Here we are with another weekly homestead update! I’ve got some exciting updates to share with you all. So grab a cuppa whatever you happen to be drinking while reading this and let’s chat!

Eggs

I always like to start out with my egg count. I collected 17 21 eggs from 2/20-2/26/2021. I haven’t collected eggs from today so I’ll be back later to update our count. BUT y’all! I collect 5 eggs in one day. Spring is so close. The girls will start laying more as the days get longer. Speaking of. I’ve been letting them out to ‘free range’ (if you can call it that since there’s still at least a foot of snow on the ground and they tend to stick to the back porch, but they’re not enclosed in their run. So it’s free ranging, I guess) and the other night I was waiting to put them up and it was almost 6PM before they went back into the coop!!

I also have a Gracie update. If you recall, I thought Gracie hadn’t laid an egg because I started getting a darker brown egg but not quite as dark as I’d had before. Anyway, I assumed it was Gracie…until I saw Gracie in the nest box the other morning. And she laid a light colored egg! Oy! So. I guess those other eggs were Maran’s and she’s starting to lay again after a little hiatus. I tell ya. These chickens are hard to keep track of. So I’ve marked those lighter chocolate brown eggs as Maran’s.

tapping trees

Speaking of spring, we tapped trees on Tuesday! We currently have 6 maple taps. I haven’t collected any sap yet which means I am slightly early. Which is good. It’s way better to be early than late. The Mister is building my evaporator this weekend, just in the nick of time!

the business end of things

I have a few business updates. I’m still mostly working behind the scenes, setting up meetings, finding ways to collaborate. But I’ve also been making updates to the website. It’s a ‘living’ thing that will always need to be growing and tweaked in some way. So I started the community resources page, updated the homepage, added a home for our book discussions, and will be working on updating the shop with some fun and exciting programs over the next few weeks. And now there are gift certificates! Why I didn’t think of that before?!!?

What? I didn’t mention the community resources page yet? Well. After our discussion last week about social media versus website, I decided that I had been focusing on my online community (which is great! And I appreciate y’alls support) but I have failed to mention my local community. Shame on me. So I built a community resources page where I can feature all my local partners, whether I’ve worked with them or they have just supported me in some way. I’ll be adding to that page as I form more and more partnerships. I did a shout out over on instagram too. It’s important to recognize those who have supported you in some way through the years. And I thank each and every one of you who have spent the time here with your encouraging words. Thank you.

I’ve also been taking a few workshops on how to increase my web presence. The workshops have been very interesting and I always walk away with one or two (or more) good points on how I can update my routine and how I’m using this space. It feels good to be growing and expanding my knowledge and implementing ways to improve my web presence. I also appreciate the conversations from last week. I love interacting with you all!

One more thing, if you haven’t signed up for my newsletter, now is the time. I’m getting ready to do a major overhaul on it. I think I’ve finally figured out how I want to use it and I don’t think you’ll want to miss out. Just sayin’.

upstate wanderings

Now for another fun update. As you might know, I love traveling around my local area and taking pictures and sharing them here and over on social media. Sometimes I call it ‘taking a back road’, but I’ve decided to start a new series called ‘Upstate Wanderings’. I don’t think I talk enough about where I live. I am somewhere in between the Catskills region of New York State and the Poconos of Pennsylvania. We call it Northeast PA or NEPA for short. So I want to start featuring this locale in more detail. It won’t be an every week feature, but as I travel the back roads and find things that I want to share then I’ll pop on here and give you an update. I’ll start today with these pictures:

The Mister and I decided to take a ride the other day. We haven’t really been any where lately and just wanted to get out to the house. I needed to go to the bank and we decided to stop for sandwiches. Then we thought we’d take the long way home and I’m happy we did. All of these barns can be found on the back roads of Preston Park, PA. The road pictures are actually of our road, but way up on the other end. And friends, I think that red barn would qualify as being in the top 5 of my all time favorite pictures that I’ve ever taken. I love them. I’m even more happy that I bought that new-to-me camera.

the rest of the story

I changed our Misfits Market delivery day (use referral code COOKWME-IC0HDH to get $10 off your fist box). I was having it delivered on Wednesdays and I realized that it was throwing my weekly meal planning schedule off. So I’ve opted for Saturdays. That gives me time to prep the food for the week and come up with a meal plan to start on Mondays. I’m not sure why I decided on Wednesdays to begin with. I guess I just wasn’t thinking! Oy. This will hopefully help get me back on the healthy eating track and therefore help with some of those pesky side effects I mentioned here. I’ve also started walking on the treadmill and doing some light yoga. That’s been helpful too.

One of the things that made me really happy this week was my friend texting me and saying she made too much soup and are you home? She brought over a container full of very yummy pasta fagioli soup! I’ve been having it for lunch this week. That’s what friends do and I’m happy to have people in my life who are like that! They’re also the friends that are going to help with the chicken coop/run renos. I’m going to owe them big time. LOL.

The List

And let’s do a check in on ‘THE LIST‘, shall we?

1. finish business plan: done with it as much as it’s going to get done. It’s a living thing and will continually be updated. I’m happy to have this off the list!
2. garden: finish moving to new location, plant garden and flowers
3. make soap
4. render lard
5. restock spices: going tomorrow!!
6. chicken coop expansion: clean out coop and run; move coop and run; expand chicken run; put metal roof on current run; expand roosts in run; fix door between coop and run; add rooster to the flock
7. finish chicken coop curtains (I’ve only been working on them for about 5 years!)
8. Do something with blueberries
9. Do something with cherries

So I haven’t done much but there are plans for the chicken coop and restocking spices. Sadly I can’t mark them off. YET! I also am rethinking the chicken coop curtains. I think I’ll just buy some curtains to hang up and use the patchwork ones to cover the nest boxes. Then I can mark that off my list!

I’m linking up with the Homestead Blog Hop (click pic for link)

And finally

That’s it for me from the homestead this week. What have you been up to? Tell me all the things-the good, the bad, and the ugly. And I’ll leave you with this sweetness.

’til next time
-k
xoxo