Now Playing: Soy and all the things you can do with it...

Ok so as most people in the world know I am working on having our little farm become more and more self sufficient.  So far Michael and I  make and use our own soap, dish soap, laundry soap and such.  We raise a lot of our own meat; sheep, goats, chickens, ducks, turkeys, geese and pigeons and of course our quail.  Our Goats and sheep also provide us milk which we make into yogurt, cheese, cream cheese and of course the above mentioned soap.  We shear and spin the wool from our sheep and have future plans of weaving some and crocheting and knitting as well.  We also hunt deer in season.  We do tan our hides, just incase you wondered… Very little goes to waste here.  .

 

We can what we grow, tomatoes, peppers…and a whole bunch of other stuff.   We make our own jams, jelly and the like.  The herbs and such we raise we dry and use all year round. We have learned to cook a lot of food from scratch and not to buy any where near as much prepared food.

 

We log our wood with our own horses; we use it to heat with and sometimes cook. 

 

In the fall we plan to fire up the forge and make some new tools and maybe make a kiln so I can have some new dishes…lol

  

But in the mean time I am learning new tricks to make life a little better for us.  Because we have chosen to live in the middle of no where thinks like soy milk and tofu and such are hard to come by and a bit pricey.  However soybeans are cheap…around $9.00 for 50lbs/22.680 Kilograms….that is a lot of soybeans.  It takes only a little less than one third of a pound or 125 g of soy beans to make a little over a quart or one litter.  That mean you could make over 150 quarts or litters of soy milk for the $9.00.  We buy soy milk by the half gallon now at a cost of around $3.00 or so; cost $222.00 not including tax.  Yikes!  So I will save at least $213.00 plus I am making it myself.  It has a by product as well.   The insoluble material which remains is called okara, and can be used as an ingredient for bread making in other form of cooking or as feed for chickens, sheep, goats and alike.  So there is not waste.  Anyone who wants to try and make soy mik just drop me an email and I will tell you how to make it.

 

No on to my other favorite food of soy…Tofu…Yummy white creamy stuff you can also make yourself for just pennies really.  You need to make soy milk and than you need to heat it a bit just like making cheese.  You a little calcium sulphate-food grade of course or magnesium chloride and it sort of jelles up .  Next pour into a cheese cloth lined mold and wait. 

 

Yogurt from soy just as easy…need any help just email me.

 

I plan to use soy milk to make soap as well….I will let you all know how it works out. 

       

Mood:  caffeinated

Lately my email has been full of people wanting to know more about how to start being an eco happy homesteader….so I thought I would tell you al little about what we have done. 

So here we go…

1. We decided to see what we could live with out. 

 

      We decided we could live with out eating out more than once a month; this saves gas as we live 15 miles from anywhere.

     

     We could live with out brand new cars…

     Mine will at least run on ethanol. 

     We own a lot of classic vehicles.  -A 1978 Jeep Wagener that was my dream car.

     A custom 1988 Cadillac, a 1989 Buick Le saber custom (We are selling this at the car show this September in Mammoth Springs as it has fuel injection.)

     A wonderful 1987 ford retired gas powered U-hal Truck.

    

     With out brand new furniture…If we want it will build it, buy it used or post for it on FreeCycle or trade or barter for it.

 

      Trip to the salon, not store bought hair cuts.

      Along with that no store bought makeup or lotion or chap stick….We make most of these our selves.

    

      Pet treats-We make these our selves and even sell and trade with others.

 

      Contract Cell phones….Gosh the money you can save here is amazing. 

      We have four cell phones and went from paying $152.00 a months to a scant $60.00.   

       Credit Cards-buy it with cash or don’t buy it…

 

      Mortgage, home owners insurance and the like (yes I have car insurance). 

      Car insurance, the cheapest source I could find that did not base you insurance on credit-The Hartford.  $92 per month full coverage on them.

      If you want to know about the insurance on you home and how it is a scam email and I will be happy to tell you all about it.  

 

      Mail order coffee, I will live with what I find at the grocery store…

 

      Paper magazines-I can read most magazines online for free and save the trees and money. 

 

      Incandescent lights- We chose to replace all the nasty energy consuming incandescent lights with thrifty florescent ones. 

      Cost of 22 florescent light bulbs= around $100.00 with tax in Arkansas…

      Savings about $15.00 per month in electric-over all each bulb has a life span of at least three years

      This means they will not only last about a hundred times longer than the old bulbs, but will pay for them selves very quickly.

 

      Washing our clothes in warm and hot water….we only wash in cold water now.

 

      Zip lock bags-buy a Seal-a-meal, for the money you will get more and it is more eco friendly…plus you can use it to reseal all kinds of bags.

 

      Some other changes we have made in our lives are:

 

      We reuse almost ever container we bring home at least twice. 

 

     We make our own eco friendly soap, (this saves fuel and the eco system).

     We also make our own laundry soap…

      Feel free to ask for the recipe…

    

     We make one trip to shop instead of many:

     

     We try hard t o buy locally grown meat, if beef only Angus, it’s grown cleaner and is local.

     We also raise and eat our own old world sheep, goats, chickens, turkeys, geese, quail, ducks and pigeons.

     We milk our goats and sheep to make soap, cheese and of course just for milk as well.

      We eat our eggs from our free range chickens and ducks.

     When ever possible we buy local produce or raise our own from heritage or heirloom seeds. 

     Our potatoes this year will be blue, red and Yukon gold.

     We can our produce and also make our own jams, jelly’s and wines when ever possible.

     We have our own apple tree, pear tree, prisimon tree and a small mulberry tree as well as a tom of wild Black Raspberries.

     Currently we have our own Bay leaf tree and many herb plants.  Sage grows very well here as does basil and mint.

 

     To heat our home we burn good old fashioned wood…we try hard to gather wood that would otherwise be wasted, plus it’s free….

     We have logging horses that help us and we love them and our glad that they have chosen to share their lives with us.

  

     We joined Freecycle to give away things we don't need that might otherwise go into the land fill.

     If we are looking for a part or an item we need we ask on Freecycle first.

 

     We also compost all our food waste that the animals don't eat and use only organic fertilizers on our land. 

     We raise cute little bunnies who help us with this…

  

    . Well anyway this is some of what we do…I am sure it gives you an idea or two of your own….

 

                                               Be Blessed                   

Shekhinah, Michael and all the kids and critters here on Mahanaim Farm

                                                         

                               www.goldendovegallery.org  

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Ducks, swaps and cars
Mood:  mischievious
What a week...We raise ducks but bartered for more in hopes of turning over some quick cash. So now we technically have most of the endangered farm ducks out there. Sadly our van broke down the day of the swap and we never made it. Hoping next week will go better I am preparing to make animal treats and Lye soap to take with me.
The jeep may be back up and running, we have not tried to drive it yet. We have dumped a lot into it, but I think in the end it will work out for the best. Classic cars require work, so what you gonna do?
I found a newer jeep for $800.00 and have considered buying it. I could trade the Cadillac for it maybe or even the Buick, it's hard to decide.
Money as always is tight and we make the best of it all, trying to make things last as long as we can.

We acquired quail a couple of weeks ago and they seem to be doing very well. They are Cortinex Quail and lay about 300 eggs a year or so...not to shabby there, plus they go from hatch to laying in 7 or 8 weeks. They are tiny but fast and easy to raise, I give them a thumbs up. You may be asking your self what in the world are these little quail good for, well I will tell you. You can hunt them as they get flight feathers faster than bob whites. You can eat them yourself or sell them to restaurants or even sell them to a game farm...they go for around $2.00 each at hatch. You can sell their eggs for .15 each fertile or not (some people eat them. I saw fresh quail eggs on line for $9.00 for 6 eggs. I know crazy but true. They require very little food compared to a chicken and their eggs hatch at about 17 days. They do not set eggs well. So it is best to take their eggs away a few times a day. The biggest problem I can see is that they are like the size of a bumble bee when born and can drown them selves in nearly non existent water. Other than that they are great.
We have a big sportsman incubator and I am guessing you could do thousands of these eggs at a time if you had them. I have a small flock at the moment only 4 hens and two cock. I ordered another 4 hens and two more cocks but it will be a while on them. I get between two and three eggs a day from the ones I have (about 18 eggs a week) but it’s a good start. I figure I will keep a third of each hatch for breading stock. So with the 12 birds I should get 36 eggs a week. I plan to buy 6 birds from the breeder ever 2 weeks until I hit 100. With that I figure I should get 80 eggs a day or better and be fairly well set. 560 eggs a week would give me eggs to pickle for our use as well as sell and barter goods. I would have plenty to hatch and plenty to eat. In theory you could make un- believable money with them if you did it right. One of our friends in trying to talk us into raising them for slaughter, but in truth I think that is a lot of work for the return. I can get $2.00 each at the swap for the little guys with no effort, why would I want to have to clean them to make a quarter more per bird. You know…
I have about given up on hatching chickens for sale, yes there is some money to be made but people are fickle and the cost of feed high. I do better with ducks, geese, turkeys and the quail. I still want to buy Peacocks and hope to have some soon…ducks you can get $5.00 a chick all day long, geese I get $7.00 each and turkey’s $7.00 and than of course the $2.00 for the quail. I plan to get $25.00 for baby peacocks. We have talked about getting swans in the future. You can get an incredible $200.00 for each chick or $800.00 per full grown pair. For now we need to create new and better pens for our bird and get ourselves a bit better established.

Anyway have to go and make soap so I can afford to become bird rich, lol…

Just another day on the farm
Just another day on the farm that's right.
We were gifted a flock of geese a few days ago, so that is pretty neat. we are getting 17 more this weekend...Don't ask me what I 'm thinking...lol
Still no new babies from our goats...but soon I hope.
We have two count them two new baby Muscove ducks fresh from under the mamma duck..whew...never thought they would ever hatch.
All is going good I guess...So Till next time than..

Roofs coming soon to own homes
Mood:  bright
Well we will soon be putting up new to us roofs...
G-d I am so happy...
we are using old barn roofing...cheap, easy and darn near free. The cost of the screws is a bit pricey, about 150 dollars for each of the two houses.

Michael has the barn roof almost finished and winter will soon be upon us.

We have a few ricks of wood put up..have to buy new handels for the axes and finish getting it ready for the cold days of winter.
We have aquired a very old box stove for upstairs, so heating should be a bit easier on us once we get it all set up.

Still hatching chicks, sold bunnies and baby goats have been born with four more gaots due any day.

Still gathering acorns for flour and such, hickory nuts are about half gathered and winter garden is about half set up in the basement.

Well off to work..big hug to you all.

A year latter
Mood:  cool
Topic: Catching up
Whew...It's been a year!
So many things have happened...
Got a bunch of stuff done here on our little farm, but there is a blooming ton left to do.
Just starting to get the new fences in place for the horses and goats. Got a bunch of new chickens, saddle there is only one of our origanal chickens left. In total we must have more than 100 chickens. We have a good size flock of ducks, about 20 full gown and 30 some peeps. Still have a few turkeys and a pair of geese. Got a new pup, an old barn dog and well Nikie the wolfy girl is still here for the moment. Poor old girl may need to be put down soon...Just makes me want to cry, but what can you do it's not fair to let them suffer so you don't miss them.
Aside from this we are still getting wood together for the winter. I am canning up a storm and we are setting our sites on being off grid within a year...G-d willing...lol
So that is about it for the moment...See you in the funny papers.

A year and a month latter
Mood:  blue
Topic: Catching up
Well here we are in Arkansas,living on top of a mountain. the house here a bigger mess than I could have every dreamed but we keep going forward. We are homesteaders now. In the morning I milk goats,michael lets our chickens out and we do the walk about trying to see what we can get done that day. We do alot of diffent things to make money. Michael of course shoes horses. We sell fertile eggs of the web...don't laugh it pays for the big chickens food. We sell roosters. We sell our art work as well as others on our website: my main website We salvage as much metel and other things as we can and sell those. In the sping and summer we will sell goats milk cheese, soap, and milk. Vegtables from our garden. Wood crafts. Plus all the stuff from above. In the news..My folks bought a house not far from us, of course we are very happy about this... :) I will leave you with this for now...I promise to come back and tell you all more real soon....

Three days before the crowd....
Mood:  not sure
Now Playing: House for Sale.....lol, evil laugh.....
Topic: Fixing the house up
Two days before crowds of people are to pounce upon my house here in sometimes sunny Rockledge, Fl.
Many undone tasks still needing to be done; Striped some of the the kitchen cabinet door, stained some, and some are still waiting to be done.
Striping paint off of tile....and all I can think is what have I done...
Need to finish up the tile in the kitchen, and the bathrooms....need more paint, more screws ( take it as you will) and more time...
The house is a mess my work crew is revolting ( again take it as you will) and I await saterday and sleep.....