The Beginning!

June 30, 2020

The Beginning!

My homestead is blossoming this summer. So much so, I've decided to chronicle it on a blog.

First, my obstacles for establishing a homestead:

1. I am a single mother.

2. I work full-time.

3. I am a full-time college student.

4. I am in the country, so I spend a lot of time on the road.

5. I have huge trees shading my yard, that need to make way for the new lifestyle. (But it's expensive to remove them.)

6. Fear of failure.

7. I have very limited resources.

8. I am not especially handy.

The obstacles I've overcome:

1. I own land!!

2. I have tools!

3. I have passion!

4. My homestead is mixed in with an Amish community.

A PRO & CON - I am single. The disadvantage is that I don't have a second person's skill, ideas, and observations. But, I also get full decisions. And I have a big vision, and pursuing that vision makes me feel so full of joy.

So I started this blog today, June 30th. Here is what hasn't been chronicled:

Using the stimulus money:

April 13th - I purchased a cheap 44' by 20' pool cover off of Facebook Marketplace and set it down as my weed cover.

April 15th - I purchased mushroom compost.

I also found all of these tomato stakes on Facebook Marketplace for $30. Actually, I only took half of them because all I could picture was a huge pile of wood sitting on my property.

April 18th - I purchased cedar from my Amish neighbor. I paid about $10 a bed for the wood and got to know another Amish family near me.

April 19th - I got over my fear that I right ruin all my wood and started putting together my beds. Since I was building these by myself, I used books to help me stabilize my beds. I was pleased with the finished results! (Note: Those are my daughter's Coke's in the background. I'm working towards an organic diet, but Cocoa Cola, if you'd like to sponsor this un-read blog, I'd let you :-)

Same day- the beds going down. Yes, they are crooked, for the most part, I straightened them out before I cut out the bottoms. The empty gap you see in the upper left-hand corner is two beds from failed attempts at gardening. One of them is crooked, but that's the great part about being INFJ, I can live with one crooked bed.

As an added bonus, my daughter took an interest when I started toting the soil to the beds. She decided to spread it out for me, while I got my next load. Since my daughter is resistant to anything she's forced to do, I'm indifferent if she helps me. This is my goal and dream, and I want her to love the gifts that homesteading bring, not resent it.

April 27th - I start growing herbs. I decided to use leftover pickle buckets from work (I work at Chick-fil-a, BTW.) The goal was to keep things like mint from taking over my beds. My herbs are growing VERY slowly. Since then, I've learned that mushroom compost is not as great for seedlings. It's too salty--a lesson being learned. They are growing now, just slooooowly.

May 22nd - There's some life in the garden.

I staked the wild blackberries and raspberries I found growing in the corner of my yard. As soon as I recognized them, I stopped mowing. These were little miracles. I'd tried for years to establish blackberry, blueberry and raspberry bushes on my property. They all died. Then, in this corner of my yard, an entire patch of blackberries and raspberries grew. I staked them for easier access.

May 27th - The First Harvest!!

June 9th I added a strawberry bed. (You can see the little Rhubarb seedlings in the empty square feet.) I planted corn, despite the late date.

June 17th - Discovered I am not alone. These two four foot snakes got tangled in my netting (intended to keep the birds out of my blackberries.) They were too tangled to save. I got my Amish neighbor to come and help me dispose of them. (By help me, I mean that I stood pretty far back and didn't watch them die.) I am actually sad to see these two go. I notice in the Spring, I had tons of baby squirrels running around. There currently are none.

June 17-20th the garden awakes:

And then I woke up on June 21st, and thought "I'm going to get chickens today. I've always wanted them, so I'm doing it today!"

I put together a coop:

Went to Tractor Supply and got four pullets (female chickens that aren't laying eggs yet. It was a tiring day for them, too. My coop says it's for eight hens, so I saved four for blue and green eggs.

On June 23rd I texted a picture to my friend of something else at Tractor Supply I'd always secretly wished to do.

June 24th: (This past Wednesday) I drove after work to pick up four chicks that hopefully would lay blue/green eggs. The size of the birds was a lot larger than my chicks, which meant I couldn't just throw them together. Since last week, I've learned I should have quarantined the new birds, anyway.

So, I had to combine flocks at 11 p.m. at night, and that's when I started thinking maybe I should start blogging about Mabel Frances Farm. Surely there were other single women who wanted to homestead but were also crazy busy. I mean, who introduces chickens close to midnight when they have 8 a.m. class? People like me need to know they are not alone.

Here's one of the chicks I got that night. This one's name is Bird Person. (My daughter named it. ) But, is it going to turn out to be a rooster? It sure has a rooster's posture. We're not sure. In fact, we're not sure we don't have all roosters.

This one's Imogene. She is the friendliest to humans of all the chickens. I'm hoping she's an Easter Egger, but then again, do I even know if she's a "she"?