The Eggs Hatched!!

The eggs in the wreath on my front door have hatched! These little guys are so ugly they're cute. I will try to get pictures every couple of days so you can watch them grow with us. My kids will be so excited when they get home from their summer classes today.

Spring Cleanup

Yesterday was a beautiful day in Kansas so the family decided to get out and get some spring cleaning done in the garden and animal areas. I was so excited to finally get out and get my hands in the dirt after a long winter. I am still so thankful for the garden space the previous homeowner started. It makes getting the spring garden in this year so much easier. Just look at the great soil I get to work with. The only thing we added last fall was some old bedding we had saved from cleaning up from the chickens. Hopefully we will have a good year. 

While cleaning up the garden space we found lots of these onions growing that we did not plant. They must have been leftovers from the previous owner. I decided to go ahead and pull them to free up as much space as possible in our small garden.

We had plans to go ahead and expand the size of our garden this year, but we have not had a chance to get around to it. I may still go ahead with our plans...maybe. If I do I am sure the hens would be happy to pull their weight around here and clear an area for me if I pen them up where I want the new plot. They are great at their job. 

I told this little cutie I would pay her if she would help me pull some weeds that have already popped up. She was so excited to get to help, especially when I told her she could use the new gardening tool we inherited from my parents. Work is always more fun when you get to use a new toy. 

Ignore the mess behind her. Like I said it was cleaning day and there was stuff strung all over the place from the shed clean out. I am not sure if you can see or not, but we more then doubled the size of the chicken pen since we are not allowing them to free range as much as we have in the past. They were just too destructive in the garden last year. We will let them out if we need some clean up done. 

This is Olaf, our new puppy. We were told he is possibly part Greater Swiss Mountain dog. To be honest I am not sure what he is. The Humane Society can only give us their best guess. After looking up the breed he definitely has many of the behavior characteristics and markings. So far he has been a great guard dog and he just LOVES our kids. At 6 months old he already weighs 57 lbs! I think we have a potentially huge dog on our hands. I am excited to see how big he actually gets.

From my research this dog was bred to be a working dog. Unfortunately there is not a ton of herding to be done in my backyard. The website suggested we get him a doggie backpack to wear on walks to help him feel like he is helping. I think we will get one and see how it goes. This breed is also known for pulling carts. I am sure the kids will have no problem hooking him up to a wagon or sled in the winter so he can "help". 

The chickens were very excited about cleaning day. We kept finding lots of bugs and weeds to toss into their pen. 

                           

I have been wanting to get this shed cleaned out all winter. I hate it when things are disorganized. I was grateful to have the help of these two. My oldest does not like having a small farm in her backyard or getting her hands dirty. I just had to get a picture as proof that she does help out occasionally. If she had her way we would be living in an apartment in New York City. 

After about an hour of work I looked around and these two had disappeared. Apparently they decided it was time for a break and helped themselves to a snack. 

There is still lots of work that needs to get done, but it decided to go from 70 degrees yesterday to snowing today! You have to love spring in Kansas. I did manage to get in some radishes, spinach and lettuce in some planters on the porch. I had planned to start the snap peas and beets today, but that will have to wait until the weekend. 

February Homestead Update- Eggs, Garden Plans and A Year Without A Purchase

We are thinking about taking this flower garden out. It is really beautiful during the spring and summer, but it is right in the middle of our yard. I think I would prefer to give the kid more play space and myself more vegetable space. Although I may leave it for the bees. 

It's February already and that means it is officially time to start planning my spring garden!! I am planning to use the same software as last year. If you want to take a look at last year's garden you can go here to check it out. As soon as I have everything laid out I will write a post to share our plans for the year.

Unfortunately the pictures for today's post are not too spectacular, I am having issues getting my phone to send them to me so I can get them on here. I had more, but I finally gave up trying to get them off my phone.

The winter garden looks so sad. You can see in the corner some green sprouts from the garlic I planted in October.

In the winter there really is not a ton to report on in the area of homesteading. It is basically a time to relax from the hard work of summer and to plan for the next year. I like to take the down time of winter to research other small homesteads to see what I can implement into ours as well as try to learn a few new skills.



Here is a great list of small, suburban homesteading blogs in case you wanted to check them out.

--- The 104 Homestead
--- The Urban Homestead
--- Lil' Suburban Homestead

The skills I am trying to learn this year include knitting, crocheting and studying the no till method.

There is not a huge amount of productivity in the winter, but in January we had 115 eggs from our 7 hens. Not too bad.

I have also been doing some preserving when I am able to buy produce in bulk, such as the 40 pounds of pears we dried, ate, or canned in December. We were also blessed with a friend who got a deer, but did not want the meat. That was a huge blessing to help fill our freezer.


Here is a list of our future goals for this year on the homestead.

• In the picture below you can see the grassy area to the left of the garden. We are planning to use the no till method this spring to double the size of our current garden. We are going to add a pallet fence all the way around the garden to keep the chickens and children out of the plants.
• We are also planning to double the size of the chicken's fenced in area so that we can keep them fenced in all the time and stop dealing with chicken poo all over the yard getting stuck on our shoes and eventually into the house. Gross! 
• If I have my way we will be adding goats by this time next year. We have a great area near the chicken coop that would be perfect for them.
• I will take pictures as we get these projects finished and keep you updated.  

Our family also decided to embark on a new journey this year that is a bit different then the norm. I had a friend read the book The Year Without a Purchase. She mentioned it on facebook and that turned into several of us asking her questions about the book and eventually an accountability group forming.

As of January 1st our family has decided that we will not be making any purchases unless they are consumable or foster family togetherness. Basically no new clothes (except for growing kids and only if there is nothing else in the house to hand down), toys, furniture, decor...you get the picture.

I have to admit that it has taken some getting used to. There have been several times where I have absent mindedly started to buy something and then realized it doesn't fit into the rules. For instance, our chicken waterer cracked due to ice. I thought no big deal I am headed to the feed store today anyway. I will just pick up a new one, Nope not in the rules.  So I had to get creative and see what we had around that would work. I rummaged through my potting stand and found a metal planter without holes...instant waterer and it was FREE.

We have managed to save some money so far by not buying anything new, but really the whole point of the experiment is to foster togetherness as a family and to learn to really enjoy what we already have. We live in a throw away society. If it is broken just go get a new one, Don't try to fix it or do without, just buy something new.

I have actually begun to enjoy not spending money. It is nice to go into a store and not buy anything. I know it sounds strange. I have also had to learn to find other ways to entertain myself without shopping. This has included staying away from coupon blogs and tossing ads as soon as they come in the mail.

I will keep you updated as the year goes along. There will inevitably be a few purchases that we had not thought about. We also decided that if there is something we as a family really need or want we have to sell enough items around the house to cover the cost of the item or we don't get it.


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My New Pie Safe!

I was poking around on some swap sites on facebook last week and I just happened to see this amazing pie safe for only $40! I quickly showed it to the husband and he said he had time to pick it up if I got it. I know it is not an original, but it is still so pretty. 

I ended up selling my bakers rack for the exact same amount within hours to pay for the new piece of furniture. I love it when things end up working out. 

Busy Days On The Homestead

I realized today it has been over 2 weeks since I have posted on here. I am still here it has just been SO busy around here. The garden is producing so there has been tons of preserving going on.

My in-laws went out of town for a week and asked us to keep an eye in their large garden. We were told that if we would water it and keep an eye on things any produce we picked we could keep. Oh my! I had no idea how much I would be getting. We go over every other day to pick tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers. cantaloupe and blackberries. Hopefully their corn will be ready soon.

I keep telling myself not to complain about the work because we have been given a gift of free food that someone else put the work into growing. I seem to go through this every year about this time. I have about had enough of the garden and the heat. There is produce falling off every counter in my kitchen. I have to constantly remind myself what a blessing this is. There are others who would love to be in my place and would gladly do the work.

I have been canning nearly everyday trying to keep up with the tomatoes before they go bad. This is not an easy feat when you have 4 little ones around needing attention on top of the regular daily chores. I do not know how Ma Ingalls managed. That poor woman must have been exhausted all the time. I know I have never been so tired and I have modern conveniences to help me.

I love my children, but I can hardly wait for school to start in 2 weeks so I can get some things accomplished. I know I will miss them, but for the moment I am ready for them to be busy elsewhere. There are days I can not figure out how I used to do all this and homeschool. I guess I had a different rhythm back then. It seems that ever since I put the kids in public school they no longer know how how to entertain themselves. They seem to need someone to tell them what to do every minute of the day. They are doing better now that summer is almost over.

I have lots of posts planned, so don't go anywhere. I will post as I have time during this busy season. I should have lots of time this winter once the garden is done. Hopefully in the next week or so I will be able to give you our August garden update. 

A Trip To The Local Greenhouse

Yesterday I decided to run to my local garden store to buy some of their eggs. While we were checking out I noticed they had summer squash for $1 a pound. Since mine has not come in yet we bought a couple of pounds.

As I was paying my 5 year old starting wandering and noticed the huge greenhouse full of flowers. She asked me if we could go look. Um YES! Did she really have to ask me?

I asked the owner to please keep my eggs and squash at the counter so I could wrangle the toddler and still keep up with my other kiddo.

Then the owner said "Everything is half price through today." Why did he have to tell me that? I have very little will power when it comes to buying plants.

I will say that that I did better then I thought I would. We only ended up buying 2 pepper plants, 1 watermelon and 3 six packs of flowers.

Seriously, I should never be turned loose in a greenhouse where all the plants are half off. It's a good thing the kids were with me.

Instead of buying just the eggs we ended up buying...

All of this plus the veggies that did not make it into the picture. 

We had such a great time exploring.

At least the kids look cute. Please excuse my terrible hair. I didn't have a chance to shower before we left.

 Thanks for visiting. Please check back often for more fun from Our Quarter Acre Homestead!