Building a Rock Retainer Wall after the Hurricane

Me and Josiah are gonna do the big animals and you're gonna do the little animals. Yes, boss. They're taking charge. All right. Look at all these eggs. Huh? One's rotten. Don't step on any more. She and I got to move the youth group to a new paddock this morning. Mandy had the boys milk the cows. Their idea. That's my project today. Place our pipes there. It's already looking better, isn't it? I'm excited. I know this is going to be a haul. Hay bombing a new paddock. We cleared this particular land from forest 2 winters ago. We're hay bombing it to improve the pasture, you know, I guess the old pasture, convert it, convert it from forest to pasture. Take a moment and enjoy this view. Only lasts a moment, and then I see everything that needs to be done. But that sort of brings me joy too, gives me purpose. I see that ravine in the middle that needs to be smoothed out, trees in that pasture from the hurricane. I see organization that could be had with the woodlot. We're starting right here. There's actually a bare spot. Mother Nature, she's a modest lady. Cool thing is these gals, and I guess guys, this is our youth group, will spread that out for us. They'll manure it and they won't eat it all. The wasted hay and the manure will cover this ground and it will come back better. She said I said it won't come back better. Is that what I said? Austin, roll it back. And it will come back better. Yeah. It will come back better. Put it up because they're going to congregate around that mineral sled and manure, and you want those nutrients to flow downhill as opposed to putting it down here and concentrating the manure down here. We want to concentrate manure high up. It worked. Figured it'd be more Jerry. Look what worked! Poop water free. She can't poop in it. Just a little rock on top of the lid, plastic notched out for the cord. Get Mama Pig a little bit of scraps. Also give Mama Pig all she can eat. Oh, she's not eating that much. Wait till those piglets start eating it. I know, right? They're getting all cuddled up under there. 4, 5, 6, 7. Okay, we're going 7 strong. You getting hungry? Hey buddy, foaming. Here you go. Yes, water is holding. Okay, I think that nipple was, uh, loose and he tightened it up yesterday and it's holding water. How was breakfast, everyone? It's good. Good. How was it, my man? How was it, my man? Must have been good, there's only one egg left. How's your protein consumption going, babe? It's good. I got— must be good, it's gone.

We got 30 Over a little over 30 grams this morning. I'm— I need to get 40, but I don't know if I can do that.

One step at a time, babe.

I'm struggling with 30.

Jonah, can you help Josiah move the boards out of the way? Nope. Josiah has a different plan than putting in the pipes. How many carbs are in that orange, darl? 8. You figured it out.

So under what I did, so I had more protein and fried fat than I did carbs.

Blaze has been acting funny since we got back. So we have our friend, Miss Leslie, coming to help check it out. It's like his stomach is irritated or something because he's sensitive to the touch.

Pretty good that way, right? Not good here.

Do you feel that? A self-serving plan would be just walking, massage, doing intuitive massage. So go into a spot. If he says no, back out of the spot, massage differently, try a different spot, go back to that spot, right? So intuitive massage. Watch him, let him tell you how he wants to be massaged. And you know, you're just working the muscles, right?

You're going to watch him? Yeah. All right, going on project. Happy day, everyone. Today I'm choosing to be happy. There's a lot to worry about. There's a lot to fret about, but there's a lot to be happy about too, isn't there? Maybe I'll start with a smile and a laugh. Just laugh, just laugh. I came out raring to go because look, hey, I hustled yesterday, got my PVC pipe. I've done crazier things. I thought this project was impending, fixing these drain lines. So I had other ideas. He won't put the material all the way down, all the way to the end before we go messing with the pipes. I just I never get beyond belief of this. The creek is way over there, and it's high right now because they're draining the lake. It got all the way up to there and took away all the soil on the bank that was here. We do have a problem here though. They've curved this, and this needs to curve more like this. I got the vision. There's the retaining wall. The retaining wall helps us build up our material a little higher than we— than we could have. Why do we want that? Well, we want it to be— see that net? I mean, that used to come out here, and we need area to make compost from the deep bedding. So we have this retaining wall. It needs to go with the new flow of the creek. The creek was more over there, but it needs to go right through there and connect to the bank. We already got a bit of a bank here. We'll build it up with more. And I think we'll bevel this down just like we did over there. And because the water is coming here and making a turn, yeah, we're going to put in some rocks retaining. Now I'm not talking about a catastrophic event like Helene. We're not talking about that. That's the thousand-year flood. We're not planning for that. We're talking about the normal hurricane rains we get. Not hurricanes, the hurricane— the leftover hurricane rains. That's what I'm talking about. This side's gonna have to quit there. He can't come any further because he's gonna bury good, uh, retaining wall rocks. We got a decision to make. You can't keep putting dirt there because those are retaining rock wall rocks that we need to not bury. And so we're also going to have to more curve our retaining wall to go with the creek to make it to the bank. We're gonna have to take this retaining wall here and make it more go, go along that way to go straight into that. See that fallen tree right there? That stumpy looking tree? The retaining wall needs to head straight towards that. So what do you want to do? You want to put these pipes on and start making deeper? Or you want to get the mini X and start straightening up this wall? Or do you want to get the claws on this and go get more stone? What? But you can't keep piling dirt here because you're burying the stones we need to use for the retaining wall. Oh, where are you putting it? Oh, you want to put it over here? Oh, okay. All right, he's not going to keep going. His plan was to hit that and go back. What I need to do is go ahead and get ready for him. They already put this down too deep, didn't they? Yes, it's actually not. Maybe we could go right on top. We might be able to go right on top. This pipe— we're gonna have to go right on top. Because I don't think we want to move that big rock. Geez, we should have done this a little earlier. It's like one of the biggest rocks we got in here. Maybe we can get it and go right there. We might be able to make that turn. You know, at first I was upset, you know. Hey, I got an idea, I got a plan. I went to Lowe's yesterday, got these for today. But does it really matter if we fill in all the material all the way and then dig the holes versus fill the holes and then fill in that rest of the material. Two words, put them on a tombstone: let go. If I want my children to have responsibility, and then I need to give them charge, I need to let them be in charge. That can be difficult. Let go, let go, let go. He wants me to move the board so he can cover it up. He could maybe do that, but I don't want to bury that. I feel like we could use that concrete. You know what, why am I throwing this up? It's trash. I'll go get Sally, load it in there and get it out. I don't want to bury anything. We need every boulder we can get for this retaining wall because I think we're getting short on boulders. Why are you not putting it in the dumpster? Dumpster's full. It didn't come. You vlogging over there? What you vlogging about? Have you ever noticed that a lot of successful entrepreneurs also look like they're secretly fitness influencers? Cold exposure. Did you mention that you're getting cold exposure while you're filming? Our future selves will thank us. If you weren't smiling before, you're fixing to smile now. Look at this, look at how black this soil is. I honestly think that's from years of piling leaves right there and it just getting down into here. Get out of here before he eats me. Now if you weren't smiling before, check this out. The little piglets are out and about. The sun. It's okay, Mama, I won't mess with them. We built those forms now a couple months ago, and we're burying it. That pole ain't going nowhere now. I didn't necessarily get to do the— well, I didn't get to do the project I wanted, but that's okay. I'm happy. Look at what we got done. Look at that. We're all the way up to the retaining wall. There, just 2 or 3 sessions in the morning. We're gonna take it and probably bevel it up and then flatten it out. We're gonna have more than enough material to do that right here. Actually, we're gonna have more material than we need. I'm not sure we're gonna— what we're gonna do. We got the A-arm replacement for South. Putting ourselves to the test, fixing our own things. Dude, I forgot it's still on its stump. Stump. Broke this arm. Is it as easy as just unbolting it and putting it on? All right, y'all on this? I'm gonna have to take the wheel off. Yeah, okay. Oh, that's a good idea. If you didn't catch this vlog, it's been, it's been, it's been a couple weeks. I hit that log, I believe we were herding cows back, and that just destroyed the A-arm, and then we got pinned up on it. I wonder if some will even start. Boy, these mules are tough. You missing an arm for it? Yeah. You want me to order you an arm? You're so old. You're poking it with your fingers. That's pretty standard. You rascals fixed it. Yeah. It wasn't complicated? It kind of was. Yeah? Yeah. Is it as easy as just taking it off, putting it back on? Yeah, besides you had to hammer on one piece because it was just jammed in there. How'd you get it off the stump? I just drove off with it. Where's Selma? You brought— drive her down there? Yeah. Good job, bud. What are you shooting? 22 Magnum in there. 22. All right. Hey, you fixed Selma!

Yeah.

Was it hard? Yeah. Why did you want to say it was easy? Was it worth it? Yeah. Learn how to fix things ourselves. All right, back.

I know, I got my potato soup.

Austin's here. Austin, that means you're sharing the love. That means you're putting this recipe out there. Yep. On the beautiful life.

Today we are making potato soup. This is a recipe that my friend who is a missionary in Japan now came up with.

We can't just—

everybody gets one lamb chop.

Those lamb chops are for me. This lamb chop's for the carnivores. We used to just eat this.

Yep, I probably would have served bread.

Yeah, gotta have some bread with those potatoes. Potatoes. It's a potato soup, y'all.

Now it's got a bunch of chicken broth in it. It does have chicken broth.

That's probably what we would have had. You're right. So now we're like, this ain't gonna fill us up.

So now where do we go?

Oh yeah, steak and potato soup. I think that'll be good.

Yeah, I think it will be good.

So all the normal people, they're gonna have a potato soup with a steak. Carnivores are gonna have a side of cheeseburger and lamb chops.

I totally want to have enough protein myself.

We are stuffed from dinner. We're part of a gardening summit, From Seed to Harvest, with Seedtime. You gotta check it out. There's a lot of speakers, including ourselves. I'm teaching on, uh, doing a— the chicken garden miracle, using chickens to work your garden. That'll be Tuesday at 6 PM Eastern. You definitely want to sign up. Link in the description. Happy day, y'all.