Another week

We have had another week working on the farm.  So many projects I can't even count.

Tom and his friend Tom went to Idaho and retrieved our truck with all of our belongings in it.  They drove it here in 54 hours.  I think they both thought they were 25 again.  Great to have our stuff back but we had water damage again in the truck.  Thought we fixed the crack but apparently we did not.  Lots of items got soaked.  On top of that we had rain the last two days and all the items we had in boxes we put in the barn for unpacking.  Well we set them on the floor on top of some plywood, not a great plan.  A river of water ran through the barn with the downpours we had.  The bottom boxes had 3 inches of water soaking them.  Very disappointing.  Something else that needs to be addressed.

Tom and Tom making me nesting boxes for the baby chicks. 

Baby chicks... Australorps and Barred Rocks.  These babies will lay brown colored eggs. 

                                              

                                                    

My wonderful friend from Texas sent me these Turkey eggs.  Hope a couple hatch !!  They are in a incubator now.  I turn them daily like a good mother hen.

                        

This is the second story to the bee colony.  Now the bees have an upstairs to get away from the 

queen if they so choose.  I put a queen restricter in.  This way they go up and make their honey and the queen does her thing on bottom floor.

                            

I have more photos to post but first I have to go check on chicks and eggs.  More to come....

New Chicks.

We have so many projects I can't even begin to list them all.  Tom is on his way from Idaho with his friend Tom bringing our possessions which were parked there for the last 4 years.  

Bebe walks with us like she's a dog in the morning.

She finds the pond for the first time.

I had to pick up some chicks locally.  There are 6 Rhode Island Reds and 4 Ameraucanas 

They are getting acquainted with each other.

More chicks to come.  I have my eye on some rare breeds.  When I decide which ones I'll post.

The First Few Days.

We have arrived and been exploring our new homestead.  Sam and Coffee love the pond.  We walk every morning rain or shine.  The first place they go is to the pond to check if there are any ducks. 

A beautiful still morning....

Really can't beat this view.

These are my bees.  I plan on having several hives.  Gotta start somewhere.

Some of you may remember Anastasia (renamed Bebe) because she responds when I say come on baby!  She was the cat at the Organic Farm in Texas.  Well we stopped to say hi and she jumped in my arms.  She wouldn't leave me and hung on with her claws dug into my shoulder.  She made the trip from Texas to Kentucky like princess.  Now she is our farm kitty.  She is in charge of ridding the property of all mice.  From of the looks of things she is taking her job seriously.  

This is our new Hay rake.  We'll be gathering the grass for use later for our sheep, goats and cows.  When we get them.

Stayed tuned for this transformation.  This will turn into our Chicken Mobile.  Which we will move around the farm so the chickens have fresh grass and bugs to feast on.

Had to put in a mailbox.  This place has never had one.  I guess it's real.

Navigating a New Path

The time has come to transition to a new path.  

Our plan when starting this adventure in the RV over 3 years ago was to find someplace to retire, just what we were going to do in retirement was still a little fuzzy.  During our adventure we saw many beautiful places, met some wonderful people and ate some darn good food.  So much so we both need to eat grass for a few months to lose some of this extra baggage.  Anyway, on the road my food allergies flared and I found some information about farm raised seafood I didn't know.  Like they feed seafood a pellet made out of mostly corn.  I found this out when eating seafood on the Gulf Coast and got a raging migraine for 3 days.  Tom finally realized this whole allergy thing was truly for real and our discussions about Organic Farming began.  That is how we came to find the land we now call our own.

We will start with feeding ourselves and work into doing Farmers Markets, possibly a farm store and becoming an organic producer for local restaurants and co op markets if possible.  

The new focus of this blog will be toward the building of our farm and new life.  Becoming self sustainable, practicing organic farming, and making most of our own goods.  Tom will do the planning of buildings, fencing and all things mechanical. We will both do the animals, planting, and picking.  I will do the recipes, canning and soap making.  This will be more than a full time job I know but really what else is there to do but enjoy this beautiful earth.  We hope to give back to our community and be an asset to our neighbors.  

So the adventure begins....

We hope you'll follow us in this new chapter of our lives.  Maybe we can all learn a little something along the way.

Movin on Down the Road

Here is our route from December through the end of February.  We left San Antonio Mar 3.... 

Our update as follows.....


After leaving the Organic farm we took some time to figure out where to go.  We thought we would head to South Texas... But..... Our plan changed around Christmas when I found a couple of properties in North Texas and  Kentucky to look at.  We turned East instead of South. Stopping in Tyler Texas for a week we trotted around North East Texas and looked at some property.  Nothing really panned out so we continued East to Louisiana for 10 days waiting for our mail to catch up with us. (Not all of it did)

We found a really cool park called Lincoln Parish Park.  There were 8 miles of trails for me and the dogs to hike on. Our New Years Eve was a little chilly.

                   We just arrived and got set up on the lake

     Sitting outside enjoying my morning coffee and being a bit warm.

                           Sunset

                        New Years Eve

Heading North after this.  Kentucky here we come.  Bring winter on we can handle it. Yeah right !! We came back south with our tail between our legs. Too Cold up there.  

We did find a property, actually it was half of a Golf Coarse that we made an offer on.  The owner said No so we upped the offer he still said no.  I guess his property will stay on the market another 5 years.  

South we go into Alabama where we took a detour and met up with some friends on the coast for a few days.  Stopped in Biloxi for a week and the ice came for us there too.  

We headed West and finally stopped for a month in San Antonio where we met some new friends and Tom got to meet a cousin he never knew.  We visited with them and had a great time with in San Antonio.  

Not many photos to share but I have a few of some Missions we visited.  

Now we are headed to Phoenix Arizona by way of New Mexico and Northern Arizona.  I will try to stay more updated.  

Thanks for coming along on our adventure.  

We have departed the Organic Farm...

The dawning of a new day at the Organic Farm was exciting and fun.  Our goal here was to learn how to be Organic Farmers.  I was hoping to learn about planting, soil, scheduling and all the things that a farmer could have in his head after 30 years on a farm.  That was not to be the case. Although I learned many things to do during our stay.  I equally learned many things not to do.  There were some differences of opinion and some difficulty with how some tasks were done.  After many confusing days we decided it was time to simply part ways from the farm and move on with our adventure.  I was very busy during our stay so here, I will update you on some of animals we had the joy of taking care of and the ice storm we endured.  

We were greeted by a friendly Cat, Anastasia.  I named her Bebe.  She was a sweetie.  Both of us were sad to say good bye to her.  She stayed close to the coach every night and even slept on our steps sometimes.  I made her a bed after a few chilly nights.  She seemed to like it.  I wish we could have took her with us.  She got to keep the bed and big bag of cat food hidden away for her enjoyment.

One of my tasks was feeding the dogs everyday.  I call these guys the 3 musketeers.  They take care of the sheep.


This is my lovely Molly.  She takes care of the Chickens by making sure no hawks swoop in and help themselves.

The chickens are grateful for Molly.  There were about 125 Chickens I looked after.  

The sheep were enjoying some dinner after a long day in the pasture.  

This is Lassie AKA Floyd for me.  The farmer didn't tell me his name so I named him.  He seemed fine with it.  He was such a sweetie.  

Sunrise ...I saw my fair share of these.  Getting up early to do my part on the farm.  

The farm was over 170 acres with 4 ponds, a large garden, greenhouse and farm store.  I fed animals, worked in the farm store, cleaned up, office work, cooked for the dogs, worked farmers markets, helped with sheep, and took care of the chickens.  

While we were there for a tour of jr high kids.  It was a fun and educational day.  I explained GMO's and what not to eat and why.  If you don't know what a GMO is message me and I'll tell you.

Kids looking out over the garden.

Part of the garden and the sheep.

The garden...It was 80 degrees this day.

The next day the weather turned ugly and by Saturday morning I woke up to.....below freezing and ...

We were living in an icy tomb...

The puppies didn't seem to like the 22 degree temps.

Frozen leaves...

I forgot to bring this fern in.

The icy prison the chickens and Molly were in.  It took me all day to get in that gate.

Bike ride anyone.  

After some differences of opinion we decided it was time to go.  We had to stay around another 4 days waiting for the thaw and packed up our toys to move on.  We'll miss the wonderful people we met there and hope there are a few we can stay in contact with.  It was super fun while it lasted.  

Right now we are in the South Dallas area decompressing and catching up.  We hope to be in Austin by Christmas... We'll see

Thanks for riding along.