The White Family Homesteaders

     Well its been well over a year since I last showed my face on here and I'm not sure where the time went. Last year was full of changes some good and some not so great.  But I won't bore you with the specifics, let's just say hello again and see what's new.      The biggest change of all is our new business venture, metal signs and decor. We take sheets of steel and turn them into signs, ornaments, home decor and even brackets using a plasma table.  Deciding on that purchase was life changing and one of the many reasons life was in the fast lane these last 18 months.  I had no idea what we were getting into or what the response would be, but so far we've had positive feedback. Plasma table hard at work, cutting some steel.      We've done some shows, selling our metal art and now we've got an online shop on etsy to check it out click here,  along with selling locally at The Coop de Ville and Forged n Found....

     I can't believe I didn't publish last week's blog until this week, I think we might have a bit too much going on right now.  The days and weeks are flying by and I don't even know what day it is.  I'm hoping last week was the worst of it and now it will be smooth sailing.  It all started with Papa's work schedule changing, so it put the whole week out of whack.  Then lil man had preschool graduation, it was his last week of school, I needed a touch up at the salon, we picked up our bees which were delayed by a week so that was a wrench in our plans and had to finish up more metal art for the market and prep everything for market day.  Oh plus we had to get more tomatoes into the garden, make new cages for the raised beds, sow more seeds because some hungry creature ate my edamame, plus our everyday chores like cooking and cleaning.  The week rushed by and now a new week is starting. One of many tomato holes, epsom salt in.   ...

        Oops I missed a week, well there was Mother's day and I did a lot of non homesteading things like surprising my mom with a day trip to the beach and then celebrating the next day with my little family which did include gardening so blog went to backseat last week.  Oh right and then there was this tiny little thing that happened, our FIRST MARKET DAY.  I'm sure glad that first day is over, now we know what to expect and how things shall go from now on.  Plus I was so anxious and had so many butterflies I was almost making myself sick.  I don't do well with new experiences, I had the feeling like it was a first day of a new job or first day of school and had my nerves all wound up.      Papa had to work the day before so I was in charge of making sure the last little things were done, for instance pricing signs, list of everything going, and everything organized ready to be loaded up.  I think because he wasn't ho...

     The hardest job besides being a mom is being Papa's right hand gal or assistant.  Now don't misread what I wrote it isn't him that makes it hard it's all the duties and responsibilities that come along with the job.  Since we've been a couple I've been helping him with all types of jobs be it car repairs, plumbing, carpentry and the list goes on.  I truly love helping him because it makes his life easier and gets the project done faster but I also learn new skills along the way.  So here's my insight on being a good assistant and what comes along with it. Helping spread out soil.      The most important skill you can bring to this job is anticipation.  So what does that mean?  It means knowing what he/she will need next, be it the drill with a screw or the next piece of lumber.  Me being on my A game and just handing it to him without him telling me, I believe and I know he'll back me up is the most helpful...

     So if you haven't heard we've been accepted into our local farmer's market.  It's pretty big news like scream it from the roof tops news.  Someone pinch me, because I'm not sure all this is real...did we really sign up to grow food for others?  Yes we've talked about it before, about maybe having a little stand to sell our extra vegetables but who knew it would be this season. Oh so many strawberries.      After we first put in our application I began to think about what makes a farm or homestead.  I began to feel like maybe we aren't ready for this step or if people will take us seriously.  When I think of a farm or homestead I think of people raising beef or the massively huge vegetable and fruit producers who have workers because there's so much to pick and plant.  But here on our homestead it's quite literally a mom and pop homestead.  We provide food for ourselves and any extras we give to friends and fa...

     Drum roll please...the greenhouse is finished, not just a few more things to do but all the way done.  I've been filling it up with my plants and I look around and I'm still in shock that we built it from some pieces of lumber.  The hubby did most of the work but without an awesome assistant he still might be working on it, just kidding. I never imagined us actually building one, we have what the old owners left behind and I was alright with it.  Now looking at my oh so beautiful barn style greenhouse I can't believe I would have settled for less. The old one was like a quarter of the size, leaking all over, dark and squirrels were constantly sneaking in.  Here's the  link  to the plans we used, thanks  Ana White  for the awesome plans. It's a beauty and filling up fast.      The last few touches were completed this week...spray foam insulation, shelves, door trim, and door threshold.  We bought a ...

     An important aspect of being a homesteader I believe is being able to or at least not afraid of trying to repair broken down equipment.  It's not only something that needs to be done on the homestead but just in adult life in general.  This week Papa saved us a lot of money by fixing the weed wacker, pressure washer and air compressor.  First we went down to the garden to clear up the rows in between the beds of all the obnoxious weeds but the darn weed wacker just wouldn't run right...so off to the side it laid to be checked out later.  When I was working on cleaning up the greenhouse door we set up the pressure washer to easily get off most of the chipped paint but the once so powerful pressure washer wouldn't stay on, and out came the regular hose.  Then when I was sanding and scraping off the debris and gunk off the door I was using the air compressor for easy air clean up but then I smelt plastic burning so I shut it off until Papa could...

     I'm not sure about everyone else but we are extremely busy right now.  There is so much on our to do list that it seems we may never get everything checked off.  The days seem to fly by and then before you know it our homestead week is over and it's back to the paying job.      With so many chores that need to get accomplished we had to come up with a way to prioritize our to do list a while back. Our solution was what we call a stoplight list.  So first we wrote down all things that need to be completed, not everything is necessarily homestead related, but this way we don't forget anything.  Next we went through the list and determined when each item needed to be completed by.  Then next to each chore we put green, yellow or red.  Green items are no rush, yellow needs to be done within month or so and red needs to be completed within week or two.  This has helped us tremendously because we often forget the small pr...

     Things aren't always smiles and sunshine on the homestead, there are devastations and setbacks.  Being a homesteader is a trial and error game and sometimes things go really well but at other times there are heartbreaks.  I'm hoping that this life we are providing for our kids teaches them to take mistakes as a learning tool.  I've always had a hard time making mistakes or failing as some might put it but the more farming we do I realize that mistakes aren't the end of the world and you can learn from them.      The weather finally warmed up so we were finally able to open up our bee hive and we were heartbroken with what we found.  All our bees were dead, which left us with no bees that was our 2nd hive.  After looking over them, our own bee autopsy...my own version of CSI...we've come to the conclusion that the hive no longer had a queen, which led to their demise.  After the shock wore off we had to decide what we wou...

     Growing season has begun and my dining room corner has become our temporary greenhouse.  Trying to start seeds in the rain with the kiddos running around can be somewhat challenging and not very productive.  At times I found myself getting frustrated when every 2 minutes or so I hear "mom watch this, mom watch this", but then I would turn around and see lil man sliding down a muddy hillside with an enormous smile and it made me realize I have to go with the flow.  Sometimes we are constantly trying to check things off our chore list that we forget we need to be flexible and goof off.  On my own I was able to get half a tray of seeds started so I waited for our weekend with Papa to get the rest done. Of course before I could get started I had to clean up chicken poop, thanks ladies.      Planting goes so much faster when there's two people.      Since we don't have a long growing season I try to get ...

     The garden planning is a continuous process and I've made more progress on it.  Remember how I organized my seed album, well at least I thought I had.  We were hanging out in the garage and I found my plastic bin I take to the garden when we plant and I had forgotten that that's where my main stash of seed packets were.  That evening while we caught up on our tv shows on Hulu I laid out all the newly discovered packets and went over my order list.  As it turns out I've got more seeds than I knew so I won't need to shell out as much cash or what will probably happen is I'll find other seeds to spend it on.  My eyes become bigger than our garden capacity when I'm looking at all the pretty pictures of what could be in my garden.  I did place my first order of seeds through Territorial seed company.  I'm a bargain shopper and am always looking for sales or coupons so I've found out that when you place an order they send you a coupon. ...

     I'm starting to believe the weather is against us.  Everytime we have a chore outside that needs to be done the weather is uncooperative but when we have no plan the weather is fantastic.  We need to get more logs cut and split because this winter is different then most or maybe I've been keeping the house warmer either way our pile is super low.  With the melting snow and heavy rainfall though our firewood processing pad is a shallow lake.  It would be cruel to make Papa cut in those conditions.  So it's been postponed another week but next week it has to be done, the lake is drying up so it looks promising. Where's the plug? I need to drain this water.      The weather here has been unpredictable and surprising to say the least.  I have a weather app on my phone and it's always alerting me to winter advisory warnings or this or that.  The one warning that usually never is correct is the wind warnings. ...