In this March vlog, Victor Justin Rhodes walks viewers through a day on the family farm, blending farm management, food preparation, and household logistics. The video opens with a discussion about hiring extra help and a light‑hearted exchange with Rebecca. Victor then showcases feeding hay to steers, explaining how wasted hay becomes organic matter that enriches soil, and notes the blooming peach trees that signal a future harvest. He demonstrates collecting colostrum from a cow, describing its health benefits and the process of making colostrum custard for gut healing. The family prepares a variety of meals—short ribs, a hearty quiche, butter, and ice cream—while improvising with limited kitchen space and equipment. Throughout, Victor and his family discuss organizing the new farmhouse, moving furniture, installing natural‑ventilation screens, and adapting to a smaller living area. The vlog intersperses practical farm tips (soil fertility, deep‑bedding troughs, Polyface design) with casual family banter, showcasing a holistic, self‑sufficient lifestyle.
Chapters
I got a text this morning from Andrew, our grader, the guy you saw yesterday, we ran into yesterday. What? I don't know if these are the best choice. They're the most comfortable, but it's raining. You want to go putz around on the farm a little bit? Where's the side-by-side? Dad joke. Where'd it go? Anyway, he texted me this morning and said, hey, would your boys happen to be for hire for a couple hours today? Y'all know how Jonah is so difficult to get up. When I asked him that, he leapt up. Are we just gonna do it like this?
Are you in disguise?
Yeah, could you see me coming?
I saw a bush coming.
Those dorks did this. I want you guys to see this hay bomb. We've been feeding hay to the steers. Do you say we have some fair amount of steers? That is a lot of beef coming our way. Our favorite. E is for elephant.
Big.
I'm generally in some mood in the morning, but acting a fool usually helps lift my spirit. So if we feed hay here in this area of pasture that struggles, they waste hay and that becomes organic matter and that feeds the soil. But they also manure, and that fertilizes the soil. Way up there, we hay bined that. The hay has already been absorbed. It's growing back greener than it certainly would have. That was a really poor area. Jonah's initiating to pick up sticks. Curious to see how our Agribon is doing. Ah, look at that, they're intact. Yes! 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, maybe 6. 6 of our peach trees are blooming, which means fruit, y'all. We're gonna have fruit this fall from the farm. Thank you for coming with me. It's the smiling one. Trial and error, trying to figure it out. Okay, good. Yep. I got a guy to come renting this today. Okay.
I don't know what—
Jonah, Jonah, what's wrong?
She went in there with a bucket of alfalfa like an idiot.
Here, here, honey, honey. Let me get my cow. Here, honey, honey. She's crazed. Wow. What you doing?
I have to tie her calf up.
Apple cider vinegar, RC Goam. Oh, that's the golden stuff, literally. Whoo! Glad you don't have, uh, smell-o-vision right now. Colostrum poop. See how yellow that is? That's what I hope they do today for part of my health journey and healing my gut. Gonna make some colostrum custard. It's what it's for. It's for sealing the gut. You didn't get that in the first hour or two, you'd be in trouble. It's a rare event to get colostrum milk. We're gonna value it. You've been keeping my colostrum keep the roost room separate. Harriet, you look huge compared to that little cat. Gather. Hold on, hold on. Let's use this for bedding. Hold on, raise it up. The next time it will be better. Trough is raisable. As the deep bedding raises, as we cover up manure and the bedding gets deeper and deeper, we have to raise the trough. That's so much better. That trough system we use for our sheep and our cows, and that's in Joel's book Polyface Design. I'll leave the link for that down in the description in case you want to build that yourself. How'd she do? What, she coming milk yet? Yeah, that's what I'm talking about. Something real nice about a freshly planted garden. You need to open this up to whatever light there is today. It's not freezing, and rain will better penetrate this Agribond without this Agribond on top. Our heroes! I'm tempted to throw them out. I told them if they didn't put their boots up, I'd throw them in the outside. Mom told me Let me know. I should throw all y'all's boots out in the rain. Shut up.
We have 10 seconds to get them.
Mama says Justin, come out here, boys. We gotta change our habits.
Just start throwing your boots out, okay?
In the house.
That's fine. If I put my boots in the house, you can throw them in the yard. Not if I take them out. If I leave my boots out in the way, just so they're in the way, I'm sure right now, throw them out. I'm sure you didn't put them away.
I put them up. I put them right up. Get in the habit. You want me to get you a bench out here to sit down, Mr. Rogers style? Wake up ready to say— Have y'all seen how organized Mr. Rogers is? What up, Mr. Rogers? Mission today: we got to get this house in order. Randolph's putting our tub up. Rebecca's shopping for us. And guess what?
I'm getting blankets from Grandma.
This came in clutch, this extra blanket. We were kind of cold just under this one. Randolph's putting in the tub today. It is a mess in this kitchen. We're all too tired yesterday to pick this up. Big day in town today. It's been a big week and a half. We suddenly been displaced and moved into this small— what, it wouldn't be 700? How many square feet is this farmhouse?
I thought it was like 900.
I would think 700, but I'm actually liking it better than the cabin. It has a better spirit about it. On today's episode of Burn It Up Cooking Show, dud muffin ribs. We need to get on them because they are going to be— he's a— he was a 8-year-old bull, he's gonna be tough. Set all the milks that are in there, save one, out on the counter. We have to stay on top of our milk, uh, supply because, well, we ain't gonna have room for it. Full-size fridge over in the cabin, plus a fridge like that. So we have— we've really downgraded. Things Randolph did yesterday, he flipped the fridge so it now opens that way instead of into the kitchen. Just those little Kind of things like that make a big difference. There's always enough time to make broth. That's Nacho's leg from yesterday. I think everybody needs to have broth at dinner. It's a food we have in abundance. Hey, thank you for putting those away, Gideon Jones, whoever you are. You have to get organized because this is our life, looking for stuff. Welcome to the Burn It Up Cooking Show, where we cook like all the rest of you, interrupting with their antics. Kitchen's not perfect. The cooking show for the rest of us. I won. Oh, One second rule. I won there. Short ribs are my favorite. Hopefully we can get stud muffins tenderizing though. This is really gonna be the Burn It Up Cooking Show because we got smoke and there's no hood in here. Got the short ribs out of the way. Pan's cooling off outside. That was a Burn It Up Cooking Show session for sure. Stop bombing the video. Okay, use lamb broth in the short ribs, right? Okay. Put it in the Dutch oven. That's it. It's kind of cool because you get that work done with in the morning when I have energy. You're gonna stay over here, come help sling clothes. All right, get these clothes ready for textile for people to take out away. Clean the house, make a quiche, make colostrum custard, a nice short rib dinner. That may very well be impossible, but extraordinary things happen. When you aim for the impossible. Maybe they bagged them up for us. Yeah, they bagged them up. All right, we got some bags. I'm literally getting in terms— we're getting some screens for natural ventilation. Dad's working hard. Bacon coming on for our quiche. Eating what we grow. We're growing plenty of eggs right now because we don't have any vent. We're gonna— this is gonna splatter everywhere. I did manage to pull this from the cabin.
In my bacon, I put some water Yeah, kind of cook. I need it.
I've never heard of this.
And it cooks it and then all the water evaporates and it crisps up real nice.
Where'd you learn this?
I saw it on Instagram.
All right, we gotta tackle this. We need— we want some cream because you need some ice cream. Is that for tonight?
We can have ice tonight. Well, it's a Friday.
You bought some cream, so what should we do with this? Should we make butter or cream? Homegrown ice cream?
Um, whatever. I don't care.
So good when you cook. Evaporating nicely. I was a little skeptical. Maybe we do a little bit of both. We keep a gallon for butter, it's right by the rest of the skim. I've got this little ladle, comes in very handy for getting inside of these quart jars. I'm just skimming off the milk, the cream. The cream naturally rises to the top. Coming along nice. We got a bunch of skim milk. Pigs and chickens will be happy. Maybe a quart and a half of cream. Look how that bacon turned out. It's basically a big— you got any room for the eggs?
We're gonna see.
Hey, fit all in there. You could have done even more. I know. A few moments later. Boy, she knows how to do it. Let me see how thick this quiche is.
It's so good. Look at it.
That is a hearty quiche. Scrambling to eat these eggs. No bad ingredients, only bad recipes, as Zane would say. Lily, after lunch, I want you to make us ice cream. Okay, how is it? It's very good. Where's your spot?
I don't have any.
Finished lunch. Now we have a meeting with the people at the cabin for our textiles because we're going in the Suburban. Taking the Suburban, huh? Yeah. Where are we gonna put this?
I don't know, in the closet.
Rainy Day Movie, Colostrom. Definitely this one. What do you think about this one? She doesn't have as much Colostrom. I can't sit on that. Not if I'm gonna wear these pants tomorrow for the 8th time in a row. Taking the Suburban. I wonder if the insurance company pays for time loss away from work. I haven't been able to work in a week and a half. We got these clothes back. It's nice and all. Where are they gonna go? I only have so much storage in that little tiny house. One cool thing about this is now I have lived— I can say I've lived in all 3 houses on the farm. I definitely want you to teach me how to do this. So you just did a quart of colostrum milk.
In here is 3 eggs.
3 eggs. Plus I put the colostrum custard in for 25-30 minutes. How's stud muffin in the form of short ribs, everybody? It's good.
Good.
It's tender. Yeah. Fatty. Really prepping for ice cream. Ice cream from our cream today. I'm in the midst of making butter. My wand got bent or something, and it vibrates No.
This is a unique dessert.
You cannot buy this. Okay, this was taking forever. I am rusty. I'm like trying to make butter from milk. I have to separate the cream out first. It's frothy. I'm gonna have to let that sit, then we'll skim the milk. Beck, I skipped a step. I was supposed to harvest the cream. Okay, that's just us losing our mind during this. We moved during a remodel. Be free.
