Is This My Once a Year Update?

Howdy!

I actually found myself googling, "Do people still read blogs?" before I sat down to write this. And whether they do still read blogs or not, I found myself compelled to add another post... even if only for my own "story keeping." 

Yes, we are still YouTubing as well, but here's a quick update as to all things TwelveAcres.

With the CRAZY stuff going on in the world today, I'm withdrawing deeper and deeper into our little farm. We are making growing our own food a bigger priority this year than ever before. The fragile food system that is crumbling before our very eyes, has jolted a lot of people out of their slumber. 

The fresh meat sections at our local supermarket. 

Because of that, we've upped our game. 

The garden is a little bigger this year, our incubators are constantly running, the rabbits are perpetually kindling... you get the idea. 

 Our "pig venture" is still proceeding. Darla, our York/Blue Butt cross is pregnant and should be due in July. Frank, the Hereford boar, is still as sweet as ever, and even teaching Darla how to love being scratched. They are growing ever bigger and we hope to be able to expand their pens yet again this year. And I'm learning all I can about hog pregnancies and birth!

Handy Husband has seen some employment difficulties this year, so another new venture of ours is making home décor and furnishings from reclaimed wood and pallets. We've opened up an Etsy shop for the smaller items; if you get a minute, we'd love to have you take a look at what we offer. 

One of our handcrafted "noodle boards," aka stovetop covers.  

Some new critters on the farm this year, are (FINALLY) turkeys! We've been talking about getting turkeys for years now, and we finally bit the bullet! We have 12, 4 day old poults: six Narragansett, and six Bourbon Red. We plan on raising a few of these for the freezer, and the rest will be kept as breeders to hopefully keep us in turkey for years to come. 

 I can't think of anything else new. We are still recovering from the housefire, believe it or not. The siding is about 90% done, and we have still have to paint. We also have two massive piles of debris to remove from the property, but without a truck it's not that easy. One day at a time! We'll get there eventually.

Thanks for stopping by the blog. I may update more frequently as the mood hits. Take care everyone and I'll see you back here next time! 

Blog Update!

Good afternoon! I suppose it's time to update you all as to WHY I haven't posted on here much lately. We've decided to switch over to primarily doing YouTube. I try to post new videos at least once a week, but sometimes I upload as often as every couple of days! 

Here's the link, in case it is not visible elsewhere on the blog:

Twelve Acres Homestead on YouTube!

And here are a few links to some of our most recent videos:

Day 31: Siding and Window Replacement Project

Quail and Chicken Egg Incubation and Hatch - August 2019

Update on Goats + the Miraculous Recovery of Our Very Sick Buckling

I hope that you can all check it out, and thanks for stopping by here!

Homestead Horror (Video)

February Surprise

Our nine year old doe, who was thought to be sterile, totally surprised us by giving birth to FOUR precious kids on the 1st of February.

Sadly two babies didn't survive. The remaining two are doing pretty well, although we have to supplement them with bottles since the momma is battling mastitis.

Kids at Play

We had a beautiful day yesterday and the human kids hung out with Griffin for awhile. He's so sweet and follows them around. 

Meet Griffin!

We picked up our new Pygmy buckling, Griffin, today. He's 14 weeks old and very sweet. I'm hoping he'll grow a bit more, as I'd like him to be able to breed our does in the future. I've read that the Pygmy/Nubian cross creates a nice dual purpose animal. 

New Animal Additions to the Farm

In an effort to revamp our farm's food production, we are acquiring several new rabbits and a Pygmy goat buckling. We'll pick up the young rabbits Saturday, and getting the buckling later today. 

We have the buckling's temporary home ready, where he'll stay for a while until we can slowly integrate him into the herd. 

The rabbits will be housed in the greenhouse over the winter, and I've been working on coming up with a good layout for their large pens. It's not finished yet, but I still have a couple of days before they get here. 

Bountiful Beauty

I cannot even describe the level of contentment I feel while spending time outside. Everything is so full of life right now and there is beauty around every corner. I love our little plot of earth and feel so blessed.

Our baby tomatoes, coming in nicely. I'm doing container gardening again this year, since I'm not sure if the grasshoppers will make their return this summer or not. So far we haven't seen a single one, but it's still early.

 

One of my "new" roses, given to me by my mom two years ago. It is SO full of buds!

 

Above, one of our Knockout rose bushes.

 

The two little guys love spending time in the yard...

 

As you can see by all the toys, our new "rose garden" is a favorite place to play.

 

An "old" rose that was here when we moved in.

 

This was a surprise... a strange-looking "bush" that up until this spring had never had so much as a flower on it, now has baby peaches!

 

This is our massive old rose bush that we've discovered actually has two smaller roses growing under/within it. It's so wonderful seeing all the beautiful surprises in nature!

 

Goats vs Horses

 To make chores a little easier here on the farm, we decided to put the horses and goats together, and open up the hay barn to give them all 24-hour access. So far they've gotten along great and the horses and goats pretty much just ignore each other.

Feeding the Kids

Baby W loves giving the goats some cut branches and pulled weeds.

Paradise Living for the Goats

Finally finished with the back pasture fencing, we released the goats to come and go as they please. They have so much yummy food to eat that its taken them a long time to explore very far into that pasture. They love it!