Life on a Mini Farm and a Book I Can't Put Down!

For years I dreamed of moving our family to a mini farm... somewhere we could enjoy the simple pleasures of country living. I hoped for a place that would give us more reasons to want to be home - - together.

Well, here we are! It's been a little over a year since we left the cute suburban neighborhood and headed just past the city limits to our 2+ acre little farmstead. 

Since moving here, we've added two cats, a dog, a rabbit and chickens. (We've also lost one cat, four chickens and our beloved dog is getting trained by our husband's parents and their older dog - we miss him tons!) 

There's an F-150 where the 525i used to be parked. And man, oh man, could we use a new ride-on mower!

We have three raised garden beds for vegetables - the size was just right for our first garden here. We hope to add to our garden this spring.

We've enjoyed having chickens for the first time! I remember having lots of questions before getting our chickens. I wondered how often we'd need to clean out their coop... It seems that every six weeks is just fine. (Of course it depends on how many chickens you have and how often they are in their coop versus outside.) 

We use pine shavings for their coop. To clean the coop, we (mostly me with help from our oldest son) shovel out all of the shavings into a wheelbarrow and replace with fresh shavings. 

Chickens are easy to feed. You can fill their feeder with food and give them plenty of water to last a few days at a time... though it's good to check on them daily. It's fun to bring them vegetables and fruits - they run out of their coop into the chicken yard to greet us (or get their treats) when they hear us coming.

We didn't intend on having roosters but "Lucy" turned out to be "Lewis." He actually makes a great watch dog rooster, alerting us of any activity. 

Sadly, we've lost over half of our flock to predators. I've spotted a bobcat and a coyote on our property. There are also owls. So, this spring we will work to make the chicken yard more predator-proof. We plan on getting several new chicks in spring.

If we're running low and I try to sneak some store-bought eggs into breakfast, my husband asks if they're our eggs - because they don't taste as good. 
There's nothing like fresh.

I guess we've become egg snobs.

Though the novelty of chickens has worn off for our boys, 
I still love to see them gather the eggs and feed the chickens.

My husband bought me this book. Not only is it cute(!), it's such a great introductory to farm life. If you ever dream of living on a farm, this is the book for you!

It's written by a New Yorker (probably why we city slickers understand it so well!) based on her husband's family farm.

One of the items mentioned in the book is a flower press. Since I recently found the above press at a thrift shop, I thought I'd share it. It's a fun little way to preserve little treasures from the garden!

And speaking of farm items, we were given this vintage milk tin jug for my birthday. It belonged to my husband's grandparents and is a special little reminder of them.

So that's about it for now... if it were up to me, I'd love to fill our barn with horses, babydoll sheep and pygmy goats. Maybe someday!

But the reality is - right now we've got our hands full raising our three boys (#1 priority and joy!), our small menagerie of animals and learning to take care of our little farmstead. 

There are always projects we'd love to tackle and new dreams for our family as our children grow. Like everyone else, we are limited to 24 hours in a day and what is (or isn't) in our bank account.  ;)

I have to remind myself that Rome wasn't built in a day... 




Grateful for who we have, what we have, and where we are... 
And I'm so thankful you stopped by today!

xo

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