The White Family Homesteaders

     I know I know it's been like two weeks and trust me I would have rather been blogging than what I was dealing with, the cold from hell.  I've had colds before who hasn't, but this isn't like any other cold it has like super powers.   It started on Memorial day with lil man just having an itty bitty cough, next day full cold and since it's trickled down the whole family.  Little lady was second, then myself, and now it has taken over poor Papa.  Of course when it took over me it was the beginning of Papa's work week.  Being a mom is a hard job but when you're sick and the kids are sick it becomes ten times worse plus you add the chores of the homestead and it feels like I'm being asked to climb a mountain. Plants keeping growing even when we're sick.      I've found myself jealous at times of some of the bigger homestead/farms we follow on Instagram until I felt like I was dying then I was so happy we're just starti...

     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 ...

     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...

     When you're homesteading or farming your chore and/or project list can be never ending so every minute of the day counts.  For us we try to be prepared when doing projects because we try to make the most of our time.  Sometimes we're fighting the weather, appointments, illnesses or lack of finances which pushes back completion but in the end we always complete what we start.  I'll share some of our tips for getting the most out of your time on your homestead. Greenhouse being covered. 1. Have tools Ready One of our newest tricks is having all needed tools in one spot, the way we do this is by using old dairy crates.  For instance our work on the greenhouse has continued this week and we were ready to go back out there because all our tools were in one spot.  When we start a project Papa puts nails, screws, levels, measuring tapes, plans, drills, basically all that is needed for our project in the crate.  What this ...

     Watch out when our calendar tells us what to do, we get it done.  It does get difficult with two small kiddos but we've come up with some unique ways of involving them so we can accomplish some not so kid friendly tasks.  This week we got so close to finishing the fence, about 75% of it is complete.  With so many rainy days lately we were thrilled to have the sun come out for even just one day.  Since we knew only one day would be good for fence building we brought in reinforcements for the kiddos, the homestead NiNi (my mom).  Being the assistant to the muscle requires all my attention and with one of our kids being under two I'm constantly looking over my shoulder to make sure she isn't endangering her life.  With NiNi's help Papa can have all my attention and the kids are safe. Getting the gate set into place.      No unexpected plans came up so we were able to get to the beginning process of building th...

     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. ...