Homestead Update

Things are finally quiet around here (at least for the moment) so I thought I would give a quick update on the homestead. 

Due to several things coming up over the past several months, we haven't done nearly as much on our little homestead as I had hoped to this summer.  We did have a small garden and even though it didn't do as well as I had hoped, we had a few yellow squash and zucchini, as well as some peppers and strawberries for which I am thankful.  I also planted two watermelon plants and the vines are loaded with melons and still blooming.  So far we haven't had any ripen enough to eat, but some of them are pretty big.  I can't wait until they are ready to cut into :)    I LOVE watermelon!!!   

Our tomatoes did not produce at all, but our herbs did great.  I have dried quiet a few of them in the dehydrator as well as making pesto from the basil to freeze. 

My neighbor gave us a good bit of corn and squash, which I was able to put up and he also brought us thirteen watermelons a couple of days ago.  In case you haven't figured it out, I have a GOOD neighbor :) 
I'm thinking about trying my hand at watermelon rind pickles, but need to locate a good recipe first.  I've only had them once a long time ago, but if memory serves me right I really liked them. 

I've decided that I'm not going to try having a fall garden this year, but I am already making plans for my spring garden.  I've learned some things that don't work for us and figured out some things that are working, so maybe next years garden will produce better. 

I haven't done as well with the livestock end of our little homestead as I would have liked either.  My chickens are still laying, but a snake got into the nest of our "setting" hen and since that point none of our hens have expressed a desire to set.  Since we don't have an incubator we did not get any little chicks this year.  I'm hoping to have an incubator by next year though.  

We still have our two rabbit does, but I haven't had time to locate a buck yet.  Since I haven't had time to get the additional cages built that's probably a good thing.  Now that things are starting to settle down, I'm hoping to get a couple of cages built and start breeding the does by the time the weather gets a little cooler. 

I dried up my milking goat about a month ago.  I decided that, in order to keep my sanity, there were some things that had to be let go and that just happened to be one of them.  I am planning to breed her and also our little nubian doe this fall so I should have a good supply of fresh goats milk this spring.  

My two older boys also expanded our horse pasture a little bit.  It's been needing to be done and they finally had a weekend off to take care of  it.  I'm glad to have it done and the horses are definitely enjoying the fresh grazing area.

Well, that's about all we've had going on the homestead front lately.  Maybe next year we'll do better :)