Tuesday, November 29, 2011

Animal update...

The last two weeks have been a whirlwind of selling!  We sold a few various items from around the house but our primary concern was to sell the animals.

The rabbits have all been bought and picked up...save for a couple of stragglers that managed to escape.  We had some terrible winds here the other day - it picked up the shelter we had the butcher rabbits in and turned it over...releasing all 12 of our pre-sold rabbits.  They ran free for a couple of days until the buyers (our wonderful neighbors) came down and helped us to catch them.  All were caught but 2 so we called it a day and figured we would catch the remaining two some other time.  The breeding rabbits were bought as a package so we were able to sell them, their cage, and all of their supplies.

The cow has been bought by our neighbors however we worked out a deal that she gets to stay on our farm until she calves!  I wanted to be there for the birth and since they aren't ready to take in a cow just yet - it works out for everyone.  How lonely for our baby girl though as she'll be the only animal here through the winter. :(

The roosters were all purchased before the Thanksgiving holiday and the last of the hens will be picked up in a couple of days.  Good timing too as the starlings have shown up again and are eating freely out of the chicken feeder.  (I'll try to get a picture of the hoard of birds that fly in and out of the coop all day long.)  The youngest hens have just started laying too!

We're now finding ourselves slightly bored in the evenings with the absence of chores .  Everyday I continue to purge things from our drawers, cabinets, and lives.  A definite feat for a pack-rat like myself!

Monday, November 14, 2011

Eerily Quiet

We have since sold the remaining two goats and it's amazing how quiet the farm is without them.  Now there's only the crowing of the roosters and once those are gone, I can't imagine what it will be like around here.  Our chores have been reduced to about 20 minutes and hopefully will be 0 before winter.  There's nothing like having to bring in waterers into the house to thaw because they are frozen solid :)

We got a late start, earlier this year, in our decision of whether or not to raise pigs.  That late start meant that we ended up deciding to purchase a butcher-ready pig from a local farm.  We picked up our pig from the butcher and it feels so good to have the freezer completely full again!  We also went and picked up some sausage casings and cure mixes to make our own Italian sausage, pepperoni, brats, bacon, and hams.  We had the option of having the hams and bacon sent out to be cured but we wanted to do it ourselves.

The garden has taken on a "Halloween" theme - the tomato plants, which produced nothing, are black and reminiscent of those scary Halloween displays with the dead trees.  Since we made our decision, we've let the garden go and do it's own thing...which, thanks to the below-freezing temps lately, has pretty much died.  The only sign of life is the planter of oregano that died over the summer and is coming back in full force.

The Marans hen is finally laying again!  She's only a year and yet she's only laid a handful of eggs.  When she first started laying, she laid about 1/2 a dozen eggs before going "broody".  (That's when hens stop laying and want to sit on the eggs to hatch them....yes, they actually STOP laying when they are trying to hatch eggs.)  She was broody for about two months (normally it's about a month) then she started laying again.  But she only laid about 3 eggs before she went into moult (that's when chickens loose their feathers and grow new ones - and they don't have enough energy to grow new feathers AND lay eggs).  All of this started in July and it's now November and we're just now getting eggs again from her!  Definitely a novelty chicken...not one that I would choose for egg production.  The only other benefit to having a Marans hen is that she gave us the most beautiful 1/2 Marans, 1/2 Rhode Island Red rooster.  He is so big - he makes our purebred Rhode Island Red look like a mini...hahaha!  Of course, our celebration over her laying will be short-lived as she will be headed to her new home after Thanksgiving.

(I was going to post a picture of him but we sold him before I could get a decent picture.)

Other than that, we're still trying to sell what we can and scour the ads for an RV.  We'll have a better idea of what's in store for us after the holidays.  The more we sell, the easier it gets to let go of "things"... And we're hoping to take a trip to the local Yurt manufacturer to get a better idea of size and construction. :)

And before I go, I just have to share this link.  I follow a farm on Facebook and they posted the following link to a different farm's blog.  This idea would be great for homemade Christmas gifts or as a way to save a few dollars: Homemade Liquid Handsoap.  I'm already trying to think of a way to use my homemade soaps instead of a store-bought bar. ;)

Thursday, November 3, 2011

A quick update

As I'm settling into our decision (yes, I am still trying to get a grip on it), things are moving along on the farm.  We've sold 2 goats, all of the butcher-ready rabbits, 1 breeding rabbit, all of our hens, some miscellaneous farm items, the chicken plucker, the apple grinder and press, and all the hay.  Only about a billion other little things to get rid of and we'll be ready...hahaha!  Seems like every time I open a cabinet or walk into a room, I'm faced with the overwhelming task of purging.  I'm trying to toss everything that is junk - those little trinkets and items that you know belong to something but can't remember at the moment exactly what it is ...so you hold on to it thinking you'll remember eventually....  But this only happens one cabinet or drawer at a time so it's not moving along as quickly as I'd like.

Our first destination is Erie, PA - to visit family.  That's about the only decision that is set in stone - well, that and where we'll settle down after our "trip".  We know it will be in Alaska, we just don't know where exactly yet.  Oh, and we know that we want a smaller house.  Actually, what we've been considering isn't even a house at all - we're looking at getting a yurt.  **I invite you to think outside the box and do a quick search on them.  I'll even give you the website that we've been perusing in our spare time - Alaskan Tough Yurts**  Everything in between seems to be up in the air - our current dilemma is whether to purchase our RV here or wait until we get to PA.  There seems to be a better selection here but we'll have more options available to us if we wait.  Ugh! The possibilities are endless....