On a happier note (for me) I am leaving for an all girls vacation to Cancun in a couple of days. I fully expect a hay baler to be at the barn when I get home.
LIVE and LEARN
Showing posts with label self sufficent. Show all posts
Showing posts with label self sufficent. Show all posts
Saturday, February 27, 2010
The Tax Man Cometh..
This winter has seemed so long and cold. I know it hasn't been as bad for us as some others, but it isn't supposed to be this cold ,this long . It has zapped any motivation I might have for anything ,particularly being outside. On top of it all it is TAX season.
Farms are great for taxs as long as you continue to buy equipment and spend that money. We hit the end of depreciation in 2009 on most of our big equipment and in an effort to become debt free didn't buy more. We also had a good flock of chickens and made quite a bit more than usual (didn't feel like it). Well.... for what we owe the Guberment this year we could have bought that piece of equipment that my husbands want/needs out right. Now we will pay that money to the govt. and get nothing tangible in return.Hmmm....
Well "debt free" lasted a short few months. It is a good idea but not really practical as long as you are making money. I am not ready to give up making that money yet. So I guess it is back in debt we go. I knew we would have to pay a bit ,but dang I could have hired help for a year and not had to work. So for this year I am letting the husband buy his square baler, accumulator, and grapple.(Not to mention I ran out of hay this year and I just paid $5a bale for crap hay). He is a happy man!
On a happier note (for me) I am leaving for an all girls vacation to Cancun in a couple of days. I fully expect a hay baler to be at the barn when I get home.
LIVE and LEARN
On a happier note (for me) I am leaving for an all girls vacation to Cancun in a couple of days. I fully expect a hay baler to be at the barn when I get home.
LIVE and LEARN
Monday, February 1, 2010
I am having trouble sifting through all of the information I have on family history and making sense of it. Since I don't know any of the people and there is no one left to help me it is quite confusing. Thought I would take a break and get outside.
Yes this is Georgia. Not our typical winter and not one I care to repeat. I really would like snow instead of ice but I guess it is not up to me.
We are just high enough to get some lovely views and secenery.
And just low enough to get ice instead of snow.
Hard to tell from the picture but we had at least 1/2inch covering on everything.Very beautiful when the sun came out.We had to get out of the woods though before a branch or huge chunk of ice fell on our heads.
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
Notes from the past.
The past is past
The future nigh
Where was I when
Time went by?
Living life and
Dreaming dreams..
Going nowhere
So it seems..
I was reading a post about handwritten notes today. I had not thought about how rare these were until today,or how lucky I am to have several hand written notes from my mother,grandmother and greatgrandmother.
My mothers side of the family were pioneers and it seems that the women were educated enough to keep some handwritten accounts of their lives. Our Family had a homestead on the Windriver in WY. It had been in our family since the late 1800's. Most of the land was sold off when my Greatgrandpa died because of multiple heirs. The original buildings and 30 acres with the best riverfrontage were kept in the family and my Aunt and Uncle took care of it until their deaths last year. The ranch was sold,again because of multiple heirs.
Being one of the heirs I received a box full of stuff from their estate. I was lucky enough to get the box with old photos and a handwritten history of the family. I also found a notebook my greatgrandmother kept. I am still deciphering the stories she wrote down (bad handwriting).I would like to share some of these stories and photos as these people were true "homesteaders" and had real American spirit. They suffered hardships we can only imagine just to try and provide a living for their families and keep them safe.
I thought I would start with one of the first entries these are my great grandmothers writings :
"I will start with my family history as I heard and remember it. My grandfather Ben was born March 26 1822. He was from Ohio and was pretty well educated for that time. He was of Welch,English and Irish ancestry as was Martha his wife. Martha was born April 6, 1823. They were Married Nov. 21, 1844 and moved from Ohio to South central Iowa near Indinolla.They settled on the river bottom on the South River. They had to clear the land of timber and built a cabin with the logs. They built a cabin 14 x 16 and another in back of it roofing the space between for storage and washing clothes, and any other chores to be done outside. Martha was a small plump woman with dark hair and blue eyes. She was a very good manager, housekeeper and an excellent cook. They made almost everything they used even spinning and weaving a lot of the fabric and linens. They tanned hides to make their own leather for shoes. Martha as talented as she was, could not read or write. They had 5 girls my mother being the fourth. Sophia the first daughter married a man by the name of starbuck, she died a year after she was married of pneumonia, no children. Belle married and bore two boys and two girls and died soon after. Anne married Diff a real nice man. They had two boys and five girls. Anne also died after bearing the children. Myself, Grace ,I had 5 girls. Celestine who married and had 4 boys and 4 girls. Martha helped raise the children of the dead daughters in her own home..
Imagine raising 5 children in a 14x16 space. I also couldn't imagine loosing 3 of my 5 children. I seems to be common.
The future nigh
Where was I when
Time went by?
Living life and
Dreaming dreams..
Going nowhere
So it seems..
This is a picture of my grandmother and my mother and aunts. Above this is a picture of one of the notes I have. I am trying to piece together a history from this and I am having to try and decipher it. Not being able to place some of the words in context and not knowing what some of the activities she is refering to are is making it difficult for me.
I was reading a post about handwritten notes today. I had not thought about how rare these were until today,or how lucky I am to have several hand written notes from my mother,grandmother and greatgrandmother.
My mothers side of the family were pioneers and it seems that the women were educated enough to keep some handwritten accounts of their lives. Our Family had a homestead on the Windriver in WY. It had been in our family since the late 1800's. Most of the land was sold off when my Greatgrandpa died because of multiple heirs. The original buildings and 30 acres with the best riverfrontage were kept in the family and my Aunt and Uncle took care of it until their deaths last year. The ranch was sold,again because of multiple heirs.
Being one of the heirs I received a box full of stuff from their estate. I was lucky enough to get the box with old photos and a handwritten history of the family. I also found a notebook my greatgrandmother kept. I am still deciphering the stories she wrote down (bad handwriting).I would like to share some of these stories and photos as these people were true "homesteaders" and had real American spirit. They suffered hardships we can only imagine just to try and provide a living for their families and keep them safe.
I thought I would start with one of the first entries these are my great grandmothers writings :
"I will start with my family history as I heard and remember it. My grandfather Ben was born March 26 1822. He was from Ohio and was pretty well educated for that time. He was of Welch,English and Irish ancestry as was Martha his wife. Martha was born April 6, 1823. They were Married Nov. 21, 1844 and moved from Ohio to South central Iowa near Indinolla.They settled on the river bottom on the South River. They had to clear the land of timber and built a cabin with the logs. They built a cabin 14 x 16 and another in back of it roofing the space between for storage and washing clothes, and any other chores to be done outside. Martha was a small plump woman with dark hair and blue eyes. She was a very good manager, housekeeper and an excellent cook. They made almost everything they used even spinning and weaving a lot of the fabric and linens. They tanned hides to make their own leather for shoes. Martha as talented as she was, could not read or write. They had 5 girls my mother being the fourth. Sophia the first daughter married a man by the name of starbuck, she died a year after she was married of pneumonia, no children. Belle married and bore two boys and two girls and died soon after. Anne married Diff a real nice man. They had two boys and five girls. Anne also died after bearing the children. Myself, Grace ,I had 5 girls. Celestine who married and had 4 boys and 4 girls. Martha helped raise the children of the dead daughters in her own home..
Imagine raising 5 children in a 14x16 space. I also couldn't imagine loosing 3 of my 5 children. I seems to be common.
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
Confessions of an Egocentric Schizophrenic
All of my life I have been caught in between 2 different worlds. My mother was raised in rural Wyoming on a ranch in the middle of nowhere. My dad was the son of a well to do Lumber Baron in Wisconsin. My dad always wanted a son, but he got 2 girls instead . My sister and I were raised in the South with parents not from the South. All of you southerners know what this means. I was a tomboy ,but not good at sports ,I liked boys,but was not attractive ,I liked girl stuff ,makeup,clothes,going to the mall, but I could never quite be giggly and cute.I could go on ,but you get the picture. I never quite fit in anywhere.
When I was young my grandmother would try to get me to sit still and act like a lady,be polite, and wear a dress. Now how can you stand on your head in a dress and be polite and lady like ?? I was sent to ballet to learn grace and restraint. I found a note after my mom died that was written by my ballet instructor.She said I needed to learn to control my exuberance and have better concentration.I probably would have been medicated in school today.I had a poem written about me that was basically about a square peg in a round hole. At that age though I was not concerned about acceptance.
We moved to an Upper Middle Class neighborhood when I was a teenager. I struggled here as well. I enjoyed my girl friends, we went skating and to the mall ,but I liked to fish ,hike in the woods ,and climb trees as well. I tried to fit in but I was tall and lanky and not very girlish. I tried sports but coordination was not my strong point. I did well in swimming but quit when a friend told me it would make my shoulders big.I just couldn't find my niche.I did well in school but not excellent (that goes back to my problem concentrating).
I still struggle. My upbringing was you were nobody if you weren't somebody. "Somebody" being measured by what you had. A nice house in a good neighborhood,nice cars,good clothes(name brand),etc. I communicate and socialize with these people , all in all , I feel more comfortable with them. I also socialize with and belong to the "nobodies". Which is basically everyone else in the world.
My "nobody" half is the happiest. I enjoy being outside and digging in the dirt. I don't mind living in the tiny trailer with a leaky roof as long as I can get outside.I love my animals and my countrified husband.I like being able to do for myself. I like drinking beer with my friends..Then my "somebody" side asserts itself and I feel ashamed of my living conditions. My high school friends would be appalled at living in a trailer (My sister is). I should go further in debt and have a nice house,white collar husband, drink wine and lay by the pool. Either life I would be missing the other.
Hope I didn't offend with the "Nobody" label but since I am egocentric it really doesn't matter since its all about me anyway.
When I was young my grandmother would try to get me to sit still and act like a lady,be polite, and wear a dress. Now how can you stand on your head in a dress and be polite and lady like ?? I was sent to ballet to learn grace and restraint. I found a note after my mom died that was written by my ballet instructor.She said I needed to learn to control my exuberance and have better concentration.I probably would have been medicated in school today.I had a poem written about me that was basically about a square peg in a round hole. At that age though I was not concerned about acceptance.
We moved to an Upper Middle Class neighborhood when I was a teenager. I struggled here as well. I enjoyed my girl friends, we went skating and to the mall ,but I liked to fish ,hike in the woods ,and climb trees as well. I tried to fit in but I was tall and lanky and not very girlish. I tried sports but coordination was not my strong point. I did well in swimming but quit when a friend told me it would make my shoulders big.I just couldn't find my niche.I did well in school but not excellent (that goes back to my problem concentrating).
I still struggle. My upbringing was you were nobody if you weren't somebody. "Somebody" being measured by what you had. A nice house in a good neighborhood,nice cars,good clothes(name brand),etc. I communicate and socialize with these people , all in all , I feel more comfortable with them. I also socialize with and belong to the "nobodies". Which is basically everyone else in the world.
My "nobody" half is the happiest. I enjoy being outside and digging in the dirt. I don't mind living in the tiny trailer with a leaky roof as long as I can get outside.I love my animals and my countrified husband.I like being able to do for myself. I like drinking beer with my friends..Then my "somebody" side asserts itself and I feel ashamed of my living conditions. My high school friends would be appalled at living in a trailer (My sister is). I should go further in debt and have a nice house,white collar husband, drink wine and lay by the pool. Either life I would be missing the other.
Hope I didn't offend with the "Nobody" label but since I am egocentric it really doesn't matter since its all about me anyway.
Saturday, May 2, 2009
Rain and Planting
We managed to finally get the corn in the ground along with the melons and winter squash.I helped my granddaughter learn the step 5 (she has short legs) drop three method of planting the melons and squash.She did a good job, talking non-stop while she planted.We are going to plant the tomato plants and pepper plants today.We need to come up with some sort of trellis system for the tomato plants.We bought them at Lowe's. YIKES! Expensive. I will be starting my own next year!Then it will be weeding and watering.
We had a nice rain last night to water in the new seeds. It should really make the seedlings that are up jump out. It looks like the grass grew an inch overnight. Probably the weeds too.
We finally got a check yesterday. Yahoo! I can pay the bills and then try to budget for a month. I still am not really good at that. I ,unfortunately ,am not very list oriented. I make lists and then never pick them up again . I am a seat of the pants kind of gal. This doesn't work well when trying to budget money for feed,food,fuel,and supplies for a month. We came up about a week short last month.I need to come up with a system but it is hard. The checks are never the same from flock to flock, or month to month, and there is no predicting how well or bad the chickens will do.Any suggestions?? Most of the expenses are fixed ,except the power bill which depends on the weather. I think they should teach budgeting in school. The only thing I learned about money growing up was how to con my daddy out of it.I was pretty good at that.Then of course I was good at spending it too.
We had a nice rain last night to water in the new seeds. It should really make the seedlings that are up jump out. It looks like the grass grew an inch overnight. Probably the weeds too.
We finally got a check yesterday. Yahoo! I can pay the bills and then try to budget for a month. I still am not really good at that. I ,unfortunately ,am not very list oriented. I make lists and then never pick them up again . I am a seat of the pants kind of gal. This doesn't work well when trying to budget money for feed,food,fuel,and supplies for a month. We came up about a week short last month.I need to come up with a system but it is hard. The checks are never the same from flock to flock, or month to month, and there is no predicting how well or bad the chickens will do.Any suggestions?? Most of the expenses are fixed ,except the power bill which depends on the weather. I think they should teach budgeting in school. The only thing I learned about money growing up was how to con my daddy out of it.I was pretty good at that.Then of course I was good at spending it too.
Saturday, April 25, 2009
Taking control
Our first step in taking control is to figure out where we are going.We both decided we would like to keep the farm ,but hate being broke.We need a way of bringing in some more money with the tools we have.What do we have? Land,garden tools,lots of manure(literally).Hmmmm what can we do with that?
This year we are putting in a small market garden. People are wanting to buy food closer to home and would like to know how it was handled.We decided on a smaller garden. We did the finish tilling yesterday and plan on doing some of the planting today.I still have my small raised bed garden, already planted. If the Market Garden works out I will change my kitchen garden to small fruit production,strawberries and blueberries for subsequent years.We are sticking with the traditional crops this year. This will give us a feel for the market in our area and hopefully some input from the people who will be buying from us.
We got most of the planting finished today .We still need to put in the tomato plants and pepper plants.The garden has nice soil as it was a small horse pasture.Weeds will most likely be a problem the first year.
Thursday, April 23, 2009
How I got to where I am
When we bought this farm 6 years ago I was looking for an escape from my working life. We had a small place ,15 acres and a house. It was on my husbands family farm. After his stepdad died we moved his mom on the back 5 acres. I love his mom but this was too close for me. We also had his cousin next door and his brother within rock throwing distance.
We found a hen farm about 3miles down the road for a steal. It already had a contract on it but we went ahead and put in a backup contract .It was 29 acres and 2 hen houses .There was a small double wide trailer on the farm. The other contract fell through at closing so we got the farm.The plan was to move someone into the trailer to help take care of the farm. We would continue living at the house untill we could build on the farm. How did that go? Not too well...
3 years into the "plan" we decided we had to sell the small farm . Our help didn't work out and I was spending more time at the hen farm than at home . The house sold and what little we made we sunk into fixing things at the hen houses. One month after we spent several thousands of dollars my husband lost his job. He was at the top of his profession and there are not many job openings for Fire Chief. He decided to go into business with his brother(mistake) mowing grass.They basically went broke in the second season when the fuel prices went through the roof.So here we are 6 years into the "plan" barely making ends meet and living in a broken down double wide. The biggest problem we have is we lived the "American" way. We spent what we made.When the job loss/pay decrease hit it put us in a downward spiral.We make good money with the hens, but the banks will only finance farms for a short period .That's alot of money to pay back in a short time so our payments on the farm are huge. We also only get a check monthly for 9 months.We have not yet had time to adjust for this since the job loss. We keep having to play catch up, not to mention with the bad economy we were without chickens for 3 months instead of 6weeks ,so this year we have been without a pay check since Oct. Here we are broke, living in an old trailer with a leaky roof on 29 of the most beautiful acres in the county.
Time to take hold and stop this snowball. We are happy but I can't say there is less stress. Until I get control of the finances again there is stress! We have decided to try and simplify our lives and live on less to keep the life style that makes us happy.
We found a hen farm about 3miles down the road for a steal. It already had a contract on it but we went ahead and put in a backup contract .It was 29 acres and 2 hen houses .There was a small double wide trailer on the farm. The other contract fell through at closing so we got the farm.The plan was to move someone into the trailer to help take care of the farm. We would continue living at the house untill we could build on the farm. How did that go? Not too well...
3 years into the "plan" we decided we had to sell the small farm . Our help didn't work out and I was spending more time at the hen farm than at home . The house sold and what little we made we sunk into fixing things at the hen houses. One month after we spent several thousands of dollars my husband lost his job. He was at the top of his profession and there are not many job openings for Fire Chief. He decided to go into business with his brother(mistake) mowing grass.They basically went broke in the second season when the fuel prices went through the roof.So here we are 6 years into the "plan" barely making ends meet and living in a broken down double wide. The biggest problem we have is we lived the "American" way. We spent what we made.When the job loss/pay decrease hit it put us in a downward spiral.We make good money with the hens, but the banks will only finance farms for a short period .That's alot of money to pay back in a short time so our payments on the farm are huge. We also only get a check monthly for 9 months.We have not yet had time to adjust for this since the job loss. We keep having to play catch up, not to mention with the bad economy we were without chickens for 3 months instead of 6weeks ,so this year we have been without a pay check since Oct. Here we are broke, living in an old trailer with a leaky roof on 29 of the most beautiful acres in the county.
Time to take hold and stop this snowball. We are happy but I can't say there is less stress. Until I get control of the finances again there is stress! We have decided to try and simplify our lives and live on less to keep the life style that makes us happy.
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