Frustratedearthmother's Journaling Journey

[frustratedearthmother]

I have both registered and non registered. My ND's are registered and my Nubians either ARE registered or could be if I'd ever catch up on the paperwork, lol. As far as selling, ya get folks who want what they want. The guy asked me, just out of curiosity, about Dusty, my big Nubian buck and I quoted him $500 because he's awesome (and that's what I paid for him). They guy is like nope, would never pay that much for a goat. But when I was showing pygmies and selling - papers were worth a lot. We get both types of buyers here. Myself, since I'm working on kinder-ish and mini-nubs now, I'm not too worried either way. Someday if Kinders really take off - I may go back to the beginning and do the paperwork. The guy today loved the kinder-types. He said they were the perfect size for his wife and girls to handle....and that's a big thing for me too.

Winemaking, at least the simple stuff I make, is so simple!

http://fivegallonideas.com/1-minute-wine-recipe/

I've made it before and while I'd not call it a "fine wine" it's totally drinkable and you get the satisfaction of knowing you did it yourself! That's pretty SS!

 

[Mini Horses]

Great on goat sales!!! Good list for savings...hmm, you eat lunch "out"?? LOL ..brown bag rules. Would sure drive the car for the mpg issues....I use my car for same reason some days.

So, on your wine, what flavor are you doing? I'm thinking white grape will be my first try....although I like cranberries, so may also do cranberry with a little concord grape mixed in. Have everything here, may do this tomorrow.

Have 4 hens setting, maybe 5 -- one wants to "share" a nest & won't give up. So, will fix up a couple more broody boxes & separate them tomorrow night. Darned girls!! Will have replacement pullets for Fall & roos to butcher. With 5 hens I may have too many of all. LOL Can sell spares.

I need to sell goat kids!! Cut that feed bill -- sure don't need them....and I'm not even milking now!! Should separate & milk, at least. WHAT an idea not even thinking here.

 

[frustratedearthmother]

hmm, you eat lunch "out"??

It was my guilty indulgence, but in all honesty, was rarely ever 5 times a week - most likely 3ish. For our little office of 3 it's our catch-up time. But, we can just as easily catch up over coffee in the mornings a couple times a week.

@Mini Horses - get to milking those gals!

I'll probably start taking his car this week. It's very fuel efficient but dang, it's a CAR! That's almost my biggest sacrifice. I don't like cars - grrrrr. I feel like my butt is dragging the ground and I'll miss the visibility that a truck gives. But, I can do it.

Found another way to cut down this morning. I'm a coffee lover, and what's more I'm an optimistic coffee maker. I always make a bit more than we drink. I hate, hate, hate wasting the last of coffee in the bottom of the pot. A lot of time it's not really wasted - we pour it in the compost, or dilute it and water the house plants with it. Believe it or not our huge ivy loves coffee too. But, DUH, this morning I just made less. (so, why didn't I do this years ago? Who knows?) Hopefully I won't have any left-over today. Such a simple thing.

It's low 50's this morning - yay! I'm planning on gardening today. I'm going to clean-up as much of the goat mess that I can. Besides eating my seedlings they simply tromped down a lot of my rows so I need to clean them up. I'll need to replant some of the climbing beans - seems like they were a favorite snack. Peppers and eggplants are pretty much just wiped out - even the ones I tried to replant. It's going to really tick me off to go pay for new plants. BUT, I'll use 'goat money' from yesterday and it won't hurt as much.
Also bought a small pkg of seed potatoes - PURPLE potatoes. We're not big potato eaters - lotsa carbs ya know - but purple ones are full of anti-oxidants so I'm gonna try to grow some in a tub and see what happens.

Can't waste the coolness this morning so I need to get busy.

Happy Saturday ya'll!

 

[sumi]

Congrats on the goat sales!

 

[sumi]

It sounds like someone's missing those bottle babies

We had a day like that here. Overcast, but warm and just lovely.

I grew taters in storage tubs last year and they did well. Had no idea what I was doing, when I was supposed to plant them, nothing. They did good though. Harvest them as soon as they are ready, or they'll rot. I lost a few in the last tub, because I left them in too long and we had a lot of rain.

 

[frustratedearthmother]

Maybe a little bit...they sure were sweet!

Thanks for the tater tips, lol! I'll be sure not to leave them too long. I finished 'repairing' most of the garden area - can't do much more for it right now.

DH tried to do a little trimming and weed eater didn't cooperate - so he tried to get some done with the small push mower and mower didn't cooperate... If I didn't have fruit trees I'd bring the goats up to the yard - but NOPE - that's not happening. At least as long as no one leaves the gate open.

 

[frustratedearthmother]

Took today off (might take tomorrow too) just because the weather is so awesome. We are going to stay in the low 80's and the humidity is in the low 40% range - awesome for here! Great weather to be working outside! So, what am I doing? Working inside, lol. Not for long though. I've already been out and did all the morning chores and milked. The milk is adding up fast. In the mornings I'm milking Red and Cocoa. Red is giving about 3qts per milking and Cocoa about 2. In the evenings I'm milking Snippet also and she'll give a bit over 2 quarts too. Spooky WANTS me to milk her, but she's still got a kid on her, but I will put her on the stand just to make sure she gets her ration of feed and I'll take a couple cups out of her. So, long story (not) short - I've got a LOT of milk.

Cure for that - use it! So, I've got most of this mornings milk re-directed into cheese and yogurt. Two quarts will turn into a nice batch of chevre, hopefully. The other two quarts are destined to become yogurt. I'm keeping my fingers crossed because I'm using last year's cultures. Hopefully, they're still good. If not, I'll have to order fresh culture and the pigs and dogs will be happy to get the rejects.

I'm going to get out and repair a section of fence in the buck pen so they can get back there to eat. My buck pen is actually 4 smaller pens. I can open or close gates to each section to select where they go or if I need to separate them etc. One of the sections has a really crappy bit of fence and the last time I let them in that area they went visiting the neighbors back yard - YIKES! They've got some trees they're trying to get started, so I really need to keep the guys home!

 

[NH Homesteader]

Eek! Yeah not a good time for the bucks to visit the neighbors!

Mm milk, must be nice to be milking for real again! How many does will you end up milking?

 

[frustratedearthmother]

I haven't decided how many yet, lol. I'm thinking about trying to find some kind of market for it. Can't sell it for human consumption, but maybe I can sell it for soap or to folks who need it for animals. Just thinking that I don't want to waste a resource. If I totally lose my mind I could probably milk up to six. Two of the does I sold were good milkers. But, they were both personality challenged, lol. One was just really pushy, with me AND the other goats. The other one wasn't always the friendliest - even though she settled down in the last year or so. Milking made her a better doe because it forced her to be handled every day. She wasn't going to miss a meal by acting up and not wanting to be milked lol. When she figured out the routine she got a whole lot better and was really good on the stand.

I've been terrible lately about picking up eggs because I've had so many broodies that kept jumping from nest to nest that I just left all the eggs out there. Couple hens hatched some little ones and I think all the eggs in the one remaining nest are YUCK. So, I cleaned out all but that last nest and started collecting fresh eggs again - yay! So, what did we have for dinner? A crustless quiche - soooo good!

I got the buck pen repaired so they had some fresh grass today. And, I put out several new plantings of winter squash and pumpkin. Saw that some of the okra is popping through woohoo Don't want to get tooo excited about the garden, but it's hard not to.

Checked on the yogurt and it looks like it's gonna work. Goa milk yogurt is thin, but I'm ok with it. I could always drain it into more of a Greek style, but we kind of like it this way. Need to go peek at the cheese and see if it's working. Hope so - I love a good roasted garlic/rosemary chevre!

 

[frustratedearthmother]

I thought you might say more like 10

ARGH - I'm not a TOTAL masochist, lol!

DH had his first lesson this morning and he did pretty well. I'll let him do it this evening and see how it goes if I'm not standing there telling him every step.

Cheese is hanging/draining and garlic is roasting - yum!