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.

Monday, March 10, 2014

3.10.14

Beautiful day!!!!!!!!

I'm just in for a very late lunch of homemade cinnamon rolls and one of Nik's pepsi's  *o*  it was tooooo nice to come in earlier but i started feeling wonky so needed to eat something.

The day has been full, lost to do and enjoying every bit of it. Laundry this morning, cleaning pens, still picking up stuff that blew around in the high winds, working in my shop/studio to get it functional, general feeding, watering tending chores, preparing to jar up some more muscle balm and start a batch of walnut salve  ...

Nik's at work, they called him back 2 weeks earlier than they said. we're very thankful for that.

Still no hot water, the propane is a horror. I'm still going to try and get it working enough to shower until I can get an electric water heater.  But that's way down the list. People offer warm showers and we do accept and greatly appreciate them but I want to take a warm shower at home!

I hope to never try to hatch eggs in winter again. Out of 42 eggs in the incubator only 9 hatched out. They were all viable and doing wonderfully until we lost power for a few hours one day. it happened right after i turned them so they had no time to warm up properly before. we raced them out to the blazer where i have a small one plug converter, but it took too long and only the ones in the very middle survived. 

The ducks did wonderfully, out of 12, 2 were not viable but the other 10 hatched out and thrived. I traded 4 and sold 3, hoping that the 3 i kept are a male and 2 females. They're Pekin ducks, which I've never had before. Good for meat and eggs, we'll see. I love ducks but much prefer Runner ducks and can't wait to have some again. 

Of the 42 eggs we had a dozen each RIR, Barred Rocks and Ameraucana. of the 9 survivors there are 5 Armeraucana and 4 RIR.  1 of the RIR might be a barred but I think it's a red.

Tonight's supper will be grilled kabobs with chicken, potatoes, carrots, mushrooms, onions and garlic. Maybe some grilled apples for evening tea.

the cottage is currently overrun with lady bugs, it's a very good thing but I rarely see them in the gardens. I need to figure out how to get them there.

I'm also waiting on two tree/bush orders for the orchard. several are things I had ordered two years ago but lost through the droughts. Hopefully with all the moisture so far and a fence around the orchard this year. I've ordered ...
blueberries
thimbleberries
pecan trees
pawpaws
Black cherry 
Wild plum
Serviceberry
American beautyberry
Golden currant (spice bush) 

Now back to it. I still have to .. make a hammock, throw some hay, clean another pen, sweep all the floors inside and fit in a little riding time  :)


3 comments:

Unknown said...

Hi... I've been following you for several years now. I want to tell you how much I enjoy reading about your life. Because I am disabled I spend a lot of time learning about others.
I wanted to let you know I worry when you don't post for a long time. I worry about your business and your family. I just wanted to let you know someone is thinking about yall and rooting for blessings Upon you and yours
Vicki from Sugar Land TX

Unknown said...

Juli, it's Tobit! Glad to hear Nik got called back to work and, despite the lack of hot water, glad to hear all is mostly well on the homestead. Time for a campfire bucket bath!

We miss you on the forum, do stop by and say hi. =)

Julia Catfeather said...

Vicki, thanks so much for stopping in. Your kind words truly made me smile. Come by any time and we'll share a cup of tea :)

JT, I have a hard time getting the pages to load but I will try again soon!