Driving Lessons/Hard Work/Bales

L on top of the stack. 

I love these pictures. 

My kids are growing up and maturing in so many ways!! 

We recently went out as a family and picked up a load of straw bales. 

If your a regular reader you already knew that :) 

Here is the rest of the story.. :)

We picked up the bales at the same farm we normally do.. but this time they were still in the field.. SO...

J got some driving lessons while Baby G slept soundly through out. She only woke at the very end.. while I was driving... to smile sweetly at the Straw Man who was getting a ride back to his truck. 

J did really well driving in the field. It was his second time driving ever and he was pretty excited! The peanut gallery (E, R and J3) egged him on from the backseat, backseat drove and pretty much enjoyed every minute of it. L was helping Papa and the Straw Man stacking bales as they threw them on the trailer. I was surprised to see he can move those bales pretty good, all that good food is turning into muscles I see :)  J drove down the field and then hopped on the bales for the final few before getting to ride the bales down the field to the road. Super fun  I was told but apparently they were a tad bit worried they'd have to ride home that way.. boys!! 

I wanted to make this saying into a reminding sign for me in the house.. and didn't realize until I'd saved it that I copied over the original.. that's ok I can share it with you :) 

That's 97 bales.. and we got two full loads.. so that's 194 bales on the floor. 

Waiting to be made into walls. 

That should do us for a while :) 

Thanks for reading.. my baby is home and my bed is calling me :) 

A Busy Night *Butchering #1

The pictures kinda bad but it gives you the general idea. 

 Papa and I recently sold a pig, butchered but not skinned, to a man from the coast who called us up then came by one morning and took a look at the pigs. He really liked what he saw.. said we respected our animals and it showed. He then paid for a pig while trading us some wonderful salmon for the $50 butchering fee Papa charges to kill, gut and skin. He then enjoyed a cup of coffee with us and left.. a few days later Papa killed and gutted the pig, (He also burned all the hair off, scraped it a little and then gave it a wash off.. super stinky!!) and let it set cool overnight. I'm still kicking myself because I forgot to take a picture of the finished cleaned up pig.. looked really neat!  The next afternoon we got a call from a refrigerated truck company's driver that the man had set up to pick up the pig and he stopped by on his way to the coast and Papa loaded the plastic wrapped pig into his refer truck with the skid steer.. to keep cool for the 6 hour drive until it reached this man!!  

The man told us he was going to roast it. Apparently he roasts two pigs a year, he has a marinade, and all kinds of tips and tricks.. *DROOL*

I'm such a foodie!! 

Man OH Man would I have loved to sit in on that feast!! 

No pun intended ;)

Papa getting ready to gut the pig while our crew and some friends look on. 

The friends are another home school family.. who also happen to have 6 kids :)..

that we have sort of reconnected with recently. 

We are really enjoying their visits and the amazing amount of JOY this family brings with it where ever it goes. 

Thankful Thursdays

Thankful Thursday is here again :)

I'm thankful for

~being able to sleep in while sick :)
~fall colors~ beautiful out there these days. I need to take the camera out and get some pictures.
~that the hens are starting to lay eggs again
~our new puppy!
~that my kids sleep well even with a cold.
~ pork in the freezer~ and the wonderful pork tenderloin we had for lunch yesterday!
~my wonderful BBQing husband who actually enjoys cooking!


And my 'odd' one is.....

I'm thankful that there is always something to do: Parenting, laundry, cooking, building, toilet training. And when I'm the one blowing my nose 100+ times a day and feeling like I got run over by a truck...my kids are able and willing to do lots of the above and that's parenting at its best :)

Tucker~ Our Little Fur Ball.

Cute isn't he :) He's a Maremma Golden Retriever puppy bred by some very good friends of ours at home church and we think he'll be just what we need :) 

The kids all watching him explore the tree :) Chip really likes him too. 

J3 having a little lesson on why we don't pick puppies up when they are peeing.... 

yeah I think it's a boy thing!! 

Baby G LOVES him and squeals loudly in glee when ever he is near by. 

He loves her too and washes her face. He weighs about the same as she does! 

Yes we have him inside :) 

We are crate training him in the entrance and he's doing really well. He gets the run of the house only a couple of times a day and is outside whenever the kids are outside. At only 7 weeks old he still sleeps a good chunk of his day and he does that and eats in his crate. 

So far he is not bonding to Chip but to us people.. like we hoped!! He is very playful and goes right at the kids to play while outside. Chip never really did. Tucker, we hope, will be the kids dog and a bit of a guardian too. Both his parents are good watch dogs and bark when people drive up and will protect the property and they are both very good with kids. IV his mother even watches over our kids while we visit there and keeps them in sight. We are hoping little Mister Tucker, who will not be little for long, will be the same :) He should grow out to be smaller then Chip or at the very most the same size as Chip. The two dogs are almost exactly 3 years apart. 

So there you have it :) The newest addition to the homestead :) 

Thankful Thursdays

A blogger friend I follow just started blogging Thankful Thursdays and I decided to try it. Focusing on  thankfulness is something we try to do daily here on the homestead and I think posting about it will help me remember how our life is now better in years to come, which is part of the reason I blog :)

Today I'm thankful for:

Healthy children. There has been a nasty cold/something going around at homechurch and so far we have avoided it! 

One pig butchered, and the 10 more to do :) 

A happy baby. She is playing in her playpen by the end of our bed as I write this. Content. 

A clean house, yesterday we cleaned house after our 3 day weekend. Boy did it ever need it! 

Honesty and integrity.  J didn't get his math done during school or after yesterday and when they went to bed I saw his after school treat sitting in his spot on the shelf. He knows he doesn't get his treat if school isn't finished and there was no indication that he was angry or upset. I asked him about it as I thought he'd gotten it when L and E ate theirs and he said 'no mom I didn't finish my math!' That's my boy!! 

Coffee, after a late night and a early baby snuggle and nurse, coffee is my friend :) 

I'm sort of a backwards person. I learned years ago that its not enough to be thankful for the things that are going right. You have to be thankful even for the things that are driving you crazy. 

So this morning I'm thankful that we have laying hens. Some are out, some are in, very few are laying  eggs and it seems like they are all using my porches for their favorite bathroom spots. But I truly am thankful for the work they do!!  I love the sounds they make and the bugs they eat and that they spread around the cow patties and help them compost.

Now see that wasn't so hard :)

Hope you all have a wonderful Thursday!!

Building Update~Ceiling &Straw~

Wired, insulated and vapor barrier-ed :) 

And now most of that empty space is filled with 194 straw bales :) 

Time to finish some walls! 

The farm where we normally get our straw doesn't have very many straw bales this year so we got extra to make sure we have enough to finish this side. 

More pictures coming soon! 

Go Horse GO!!!

J3 loves this riding horse :) 

Here is a quick video of him riding it.. man that thing can really GO!!! 

Haha sorry it's sideways!!!

Some Shots Around The Homestead And A Farm Update :)

I'm so used to doing a load of laundry every day that this morning I decided to hang out our bedding to air out because I actually didn't have a load of laundry to do. It's such a beautiful day I didn't want to waste it. I did end up doing a load of laundry anyway as I decided to do our bedding while the blankets hung. 

While I was hanging laundry Papa cut a hole in a pallet and got it ready to fill up the laying hens bulk feed storage.. more on that later. Doesn't Peggy Sue look nice in the sunshine?

Big pigs and little pigs having breakfast. The littlest piglets are 6 weeks on Monday. They will be weaned soon, maybe even Sunday night which will give us three days while Papa is off to deal with any that escape  and try and find the Momma pigs. We'll be taking the big pigs out and leaving the littles in. The big pigs will follow Papa and a bucket and Papa will lead them all the way down to the butcher pigs at the pond. 

My crazy rhubarb plant which doesn't seem to realize it's fall! 

The yard and play area. There are at least two kids in this picture :) 

A zucchini plant I found that reseeded it's self in the cow pen. 

An empty wire cage. It kept the chickens out of the horse radish all summer.. and for a couple days it kept the cows out too.. but Isabel figured out she could move it and she moved it around and ate the whole thing. Sometimes I wonder why I bother! 

 Fluff :) and if you look very carefully you can see Hunter, orange tabby, in the background. I didn't even know he was there when I took the picture.

The ladies.. Isabel in the center, Norma Jean to the right and Star bringing up the rear. Papa and I tied Star, on her tether, close to the electric fence for several days until she learned to stay on one side of it :) Then we put her in with the cows. She learned her lesson really well and the two older cows are teaching her some cow manners. They have about 2 or 3 days of grass left then we will start feeding hay.. probably for the winter now. We've already fed one large square while we waited for grass to grow but the season is ending and we still aren't getting the rain we need to keep the grass growing.

Filling the layer feed storage. The pallet he cut a hole in is under the feed bag. There is a hole in the bottom of the bag that ties shut. So he locks the bobcats forks in place, opens the hole in the bottom of the bag and fills up the storage thing.

Here is our tarped hay stack, compost pile, bobcat parking, pallet storage area, and camper parking. I also got Papa's chain saw in the picture I see :) We should have almost enough hay for the winter.. We were expecting more grass so we might need a few more later on. 

My little garden area :) The onions and strawberries and the lettuce did wonderfully! 

Now all we need to do before winter is get firewood done, it's at about a 1/3 done, butcher a bunch of pigs and a steer, bring Maggie (our other milk cow) home, sell a whack of piglets and a couple of butcher sized pigs and move the keeper pigs into their winter barn, getting the hens to their winter barn with a light and winter pen, winterize the trailer/hoses/trucks/milking machine, and I'm sure several more things that just aren't coming to mind right now.. thankfully just looking at that list is making my eyes cross. 

And the good news is? Papa is now on 4 tens so he has three WHOLE days off every week and doesn't go to work until noon thirty the 4 days he works. :) :) :) So we finally might have time to get working on that list.. and the house.. and everything else :) 

Oh and Papa's back is MUCH better!! He's off morphine totally and is only going to the chiropractor every second week now!! YAY!! He's even been seen sitting!! 

So now you are updated on the homestead and Papa too :) 

My next job over the next few days is to update the kids pages :)  

What's Happening On the House?

We get this question about once a week sometimes more, sometimes less. 

I realize I've not been keeping you updated on the house building, partly because I've been very busy

 and partly because I'm very busy :)

 Actually we started a new schedule which is helping with our general busyness! 

But I went out this morning and took some pictures for you. :)

Here is the back half of the new addition. This will eventually become the master bedroom! 

The ceiling joists are all in, window frames are ready for windows, insulation and wiring is mostly done. Instead of trying to find the ceiling joists while putting the ceiling up we've decided to do strapping inside on top of the vapor barrier so that is next! Then we can nail the 4x4 sheets that make up the ceiling right to the strapping there fore making our lives easier. We are waiting on bales or the walls would be finished. The farm we get bales from should have some very soon. 

Here you can see the rest of the ceiling joists are finished and Papa is working on wiring, insulation and vapor barrier. The front does not have ceiling joists as it will be a vaulted ceiling. This area is missing three window frames as we are unsure of the sizes we want/can get. This area will be two bathrooms, side by side, another bedroom and the pantry. Then under the vaulted ceiling the dining room and kitchen! The middle area where the trailer is now will have a laundry room, half bath and two LARGE bedrooms :) The space between the trailer and the new addition will actually be the hallway! 

So now you can consider yourself updated :) 

L's Teeth!! *Warning may gross you out!!

L has the worst teeth for pulling! They get a little loose then never fall out! SO we wiggle and wiggle and twist and pull and FINALLY they come out!! The 2nd last tooth I pulled, and I believe I've pulled all of his teeth so far!, I turned completely around in his mouth and it STILL WOULD NOT COME OUT!!! This one was easier! After I twisted it half way round it pulled out easily! 

Happy L with a big hole in his mouth! 

School Photo's~ Griggs Family School!

J is 8 years old and in Grade 3 :) 

L is 7 years old and in Grade 2! 

E is 5, almost 6, and in Grade 2.

R is 4 and is doing some fun school this year,(coloring, matching counting) but is not in Kindergarten as she is too young. 

J3 is 2.5 and in Potty school at this time. It's taken him a while to catch on but he's getting there! 

Baby G is almost 10 months and is in house training school.. no you can't go in the entrance where the wood stove is, yes you can play in the living room.. stuff like that. Oh she's also in a bit of manners school; no you can't bite me with your one little tooth, and mobility school: walking around the couch is FUN!! 

Those are all the students in the Griggs Family school! 

Oh wait I forgot one :) 

ME!!! 

I'm still learning every single day! 

And Loving EVERY minute of it :) 

School Patterns :)

Last week Friday we had a pajama day and did some fun hands on school.

E's Patterns with blocks :) 

Crazy faced L and his patterns :) 

We had quite a fun day, and did a lot more then just patterned blocks, but this post is for Mrs. Hunt the kids teacher down south :) and these are the only ones she needs in pictures :) 

~Family Devotions~

Papa normally does family devotions after supper at the table but we started a new book and it has some really cool pictures in it so they all gathered round on the floor right before bed. 

I love this picture! We are doing Apologia's Who is God book and loving it! 

Now on our new winter schedule we'll be doing devotions right after breakfast!  

Our Church Family!!

Pretty much the whole crew!! As it were :) Missing Molly B and K&D and Thunder. 

Just the kids :) Oldest is 16, youngest is Joel at 4 months :) 

A couple of neat facts.. 

All the families with school age kids home school. 

There are only 3 adults in the picture who were raised, all or partly, in the area we now all live in the rest moved here as adults.

Our oldest person just turned 56 and his son is our youngest at 5 months.

In this picture there are 3 babies all 4 months apart :) 

There are 8 small boys 3 and under! 

Two sets of twins. 

Two families with 6 kids in the family.

Two families with 3 kids in the family.

Three families with 2 kids in the family. 

One family is missing a girl in the picture.

There are 4 three year olds.. all boys :) 

 I BELIEVE there is a child for every age from 1 to14, 15 is skipped and then 16.

There are 23 children in the picture, only 7 girls, and 13 adults. 

There are two pregnant ladies in the picture.. no I'm not one of them ;) 

Three families own and milk a cow at this time :) and a forth has done in the past.

Four families are activity house building. 

We are: farmers, truck drivers, mechanic, animal massage therapist, teachers, homesteaders, carpenters, bakers, cheese makers, musicians, nurse,cowboys, bankers, small business owners, 

seamstresses, builders, ropers, students, 

crafters, writers, fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers, Parents! and people extraordinaire.

These pictures were taken as a good bye gift to Hales as they have been called away from this area for this time and so have the B's who still visit sometimes from their new home 2 hours away. The rest of us still meet weekly as a group and in Bible studies. We are truly enjoying this group and are VERY Thankful that God led us to them :) We love you guys!!