What a Girl Wants

I am certainly not getting any younger. I am rapidly increasing in age (and in size btw) and even though most of my life and heart is satisfied. There is part of me that is still reaching for this seemingly unknown goal. I have a defined and growing “bucket list” and as I scratch things off, I am adding more on. The one constant in there however is that I want animals. I want sheep and goats. I want more chickens and turkey. I want ducks and guinea fowl. I want a big tree in front of my house. I want to have to take a walk in order to go find my husband who is digging a hole somewhere on our land with his tractor that he spends just as much time fixing as he does driving. This is what I really want. I know this is not a glamorous life. I know its not easy but it is really what i want. (Trust me I feel anything BUT glamorous when I am mucking the chicken coop)

Here is the thing about me. I dont think I will truly be happy with my makeshift life. I think unless I do it, there will be that slight tug and "shoulda" feelings. I just can't see any way to accomplish these things and still maintain the other things that make me happy in life. Its a real crap position!

So I will keep plugging away at my life, making my little garden, dealing with my little issues in my tiny little coop with my tiny little flock. I will train my (not so) tiny little new doggy and love my husband and children. But if you catch me staring off into space looking wistful, I just may be thinking about goats again...

Leaving on a Jet Plane!

I am sorry I have not updated since the baby chicks were hatching. We were very fortunate (or not!) in that 12 of 14 hatched! Sadly we lost 1 somewhere in the zip phase and the other never hatched at all. I know that we are not supposed to help them out of the shell so I let nature take its course. All of the chicks are black except 2 that I called Frankenchick as they were black bodied with yellow heads. That would be due to the buff rock momma and the barred rock papa. It will be interesting to see who grows up to be a Roo and who grows up to live in my back yard. Of the 12, we sent 6 to live with a friend in Mass. I have NO idea if I handed her 6 roosters or if I handed her all the hens lol Being straight run, we will have to see what happens. I am sure we will know in just a few months and then probably will spend some time finding homes for Roosters!

The children (I can hardly call them that anymore can I?) and I are headed out tomorrow morning bright and shiny. We will be flying to Florida to visit my mother who has been living down there alone since my dad passed away last spring. It will be nice to see her. Unfortunately husband cannot come with me as he is on call this week as well as we need someone to take care of all of the critters in my absence. It was meant to just be a trip for me, however, I decided at some point to take the brats with me to see their grandmother. I am not sure how this is going to turn out. I am tempted, since we are taking southwest airlines, to sit completely far away from them as there is no assigned seating. This will give me some sanity. I have many positive attributes but I must admit that patience does not come easily to me these days. They are almost 17 and 14 and it seems like I want to smother them more than hug them lately. I am sure this is a phase of life we all must go through!!

SO for the above reasons I will be away from blog for about a week and then I will be back at it. When I get back, we will be starting our seeds for the super shmoopy garden and I will reveal some of the plans for S-wood. Its all very exciting and I cannot wait to share the progress with you once again. We did not spend as much time on S-wood last year as we hoped. We needed a hiatus due to all the family troubles we had but we (husband and I) are eager and raring to go this year!

Sidenote: I promised Linda a recipe and I promise I will write that out for you!

Of Lessons Learned

I am going to tell you a story. Currently this story has no end, because its an ongoing story but I will be sure to fill you in as things move along.

I will begin my story with explaining that I am learning alot about myself in the process of becoming more "self sufficient". One of the things I have learned is that I am pretty strong, but I am extremely stubborn. I do not necessarily jump into things but I engross myself completely in the research and when I think I "got it" then I go for it. Last weekend is an example of that.

Since beginning the chicken thing, I have done nothing but read about chickens, look at pictures of chickens and as you know, write about chickens. There are some pretty cool chickens out there. I have a short list of all the chickens that I would like to someday own. Last weekend there was a swap in my local area. A chicken swap is a meeting of many chicken people who have different kinds of chicken products, chickens, hatching eggs, eating eggs etc. You can buy/sell/trade whatever chicken related item you want to. I had met a few chicken people online and one of them offered me a chicken that I had always wanted. She is 9/10 weeks old and "beautiful". This chicken is a breed that I did not know much about, but it is mostly a "show" bird. I have a coop full of practical birds ranging from egg machine to dual purpose. I somehow convinced myself that this bird would make a fine addition. I did some research on the person offering and found that she had swapped with MANY people in the forum and was reputable... or so I thought.

Anyway long story short, I picked up the chicken and brought her home. It was not long before I realized that there was something seriously wrong with the chicken. She wouldn't walk. When she did try to walk she was crossing her legs over each other and stepping on her own feet. She was also shaking her head alot. Dave and I finally discovered (over the next 2 days) that she was in fact INFESTED with northern poultry mites. I mean INFESTED with bugs guys. Not only was she probably anemic from blood loss (hey those dots on her feathers aren't dirt, they are blood spots), but she was never let out of her cage, was kept confined, malnutritioned and probably never learned to walk in the first place. We have her segregated in a great dane crate, by herself. We have dusted her with Diotomaceous (sp?) Earth and started giving her polyvisol vitamins and watching her carefully.

As I sat at the table late on saturday night, with my head down, worried about the state of my chickens (incidentally, they had to be dusted too for safety). My husband looked at me and said "read the paragraph that states what our blog is about... It's about learning and this is us learning". This reminds me why I love him and it reminds me that my failure may teach someone else a lesson. Of the lessons easily learned from my mistakes, please remember to practice biosecurity with your poultry and do your research. I could have very easily infected my entire flock. These mites can take down younger chickens if gone unnoticed.

We do not know if Phyllis Diller the chicken is going to live or not, we dont even know if she will ever learn to walk or recover from her malnutrition, but if she does, we will find her another home. We have alot of love to give, but I have learned my lesson and will stick to my own flock, regenerating my flock within my flock by having babies and nurturing my core flock only.

I will keep you updated on the little chicken.

this is her on saturday, see her legs?

2009 wish list!

So many exciting things are starting to happen and I cannot wait! We did NOT get up to the cabin as hoped this weekend. Sometimes life gets in the way I'll tell ya! Anyway I did promise to give you a glimpse into the spring though with what our plans for 2009 are. We have so many hopes and wishes for this year!
One of the more exciting things is that we will be planting a 'trial' garden up there. Dave is working (in his head rmember) on a way to automatically irrigate the garden and "critter proof" it as best as he can.

We are also planning on adding onto the driveway so that we can get there in teh winter. All we would need is to hire someone to push the snow away so we can put our cars/trucks off the road.

I would like to complete the bathroom. Last year we ran out of time (and wood btw) before we put walls up and connected the pipes. Basically the sink and tub dont hold water yet.

We will be planting fruit bushes in addition to our already extremely plentiful blackberry bushes. I put in a few "trial" blueberry shrubs to see if they can make the winter (heavy snow load), actually produce fruit, survive deer/bear/others etc. We will have more info about that in the summer months but so far so good!

Personally we had goals regarding health and we are currently tackling the cigarette thing. I am also trying to run. I think being in better shape will help with the great shmoopywood experiment!

Wood, we have to cut split stack and store more wood. I mean we need an unbelievable holy crap amount of wood stacked and ready to go.

Organization, we have a ton of stuff but its everywhere. Dave is a one man tool tornado and we are both pilers. Inevitably he puts a tool down and I will pile stuff on top of it. Its really frustrating for both of us because he can't find something he needs and makes a mess while looking and I am picking up the new mess and piling it on top of something else!! Can we say counterproductive?

Oven: we are working on building a cob/adobe outside oven. Ok wait... we are working on mental plans for said oven.. and yes thats right it will be a "test".

Construction will be happening as well. We would both like to finish the walls under the stairs and put the door in for the basement. That leads me to the next thing which is walls in the "guest" room. We have yet to finish the railing as well.
although we both would love the kitchen work to start, it really is lower on the list I think. We are not sure yet what we need in there so it would be sad to put thins to gether only to have to move them in order to accommodate the new plan.

Finally (or at least the last thing I can think of) we are working on the solar (yay)

so thats it so far. Any tips?
:)

Departure

I am going to depart from the normal update to just reflect for a moment. You can either read process and consider, or you can X out.

THe last 7 days my beautiful 15 year old daughter has spent countless hours on the creation of some rather beautiful (in my opinion) Hemp jewelry. Her purpose in this is to help the Great Dane Rescue that her mother spends so much time taking care of and working for. We have a meet and greet on 9/6 and we have been banging our heads against the wall trying to find something to give people when they make a donation. This is hopefully to inspire the donation but also to express our gratitude. I showed Tarynn how to create the jewelry and let her run with it. She has created beautiful pieces, so beautiful in fact that as a test run, I took some to work and left them in a ziplock bag in the kitchen. Ours is a company only of about 30 and much to my surprise, I have found later that 10 bracelets and 1 necklace to be replaced with $58. That may not seem like much to you, but with our limited budget and FOUR fosters in homes right now, it is huge. $58 can give a veterinarian exam, or a round of vaccinations, bag of food, a bed and toys for a dane that has lived its life in peril or outside its whole life. How sad to me that we have created a demand for these animals and then we treat them so poorly.

So today I make that departure from my normal blogging to thank beautiful Tarynn for the Danes and from her mother. We hope to continue selling these and creating more hope for the creatures to find their forever homes.

We stayed home this weekend so I fear, there will not be much of a Shmoopywood update. I have however, held back some updates from the last weeks and will keep you posted (ha get it? posted?)

Thank you for reading if you made it this far. I have so much to be thankful for these days I try to live my life in a way in which I pay it forward to the next in need.
Dave and I will be riding our (ha! i say OUR like I actually own it) Harley to benefit Liberty House, the homeless veteran shelter nearby.

Take a moment and think about how "green" you live and how you can possibly make a difference in someone's life with just a small offer of your time, energy or even a few dollars.

Lisa

Real People, Real Problems, Really Great place!

Off to cabin we go tomorrow (collective "yay"). The days are growing shorter and the nights are growing colder and our days are numbered. So now begins our crunchtime if we want to spend any time at all up there this winter. The wood stove is sufficient to keep us warm at night in the cold but it takes a good 6-8 hours to bring the cabin to a temperature that is comfortable. Then we have to deal with the driveway that is at a very steep incline. This driveway with 2 + inches of snow is impossible to pass and unfortunately with the street plow there is no where off the road to park and there is nowhere off our drive to stop and hike because the snow banks reach in excess of 5 feet!

But enough of my complaining, we hope to get some of the railing done this weekend and maybe even start the plumbing! (an additional collective yay).

One thing I did want to touch on was how happy we are up there. In our world the hard labor is worth the down time and the incredible neighbors we have met while up there. These people are the kindest and funniest people I have ever met. They are the type of people who will go out of their way to invite you to a party even though they know the host doesnt know you. Then they will sit by your side the entire evening and introduce you to your neighbors. They will check on your house in the long winter because they know you can't. They will go out of their way to do nice things for you and just get to know you. They are real people, they are who they are, there is no hidden agenda, no complaining and no grumpy. I have lived in our other neighborhood for 3 years and have yet to meet more than one of my closest neighbors yet up there in shmoopywood world, mi casa es su casa. Amazing.


Our dogs run free, we have turkeys, moose, deer, hawks, hummingbirds and all other kids of animals frolicking through our land (dont forget coyotes). My heart is there and i really hope that one day I will be able to be there full time. Django likes it there too ;)

Turkey Epidemic

We had a great weekend full of progress and cheer. We are really coming along on the railing. I say we, but i haven't done a single thing other than help carry 10 foot hemlock beams up the side of a mountain. I have pictures of the progress but my brain has left me and I apparently have forgotten to upload them and I am not near my camera so you will have to wait until I am. My apologies.

I did however hang some curtains over the plastic/insulation walls, Keep in mind that it took me 2 years to pick out curtains for our "every day" house. I think for me it was a necessity this time in order to make the place feel more like a house and not a work in progress.

Lets stray a bit from the issue at hand since i forgot to upload the correct picture, lets talk about something I have been noticing and maybe you folks will be able to offer a confirmation or rebuttal of this new observation.
So has anyone else noticed the turkeys? I mean everywhere, turkeys. I saw at least 50 on just one drive down our country road. Heck, I see them at our every day house just standing on the side of the highway looking, judging, maybe even sizing me up. I have been going to S-wood now for 3 years, never saw so many flipping turkeys let alone on one day! So keep your eyes out and let me know what you observe. Maybe someday you will hear on the news that we have a turkey epidemic and you will not think me as nuts as you do right now ;)

So please expect the real update post later. :)

L

quick

We came back *sigh*. I swear I could stay there forever... well, I can once we have indoor plumbing anyway. So here we are and I am exhausted. I DO have updates and I WILL post them tomorrow but for now, I wanted to post my favorite picture EVER ;)

it demonstrates how I feel right now ;)Our baby Django havin a nap. He works so hard when he is at camp.

Who Are You People?

I thought I would create a post that would help you get to know us a little bit, see who we are, what we are doing and why. When all the work is through for the day, we usually cut loose with some of our hobbies, a hike with Django in the woods, collecting blackberries for jam, a ride on the ATV, watching the gorgeous sunset, sitting out there in the dark listening to the critters running around on the property, shooting (paper, not animals) or just a general goof off.




Here is Django on "look out" for big mean attack hummingbirds.

Saskwatch hike

Dave killing the attack pumpkin with my 12ga emergency shotgun. He is actually standing in the area that has become our house.
















Me and my friend Sterling hiking with our Great Danes (django is the freakishly large one)







We are headed back to S-wood this weekend and hope to get a few things done. We still have yet to dig the posts for the dog fence off the back of the house for our "smaller" dog Frankenstein who has a bad habit of running away, a railing in the loft for those mornings when DJango decides the thunder is too scary and runs up the stairs at light speed, and yes... plumbing.

A little about me: I am 37 year old mom of 2, Tarynn 15 and Andrew 12. I used to be a property manager for condominiums until I burned out, got tired of the city and the demanding schedule and left that to become software support for a property management software company. In my vast free time, I am the vice president of a great dane rescue based in Maine and New Hampshire ( http://www.aabgdr.org ). Django and I also do Meet and greets and recently we were given a high honor of making a wish come true for a nursing home patient in MA who wished to the Twilight Wish Foundation that he could spend time with danes. Dave works for a large communications type company from our house while he takes care of our boys Frank(enstein) and Django ages 2 and 4 Great Dane doggies. Dave also volunteers occasionally at Liberty House which is transitional housing for homeless vets as well as support me with the Rescue work. He and I have been married for almost 2 years and we are both previously divorced. I am so lucky to have him in my life. There is nobody else on this planet that I could possibly work this closely and this hard with. Its good honest work and we both enjoy it, even splitting wood! We hope to someday, maybe, move to S-wood on a more permanent basis, so when we do things there, we are constantly thinking along those lines so we wont have to do it twice. We are both VERY environmentally aware and have made a ton of changes in our daily life such as hanging our laundry, using cloth bags for shopping, having a no-napkin rule (we use cloth), using friendly cleaners, detergents etc, CFL's, composting and now we want to take what we have learned and put it into our off-grid green as possible, recycled cabin. We hope to also have animals, grow our own food and live a sustainable lifestyle, but these things take time. My kids think we are nuts, because we are so aware of "enviro crimes" and I think they are rather tired of it but we hope that they will continue to live this way or better in their future lives.

Anyway, thats us.
Thank you for joining us on our ride thus far, i hope that you stick around to see where we end up. Its going to be very exciting :)






Django helping daddy measure for railings to keep him safe.
















Our puppy (Great Dane)Frankenstein and my 15 year old daughter on the deck relaxing.





















Tarynn being silly

Too hot!

We didn't do much as far as progress this past weekend with the 90+ degree weather and no electricity its hard to even move! We measured for the wall board and we also sweat our butts off. I do have a funny little story though:
Saturday morning, Django and I got up early. I was sitting out on the front porch in a rocking chair and Django was laying by my feet. I was taking pictures of the fog lifting over the mountains when I hear this BRVVVVD noise. I turn around and looked at Django who was laying right next to me on the decking and found a humming bird trying to drink nector from his orange collar!

He didn't even lift his head, he was like twitching his ears like a
mosquito was buzzing him.

I got some pics of the scenery from the deck but missed the picture of the hummingbird.