Happy Homesteaders

 Several years back Kelli and I quit selling our farm produce. We sold the roadside farm stand and scaled way back to just raising food for our selves.  Once we stopped trying to raise enough to sell to the community the stress level went way down and we became happy homesteaders here once again.  

If that was all we were doing I don't think we would have felt as much stress. In essence we were running 3 different businesses. The garbage business, cabin rental and the farmstand/produce sales. Now there is something to be said about being diversified, and I like the idea of that ,but we were getting too far behind on everything to try to keep up with it all. And we weren't as young as we used to be either.  

This last season the only gardening we did was right out our back door in containers and a couple raised beds. This was wonderful and we both thoroughly enjoyed having a kitchen garden, just stepping out the back door to harvest what ever we might want for lunch or dinner.  

We raised one batch of meat chickens and one batch of new laying hens.  Starting way too early with the meat birds, with snow still on the ground we lost more birds than we ever have in the last 22 years of living this homesteading lifestyle.  We ordered the birds way earlier than usual because we heard about people buying up chicks due to the state of the nation earlier this year.  So we didn't want to miss out. It was a mistake to try and raise up the fragile meat chicks in the colder weather, even with 2 heat lamps going 24/7. They outgrew the brooder too soon and our moveable pens simply were not thermal enough for the cold weather we were still experiencing early spring. 

The layer hens which we got later faired much better because that was the time of year we used to get the meat chickens. We were down to a "skeleton crew" of old layers from when we were selling eggs so they badly needed to be replaced. So we have had plenty of eggs since late summer with this new batch of chickens coming of age.  

My parents went in on a freeze drier with us this year so we have been freeze drying the surplus eggs rather than selling them. So then when the egg laying tapers off this winter we will still be eating our own eggs through the winter.  

We are down to just the basics and it's much more manageable for us. We are getting caught up on repairing and rebuilding a lot of the old infrastructure that was getting in disrepair due to us being too busy with 3 businesses.  We have ducks, geese, chickens, sheep and livestock guard dogs to care for year round and now just the small back yard garden.  This is perfect for the two of us to take care of.   

Now the garbage business is just 2 days per week and the cabin is being rented very regularly. I handle the cabin bookings and all the correspondence that it takes with the guests and potential guests. Kelli primarily handles the home keeping, gardening, yard maintenance and now she is the resident freeze drier expert! And we both clean the cabin. I always say we don't have a cabin rental business we have a cabin cleaning business! :)  Our one daughter still living at home used to do a lot of the cabin cleaning, but she now has her own business, a coffee shop in nearby town.   

When we first moved here in 1998 it was easy to get in over our heads with everything.  We were like kids turned loose on a giant 120 acre play ground! We've had just about every kind of farm animal over the years and even horses in the early years.  Horses are a big commitment in time and money and we have steered clear of them for a long time now. I'd love to ride a horse around here again, but all I have to do is remember the commitment in time and money and I go back to excepting that things are just fine as they are now. 

We are living in uncertain times and this year just about takes the cake! Life is always uncertain to be sure but a lot of things are being orchestrated to come to a head this year for whatever reason. It feels like a kind of purging and kind of a separation of the sheep and the goats. Some people are reassessing priorities and what's really important in life.  Others are just embracing their evil side and going with it. It's getting easier to see who the children of God are and who the children of the devil are. 

We just wait and see how the rest of this year will play out. I hope you are prepared for anything at this point.

Until Next Time

Thanksgiving 2020

I lost my inspiration to keep on blogging. The only reward was just having a place to share my thoughts and maybe get an "atta boy" once in awhile from someone who was moved by my writing. 

Been on facebook for 4 or 5 years give or take and the only reason I went on there was to try and promote our log cabin rental logcabinhomestead.com.  However I found that it was enjoyable to connect with family and friends that I had not communicated with in decades so I got fairly hooked on it. 

But I'm getting kind of burned out on social media especially this year 2020 where the divisions in our country have come to the forefront of everyone's attention.  Deep, deep divisions! 

A lot of people buying into all kinds of scams, just makes my heart sick.  People don't seem to know a con-job when they see one.  

I'm not putting my trust in any political party, but I am putting my trust in Jesus Christ that everything will work out for His good in the end.  Evil doers who think they have it made in this world will ultimately receive their just reward!  

With that out of the way I may just start making posts on here once again. It's a quiet place these days and there will be less likelihood that I'll offend people. I expect to be able to just relax and be myself here once again.  Just me and this vast expanse of uninhabited cyber space called "blogger". It's hard to believe that it is actually still here really. I think I get surprised the rare times that I pop in here and everything is just as a left it. Nothing that I even have to dust off!  Clean as a whistle! 

It's risky to air your religious and political beliefs on social media when you're trying to promote a business since you can easily alienate half your potential customers.  I always thought I might try to use this blog as a way to promote our cabin, but I never really geared it up that way.  Can't really refer our cabin guests to it either since it really became kind of a place where I aired some of my most personal thoughts, things I wouldn't necessarily share with people in a business type relationship with us.  

I should have created a sight where we just talk about the land, homesteading and cabin life and leave the personal stuff out of it.  But then again I'm really not a marketing guy, I just am who I am, take it or leave it! 

I've been seeing people become very successful via the internet and social media. One guy I've been watching on YouTube for awhile is one of those success stories Wranglerstar.  The first video I saw of his was where his dog I think, was attacked by a coyote and I think he shot it, if I remember right. Anyway I looked at his other video's after that and really enjoyed them.  He had not been homesteading near as long as us, but he really had a way of communicating with his audience.  

I watched Wranglerstar grow to having over a million subscribers and I watched him and his family become more and more financially successful judging by the many items, tools and machinery they were acquiring to make homesteading life that much easier.  He is an excellent communicator and does a fantastic job doing product reviews.  It appears that he gets a lot of free stuff from manufacturers so that he can review them. Plus he has an amazon store where you can buy the things he's reviewed getting a cut of all the sales of those items.  I'm happy to see these kinds of success stories.  However there does seem to be a down side to that kind of fame in that there are a lot of weirdo's out there who give him trouble from time to time.  That might be one reason why I held back on really trying to use this platform as a way to promote our business.  

Our log cabin rental really took off after we got on Airbnb. Our rentals almost doubled over night once we got on there. We have used Airbnb for several years now but will be ending our relationship with them starting January due to their political affiliations and stance on "covid".  There again a business risks alienating customers when they air their positions on certain things!

The log cabin rental business has been an over all positive thing for us since the early 2000's.  We were planning on starting another cabin this year, but then with the whole virus "lock down" thing we got cold feet and decided it wasn't the right time to expand.  But in reality I'm pretty sure this has been our best year ever on renting the cabin! So it probably wouldn't have hurt to start another one judging by this years success. Just lots of uncertainties to make a guy nervous to take a leap.  

My hope for building more cabins is to retire from picking up garbage for a living, yes I'm still picking up garbage it's been 20 years this year.  But I've made some deals with other haulers that have got me down to just 2 days a week of collecting garbage and now for the time being have a guy helping me. A much needed break for my sore body!  Actually earlier this year I injured my shoulder and have been working with this the majority of the year. The pain level has been about as much as I can bare, but this fellow who has been helping is an answer to prayer!  I can feel my shoulder mending! Praise the Lord!

Well there's a lot to catch up on but I will save it for more posts.  Heck maybe I really will get back into blogging!  

Until Next Time