Month: January 2010

The chicks are doing great.  I moved them to the brooder after about 38 hours in the bator (for the oldest ones).  They are super vigorous and healthy, I am thrilled! I don’t know if you can see it in the pics at all but they are already getting some little feather on the tips of their wings.  One had a little poop stuck to it’s butt so I soaked it with a warm, wet wash cloth and pulled most of that off.  All six are healthy, eating and drinking, and sleeping a lot.  I raised their heat lamp a little bit because they were crowded at the far end and obviously too hot.  Now they are moving around comfortably although a thermometer right under the lamp is only reading just over 90 degrees F.  I usually start them at 99 and go down gradually but if they’re happy, I’m happy. I set 24 more eggs in the bator tonight!  This could definitely be addicting.  I’m hoping for a better hatch rate this time since I stored all the eggs at room temperature, in egg cartons, and tipped them a couple times each day by putting a canning jar ring

I’m sorry the picture quality is so poor – it’s hard to get good pictures inside the incubator.  Yesterday 4 eggs had pipped before I went to bed.  Pipping is when they peck at the inside of the shell a bit and you can see a crack in that spot.  Brian got called in to work at 4:30 this morning and woke me up to tell me that we had 2 chicks!  When I got up again at 7 there were 3!  Then, when I came home from work tonight we had a total of 5.  Now I’m sitting next to the incubator typing this and watching #6 hatch.  So far I don’t see any pips from the remaining 4 eggs so this might be it. If you’re serious about wanting to hatch chicks I suggest you check out the BYC forum (it’s on my sidebar).  That’s were I learned everything I know about the topic, and only in the last month or so.  Right now I can see a logistics problem.  This time I didn’t have many hatch out of the original 24.  I’m hoping that’s because so many of the eggs came out of the refrigerator.  However, if

They’re not really excuses I guess,  just the truth about what’s been taking up all my time lately! 🙂 My routine is all messed up. I usually get up a little before 7, clean the house  and do my general housework until about 8:30 or so, eat breakfast while blogging, then do chores and go to work.  This is the second week now that the builder and the electrician have both been here.  The builder shows up about 8 so I’ve been trying to do chores early – I don’t mind the builder but I miss my alone time in the barn.  It is a nice way to start the day.  Then the electrician shows up at 8:30 ish so I lose my privacy in the house and usually my power too, i.e. my ability to make breakfast and blog.  Plus, I’ve spent a good chunk of each morning rearranging whatever room they are going to wire next so they can get to the walls.  That leads me too… I decided to paint. Our office is the only room downstairs that I haven’t painted and it was pretty drab.  Since I had all the furniture pulled to the middle of

Old Homestead Bean (Kentucky Wonder Pole) Tendercrisp Celery Black Aztec Sweet Corn True Gold Sweet Corn Long Purple Eggplant Yellow of Parma Onion Tall Telephone Garden Pea (2) Big Month Tomato Amish Paste Tomato Jersey Giant Tomato Rutgers Tomato Purple Podded Pole Bean Arikara Sunflower All ordered through Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds at rareseeds.com.

I actually took these pics earlier in the week with the hope of posting a Sunday Stroll.  It has taken all day to get the pics loaded with my sporadic internet connection but here they are… A steer playing peek-a-boo Apparently the wild rabbits have been snacking on our hay Gee Sam, you weren’t nosing around in the snow, were you? Dark, Maci playing I took this one to show the extent on the drifts all over our yard The chickens are doing really well even in the eggmobile and the bad weather.  I’m very happy with the heritage breeds I picked. And the sun goes down on another day… I hope you had a great Sunday!  To see who else took a stroll head over to The Quiet Country House.

I’ll be expanding our garden again this year.  Even though we’ll have more space I want to cut back on the variety a bit and focus on the staples.  We’re slowly eating more and more food that we’ve grown ourselves.  Last year I put up a ton of food that I gleaned from friends and family.  I am very grateful to them but last year was a good year for a lot of plants and I don’t want to be so reliant on others when we have a bad growing season. I started by poking around in our pantry.  BTW, I haven’t forgotten about the pantry update.  Right now we’re in desperate need of more shelving so I’m waiting until everything looks nice and pretty before I share pics.  Anyway, a major part of our pantry is made up of tomato products.  Last year I canned over 50 pints of tomato meat sauce – enough for the whole year.  I would estimate that 1/3 of the tomatoes came from our garden and the rest came from others.  Also in our pantry we have store bought tomato goods such as: ketchup, tomato paste, and crushed or stewed tomatoes that make baked

I’m keeping notes for myself here and if it proves to be a worthwhile process I’ll post it for those who might want to make their own newsletter someday.  I began by Googling “farm newsletter” then “beef farm newsletter” to get closer to the type of farm that we have.  You wouldn’t believe how many awful newsletters are out there!  No pictures, no dividers, often just full pages of text typed up like a letter.  No visual appeal, no headlines that reach out and grab you.  That is NOT what I want our newsletter to be.  Ours is going to be fabulous. Since I couldn’t find much for inspiration I decided instead to start with a list of what I want for contents: Order form/price list A place on the form for feedback Some pictures, not enough to be overwhelming Recipes, at least one Maybe a FAQs section Hay info New barn pics/info Meet _____ featuring another local small business Welcome to visit message Spread the word/referral incentive Help Wanted Next, I contacted Thumb Graphics, the company that got our website going.  Theron, the owner, suggested I go with 17″ x 11″ paper folded in half and printed on both

My Mom came out last night and stayed over.  She came to pick up a quarter of beef for her freezer and it was nice to visit.  This morning her, Brian, and I were chatting.  “So what do you do around here when you’re not canning and freezing all that food,”  she inquired.  I laughed.  Brian made a comment that all I need is a good book and I don’t complain much.  True, I’ve spent many hours lately curled up under my heated blanket with a book or the computer.  I suppose it is okay to relax.  After all, there are only a few months of the year when that is even an option around here!  But still, there is a lot that needs doin’: I could… Do the budget for January.  This is our third month on a full budget and the third time had better be the charm! Along with the budget I want to make up some kind of visual aid for our savings progress.  Maybe a thermometer type chart to go on our fridge.  We’re done paying for the new barn so – now we get to start saving for a semi trailer – then we