Building a Homestead in 100 Days - Day 6

Ready? You want to come eat? Come on, come on. Good girl. Livers and legs. Holy mackerel, you guys took down these weeds. I removed the panels and they went to town. I think you guys unveiled all the fruit we had the other day. Oh, there's one nice acorn squash. Did they not stay on their perch? Oh, get in! Didn't put the bounce bar up. And they're all just hanging out in there. Guys, I got you a perch. One of you figured it out. Well, you're in the middle of a molt. Let's get out. You coming?

Oh look, my boat came out.

Funny. Day 6 of 100 Days of Growing Food. Are we building over there on that side of the street, or are we building over there on that side of the— well, on that side of the creek? Either way, we're getting further off the road and building something together as a family from scratch. Although we're not building the house during the 100 days, I'm thinking we do need to find its site. So water, access, pasture, house site during this 100 days.

5 more days until I go on our trip.

That's right, you excited about that? Yeah, we are going to Beth and Sean Doherty's, famous for being able to live 90% off their farm with basically no outside inputs. What are you most excited about?

Going in the plane.

Going on the plane?

Uh-huh.

Yeah, we're flying up one day, spending 24 hours there, flying out the next day. It's gonna be a whirlwind, but it's your turn for a trip alone with me. We're going there because we're adding a course from them to Abundance Plus University for our November 1st launch, and I just want to document that. Dan will be there for 4 days capturing the course and shooting a documentary on them.

I didn't know Dan is going to be there.

Yeah, Dan's going to be there. Oh, now little buddy's not going to be there though. Okay, today we need to move sheep to help clear pasture across the creek. It's also getting towards the end of the week. We're getting a little bit tired and I feel like we need some thinking time. We're trying to get our chores done early so that this afternoon we can go camp hunting. We were hiking on Friday afternoons and then Jonah, well, dislocated his hip. But we're thinking, why can't we go find next year's campsite? We also remembered that Sliding Rock is still open and you don't even have to pay this time of year. Of course, it's like 30 Agrees this morning. Anybody up for a polar plunge at Sliding Rock?

No.

Josiah, you're not giving us a dance? Where's your polar plunge dance? I'll do it if you do it. Yes, I'll do it if you don't do it. It's gonna be a beautiful day for a drive. The leaves are just past peak. It'll be nice. He'll come over soon. Graham will come over soon. Kept them successfully away last night. It helps when you actually connect it to the power source. Keep the calves separated, put them in with the sheep. They're separated by electric net. Milk gets built up. We put them up early afternoon too, so we're gonna get a lot of milk today, Lily. Oh, doesn't stop you from laying in manure. At least it's not as bad as the other day. Look who's coming on the quad. Beautiful one. You look like quite the rancher. Second round of washcloths on her. Problem with mom coming out, he's got to be with her if she comes out. He won't go down too because it's frosty, so he won't go down and play. So we're just not in that stage yet, huh, Beck? Can't milk together yet.

It's not our season.

Gotta go nurture the little one. He'll get down and play inside because it's warm.

You want to play with your brother?

Get down and play with your new boots. Come on, look. Yeah, yeah, you finish?

Yeah.

Okay, I finished too. Let's get some, uh, let's take this back and get yogurt, make some yogurt out of it. You need to get to 100, okay? It's already at 82. It's not going to take much. Come on, start in there. Good. Don't get it so full, let some out. Okay, now let it drip off and then put it in there. And put it in there. It's heated to 100. Good. Get back this dehydrated walnuts out of there. You're just a little person. You're just a little tiny person. I love you very much. Let's go. We got a little less than an hour to move these sheep. You want to go see Grandma? Oh yeah, he knows. The strategy for getting a homestead set up is, well, slow and steady. As much as we can every day, but at least something every day. So if that means we just get the sheep moved and we have a few thinking sessions, then so be it. You can go see Grandma. Sheep, the tireless workers. Where are we going next? We started here and we went around close to the house. And we went all the way around up through there. They helped us clear where we've been clearing, and they've, they've gotten in here. It's a wonderful relationship because the sheep need something to eat and we need to clear. So this is impenetrable. It's going to be hard to get into. So let's put the sheep in here. There's plenty of food. Right there is where they've been, guys. You guys can see, right, where they've been. Where they haven't been. Winter is also playing in our favor because deciduous trees are dying out. But I'm thinking let's give them a big paddock because we're having to spend too much time moving them, and they can stay in here as much as a week. So what if we came way down through here? And it's not that much harder to give them a big paddock. It's, it's mainly getting it set up and tearing it down. So then we could come back in somewhere here because, uh, our property line's here somewhere. There's our property line. See it marked on that tree? I wonder if we could— we don't have to get so much in here. See how this is not that thick? We can actually get in there and work up these trees. We don't need the sheep, but up here we do. It's a gigantic tree down. Lots of neat little pasture back in here. Little, uh, little logging road right here. This is exciting. I'm exploring every inch of our property. Our fence is there. We come down through here, we come through here. Can we just kind of over, over this, right through here. Let's take a minute, look at the sheep. What— look at what they have done. This was so bushy you couldn't see through it, let alone walk through it. Now, but you can see what we can do now. Next week we're getting a blade trimmer. Let's get that blade trimmer next week. The boys will be excited. And you just trim this down and then it's not so bushy and you can just easily grab it and put it in your burn pile. Guys, you are amazing! And they don't have my distractions. They don't got to put up a video. They don't have the internet. They're not creating courses. You guys are just out here chewing your cud. If I've said it once, I've said it a million times: you go through first, get the small stuff. So your small stuff tool, which is string trimmer. And then we'll go back through with a bigger tool. I think all we'll need is loppers. Got what I could with the string trimmer. Loppers. I could go through with a little chainsaw. Right now, but it's also about trying to enjoy the process. And it's not that chainsaws aren't fun, they're a blast. It's just this is rather peaceful and quiet. Could have done that with all this, actually come in and drop the top for them. See, they've eaten as much as they can. They can get pretty high. I don't know how they do it. Look at that, bought us some time in there, maybe to this afternoon. Now let's go ahead and finish setting up their paddock though, and then they'll be ready to easily be moved over. We're trying to quit early so we can go to the woods. It's important to take a little break from the farm. And what's the Zen proverb say? Spend 20 minutes a day in the woods. You don't have time for that, spend an hour. Josiah's already started to set up a lot of the net. Y'all still happy browsing? Bad news is it's 10:30, we got to go. Good news is We got the net set up. More good news is we have them some cut bramble to last them this afternoon. Henry, were you happy in there?

Yeah, he was.

That's good. The feed delivery made the wrong turn. Come on back, man. We got a nice turnaround for you. You guys got to see this. We took leftover turkey, fried some onions. Be easy on that, we all got to eat this.

It's yummy.

Okay, well, we all got to eat.

Is that all I get?

Uh, fried some zucchini and onion, or onions and garlic, then the turkey, then zucchini. Is it weird? I like it. Yeah, I don't know how that would go, turkey as opposed to chicken.

Yeah, I was concerned, but it turned out good.

Well, you were willing to try it. We need you to hold down the homestead, all right? We've decided on the Polar Plunge. You're gonna go down Sliding Rock?

Maybe.

I'll say this, there'll be nobody else there. We'll come back, we'll move those sheep in the afternoon. I think we gave them enough treetops to last. Hang with us, hang with us, it's gonna be a lot of fun. Dude, it's a 45-minute drive. Housekeeping. There's somebody in the comments, uh, posing as me saying take a screenshot, I'm on Telegram, you win something. That ain't me. I'm not on Telegram. I didn't even hear about Telegram until somebody just said, hey, is that you on Telegram giving away stuff if people take screenshots? No, that's spam, guys. That's spam. Best thing to do is probably ignore it and then it'll go away, hopefully. Towels, change of clothes, diaper bag, camera. If you're gonna go down Sliding Rock in 40 degrees, it's work better with a camera.

Is that through Pisgah?

We're here. Possible campground. For once we're being We are very, very well prepared.

We're gonna check it out.

Because the last time we went camping, we didn't even know you had to reserve sites, so we were on a scramble to get one.

Well, we planned—

and now—

yeah, we planned to do roadside camping, but that road was closed and it wasn't on the website because I looked.

So, this is a possibility.

Now we're checking this out.

Well, we're turning around. There's no drive-throughs and the whole point was— he said we could walk, but— we can't walk. Jonah, we didn't bring your wheelchair, did we? No, we didn't. Who knew they'd be sold out or full? That's one reason he won't let us do a drive-through. It could be because of that. I mean, it's beautiful leaves right now.

He made an exception.

He did? Yeah!

Cuz I told him that Jonah had dyslexia at his hip, so he's like, oh, I didn't know that. He's like, I'll let you do it. So we were like, okay. So we have to give him the tag on the way out though.

Sweet. So we get to drive through.

And then he marked his— he's marked his favorites.

Yay!

So this is good, so we can go around and see it.

We're seeing some stuff. We're seeing some sites that lead down to the river. We're making our marks. He's got some marks. We're marking the ones we see. It wouldn't be bad to be close to the bathhouse, huh?

I'm not opposed.

Of course you're not opposed. See how close we are to this creek. It's got a little trail. Well, you can't really get to it. Just go down this. You want to go— you would go down there? I guess you could. That's cool. River coming into it. This trail next to the creek is cool. You guys could go down that bank. Here you go. This is doable with your mom. Oh, there he goes. Yep, cool. Your little beach. So this is the closest one to that swimming hole. Yeah, it's right— you got a neighbor right there, but you could rent them both. I don't think there's an attendant.

It's not as cramped as it was.

No lifeguard, no bathroom, no fee. That's our kind of— that's how we roll. And there's barely anybody here. It's just slammed.

Look, and that, that second parking lot is closed too.

So kids, if you want to go swimming without a, without a crowd, now is the time. Only Ice Boy is going to go with me, huh?

Yeah.

Nobody else is going with us?

No.

Ice Girl? Wild Man? Jonah?

I'm hurt.

Hey, you got inflammation, man. You can go go soak in the bottom.

The problem is, is that he can't because, um, the brace. He's not allowed to.

Oh, you can't get the brace wet?

Yeah, he can't take the brace off.

You guys think anybody else is doing this today?

I think maybe we just passed people that were wearing jackets and gloves.

Those are people from Florida.

They are from— they probably are.

Nobody there. Hey, no lines today. There's normally a line way out to here. Going across the creek, up the rock. It's been 5 minutes.

All right, have fun.

That is cold. Is it cold?

How was it, Josiah? You're not gonna hang out? No. How was it?

It's very cold. I can see that. You never warm up because the water is always moving. Well, this was a bonus surprise because normally this waterfall is packed, but there was parking right here. This is something Jonah can do. We're on exotic polar plunges January 1st. We're probably coming back to this waterfall, dunking under that waterfall January 1st.

We'll see. I don't know, we'll see. I don't know, because I kind of like DuPont too.

Yeah, DuPont has this really cool hole in a rock that looks like a cold plunge bath thing. It's crazy. I've got the heat on full blast. Mom's got the window up. And I'm burning up. Well, look here. Look who's come down to visit.

They took over the farm. Steadwolf is gonna start grilling him a steak.

Oh my gosh. All right, we got to get him because he's gonna get into those— that plant there. Did you get them put up? Yeah. Okay, did you get your calf separated? Uh, no, I forgot to do that. Do that and then make sure— oh shoot, because you got to set up another fence, don't you? Shoot. I was out here mowing a lane for Josiah for the nets, and what am I hiding? Hang on, I'm stuck. My wheels are just spinning in the air. There it is. I bought them— I bottomed out the skag in the back. Fair warning, Sunday and Monday shows are going to be Fridays and Saturdays, which are days we normally don't vlog. So apologies if maybe it's not as exciting or as farm-filled, especially tomorrow, guys. It's what we call a zero day. Unless we're having any problems, there's gonna be very little farm content, and it'll probably be a short vlog. No, we'll take you along on chores and stuff. I'm sure something interesting will happen. It always does. Yes.

Not wake up in the middle of the night and do chores on tonight, and then that's interesting, go back to bed. We don't have to do chores in the morning.

We could do a lot of the chores tonight after supper, like fill the chickens, get the chickens water. I don't think it's going to freeze, but tomorrow it's a rest. And I think that's very important, one day a week rest. Of course, the animals still got to eat, they still got to get milked, but you do that and then no projects. So we probably won't be— well, I know we won't be working up any, uh, land for the 100-day of building a homestead, but you know, we'll be dreaming, we'll be walking, we'll be thinking and talking. That's doing it. That did it. All right, that's good. How'd y'all do? You do it? Yeah, look, the stuff we cut down for them, they did. You know what that tells me? We need to do that every day, every other day. In here. There's no way they're going to be able to reach these up high, but there's a lot more food in here for them, and they can last longer in the paddock if we do that. The longer they can last in the paddock— we don't want to go more than a week because we don't want them to be in their manure too long for parasites— but the longer they can be in, the more focused we can be on the chainsawing, because they're ahead of us. We can't keep up with All right, sheep, sheep, sheep, sheep, sheep! I love it. Judy's lambs are getting into the groove. These guys are leading the way. Look at all the hitchhikers on them. Goodness, that's a very good sign that they go right into the new paddock. And start eating. Let's spook them down. Doesn't take much to spook them. I'm like 30 feet away. They get it, they get the idea. It's very helpful when others are on the farm that know what they're doing. Gideon's got us making chocolate chip cookie, and then Mama's got us making— turning it into an ice cream sandwich. This is— who is this? Deliciously organic. The boys got some chainsaw gear, got them some protective gear. They're itching to help me in a bigger way. We're gonna be really getting it done now.

When I—

oh, I gotta get better. Yeah, I heard Josiah saying, I wish tomorrow wasn't a zero day and we were working. Yes, that's good. But we're gonna rest. We'll go at it strong Sunday. Lots of ingredients. Gideon, I'm not doing this without you, man. You said, can you bake with me? So this is what we're doing. It's good. Gideon's been working hard.

I'm sorry.

Cookies are in the oven. All right, look at this. Now they didn't spread out too much. That's fine, they're just gonna be little miniature things. They're gonna cool there. For 45 minutes, then we're gonna freeze them. Then tomorrow we put ice cream on them, freeze them again, and serve. So we'll see how it is tomorrow. If you want the review, full review on ice cream cookies, join us tomorrow. Day 7, day of rest for the 100 days building a homestead from scratch.