban house, but moving the camper onto our own patch of earth. I wish i had pictures but it was a very highs stress situation for DH and stopping to take pictures would have been a very BAD idea! We have a nice big Dodge truck but it is not heavy duty or anything. The trailer is a 26 footer at the top end of the Dodge's hauling capacity. When we hooked it up the hitch only cleared the ground by 6 inches on flat ground. The road out is nice for a car but bumpy with curves and runs through a slough which has washed out and been redone a few times since we put the camper up in the woods.

On the right-the road out of the woods and through the slough-taken 2 (3?) years ago

DH was having visions of the camper tipping into the wetland. The hitch began to catch dirt before the slough. DH went to town to put more air in the truck tires (and recover his cool), meanwhile my Dad, brother-in-law and I went to work removing the raised 'crown' of the road and redistributing it to the sides, raising the tires and giving the hitch a low spot in the middle. Success!
Thank you to everyone in our 'work party'. Our camper is now parked on our hill. It looks like redneck heaven right now, but we will get things straightened up over the next few weekends. We watched a hawk float in the wind not more than 30 feet from us. He was dropping towards the grass looking for mice and swooping back up into the wind without a wing flap. The first of many encounters I am sure.
The wind will take some getting used to-we had 40mpg gusts Sat night and the camper sure rocked. I think some some digging may be in order to lower the campers profile a bit-either that or tie-downs :)
We have 130 freedom ranger chicks coming in June along with 12 laying hens, the floor plans are done for the house-just waiting now for the estimates so i can go to the bank and ask for $. It is all feeling very real!

I Plead Temporary Insanity

2010-04-20T21:12:00.002-05:00

I have a half-baked post at HWW about multitasking and the importance of focus. Taking my own advise, I am putting a moratorium on my blogging. I need to focus on what I am doing here. I want to have my house listed in 2 (or 3) weeks, we have several chicken tractors to build for the 130 freedom ranger meat birds-why 130? Well it involved some wine and all I can say is chicken 'beer goggles'.!

The house plans are drawn up and our building loan is 3-4 weeks away. We will be moving into our 26 foot camper for the summer in 6 weeks and I am feeling a little spastic. I am also still working over in my mind how to make my work life managable, at least until the bank has okayed our final mortgage :b

Peace and send me good vibes!
Kris

Too Busy To Post

2010-04-18T19:04:00.006-05:00

I am finding it harder and harder to call this place home! We becoming more invested (emotionally AND financially) in the Grass Works Family Farm, and I so look forward to the time school gets out so we can relocate. This weekend I planted onions and garlic and turned over another 2 rows of the raised bed garden. The dandelions were having a field day-but no more! I still cannot get the girls interested in their gardens. They will help me but want to play, not work. I won't push it but they WILL be required to help with the main garden.

View of the building site from Dad's hill. The truck is parked in it's staked out 'garage'. The brown patches of dirt mark the area which tested okay for the drainage field. Below those is a low spot we hope some day to build into a pond!

DH broke in a new tool, the pick axe, to dig a ditch in which to place heavy duty PVC pipe to improve Dad's road through the slough. Every spring it washes out, and every summer more material gets added. Perhaps this new drainage under the road instead of over it will be the answer.

We were both very tired and stiff, so naturally today was a good day to transplant spruce trees for my Aunt's gravel pit (THANKS PEGGY!) to the western edge of our field. In 10 years we will have a nice wind break :)

We are meeting the well driller this week, and arranged with a local farmer to have our field planted to pasture. He will plant a timothy, orchard grass, white clover and alfalfa mixture -along with oats. The oats will grow tall more quickly while the rest establishes itself underneath. He will combine and harvest the oats and straw in August leaving us with a usable pasture by late summer. It is cheaper than buying a tractor this year, but I need to check around to be sure he is not taking these city folks for a ride!
Tired but happy and taking glucosamine for my aching joints!
Kris

Peas and Oats

2010-04-10T20:41:00.003-05:00

Two more work days in. The last of the charred remains have been hauled away -the entire patch rototilled. We used the garden tiller-didn't want to have to replace one of Dad's tractor tires by running over a metal spike :) Then the girls and I flung a 50/50 mix of field peas and oats over the area. The feed mill guy said the typical application rate was 2 bags per acres--well we used 3x that much -but we aren't machines planting in rows and we had seed fights (I had oats in places where the sun don't shine!) One job complete!
Then DH got out the 'big tiller' which runs behind the garden tractor. He tilled up about 1/2 acre and the peas and oats girls went to work again. He plans to work up another plot this size to plant sweet corn in (for both us and the wildlife), and start a rotation between corn, p&o, and pasture. We girls decided we don't want to seed 1/2 acre of corn by hand--I see a seeder purchase next month!
My next job was to help the girls with their gardens, just lay out the walkways with mulch. That didn't go so well. Erin turned into this evil pouting thing (i think it's a tween phenomenon) Fine with me-it is YOUR garden. If you decide not to plant it I'll turn it in to popcorn, or flax, or sunflowers. It's all good. She will just have to ask me NICELY if she wants help in the future.
I planted a double row of both shell peas and sugar snap peas, a little spinach and lettuce and a few kolrabi seeds. Nothing too crazy. It is still April in Northern Wisconsin and historically speaking we still have 6 weeks before the 'frost free' date. It is just so damned dry and warm already. We had 80 degrees last weekend and only one nice rain this spring. I have an extra package of peas- what do i have to loose if they get frozen?
I just realized I neglected to buy any seed potatoes. I meant to do some research about blight resistance but never got around to it. Does anyone out there know what the latest word is. We didn't have any problems with either the tomatoes or potatoes last year-but we have had drought conditions.
DH is going back out to do some more work tomorrow, while I stay home to catch up on cooking and housework. I love having homemade bread, yogurt and leftovers for lunches but it takes time! My body is tired-i will let Tom dig fence post holes tomorrow, I know he will enjoy the alone time.

not working

2010-04-07T21:23:00.005-05:00

I have a post today at HWW about not working, for wages at least. I am so lucky to be in a position where I can make that choice and not have it made FOR me. I certainly cannot quit working for a paycheck altogether, but we are seeing the results of many years of frugality and hard work. We are NOT debt free by a long shot. It is certainly something to strive for, but if I make that a prerequisite for getting off the ol' rat race...well, I can't wait that long.

I have been thinking alot about jobs and personal economy. When did it become mandatory for a person to earn dollars in order to survive? Then families needed TWO income streams to make it. Maybe I have just read too many Little House books. I have also been reading Pop's 5 Rules (one of which is Don't Specialize). When did I become so specialized that I need to pay someone in order to feed and clothe myself, get water and heat for myself, to entertain myself. Am I really so helpless? By specializing I am betting my success on those skills being in demand- if no one requires my skills- well, tough luck. What if someone needs your skills but doesn't have the dollars to pay you. When did our self worth get so wrapped up in dollars? What if I/we could develop my/our skills to a point where we don't require so many dollars to buy the things we need? Notice I said NEED not WANT. Wouldn't thant be something to be able to take your dentist a couple gallons of maple syrup in exchange for a procedure or barter the IRS man twenty chickens to pay the property taxes.

Our Ginseng Clean Up

2010-04-03T06:23:00.004-05:00

Goodbye YMCA membership -there is a new fitness program in my life. It's called the Grassworks Family Farm and I have never been so tired. It's a good kind of tired, that comes with a sense of accomplishment and a tangible outcome. Two overweight, out of shape, city folks got initiated this week. This is our project:

Ginseng made some Marathon County farmers very wealthy, but like so many things it was not sustainable. Part of our acreage was in ginseng 15-20 years ago, the roots were harvested and the slatted wooden rafters (a ginseng crop needs artificial shade) stacked up for another crop. Except the prices dropped by more than 50% from $40/lb for dried root and $100/lb for seed. So there sit the stacks and stack of rafters. We asked that they be removed before buying the property and they were-mostly. They missed a little bit:

What was left behind was pounds and pounds of metal-staples, spikes, nails, etc-all the hardware which held the artificial shade structures together. We don't have the equipment to bury it so we are hauling it to the scrap pile on Dad's property. Every farm around here has a rock pile/scrap pile where stuff goes over the decades- his has coils and coils of rusty barbed wire, old implement parts, rusted out livestock watering tanks. I used to look at these sites and think ick, what an eye sore-but now I see them as a necessary evil and sort of an archaeological site-lots of information about how farming has changed over the years! Anyway -THANKS DAD!

We spent our freakishly warm (80 degree) April Fool's day raking and shoveling and dumping. When we realized we were NOT going to finish in one day the fight went out of us and we moved on the the garden -something we CAN finish(see previous post). I think we will finish this burn site next weekend and get the area hand rototilled (not with the tractor -I don't want to have a punctured tractor tire to replace!) and spread some sort of grass/clover seed on the site. I will never feel 100% comfortable grazing livestock over here, but since this will be the main 'cross-country' route between dad's place and ours we won't leave it as is. There are 2 more burn sites like this one running parallel to our driveway, we won't tackle these this year.

Ahh, the grass is growing and spring is here. Hopefully next year this will be an established pasture and pond at the low site at the right.

First Workday at Future Farm

2010-04-02T06:05:00.003-05:00

Our plan was to get the garden rototilled and organic material hand forked under. This garden is the same one I used last year on my ftaher's property. Since he is 'winged', he will not be able to do much gardening-so our family will have the entire fenced in space-it's big! (1/4 acre??) What ever we don't need for vegetable garden will go to buckwheat, flax, or peas 'n oats for chicken food.

My DH hooking up the rototiller to Dad's garden tractor-I love it when he gets dirty!

See my 'chair' is in the garden already!

Six raised beds to turn by hand-the rest rototilled

The bigger project was cleaning up the burn site, which I will have to write about later as I am late ! (A pile of 20 yr old gingeng rafters15ft high in a 200ftx15ft stack-torched -and we get to clean it all up!)

I'm a BAD Blogger

2010-03-29T20:52:00.005-05:00

Now that things are getting interesting I have not been posting very much! BAD BLOGGER! Land purchased, work commencing. I drew up a couple house floor plans and we arrived at one which was workable. Small passive solar ICF construction, very open living space. Three bedrooms, 1 3/4 bath, built on a slab so we want/need a concrete 'safe room' for tornadoes. The plan I workd out has 1150 square feet-no walk in closets or master suites here!

The idea is to really force us to pare down our 'stuff'. I have been taking steps along the way to get us to 1200 sq feet (plus garage!). Many, many trips to donate at Goodwill, getting rid of holiday decor that is not special to the family. The homemade nativity set made by great Grandpa Carl stays, the plastic, plug-in, snoring Santa and outdoor light displays are gone. I'm down to 4 boxes of christmas stuff, 1 box for Easter (mostly the kids baskets) and 3 for Halloween; but I know I can do even better than that! I also got rid of my clothing dresser last year. All my clothing fits in 1/2 (okay, okay 2/3) of our standard sized closet with organizer. The little house will be a challenge as our possessions have grown to fill the space we occupy now -about 2400sq ft -including partially finished basement and 1 car garage.

Anyway, we signed on Friday and met with the builder on Saturday. He will turn my grid paper scribbles into a real code upholding floor plan for the loan officer. They will then loan us 75% of the assessed market value. The assessment and paperwork usually takes 3 - 4 weeks during which time I will be arranging well drillers, septic system installation and the public utility to run electric from the road. When we get the go-ahead from the bank in the beginning of May I can be ready to pull the trigger -so to speak.

I also talked to the real estate broker I wish to list with and told him I would like to list May 1st. So now I (WE) have 4 weeks to pretty things up. It is certainly do-able but this will not be a house to pass a 'white glove' test. It is what it is, a decently maintained older ranch in a really sweet family neighborhood in a great school district. It is lived in, has a butt ugly kitchen, a kick-ass deck and yard, its a HOME not a showpiece. Hopefully we can price it to sell before our new mortgage kicks in!

The beautiful pictures I had in my mind of the land have faded a bit with the realities of the work in front of us. It is a 10 or 20 year marathon -not a 2 yr sprint, I continue to remind myself of that.

Thursdays at Home

2010-03-25T12:58:00.005-05:00

I have post at HWW today about homemade taco seasoning and why our family has taco salad at least every other week... :)
It's another Thursday at home and some how the whole morning has gone and I haven't even begun to clean up the house or bake bread or (insert boring chore here). However I DID have brunch with my father and his girlfriend/partner (hmmm Stoney what do I call you?? -live in spiritual advisor??). We haven't talked for a while and it was really good to do that! They were ale to help me with floor plans and lessons learned from their experiences building in the boonies!
We sign (and pay for) our land tomorrow. Four acres for cash and the remaining 15 on a land contract with Mr Nice Farmer. Saturday we are getting together with the builder. The loan officer (construction loan) will be out of town until after Easter, so hopefully we can have drawings submitted to her the first or second week of April so she can begin the process of securing our construction loan. That process will take 3-4 weeks. Even thinking positively it will be middle May before funds are released for us to build. Garage and well first, then list house. Whew.

Thursday mornings we do Dr meetings at work. They always depress me. It should be a collaborative team building session, but increasingly I'm finding myself wanting to not be on this team. The most meaning I am getting from work lately is the paycheck, it's a nice paycheck and interesting work most of the time -but the small animal-pets as children -best medicine model is crushing me. I want to help people by helping their pets not cover my ass all the time.
Acck, time to knead some bread, open the windows and let the spring air blow through the house.
Kris

Sprouting!

2010-03-22T08:08:00.004-05:00

The 160 lbs of potatoes we stored in the basement root cellar (ie closet) are sprouting; some just a little, others alot!

Time to use 'em or loose 'em. Sunday I peeled, sliced about 1/4 inch thick with the mandolin slicer (-best $30 I ever spent!) and dehydrated about 3 quart bags full of finished product (plus a large crock of scalloped potatoes for supper later this week). I read many different techniques for avoiding brown dried slices. I noticed that of the 4 potato varieties in our cellar-one was consistently more brown than the others-problem is I don't know which one. I can say for sure the Yukon Golds did NOT brown with this method...

Peel potatoes, place immediately into pot with salt and lemon juice added. Dump dirty water (I didn't wash potatoes prior to peeling), refill with salt and lemon juice. Slice and immediately put slices back into pot, have small helper feel around bottom of pot to find all hidden whole potatoes! Rinse to get rid of lemon juice (no SOUR slices!). Place on dehydrator racks (110 degrees for about 4 hours ??) until crisp.
It didn't take many potatoes to fill up our 4 rack American Harvest dehydrator. I see this being a project which I repeat every few weekends! I also see the need for a solar powered dehydrator to store the much increased garden produce I have planned :)

Unstuck

2010-03-21T16:39:00.003-05:00

Unstuck in a big way. Friday I finished the artwork I blogged about last time. My art=life metaphor followed suit. On Friday I met with the attorney to finish the land contract stuff-we will be signing on the dotted line next week! This weekend I was finally able visualize what the garden for this year would look like and I sat down with my seed packets to draw out the garden plan. DH finished the grow light/seed starter/potting bench unit (I promised to devote a post to his {carpentry and design} prowess later this week). 'IF' has been replaced by 'WHEN'.

Finish What You Start

2010-03-17T08:17:00.005-05:00

I have a problem finishing things. I love to see the possibilities in things. But sometimes when you finish they are crap; all possibility is gone, the potential is never realized.

This winter I began art lessons-one hour a week with my Mom. I am a pretty talented amateur artist in my medium of choice-charcoal. I have been wanting to try something with vibrant color, so we began working with oil pastels. At first I felt as if I was coloring with my kid's crayons, but I have stuck with it and am on the verge of creating what I would consider art (something which would give me pleasure to hang on my own walls). But I have frozen, I don't know how to go forward without wrecking the potential.

This is the metaphor for my life right now; on the verge and afraid to go forward-what if the reality doesn't live up to expectations, what if I really suck at this? What if I never try-that would be the worst. This is a piece of art I will finish (both the pastel and our homestead attempt), even if it is not a magnificent piece of art -it is me trying and not giving up.

Some of my previous art-currently gracing the walls of our home:

In other news: we may be land owners next week!! Now I can START to think about calling the real estate agent, well driller, and the building contractor. I also let the bunnies have a 'date'. We should have a litter of Florida Whites in 30 days. The female got very fat over the winter-I guess the girls were doing a very good job in feeding her. A fat bunny doesn't usually have sizable litters-hmm we will see what happens. I figure her litter will be about 6 weeks old when school gets out for the summer and we move to the camper on the land, they should be able to handle the stress of a move at that age. Spring is here-I'm just not quite ready for it.

Master Baking Mix

2010-03-14T09:32:00.003-05:00

Good Morning!
Following in the Real Food Challenge theme, today at Homemakers Who Work, I have a post about creating a store of Master Baking Mix. A nice Sunday project to make your week go a little smoother!

Kris

Dumping the 'have to's'

2010-03-13T09:27:00.006-06:00

The snow is nearly gone, the sap is running, we are having consistent highs in the 50's. My blood is singing with thoughts of planting pasture, baby chicks and the Grass Works Family Farm. The land purchase contract is agreed upon. We are now working on a maintenance agreement for the driveway. The land we are purchasing sits back 800 feet from the road. We are buying a strip of driveway 800ft x 33ft. This will satisfy county code requirements and allow us to build on this 20 acres. The problem is the easement; the driveway the only point on ingress/egress for the neighbor to the north (Mr Nice Farmer's Dad). He has 160? acres of farmland adjacent to us which he leases for manure spreading and crops. We will share our driveway with a stready stream of heavily loaded manure tank trucks for 2-3 days each spring and fall, as well as the ginormous tractors, combines, etc which go along with big ag.

We thought long and hard about this before offering to buy this land. We are choosing to move out here and will not protest the realities of country living. It's only a few days each year. However if we build a driveway so my little Saturn can navigate the snowcovered hill- these trucks will squash it(the driveway -hopefully not the Saturn!). So we are working on an agreement that basically says if you break it, you fix it back up.

Part of me is really hoping they will just say-aw heck, lets just forget this fussy driveway and create a new track on the other side of the field. It's not a deal breaker but it sure would be nice! We are already planning a thick brushy row of trees and grasses to serve as a visual barrier/wildlife corridor/manure run off barrier.

I have also realized that I cannot try to think about selling house/building house until the land deal is done. That is PART of what was driving me off the deep end. Too many 'what if's'. Land first, then house stuff, then career stuff.

Ruth and Ms Effie both mentioned career choices (in their own unique ways!) as a way to a healthier mind and body. For the past year I have been allowing myself to picture alternate career paths. I am becoming resentful of the responsibility my career in its current form entails, it is too much pressure for me. I sometimes want to scream when I hear the phone ring or hear the door chimes ring-GO AWAY, I can't fix anymore problems, I'm empty, I have nothing left for you. Not a good feeling. When I am 'full' I love to help people; it gives me such pleasure.

I will find that happy place where my life is not full of should and have to but want to and love to.

Still Kicking

2010-03-12T13:00:00.002-06:00

I'm still here, still kicking. It was a rough week but I am on the up-turn. I need to use the correct terminology, it wasn't a funk, it's not moodiness, it's not SAD, or pre-menopause; the correct word is depression. There, I said it, I suffer from depression. Not every day,not every week, sometimes I am unaffected for months and months-but it is a part of me every single day, like my left-handedness or freckles. I need to acknowledge it and take steps to prevent it from taking over.
That is all for today. Back to your regularly scheduled programming tomorrow :)

Funk

2010-03-04T08:18:00.004-06:00

*** Nothing to see here folks just some blog venting instead of seeking professional help-ha***

I am in a funk (again), this is such a recurrent theme for me. I'm up, I'm down; repeat weekly, daily, even hourly. While this is a pretty normal thing for me,this yo-yoing up and down feels like it has been increasing in amplitude over the past few (years?)(months?).
A few contributing factors:
*Realizing that I don't like being the boss. I'm an indian not a chief-or maybe it would be better if I was the chief of a smaller tribe :). Sorry not a very PC metaphor but it's all I got. Our clinic is growing and profitable but I do not feel connecting to it -it makes me tired and pays the bills. Although I do enjoy being 'somebody' in the community.
*I think I may be in pre-menopause. I have begun getting my period every 2 1/2 -3 weeks. Yuck. Along with the 'get out of my way I am having sugar RIGHT NOW' which accompanies above mentioned period. I will go in for my annual exam -i am overdue (by about 12 months!)
*Then there is the moving/lifestyle change we are attempting. Really won't it be the same lifestyle just with a longer commute, a new school district, and fewer neighbors/resources to draw from. I am seeing that our vision for this place hinges on one of us being home alot, can we afford that? What if our house doesn't sell, how long can we pay two mortgages (indefinitely-IF i work more-but that isn't the point).

I am being whiny and scared but this is REAL, not one of those glossy pie in the sky blogs. And I am a REAL person- not super mom, veterinarian of the year, blah blah blah.

Some pictures to make me smile and remember what this is all about:

It's working -feeling better already. These are all pictures of the things which are most important in my life. That is the hopefull idea I will hold on to, which will give my the courage to go forward and be brave!
Peace
Kris

Crockpot Yogurt at HWW

2010-03-03T10:38:00.003-06:00

Posted yesterday at HWW about making yogurt in the crockpot. I love it, the kids smile and roll their eyes at me. But it was fun growing stuff in my own kitchen. Oh, my poor OCD germ phobic mother! First the 'home-captures' sourdough starter now this!

Sandwich Bags and Yogurt

2010-02-27T19:15:00.005-06:00

Hero Glad.
Originally uploaded by hfabulous

I have been working on improving the lunches I send with my girls to school. We used to use hot lunch only, but I got fed up with the low quality of the food, all those preservatives, lots of salt, fat and HFCS. Now they make their own sandwiches with homemade whole wheat, local cheese and deli meat (or PB&J). I round out their lunches with different things: apple slices, string cheese, trail mix, or raisins for variety. We also use alot of yogurt in lunches (kids AND parents!). We started with Yoplait-in the little containers, more dessert than anything else. I have been sneakily switching to the fruit on the bottom stuff-trying to get all of our tastebuds accustomed to something closer to real yogurt. (As an aside the other cool thing about the yogurt is we freeze them and they double as an ice pack for the lunch!). In conjunction with the Real Food Challenge, today I am going to make homemade yogurt in the crock pot. Then add a bit of frozen strawberries (or strawberry freezer jam), and put the yogurt into individual glass jars (4oz Ball canning jars) for our lunches. Bye, bye HFCS and plastic container. Now I just hope the yogurt turns out and that everyone finds it tastey!

Oh yeah, the funny story...instead of ziplock sandwich bags, I bought the fold-top kind. Apparently these are dinosaurs from another age (like me ;D ). My kids were mystified. 'Where is the closey thing? How will the sandwich stay in? Mom, how do these work?' I had to give them a lesson on How To Use A Fold-Top Sandwich Bag. First the typewriter, then the walkman, now sandwich bags...

They Are Gone

2010-02-26T08:27:00.002-06:00

They have left.
The house is quiet.
I am alone.
What a relief.
I love my husband and children dearly, but I so need this time.
Alone.
A weight lifts, responsibility receeds.
Without this time I become someone not myself.

Cup
Originally uploaded by subsetsum

Giveaway Time

2010-02-23T07:04:00.004-06:00

Hurray...it's free stuff. At Homemakers Who Work we are giving away a prize! Many of our authors have contributed prize items in return for feedback. We would like to know what we can do to improve our site. What can we do to improve the content or the layout to make it a must-read for YOU. Entries close at 5pm on Feb 28th.
My conribution is a homemade wooden sign 'Live Simply' on one side and 'Kindness Matters' on the other.
I feel a little strange about being a part of this group-I am not a foodie, or a super-woman, or even a very good house-keeper (ssshh-don't tell). I learn as much as I contribute there.

Real Food Safety

2010-02-21T21:18:00.004-06:00

(Just a random-real food picture. I've got summer on the brain)

We watched Food, Inc this weekend. I have to say I was not that impressed. For someone who has read a couple of Salatin's books and Micheal Pollin's work-it was all old hat. Intersting that it was rated R. My Dad and sister were concerned that I was allowing my 11 and 7 year old to watch-but the old R stuff was what happens inside the meat processing plants. I don't consider that R rated-just real life.

A more moving video was Life According to Monsanto. It literally blew me away. If Monsanto is half as evil as this producer make them out to be...first it made me want to cry and then made me so mad-mad at multinationals who place profit above humanity, mad at our government who is supposed to be there for US but is instead placing the fox in charge of the hen-house. 90% of our soybeans are now GMO 'round-up ready' and 70% of the processed food in your grocery store contains GMO food ingrediants-with no labeling and no real safety testing. I am seeing red just thinking about it.

In other fun news, we helped my DH's gandfather celebrate his 100th birthday today. His kids threw him a big party. He is amazing; still living in his own home, cooking for himself, doing his own laundry, no walker or wheelchair. Happy birthday grandpa Carl!

I'd Like To Scream

2010-02-18T16:13:00.003-06:00

We have the contract and title insurance in hand and today I met with an attorney who specializes in land contracts. It turns out Mr Nice Farmer failed to mention that he does owe quite a bit of money to the bank on this piece of land, there were all sorts of verbal promises made about upkeep of the driveway which did not make it into the written contract. So now I get to call him back and ask him WHAT THE HELL WERE YOU THINKING?.

Join the Food Revolution

2010-02-18T04:49:00.002-06:00

Another post today at Homemakers Who Work about food! Reject the commercial slop passed off as food, you deserve so much more.
Kris

Grass Works Family Farm

2010-02-14T08:09:00.010-06:00

Begin with the end in mind...I don't know exactly where this will END but within the next 5-7 years we would like to be living a very different lifestyle. This will be the home of our retirement, the homestead which we will bequeath to our children.

What are we hoping to find in the country? The first is space -both physical and emotional. To get away from such close proximity to the consumer rush, to watch the sun rise and set on land in our stewardship. Personally it is also a test; a way to gauge and build my grit and gumption. I have always been the smart one, good at reading, comprehending and taking tests. This has gotten me far in my life, but I wonder, do I have what it takes to thrive and persevere when things get tough? Take me out of the office- can I cut it? A measure of self sufficiency is important to us-food as well as power. That will certainly not happen in this home, we are too comfortable here with the status quo.

We plan to create the Grass Works Family Farm as a small business this spring. Admittedly the first years will be significantly in the red but that is part of the plan-the losses will help negate some of the (taxable) profits from my small business. We plan to market pasture raised meat chickens (Freedom Rangers). The first summer we will only be able to raise one run for immediate family; but by 2011 we should have some kinks worked out and be able to direct market (we have some ideas for that too).

We have been reading alot about rotational grazing this winter and it is our goal to stay within a permaculture model. Allow chickens to be chickens and cows to be cows, let them do the work! To get by with the least amount of physical struggle and capital investment. Instead of bullying the earth with equipment to use our minds and our creativity to achieve our desired outcome. Hence to farm name: Grass Works.

Nineteen acres of beautiful productive grass pasture for pastured meat and layer chickens, a dairy goat or two, the Norwegian Fjord horse. Field rows of native oak, crab apple and other food and cover for wildlife. A large garden from which we can feed ourselves, a garden for medicinal and culinary herbs. The orchard and small fruits, such as grapes and blueberries. All very idyllic, no? What about jobs, property taxes, health insurance, college saving for the kids, and let's not forget the 5 months of winter in wonderful Wisconsin!

For this story-book ending to happen we need to do a couple of things. In the next year or two one of us needs to stop working outside the home(stead). We are both pretty well paid professionals, we have a nice income but also alot of debt (student loans, loan for purchase of business). We need to pay down our debt to allow one of us to devote time to the farm business. If this is to be more than a hobby farm one of us will need to not be working outside the home. If worked full time I would have the higher income but DH has the health insurance. Is is a good problem to have in these times. We have so much to learn about food storage, gardening, livestock, real cooking, and oh how I could go on... it is exciting and a more than a little daunting, but it is REAL now, no longer a dream.

Hello Old Friends

2010-02-13T09:36:00.006-06:00

I can feel the sunshine flowing through my veins, waking up my sleepy brain. I uderestimate the effects of the long dark winter on my psyche. My focus turns inward, to the bare necessities, and just placing one foot in front of the other. I am sitting in the east bay window letting the morning sun pour over my face, ahh, warmth and awakening.

Things are becoming REAL on the future farm front, we had a successful soil test performed last fall-for a mound septic system, the land was surveyed and the stacks of old ginseng rafters disposed of. The purchase contract is in the mail to us as I type.

We are buying 4 acres plus a 800' x 33' driveway easement for $3,000 an acre. This is a little higher than the $2,000 to 2,500 which seems to be average for farm land in this area-but it is adjacent to dad's 40 acres and that was important to us. We will also have a land contract for the remaining 15 acres of farmfield at the same price at 3% interest for 10 years, with the option to pay off early.

This is a little convoluted but the bank assessed the property at $2,000 an acre which meant to get a bank loan we would have needed to place %15 percent down PLUS the $19,000 dollar difference between assessed value and purchase price. We decided to buy the building site and driveway outright to make the bank happy when we do the construction loan and final mortgage, and Mr. Nice Farmer will finance the remaining 15 acres at a very NICE interest rate while allowing us full use of the acerage. Now all we have to do is live in our camper while the house is built, sell our current house and start the girls in a new school!

(Picture from last fall-view towards the south-the house will go about 100 feet down this south facing slope with a view of Dad's woods-to the left of this shot- and slough.)

More tomorrow about my ideas for the farm!

New Additions

2010-01-31T18:55:00.004-06:00

The story goes like this...we have been experiencing a very frigid run of weather with wind chills in the minus twenties, when a delivery driver at DH's work told him about a pair of cats he was worried about. He typically parked his big truck and ate lunch in this vacant cul-de-sac between a wetland and a strip mall, and for the past few days he has been seeing these two cats. DH called me and asked if there was anything that could be done to prevent them from freezing to death. Well, of course! My mom and I drove out there with a plastic storage container and some lunch meat. It was cold! We could see the kitty prints in the snow and the sandwich the nice truck driver had left them, but no cats. Mom thought she heard a meow, so I go off walking in the field and there they were-curled up together on the south side of a snow drift. Friendly little things, or maybe just too cold to be cautious. We scooped them up and brought them home with every intention or taking them to the Humane Society.

We have been a pet-less family for more than 15 years (unless you count Oscar the iguana)because of DH's allergies and asthma. Our 7yr old also seems to be mildly allergic -getting red weepy eyes if she rubs her eyes with 'catty hands'. So when I called DH at work and half jokingly said 'Awww, can we keep them?', to my surprise 'yes' was the response-with a qualification about allergies.

The girls named them Shadow and Sunny and they are adjusting very well -I am sure they were house cats previously. So far no problems from my DH and only one episode of red eyes from Lizzy. It is strange having a cat to just pet and warm my lap-I don't have to poke or prod, or figure out why they are itching/vomiting/pooping in the laundry etc. They are pretty great little cats! Now to figure out what to do with them this summer when we are living in the middle of a field in our camper :)

Screwed

2010-01-22T07:33:00.002-06:00

Yesterday the American public got fucked, how was it for you? I feel a little weird just typing the F-word, but there is no other way for me to really express how mad I am. You see, yesterday our supreme court ruled that the government may not ban political spending by corporations in candidate elections. It is 'a vindication of the First Amendment's most basic free speech principle'. Upholding free speech sounds very noble and good. Except corporations are not freaking people! Corporations do not have the guaranteed right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, they do not have opinions to express. Corporations exist for one purpose and one purpose only-to make money. The idea that Kraft or BP has the right to free speech is so ludicrous I can't even believe this case made it to the highest court in our nation. If the entire board of Monsanto wants to give to an election campaign -that's great, if they wish to encourage their employees to do the same -go for it! But a corportation or union needing First Amendment protection-get real! Maybe we should just get it over with and sell naming rights for our federal buildings--we could have the ExxonMobile Capitol Building, and Citibank White House. Then we would at least have some of the much lauded transparency in politics.

Well, I feel a little better for ranting. The American public will know slick advertising when they see it and use their head to form their own opinions.... hmmm, on second thought- we really are screwed.

Icky Pictures of My Floor (or What I Did On My Day Off)

2010-01-20T10:14:00.003-06:00

Nasty grout, eh? We have lived in this house for 7 years and while I wash the floors (fairly) frequently, I have NEVER really scrubbed them. Last week the kitchen 'zone' received some extra attention. I cleaned out the fridge and cleaned grout! I researched the grout part a bit and came up with using 'oxygen bleach' as a cleaner. I don't know how environmentaly safe it is but it's been 7 years, so I went with it. I picked up some OXY-Clean from the grocery store (the stuff you use in the laundry) dissolved 1/4 cup in a gallon of hot water and filled the grout channels with the solution. I did scrub a little with a stiff brush at 0min, 30 minutes and then a good scrub at 60 minutes. All the crap that came up was truely GROSS. Then a really wet mop to get all the dirt off the floors and into the sink. Voila! the kitchen floor looks great (now for the rest of the tiled floors... (entry, hall to the bedrooms, rest of kitchen to back door) I think I am going to just do the darkest stuff and try to 'blend' to the fairly clean edges of the less traveled portions of the floor!!

Gratitude

2010-01-16T05:35:00.004-06:00

************CAUTION: This is one of my long introspective wanderings in which I chronicle some insight to my psyche, really important for me to document and explore but boring as hell for everyone else!

I had a horrendous week (or two) at work, I felt as if every thing I touched failed and I know I could do, I have to do better for myself and for my patients. I have really been struggling with my career in the past 5 years since buying a portion of the clinic, I really do not enjoy being the boss. There was some non-existent communication between the other owner and myself which has led to alot of resentment on my part-mostly financial expectations not met. This has been spilling over into the part of my job I am so in love with-the clinical hands-on with people and their pets. I have developed a bad attitude and a whiny, 'poor me' the victim outlook. I haven't been taking my job as seriously as I should in a lot of different ways and last week was my wake-up call. Our clinic is moving forward and earning a reputation for high quality work; I need to be an enthusiastic participant or walk away. I refuse to hang on grumbling and digging in my heels.

I also realized how much of my image of myself is wrapped around being a veterinarian, that's not a big surprise -since the age of 17 that has been who I am or who I was training to be. Now 20+ years later it is part of me; part of what is valued about me. There are alot of self-worth issues here. I have value because of my profession-if I gave this up what would I be? An overweight stay-at-home mom who likes to garden? (don't yell at me-I am just exploring). My perception of self worth also affects what happens in the exam room. Thoughts of I am no good-what I do doesn't have value, the client will not accept treatment for xx dollars, results in a low estimate which means I am constrained to only performing x, when the cat really needs x AND y, so I do x and y but do not bill for y so I can stick to my estimate. (hmmm, remember what i said about financial expectation not being met?)

I just paid my computer guy $75 per hour to debug my laptop, I didn't blink-so why do I cringe when I bill someone $125 per hour to remove a corn cob from their dog's small intestines. In addition to my time, I am paying for a vet tech and expensive monitoring and anesthetic equipment. As a surgeon my time is worth that (and then some) but as me -kris- am I worth that? (Again the intertwining of professional and personal worth) I cringe and hand over the bill and guess what ? The client doesn't blink.

BLAH, BLAH, BLAH-long story short. I will use some of my 'off work' time to work-read journals, stay current on new drugs and surgical techniques. Keep the passion high for the clinical stuff. The owner stuff, well it pays the bills, I may sell after we have moved and built, but I won't let the victim just roll over and be passive about it. I will practice gratitude. Thank you for the opportunity to help people, thank you for the opportunity to use my mind, thank you for the income to live comfortably, thank you for the opportunity to improve and take pride in what I do. I can't tell you how much lighter and clearer I feel after figuring these things out, letting go of the resentment and replacing it with gratitude was absolutely liberating.

Bad Virus

2010-01-09T16:45:00.002-06:00

My laptop has some bad spyware and I will be down for awhile.
Hope to be back next week some time. I am missing all you guys!

Not A Sucker

2010-01-05T21:16:00.002-06:00

Pandemic, what pandemic? Have you heard about this? I happened across this entirely by accident and I don't think it has picked up any coverage by mainstream media here. I guess ABC and CBS do not want to loose all those advertising dollars from the drug pushers. This just makes me sick. Yet another reason to be a skeptic. I sure am glad I didn't have my kids (or self) vaccinated for H1N1, but now I know why the whole thing felt too much like a high pressure used car sales pitch, and following my gut instinct in the future will be a little easier.
My question now is this- in the future when there REALLY is a infectious disease threat how can we trust, who do we trust? Certianly not those who stand to profit by cramming drugs down our throats.
There is a sucker born every minute-but it is not ME.

Stocking Up

2010-01-03T17:37:00.009-06:00

With this wonderful long weekend today felt like a 'freebie' kind of day. We used the time to do a little prep work. We had 15 bantie chicken carcasses in the freezer which were looking a little freezer burned, Tom and I worked hard on those guys (see this post) and were not about to allow them to go to waste. Time for stock! These little birds could not have weighed more than 3#, feathers and all. Being a couple years old, pretty stringy, not for roasting but the flavor is incomparable for soup stock, hands down the best I have ever tasted.

Banties in the orchard -with the big beautiful rooster (unknown breed!)

We cooked the 12 chickens in 2 batches with just onion, garlic, salt and whole peppercorns, using the canner as a soup pot.

After allowing them to cool a little - stripped the breast meat and some of the bigger pieces of leg/thigh. Good enough for chicken salad or in casserole but not great as a stand alone ingredient!

The liquid was poured off through a colander to cool and
allow some of the fat to be skimmed off.

Two cups of stock to a freezer bag (one ladle = 1/2 cup for me) and out to my walk in freezer :) ** Total for the day: approx 20 two cup portions.

Thank you little chickens.

My Plan

2010-01-01T16:48:00.003-06:00

As noted in my previous post-I have been craving structure in my life. This fall I feel as though I am wandering rather aimlessly. No real purpose other than getting through the days and weeks-which is a good thing -but I am capable of more! I have flashes of brilliant motivation and lofty ideas, followed by days and weeks of dull just treading water. Just treading water would be easier if I didn't have these tantalizing flashes of this creative, energized alter-ego; a bit manic depressive, wouldn't you say?? Part of what (I hope) will set me back on track is some structure in my life. Most of my life has been structured- school, more school, then work. I am now a part-timer and I don't seem to be handling the extra time very well now that there is not a garden to care for. Or perhaps it is the lack of sunlight --note to self --pick up a UV light for desk lamp!
So my Plan (or system as one HWW reader termed it -thank you! i like that much better) My system revolves around a couple things 1) work outs at the Y (or basement if I'm late) from 5-6am M-Sat. 2) dividing the house into 'zones' ala the FlyLady and spending 15 minutes at a time working in the 'zone' for the week 3) a daily schedule- ex. each thursday is meal planning, grocery shopping and desk time, fridays will include a painting lesson -yep something fun for ME, and a weight watchers meeting. I hope that with some sort of continuity to my schedule that I will retain some autonomy (as much as a Mom can have!) to my time instead of revolving around the schedules of others.

Fun things for today- I finished browsing through a couple 'small house' books from the library and am re-energized about working on floor plans. All my potential plans had been abandoned to a folder for the past month, the creative juices are flowing now! What else... have been reading about raw food diet and while not convinced than live enzymes really get past the gastric acid, and not really convinced that live enzymes will dramatically change my health or my energy levels, I am willing to put more raw food into my diet I would also like to eat less wheat-(that may change the flatulence issues my entire household has!) Does anyone have good resources for no wheat bread? I also ordered a Diva Cup today-hurray I have been meaning to do that for, what, a year?
Can you say manic?

I Need Structure

2009-12-31T10:01:00.003-06:00

I have a post today at Homemakers Who Work about routine and getting back to a schedule. My Plan to get back on track...

Sans Microwave

2009-12-31T05:40:00.003-06:00

Three weeks ago our microwave bit the dust. My gut reaction was to moan and groan and then check the sales fliers for a good deal, but instead we decided to try going without. Initially it was very hard, I mean how else do you warm up a cup of coffee, or make a couple Morning Star sausage links for breakfast? Microwave popcorn, quick defrost of meat, melt white 'chocolate' for our traditional xmas pretzels?

However humans are adaptable creatures and thrive under adverse conditions! I have learned that warming water for tea is almost as fast on the stove, taking meat out ahead of time is a wonderful thing, the stove *gasp* works great for breakfast links, and we don't eat the prepackaged 'must microwave' stuff anyway-except sometimes for lunches at work. I think we will try the old fashioned popcorn in a kettle tonight (with REAL butter) for a new years treat. I will need another small sauce pan to make this work long term.

We have decided to go without -our future (off grid?) home will be small and spare; cutting back on electricity use and the extra clutter of bulky appliances is how we explained the situation to our curious mom-in-law but maybe it was just plain old contrariness-I'll never tell!

Winter Walk

2009-12-23T07:46:00.005-06:00

This weekend my husband and I ditched the children :) and took a much needed woods walk. It was about 15 degrees but sunny and no wind. I had my new Carharts and was ready to roll! We walked our newly surveyed 20 acres and then slipped into Dad's adjacent woods. It was a great work-out! I didn't think we had enough snow to warrant the snow shoes but we forgot what the wind does out there. The sun and the sweat and the dream of things to come were just what we both needed!

An 'island' of grass with lots of mouse activity

Birds in the fencerow

Rabbits

Raccoon!

GOT MILK?

2009-12-18T09:04:00.007-06:00

Following this link from Homemakers Who Work? Sorry-I have a sick kid today--I will write a nice (maybe naughty) post this afternoon! Check back soon. Kris

This week I received an e-mail from my state professional association, it was a copy of an email sent to MY state legislators informing them that WI veterinarians are against the raw milk bill. What? When did I say that? Did I miss some poll? The e-mail got me going for several reasons. I am FOR raw milk; at least give us, the unthinking masses the chance to choose. I am also paying association dues to be misrepresented. The WVMA (and national AVMA) is also very much for NAIS--another topic you do not want to get me started on! The threshold has been broken-I am ticked, these blog rants are a way for me to blow off a little steam before I settle down and write a good logical, professional(but still mad) letter to the WVMA.

Wisconsin is agriculture. In fact the county in which I live used to be known for having more Holsteins than humans! Due to historically low milk prices (something on the order of $0.84/gallon) to the farmer-they are bleeding red ink this year. A combination of declining milk exports and high prices for feed have created an estimated 'average' loss of $47 per cow each month. Farms are going out of business (which by the way does not mean less milk produced-someone buys and milks those cows), which means people loosing their livelihoods, their retirement equity, and in most cases their homes. Farmers are not eligible for unemployment benefits.

The whole and local food movement has created a demand for raw unprocessed milk. Dairymen who sell milk fresh from the farm can make $4-7 per gallon, a living wage-unfortunately this is illegal in WI. The bill in front of the State would allow class A dairies to apply for a raw milk permit and legally sell unprocessed-straight from the cow milk, without being held liable for possible damages-unless obviously negligent. Bonus-they can pay their mortgage, pay their bills, and have something left over for retirement.

Yes, you can get sick from raw milk. It's going to happen. Listeria, brucella, e. Coli, Q fever-there are all sorts of nasties which can live and multiply in milk. But wouldn't you rather have permitted farms selling milk or black-market, under the table sales? To have a raw permit-the dairies should have scheduled bulk tank sampling and cultures, a Johne's negative herd. It is a win-win situation. People get the product they want, the state gets permit revenues, the farmer gets a financially viable business ( and oh yeah large animal DVM's have increased revenue from the additional testing as well as farmer who can actually pay their bills each month!)

The milk safety issue is an interesting one. There is the acute illness we can see and measure when there is a local outbreak of gastrointestinal disease, this is (relatively) easy to lay blame on contaminated milk (or peanut butter or spinach). But what about the chronic health problems which lead from a life-time of eating processed, dead foods? There is no way to measure something like that. As a person of Northern European descent, I believe my body is more capable of dealing with the occasional bacterium in a traditional food like whole milk than in highly processed dead food. I trust eons of natural selection and symbiosis over 100 years of 'progress'. Which is the safer food? Food scientists are really smart and we have come a long way, but I don't think we have come close to understanding the subtlety and complexity of nutrition.

Come on Wisconsin-at least pretend you care about your farmers more than you cater to agribusiness.

Some links to look at for more info www.realmilk.com http://rally4rawmilk.blogspot.com/

A Health Care Muddle

2009-12-15T20:55:00.003-06:00

Is health care a constitutionally protected right? Is it right up there with life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness? Do we have a responsibility to provide the same level of health care to everyone across the board? Or is health care something you earn; work hard, take responsibility for your own life, don't have kids until you can afford them, etc. The price I pay for being a Libra is I can see both sides of the argument. Both have merit. I fall somewhere in the middle I suppose, but all the shades of grey are difficult-it would be so much easier if things were black and white.
In theory I am a survival of the fittest kind of gal, and while supporting the weakest member of a society is good for those weak individuals it is bad for the society as a whole in the long run. Sorry if that is offensive, but I am too much of the Darwinian biologist to think any other way. I do not believe access to health care is something our society is mandated to provide to every member of society, but I would support health care for every child under the age of 18 yrs. I would also support a national health care pool from which you could not be excluded based on pre-existing conditions. But not free. Free is not free, free means people with income pay for those without. I have worked very hard for a long time and would rather not support someone who has made poor choices and screwed around with his /her life. There are all sorts of extenuating circumstances though-mental illness for example.
It is all just a muddy mess. What sort of solutions do you see?

After the Snow

2009-12-13T07:26:00.005-06:00

We are one of only a few households without a snow blower in our NC Wisconsin neighborhood. I'm not sure if it is stubbornness or frugality (actually I am sure it is a healthy dose of BOTH), but we have resisted buying an expensive noisy beast.
We only get a handful of big heavy snows each winter, the remainder comes in 1-3 inch increments-easily handled with a shovel, the only kicker is the snowplow leavings across the driveway.
Last week we received 11.5 inches of snow-it was light and fluffy but still a lot of material to move...enter our best friend after a big snow-the snow scoop.

We have a double lot on a corner which translates to a block worth's of sidewalk! So I love this thing, no lifting the snow. I can push it with my body if my arms get tired, and even when full loaded with heavy snow it is easy to 'drive' it up a snowbank then a quick jerk backwards deposits the snow.

The south side done-only wide enough for one person and a dog-good enough!

Second half to go-down to the telephone pole,this is the second time through-after the winds stopped!

Stepping off a Cliff ?

2009-12-10T20:07:00.005-06:00

The enormity of what we are doing is sinking in. It is one thing to sit around the campfire and say "let's move to the country" after a beautiful summer day of gardening and hiking and playing. Another thing entirely to consider 5 long months of snow and wind and darkness. To be confronted daily with mother nature at her fiercest and most beautiful; to realize that as an individual (or even as a species)that I am NOT special, that I AM vulnerable, that my survival depends on how well prepared I am.
I admit I got a little weirded-out driving out to the property last week with -20 wind chill to meet the surveyors. I had to borrow my hubbies 4 wheel drive(to make it up the -plowed- driveway). I also had to borrow his Carhart's because I don't have decent warm clothes. I was feeling a little over my head. But I accept this challenge. We can do this-our family does not belong in town anymore-we have outgrown it.
The land purchase is going forward. Since we have agreed to the land price, Mr. Nice Farmer is working very hard to be sure we hit no other snags. We should be finalized around the end of the month!

Woulda-Coulda-Shoulda

2009-12-10T19:41:00.002-06:00

All the Woulda-Coulda-Shouldas layin' in the sun,
Talkin' 'bout the things
They woulda-coulda-shoulda done...
But those Woulda-Coulda-Shouldas
All ran away and hid
From one little did

I've been full of shouldas and wouldas,
Thanks Shel Silverstien for showing me the way

Garden Plans (and snow)

2009-12-09T09:15:00.006-06:00

The view towards the rabbit hutches: the girls have been making trails :)

My poor little car!

We have been hit with snow like the rest of the midwest, maybe 8 inches? It is hard to tell with the drifting. The wind shifted to the north last night and the poor bunnies nest box opening face north-they had a bit of snow in their little houses. We got the plastic up for them this morning! I have been pretty complacent with this long mild fall.

Tom has been reading 'The Good Life' by helen and scott nearing. I read it a while ago and got it out to re-read part again...We were both struck by their sense of order and doing things the 'right' way. Their disciplined approach appeals to both of us-something to file away for future use. Tom is interested in being more involved in the garden this year! I would love that-it is good to work TOGETHER on something.

With a couple of months of eating foods we have grown and stored, I have a better idea of what works for our family. The dehydrated carrots are WONDERFUL for casseroles and soups. We certainly want to plan for more carrots -planted in succession, next year. The frozen green beans have also been really good in casseroles and soups. I don't think you can beat dried beans for ease of growth and storage. More varieties next year! The sun dried tomatoes in oil are little treasures too. We certainly need to get the solar food drier running next year.

The 150 Lbs of potatoes are doing well. We dug them up too early and some are beginning to show some sprouting activity. The yellow onions are fine in the basement closet too. (Don't try to store red ones!)

I can hardly wait for the seed catalogs to start arriving!

Tomorrow I pull out the snow shoes and 'supervise' the surveying. It has gotten more complicated now that we are buying a 4+ acre portion and creating a 15 acre 'sublot' to put on the land contract; more fees to pay the county government.

Don't 'Fall Down the Stairs'

2009-12-07T16:57:00.001-06:00

The Christmas tree is up; snow is on the way (up to one foot of the stuff!), we have a cookie baking extravaganza planned for next weekend and guess what? It’s beginning to feel like Christmas! Finally.
I have a bad attitude about eating on a diet, this weekend I ate grilled cheese sandwiches (homemade sourdough-mmm!) and eggnog with no regrets! My co-worker gave me a great quote “just because you tripped down a couple stairs, don’t throw yourself down the rest of the stairway”. Something to that effect, anyway. She’s right-and she should know-- she has lost 57 lbs. with WW and exercise. I almost didn’t go to workout this morning; I was grumpy and ugly. Then I reminded myself that it wasn’t optional. I am working on increasing my running (jogging) distances, gradually working up from 1minute jog, 1 minute walk, repeat. Today I ran a total of 0.8 miles. It isn’t pretty but I felt great doing it and the liberating thing about being (nearly) 40 is the complete and utter disregard I have for how I may look to others! It just doesn’t matter-I wish I could go back and give this peace and acceptance to myself at 17.
We were scheduled to have the land surveyed on Wednesday-it is supposed to be blizzard-like, if so it will be put off until next week. Nothing else to report here.

Mindful

2009-12-06T00:22:00.002-06:00

Today I have a post at HWW about mindfulness and living in the moment. Enjoy the holiday season, every moment!

Plant Sex

2009-12-04T13:04:00.006-06:00

No one guessed what the pictures in the previous post were...plant porn. Electron microscope photos of pollen enhanced with color. Once giftmas (oops christmas) is history-I will break out my old paints and see if they are all dried up or still usable! It's been years.

A helpful radio announcer reminded me that there is only 20 days until gift..christmas, I better order gifts for the girls. They have been circling and cutting out pictures from the catalogs we receive for months! Everyone else is covered, I think.

I have been working out 3-4 days per week. I feel great. The scale is not moving much (5#) but my blue jeans are much looser-as in I can pull them off without unbuttoning. Its something, I'll take it 5# at a time.

The land contract on our 20 acres is going forward. We will buy outright 4 acres plus the 33x800ft driveway, and write a contract with Mr Nice Farmer for the rest. The surveying will happen next week -to the tune of $1,000 ouch! The builder we will use is available for next summer. We will get together with him sometime in january to go over our scribbled plans.

I need to work on a post for tomorrow's Homemakers Who Work. I think I will talk about my personal hero the FlyLady...interested...come visit us there.

*WARNING_GRATUITOUS KID PICTURES*
(i don't think I posted these from this summer)

Erin before her first class--she's crazy nervous but it doesn't show

Lizzy on Beljit with trainer Liz Rice-Beula

2009-12-02T07:54:00.002-06:00

This weekend i participated in an Alternative Holiday market at the Universalist Unitarian Church. A group called the Simple Sustainable Living Network (SSLN) meets at he church and hosts the market. ArkWorks Farm had a table at the market and Dad-looking for a little moral support-invited me to market my primitive wood crafts there as well. Making these wooden signs has been a bit of a hobby over the past year-not technically challenging or particularly creative but they keep my fingers in the paint pot so to speak. All proceeds were to go to the local Women's Community Center-except I had no proceeds! A lot of looking but no buying. I am not crushed! Now I have plenty of christmas gifts to give away! I was happy with my quality of work, etc and it was fun to get out of my little world. Dad sold a few chickens and made alot of new contacts and reconnected with many old teacher colleagues. We were tabled right next to the farmer we buy our grass fed beef from and what a great guy-very serious about his cattle and improving the his land. There may be a possibility of working with him in the future.

It was really important for me to get out of myself this weekend, i realized how self involved I have become-work, land, plans, family. Nothing else-nada. I need to get out more, raise my horizons. I really miss the SSLN people-we have not been meeting because everything had fallen to the 2 founders with no one else willing to take up the reins. Perhaps I can... I also missed the UU church -last winter I went to a few services and I think I will go back for more this winter.

Other fun things-I continue to wrestle with my career-I am so blessed to be able to be in a position to DECIDE how to make a living. Specialize or generalize. One of the reason I am balking at the direction of specialization and increased standards of care is I am not comfortable with an increased level of responsibility, I am afraid of being held to a higher standard and found inadequate. I am smart but not brilliant, I am a good veterinarian but not great-my strengths are empathy and compassion not logic. That is why I am afraid of the direction our clinic is headed-but perhaps my strengthss will be needed even more now.

I found these pictures in the recent National Geographic magazine (thanks Mom!)

They really stirred the artist in me. I may have to break out the acrylics again. I haven't felt the tug to paint in a long time but the color and shapes did something to me that I won't ignore. Do you know what they are?? I'll tell you next time!

Hiding Under the Covers

2009-11-29T21:15:00.003-06:00

Did your mom ever tell you 'if you don't have anything good to say...'? Well I've been pretty quiet lately for that very reason. Last week was one of those black times for me. It seems every few months around my period I have a few days where I just want to crawl under the covers, curl up and cry-for no particular reason. Or get under those covers with a big piece of chocolate and a book. I've been exercising regularly and not eating much sugar so I know those are NOT contributing factors. I think narcissism and depression are on opposite ends of a spectrum which is too self-involved. Both personalities focus inwardly-thinking only of themselves, but where the narcissist has these grandiose ideas and inflated self-worth, the depressed person is focused inwardly on their own misery and anxiety. Take these ideas for what they are worth, just some random thoughts.
I was on medication for post-partum depression 10+ years ago and hated the zombie deadness. No pain, but no joy either. I am generally a pretty buoyant person, I will take the few days of chocolate under the covers over steady state zombie any day.
I am coming back to myself now, hormones are normalizing and I was kicked out of my little cocoon of self-involvement to be an vendor at an Alternative Holiday Market. More on that later-i am still sorting through some ideas which have been planted in this fertile ground between my ears. (fertile or just full of shit-time will tell)

MOSES Conference

2009-11-22T15:38:00.005-06:00

Are any of you Midwestern readers going to the MOSES (midwest organic and sustainable education service) Organic Farming Conference in LaCrosse, WI this Febuary?? I just learned of this organization and (if we actually have a place to farm next year)DH and I would like to attend. They have a wonderful mentoring program for new organic farmers! I was just wondering if any of you Midwestern folks are going, it would be fun to meet you!

Specialist or Generalist?

2009-11-21T05:08:00.004-06:00

So I'm a bit of a doomer. These days if you haven't had an uneasy feeling about the future you must be completely sleepwalking through life-eyes wide shut. I have been waking up to the fact that the status-quo will change, has to change as we run out of cheap energy, as sea levels rise and human migration occurs. I have no idea when any of this will happen or how; will it be slow and orderly or an apocalyptic four horsemen type ordeal? I have written before about adapting being the key to making the best of changes/surviving an apocalypse. This is the background coloring my general take on the future -yeah, cheery.
I am approaching a crossroad in my career where I need to decide -specialist or generalist. Our clinic has been changing alot over the past year, the level of care has gone up, we are providing really quality medicine and looking to push our selves further-with the purchase of an ultrasound-Doppler flow so our ACVIM DVM can start doing cardiology consults along with standard abdominal US. I have to admit to coasting a bit in the last two years- I have not been burned out and not very focused on my career. If I wish to perform at MY self-expected level within this practice I have some work to do, focused continuing education, a big backlog of journals to digest- I have NO wish to be the practice owner who is years behind, medically speaking. Part of me is excited by this prospect-we have a great group of veterinarians and clients who would appreciate this level of care for their beloved babies. This is the route the industry tells us a 'healthy practice' should strive for; specialization and a high standard of care (along with a healthy bottom line).

But the flip side is that I am feeling increasingly uncomfortable about where we are headed. We can do X for your dog, it but should we? Human health care costs have spiraled so high, and I can see similar things happening to veterinary care (but minus the insurance issues!). I am legally obligated to inform a client about the 'standard of care' for a particular issue. With the advent of the Internet the standard of care for Smallsville Wisconsin is the same as that in the most affluent Manhattan neighborhood. I can't bear to see my clients wrestle with the idea that the best option for their pet's condition is a procedure or medication which is so far out of their reach financially, I can't bear to see them feel like a failure because they cannot afford the best care or even the second best care. But it has to be offered. Period. Even to little old ladies with rusted out barely running cars, who are already supporting their unemployed daughter in FL and has a diabetic 14 yr old cat who really needs a dental (sorry, she is one of my clients!)

With our (planned) move to our (planned) homestead next summer, I have the opportunity to re-think my career. Perhaps I should become a generalist. Instead of investing my time into brushing up on cutting edge small animal medicine, I should learn (or should I say re-learn) about beef cows, small ruminants, and chickens. Will the need shift away from animals as surrogate children and back to animals as tools for survival with-in my working lifetime? Will pharmaceuticals be available at a reasonable price for animals? Should I concentrate on husbandry -not letting them get sick in the first place-will people be willing to pay $ (or firewood) for that? Should I learn to be a veterinary herbalist and grow my own medicine. This is where I am leaning, it scares the crap out of me, honestly.

Thanks for reading my rambling-I need to put thoughts into words and paragraphs to see how they hit my 'gut'. In writing this out I can see where my heart is taking me. Now to figure out how to make it work and still pay the bills.
Kris

PS-Mr Nice Farmer is interested in pursuing the land contract (maybe he needs the money just a little bit more than he let on). We would buy outright the easement and the building site (maybe 4 acres?) and write a contract for the rest. That will make the bank happy, and me too!

Setbacks

2009-11-19T07:16:00.002-06:00

Setbacks-plural-as in more than one!

Setback number one: call from nice bank lady, the appraised value of the 20 acres is $40,000. Nice farmer wants no less than $3,000 per acre. If we want to proceed we will have to come up with the difference. Instead of the $7,500 down payment we were anticipating, we would have to cough up $27,500. Yikes. We have it, but it would not leave us much for a house. I am fairly certain nice farmer will not bring his price down, he has said this before. I am fairly certain we will not spend the lion's share of our hoarded savings on land down payment. Delaying the move into a more sustainable home/lifestyle is not something I am willing to do. I am anxious enough as it is about waiting until spring to build/sell our house. I continue to wonder when this house of cards we call an economy will come down around us. I worry about inflation and interest rates. I just plain worry. Time to think outside the box.

Setback number two: actually not a setback but a not moving forward. Less than 1 lb loss last week. I swam 4 times last week, but didn't keep track of food intake. My little shortcut was not helpful and I have learned a lesson. Write it ALL down and have a plan the night before. I was/am pissed for faltering but in a good-strengthening resolve kind of way. Lifting weights yesterday helped alot. I forgot how much I loved lifting, not I just need to find my old Powerman5000 and Metallica cassettes to put in my Walkman- ha, ha.

A New Week

2009-11-16T09:12:00.004-06:00

What a great morning! I am feeling very energized and optimistic. I just retruned from the YMCA -I swam for 30 minutes. I used their 'swim flippers' and felt like I got a much better work-out-more resistance for my leg muscles (plus going fast is much more fun). Once my endurance is better I will look into adult swimming lessons so I can be a 'real' swimmer :)

I have found myself sort of 'wandering' on my days off. When I am not working I don't really know what to do with myself. Garden is done, food storage is done, there are no 'fires' to put out. Not that my checkbook is balanced and the house is clean, etc but there is no emergency demanding my attention so I sort mess around here and fool around with that, not really accomplishing anything.

My solution is the start my FlyLady routines again. It you are a hopelessly disorganized, easily sidetracked kind of person (like me) adding these little routines to your days/weeks will help! I need to know what I have scheduled myself to do so I don't spend half the morning making lists and priorizing , etc, etc instead of just doing them (15 minutes at a time -you can do anything for 15 minutes !)

Another postive note. I have found my brain again! It has been at least 3 weeks since I have 'lost' my wallet (or keys, or fill-in-the-blank-here). This is a good thing I was worrying that I was an early Alzheimers candidate, but it was really just too much stress.