Homesteading ALONE

Cody is on vacation for a few days me and the children are at home and we are going to attempt to run the homestead while he's gone oh she's dirty this morning oh my goodness he's normally in charge of all the animal chores so I have a few more jobs on my list can we do it this video is sponsored by Thrive Market Cody is meticulous about the chores being efficient and easy he gets pretty grumpy with janky setups because he's very inventive and he like makes it his duty to solve problems and make sure that everything everything runs smoothly so I'm not worried about the chores he's also really good about doing as much stuff ahead of time as he can and making sure that like the feed and the hay are stocked before he leaves so I basically have to do the beest Necessities milking Maddie is the biggest thing for me to conquer Maddie is a really big cow and she definitely prefers Cody over me but yeah I'm not too worried she's right here she just he's like move out of the way good morning Maddie oh she's dirty this morning oh my goodness Maddie what were you doing when it's so rainy outside she gets super muddy and it's really hard to get her clean last night I separated Holly which I was kind of afraid would be a rodeo but because of all the rain they were up here already underneath the the lean tube so it was wasn't too bad at all so all in all chores are going pretty good by now holy cow that's so [Music] much I think I need to work out more yes milking is always the part that I'm the most nervous about when I'm doing chores but it went flawlessly this morning come on come on all done Maddie come on now come on no like come on go thank [Music] you I have quite a few plans for today and probably my plans are slightly optimistic but I'm going to try anyways have some things that I'm really excited about but first I've got to get some food into my kids and also get some school done with them I'm really prioritizing school right now because gardening season is starting and I can't homeschool and Garden at the same time so got to make that [Music] priority I'm rewarding myself for a Flawless milking session with a collagen and raw cream London Fog and then I'm going to make some Crepes for the kiddos I like to try to do special things when Cody's gone me and Cody like to give each other a break we found that it really helps um our marriage when we can have some individuality it just like refreshes us and gets us excited about life so when one of us is gone taking our personal time the parent that stays home tries to make it fun for the kids too well I get started with breakfast the kids are going to do their morning chores this is so helpful for me especially at a time like this plus it teaches the kids responsibility and important life skills I also love that it gets the kids outside in the morning there's something about going outside first thing that really helps start the day off well it's been an hour since milking time so it's time for me to let Holly out to her mama thank you to thrive market for sponsoring today's video if you live far away from a health food store like we do or are on a diet or just want to get a really great price on groceries you should definitely look up Thrive Market Thrive Market is an online membership based grocery store on a mission to make healthy living easy and affordable for everyone with guaranteed savings on every order in fact if you find a lower price somewh else they'll match it some of the products that I get over and over again from Thrive Market is organic King Arthur's flower I get their whole wheat flour their bread flour and also their allpurpose flour I use that for feeding my my sourdough bread Cody was obviously in the cart again this time he got a bunch of more marshmallows camping season's coming up the weather is beautiful outside and these are at least a little bit better than the real marshmallows I like to splurge sometimes and let my kids taste foods that they hear other people talking about that I don't actually buy very often I really like how Thrive Market has healthier swaps for some of those foods and I can let my kids experience them and taste them without all the junk and the cool thing about looking for products like that or anything to fit a certain diet you're on is you can filter products by things like gluten-free vegan keto and a lot more we also go through a lot of collagen we use this in smoothies in our morning coffees and teas also beef gelatin grass-fed beef gelatin is something that I think is really great for my kids I make jello with this and I also add this to my yogurt and beekeeper Naturals immune support is also a really great throat spray that got us through the flu that we had recently go check them out and if you join using our link you'll get 30% off your first order plus a free gift worth up to $60 go to thrivemarket.com morean Farmers the link is in the description box and in addition to our 30% off discount Thrive Market is running a friends and family sale through April 24th which makes it a great time to sign up chores went later than normal this morning because we are doing them ourselves so breakfast is a little bit late and the kids are very hungry my 3-year-old is getting super grumpy so I have to really make tracks here I am going to make sourdough crepes with some Berry sauce and fresh whip I've been making these Crepes lately because they take a ton of eggs super good way to disguise eggs probably every single Homestead YouTube channel right now is featuring like creative egg recipes because everyone just has so many eggs right now since it's spring I'm going to set this whip into the freezer for 10 minutes before whipping it this is the trick that will make a world of a difference with how your whip topping turns out from Fresh Cream I have fresh strawberries and raspberries they're not fresh I guess they're frozen but but they are from our garden I'm trying to use up all of our berries so that we can refill with fresh ones in Berry season and I still have a ton of berries to go I'm going to put a splash of juice onto those berries just so that they have something to cook in frozen berries are going to release a ton of juice so you don't want much but just a little bit I also just put in a pinch of salt and then I'm going to let these cook down they will cook down in like 5 or 10 minutes and then I'm going to add in some cornstarch and honey Cody got me this Nifty egg Gadget I actually if I'm honest am not a gadget person I do not like one use like one purpose gadgets around my kitchen at all I was having this issue with my eggs getting old because I would always just use the eggs off the top of the basket and so the eggs in the bottom of the basket would never get used by the time I was like oh I really need to be using the eggs in the bottom of the basket they would be old and really runny and just borderline rotten and so I finally allowed Cody to get me this gadget and I actually I will admit I do really like it you just put your fresh eggs in the top and then you pull one out of the bottom and all the eggs move down I mean that that's pretty cool I will have Cody link this in the description box for you guys if you're interested in trying out something like this I'm going to use farmhouse on Boon recipe for crepes sourdough Crepes it takes eight eggs for one batch not only does it use up a lot of eggs but it's also very rich in protein which is very very important to me to get protein into us in the morning I actually don't usually make anything sweet for breakfast we usually have potatoes and eggs and burgers and sprouts and things like that but like I said I am trying to do something extra special this morning but this also is a very protein Rich breakfast this is sourdough starter that's nice and bubbly from sitting overnight I will say this recipe has gotten a little bit runny for me sometimes so I'm not going to put in the full amount of milk this could just be a difference in how me and Lisa Bass from Farmhouse aloon how watery our starter is [Music] so who no no no no no no no no no I'm just putting about a tablespoon of corn starch mixed with water in here it'll just thicken it up a little bit so that it doesn't make your crepe [Music] soggy mommy add a little bit of maple syrup to this and I have one of those to it after I'm done [Music] okay there you go I get two yep I have a lot to do today so I'm going to bust out paper [Music] plates the first crate never turns out as good I don't know [Music] why come for breakfast guys I am just going to give the kids a tiny bit of school today because I don't have very much time with Cody being gone I have a ton of things I need to do so I'm just going to give them something simple you can see our books are very thin we're almost done the kids are going to be learning about sharks today in their science I'm just going to put a video up like PBS has some super great documentaries on sharks and whales and all kinds of animals like that well the kiddos are finishing up their science in the living room I am going to tackle all these dishes this is kind of one of those things that we don't show much in our videos but there's just dishes all the time when you're cooking from scratch and growing all of your food there's just so much cleanup that goes with it so today I'm going to validate all of you homesteaders who are constantly cleaning up messes it's just part of the job so there's a little break in the rain it's still like misting and kind of nasty out here but it's not pouring so I'm going to do my least favorite job or the job that I'm looking forward to the least I guess you could say I'm going to fertilize our Evergreens we have a big row of Evergreens out along the road to try to help with overspray from the fields and just to protect our farm and I want to fertilize them with this fertilizer that we got from Berlin seed so I'm just going to quick do this and get it over with and the fun stuff can come later something died in that bag smells so bad you're supposed to water this fertilizer are in but it's supposed to rain and so I'm just going to sprinkle it down and there's so much water here in Ohio that I'm not concerned smells like a thousand fish died in this bag hopefully it won't attract [Music] animals so the job that I was most excited about doing today was actually planting my broccoli and cabbages that I picked up from a greenhouse I was going to plant those into the raised beds today I've been looking forward to it for a long time they are so so beautiful and definitely definitely ready to be planted out but there are flood warnings again and it's raining pouring rain again and so I don't think I'm going to be able to go outside today the awesome thing with the raised beds is that everything else outside is flooded but the raised beds would be totally fine to plant in but I'm not either willing to go out in the cold and wet and be miserable I'll probably wait till tomorrow to do those but in here I have these tomatoes that I must have planted too early because they now need to be repotted because they're massive it's just a little bit too early yet to plant them outside so I'm going to transplant those into these pots so that they don't get too root bound the other thing that needs to be done is I'm going to plant some squash and cucumbers I just decided that part of my strategy this year for trying to get on top of the squash beetles is to plant the cucumbers and squash out as plugs so that they are a little bit more established hopefully before the bugs come that's something a lot of people told us I don't know if it's going to help but I'm going to try I know that cucumbers and butternut squash they don't love to have their Roots Disturbed in transplanting so if you do this you have to be super careful not to mess with The Roots much at all when you're transplanting them so we'll see if this works we had a reader tell us that cross country hybrid works really well for her thank you Amy for the tip I'm going to try these as most of you know if you've been watching for any amount of time I have a horrible horrible problem getting cucumbers and squash to grow because we have so many squash beetles so we're going to try it diamant is another one that I'm going to try and then also homemade pickle here I've got some butternut squash seeds that I saved from last year I don't do a ton of seed saving yet although it's definitely something that's on my bucket list but I did do butternut squash and also Patty pan squash so I planted more Tomatoes than I actually need so I'm probably going to be giving some of these away see if people want them because I just have too many I'm only going to do 10 tomato plants this year so I have to Choose Wisely I think I'm going to do five Amish paste since that's my favorite and then I'll just do a few other varieties for fun as a content creator I'm constantly seeing people within my Niche doing things very differently than I do and I get intimidated sometimes and question myself especially in times when I'm feeling overwhelmed or busy or like a failure in some area recently I've had moments where I've fallen into this comparison trap which causes me to wonder if I'm doing enough I see other creators who have hundreds of seedlings in their green houses or have no till wood chip Gardens or others who know all the things and can explain the science behind everything they do I'm constantly having to filter through people's opinions their praise their criticism and then decide what I want to do for myself I'm really thankful for input it's really helped me to grow as a gardener and also as a person but it does take effort to sort it all out the most comforting thing for me when I'm struggling to make a decision or to even just stand on a decision that I've already made is to recognize that there's more than one way to be right there's more than one way to grow a tomato there's more than one way to be self-sufficient and raise food for your family I've chosen the minimal route because it's what I can handle at this stage of my life and that's okay I don't have a ton of seedlings under my grow light I don't grow a huge variety of veggies in my garden I keep things very very simple but in the end I'm still growing most of my family's food for the year so it's a win for me the reason I'm saying all this is because I have a hunch that some of you beginning homesteaders might be overwhelmed and intimidated as well with all the information out there and I just want to encourage you and give you permission to make homesteading and growing your own food look the way you want it to look choose methods that seem doable for you and for your particular set of circumstances and stage of life and then be okay with it stand on that and don't worry about fitting in or being the best me and the kids are on our way to town right now before c left he gave the kids each a couple dollars and told them that they can buy something at a coffee shop so I just figured the kidss were so good this morning I may as well reward them and take them to town for their drinks may as well make the most of this rainy dreary day I would also like to go for a walk at the park I can't really go on my daily walk with the kids with just me and the kids at home cuz I can't really leave the house but I'm not sure if the weather is going to allow for us to go walk at the park we shall see [Music] we are back from town we're hungry so I'm going to make some really quick pizzas I'm going to keep them really simple I would like to have more protein on my pizza than the kids um want so I'm going to make fry up some hamburger with shiitake mushrooms and I will put that on my pizza instead of just cheese and pepperoni these are homegrown shitake mushrooms from a friend of ours and they are so good these cast iron skillets have been in the oven at 400 for I don't know 20 minutes or so preheating I'm just going to drizzle some olive oil in them and spread the sourdough starter around sprinkle it with some salt and Italian seasoning and bake it again for like I don't know 5 minutes and then I can just put my toppings on bake it again until everything's melted and you've got a pizza so this next Pizza the last one is going to be a little bit different this is our special dessert I don't make this often but it's super fun when I do make it I had this idea a few weeks ago and I just tried it I hadn't actually seen anybody do it I was just like hm this might sound good we went to a pizza shop and they had like the um cinnamon roll sticks so what I do is I just make this like I would the other pizzas I just put the sourdough starter onto the pan with the avocado oil but instead of using avocado oil I'm going to put some melted butter on there this is some colostrum butter so yellow I'm going to actually sprinkle just a teeny bit of salt on this since the dough isn't salted at all not much just a little bit and then after you have the butter on just take cinnamon sugar and sprinkle it on heavily and then I just bake this like I do the normal pizzas just until it's nice and crispy and then I do a little bit of powdered sugar with a tiny bit of raw milk to make a glaze and I just drizzle it over the top so good this one's ready to put toppings on you don't want your crust like fully fully crispy before you put your toppings on it it literally takes them like four minutes max until they're set and ready for the toppings pepperoni is a delicacy in this house we almost never have it but I every now and then grab some for [Music] pizza while the pizzas are finishing baking I'm going to quickly whip up this glaze dash of vanilla little bit of powdered sugar and a couple teaspoons of [Music] milk it's time for dessert I'm just going to slice these into kind of like [Music] sticks it's honestly so good so so easy we finished off the day with hot tea in a movie we watched Peter Rabbit which was super funny we all really loved it the next day was beautiful and sunny and I finally got my broccoli and cabbages planted out into the raised beds my raised beds have been a godsend this year everything else is flooded and muddy but the soil in these beds was perfect for planting because it drains so well this was all I planned to f film for this video but there ended up being one more Adventure to be had needless to say I feel very attractive the kids came in and told me the Woodpecker Hol sign out by the bees is covered in bees so obviously there's a swarm going on I called Cody he said usually bees are very calm when they're swarming and that I should just pick up handfuls of them and put them into a swarm box and then he'll take care of them tonight when he gets home it's about the last thing in the world that I would want to do I'm terrified quite out of my mind I've never done anything with the bees like nothing at all I am just taking one for the team and I'm just going to do my best and call it good that's all I can do and Cody said the same thing just do your best and it's fine I have been chased by these bees before when I was mowing the lawn one day they chased me and I was so scared I jumped off the lawn mower and like the lawn mower kept going it was positively terrifying so I'm just going to go and face my fear and do my best I feel like I need to clarify here that Michelle volunteered to do this she called me and I told her what would need to be done but that it was up to her if she wanted to do it or not it would be a bummer to lose a swarm but not the end of the world she said she wanted to do it though and I was really proud of her for it while I've got your attention here anyway I bet you were wondering how my vacation went well whether you were wondering or not I'm going to tell you it was one of the best and worst vacations of my life I was headed to Florida to go deep sea fishing with my uncles and cousins but my flight on Thursday got cancelled and I ended up having to sleep in the airport this is my bed for the night my flight got cancelled and I got rebooked on one leaving really early in the morning it wasn't worth going home so get to hang out out here at the airport all night I hope I can get at least a little bit of sleep that was the worst most uncomfortable sleep I've ever had I made my flight the next morning though and had fun hanging out and finding lots of shark teeth at Venice Beach on Friday Saturday morning we headed out to to go fishing because of the high winds the previous 2 days the waves were fairly High the boat rocked and rocked and rocked and rocked about an hour into our 9-hour Excursion I got sick really sick I heaved once over the side and soon after I went to heave again and passed out when I woke up about half a minute later I had no idea where I was or what was going on I ended up laying down and sleeping on and off on the floor and then on a skinny little bench for the rest of the trip a few of the others got sick as well but they still managed to catch some fish we made some delicious fish tacos that night I still had another day to hang out I made sure I didn't miss any of my daily runs and all in all I really did have a good time my flight coming home went fine I was glad to be back and I was very impressed with all that Michelle accomplished while I was gone there any holes in these gloves calm isn't really the word that comes to mind they're not calm I mean they're not calm by any long shot I'm out of here are they following me all right so plan B I am going to put another frame in the Swarm trap back there and I'm going to take the lid off and I'm just going to see if the bees will go into the box with all the other bees that already in there I don't know why they're not calm enough for me just to drop them in the box or brush them in the box but I'm just going to put this in there and hopefully the queen is in this warm trap already and then the other bees will follow her in there I don't know I don't know anything about it you know the Swarm ended up leaving which was a bummer but I was really proud of Michelle for trying I checked the hive after I got back and there are still a lot of bees in there I removed the winter insulation added a few frames so right now they're looking good next week Holly will likely be going to our new home we've got some baby chicks coming in the mail and we've got a surprise new animal coming to the farm you won't want to miss that but until then you should watch this video next be sure to check out Thrive market during their friends and family sale use our link for 30% off your first order and and a free gift

Channel: More Than Farmers

Views: 83,467

Keywords: homestead, organic farm, simple living, how to grow food, homesteading, homesteading family

Id: 5U8vkZLrjtU

Length: 25min 0sec (1500 seconds)

Published: Mon Apr 22 2024