Homesteading: More Than a Lifestyle

This week has FLOWN by. I frequently sit down on Tuesday to write my post and think "what in the world did we even do this week?" Blogging has been great for helping me (and by extension Dave) slow down and realize the "little things" really do add up to big things. Homesteading has totally transformed our life...so much so that most of the time I don't even realize it until I look back at my weekly photos. Our interests, family trips, and daily activities are almost always (and unconsciously) centered around agriculture, self-sufficiency, or DIY projects. Farmer Dave and David helped me tackle some DIY projects around the homestead, we enjoyed our annual trip to the National Pike Days Steam and Tractor Show and we made a pretty huge decision...it wouldn't be much fun if I told you now so I'll keep you in suspense until the end 😉

Functional and Frugal

There's a common joke about ordering items off the website Wish and how they don't quite look like the original product. My DIY projects often end up like that...because I am...shall we say...frugal 🤣 I have been nagging Farmer Dave about building me a cattle panel trellis for my cucumbers and FINALLY we reached an agreeable compromise. It's not the prettiest thing on the block, and it's definitely not going to be featured in Home and Garden magazine, but it was totally free and it's 💯 functional. Most importantly, it's done. I couldn't bring myself to use an expensive cattle panel to trellis cucumbers so I picked through our scrap in the weeds by the corn crib (yes, literally the weeds) and found a piece of old rusty field fencing to use.

Dave and David helped me staple it to the outside edge of my raised garden bed, I used my 💪🏼 to help create a tunnel bend and then we wired it to the outside of the garden fence. Time will tell if it will hold up to the weight of my cucumbers but overall I'm pleased with it.

Operation Beautification

Following right along with my frugal theme, I had an old metal fire ring with tractors and barns lasered on it that Farmer David claimed for his "burn pile" in my front yard that I wanted to re-purpose. It was too cute to throw away but I definitely didn't want it collecting miscellaneous items in the front yard anymore. I've been thinking about how to weed control around our mailbox for a while and it finally hit me to try and use the fire ring as a flower border. Farmer David was not pleased at first to lose his coveted gem but after convincing him I needed his help to plant flowers in it around the mailbox he agreed to my plan.

It took us about 2 hours to dig out the grass, place the ring, and plant some perennials mixed with zinnias. It added some nice curb appeal and will hopefully cut down on mowing.

Family Fun Day

Every year in May our town holds an event called Pike Days. It's a fun weekend filled with garage sales, a horse drawn wagon convoy that travels through multiple cities along Route 40, and our favorite event...the National steam, gas, and horse show.

This show is what little boys and men's dreams are made of. Hundreds of old tractors on display, wood sawing, rock crushing, rope making, corn grinding, blacksmith demonstrations, and huge excavators (amongst other heavy duty equipment) digging giant holes and pushing dirt around. David and Chelsea entered the pedal pull this year and the other kids entered in this competition were STRONG. David took second place pulling 40 pounds almost a full pull.

Chelsea took third after THREE pull-offs in a category of all boys. She pulled an impressive 90 pounds 23 feet and 7 inches! It was a great way to finish a fun day!

What did we do????

And now...the big reveal...What's our big decision????

I'm sorry to say, I've lost the good fight. I've resisted for 6.5 years...but alas, I admit defeat. After many many MANY years of discussion, we bought Chelsea a pony 🐎 Remember the night of the great chicken disaster when we left for 2 hours and they almost froze to death? We had left to audition this horse and see if he was "the one."

https://video.wixstatic.com/video/0430e8_f1237dbb6ec943c184ecc908ef284ca1/360p/mp4/file.mp4

I mentioned early on that it's not love at first sight with me and a horse but I have to say I really like this one. Sparky is kind, gentle, and forgiving but he definitely has some pep in his step. He will be going to our trainers barn for a couple months so we can learn how to properly care for him and it'll give Chelsea some time to build her relationship with him while we have help. It's by far the biggest luxury purchase we've ever made, however, we see this horse as an investment into our daughter. This is her horse. She will care for him in the cold, rain, heat, and when she is sick. We will help but she is responsible for him. We see possible career paths with this moving forward and most importantly a way to help her grow emotionally.

Welcome to our family Sparky! I know you're going to teach us some valuable life lessons (like, I need to learn how to pull a horse trailer 😳) and create some amazing memories along the way!

I did some experimenting with making raw milk yogurt and drying sourdough starter but I will cover those adventures next time!

See yinz next week for more Roberts Family Farm Fun!