Wild Moon Cottage is a small working homestead in the pristine Ozark Mountains. We have dairy goats, poultry, organic herb and vegetable gardens, a start of a tiny fruit orchard, several black walnut trees, wild berries and fields of wildcrafting goodness. We raise our own milk, our own eggs, much of our own medicine and food. I do laundry by hand, make my own vinegar, candles, soap, bread, cheese ........ For a living I am an artist and herbalist. My goal for myself and our homestead is to be as self sufficient and self sustaining as possible.

Thursday, December 15, 2011

So much to say, so little time

I've been very busy lately but, all good things :)

Among the many good things ....

Business has picked up, which is wonderful! I had to reopen my etsy shop because my website has been down for months now and still haven't heard back from the host, MSN. So here's the shop for now ... TheWildMoonCottage.etsy.com I'm listing some earrings there while I write this.

Better business has enabled me to be able to start working on stocking the pantry again. We had eaten from it without being able to restock for months when we first moved. But just a few weeks ago i was able to afford 2 cases of canned vegetables and things have been looking up all the way around.

I had some wonderful trading, traded 3 rabbits for an 8 qt dutch oven. I lost mine years ago when it disappearance during a move. This one is a big iron Yeti and won;t fit on any of my current inside cooking surfaces. But it will be perfect for outdoor cooking and might fit inside our wood stove for baking and roasting.



Nik was able to get out chainsaw working again. It's so loud and violent but does make the work go much faster. Using the bow saws was taking to long and we were getting a bit cold. The cottage does hold the heat very well but it takes more wood to heat it up before it's warm enough to hold. The stones soak up a lot of the heat to start but then keep the house very warm afetr. I'm still looking for a good large one man cross cut saw tho.

The rabbit colony (The Burrow) is thriving and doing wonderfully. We have 5 females in it now all getting along wonderfully. They have a central community nest that they all share, it's a lovely site to see a nest full of bunnies.

We're also preparing for baby bunnies starting this Friday. I hadn't intended to put any females with any males until spring, winter isn't the best time for babies of any sort. But things happen as they will and an emergency caused females to live with males and there you have it. We got the baby beds finished and put in a few days ago so they're ready when to Buns are. 5 beds for 5 females, nothing fancy but they will contain the babies. I think there's also a good chance that they will ignore the beds and have their babies in the community nest. We'll see.
The 2 males now live alone in Rabbitville, side by side but separated with a board so they don't fight. The other morning Jack escaped and hopped all around. Nemo helped out and cornered him for us so we could catch him. He did stay within a certain area of the colony and rabbitville tho and had a couple of safe places to hide out. I don't know how long he had been out but there wasn't a scratch on him.

And we still have Juniper, of course :)

Still preparing for winter, drying more carrots, potatoes, sweet potatoes and onions today to put back in the pantry. The root crops keep pretty good as is but drying ensures they keep better. I try to have plenty of both, to many hungry memories to take chances :)

I was able to find insurance in time for the house, Thank the Mother & Father! It's not completely certain because we're waiting for the underwriters to inspect the house and they may reject our woodstove because it was homemade. If they do reject it we'll have 30 to 45 days to get an approved stove, so it's not to terrible either way. For now tho, we're good :) and if anyone is looking for insurance that will cover woodstove as the only heat source, I would suggest Farmers.

One sort of bummer (and sort of not) is that, for the first time in 2 years I am going to have to buy milk. Thistle has dried up completely. She started giving less and less and at first i got her going again with herbs and continued milking and massage but in the end I decided that her body must feel the need to dry off and her health is most important, so we'll have to find milk elsewhere, at least until March, when her babies are due. A bummer that we won't have milk but not a bummer because it's best for her and, hopefully in a few months we'll have milk and babies :)

I'm also definitely selling our buck, Thunder. I'm wanting to keep any doelings Thistle has so we can't keep Thunder. I'm going to list him on my sales blog but have to straighten it out and fix it up a bit.

And a wonderful thing ... We've found a good, reliable, very local, source for hay, which was one of my big hold backs for getting a horse. Finding that is a huge step closer :) :) :) So close that i even emailed someone giving away a free colt. Never heard back but it was a hoofbeat closer. So, if anyone has or knows someone giving away a Vanner :) or any other sure footed, healthy gelding or mare, between weaned and 8 years old, please do let me know! It does need to be a sure footed, strong legged creature because he or she will be taught to ride, drive and pull, they will be part of the family but have to work like the rest of us :)

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