This summer I brought my aquaponic system outside and changed it to hydroponics to see how it would do. Well it worked out so well and we got such beautiful lettuce from it, I wanted to bring it back inside again for the winter. So this past weekend we disassembled the bottom part by removing all the water and taking out all the clay balls placing them into 5 gallon buckets to bring them inside. Placing the system The hardest part of bringing the system in is where to put it. So we had to strategically move around the living room yet again to make space for the 40 gallon stock tank and 29 gallon fish tank that will act as the reservoir. Plus when everything is reassembled and water is added, you are looking at over 500+ lbs of weight - not for the faint of heart homes that is for sure! Jonathan with new lights One of the biggest issues we had last winter with the AP system, is the lighting. There just wasn't enough. So this year we bought two lights and Jonathan mounted them together to create a 4 bulb span that can be raised and lowered over the grow bed. With exposed beams in the ceiling, it gave Jonathan a great mounting point for the light system so now it hangs perfectly over the grow bed. System ready for operation So here we are, grow bed is filled with hydroton, tanks have water in them, lighting is mounted, and pump is assembled and running and first nutrient liquid has been added. Now it is time to plant a few seeds and see if we can have fresh lettuce and spinach for Thanksgiving! Won't that be a treat up here in Maine!!
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Ben's Birthday great weekend break It is hard to believe how fast this month is flying by! With guests, cooking, working on the addition, facebook, reviewing books, school, soccer, and winterizing the gardens and inside of house... It has definitely been a whirlwind first 2 weeks! Siding delivered from Tukeys With the arrival of the siding, we could finally get down to business and side the new addition. The roof is now on and secured.. I am so glad Jonathan doesn't mind heights! The new roof almost complete To save money and for ease of installation, we did not special order a long run of roofing. Instead we opted for the 12 foot sections that the local building supply carried. Yes it means our roof has a few more seams, but Jonathan has made sure the hatches have been batten down securely! And seriously, we are going for function not fashion. Blocking and wrapping Before we can even think about putting on the board and batten siding, we have to block between each stud. Why? Well for two reasons really, first to have a stable surface to nail to and second for added support in the walls. Once the blocking is on, we used recycled feed bags as the vapor barrier in lieu of house wrap. Let the siding begin.... Here you can see the feed bags we used. I was saving them to make reusable shopping bags, but this was something I definitely could do another day. It was important to get some kind of barrier up and believe it or not, the feed bags are basically the same material used in house wrap! So not only did we save money we recycled something that would have ended up in the landfill! I love it! One side almost done Here is the side almost completely sided with the base boards. Jonathan will still need to go back and put the battens on which is a 3 inch wide piece of siding that will cover every seam between the base boards. It isn't exactly like the board on board we used on the house, but we believe will make it more air tight. The picture below shows the siding all done... now just need to frame out the door opening and install the door! North side complete with door & window The other side is all enclosed with a door and a window too! We ran out of feed bags, so this side has some felting paper as the house wrap. Since this is the North side of the house, Jonathan made sure to really focus on getting the seams tight even before the battens go up! Now all that is left is the last lower part which is going to be a storage area. North side of workroom Another view of the North side of the workroom. I really can't wait to be able to organize a work area as well as finally get some much needed attic storage! It is hard to believe this has taken all summer to get to this point when we built our whole house in less time! But we had more time and a deadline for the house. This workroom is an added bonus so not an essential and when money is tight you have to take it slower to buy supplies. All said and done this glorious 20 foot x 24 foot addition will end up costing less than $3,000. Doing all your own work definitely pays off! This week with the cooler temperatures, I have decided to add two new recipes that our family likes once the leaves start changing. You can find both recipes located under the recipe tabs to the left or by clicking on the appropriate tabs. The first recipe pictured above is Penne Pie! A blend of Sausage, Salami, Spinach and 3 cheeses that will have you begging for more! To me it is a cross between a mac & cheese and lasagna without the sauce. The salami adds just enough zing to it and adding things like kielbasa or bacon has been mentioned on our facebook page. To find out how to make this wonderful pie simply click on this link: Penne Pie The second recipe I have added this week is Pork Stew! This is an old fashion recipe which I have made for quite a few years now. Probably too many to remember :) One of our favorites and one that I love to make when we have company coming that we aren't quite sure when they are arriving. This is also fantastic as a left over for lunch the next day! Combining Pork loin, Sweet Potatoes, onion, green peppers and a tomato gravy, this is a sure winner on any cold night! To find out how to make this recipe simply click on this link: Pork Stew The best part of both of these meals is they heat up the house so nice which maybe will help with not having to turn the woodstove or furnace on yet... Both take about 1 hour or more to bake so make sure you leave yourself ample time to prepare them before Some of the eggs we get in a day When you have 16 hens it is hard not to have a surplus especially when your family of 5 is now down to 4 and your neighbors.. just don't need anymore right now. So I have been trying to find unique ways to use up some of them so that they don't go bad. One of the ways is of course making quiches which I believe I had 9 in the freezer and now I am down to 5.. so I don't need anymore of them at the moment. So how about freezing them raw. Yes you can if you take an egg and blend it up or whisk it, place it in a bag or container in single or multiple eggs depending on what you want/need. Then freeze. When you need some for baking or scrambled eggs, just remove the bag and place it in a bowl of water. The egg is thawed in a few minutes and ready to be used! Perfect! Frying eggs in canning jar bands But can you cook an egg and freeze it? Well the answer is a definite Yes you can! That is exactly what we do here. Our family loves egg sandwiches which consists of an english muffin or bagel toasted with a fried egg, canadian bacon and slice of cheese. Perfect for a quick breakfast, snack or even dinner on those really crazy nights! Best part is they are super easy to make using rings or the bands off of the canning jars. They can stick so you must butter the bands with each batch but the clean up is easy if you let them soak for a bit when done. Each egg is perfect size for sandwich I have a griddle which makes life so much easier when I make big batches of anything like pancakes, or fried eggs. You will find your own technique for doing this but here is what I did. I buttered 8 canning jar bands. I placed them on the heated griddle placing a small bit of butter inside each ring. I then cracked an egg into each ring. Sometimes the white will sneak under the edge but that doesn't matter. Once the egg has cooked about 1/2 way to being over hard, I flip the bands using a wooden toaster tong. Then I loosen the egg from the band with a butter knife and remove the rings to finish cooking the eggs. 40 eggs cooling and ready to be packaged! I remove the eggs when the yolk is solid to a cooling rack. Allow eggs to cool all the way then package them between layers of wax paper and place them inside freezer bags. I mark the bags with the date and how many eggs are in it. Now it is as simple as removing an egg in it's frozen state, placing it in the microwave and cooking for about 1 minute. So simple my 8 year old can do this anytime! Follow the steps for making a sandwich above and Presto you are done! Whole process should take only a few minutes so even on those close call mornings when the kids are running out the door, you can give them a hot breakfast to take on the run! Packaged and ready to freeze! You can also use these all ready cooked eggs in a variety of recipes including fried rices and salads. I also will take a few out and crumble them up to put in the Parrot food I make called Chop. It is a time saver as well as a way to save money instead of buying those pre-made sandwiches in the grocery store. You know exactly what went into making them and who touched them... so much better for you and your family! Happy Eating! Addition looking from back to front It has been quite a few weeks since I last did an update on our workroom addition. We have slowly worked away at it in between house guests, bad weather, school starting and life in general! We have added the walls - changed the design and now finally have started to put the roof on. So let me break it down one by one... first the change of design... South side of addition We had originally planned on extending the roof line right down to a knee wall about 4 feet off the ground. From the door over to the right would be the workroom and from the door down to the left (imaginary knee wall) is where we would have the barn for the goats and other animals that need housing for the winter. Somehow, reality didn't add up to paper and we were off somewhere... one of the pitfalls from building off the cuff :) But this is Maine so it is ok LOL! So now we are left with our workroom and a 6 foot wide storage space. This storage will now be used to hold most of the items found in our grey storage tunnel - you know the ones that folks use for cars, boats and even livestock! Grey Tunnel we use for storage Here it is, the grey tunnel just after we built it. Now of course it houses everything you would normally find in someones attic or basement. Yard sale leftovers, building material, Holiday decorations.. and a lot more :) Honestly we can barely walk in it. So the idea we came up with is once the workroom is finished then we can move all the building material and tools into the workroom, everything else hopefully will fit in the storage side.. then we can convert the tunnel into a barn! We plan on building a solid front with doors and vents as well as a solid back which will also open to allow the goats and?? to graze in a paddock area. It won't be forever as this was purchased originally with the greenhouse kit so I could convert it into one when we were done with the workroom/barn. See Homesteaders always planning ahead! Sometimes it just takes a bit longer to get there. But the way I see it, the soil should be fantastic in that area once we get it converted into a greenhouse! Area to be used for storage This is actually the area we are going to use for storage. Not to shabby if I can sort out the unnecessary stuff and only keep what we will need. These are the walls that Jonathan and Ben have been working on over the last few weeks prior to Ben starting college. They also put on the strapping for the roof which are the boards sticking out towards you on the roof line. One thing nice about metal roofing is you don't need a sublayer of plywood only strapping so it helps keep the cost down. Future workroom The walls are built from the same lumber as the house - rough sawn hemlock from Tukeys Brothers. I am still so thankful we have a mill near us! The window you see in the photo is a free salvage from our local refuge (dump). Not a bad find at all as there was really nothing wrong with it. It looks like it will be a really good sized workroom and I can't wait to start organizing it! And.. maybe down the road this might make a great Master bedroom with a huge walk in closet?? You know... Homesteaders..always thinking ahead! Jonathan roofing addition Next on the agenda is finishing off the roof install. Not difficult but a bit time consuming especially working a one man team these days. I am usually up there too but with a recent injury I am left with both feet on the ground. Once the roofing is done we will be slapping up the siding and should be weather tight before the first snow flake falls.. I hope! Would love to get it all set up before winter so I can use it to make the birdhouses and things I used to do a few years ago. I also plan on having a summer canning kitchen where I can make soaps, salves, tinctures and of course canning. Jonathan foresees his workshop as a Norm Abrahms workshop.. lathes, routers... a new Yankee workshop British style! I am thinking the room is not going to be big enough :) Hope you enjoyed the update so far... I will try to update it again as soon as the roof is on and we start siding. Have a great day everyone! Our family celebrating my birthday Back in April when I first started to write this blog, I had never envisioned where it would grow to today, or the fulfillment I would get from it. I have always had a creative writing flow but never found a niche to vent it to. I toyed with writing a book but I really do have more fun with reading them then actually sitting down and writing one. But maybe someday. So milestones it is... and last week on facebook I reached my first milestone which was we had our 100th like! This has now turned into 144 likes and I am tickled pink!!! I can't believe how many people out there are interested in what we are doing here and following along. Yes the recipes are good too! LOL But it amazes me how many people are jumping on board the Homesteading wagon or wanting to. And I like sharing what I have learned both the good and the bad so it is a good fit. So now my next milestone has been reached... I have decided to buy my domain name. Yes, heidishappyacrefarm.com is official and should be up and running as I write this. So if you are looking for our blog it is as easy as remembering my name with a dot com at the end. Kind of flows... So we shall see where this new path takes us. I do know one thing... where ever it is will surely be an adventure! Thank you to all those who support us and have been following along from the start. We couldn't have done this without you our family and friends! We love you all!! Abbie and Ariana on their first day of school I can't believe it is here already! September... start of a new school year for the girls and a new college career for Ben. Where has the year gone? Before we know it the leaves will be changing, then falling then something else will be falling... Snow! Ugh I know I dread that four letter word too but it is inevitably coming! Ben all set in his new dorm room But let us not forget how much we have accomplished over the summer months. The food we provided for our family that was grown in our own gardens, the eggs we collected, the repairs that were made on home, coops, or lean to... all of course while it was still warm enough to hold the handle of a hammer without getting frost bite! That is a novelty in itself! Belle picture taken Winter 2011 We welcomed in a Blue Moon and said good bye to an old friend (RIP Belle). We have already stacked wood, and stocked the freezer. We have gathered herbs and jarred them for future remedies. We have jammed, we have pickled and we have feasted! Yes we have had company galore this summer which we are very thankful for! Our door and spare room has always been revolving and it continues to be for the autumn as well! Bounty from the Summer So yes it is September and the air has started to cool. The grasses have started to dry up and the gardens are starting to slow. But it isn't winter yet and this is what guides me now! Because there is always the fall crops to come in and Soccer season to look forward to. Finishing off the workroom and barn - and the holidays! Another time for enjoying family and friends. So even though it is September don't give up on the year just yet... we still have a few months left of the year to enjoy before winter sets upon us and the green of our gardens are a vague memory reawakened when we look at a picture or open a new jar of jam made from summer ripened berries. Autumn is really my favorite times of year as I love apple picking and baking pies, walking on a path full of dried leaves that crunch with every step. The cool crisp nights and the warm breezy days. The smell of the drying plants in the air which has an herbal scent. So even though it snuck up on me quick... I am glad it is here.. Welcome September. Ben and girls on graduation day 2012 So much to celebrate already today! Not only is our son starting his college career at the University of Maine Orono to study Civil Engineering but we reached surpassed our goal of likes on our facebook page! Definitely a day of smiles!!! And now to the serious stuff.... two new recipes! Quiche First recipe for today is Lazy Lady's Quiche - this is a quick simple recipe using biscuit mix to form the crust. Add some milk, eggs, and a few choice ingredients - put it in your oven and Presto! You have a quiche in under 1 hour~! No double baking crusts anymore! Love this! To see the recipe click on this link which will take you right to the page or you can also use the tabs on the left and scroll down to the recipe. Lazy Lady's Quiche Jar of biscuit mix The second recipe actually ties into the first one - but its 1001 other uses is pretty good too! It is homemade biscuit mix! Yes just like the store bought brands but for 1/2 the price. And because you are making it yourself with a few ingredients, you know where it comes from and what is in it! To see the recipe click on this link which will take you right to the page or you can also use the tabs on the left and scroll down to the recipe. Biscuit Mix I hope you enjoy these two recipes as much as we do. I now have 7 quiches in the freezer to use as a quick meal during the busy soccer season! See I am so organized... for once! Have a great day everyone and enjoy the full moon tonight! Flat Leaf Parsley One of the best things I love about my gardens is being able to go outside and pick my own fresh herbs to use in a recipe. I also love to pick and dry my own herbs to use in the winter when my plants are laying dormant under a foot of snow. It also cuts down on the cost of having to buy herbs. This year I even had a sage winter over and now I actually have a sage shrub in my garden! Sage Isn't it beautiful! I love adding some dried sage to flour with a bit of paprika when I make my fried chicken batter. One of Benjamin's favorite meals that I make for his birthday. It has been fun having a dehydrator (thanks to Mom and Bob again and their love of yard sales) as I have been drying all my herbs in it. The other day my house was full of the scent of thyme which lingered for a day or so. Thyme I actually have 4 big patches of thyme in the Water - West side of my Elemental Garden. It is doing so well I could probably start sub-dividing it and place it strategically between my stones in a path like I have always wanted to do. I love walking in a garden and brushing up against something like Thyme or lavender and having it scent the air. I actually have the English thyme as well as the French thyme - the difference is in the leaves not the taste - or not that I can tell anyways. Lavender My lavender has been surviving. I have 2 different plants - one I have had for a few years and it comes up every year but only sends up a few flowers. This lavender I bought this spring and already it has triple the flowers the other one had. I am hoping it will survive the winter and grow enormously for next summer! That way I can harvest the blossoms to use in recipes and soaps. Oregano One of my other favorites to dry is Oregano. I love oregano in soups, sauces, sautes... I use it really in everything! Actually oil of Oregano is supposed to be really good for you as an astringent and some people who make their own toothpaste are using it as one of the ingredients. Rosemary Rosemary is one of those good meat herbs. I usually have it on my lamb or other rich meat meals or stews. It is quite pungent so make sure you like it before you use it. I was toying with using it in an herbal soap as I think the smell is very nice. Again this is one of those herbs you love to just brush up against or pick a leaf or two when walking by just to get it herbal scent. Chives Chives are one of those herbs you have to have in a garden. If not for the beauty of the plant itself, then for the versatility of its uses. I use it in my cheese making, on sandwiches, in salads, in place of scallions in recipes, in eggs... really the list is endless. This plant I have here is originally from the house I grew up in and has to be over 50 years old. And what is a garden without a few mint species! This is my pineapple mint which I have opted to put in a container instead of in the ground. Normally mints are invasive and will take over any area they are planted and then some. Unfortunately my soil is so harsh that both my mint and my lemon balm were not even worth taking a picture of they look so poorly. This was another reason I decided to pot up the pineapple mint and I am glad I did as it looks beautiful! Well there you are... you have now taken a walk with me in my culinary herb garden... it isn't a very long walk but the few plants I have now allow my to make some really good tasting food for my family which is all I really care about. As the years go on I will add more to it like Dill (which the chickens ate this spring), Angelica, Bee Balm, Marjoram and Tarragon just to name a few. So look for updates in the future as the best part of gardening is a plot of earth is an empty canvas waiting to be painted! Enjoy the day! Americana Hen Can you believe August is almost over already? I wanted to do this update a week ago but some how the time just slips by so fast and the week is gone before you know it! Where to start....First our big news of the week! We entered Grit Magazines Homesteader of the year contest and I just received a notice saying we are one of the lucky Honorable Mention winners! We will have an interview in an up and coming Grit Magazine as well as a 2 year subscription, a collection of Grit Guides and a hat. We are so excited and honored to be chosen. It was quite a surprise :) Now on to the farm. Lets swell how about the chickens! They are doing very well and we are getting about 10 eggs a day on average. We have 16 hens and the 2 roos. We did lose one of our Plymouth Rock hens when she got trapped under a root of a stump. We didn't realize she was missing until it was already too late. Very sad :( Of course we spoil our chickens! When we have some extra milk that we haven't used up, I bring it to them and you should see them gobble it up! I also bring them the whey when I make cheese. They love that too! French Black Copper Marans Rooster Then we have our handsome Rooster. This is Abe who is a French Black Copper Marans. He has feathering along both of his legs and is a very protective Roo. He is actually not the alpha male as Lincoln has taken that role. He is what I call the sentinel - he guards the perimeter of the fencing and keeps everyone in line. If a hen jumps the fence to freedom, Abe is right behind her to watch over her. He takes his job very seriously. Isn't he beautiful? Goose Antics! Then we have Ferdinand and Waldo. Still as full of antics as ever. I am thinking that Ferdinand is a female.. still not 100% sure as she has a slight hump on her head but not as prominent as Waldo's whose definitely sticks out. Here you see them playing in a bowl of water. Yes they still have the pool I made for them - but do they swim in it??? NO! Only thing swimming in that pool are frogs... go figure! Gandalf and Sky hamming it up! Here are my boys! Yes they are getting so big already. Gandalf the white is now 7 months old and Sky is around 5 months. Sky will be the only lucky man on the hill this fall as Coco will be the only goat we breed this year. The others are too young yet to have kids of their own. Hydroponic Lettuce Ok on the garden side of the world... Here is the hydroponic lettuce that is doing fantastic in the tubes! I moved it up out of the bed garden so that I could start more seeds in the grow bed. You can just make out new green leaves from the seeds I just planted. We had some of the lettuce in our salad last night... crisp and delicious! We will definitely be bringing this system indoors for winter so I can continue growing our own vegetables! Cucumber A frame from cattle fence Talk about the success of this A frame! And only half of the cucumber plants survived! We get a minimum of 2 to 3 cucumbers everyday - in 3 different varieties. The regular pickling cucumber, the white cucumber which is low acid and burp free, as well as the Japanese long cucumber. All are very tasty and they are what I made my pickles from already. Tomato Jungle Talk about tomato jungle! This is my vine variety tomato plants. They had one mishap a few weeks ago when during some high winds the whole support and tomatoes came crashing down. They smooshed some pepper and onion plants but believe it or not, the tomatoes came out ok. This is also where we had an outbreak of Tomato Horn Worms. Very ugly, very big and very green. Chickens had a treat that night! So far yield has been ok... not inundated with tomatoes as they are on the small side - but the ones we have picked are very sweet. I am thinking I may try to dry some??? Acorn squash Here is my hiding acorn squash - you can just make it out in between the stems of the plants. So far we have 3 squash...LOL won't save us from starvation but will at least be a decent meal one cold night this fall or winter. Butternut Squash And can't have one type of winter squash without having the other. Here is a butternut squash that is forming. I am hoping it reaches maturity before the frost - and it looks like this may be the only one we get - so it too will be cherished. Watermelon Of course you can't have a garden with kids and not grow watermelon! We have 3 trying to grow and mature before the frost comes. It will be a close race I think as melons in general do not grow well up here as the season is just too short. But we shall see. Sweet Banana Peppers Here is some sweet banana peppers. My peppers have done ok - but for 24 plants we certainly didn't get the yield I was expecting. Some of the plants just didn't produce any fruit at all where others growing right beside it, produced multiple large peppers. Not sure what happened to cause that. These do taste very good though.. and I can usually find Ariana with one in her hand eating it almost daily! Long view of raised beds This is a view of the two raised beds we have. The squash are in the near bed and the peppers were in the far bed. I have a touch of blight in the farthest bed on the tomatoes. I am in the process of culling the plants and will have to be careful what I plant there next year. I have egg plant flowers on all 6 of my plants but still have had no fruit? Again I am not sure why this is happening when plants right next to them are producing their fruit just fine. Potato Towers Last but not least for this August update, are my potato towers. As you can see the two back towers are doing very well still. The front tower which never even had a 3rd tier put on it, has died back either from blight or some kind of fungus. These potatoes where from the kitchen - you know the potatoes that you forgot about and they kind of grew in your basket :) The other variety are a fingerling variety from Johnny Select Seed and I do believe they are blight resistant so are still alive. I can't wait until we tip them over to see how well they did! I will keep you posted. Well that is it for now. I will have another part in a few weeks that will show a few of the other animals as well as different parts of the gardens not covered in this update. I hope you enjoy seeing how things are doing. If you have any comments, questions, or even would like to share your own garden or experiences, please feel free to contact us! Have a great day and Happy Homesteading! |
Heidi Burrows
A 40 something woman who has decided it is time to take control of our life Archives
February 2014
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Building a homestead Our 1st story
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