My family's journey down the road less traveled....

Monday, April 19, 2010

We have babies!!!

The best way to learn is to do, so I did...or at least tried. I purchased 12 Americana chicken eggs and 6 Bourbon Red turkey eggs to hatch this spring. A kind and generous friend lent me her incubator and I was off. The kids and I spend many a night candling the eggs and weeding out the obvious duds. It was very educational all around and one night we even saw movement in one of the chicken eggs!!


This past week was hatch week so we've been on eggshells (sorry for the pun), waiting for zips and pips. Thankfully we were not disappointed. Our hatch was smaller than I'd hoped for but not too bad for a first-timer. We welcomed 7 chickens and 1 turkey into our family!!

The whole point to all of this is less reliance on store bought food. I like knowing where my food has come from and having a hand in the high quality. It's also cost effective due to the high price of organic foods on the market. Next step in our educational process is the Whizbang Chicken Plucker! Sounds awful but it's the best thing going right now for processing your own chickens.

The seedlings for my garden are emerging in the mini-greenhouse I built and fingers crossed, I can get a load of topsoil delivered this week and will put my raised bed gardens together. Frost dates in this part of Ohio are second week of May so I have a few weeks yet but hate waiting till the last minute!!

With the apple and cherry tree in full bloom my spring plans also include the revamping of our sad, little pantry to help accommodate all the applesauce and cherry preserves we'll have.

Until next time...

Monday, April 12, 2010

My pet made my breakfast...

This folks, is breakfast perfection.....

One fresh, still warm egg from the coop, fried and served on homemade artisan bread. Doesn't get any better than this!!!

Special thank you to the lovely and talented Ella for producing such a gorgeous egg to begin with...yes, my pet made my breakfast.

Saturday, April 10, 2010

New beginnings....

Not to scare you and cause a mass exodus to the hills with shouts in horror and fear, but I'm back. I've revamped the blog a little and chosen a catchy new title inspired by the great poet Robert Frost.

The Road Not Taken

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim
Because it was grassy and wanted wear,
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I marked the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way
I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
His words speak to me and inspire me, and the whole family for that matter, to take that lesser traveled path in life. Michael and I have worked very hard to set ourselves apart from the masses by sticking to our principals and making sure we know why we believe what we believe and teaching that core value system to our children.
In light of these turbulent political times our family is working towards a goal of becoming more self-sufficient. This spring and summer we will be building our garden up to make it more productive and hopefully less maintenance with the addition many raised beds. We are also working towards obtaining several dairy goats which will provide our family with milk, cheese and yogurt. Our hen house will become a little more crowded in the next several months as the turkey and chicken eggs hatch. With the addition if a Whizbang Chicken Plucker that Mikey is so graciously going to build me, we'll have a fresh supply of homegrown meat too. My grand plans for our little 2 acre homestead include a new and better compost bin, rain water collection barrels, solar panels and hopefully a wind turbine!!
I hope you all will follow us on our journey down the less traveled path. It's sure to be filled with bumps, setbacks, heartaches and hopefully a lot of laughter and will make all the difference!!!