Times of Extreme Weirdness

Even for our place, things are getting strange.

I'm attempting sourdough starter and, since our place is fairly chilly, I've got it on a heat mat along with seed starts.

Stay home, stay safe, wash your hands.

Times of Extreme Frugality: Waste Not, Don't Want

Those of us raised by frugal parents, have the phrase "Waste not, want not" ingrained in our dna. And we can't escape the guilt if we don't use a resource, even if it's not something we're thrilled with.

Like pumpkins.

I grew pumpkins this year. I love to grow pumpkins! One little seed produces rampant, leafy vines and the varieties are fascinating. What I don't like, is eating pumpkins. Nope, not even pumpkin pie. Not a problem when we had livestock. Chickens and goats and rabbits love pumpkin and it's a natural dewormer. But Silk Road is still lacking farm animals.

A partial solution this year was growing some Kakai Hulless plants. These produce no-shell seeds, great for snacking.

 But I also couldn't resist a few Jarrahdale, large and bluish pumpkins (or squash, whatever). They are so pretty and keep well. 

I still have at least 5 or 6 pumpkins hanging out in the house waiting for me to do something with them.

The first day of a new decade seems like a good time for action, so, I decided to cook up one of the blue gourds.

There is a lot of deep, golden flesh in one of these critters.

The woodstove is going constantly now, so I decided to use the cooktop to cook the flesh. This one pumpkin filled two pots. And when done and the rind cut away, filled seven tubs with puree.

We now have enough pumpkin to overload the freezer. This will last a long time. A long, long time.*

Thanks to the internet, I have recipes for pumpkin bread, pumpkin dinner rolls, pumpkin cookies, and the tonight's treat, pumpkin biscuits.

Drop biscuits

These should pair up well with the leftover chili currently warming on the woodstove. 

Homemade biscuits, one less pumpkin in the closet, no guilt from my thrifty conscience. All in all, a good start to the year.

*Someone remind me of this when planting time comes and encourage me to cut back on the pumpkin patch.

Times of Extreme Frugality: What the Heck is Hugelkultur?

It's been a while since I posted but the beginning of autumn and the end of garden season has meant a mad rush here at Silk Road.

We've been harvesting and processing tomatoes, picking apples, pulling carrots and onions, digging potatoes, mining for sweet potatoes, gathering pumpkins, and trying to take back the garden from a massive weed invasion. 

Tom has also embarked on the adventure of substitute teaching, getting calls at 7am to be at the school by 7:30. Needless to say, being blasted out of bed and pushed immediately out the door is hard on a night owl like my husband. But he's managing.

And we have finally managed to try our first experiment with hugelkultur.

Hugelkultur (say it like you're baying like a bloodhound. Don't you just love German words?) is gardening with raised beds built on rotting wood and other biomass, providing long-term humus and fertility production. It has been practiced in Europe for decades and is now the latest darling of the hipster gardeners. 

Since part of our garden was water-logged long into spring, I thought a super-raised bed might help. 


The first step is to dig out the soil.

We did this with two shovels and two aching backs, so we didn't dig that deep.

Next, you put wood in the hole. We didn't have any rotting or otherwise useless wood hanging around, so Tom ventured into the edge of our lawn and hacked off some dead limbs.

We had saved the hay mulch that was on top of the bed. This went in next.

Then we got to re-shovel the same dirt, back where it came from.

Not as high as a traditional hugelkultur mound and it will settle over the winter, but I'm hopeful it will drain faster than this spot did last spring.

We can now say we are up with the latest trend in gardening; two  hepcats swinging to the hugelkultur beat *plays bongos and snaps fingers*.

Times of Extreme Frugality: A Bird in the Hand...

...is not nearly as much fun as birds at the birdfeeder.

We've been here just over a year. In that time we have seen almost 40 different species of birds at our feeder.

And not gotten a good photo of any of them.

I am in awe of anyone who can can catch an image of a bird without sophisticated equipment, or even with. The birds that visit our feeder and stay calm even when the cat is sitting right underneath, fly away if we even point the phone in their direction.

But just watching them is a delight. Bird TV rivals any cable show and is a bargain.

We have four birdfeeders. One is a squirrel-proof job bought at least 8 years ago. A squirrel did manage to knock it off the hanger and the plastic shell broke. The company sent me a new one at no cost!

The second feeder I cobbled together this spring. I have way too many canning jars and am always looking for ways to use them (yes, I can food but still have left over jars). An internet search yielded a feeder made from a jar and a chick feeder. We don't currently have chickens so the chick feeder wasn't in use. I put a dollar store pie tin over it as a cover, it doesn't look fancy but, so far, it works.

The third feeder I quickly put together when our little backyard bird oasis was visited by Baltimore orioles. The males' bright colors were so enticing that I knew I wanted them to be regular visitors. I had a hanging plant holder that was in a box of junk from an auction. I took it apart and made a low holder for orange halves and a small tin for jelly. It's fun to watch male and females eating the jelly, then wiping the stickiness from their beaks on a twig.

Bonus thriftiness: last year I made corn cob jelly--couldn't resist making jelly from something I would normally toss on the compost pile. It's not anything we're crazy about and orioles like jelly, so they are welcome to it.

The fourth feeder is the wire suet feeder. When I ran out of bought suet blocks late this winter, I made some using saved hamburger fat imbedded with seeds. This is for winter only, as I learned when the fat melted and dribbled to the ground in June.

Speaking of which, I have found that the best and cheapest thing to use in the seed feeders is black oil sunflower seeds. Everything that visits our feeder, from goldfinches to grosbeaks, cowbirds to wrens likes these. I buy it on sale in bags too heavy to lift (40 pounds?). An added feature is the dropped seeds that escape being eaten by cardinals and mourning doves and skunks, sometimes germinate for a nice ground cover under the feeders.

Oops, we have 5 feeders. I forgot the hummingbird feeder attached to our kitchen window. I make the food (one part sugar to 3 parts boiling water). Hummingbirds are fierce little things and their territorial and mating displays are a riot to watch.

Don't let finances deprive you of the greatest show outside your window--hang a feeder and enjoy the jewels of nature, our feathered friends.

Life and Death and Pizza

We are well into the growing season here at Lick Skillet.

 

The garden is green and lush, yielding tomatoes and beans, corn and potatoes, bean beetles and slugs and flea beetles. 

At least this year the balance is tilting towards more vegetables than pests.
 
Our livestock is blossoming also.

Dale had more kittens (she finally has her date with the veterinarian next month). Current cat count is now at 5.

Mr. Gottlieb

Mrs. Claypool

Our two breeding does continue to be productive. Fluffy Black Phantom (I gotta stop giving the grandkids naming rights) had 9 fat kits who are now old enough to drive her nuts. Monster Bunny followed a few weeks later with 6 babies of her own.

And we recently harvested* eight rabbits. 
That brings the population at Rabbit Town up to 18.

The big surprise of the summer is keets!

One of our 4 guinea hens took herself off into the weeds for a month and came strutting back with 16 babies following her around. The noise level from 4 guineas is sometimes overwhelming, There just may be roast guinea on the menu at some future date if we want to keep our hearing. 
Guineas number stands at 20!

Our chicken raising hasn't been so successful. Our last two laying hens were attacked and killed WHILE IN THEIR FENCED RUN by what turned out to be a neighbor's dog. I came home a few weeks later from a poultry swap with three adult hens, two of whom died within days. The remaining Barred Rock is getting used to her surroundings but keeps looking for a flock to hang with.

So, on a whim, I ordered chicks from the Meyer Hatchery. 

This is a mixed bunch of peeps of indeterminate variety plus a free one. Meyers offers a free chick if you agree to donate its eggs to charity. Got my fingers crossed that it lives that long!
Chickens at this moment=17.

We were blessed to increase the human presence to 4 at Lick Skillet for a few days in July. Grandchildren Lizzy and Elias came to help out and keep us entertained.

 

They ran and climbed and painted and planted. We watched and listened and scolded and loved. In a few years we hope to add brother Oliver to the mix. A group of sheep is a flock, a bunch of sparrows is a host. Would a trio of grandchildren be called a frenzy?

A farm is a microcosm of the world; life and death and growth. Animals are born, some die. Crops grow and wither. Seasons come and go. But at Lick Skillet, one thing never changes...

Homemade pizza for dinner at least once a week.

*In other words, we killed and ate them. I was trying to be sensitive.

You Reap What You Sew

 

Realtor's photo: think pink!

My newfound resolve to look on the bright side (Innovation and Eggface) has hit a snag this week: I'm sewing.

The previous owners of our place very graciously left the curtains and blinds in the living room. They couldn't have chosen things I would hate more if they had known me for my entire life.

The major color is mauve. My friends, relatives, and the world all know that pink is my least favorite color and mauve the hue most likely to induce me to hurl. On top of that torture, the flounces and lace are more country cute than country me.

So for the past 2 years I've been meaning to replace them and this month finally ordered supplies to make Roman shades.

This seems like a good time to take a side trip and discuss the issue of buying locally. Many well-meaning folks swear that the salvation of our nation is to purchase needs and wants within a limited radius of your domicile. The theory sounds good, but like most philosophies that will fit on a bumper sticker, implementing it is difficult.

Take making window covering for instance. The closest fabric store to Lick Skillet is over 60 miles away and then it's a chain that carries mostly items from China and most probably would not have drapery cord or shade pulls or the other bits and bobs I need. And studying our other online purchases for the past year, I note we have bought such disparate items as organic wheat berries, pewter metallic paint, and vintage movies, none of which we could buy within 4 or 5 counties of Lick Skillet. Ordering online for us is a better use of time and resources. If we have to travel to the nearest metropolitan area to shop, not only do we rarely find what we want, we also increase our carbon footprint with the gas used and we have to go out for lunch which hurts our wallets and our waistlines. Mini-rant over.

Back to sewing.

I have sewn shades before, at least partly successfully. This time there seems to be a conspiracy to ensure that this is the last fiber project I ever attempt. Everything has gone wrong and the air has a blue tinge from my vocabulary (I bet Tom didn't even realize I knew all of those words). 

This should be simple. A Roman shade is really just a rectangle but no matter how many times I carefully measure, the sides don't add up. I think maybe math has changed since I last made these.
 
One shade is finally completed (but not the valance).

Before I got the cleats to hold the cord.

But we have 4 windows!
  
 If I live through this project I will never boast about my sang froid again.

Blog of the Century!

We butchered our first rabbit; it was an awesome experience! Extreme simplicity and the meal was the ultimate in taste, a major culinary Event!! A self-reliance shocker!!!

 Along with the rabbit, can you taste some thinly veiled sarcasm?

 I am sick of exclamation points. I am tired of the media touting everything as the latest wonder, miracle, or other superlative. I don't want to be told to go for the gusto, live large, follow my passion, or DFTBA (don't forget to be awesome).

Stop.
Think.
Reflect.

 A life of all hill-top moments is exhausting and unsustainable. Life is daily. It is lived in seconds and minutes in the valleys. It is savoring the real and the common. It is whispering care and concern for our families and friends and world, not shouting our egos abroad. How can we be mindful of our lives if we are too caught up pretending that the minors are the majors?
 
Yes, there are wonders in this world but you won't find them on Facebook.

 DFTBA?

Let's strive for DFTBM--don't forget to be mindful--instead.

We just can't seem to stop building things

We have about 2 acres of pasture. Or what will be pasture once we get it bush-hogged down to manageable length.

The plan is to use the electronet fence to rotate the sheep on those 2 acres, giving them fresh feed and us mowed fields.

The biggest problem (other than the bush-hogging and the fact that the sheep aren't trained to move where we want them to go) is that these pastures have no shade. None. Nothing on the sunny side. So we needed to make something that would provide relief from the sun and be easily movable.

Our glorious contraption pictured above is made from 4 old fence rails that we gleaned from a neighbor's wood stash, 3 lengths of pvc (we had to buy these), the unripped part of an old tarp, all tied together with baling twine.

It should be sturdy enough to stand up to sheep curiousity and it's light enough that the two of us can pick it up and relocate it.

Of course, it may also be light enough for the wind to toss about but I'm working on that.

The sheep have given it their baaa of approval.

Bankruptcy Barn

Well, not quite that bad, but you know the old joke:

Q. How do you make a small fortune in the country?
A. Start with a large one.

My thinking, grounded in the economic realities of around 1958, said it can't possible cost that much to build a 10'x15' pole barn if we do it ourselves.

I stopped keeping track of actual costs after about the 5th trip to the lumber yard but all in all this small construction project took at least $850 out of our checkbook even though we applied every frugal trick we have learned in 41 years of living la dolce vita on a budget.

And then we had to fork over the money for

Ivy and Maisie (the ram should be here early July).

We've resolved to put large construction projects and animal acquisitions on hold for now. I think with the garden gone to weed, the pasture overgrown, the large pile of scrap metal in the driveway to dispose of, fire ring to rebuild, firewood to cut, grandkids coming to visit (!!!), and some musical projects of Tom's coming up, we can manage to keep busy and at the same time give the finances a chance to rebloom.

Remind me of that resolution if I start talking pigs. 

Flopsy, Mopsy, and Cottontail

After months of moaning around, feeling like nothing was happening, we're springing full-speed ahead.

Got our shiny, new metal roof finished.



The garden is plowed and soon to be tilled*.

And we have rabbits!

I hopped on the idea of the bunny trail during the long days of dreaming and planning during winter.

Rabbits are, supposedly, easy homestead meat animals. They require little space, they're quiet and produce copious amounts of great fertilizer, and they breed like...well, like rabbits!

We started building cages and I began checking Craigslist for some local furballs.

Before I was really serious, I came across an offer on a local Facebook page that I had to grab. Three does, cage, bedding, pellets, the whole shooting match. And the seller was only 11 miles down the road.

After a few emails, we came home with the three nose twitchers.

Of course, there's more to the story.

Earlier, I had gone to our feed store and saw they were selling rabbits. I asked what breed they were; the young man paused to consider and answered "Amish rabbits. We get them from an Amish farmer." Hmm, never heard of that kind before. I wasn't quite ready to buy yet anyway, so I passed on the bunnies reasoning it wasn't a good thing when even I knew more about rabbits than the seller.

Leap forward to the Facebook post which claimed these are Rex rabbits. In conversation with the poster, turns out the husband works for the feed store so these are also "Amish" animals. However, the wife had raised rabbits in 4H so at least had some experience. They looked healthy and happy so we brought them home. The cage doesn't have electricity and they're dressed in black and white and grey so I guess they really are Amish.

We had part of the outside stand for the cages finished but still needed a roof. It took us two days but we got one done that should work.

The rabbits are around 2 months old so in a few months I'll be looking around for a buck. By fall we should have the ingredients for rabbit stew!

Roof, garden, new livestock and warm and sunny days--welcome May.

*For the record: this is the first time in my long history of growing things that I have ever had a garden plowed. We have always hand turned garden beds and small plots. But this size is a bit beyond a shovel and fork; I may even plant some things in rows!

Just Dishy

 

 

 



 

 

There's a very good reason I haven't posted in the past few days.

 

 



 

 

We're having a new roof put on the house and we found out that not only did the roofer have to remove the satellite dish but that it couldn't go back on a metal roof.

 



 

 

But today the nice folks from 1st Choice Satellite came and, in the pouring rain, installed our dish with an upgrade and, yes, on the pole in the berry garden (see Sod Off  . I knew there was a reason we couldn't get it out of the ground!). So  now we are back in the land of the cyberconnected.

Of course, 90 minutes later the electricity went out but, hey, that's life in the country.



It'll Do

We're still waiting for our garden plot to be plowed and disced. In the meantime, I am craving fresh greens.

So, since we've had many days above freezing and our soil is barely frozen, I figured I could start some lettuce in the bed by our front porch. It does need some protection both from frosts and the cat.

We decided to knock together a temporary cold frame.

Scrap wood, pieces of this and that. It ain't pretty but it will get the job done.

The Rasely family creed.

Heatwave

They say wood heats you twice--once when you cut it, once when you burn it.

We've found it warms much more than that.

A woodstove provides a cozy place to sit and read and dream. A place to percolate coffee and simmer soup. A drying rack in front of the stove beats the clothesline on drizzly days and a table nearby provides a great spot for dehydrating fruits and vegetables using solar power once removed.

Burning wood warms your buy-local-carbon-footprint heart when you buy fuel from your next door neighbor who harvested it 1/2 mile away. And even those of us who don't cut our own gain exercise from stacking and hauling. And we get fertilizer from the ashes.

The financial benefits are heartwarming also. We dropped some serious change to buy and install this stove but I'm betting the price of propane will continue to increase and outpace firewood; as many have said, a woodpile in the yard is money in the bank. This stove will last a lifetime, unlike a furnace, and requires no electricity to run.

During winter, a woodstove becomes the center of the house. When you come in from the cold, you immediately feel the warmth wrap around you, your muscles loosen up, and you know you're home.

Welcome home.

Home is where the cookies are

The best thing about our new Lick Skillet kitchen was the curtains, which the sellers had generously left behind.

A Rasely make-over was indicated; that meant more shelving, a warmer color, more shelving, propane stove, more shelving, a new light and faucet, and did I mention more shelving?

Here's the kitchen in the real estate ad:

We did the simple things first. Replaced the leaky faucet: expensive (everything was so corroded we had to get a plumber in) but easy. Moved the too large and old fridge out to the garage and brought in our smaller one from New York and we placed it on the same wall as the stove.

The light over the sink was florescent and didn't work right. It was one of those "simple" jobs that took all afternoon and left us both with aches and pains but we did get it done.

We had new gas lines run and installed our small, basic propane stove; I much prefer the control you have with a gas stove.

The walls were white and badly in need of a paint job. I decided to go with a creamy white--helping me look forward to the day we get goats again and have rich, fresh milk! In addition to painting the walls, I also painted the cabinets and added handles,

painted the shelves we built,

and the freestanding cabinet we found in the garage, plus the in-wall shelf. 

At Woodchuck Acres, we had a separate pantry, here all the shelves are in the kitchen so I can see at a glance what stores I have at hand.

I'd still like to replace the table with a rectangular farm table and do something about the floor. But we're happy with the changes and it feels more like home--complete with cookies in the cookie jar.

Inch by Inch

I read a country living/prepper kind of internet forum regularly. One thread is "What did you do today to prepare for whatever...". Folks post about planting 50 acres of corn or building a root cellar or canning rutabagas.

Our big accomplishment yesterday was tearing up a corner of vinyl flooring.

Underwhelming, maybe. But for us, these past two months have been a series of baby steps. No, not even baby steps. More like first tri-mester, toes starting to develop steps.

• Locating the website that lists the local farmer who sells straw and getting a map to find his place--all for 10 bales for chicken bedding.  
• Calling and waiting for the plumber to fix the pressure tank so we can call around and find a used washing machine, which doesn't work at first so it has to be fixed.
• Cleaning up the debris from the fallen pine tree limbs only to have two more massive branches come down in as many days.

But mostly waiting for the sale of our former home so we have some money to really work on the to-do list.

But back to the floor.

We want a wood stove. While waiting for an estimate for installing a chimney (we did our last one ourselves and I don't want another crushed disc), we thought "Oh, easy-peasy first move--tear up the flooring in preparation for laying tile." Who would have thought that a piece of vinyl 5' x 5' would fight tooth and nail to stay on the floor. As the photo shows, it came off in layers, when it finally came off at all. We finally came to our senses and said "We've got to put down backerboard anyway, the layers can stay."

It looks crummy, took much longer than it should have, scraped our knuckles and hurt our backs, but it's progress. Real, tangible, step by step, inch by inch progress.

Blame the Grandkids

We let our grandchildren name the chickens, so meet

Brownie, Stripey, Cinnamon,

and Hot Dog.

I named the cats--Penny and Dale, two Ginger Rogers characters in Fred Astaire pictures, but I bet you knew that.