Building a Homestead in 100 Days - Day 99

It's raining.

Two very disappointed boys right there. One very disappointed man right here. Day 99 of 100. Got the machines, both the machines, and it's raining. I kid you not. This is our last day, 99, to work on the 100 days of growing— I keep saying growing food. Done 3 of those series. Building a homestead. Tomorrow I will give you a tour of the finished goods after 100 days, and you get a special feature-length documentary of the entire process from beginning to middle, broken down to the most exciting, interesting parts. That will be the 100th video. You don't want to miss that, it's going to be good. Then we're taking a break, then we're taking like a 2-week break from vlogging. From posting videos. This is some original narration that I'll be doing today for Dan, who's working on that documentary. Mr. Brown, are you ready or are you shopping online? Today is also a very big day. We have— we're going live today inside Abundance Plus for our Homestead Design Workshop. What are we going to do? We're all disappointed it's raining. You can't really run the heavy machinery equipment over our future pastures. When it's so wet and vulnerable like this. Taking a 2-week break, but we're going on vacation, guys. Can you think of that? I haven't taken a 2-week posting break from YouTube since 2018. No, that was maybe 2017, right after the farm tour. Yeah, that's when it was. What should you guys watch while we're gone? Well, you could watch that, The Great American Farm Tour, feature-length film. It's on Amazon. You could also watch all the all, every single day of the farm tour on the Great American Farm Tour playlist. I also keep saying, oh, 100 Days of Growing Food. Well, we've got 3 of those projects, we got 3 of those playlists, and those take place in the summer. Those are challenges to see just how much of our own food can we grow in just 100 days. I think the one in 2016 is particularly of interest because we didn't— we started from nothing, and by the end of it I was eating 75% of my own food. So today we're gonna secure the homestead. Presby and God. Yes. Aren't you adorable in that little outfit? If I wore an outfit like that, I wouldn't be so cute. Are you watching him?

Yeah.

Do we have 150 pounds of feed right here?

Lay a feed bag right there.

It looks like it.

I don't know if I want the farm sitter to have to soak. I think I'll just buy some— 3 bags of feed in town will be enough while we're gone.

Am I limping?

A little.

I hurt my knee, that's probably why. I worked out too hard yesterday from PT.

Name of the game is make life as easy as possible for the farm center. No soaking feet, no dealing with— how many buckets of skin here? 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Are you making good decisions? Coming with. Could we put pig panel over that? That'd be the quickest fix. Should we build another one of these?

They can't go through those.

They are— you, you don't think they're getting out that way, but I've seen them go out myself. We really need something removable because we have to get wood chips in there. This used to have clamps on it.

There it is.

See if there's another one. There's one in the middle, but is there supposed to be one in the middle?

Now that it can sit flat on the ground, if you grab a staple—

oh, that's not a terrible idea.

Then we could screw a board here, and then there's only two screws in this plastic.

Listen, and then we can— you can't put a staple in it because you have to undo it to be able to pull it up. We don't fix this. So this sits more flush like this. The chickens are going to continually get out and they're going to get got, and our farm— or our farm sitter is going to have to be dealing with it.

So let's get out if this plastic is like this.

So no, I know, I think you're on to something here. This would need to press it on but need to be removable. A magnet would be amazing if somehow we could attach a magnet.

Put a piece of metal right here. Put a piece of metal right here and then attach the magnet.

If you put a metal plate here, that's the ticket.

They sell that type of stuff on Amazon and stuff.

So let's— for now, let's put this on better. I got the clip off. Let's see how this one's on, and we need to match it. Now pull it down. There's that.

If you get the magnets, you could just literally attach them to this kind of—

there's metal right here. We might not even need a plate, but plates aren't hard to get. Also If we had— we had more of this, we have more of this somewhere. Could we just put this in? Let's get this chicken in.

What do you want with those?

There it is right there.

What do you want with it?

I think maybe that's big. I don't do it. Go put these right back.

When you bend it and put it in, when you take it out, it won't really— it'll be in the same shape as it was in there.

Oh, it's not springy.

No, look.

Well, maybe this will hold us till we get the magnet in the plate. Maybe, right? But he also wants to stop doing this, start moving hay with the track loader. Leave an end out, okay, so it can be easily removed. I'm gonna leave a good chunk out so they can see it. That worked real nice. That was super easy too. You just push, push one end in, push that in, then you push that one in. I put these up at the most vulnerable spot where they're jumping out, so it'll be tighter right there. That means you guys can't be rolling it up on that. You have to remember See how wet this is? Yeah, there's no way we can go up into the acres. You're gonna be able to put the forks on? First time putting on the forks on our own. That's good. We need to leave them on the forks in case some sort of shipment comes while we're gone. I know, I love that new, new smell. New car smell. Probably pretty toxic, but it's not good.

I'm gonna leave the bucket right here.

That's not the worst idea in the world. We need to park this thing in the front so it can be accessed. We use it more. That's going to be more for projects like clearing stumps, not so much as just, oh, run and get the track loader, let's move some hay kind of projects.

Remember how to do it? Let's be able to unlock this from the cab. Tip it this way. Tip it like this. There you go. There it is.

Watch your backup camera. I think you're there. Now lock it. See if that worked. Looks like it happened. Good job, bud. So we had to put the steers in our shed so that we could put the sheep where the steers are to keep them away from the bigger cows. We're going to put a hay bale right here so it's easy for us and farm sitter to feed these steers.

Can I get these because they're low?

Yeah, and they're older. These are the oldest ones. You have to get underneath them. You can't poke it with that though, I don't think. These aren't hay forks. We're getting some hay forks, but Until then, go under it and watch this post here. You don't want to pull it into this post. Keep going. That's 800 pounds. Let's see how this thing does with it. Watch your pole. You gotta spin. You guys make it spin that way.

It's so strong and I just like barely moved and it picked the hay bale straight up so fast.

Boys, I love it that this is what their fun is. Real life video games right there, buddy. Go high! No thing is in there. You want to get one, Josiah? I do. Do you?

Yeah.

Okay, let Josiah get one.

I'm planning to haul 4 of these.

Let's go. No, you're not gonna haul 4. We don't need no more. I guess we need some glitter, don't we? Okay, let him get one.

Okay, and then I get the rest. Josiah's in it.

Okay, bring the bucket up. Tilt the bucket down. Tilt it and it'll come back on you. Shake it a little bit.

There you go.

This thing makes it so easy. All right, that's good, that's good. You're gonna hit the shed. Set it down. Let's go the long way home. Get in and see that no chickens are getting out. Oh wait, there is one out. I think that one might already been out though. Gideon, let's put this chicken in. Hold the phones, don't call the Inquirer yet. You're gonna do that? Okay, I'll spot you here. All right, rooster's still in there. Let's go see if Mom's made breakfast. I'm starving. Y'all starving? She did? Yeah, I owe her a big old kiss on the cheek. You kiss on cheek?

Why?

You're cold. You made breakfast? Your nose is so cold.

It's cold out there.

How's that look? Looks pretty good, right? Oh, I just walked us through making connection of the main story through the last of the 100 days. It was funny, there was a bit here at the end. Thankfully nobody got hurt this whole time. We were done clearing and then we did that extra clearing patch. Yeah, and then we got hurt. So kind of interesting. And then this is gonna be— it's been kind of a fun ending, this 100-day challenge, isn't it? Talking about like when the machines come at the very last end, uh, so that would definitely allude to chapter 2 of this, won't it?

Papa, can I jump to you?

Hey, you sat so good during that too.

Sure.

All right, shut it up.

Like, can I not make your bed?

My bed?

What are you doing?

Oh, I'm just cleaning all of the kitchen stuff for our vacation.

From the tiny mouse turds gotten this. Try number 2. We got our ground beef back. It's too fatty. We're gonna try some lean 15% mixing with it, not to 1:1. But a 1 to 2 ratio. 1 to 1 is still a little much. 2 packages of 15% fat. 1 package of what looks like 50% fat.

Good morning. It's still morning. I made a gigantic pot of chili yesterday. It was for our family. We ate that for dinner last night. I made it for a friend who I'm taking dinner to. We're actually having it for lunch. Justin is making hamburgers, and then we also have a pot of chili going that we took from this big pot of chili. And I just wanted to share with you something that I love, which is Super Cube. There's 5 filled here, so this is 2.5 gallons of chili that I already have. And then it will store— I'm going to show you how it stores, which is amazing. This in the freezer. So this is broth that I've frozen. So you can see that there's one cube missing. It lays so nicely like this in the freezer, and so then you can stack them on top of each other. And you can freeze— like, I've frozen all sorts of things. I've frozen like leftover spaghetti sauce that we just had, like a couple cups leftover of them. We put our butter in the 1-cup one that they have. They have a bunch of different sizes. So there's just like a ton of different things. I only freeze in them. They say you can cook in them. I haven't done that and I probably won't just because, um, I don't need to. But so that's what I'm doing today.

I'm working on this piece of meat. Still tastes a little gummy.

I have— I have—

there's still strong tallow taste. I'm kind of wondering we had to mix tallow. I know tallow is beef fat, but it's rendered beef fat. Hamburger is made up of unrendered beef fat, right? Which would give it a— at least the texture, because this tastes a little, uh, gummy. It doesn't always taste better when you grow it yourself. That ribeye— well, you can't beat the rib.

We had not added the tallow.

We made a mistake.

It would taste good If we hadn't added the tallow to it, it would taste great.

Lesson learned. We need to scrap every piece of fat we can off of it and put it into the ground beef. Talking horses, she's relentless. Thought about getting her a donkey as a trainer, then I realized that'd probably be like getting a, a goat thinking it's easier than a cow, and we'd be starting with a more difficult thing. We just have to wait until you're ready. And here's the thing, you have to be so ready and experienced because me and your mom don't want experience, and we don't have any, so it's going to be all on you. And we're definitely talking about an experienced horse, and we're definitely— you're wanting to get a jumping horse, a horse trained in English. Sure. Are there such things as already trained English horses ready to trot? What is it, trot, gallop, trot, canter? And try to get more horse experience, so you're getting lessons every week, but Uh, you want to start visiting other people with horses? You want to be on the movie? Hey guys, taking my notebook. Rebecca, are you gonna end up coming? Our longest show ever. Jonah's gonna stay and watch the baby. Little kids go up the hill. Longest show ever. Bit nervous, probably more for tech problems, also more for— can I talk for 4 hours? Probably gonna need this. I'm about to push my professional talkability to the test. Hey, you ready for this, Matt? I got coffee. Yay! You've run through your checks already?

I've run through a number, yeah.

I noticed this. Do we— are we gonna need this mic on this thing for any reason?

We shouldn't.

Okay, well, that's a wrap. Forgot to record any of it. It's on Abundance Plus right now. You can go watch the replay totally free. I think some of the— what are the key takeaways, Matt? What'd you learn?

I liked a lot about the stuff about which way to face your, your home to avoid cold air or make sure you're in the sun. Yeah, and then also, you know, getting— using the, the vegetables to feed the ruminant animals so we have something to eat.

Yeah, that's right. Pete, what'd you get out of it? I learned all kinds of stuff. I'm gonna go start a homestead now. You're motivated, ready to go.

Cat in. Okay, under the bed. You gonna get it out?

Sure. Me versus the cat. Oh hey.

Oh no.

Okay, I got you, I got you. You want to get out of here. You'll die of starvation in here.

I know you will die. You will die in there. You don't want to be in there.

All right, ready to go eat?

Yes, we're going to eat.

So what did— what's your takeaway, Rebecca? Sell it, sell it to them, baby. Give them the benefits of the, of the replay.

They will benefit by Knowing how to get started and planning. Let's watch out, there's a step.

I gotcha. New step.

Planning the homestead. Have you told everyone that your shoulder is doing okay?

I should tell everybody.

You should tell everybody.

It's been so miraculous. I mean, it was that next day I told everybody it was doing good, but yes, thank you for your well wishes and prayers. It's like, I'm not used to healing fast, but this shoulder— I'm holding you guys up with the camera right now. With the bum shoulder. It's doing just fine.

Totally fine.

It's absolutely incredible.

Thank goodness.

I know, because clearing is dangerous work, and we're just very thankful. And we're done. Tomorrow's video is going to be an epic documentary of the whole process, plus a tour of the finished goods. I'll go out and do a fresh tour. The 100th day, can you believe it?

Yeah, I'm so glad it's over.

Vacation, here we go! There are two happy days for a homesteader: when you start a new project and then when you end that new project. Going up to G-ma, she's savior today. She, uh, she watched the kids, cooked the dinner. Free trial, watch the replay on Abundance Plus. Don't like it, or get in there and consume all you can for 7 days, then cancel. You never get charged. Chances are you're gonna like it, you're gonna stay. Join the Abundance Plus family. Let's see what we got. Hey, hey, we've been gone from each other for 4 hours. Hey, hey, hey, who cleaned the porch?

Me.

You did?

Yeah.

Good job. In the house?

Yep.

Good job, I'm proud of you. Grandma's working herself out of a job. She's got something vacuuming. Oh look, it gets under the couch.

The robot's stuck.

There it is. Get in. Don't look, Henry.

Should we get rid of those? Our house ain't always clean.

Imagine how quickly that would fill up. Grandma fed us extremely well.

Yes.

You ready to go?

Yes.

Here's your—

where's the baby?

How's my voice? Is it holding up? Feels a little sore. Your voice sore? You didn't even talk as much. It's been a big day. Get ready tomorrow, the release of the documentary, or the next video. Forgive us if it's a day late or something like that. Dan's been working hard the last 10 days. It's a documentary feature of the entire 100-day process, the best of whittled down into 2 hours. That's in the next one. See you guys there. Hope you enjoy.