In this informal day‑in‑the‑life vlog, Victor Justin Rhodes (Speaker A) and his family walk viewers through a typical homestead day on Day 87 of their 100‑day build. The video opens with a humorous struggle to get out of bed, then moves into farm chores: milking cows, managing pigs, clearing pastures, and fixing tools and equipment. The family discusses a DIY repair involving a drill, bolt, and washer, while children play soccer on a newly cleared field. Mid‑day the conversation shifts to home‑renovation plans – a front porch, a sunroom, a deck off the master bedroom, and skylight ideas – with Rebecca coordinating meetings with a draftsman and interior designer. Financial logistics surface as they prepare for a bank appointment to secure an equity line for the remodel. Later, Victor reflects on his carnivorous diet, cravings, and habit‑breaking strategies. The vlog ends with a backyard soccer match, rule‑making, and light‑hearted family banter. Throughout, the tone remains conversational, practical, and upbeat, offering a snapshot of daily homestead life, project management, and family dynamics.
Chapters
Gas water. I did not want to get out of the bed this morning. I really don't ever want to get out of bed. Every morning I make myself get out of bed. You guys jump out of bed, or do you struggle with it? I can't believe this, but I'm in search of my coat.
You lost your coat yesterday.
I guess I did. Do you not wear socks? I do weird jobs sometimes. When I start looking for my coat, I'm about to walk out the door, bro. Although I don't like getting up in the morning, I do like the results of getting up.
When I come back in from chores, can I make rice?
Sure, I'll let you if you stay with me. She's savage. That was a huge piece of fish. That was for Winnie, Sabina. Winnie, you snooze, you lose. Sabina's getting it. Where's Sally? She's got my coat, I hope. Aha, it's there. This is very damp cold. Ah, Lee Gideon was staying with me and he wanted to go in and get more coats. It's a biting cold. I hope that wasn't a mistake because can't we not find his coat? I don't know what he thinks he's gonna get. Gannon, can you go get that drill you found yesterday? Josiah's got it. And our drill bit, Josiah. And the bolt. Oh, I just looked out to the field, I saw the soccer field and had fondness come into my heart. We've created what Joel Salatin would call commas. We've created a comma on the farm, turned a bit of pasture into a soccer field. We paused a little bit, had a little bit of fun, and got right back to it. Uh-oh, where's your other sweater? I thought you were gonna get another sweater. I think it would be better to move everybody out, put down the daily bedding, then move the cows back in for milking. Look who is all about this alfalfa today. That's good. Yesterday she wasn't touching it. We went from the mesh to the pellets. Yeah, I guess it takes some getting used to, huh? But you're already at it. This gets all the loose algae. The ground's gonna love it. Hey guys, let's fix this. We've got to grind through those screws right there. If I straighten the screw, I think I can screw it out. I mean, you could put one screw in it, but we're putting a bolt through it. We had a bolt and he had a drill. He had his drill with a half inch on it. Ah, he's gone on the lesson. If I was a 12-year-old, where would I put that? Here it is, but I don't know where the drill bit is. Would it not go through?
Fit—
the washer goes on that end, but I don't know what to do. I can't find that drill bit. Josiah's in his lesson. We did screw it on there for temporary, didn't we?
Uh-huh, I did.
Okay, make sure you grab that bolt, hun. We'll need it tomorrow. Hey everybody! Hey! She's got a meeting with the draftsman at 10 AM.
And I have a meeting on Thursday with an interior designer who can help pick out— Oh really?
You found one?
Things that— yeah, well, I mean, I'm gonna meet with her.
In town, or are they coming here?
No, it's gonna be over the computer.
Oh, okay. What do you want to talk about?
The thing about—
We're putting a porch across the whole front of the house.
Correct. So I guess it doesn't have to come all the way down. It can end here.
Now how is light gonna get in if you have a covered porch?
Well, we could have skylights. I don't know what we're gonna do with this because I want him to kind of come. I want some ideas. I don't know what to do here, but I don't like this flow. Maybe we keep it this way and we keep the washer and dryer here, and this is like a little bit of a mudroom.
Yeah, I think that you could work that out. You feel like you're ready for your meeting with him then? Yeah, I do. We're gonna have a porch off our back bedroom. Add stairs because I could go tend to the wood boiler in the middle of the night. You've had me how many times go out and check on something at the pole barn in the middle of the night?
An animal.
Imagine this, a deck off of our master bedroom. Oh, I better go get that little lamb back in. Stairs. Could also go tend the wood boiler if in the— I forgot. Lay down for bed and be like, oh, I forgot a wood boiler. This is what I'm proposing become the outdoor dining area. It's currently our deck. We just build it on top. And the reason I like this side is because, well, that's the south right there, okay? So the south is going— the sun is going across the sky there in the summertime. This is shaded in the evening, and so it's naturally cooler. That southern side is always exposed and warm. That can be good in the winter, but not in the summer when we're most likely to want to eat out. Further, if this becomes our outdoor dining area, we also have a great view. We have the raised beds and the chicken run, and we will have a beautiful yard, believe it or not. This is our current porch. It's going to become a sunroom. One addition here is a deck, open deck coming out. We're both in agreement on that. That exposes us to the south, and maybe in the spring and fall we can come outside and dine, and maybe even warm days in the winter. Rebecca's proposing extending our covered porch down through there. This one becomes a sunroom. That's the south. We want to take advantage of the south and get as much light into the house.
Baby!
You're the baby? He loves to go outside, but when it's cold like this, he usually comes back in. Looking all betrayed. Plus we got an appointment with the bank, Becky. Equity line. Becoming real adults. You ready for that? Gonna have to get an equity line for cash flow purposes. Hopefully we can pay as much of this as we can as we go. I'm doing a lot of the work myself. That's the plan. So we're kind of just maintaining the farm this summer, not doing any crazy farm projects because The crazy farm project is the remodel of this barn house. Yeah, maybe we shouldn't have left Sally outside.
How can you see?
I can't.
What happened to it? I didn't do it.
We left it outside in the front yard. Oh, you took it this morning?
Yeah.
Oh, I guess it happened since then. You know, the coldest hour is right before sunrise. So how's the Everflow doing in 20 to 30 degrees? I hear water running. The nipples are unfrozen. That's just the mass of the water in here. Listen, it's working! Ah, that's so good! It's so cold. You're so far out in the woods. That made running 10 pigs in the winter possible out in the forest. I'm gonna park it just like that, that way by the time we're done, the sun has melted it off. It looks like I might have marked it too high. Guys, the tape is way— I don't even think you can see it in here. I don't think the mower can mow it. 13 days left, less than 2 weeks. We have an hour and a half. I'm so excited. We can get a significant amount of work done in that amount of time between that pasture and this one that we've cleared. Even though we're not going to necessarily graze that bank, we could clear the trees on it so that sun can get down into that pasture. If that's south, that's— those trees are going to be blocking that sun from getting into that pasture. Nice, right on the brush pile. We just got an incredible amount of clearing done. We got about 20 more minutes. I want to clear this access road. It comes out up at Grandma's. Henry!
Woo!
Came up this way and we got a crossroad. You go down. That's super cool. This goes straight up behind Grandma's house. That little access was a stretch goal, but what a cool little trail, hiking trail access. Look where we are, top of Grandma's. We did it. Ice is all cleared. We're ready to go. How'd your meeting with Austin go?
Really good. We still haven't figured out this area yet, but he's gonna work on that.
Yeah, he's got some homework, huh?
But what we're gonna do, we're gonna get rid of the walk-in closet over here and we're gonna flip it over here. Okay, we're gonna put our bed this way, facing this way.
Yeah, that makes sense because then we have more access to the porch up there. Yes, we're still gonna do a sunroom right there. She's gonna have an arched roof out there, pitched roof like this. You can have a higher, higher—
so we can have a higher ceiling in the inside.
Look like an addition.
It won't, because we're going to— because we're reciting. Okay, so, okay, because we're reciting, it won't look like an addition.
I think it'll make the house look better.
It's really exciting.
Good. What we decided makes it real for you, I imagine.
It does, because like, it's just gonna be so good. It's just gonna be so good.
You know what? It's gonna make it real for me? The bank. I'm in charge of the dollar bills. That'll set it in motion for sure for me.
Yeah, that's good. I don't, I don't feel—
I am a carnivore. The one and only vegetable that I miss: onion. Kids can't stand them. I couldn't stand them when I was young either, but I miss this. I miss fruits. Do not miss vegetables. Would not feel sorry for myself if I never ate a vegetable again. Although, a good Greek fried chicken, Greek salad, some gluten-free croutons. Yeah, I could eat some of that salad. Fried apples look amazing. Little lemon juice in there, salt. I guess that's the one fruit I'm doing is lemon juice. Oh well, I do fermented pickles. This is one vegetable I do. Bubbies fermented sauerkraut. Well, it's cabbage, you know what I mean? I'm trying to see how long it takes me to break a habit. Vacation's coming up. They're talking about going to an organic restaurant once, and then there's an organic, uh, fruit smoothie place. Trying to decide if I should jump off the wagon for those. I eat something and then eat a little something else. And then more, more, more. Like, if I break the gateway and eat the one thing, I become very vulnerable. Cravings increase. I feel like, oh well, I, I cheat on that thing, I might as well just cheat on it all today. And then I might as well go 3— I might as well go through the weekend. See what I'm saying? But knowing that about myself is going to help me when I go into a situation like that where I might want to let loose. Cheers! There's my plate. It is afternoon. We are back from the bank. I believe we have our answer. We have a small equity line on this house already that we haven't used. I don't think it's enough. We can get a bigger one or more, but it affects— it affects the interest rate. And as you guys know, interest rates are crazy. I think it's one of those things where we're gonna make this work. We're just gonna hustle. We're just gonna earn. We're just gonna use what we have. We've done it before. We'll do it again. Are you down here to play soccer?
No, I was just out here with the kids for a nice— for a nice— Henry's poop, so gotta change his diaper.
They're mad at me for winning yesterday. Hey, are we gonna be good sports if we lose?
Sure, I'm doing all the refereeing.
Okay, I'll try to be careful. Hey, you can have one ref on your side and one ref on this side, but you got to go by the soccer rules.
Yes, I know the soccer—
no handballs. Yes, if you get a handball And somebody's doing like this and their hands are on their body. I don't think that counts, does it? Doesn't count. But if their hand is out here, a natural position— no, it has to be on the body for it not to count. 4 to 3. They learned how to pass this game. And they did a lot better. Good job passing, guys. Was you happier with that game? It was better. There's a few bad calls on your end. We'll take it. At least y'all aren't storming off today, huh?
He tripped me.
And I made a rule, Rebecca, if I knock anybody over, I'll let them have the foul. You guys learned how to pass?
Yeah.
Who taught you that? That's gonna be a game changer. Soon enough you'll be beating your old man. And Big Papa will be in the goalie because he can't run. Beck, how was it cooking the Mexican with our beef? I think it's good. Wasn't too fatty?
