Weekend four

We start early..... The sun is barely up, but who am I kidding, I am barely up. Since it gets so hot now and we are exhausted and sweaty long before lunch we have decided to start at the crack of dawn. I think each day we decide to start earlier.


This was my view Friday morning as I went back home for the gas can at 7am. Sometimes the beauty of this earth amazes me!


Tanner has been having a blast building our house. He was so excited to go, he wanted to make sure I didn't leave him behind. Sometimes when we start really early I leave him home with Morgan until they are up and animal chores are finished and then I pick them up. He just gets so upset when he wakes up and we have gone to work on the house and he didn't get to go.

His #1 job is to collect all of the scrap wood and haul it in the wagon to the scrap pile. Some days he takes it very seriously, other days...his neck hurts. That is a story for another day, but that is what he says when he doesn't want to do any work (he also sometimes uses that line at home when asked to pick up his toys and books).



He was so excited when Papa let him stand in his room on the lumber.









Here is our restful set-up, well as restful as it gets in the 95 degree heat with no breeze. We have a canopy, a few chairs, a 5 gallon thermos of water and a few sheets to keep the sun at bay.


On Friday we continued working on the floor joists. We got alot done on Friday with only about 200 square feet to finish on Saturday. Mom and I continued to saw the boards while Dad worked on aligning the joists and nailing them in (a much harder job, I admit).

Eric mentioned the other day that everyone has a picture on here except me, well... here is me working on the bracers (metal bridging) for the joists. Not sure how he expects me to get a picture of myself when I am the one taking the pictures though. This was a rather precarious job. Mom decided after getting up there that this wasn't the job for her.

We had a few of the remaining joists laid across the joists and I had to scoot along that board and nail in the bracers. Obviously once up there I didn't want to come down until I was finished. Unfortunately it was extremely hot by the time we got to this point and the board was very, very hot. I would not recommend this as a weight loss regimen, but I think I melted off all fat on my tooshie (Tanner's word) from scooting down that boards for 45 minutes in the blazing sun.



Eric spend his time working with Dad and putting in the final nails along the front of the house to attach the joists to the sill plate. Isn't it great that I know all of these technical terms? I almost sound like I know what I am doing...not to be confused with I take direction well and have a decent memory.



I have to take some time to give some kudos to my parents. Without their help we would never be able to get this done. Mom takes care of alot of the normal every day stuff that I would get to eventually, like toilet paper, paper towels, plates, etc. She also makes sure we always have water and Gatorade (or Gladorgade, as Tanner likes to say) available. This is another one of those thankless jobs, but extremely necessary, and I am very thankful that she does it so willingly. I know to her it seems like she sits around alot (when we are not sawing constantly), but she is always there to do whatever is needed (especially bringing drinks).

Dad will tell you he doesn't know what he is doing, but don't let him fool you. He spends most of his time doing the leveling, aligning, squaring stuff...you know, all the stuff seems like it that takes forever to accomplish. I don't envy him is job, but he is good at it, no matter what he says. So here is to you Mom and Dad, thanks for everything you do.

This is the beautiful picture of the bracers that I nailed in. You might not be able to see it so well, but it is such a nice straight line, I do so love straight lines.





So that is what we got done this week, until next time, be happy and healthy and stay in the shade.

Weekend three

We spent all week cleaning the shed so we could have it moved on Thursday. Three loads to the dump took all Thursday morning. The barn mover called at 11am to tell me he was between 1 and 2 hours away (and we hadn't moved anything out so far). We finally finished getting everything out and the ramp off when he arrived. It was at precisely that time that the sky opened and poured for about 10 minutes.

After the rain stopped he got the shed on his trailer no problem. We drove over to the farm and got it to the area that we wanted it. That is when I began to worry. With the recent rain (and our soft ground) he was having a hard time getting the trailer to the right spot without it slipping. Finally he got it there and now we have a building at the farm.

We decided to start early on Friday (since it is cooler). But with all the rain we got on Thursday night we weren't sure we would be able to get anything done. So we decided to check it out before we packed up all the tools and stuff. This is what we found.....a moat.

We decided to work anyway (in muck boots), so we got it all together and were working at 9am. FYI, I can't wear muck boots with capris because I get a a blister on my shin where the boot rubs. So I had to wear jeans. I HATE wearing jeans on hot weather, I am miserable....and I was, all day.

We got a good amount of work done and then the generator died. We only had it for 2 weeks and it was dead. So I packed it up and drove all over Athens to find a repair shop, and one after another said "I won't touch a COLEMAN, they went bankrupt and I can't get parts". So I had to buy a new generator.

Saturday we started early and got to work right away. We worked on floor joists all day. Eric and Madison brought the lumber over to the saw and Mom assisted while I sawed them to the correct length. While we did this Dad was putting them in place and attaching them. After we had alot cut, Eric went to help Dad put them in place. We got almost 2/3 of the joists in.

We got lucky that we had a partly cloudy day, it made it so much easier since we had periods when the sun wasn't baking us (but we still drank all 3 gallons of water that we brought, and almost all of the gatorade)

When Madison wasn't working (or bringing us water) she was playing with Tanner. He was having such a great time 'working'. He piled all of the pieces of wood in the wagon and pulled them over to the trash pile (he did this twice). When he wasn't doing this he was moving dirt. He is such a good little boy and he does a great job of staying out of the dangerous stuff and listening when we tell him something.

I was cleaning up my picture folders this week and came across some pictures that fell through the cracks. So I decided to put them all here.

This first one is the frog that we found in the wood pile. It must have really liked it there because we had to step over it for a few hours before it jumped away.


The next is the turtle that we found in the clearing. We think it is a snapping turtle, but he pulled his head in so quickly we couldn't get a good look.

This is the tiny frog that Morgan found in the grass one day. We couldn't believe that it was so tiny.


Here are the sheep right after we moved them. They really love to eat their grain. They do whatever they can to get into their grain bucket.

Here is my cowgirl holding down a tree branch for the goats to eat the pine needles. She really loves spending time with them and playing with the goats.

Art class at the farm

At the cookout on Saturday Shannon was nice enough to plan an art project. The kids all brought dark colored shirts and they used stencils and bleach spray to bleach around the objects and make a design. We really have some super creative kids in our group, all their shirts turned out awesome.

We had such a great time having all of our friends over for the cookout. The kids played in the creek up by the waterfall while the parents watched. After we ate, the kids went back into the creek on the other end. They were there for such a long time some of us parents went looking to see what they were up to. I wish I had pictures. They were in the creek pulling up clay and making sculptures on the side of the creekbed. They even made a slide, although I heard later that the slide was too bumpy.

We just finished our second weekend of working on the house. We have a generator and a saw now, so it was alot easier to get things done.

Friday we spend the morning getting the new tools set up and put together and the rest of the day we finished the beam across the back of the house. Saturday Eric and Dad spent the morning working on the main beam while Mom and I mowed some grass. We had a cookout planned so we had to quit early, but we wanted to get as much done as we could. Finally the beam is finished and next weekend we can start putting the floor joists in.

We are still waiting to hear about the septic. The excavator is waiting to hear from the inspector that the meeting with the soil scientist is scheduled. We just did this all a few weeks ago, but after the grass was mowed the lay of the land can be seen more clearly and he feels that alot of what they are asking us to do is unnecessary, especially since we will be using a composting toilet and wont really be using the septic.

So, we decided to take out all of the stakes in the clearing so we can play baseball after our cookout. I trimmed the grass down really low and spray painted the hole so I could put them all back in before their meeting. Hopefully they will have that meeting sooner rather then later.

Chickens

I realized that I never got a post on here that included a picture of the chickens in the 'chicken tractor' or 'egg mobile'.

After the chickens spent ?? weeks in the shed making a mess we got them out in the chicken tractor. We did put them in there a bit early. They were still a little small and we had to be really careful that they couldn't get out the bottom. We did have one bad morning when some had escaped.

That morning about 7 chickens were out in the orchard. Madison came in to get me to help her capture them, she was really upset since they were her responsibility. Kaiser (the Rottweiler) had already caught one and was proceeding to devour it. Brindle (little mutt) and Gideon (black lab) were chasing the remaining chickens. Sampson (Anatolian shepard-livestock guardian) had a chicken sitting right next to him and he just looked at it, then Brindle came to chase it and Sampson laid a 'beat down' on Brindle.

The 'chicken tractor' or 'egg mobile' is a really neat contraption. It is a movable chicken coup that allows the chickens to graze and eat bugs. It keeps them contained, they have a place to roost under the roof and they have a place to lay their eggs that we can get to easily. The olny drawback is you have to move it daily and it is very heavy. I can move it by myself, but the girls can't.

Tanner loves to take walks around the yard with us. We started doing that when we moved here 2 years ago. As soon as Tanner could walk he went along with us. Last week Tanner realized we had strawberries in our strawberry bed. Tanner LOVES strawberries. He looked at them, then looked at Eric and said "Daddy, what those?". As soon as Eric told them what they were he started eating them. We also have raspberry briers that have tons of berries that are almost ripe. It is only a matter of time before Tanner realizes he can eat the raspberries too.

The First Day!

We started working on the house last weekend. We still didn't have electric so there was only so much we could do. First was to move dirt into the trench around the inside of the foundation. This would have been done by the excavator but he isn't coming back until he can dig the septic and we don't want to wait for that. So after ?? loads of mud (yes, it was mud), we had the whole trench filled.

While Mom, Eric and I (and Tanner) worked on that Dad was making the sill plate and planning and preparing to make the beam. Madison was Dad's "go for" and she had a great time. We got alot accomplished until we realized that the pillars weren't all the same height.

We did realize that we needed to get some type of electric, sawing wood by hand is just too tiring, and I was just watching Dad.

We have been so busy lately I didn't have time to post what we have been up to. So here is a rundown of what has been going on at our current home with the sheep:

Fri. May 22: We needed to move the electric netting and the sheep. They ate the grass down almost to the ground in the 3 weeks since they have been here (although they left the stalks of the longer grass and it still looked like there was grass and they didn't eat it evenly, they left lots of spots that were still long). I in my wisdom (or not), decided it would be a got idea to just use one of the fences so they would eat it more evenly since they like the edges so much more than the rest. My parents came over to help and we penned them in one side while we set up the second one. Then we had the chore of getting them across about 160 feet without fencing them, right. They ended up splitting up and the group in the new pen just wanted to get back to those in the old pen. Long story short, it was a mess. Finally they were in and the electric was working. They should be good in that for a week or so......or so I thought.

Sat. May 23: Eric and I set up the second net to get it ready for the next sheep move. We put it half in the grass and half in the garden (so the goats could eat the weeds). We got it all done (even though it was dark) and the next time we move the sheep should be easy since the openings are right next to each other.

Sun. May 24: We had to move them already!!! Eric moved them this morning since they ate the grass to the group overnight. This one should last is at least 3-4 days since there is some really nice grass and some weeds....or so I thought.

Mon. May 25: Not even 24 hrs and they are a mess. They mashed all the grass and ate all the weeds and now they are all muddy since it has rained all day. Eric decided we needed to get the next netting set up tonight so I could move them in the morning before Homeschool Co-op classes. I was already in my pjs, but hey, I live in rural Tennessee, so I put my muck boots on and we got it started. We had it all laid out (decided to use the chain link as part of this section to make it larger) and were mowing the line (at this point I must tell you it is dusk and my vision is impaired) when....I mowed over the netting. That was the end of fencing that night.

Tues. May 26: After Science and the park some of the group came back to our house for dinner. After dinner we needed to finish getting the netting up. I took some time to cut out the mowed part and retie the ends. Then we finished putting it up and it went really well. We decided this time we needed to make a chute to get the sheep from their current pasture to the new fencing. We set up plastic posts and strung some polywire. We thought it would work great, they just needed Madison to encourage them to go. She did as asked, but the sheep decided to stop for a snack, and then one touched the wire and got shocked, so they all bolted....in three directions, luckily we got them all in. Now they have some really good grass, more than the last section, but less than the first. This time it will last at least 4-5 days...or so I thought.

Wed. May 27: Twelve hours after being put in the latest section the grass is over half gone already!!

Thurs. May 28: 8am and I am setting up the netting so we can move the sheep. They will be right next to the current section on the back hill, easy to move and check on them. It was readly hot and the hill is steeper than it looks. With the help of my mother we got it all finished and the sheep were moved. This is the best grass they have had so far. Eric suggested we put the other net up on the last spot on the hill and we switch the back and forth each day or two. So that is what we did, and we got it all done before it got too dark. Maybe the grass will come back better this way and they will last here longer...or so I thought.

Fri. May 29: They already ate almost half in one day. So I moved them into the last hill pasture, hoping that they wouldn't eat it too fast. We also gave them branches for the trees we had to trim to put the netting up. They loved them and gobbled them all up.

Sat. May 30: The grass was almost down to the ground at spots, and other spots weren't touched. I moved the branches off the longer grass hoping that they would eat it and our idea would work....it didn't. They finished that pasture in a total of 36 hours, once again we moved them back to the previous pasture so we could move the netting.

Sun. June 1: This time we will be putting the two nettings together again (hoping that we can keep from moving it for a few days, we have no illusions anymore). We put the netting in the area with the trampoline and play tower, since this really did have nice grass. It is thick and lush and on the longish side. It was a real chore putting the two nettings together and doing it with only those two nets, but we did it. This time when we made out chute we used more posts and 3 lines of really tight polywire. It actually worked, they all followed Madison and went right into the new pasture. We then got the rest of the netting up and electrified and finally got in the house at 11:30pm. This time it really should last a week.

Tues. June 3: It still doesn't look like they have even eaten the grass, yippee.

Fri. June 5: They are finally starting to eat some of this section really close to the ground. We will need to move them soon, but hopefully it can wait until Sunday evening.

Breaking ground

While I was at the farm monday morning working on the fences the excavator came to start working on the footers. We are so excited, we have waited so long it was getting to the point where it seemed like a dream and it would never get started.

First they needed to cut down the big hickory tree. It was huge and they had a really hard time getting down. I was actually standing there waiting to get video of it falling and my battery died while I waited, so all I have is the before and after pictures. Yes, that huge tree is the one cut down. We hated to do it, but it was too close to the house site.

Here is the tree all piled up at the end of the lower clearing (I am not looking forward to getting that all cut up and stacked).

It is really strange to see that area without the tree now, it looks completely different. We left the stump as a reminder of the tree and as a place to chop wood later for the wood stove (although we will have to level the cut).







Finally, the footers for the house are dug. Today the concrete was poured and if it doesn't rain, the blocks will be laid for the foundation on Friday. It is really weird how sometimes it seems like you will sit and wait forever for something to happen, but once it starts it is like opening a floodgate. At least now things are happening.

The continuing saga...fences

Well....obviously the fencing that I had tried to rig didn't work. Once again the cows were out. Now it isn't all of the cows, just a few extra curious troublemakers. They are named the "skunk brothers" (white stripes down their backs, and they are brothers) and "steak" our bull that shouldn't have been a bull. After walking the fence line again about 3 times and calling my father to ask what I could be missing we finally found the problem, well Dad did. It was a broken insulator 2 posts down from the pasture. At least now we will have electric and the cows will stay in.....

NOT! We stopped by on our way to take the kids to see Star Trek (excellent movie by the way). And once again the cows were out of the pasture and making their way to the driveway. So we got them back in and decided to make a new barbed wire fence over the creek really quick. Did I say quick, yes we were delusional.

So there we are, Eric and I dressed for a date with the kids (who were waiting not so patiently in the van) and we are up to our knees in the creek fighting with barbed wire. Finally we get 3 more strands up, hoping that they are tight enough to keep the ever elusive wanderers in the pasture.

Sunday comes and we check and they are still in the pasture, finally it worked. Or so I thought.

Monday morning comes and I am once again feeling aweful with a cold that was once more passed along from my children. But I have to check on the cows and get the drawings to the excavator so he can dig the footers for the house. And what do I find when I get there bright and early at 7:30am? Cows in the driveway.

Arghhh. All right, that is it, this is war. I decided I am putting up electric across the creek, that had better keep them in. So I spend about 2 hours with my mothers help putting 3 strands of wire across the creek so that it is at the right level to stop them and still not go under the water when it rains and the creek rises. This can be a very difficult feat considering the creek banks are very deep and there is almost nothing to attach the insulators to. Finally we got it done. I was exhausted, but guess what, no more cows in the driveway, now they go the other direction (at least they are still in a pasture).

We found out this week that electric fencing isn't always easy. Actually, when a problem comes up it can be a real pain. Wednesday night I stopped by the farm on my way to take Morgan to church. When I got there I had cows in the driveway.

My first thought: 'great, another spot of barbed wire that needs to be fixed'. My second thought: 'how the heck do I get these cows back in the pasture myself' (and I am already late getting Morgan to church).

So I let Eric know the cows were out and he had to come straight to the farm from work (he wasn't real happy, and neither was I). So long story short, I got back from dropping Morgan off and Eric and Brian(friend down the street) had all the cows back in (thank goodness they slobber over grain). We now proceeded to find the problem in the fence and came to realize that the electric is not even on.


Since we just got finished with about 2 weeks of rain we didn't have a chance to trim fence line. So we thought maybe it is the grass shorting out the fence. So we gasses up that dreaded trimmer and fought to get it started and Eric trimmed the first pasture, and still no juice in the line. Then we walked the fence again to check for problems and still couldn't find any. So I unhooked the wires and checked the solar charger and it is working fine and throwing 4,000 volts. I changed the jumper wire, just in case that was the problem, nope, not that either.

Now it is getting late and is now dark, so we decide to head home and I would have to check it again in the morning (hoping the cows don't get out again).

Fast forward to the next morning. I am at the farm early for a meeting about getting the septic started. I decided to bring another charger over, just in case the solar was depleted by a short or something. I get it all hooked up, fully expecting the fence meter to jump into the green and everything to be fine. No luck, in the red 'check fence'.

So once again I walked the fence, and this time I found that the extra gate we made to let the goats onto the creek bank had slipped and the wire was touching the metal post. Aa ha!! Finally I found something to fix that made sense. I cut the whole thing off(to save time) and went to check the fence again.

Finally we have a charge, not much, only about 1,000 volts, but it was working. So I left it connected to the battery charger so the solar could charge up again (just in case). Hopefully when I go to check it today it will be fine and all the cows will be INSIDE the fences.

Goats and sheep

Today while I was updating the blog, Eric was watching the sheep and the goats out of the window. Snowflake would jump on the doghouse (goathouse) and then the sheep would gather around. Sometimes she would try and headbutt the sheep that came too close. They ran around playing like this together for about 30 minutes.

Sheep and goats

On April 29th we had our first goats delivered. We decided to have them stay with our friends Mary & Kevin for awhile. These goats are Boer/Kiko mix (meat goat). The first picture is Penny (Nanny) and her baby Snowflake.



This next picture is the 2 babies Snowflake and Cream (her mama is Peaches and I couldn't get a good picture of her).





The sheep got here on May 2. We got electric netting for our yard to house them and we put that up the Tuesday before. That saturday morning I went out to check on it and it was all saggy. I called customer service and asked how they get it to stand up and she told me we needed to mow the grass really short and then pull the fencing really tight.

So in the pouring rain and thunder Eric and I and my father were out in the yard mowing a path to put the fence in. We finally got it finished about 15 minutes after the sheep arrived. We were soaked to the skin, but we got it accomplished.


On May 8 we got Erica, our Alpine milk goat. She was born on Eric's birthday (hence the name). She is extremely friendly and loves to be around us. Tanner just loves her.








Here she was meeting the sheep for the first time.

Catching up.....

I has been awhile since I had time to sit down and update. Here is a picture of Tanner eating wild onions from the pasture. There are so many of them and one day while we were there working on fences the kids made a game of pulling them. Tanner decided they were good and ate at least 5 (and only because we stopped him).



This was the sky one afternoon between downpours. If I remember correctly it was also during a tornado watch.






We had about 3 weeks without rain and our friends came over to play baseball in the clearing a few times. The kids had alot of fun. In the beginning the parents were filling in pitching and catching and the kids played outfield and batted. Later we decided to play kids against parents. The kids got 3 outs and the parents got 1.





The girls like to play in the creek just above the waterfall. It is deep enough for them to still on the bottom and just have their heads out of water. They have so much fun there that we decided to have a picnic with my parents and then we all went to play in the creek. I think they could play there all day long (or at least until one of them finds a leech).



One day while sitting at the window there was a butterfly handing around. Madison decided to try to get close to it. A few minutes later the butterfly was on her finger. It would fly away and then come back.

I can't tell you exactly how much fence line we will have when finished. But I can tell you that it is alot.

I spent most of the day yesterday trimming fence line so we can put on the bottom line for the sheep. I went through 4 tanks of gas and an entire spool of line. I calculated I did about 1550 feet of fence line and only finished one and a half pastures.

I cannot begin to express how much I loath trimming. I do whatever I can to reduce the need for trimming. For me it isn't about the job actually, but the equipment.

The trimmers are usually too long, requiring me to hold my body in an uncomfortable position. They are usually also heavy, meaning that the arm that supports the motor is going to hurt alot afterwards, especially if it vibrates alot. Lastly they are almost always difficult to start. With my last one it was so difficult to start that I began praying before I started and then begging it to startup as I continued to pull the string

So for me just the purchase of the trimmer was painful. But off to the Co-Op I went and found a trimmer that was shorter and not so heavy. Hopefully it will be easy to start.

I got to the farm, timmer in hand and proceeded to start the object of my dirision. Of course, it didn't start. So I followed all of the steps in the manual for " if the engine doesn't start", to no avail. Then I got to the part about checking that the spark plug is clean. It was then that I realized that the spark plug wasn't even connected. I plugged it in and it started on the first try, this was way too easy.

So I got into the pasture and started it up again and got to work. It was heavy, but not impossibly so, and it did vibrate my arms a little, but not so much I had to stop. I decided I would work at least until I got to the lower gate, then break for lunch.

When I got back I felt so satisfied by what I had accomplished that I decided to finish the pasture and then go until the gas ran out. Unfortunatley the string ran out before the gas and I had to stop.

My arms were tired and achy, but it was so nice to see those trimmed fence lines this morning when I got back.

Princess Ooyu

It sounds like the name of some anime character. Instead it is the name of our young holstein heifer. Ooyu (spelled phonetically) is the work for 'milk' in Korean and she is such a princess that it just fit.

She is a bit shy, but she really likes to eat and we can almost get close to her if we have some feed with us.

Adventures in ....Chickens?

I have to admit, I haven't checked on these creatures much since we have had them. They live in the shed until they are big enough to go outdoors and Madison takes care of them each morning and night. When we got them 4 weeks ago they were cute little things. It is amazing how fast they grow.

So yesterday I decided to check on them myself and see how big they are. Man are they ugly. Not only that, they are dirty creatures, they mess everywhere. Luckily they are almost big enough for the outdoors.

They are Barred Rock chickens, with black and white stripes. These are just starting to get their stripes. Today Madison came in and told us that 2 of them had escaped and were running around the shed. The girls went out and finally got them back in. Hopefully they stay in for a little while longer.

We have COWS!!

Monday our cows were finally delivered. We were supposed to have them delivered last Wednesday but it rained all last week and most of the weekend. So we have been waiting patiently to have them delivered.

We got over to the farm and still needed to hook up the electric charger to the fence. We finally got the grounding rods in the ground (hit rock twice) and the wires connected. We got the charger attached to fence and grounding rods and Tanner flipped the switch. I got out the fence tester and nothing. Then we realized that is was so sunny we just couldn't see the lights blink.

Then I needed to get in the creek and clean the debris from the barbed wire that had collected after the rain. Wow, was that water cold and deep. I had just enough time to get my boots back on when the truck with the cows started down the road.

It was amazing watching them get out of the trailer. I just kept thinking, these are ours, we have cows!

We have 2 heifers (girls). One is the little red one (angus) that was looking at me, and the other is the tan one (in picture above). We also have a holstein heifer which will be a milker in a year or so.

Sampson was definitely NOT afraid of them. He walked around like he knew just what to do. Then he started eating their food. They came over to see what he was doing and just stood there staring at him for the longest time. We eventually had to pull him back off the food so they could have some.


Tanner was having fun feeding some of the smaller ones. After about 5 minutes he said "I want to chase my cows". We had to explain to him he couldn't do that. His response was a grunt.

Fences are done, now bring on the Beef!!

We spent all of last Saturday, and Sunday working on the fences and mom and the kids and I spent all of Monday finishing the fences. We got almost all of the perimeter posts in the ground with insulators on by Saturday at 5pm (thanks Mary and Kevin for all of your help).

Sunday we planned the first pasture and Mom and Dad and I worked on getting the inner fence line set and insulated. We also got almost all of the barbed wire up for the watering spots for the first 2 pastures (Eric worked really hard to get that finished).

Monday, Mom and the kids and I spent the better part of the morning lugging those heavy rolls of wire around and installing the wire. We got 3 of the 5 lines up with handles and hooks and gates. The girls and I also finished the barbed wire for the first water spot. I wanted to get the electric on, but I was missing 2 grounding rods and the insulated wire.

We all worked really hard, and we all slept really good those nights. During this time I learned the importance of good shoes. I have an old pair of work boots that I bought at Walmart (boys size 6, since they don't carry women's). They really didn't fit well and my feet hurt so much I almost couldn't walk after sitting for an hour. I really do need new boots, but the fence is done!

Today we took down the large dead tree in the pasture. Thanks to Kevin and Mary and Kevin's chainsaw we made short work of the job. I wish I had pictures of the tree before it came down.

Here is a picture of what we have left. Still alot of work to do cutting up all the branches for kindling, but at least it is out of the way of the fence





When the main trunk was being cut the bottom part split. We decided to just let it there since it would have been difficult to cut it and not have it land in the water. As we looked at it we thought it looked like an Alligator, so Kevin made an eye and teeth.

When we got home and told the kids that we have an alligator they just stared at us until it sank in that it isn't possible.

Cows? in less than a week?

Here is what the pasture looks like today.

So we found out tonight that the cattle that we were trying to get are coming on Wednesday. We are excited that we have this opportunity but wow, what a job we have in front of us. That means we have just 4 days to get LOTS of fencing up. Nothing like having an important last minute job to accomplish.

The Orchard

We got all of our new orchard plants today. We already have 4 apple (2 fuji and 2 gala), 2 nectarine, and a pear. Now we will have another pear 2 cherry and 4 plum. To go along with that we will have 5 blueberry, 6 raspberry, 6 blackberry and 32 strawberries. I am so excited and can't wait to get fruit from our trees, I just have to wait 2-3 years :(

Green and "eco-friendly"

As we planned for this house we decided we wanted to be as self-sustaining and earth friendly as we could. So our first purchased was an Envirolet composting toilet. Thus removing the need for a septic system.

I went to the county courthouse to make sure I knew all the rules and codes before we started building the house . It was then that I found out that they do not recognize the greywater system that we designed and we need to put in the septic anyway.

I wish I could make sense of what our regulators want. They want us to conserve and do things better for the earth and then they make it impossible for us to actually do that. I wish there was a system in place that allowed these "specialists" to make decisions not only from what they learned at school, but also what they might learn from "everyday Joe's" like us.

So now my septic system will be a very expensive rainwater cistern for watering my garden.

The Driveway

Finally, after 6 weeks of excuses the driveways is finished. It doesn't look the way we would like, he left piles of mud every where and the sides of the drive are all rock (nothing for grass to grow on). But at least we can drive back now. maybe now we can get started.