Donna's Cottage

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A Busy Day

What a beautiful day I had today. I got up at 5:00, made coffee, threw in a load of laundry, looked at some things on the computer and went out and milked at 6:00. What a nice peaceful time to be in the barn. I can milk my girls and watch the sun come up. When I came back in I put the milk in the water to cool and sat on the porch with a cup of coffee and the dog and my knitting and watched the animals munching on hay. After I took care of the milk I cut the feta cheese that I set last night and while that was going through it's next step sat back out on the porch. Came in drained the curds, found a way better way to do it than dumping in all in the lined strainer at once and hung it up to drain until 12:30 and hung the laundry. I had to make an appoint for Lexy to go get her sports physical and after I did that I went out to the barn to do some work out there. I came back in around 11:30 to make sure I was in here in case the doctor's office needed any information as this was the first time Lexy went all by herself. I ate lunch and then it was time to put the cheese in the press. After I did I started my bread and during the first rise I went back out to the barn again. Worked out there for a while and came in to get the bread ready to put in the pans. Put it in for it's second rise and finished up in the barn. By that time it was 4:15 and I baked the bread and had warm bread and chicken soup for supper. Milked at 6:00 and am going to start some yogurt tonight. I'm hemming a skirt that I made three years ago and has been just sitting there with the hem pinned up and I decided it was time I did something with it. It's back to work tomorrow.

All day today I looked around me and was in awe at all the wonderful things Our Heavenly Father has given me and am truly greatful.

I have made the decision that I'm am going to start wearing skirts, jumpers, blouses and dresses again and also a head covering.  I have wanted to do this for a long time and now, through God's grace, am going to do it.  I started about two weeks ago.  I had to go to a fund raiser breakfast for Lexy's volleyball team on Sunday morning so I wore a dress.  I had a head covering on and just left it on.  I cannot tell you the strange looks I got.  That would have made me feel like I was doing something wrong before but I don't care what other people think anymore.  I'm doing this to the Glory of God not man.

My Barnyard Friends

My "friends" on my little homestead consist of one horse, six Finn sheep, five dairy goats, seven chickens and seven angora rabbits.

I'll start with the first critter to come to my homestead and that was Napolean, my six year old Haflinger/Percheron horse.  He is three-quarters Halflinger and one-quarter Percheron.  He looks just like his Dad kind of took Mom's size.  He's about 15 hands I would say.  I bought him to be a buggy horse as that is the mode of transportation I want to use when all is said and done.  He is also strong enough to pull farm implements such as a manure spreader.  I will ride him as soon as I find a saddle to fit him. The one I used last year has gotten too small. It's probably my fault because I do tend to spoil him.  He is a good boy though.

Then came the bunnies.  I started out with one Satin angora buck and have progressed to three does and four bucks.  I have no earthly idea why because I will never breed them, or at least I don't think I will.  I hand pluck their fiber and sell it and have also blended some with my Finn wool and spun that and have tried to spin plain angora but that is kind of tricky. At present I have my does are Wicket, Cocoa Channel and Lady Bug and my bucks are Mad Mardigan, Jimmy Jones (after the football coach), Charlie Brown and Ghostbuster.

The next set of critters to come to me were my sheep.  I started out with three Finns, added two purebred Icelandics and a Tunis/Merino/icelandic cross.  The two Icelandics didn't last long, actually from Thursday to Saturday, because they are what they call a Primitive Breed, and have no flocking instinct at all.  They got out the day they were brought home and it was really a nightmare.  Oh yeah, it's funny now but I can tell you it wasn't then.  The Tunis/Merino/Icelandic cross, who I named Prissy because she was always standoffish from the Finns, just went to another farm as part of a barter.  Now I have an all Finn flock consisting of Lilly, Sarah, Gabby, Bonnie, Dixie Little and Little Sister.  Lilly, Sarah, Gabby and Dixie Little all came from the same farm and are white.  Bonnie and Little Sister are from the same flock, are black and yes, they are really sisters.

Then came the goats.  What was I thinking.  I was thinking, how cute and I can have my own milk so on December 30, 2007 Lexy and I went almost to Canada to pick up a Nubian doe named Phoebe and a LaMancha doe named Squirt.  Phoebe is jet black and Squirt is black and white.  I bought them as bred does but as Our Heavenly Father know what is best they were not.  They were so small when they both came home in the same large dog crate.  I was disappointed but also relieved as I knew they were too small to be delivering kids.  Before they came I had made arrangements to buy an Alpine/Nubian cross from a friend.  She was bred and I asked her if she would keep her until she had her babies as I had no experience and the babies would born in the middle of winter.  She agreed and Maples the pushy Alpine/Nubian with a set of  horns came to me in May along with Snowball, a little, you guessed it, white Sannen/Boar cross, also with little horns. Then a week ago Lollipop the big brown Nubian came along.  So, now I'm milking two goats and loving every minute of it.  It took about a week for Lollipop and I to get used to one another but now everything is going fine, except Maples is now pushier than ever and that kind of worries me.  The past couple of days though she seems to have settled down.  This year, probably in November or December, I will get Maples, Lollipop and Phoebe bred.  Squirt the LaMancha is going to the lady I got Maples from as part of a barter.  She is really pushy too and I can only handle one pushy goat on my farm at a time.

Two weeks ago I bartered goats milk and cheese for seven hens.  Next week I'm getting 11 more hens because I have a lot of people who want eggs.  I love to watch the hens.  I wanted a rooster but when I asked the lady across the street if she would mind if I got chickens she asked me if I was getting roosters and I said probably at least one and she wasn't too happy so I won't get one.  In the spring I want to order some Barred Rocks because I've had them before and I know they lay eggs well and a lot of them.

Friends

I'll start here.....

This is going to be a journal of my search for simplicity and will be dedicated to my Mom, Dad, Grandma, Great Aunt, Kat, Jamie and Cathy and all the other friends who have encouraged me and guided me.  I thank Our Heavenly Father every day for these wonderful people and all that he gives me.

My search for simplicity started back in 1981 when I was expecting my second child.  I was living in a city at the time and married to a very controlling man who had no concept of what groceries and bills were.  In order to help make ends meet I began to can and bake my own bread.  After my second son, James, was born I was lucky to be able to stay home until he was eight months old but then had to return to work.  I just couldn't stop thinking about living simply.  Well that worked until one day I was doing my daily chores and the phone rang and it was an attorney I had worked for through a temporary agency years before.  She asked me to come in and talk to her about working for her.  I ended up working for her.  Then I became pregnant for my third child, Valerie Ann.  I worked up until I was eight months pregnant when the doctor took me out of work.  I was determined to be a stay at home Mom but again, ended up going back to work.  I still clung to my hopes and dreams of being as self-sufficient as possible but I was met with so much resistance from my then husband and society that I reverted back to the horrid ways of the world.  I was so unhappy working in law offices.  I wanted to do something to HELP people, not hurt them so I decided I wanted to be a nurse.  I took the test and was accepted into the program and started nursing school when Valerie was seven years old.  We were living in the country and I still determined to be self-sufficient I had chickens (which came with the house we bought - long story) and had planted a huge garden.   Then diaster struck, on October 16, 1989 Valerie Ann was struck with leukemia.  This was all part of God's plan to bring me back to reality as to what was really important, family.  Of course, the marriage ended and I had three children to care for.  I was working at the time in the nursing field as a Nursing Assistant in a nursing home second shift.  A new man entered my life, so caring and understanding and helpful at first, and I was pregnant with child number four, Alexis.  I was certain that God was trying to prepare me for the loss of Valerie by bringing another child to me, a girl. My family wanted me to stay in school and I made it until one month before fininshing my first year. I stay in school until one month before fininshing my first year and the week-end I quit I was scheduled to assist a doctor putting a chest tube in an AIDS patient. I just felt it was wrong to expose my unborn child and my child with leukemia to any more than I already had by working in the health care field. Valerie survived and Alexis was born on December 2, 1991.  The "wonderful" man turned out to be a nightmare but I stuck with it for 12 years of supporting a family while he stayed home, his smoking, drinking, womanizing and God only knows what else.  I went back to work when she was not even three months old.  I worked in the nursing field until 1994 when it became clear that my children needed me home in the evenings because my son, James, was getting to the age where he would be involved in sports and the "step-father" wouldn't pick him up from practices. I applied for a job as a medical transcriptionist and have been doing it ever since. I felt I was being punished and deserved nothing better. Mind you, all this time I was still trying to live simply.  I still cooked from scratch and had a garden a couple of times.  I stuck with this horrible nightmare until one day in 2005 I decided I had had enough and with God's help ended the marriage but only after God gave me the strength and courage by making me see this man's true colors.   Alexis was at cheerleading practice and they thought they were going to have to take her to the hospital because she couldn't breath.  I took her to the doctor and explained about the second hand smoke in the house and asked her to please, please help me.  She said there was nothing she could do but to tell him that she said he could no longer smoke around Alexis.  I did and he seemed fine with it and Alexis and I went to do some school shopping. We came home and he asked for a blanket and said he was going to sleep in the car because he wouldn't stay in a house where he couldn't smoke.  I didn't tell him he couldn't smoke, I told him that he couldn't smoke in the house.  After one night in the car he decided he could live with smoking on either the front porch or enclosed back porch. That lasted for about two weeks and one morning I got up to find him smoking in front of his computer.  I had been working at home since 2001 so I guess I felt a little more secure and explained to him we had talked about it.  He said he had options and I told him to take them then and he started moving his computer out.  This wasn't the first time he had left the family but this time it was different.  I was given the strength and help of God to help him move his things out.  I had never done that before but this time was different.  I had always felt I had to try to make the marriage work because that is what God teaches.  A very good Christian friend of mine told me that it was not God's plan for me to be me and the children to be mistreated and to keep the faith.  I did, I have and things are now where I think God wants me to be.

During this whole time my Dad and I were companions every Sunday, holidays and my days off.  We would go shopping together and back in 1999 he decided it was time we took a vacation and he and Alexis and I went to Lancaster, Pennsylvania together.  In 2004 he had a fall at home and it was time for Dad to come and live with us.  While he was recuperating in the Vet's Home I had the job of cleaning out a house he had lived in for over 30 years.  All of my furniture, dishes, pots and pans were all given to people who needed help and all of my  Dad's belongings came to my house. After all, this was going to be his home and he deserved to have his things around him.  Dad lived with us for almost a year and a half when he became too ill for me to care for at home alone and Lexy was only 12.  He went back to the Vet's Home and died on December 17, 2007.  He taught me to be strong, good work ethics and a lot of my cooking I learned from my Dad.  My Mom was the baker and I learned that from here.  Lexy (that's what we call Alexis) and I brought him to the new farm I bought in August of last year for Thanksgiving, his last Thanksgiving.  He was so happy that I had finally realized at least part of my dream of having a self-sufficient lifestyle, even it is just food self-sufficiency for now.

Lexy and I live here on this little farm by ourselves and she is busy being a teenager and I'm busy working as a medical transcriptionist and taking care of my goats, sheep, chickens, angora rabbits, horse, dogs and cats.  Lexy and her boyfriend are a wonderful help here though.  When I bought this farm the barn was not set up for animals, at least not the type of animals I have.  This had been a chicken farm and at one point in time there were 3,000 chickens in the barn.  So, at first I just used cattle panel to make pens for the animals.  That worked for a year and now Andrew (Lexy's boyfriend), Lexy and I are building stalls using pallets.  These two kids are a gift from God because I was hospitalized on an emergent basis in June and they took over the whole farm, chores and all, by themselves.  While my children think I'm crazy for wanting to live this way, they are supportive.  I didn't get much of a garden planted this year but did not stress out about it because I know God will provide for my needs.

One of the ways God has provided for me is by blessing me with my wonderful friends.  I met Kat through snail mail back in 2002 when she wrote an article for Countryside Magazine.  I realized her address was not that far from me so I took a huge chance and wrote her a letter.  She land her husband live the life I want to have.  They live in an adorable house in the State Forest land and lives totally off the grid but still has a home-based business on their laptop computers.  Larry is a gifted muscian, horseman and all around great guy.  Kat is a walking encyclopedia when it comes to living simply and is my shining star.  I met Cathy when she wrote an article in Countryside and I suggested Kat should write to her.  Kat did and the three of us have been friends ever since.  Cathy works for the same hospital I do although she works in-house and I work at home.  Cathy is also one of my shining stars when it comes to homesteading.  She is gifted when it comes to cooking, caring for animals and being self-sufficient.  Now enters Jamie, who I met through one of the homesteading boards I'm a member of. She moved here from Texas last year and she and her Jeff are building a home about 45 minutes from me.  Another shining star.  She is, just like Kat and Cathy, a gifted garden and knows a lot about herbs. We all have a lot in common but I think the most important bond is homesteading.  They are my greatest support and cheering section and are true blessings from God. As a matter of fact, Kat is starting a Bible study group at her home in September for us as I'm having a really hard finding a church in my area.

I have two nubian goats, one LaMancha, one Alpine/Nubian cross and one Boar/Saanen cross.  I'm milking the nubian and alpine/nubian cross and am getting very proficient at making Feta cheese and a cheese spread for bagels and crackers.  I never realized how good goat milk was until I started drinking it.