Homesteading Pagan Style

The Dreaded Pamphlet!

2012-10-16T11:15:00.000-05:00

I have decided that I am going to make little pamphlets describing Paganism,about the history,deity's and beliefs.I will then hand them to all the people who think it is ok to give me pamphlets on their religion. Yesterday I met a guy that wanted to buy the juicer I had listed on craigslist.As we were talking he asked about the blog I had listed under my name on the e-mail.He wanted to know what Pagan Style meant so I said pagan goddess,that is all I said and he reached into his car and got the dreaded pamphlet.He started talking about believing in Jesus,the bible and going to heaven.Now this guy had no idea who I was or what my beliefs were yet he felt it was fine to push his on me.Why is that I wonder? This happened another time when I just wanted to buy a sheep from a lady,she also had to share her beliefs after just a short meeting.How would they have reacted if I had given them a little book extolling the virtues of the goddess and paganism? I probably would have been asked to leave,lol
Why do people feel they need to tell others what to believe,wither it is religion,abortion,same sex marriage or the myriad of other things we are told it is wrong to believe in.If you don't like my religion the don't believe in it,don't like abortion then don't have one and don't tell me who to love based on what you believe. I do like discussions on these subjects, let me know what you believe and why but do not tell me that I am wrong and going to a hell I do not believe in when I disagree with you,and do not sideswipe me with your beliefs when all I want to do is sell you a juicer!

Blessed Be on this beautiful fall day!

Blessed Mabon

2012-09-22T10:01:00.000-05:00

It is the time of the autumn equinox, and the harvest is winding down. The fields are nearly empty, because the crops have been plucked and stored for the coming winter. Mabon is the mid-harvest festival, and it is when we take a few moments to honor the changing seasons, and celebrate the second harvest. On or around September 21, for many Pagan and Wiccan traditions it is a time of giving thanks for the things we have, whether it is abundant crops or other blessings.
Typically the focus is on either the second harvest aspect, or the balance between light and dark. This, after all, is the time when there is an equal amount of day and night. While we celebrate the gifts of the earth, we also accept that the soil is dying. We have food to eat, but the crops are brown and going dormant. Warmth is behind us, cold lies ahead. Mabon is a time rich in magic, all connected to the changing seasons of the earth.

                      May the Blessings of the
                       Fall Harvest fill your home!

                                                                 Blessed Be!

information about Mabon was found at
http://paganwiccan.about.com/od/mabontheautumnequinox/a/AllAboutMabon.htm

Favorite Homeschool websites

2012-09-21T13:42:00.000-05:00

Our school year got off to a late beginning this year due to an ac leak.We ended up having to replace the kitchen,laundry room,one closet and bathroom floors.It was very loud(due to the wall drying fans) and messy.But now we are back on track and finally getting into the groove of school.One of my favorite things and downfalls about homeschooling with the internet is that there is so much out there
to get lost in.I have so many sites saved that I get overwhelmed looking at them. I decided to make a folder of just the main websites we will use this year'

One of the new ones I found this year is Spelling City,http://www.spellingcity.com. On this site you can make lists of the spelling words your kids are using or use the ones already on the site. There are games to play for each word list and when your child is ready they can take the tests to see how many words they have learned. This week we have been doing the compound word lists and the girls are flying thru it.
CK-12,http://www.ck12.org/teacher/, is another great free resource for so many subjects.I plan on using it for earth science and writing with the girls this year.
Khan Academy,http://www.khanacademy.org/,is on our list every year and is a wonderful resource!
For history we will be checking out
HyperHistory,http://www.hyperhistory.com/online_n2/History_n2/a.html , Have Fun with History,http://www.havefunwithhistory.com/,American History Games,http://gamequarium.com/americanhistory.html,and Best of History website,http://besthistorysites.net/,

Pics4Learning website,http://besthistorysites.net/, has wonderful pictures to print out for timelines and for anything else you might need them for.
Another great resource is a blog that I follow,Joybilee Farm,http://fiberarts.ca/blog/free-kindle-books-for-homesteaders-and-homeschoolers-september-21-edition/,everyday she puts up free Kindle books that can be downloaded to your kindle or computer,homesteading,homeschooling,craft and several more subjects.Be sure to check her out.

We also plan on using Life of Fred books for math and Netflix for all the wonderful documentaries they have.

What are your favorite websites to use in homeschooling?

Blessed Be!

Oak Meadow Give away!

2012-09-06T08:53:00.000-05:00

Hey everyone,Oak Meadow and The Secular Homeschool Community have joined together for another great giveaway.Please go and check them both out,they are both a great resource for your homeschool needs!http://www.secularhomeschool.com/content/780-september-giveaway-oak-meadow-curriculum-school/?postid=101145

Blessed Be!

Duck dreams!

2012-07-18T22:51:00.000-05:00

A few days ago my daughter ask me what was the biggest breed of duck.We went to the Internet of course and found out that the Aylesbury duck is considered one of the largest breeds along with the Pekin. I found the information from The American Livestock Breed Conservancy,http://albc-usa.org/ This website lists heritage breeds for farm animals that are critical,threatened or on watch status.One of the best things you can do for your farm is decide to raise heritage breeds,call the ALBC , find a breeder and give them a call.Help save these breeds from disappearing!

This is what we found about the Aylesbury duck. "In the Vale of Aylesbury, forty miles north of London, Buckinhamshire 'duckers' were renowned by 1800 for the production of England's finest white-skinned market ducklings.Ó (Holderread, 68) Aylesbury ducks were held in high esteem not only for their for their white skin and unusual pink bill, but also for their large size, ability to produce eggs in the winter months, fast growth, light bone, and high percentage of mild-flavored meat. (Holderread, 68) This duck breed was one of the first to arrive in United States from Europe. Ayelsburys were exhibited in 1849 at the inaugural poultry show in Boston, Massachusetts and were included in the first publication of American Standard of Perfection published in 1874 by the American Poultry Association. The Aylesbury duck is a superior meat breed with pure white plumage, white skin, (a unique attribute since most ducks have yellow skin) orange feet and legs, dark grayish blue eyes and an unusually long, straight pinkish-white bill. It has a long body, horizontal carriage, and a characteristically straight, deep keel that nearly reaches the ground. The Aylesbury is described as "slow moving, and exceptionally tame.There is a critical need for more conservation breeders of Aylesbury ducks. Their large size, white skin and white plumage make them an excellent market bird and a great addition to any small farmstead or backyard producer's flock.

When I called the ALBC I was told that there was only one breeder of these ducks in the US.I think they consider a breeding flock one that has 50 birds or more.I was given the name of Frank Reese of the Good Shepard Ranch in Kansas, .http://www.goodshepherdpoultryranch.com/index.html. Mr Reese spent some time talking to me and gave me a lot of information on Aylesbury ducks and poultry in general. I learned that if you want a breed true to standard then buy from a breeder that is raising heritage birds,not from a hatchery as those birds have strayed from the breed standard. Mr. Reese's advice was to join the American Poultry Association,http://www.amerpoultryassn.com/ and if you are serious about raising heritage birds then also subscribe to The Poultry Press,http://www.poultrypress.com/.Going to the state fair and checking out the poultry is also a good idea. We talked about feed and what should go into it. Mr. Reese blends his own feed for the ducks,chickens,turkeys and geese that he raises. Duck feed should be high in fiber and fat(fish meal is good for the fat).Contacting a commercial bakery and getting their stale remains is great for the birds also as it has vitamins already added to it.I found out that if you have chickens picking on each other then give them tomatoes with salt and the picking would stop(good to know)
Mr. Reese said the best books on waterfowl to read were the black and white version of The Standards of Perfection,anything by Dr. Marsden(haven't found much info on him yet) Oscar Grow who wrote Modern Waterfowl Management and Dave Holderreed,http://holderreadfarm.com/ .

I asked Mr. Reese if he brought new birds in to strengthen his flock or just eggs to hatch. He only brings in eggs to hatch as he has to much to lose if a new bird brought in has a disease or something.One diseased bird can wipe out an entire flock (scary thought),He vaccinates the chicks right after they hatch to prevent this from happening.
I was told that there was another breeder of Aylesbury ducks in the US and he was actually here in Arkansas. Mr. P. Allen Smith is also a breeder and had bought his large flock from Mr. Reese.I was very excited to hear this! I had just found Mr. Smith on facebook and it seems that everyone I talked to knew who he was.Evidently he is a celebrity,http://www.pallensmith.com/. I am in contact with his farm and hopefully by spring I will be a beginning breeder of Heritage Aylesbury ducks!
When we started this farm journey I figured we might have a couple of ducks along with the chickens,never dreaming I would fall in love with these funny little birds. We have 3 Muscovy's, 1 Black Swedish and 6 Pekins at the moment,I really need to build a pond!

These are our ducks,

Do you raise ducks or are you thinking about it? What breed tugs at your heart?

Blessed Be!
one innocent question can set your feet on a different path!

Summertime!

2012-07-15T09:25:00.000-05:00

I can't say this summer hasn't been interesting so far.Last post I talked about our predator problem.I started setting a trap and have caught 2 raccoons so far.One was full grown,the other was just a little guy but I'm sure if he could have got to my dog like he wanted to he would have torn her up. I wasn't sure what to do with the first one when I found it. My husband had left for work so I had no car to take it anywhere.If I owned a gun I might have shot it,but as it wasn't my trap and I didn't have a gun ,that was out. I did think about drowning it in the duck barrel but couldn't do it even though we had lost 3 chicks,3 ducks and a turkey to these little monsters.I decided to wait until my husband came home and then we could release it at the nearby national forest.I will keep setting the traps every night until our new puppy gets big enough to take them on.

Raccoon #1
We had thought about getting a guard dog and when the coons started showing up I started looking. The best LGD breeds around here are the Kuvasz,Great Pyrenees and the Anatolian Shepherd. To get a dog that is already trained in livestock or a good puppy raised with LGD parents is expensive,anywhere from $100-300,not in our budget.We ended up finding a beautiful little female Shepard/Pere mix.We named her Fallyn(Irish for "in charge"),she already shows signs of being a good livestock dog.

This is going to be BIG DOG!
Besides Fallyn we have added 2 Pekin ducklings and 4 Copper Maran chicks,hope to have 3 more ducklings hatch today.These ducklings are the last fertile eggs from our big male Pekin the the damn raccoons killed.I had some hens wanting to set so I put the eggs under them and hoped for the best,so far so good!

Still on the agenda for the summer is to clear the land where the garden will be next year,redo the girls room and craft room,paint the walls and decoupage the floors.We will see if it all gets done.
What are your summer plans this year?

Blessed Be!

Predators

2012-06-06T21:34:00.000-05:00

Day before yesterday I went out to feed and check on our animals like I do every morning,as I got to the ckicks in the grow out pen I noticed one little banty not moving and I realized that something had grabbed her sometime during the night and killed her.I found out two others were missing,one of them being my smallest silkie.I was so mad! I thought they were safe in this pen,that nothing could get into it,never thought of something could pull them out.I suspect a opossum but it could have been a skunk. This was the first time we have had to deal with a predator here on our farm and I am looking for ways to stop them from getting my birds again.

In our area the main predators are dogs,cats,opossums,raccoons,skunks,hawks,snakes,fox,coyotes, and the occasional wolf or bobcat.I found some great information on predators on Fresh Eggs Daily,she has great articles on chickens and ducks.http://fresh-eggs-daily.blogspot.com/search/label/predators.
At the moment I have our chicks,baby turkeys and ducklings in the little shed we are turning into a hen house.I will move them to the old hen house when we are done with this one as they are not quite big enough to go in with the big girls.I think I need to be done with babies for awhile! Hopefully by next spring when we get more I will have better brooder boxes and grow out pens for them.
Losing animals is part of farm life but it is a little harder when you thought you had done everything you could to keep them safe and something still gets to them,:(

Blessed Be,

Spring has sprung and Babies abound!

2012-05-16T09:48:00.000-05:00

Well things are trucking along here on the farm. We have had chicks and bunnies born here in the last month! Two sister hens were setting at the same time on about 20 eggs.It was funny to watch them take eggs from each others nests and switch nests often. The problem was they would also take eggs the other hens had laid and add them to the nests. Out of all those eggs they only hatched 2 a piece before walking off the nests.I didn't have an incubator to put the rest in so we lost them all. I made the suggestion to the girls and their friend that they should autopsy the remaining eggs,to my surprise they did! Several were duds,several were not far enough along to hatch anytime soon,and about 4(including 2 duck eggs) had just needed a few more days. The two hens tried to coparent the chicks that had hatched but kept fussing at each other,we found one dead one morning so we took the remaining chicks and put them in a brooder cage.I felt bad for the hens but I really wanted these chicks to survive.Lesson learned is that as soon as you are sure a hen is broody get her in a separate place from the other hens so there will be no other eggs added to the nests.

Our baby bunnies were born around the end of April and Dovie is a really good momma. She had 5,4 black and 1 brown,they sure are fat little bunnies! Zoe thinks we either have 2 girls and 3 boys or the other way around,need to wait a couple of more weeks to be sure.We plan on borrowing a friends Jersey Woolly male to breed Dovie to next,We will then have Jersey Woolly Lops,lol

The big chicks are doing fine. We took the 6 biggest ones last night and slipped them into the flock,they seem to be doing fine so far. We are down to 3 1/2 silkies. 1 died I think because it was just to small,and one was sat on by Angel who is twice as big as the other chicks her age.The 1/2 comes from one that was supposed to be purebred but is a mix of some kind.

Mixed Silkie,looks like a raven with a Top hat!

Hi!

Blue Splash Silkie

White Silkie

With the addition of all the chicks we will have outgrown our hen house so I plan on remodeling a shed for a bigger hen house.Friends are coming over next week to help with that.I can't wait to get everyone into their new home with an easier feeding and watering system.

Blessed Be!

Raising Miniature Livestock

2012-04-15T09:26:00.000-05:00

When we dreamed about raising our own animals for food I always wanted miniatures. Miniature cows,pigs,goats,sheep and donkeys. Research had shown they would be easier for me and the girls to handle,take up less space and wouldn't require as much grain. We are still deciding on exactly which breed of each we will end up with. As of now we have 1 ranling(painted desert) 1 nubian buckling,2 min. rabbits,an assortment of chickens,2 pekin ducks and as of yesterday 1 pot belly pig.
As I was looking up pot bellied pigs last night I was surprised at the lack of information on raising them for meat. There was a ton of websites extolling their virtues as pets but very few about the meat they could provide a family.I finally found a good website about them and was surprised to see a page about the hate mail they had received. I was even more surprised to find out that several farmers had gone underground or stopped raising these pigs altogether because of the harassment they received from individuals or groups who consider them only as pets.
Here is a little background info on these pigs from Raising Miniature Livestock.
In 1985,Canadian zoo director Keith Connell traveled to Vietnam and brought back 18 pigs of the one breed,planning to breed and sell them to other zoos in North America.In 1986 he sold some to American pet breeders and the potbellied craze took off.Pretty soon everyone was raising and selling these pigs as pets thinking they wouldn't get much bigger then when they bought them.Yes, potbellied pigs are smaller than the standard domestic pigs but they can reach up to 200 lbs or more. Here people were house training these little pigs but pretty soon didn't want a 150-200 lb pig in their house. Worse,owners quickly discovered that pigs are smart,strong willed and they live their lives from a pigs point of view.Behaviors like rooting(all the linoleum from the kitchen floor),chewing(interior walls) and nipping to establish a place in the herd(which comprised the humans in their household) upset pig owners very much! Owners who worked through problems with their house pigs loved them,they ones who didn't begin giving them away.Pig sanctuaries sprang up across the country and humane groups became inundated with unwanted pigs,yet promoters breeding more piglets because there were still interested new buyers.
In Vietnam and Thailand these pigs are raised for meat as are other animals we in America only raise in pet status.We plan on raising potbellied pigs along with American Guinea hogs as livestock to provide meat for our family and friends.
The American Guinea hog is not a guinea pig nor is it a potbelly pig. The Guinea hog is small, weighing 150-250 pounds and standing about 17 inches as an adult. They are black and often hairy with upright ears, and a curly tail. These hogs are long and lean. They have the appearance of a small bacon hog, although they are classified as a lard hog. The background of the guinea hog is mysterious. There is some discussion of them having a West African origin with Essex blood mixed in as well. Guinea hogs are unique to America. In the late 1800's to early 1900's, they were a popular breed. These are considered a rare heritage breed and farmers are working on bringing them back into popularity for small homesteads.(http://rudugastsideal.com/)

It will be interesting to see what we eventually end up with on our farm and what the journey holds along the way.

Blessed Be.

Life on the farm....

2012-03-25T18:27:00.001-05:00

The last couple of months have been a little busy around here. What with having hardly any winter(2 days of lt. snow) and quite a few warm days we have been able to get more things done outside. We now have 2 rabbits,the Lion head(Ninja) and a Holland Dwarf(Dovie) and a Painted Desert ramling(Boomerang). What with the chickens,ducks,rabbits,lamb,dogs and cats around here we are starting to look like a real farm.A new shed had been put up so we can make the old one into a bigger hen house,the old hen house will be cleaned up for the lamb who now sleeps in a dog house.Does that make sense? LOL
We have been planting flowers and clearing areas for more garden beds. Last year's garden didn't do very well due to bugs,poor soil and the heat,I hope this years will be better. Fayetteville had a Dig In Festival earlier this month. There were classes on beekeeping,seedsaving,gardening,chickens,cooking,bugs in your garden,and several others. Local organic eateries brought in wonderful treats for us and there were movies playing several times during the day. All in all it was a great learning experience and I am thankful to have the opportunity to learn from others.
Piper and Zoe had their birthdays this month,they are now 11 and 13. I asked them if they wanted a trampoline or animals for their birthdays,they chose animals. Zoe wanted a lamb and rabbits,Piper wanted chicks.We will be getting bantams for her this week. We have 8 laying hens at the moment and 6 new hen chicks but 11 roosters(poor hens),nine of the roos we have now separated into a different pen to be sold or maybe for the freezer.Because of the light winter we had everyone is worried about the bug population exploding,especially the ticks. My sister keeps telling me we need guineas, I don't like guineas,they are loud and obnoxious but I will probably get some because I dislike ticks even more!

Dovie

Oreo

Boomarang

Shadow Ninja

Elie and Plato

Raver

New chicks

So what's hatching,quacking,baaing,crowing or running around your farm?

Blessed Be!

The journey to the food we eat,

2012-02-03T09:00:00.001-06:00

"Farmers are the only indispensable people on the face of the earth."

Lately we have had many discussions about what is actually in our food,where and how all that we eat is processed. Label reading happens with everything and discussions about what the ingredients actually are has become the norm lately.We watched the movie Fresh last night with our girls (10 and 12) http://www.freshthemovie.com/.%20This This movie is about change, changing the way we raise the meat we eat and the food we grow. Now I have been talking about these ideas for awhile now and the kids listened with half an ear, thinking mom was on another health kick. Watching how the animals were treated in the movie last night and learning what was injected/fed to them must have really hit home, I could actually see the light bulb go on over their heads,lol. They asked where we could find meat that wasn't processed in the ways shown. They were really furious seeing how the chicks were thrown and crowded into the chicken houses. We talked about the pesticides that were sprayed on the crops and watched How stuff works in the food and beverages. We watched how corn, salt and wheat were processed, the spraying of chemicals on the corn and the genetic modification of both wheat and corn.

There are several movies in our netflix queue for use to watch exploring more on this subject. Fed Up, What's on your plate, Ingredients and Food Matters are on the list. Tomorrow we will visit a local fresh bread store and a meat market, comparing prices and ingredients. This morning Piper looked at the ingredients for the granola cereal she was eating and asked why there was sugar,honey and dextrose in it. So we talked about what we wanted in our granola and plan on making some this weekend. Zoe was ranting(she tends to do that) about potato starch in the shredded cheese we had for dinner so we are going to learn about making cheese and why potato starch might be put in there.They have about decided that if they can't read or understand the ingredient when it is looked up then maybe it didn't need to be there. We are looking for different ideas for meals using the least amount of processed ingredients possible. I feel like they are coming to understand why gardening and raising our own animals are so important. It also helps that several of their friends parents are going thru the same process with their kids, I love listening to some of the conversations they have about the food that they are eating. The next read aloud book will be Animal,Vegatable,Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver. I want to explore how many of the foods we eat are grown close to home(50 to 100 miles).
Somtimes I really feel that the girls aren't learning anything in our homeschooling journey and then there are times like this where I am drowning in the wave of information they are processing. Homeschooling Rocks!!

Blessed Be,

2012-01-30T09:00:00.002-06:00

Have you heard of Pinterest yet? To me it's a great place to keep and organize ideas. You can collect pins for gardening, kids, books, whatever you want. On your page you will have as many boards as you want,named with whatever appeals to you. If you find something out on the web or make something you want to share, copy/upload a picture of it and add it to the appropriate board. Keeping recipes with pictures is a snap, ideas for your garden, fun things to build/make with the kids, a honey build list with ideas for the house. This is a place to store so many fun things without clogging up files in you computer or risk loosing them when your computer crashes(as mine does frequently). You can follow your favorite boards and friends.Hit the Pinterest button on the right side of the blog and come play!

These are just a few pins from my boards, come stretch your imminagition!

Blessed Be,

Come on Spring!!

2012-01-29T18:50:00.000-06:00

Here in NW Arkansas the weather has been particularly nice this winter, a few cold days, a dusting of snow and a little rain. Makes me worried about what will happen here in February and March. We have also been receiving the annual seed catalogs in the mail, you know the ones that makes us feel like a kid in a candy store, so many choices that it's hard to decide what to plant. My friend Tabbie and I are going in together to buy seeds from Baker Creek,http://rareseeds.com/. We have a list of 53+ vegetables and herbs that we want to put in our gardens this year. My garden didn't well at all last year due to the very hot summer we had and the major invasion of bugs that came to visit. I am going to expand my garden quite a bit this year, make space for a larger variety of yummy stuff. The melons, squash, and cucumbers are all going on the little hill area behind the main garden, I hope to get more than last year as Hershey isn't here to carry them off. 6 more raised beds will be going up in the next month or so with other planters scattered around the garden. I want a really colorful garden with all kind of eccentric planters and surprises that catch your eye when wondering thru. I found tons of ideas on Pinterest and hope to put them in the garden this year.

These are just a few ideas I want to incorporate into the garden, to find more click on the Pinterest button on the right. What are you plans for the garden this year? Blessed Be,

Happy Solstice;Let your light shine bright this coming year!

2011-12-22T12:08:00.000-06:00

^{Last night we celebrated the winter solstice at a ritual held at the local UU. It was a heart touching ceremony and such beautiful music. One of the songs that we sang was This little light of mine, I love that song! As we sang I could hear my son and daughter singing along and I wondered if they knew the light they bring into this world,my world. My son home from his Navy training singing "All around the world, I'm gonna let it shine" and I know he will,my 10yr old daughter whose light shines on all of us with her oh so loving heart,my other 3 children who I feel blessed daily to have in my life. Do they see how their light shines on people,on me? My niece in colorado who joined her family and made it complete,who plays with her cousins so sweetly when they visit,does she see the light she is in this world? She has 3 loving strong brothers who are out finding their way in the world,do they see the light they send out to everyone they meet? My nephews and nieces in Texas ,California and La.,as they canvas this country and travel the world,do they see the light they add to the world? My sisters and brothers, for without them my light wouldn't shine as bright,do they see how their lights help others shine? My friends who I have been blessed to find in the world,do they see how their lights help light the path for this journey we are all on? My loving husband of 31 years, does he see the light he shines so brightly for this family,for the people he works with,for me? And me, I know I don't see the light I can be very often but I do see it in my children's faces and actions, I feel it in my grandsson's hugs,I see it in a friends smile.}
^{This Solstice let your light shine! You might never know who your light shines on and how it can change their day/life!}

Watch the Light of kindness travel, :)

Blessd be to all this Solstice season!

Pictures from the bonfire,

Earth Banner

Air Banner

Fire Banner
(some of it is caught behind a door)

Water Banner

Old Mill, treasure that we found!

2011-11-16T17:17:00.001-06:00

   After our trip to Bloomin'Acres Farm we decided to go to a nearby park for lunch. As I was driving I saw a huge wheel next to a skeleton of a rock building just begging to be explored. We pulled in and were followed by the rest of our group. All were excited to find such an interesting looking place to explore!It was decided that it must have been a mill at one time.Here is the info that one mom found after they got home.
   "A prominent landmark in the Cane Hill area is the water-powered mill known variously as the Pyeatte-Moore Mill and the Moore-Buchanan Mill. Built during the 1830s, the mill was used to grind wheat for flour and corn for corn meal, to saw logs, and even to card wool. It appears to have been moved to its present location on Jordan Creek in 1902 and was used until the 1930s. The remains of the thirty-six-foot diameter draw wheel can still be seen, and the mill is in the process of being restored. "

   The kids want to go back to explore more and maybe see what is under the building.

Blessed Be,

Bloomin'Acres field trip

2011-11-15T12:11:00.001-06:00

Yesterday a group of our homeschoolers went on a field trip. We went to Bloomin"Acres Farm, they have Icelandic sheep. Zoe has been doing her research on sheep that she wants to raise. She decided on the Icelandic breed and we found a local farm that raises them so of course we had to go visit. We met Marilyn Miles who showed us around her beautiful farm. The kids(and moms) had a good time learning about this breed of sheep, meeting the guard donkey and Blossom the guard dog, watching the ducks run around and finding eggs in the hen house.

Icelandic sheep are one of the oldest breeds on record, dating back over 1,100 years, and they still account for more than 25% of Iceland’s agricultural output. This makes them one of the oldest and purest breeds in the world today. They are a mid-sized breed and an excellent choice for small or large farm operations. Ewes typically average between 130 and 150 pounds, with rams weighing in between 175 and 200 pounds. They have wonderful conformation and their stocky build makes them a great selection for meat, milk and wool production.

The ewes come into heat in late October and cycle through May, if they are not bred. Rams can begin breeding at 5-6 months of age. Ewes begin breeding at 6-7 months and can lamb before they are a year old! This is a very rapid return on investment.

Gestation ranges from 142-144 days.
Rams are mature by 6 months and can service 20 ewes.
The Icelandic are excellent mothers with lots of milk and will nurse triplets without assistance.
Icelandic have been known to be productive until 12-13 years of age.
They have a good prolifically rate, averaging 175-225%.
Lambs reach market size in 4-5 months on good pasture.

I think this will be a wonderful breed for us to raise along with the other fiber animals we find.

The trip was a great success and I hope to visit again soon(maybe to pick out our own!)

Bloomin'Acres Farm

http://www.bloominacresfarm.com/index.php

Blessed Be,

Information about Icelandic sheep on this page was found on the Bloomin'Acres website.

Our Homeschooling Journey

2011-11-05T12:06:00.000-05:00

9 years ago I had never heard of homeschooling, didn't even fathom that I could or ever would teach my kids at home and why I would even want to. I was working at Hancock Fabrics at the time when a co-worker mentioned she homeschooled her 7 kids. Talking with her I learned all about homeschooling and what it entails. I went home and told my husband about this awesome possibility I had found out about. We were going thru a hard time with my fifth grader's teacher at the time and we were not happy with the school system at all. My oldest son who was going to be a senior at the time thought he might homeschool his senior year, but when I asked him if he wanted to stay home with a toddler and a baby(our youngest) all day he changed his mind. Good thing to because I think that is the year he met the cute girl who later became his wife. I also didn't think starting homeschooling with a senior would be something I could do. Not long after this we moved back to Fayetteville Ar. where my husband and I had grown up. My son was now in the 6th grade and every teacher he had that year told me he was ADD. We had him tested and he was not ADD, just very smart and bored. Again I brought up the idea of homeschooling and we all decided to try it. At the time there were several curriculum's out there that you could buy, but they were expensive and all christain based. There wasn't very much online then like there is now so I went down to the local teachers store and found books on subjects we could start with.

My son homeschooled for 2 yrs. before going to a local charter high school that he graduated from. During this time Zoe had started kindergarten and first grade. At the beginning of second grade we decided to homeschool her and Piper, this turned out to be a good thing as that was the year Zoe was diagnosed with diabetes and would have missed a lot of school. The next year Piper wanted to try school, we went to register her as a 1st grader and the school said no she had to come in as a kindergartner( I didn't know then that I could have fought them on that). So Piper ended up doing K-1st, Zoe went back to try third which didn't work because she caught every cold/flu and everything else that came thru school and even though she had a 504 we still got the letter saying they would report us for truancy if she missed any more. We tried having a home bound teacher for her but that didn't work very well either. I finally became so fed up with the school that I pulled them both out completely and went back to straight homeschooling and it has been wonderful! We have tried virtual schools but I think eclectic learning is best for us. There is soooo much free stuff online now that building a free curriculum is no problem what so ever.
These are just a few of the free curriculum's that I have found.

Pathways : K-6th
http://www.lessonpathways.com/Home

Ambleside Online: Charlotte Mason's method of homeschooling.
http://www.amblesideonline.org/

Khan Academy:

http://www.khanacademy.org/

Live Binder: This one looks awesome!
http://livebinders.com/play/play_or_edit?id=9506#

CK12 Flexbooks:
http://www.ck12.org/flexbook/

Thinkfinity:
http://www.thinkfinity.org/lesson-plans

Free Unit studies:
http://www.thehomeschoolmom.com/schoolroom/unitstudies.php

There is so much out online now that it can be overwhelming but the flip side to that is there is so much to mix and match. So if you are thinking about homeschooling, google it and start your adventure!

Blessed Be,

Being self sufficient and prepared,

2011-10-19T11:14:00.001-05:00

For awhile now I have been thinking about what would happen to us if the world around us collapsed. If the banks went belly up, no jobs, if we had to survive completely on ourselves. We would probably, maybe last a month! Where we are in our home/lives at this moment we are not self sufficient what so ever. The only bulk items I have on hand is popcorn.Does anyone ever think about what their family would do if the world crashes like that? Because there is a good chance it just might. My husband and I have talked about what we would do, talked a lot but haven't done anything yet. The #1 thing we would do is go to as many pharmacies or stores that carry diabetic supplies and load up on them as this would be what we would need to keep our daughter alive until the world straightened itself out.I hope we will be in a place to supply as much of our own food as we could and I am learning to make things like laundry soap/other soaps we would need, not much but a start. I have been collecting books on homesteading/how to/herbal medicines which I hope would be of use to us.

I look back on my childhood and came to realize just how strong my mother was. We pretty much always lived out in the country or in very small towns. We moved around a lot! One of my favorite places was in the itty bitty town of Pyatt Ar. We started out there on a large acreage that had a new barn, a new milk house and a well house on it. Those buildings were what we lived in. We had our beds and living area set up in the barn and the kitchen was in the milk house. We had several acres of vegetables growing in the bottom land and a huge on up by the house for us. My brother who was about 16 or 17, myself(10) and the twins who were about 5 at the time helped mom take care of those gardens. We would swim in the creek down by the road or out by the rail road tracks.We had chickens, ducks, rabbits and dogs. I remember mom canning in the milk house and how hot it would get. The twins and I would take off up in the woods for the day and come back when it was getting dark, drinking out of the cold spring, eating blackberries. The school I went to had 1st-2nd in one room,3rd-4th in another and 5th-6th in another, the other grades were over in another building. I thought it was a wonderful school! In the winter we would move into town until spring and planting time. My mom was about 45 at this time and I remember how hard she worked to grow food for us and get it put up for the winter.I remember her making clothes for us and teaching us what bugs in the garden were good and what were bad. For a kid it seemed like a great life most of the time but for an adult I think it would have been a struggle. My older sisters probably know more of what mom went thru at that time. To me the strength she showed back then gives me hope that I can get my family thru anything that comes our way.
It has finally dawned on me that my husband,kids and myself will not be able to do this on our own. We need a community, a group of people/families with varying talents and skills that can work together to build a secure,well prepared place to take care of our families if anything major happens. I don't know if that can happen on this property we are on now or if we need to look for a more suitable place. I do feel that everyone needs to get themselves someway ,somehow, into a position where they can safely survive a major catastrophe. It might be getting some families together on some land and growing or building everything you need, a group of people in a neighborhood banning together and making plans, everyone in an apt. building working together to makes things safe (this would require you to know your neighbors), helping family/friends monetarily who can get a safe place set up so that you could take your family there. I am not an alarmist, but bad things do happen, be it with mother nature or man made and there needs to be plans in place for our families so we will not have to rely on a government that probably won't be there to help us.The 99% needs to start taking care of their own! We can you know, we can band together, thinking outside the box and create our own paradigm shift.

Blessed Be,

A Homeschoolers Prerogative!

2011-10-18T11:16:00.000-05:00

This year the girls and I decided to try the ACE program out of the local school system. ACE provides the books from K12 then we work in them and online for about 4hrs a day to complete so many lessons by a certain time. Started out real good, loved getting all the boxes of books from K12. Piper loved the art and science, math and spelling not so much. Literature was Zoe's favorite with math and science running last for her. They both liked the history books also. With this program you set up a schedule of what lessons you would do every day of the week. I realized pretty quick the it took longer to do some of the lessons than they allowed for(math) and once we really got into a subject (like history) we would have to stop and do the assessments which would interrupt our rhythm. I started feeling the pressure of not getting all the lessons on the schedule done and so we tried the block schedule which helped a lot. One of the concerns I had was what to do when the girls got sick. When Zoe gets sick she is usually out for a week and then when one gets something, the other one gets it a few days later, we are dealing with that now. The teacher we are working with said to work ahead as much as possible so we wouldn't get behind, so on Sundays we would get out the books and try to get ahead as much as we could. I started to feel like we couldn't spend enough time on subjects they really liked because if we did they would fall behind in others. I felt I was teaching to the test (major pet peeve about schools), that they were learning just enough to pass the assessments at the end of the lessons.In Sept. we had started our classes with our co-op and this also took time away from ACE but could be counted as supplemental.

Number one reason we started not liking what we were doing was the learning was no longer fun! Befor this

we played board games for math, history, spelling, all kinds of games. We would watch documentaries and videos on everything. Do projects with our friends and pretty much had a lot of fun learning for the sake of learning. When I started telling the girls that they had to learn a certain subject on certain days they started resisting. We tried letting them pick what they wanted to do for the day, history, lit.science and art were always done with math and writing falling behind.During this time I had started reading a book called Feel-Bad Education by Alfie Kohn. Maybe this wasn't the best book to be reading at the moment as it just emphasised all I felt I was doing wrong in teaching our kids. Here is a video about the book.

I truly believe that anyone who is in the process of educating children should read this book. If anyone has read it I would like to hear your oppionions on it.

I finally sat the girls down and we had a long talk about what they liked about the program we were using and what wasn't working at all. The decision was to no longer be part of the ACE program and go back to the way we had been doing things.Everyone felt very relieved and started looking forward to not being on such a tight schedual again. Maybe we can keep the books we liked and work out them the rest of the year.

This is what I really like about homeschooling, if we find that something we are doing is not working for our kids we have the prerogative to change the direction we are going.

Making a timeline for Ozark Tapestry class

Learning to make sushi,

Hanging out together,

Yoga class,

Blessed Be,

Change is not easy or cheap!

2011-10-16T11:33:00.000-05:00

For awhile now I have been trying to change our eating habits and encourage my family to eat a little more healthy. This can be hard due to the high cost of healthy food and getting them to eat a lot of things they don't like or haven't tried. I will never understand why organic food cost so much higher then food made with tons of chemicals and preservatives. Here are some of the reasons I found for the higher costs.
Primarily because organic growers still have to find alternative natural methods of discouraging pests, fungus, etc. which are more labor-intensive, so what you're paying for, is the extra labor…
Also, without genetic engineering, organic produce may be smaller in size, yet require as much water, so the weight of the fruit. in the final analysis, is what counts, in terms of price per pound…
Finally, the larger scale agricultural industry has been in place for sometime, and often receive government subsidies to offset losses due to weather, plagues, etc…while the organic farms, which started out more recently, on an experimental basis, are usually smaller scale, and they are on their own, when it comes to risks…
While conventional farmers can use every acre to grow the crops that fetch the highest prices, organic farmers use crop rotation to keep their soil healthy. Instead of planting a cash crop on every acre every year, they rotate fields and plant "cover crops" that are plowed to improve the soil's nutrients for the long term.
"When you're rotating crops, you're not necessarily growing all your highest value crops all the time, which is different than a conventional system," said Catherine Greene, an agricultural economist at the USDA.
Organic feed for cattle and other livestock can cost twice as much as conventional feed, said George Siemon, CEO of the Organic Valley co-op, the largest organic farmers' co-op in the country. A ton of organic cattle feed can cost from $350 to $400 a ton versus $220 or less for a ton of conventional feed, he said.
So this can explain in part the high cost of organic food.
Change happens slowly in this family! I have looked at the food we eat and tried to determine what would be the best to change. We already eat wheat bread and I am working on changing them to sprouted breads. My three youngest will not eat white bread at all now. When I wanted to change from white bread to wheat I would buy a loaf of each and make their sandwhices sometimes with a slice of both and gradually changed completely to wheat. The next food I looked at was milk. We don't drink a lot of milk, 1 1/2 to sometimes 2 gallons a week if I am using it for cooking. Milk runs here from about $2 at our local walmart express to 3.70 other places. I started looking into raw milk for the health benefits and really liked what I found.

Here is a great article on Raw vs Pasteurized, be sure to ck the date it was written, it is just as true today as it was then! http://www.realmilk.com/rawvpasteur.html We started buying raw cow's milk from a local farm and the difference in taste was wonderful. I bought extra cream and we made homemade butter. I grew up on goats milk and wanted to find some local. In the store it runs about 3.69 a qt.so I didn't buy it except as a treat once in awhile. I found a local farm that sold it and we went for a visit. I was very impressed with their operation and how clean the process was. There it was sold at $5 a gallon which is a lot more affordable to me. Yes, cows milk is cheaper in the store but I feel this is a better deal health wise for my family. My daughter Piper swore up and down she would never drink goats milk, but now will drink nothing except raw goats milk! If you do decide to switch to raw milk please be sure and ck out the farm, if they won't let you see how things are done and how clean they keep it ,find another farm to get your milk from.
The next thing I looked at was breakfast,which everyone knows is supposed to be the most important meal of the day. Breakfast in our house has always been either cold or hot cereals, eggs, pancakes and whatever went with them. I have been steering the kids away from overly processed ,no health benefits what so ever,sugar cereals. We decided that pb and j sandwiches could be good for breakfast, pancakes with peanut butter on them or fruit in them are awesome, yogurt with fruit, fritatas,pumpkin custard,breakfast burritios,or whatever sweet breads that have been made,so slowly we are changing our ideas on what consists of a good breakfast.
I have also been working on low carb cooking. With having a diabetic child carbs are always on my mind.
Tomorrow night I am going to make eggplant lasagna, using the eggplant instead of noodles makes it really low carb.
When the girls and I went on vacation this summer I was struck by the differences in the snacks we bought from when we went on trips with the older kids. Now we buy gronala bars, fruits, veggies, water or jucies,back then it would have been sodas, candy and chips, I love the changes we are making.
How have your family changed what you eat, more healthy, less? What is your favorite low carb recipe?

Here is the reciepe for the Pumpkin Custard,

Bake time: 1 1/4 hr at 325
1qt ovenproof casserole

you will need,
1 1/2 cups of pumpkin puree (or pureed butternut squash, or mashed sweet potato)
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tap each of nutmeg,ginger,and cloves
1 1/2 cup of milk (dairy or soy)
1/3 cup of maple syrup
4 eggs
1 tsp vanilla

in casserole, stir together the pumpkin,salt, and spices until well blended
Add milk and sweetener and stir to blend.In a separate bowl beat together the eggs and vanilla. Add this to the pumpkin mixture and mix well. Sprinkle lightly with nutmeg on top.

Place casserole in a baking dish and surround with water to level of custard (if possible) and place in pre-heated oven. It is done when the top has puffed slightly or when a knife placed in center comes out clean.

I didn't have maple so I used 1/2 cup of sugar, also it took a lot longer then the time it says(this time I put the temp at 350). You can have it for breakfast or add whip cream on top for desert! very Yummy!!

Blessed Be,

To All who Remember,

2011-09-11T09:02:00.000-05:00

To All who Remember ,

Blessed Be!

Homeschool Games we learn from,

2011-09-08T10:17:00.000-05:00

My girls love to play games, card games, board games,all of them. We do a lot of learning with these games and I know the lessons stick a little better when playing them. We play math, geography, history, vocabulary,and a lot of different bingo's. Some of our favorites are:

I wonder if you could build a whole curriculum from just board games!

What are you favorite games that you play?What about making your own games.

Make your own cards,

http://www.wired.com/geekdad/2008/07/help-your-kids/

Make a box to out them in,

http://www.cpforbes.net/tuckbox/tuckbox.cgi

and here is a site to order games on every subject and every grade,

http://www.educationallearninggames.com/

Blessed Be,

Sorry if the pictures look out of place, I can't seem to put them where I want them!

Chanting sooths the soul

2011-09-07T08:55:00.000-05:00

When we lived in town I would go to a a chanting group that had derived from the Goddess Festival. The energy that was raised in these chanting sessions was incredible! I am constantly amazed at the power of sound, of voices raised in harmony. Michelle ,whose house we met at,worked very hard to put all the chants into what she called a hymnal that she later sent to us. We were never able to record all of us chanting so I am going to put up some of my favorite videos that others have made.

Earth My Body

Elemental Chant

Witch's Amazing Grace
(I would so love to hear this with the words being sung)

Here are the words to a few favorites that I haven't found on you tube.

Atish Ananda

Recorded by Ozark Avalon, MO

Atish ananda the, the dew is in the grass

Spirits of the ancients

We are children of the past

The one breath that creates us is

the one breath we all take

makes a rainbow ‘round the world

with the love that we all make

Hey, hey ya, hey ya hey ya

Hey, hey ya, hey ya, hey ya

Born of Water

Unknown

Born of water

Cleansing. Powerful

Healing, changing

We are

Deep, Deep, Deep

Unknown(Winter solstice)

Deep, deep, deep into the heart of the winter

Deep, deep, deep into the womb of the mother

Deep, deep, deep where there is no other song but the song of my soul

The Earth is our Mother

Unknown

(The earth is our mother (The sky is our father

we must take care of her)x2 we must take care of him)x2

(Hey yana, ho yana, hey yan yan)x2 (Hey yana, ho yana, hey yan yan)x2

(Her sacred ground we walk upon His sacred air we take inside

with every step we take)x2 with every breath we take)x2

My Roots go Down

We are the Ones

Unknown

(We are the ones, we are the ones we’ve been waiting)x2

(We are the ones we’ve been waiting for)x2

(we are the ones)x2

We’ve been waiting

What are your favorite chants?

Blessed Be!

Lessons learned this year,

2011-09-06T11:22:00.000-05:00

I have been thinking about the lessons I have learned about homesteading since we bought this place almost two years ago. Some were very subtle, others hit you right between the eyes letting you know what you did was a dumb idea!
1. Labradors do not belong on homesteads that have chickens! We had to find a home for our chocolate
lab Hershey because she liked our chickens as much as we do. Labs are wonderful dogs but it is their nature to hunt birds and small animals.
2. Plant a garden 3 times more as you think you might need, that way you might get at least some of the produce that the bugs don't eat!
3.Homesteading and living in the country is hard work! I did know this really, I just get reminded a lot.
4. Two vehicles are a must,with one of them hopefully being a truck. You will always find something on craigslist or freecycle that you need a truck for, but then again you also find just how much feed, hay or wood you can put in your car when the seats lay down. Note: big goats do not fit in the back of a car!
5. Grass and weeds grow faster than you can mow!
6. During the winter, when you think they will never get the road plowed, walk down and look at the road. It might be that the roads are clear as a bell and it's your long snowed in driveway that is keeping you from getting out. The two winters that we have been here have been the worst in the area, my husband has to stay in town for several days during the worst snows and we now park at the end of the driveway when the weather gets bad.
7.Dogs like to bring you gifts of dead things!
8.It takes 2 to 3 times longer to build something than you think it might.
9.Friends and family don't come to visit very often because they think you live in the boondocks, even though you tell them that you live on a paved road and 30min. isn't that long of a drive. Gas prices might have something to do with it also, :)
10. That no matter how hard homesteading is, it is a wonderful life and you wouldn't change a thing! (ok, maybe more money to get things done faster)

Happy Homesteading and Blessed Be!

D Day at our house

2011-09-05T16:49:00.000-05:00

What is the one of the most memorable days in your life? The day you were married ? When your children were born? Many parents I know would say it was the day when their beloved child was diagnosed with a chronic disease. That memory will wake you in the middle of the night for the rest of your life. I know this because just about 5ys ago my daughter, who was then 7, was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes. With those words the course of my child's life was changed forever. Now we had to learn very quickly how to give her a shot of insulin several time a day, poke her finger 6-10 times a day to ck her blood sugar, watch her so she didn't go low or have her blood sugar go to hi, pay close attention to what she ate, learn the words A1C,ketoacidosis and glucagon. Believe me this was a crash course that we learned quickly.
There was no Type 1's in our family and only 2-3 type 2's,so we had no idea this was coming. About 6 months before D Day(diagnosis day) Zoe had had strep throat twice in two months. We had noticed she was dropping a little weight but her Dr. said she was just growing taller. Her energy seemed to be fine, and there didn't seem be any other signs except she had started having nightmares a lot. For the Thanksgiving holiday we had gone to my sister's in Tx. when it hit me that something was really wrong. I was helping the girls with their bath and realized just how much weight Zoe had lost. I weighed her and she was 53lbs, down from over 70. When we came home I made her an apt. with her Dr. for the next Monday and started doing research. The Internet can be a wonderful /terrible source for medical information. I had kind of narrowed it down to diabetes and hyper thyroid when she started getting what we thought was the flu, so I treated her for that and then she started saying her side was hurting a lot.I had taken my husband to work and told him I was probably going to bring Zoe in to the ER just in case it was appendicitis.When we got there Zoe couldn't set up very well and when the guy taking her vitals saw her he called to have her taken back immediately! This is when the pace picked up so fast it was hard to keep up. He was calling for a Dr. as he was taking her to a room and saying they needed blood work NOW! As the nurse and Dr. ask Zoe questions she couldn't answer them,she was slipping into a coma. Her blood work came back and they told me she was diabetic, in severe ketoacidosis and would not have made it to her Dr.apt.I remember crying and waiting for my husband to come upstairs(he worked at the hospital), They put her in ICU for a couple of days until she stabilized and then into a regular room.We were told that the closest Endocrinologist was a Dr. Jelly in Tulsa and that we would have to go there to learn how to take care of Zoe's diabetes.They sent us home with orders to be in Tulsa by 8 the next morning(we live 2hrs away from Tulsa). We were so scared to take her home but were told that the long acting insulin would hold her until we got to the Dr.
In Tulsa we were taught how to give shots, ck blood sugars and given a major crash course in what was happening to Zoe's body. Dr. Jelly seemed nice enough and he explained that Zoe would have to be on a strict schedule for shots, meals and snacks. Now we are not a family that goes by a schedule very much so this was going to be hard to do. Zoe was to get her insulin shot and only eat 45carbs at meals and about 22 for snacks. This kid was starving ALL the time, I couldn't keep enough low/non carb foods in the house for her. We stayed with this Dr. for about year,going to Tulsa every three months for a ck up, when we heard about a Dr.Adam Maass here in Lowell. This guy was a god send! He took Zoe off of her strict schedule and said she should eat whatever she wanted! She would eat and then we would give her an insulin shot based on how many carbs she ate and what her sugar was. Life became so much easier, diabetes became something we could manage, not a huge monster that managed us.
Nov. 30th will mark 5yrs since we started this journey that will last the rest of our lives and yes it does get easier, some days are hard with some being downright scary! We have made new friends who understand because they are having to deal with this disease also, learned a whole lot about the human body and have became closer as a family. While I would never, ever wish a chronic disease on anyone, I do believe the Diabetes is one of the more manageable ones and you stay on top of it.
Here are some links for more info on diabetes,
http://www.childrenwithdiabetes.com/ (ck out the humor section.)
http://www.diabetes.org/living-with-diabetes/parents-and-kids/
http://kids.jdrf.org/

Blessed Be,