Getting Back On Track

Whew...it has been a hard couple of weeks with the flu running through our household. We are all feeling better, but we are all still dealing with being tired in the evenings. When we were all sick, so many things were left undone. It is amazing how things can be so important until I feel bad, and then I really go for getting the bare minimum completed. I have spent much of this week restoring our house back to order and cleaning things that had been neglected. I am back on track once again, and I am enjoying our household being back on schedule.

We are continuing to make farm plans throughout the winter. We will be ordering our seeds today from Heirloom Acres. I already have some spinach and lettuce seeds left from last year. I will be planting those today in our new growing center in Michael's shop. I am looking forward to seeing how the plants grow under the grow lights. I still would rather have a green house, but I will be happy if we can grow our own plants under the lights.

Michael and the boys have continued work on our fence. They are getting very close to being finished. We want to get our dairy cow from TnFarmGirl soon. I am so excited about the new addition to our farm. I am also wanting to purchase a couple of calves for meat. We are really wanting to reduce our debt, and if we can produce our own food we will be saving more money to put on our debt. When we raised our hogs, we were able to really save on our groceries. The meat was wonderful, and we knew where our food came from. As I have said in the past, I am not a farm girl from birth. It has ALWAYS been my dream to live on a farm, but I was raised in a neighborhood in a small town. I have had a lot to overcome in my new lifestyle. I remember the farm fresh eggs. I LOVED the way they made my baked goods look and taste, but I had a REAL hard time eating them on a plate. I would cover the eggs in ketchup so they wouldn't look so odd to me! Now, I feel that same way about the grocery store eggs. They are so pale compared to what an egg should be. When we raised hogs, I was really concerned about how I would overcome the memory of the pig when it was on my plate. I was afraid that I wouldn't be able to overcome this problem and I would just not eat it. However, by raising and butchering 3 hogs at the same time, I didn't know exactly which one I was eating. This helped me a lot. Now we had to put the law down at the dinner table because my boys saw me struggle with this issue, and it was so funny to them. They had named our pigs Napoleon and Petunia and I forgot the 3rd pigs name. When we would come to the table they would wait until I took a bite of pork, and then they would start reminiscing about Napoleon and Petunia. They thought it was so much fun to make me turn green right before their very eyes. Their father had a few chuckles himself over this aversion of mine. However, he finally came to my rescue and forbid any farm memories to be discussed at the dinner table unless we were talking about the vegetables!

Now that you know the real truth about me, I will tell you that we plan on raising 2 cows for meat. We can sell one and slaughter one, and I do not want to know which one is which. I am growing out of a lot of my silly quirks, but until they are all gone this method works for me. We will post pictures of fence repairs and our growing center soon.

grace and peace,
julie