Look how I’m Adding 2 Acres of Pasture to my Small Farm

I think we can literally add 2 acres. Mr. Brown, you going with— you are? It's 21 degrees outside. Don't care. Why not? Because. Well, come on, are we gonna get dressed? Yes. All right, let's go. Do you know where your big black Carhartt jacket is? Oh, it's right there. Wow, we got lucky. Come here.

I don't know how to dance, you know.

Any clue what kind of shoes you want to wear or where they are?

My pants are cold.

Yes, your pants are cold. You just put them on. I don't see any sign of any kind of cold-appropriate shoes for Mr. Brown. Oh, you know where they probably are?

Where?

Down at the hay fort. Yeah, this thing is completely solid. Let's switch it out. It's completely iced over. Oh, oh yay! This is— winter boots are here, along with some tennis shoes, and along with your shoes, Birdo. Okay, Mr. Brown, I found your shoes. Put them on and come at your leisure. Well, hey there, guys. I got you in. That's great.

After this, I'm going to take pictures for Homestead for America.

Okay. So Do you want this camera to take your pictures or a phone?

I'm gonna use my phone.

You can use my phone. Bring it back.

This is how I hold penguin. This is the one I can hold like this. It's the other ones I can't roll.

She doesn't mind. Here's your— here's your— my phone. Do you want it in portrait mode or regular mode? Well, I guess you can switch. So there's photo and then there's portrait.

What's that mean?

Portrait makes it more like in-depth.

Look, like that.

See how that looks kind of nice, but it is kind of zoomed in. Just depends on what you're looking for. Thank you for getting the cows down.

You're welcome.

Yeah, I saw you bring the cows and then the calves. That was smart. I was proud of you.

Good morning, hamburger.

Good morning. Good morning. How are you guys? You feel so nice and soft. How are you, Moose? You feel so nice and soft too. You guys staying warm? You drooling for some alfalfa? Okay.

Papa, I got a lot of pictures.

Let's see these beautiful pictures. Oh, there's one of Almanzo. Oh, look at that. That's beautiful of the garden. Good job, Lily. And the neighbor. Oh, that's creative. I like that. And then there's one of the fence. Oh, and your flock. And Mama's raised bed, her cover crops growing, her peas.

Uh-oh, that's not the picture I took. That was the first picture I took.

Oh, okay. All right, good job. Are you warm enough to stay out and milk with me? Uh, you need to go get warm. Oh, all right, we'll see you. Hey, where's Mr. Brown? I got him ready and he's not even here. Already milked a good bit. Pour it out just in case she steps on it. All right, Lily just hollered at me. She said Gideon will come if I come get him, but he's probably already stripped down and everything, so I'm gonna come get him in between, like after I milk this one, when I take this milk up.

Jonah!

I think Jonah's getting ready for our project today. Hey Jonah, can you, uh, let— switch them out please?

Sure.

Well, we've got two big projects: turn that compost pile out at the Breakfast Posse and go into the woods and do some clearing for our silvopasture while it's clearable, you know, being winter. And being accessible.

Come here.

What happened, Mr. Brown? You're stripping it down. Bet your apple and cheese is still in the fridge, huh? Or did you get it out?

Nope, that's my fault.

All right, Lily, get your coat on. We're gonna leave soon. Get in. He's got his on. All right, let's go, G-dog. Are you getting in the liner? There you go. Good. All right, come on, my friend. You help me milk. If I don't have them— well, one, it's fun to have them with me. What's the point of doing this all by myself? Two, you're getting all kinds of trouble. Let's go, come help me milk. I'll let you listen to your audiobook. Struck a deal. What audiobook you want, Mr. Brown? Uh-oh, shoot, we need to hold on. Let's get her— uh, we're out of alfalfa. This brown bag should last us till Thursday.

I got you.

Pull it. No, no, no. Like this. There you go. Good boy. It's so much better to have them out here with me. You know how to give her her alfalfa? Hey, you gotta make sure you get it in the bowl. They don't get in the way. They're why I'm out here, right? Chidlers first. Growing chidlers first. Are we growing chidlers first? Are we growing chidlers first?

Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, we are.

Hey, you're doing so good. We'll just pour half of it in there, okay?

Okay.

We have more. No, yeah, get the thing out of there. Good. What audiobook do you want to listen to? Uh, Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel, Mighty Construction Site, Snowy Day, Elbow Grease, Happy Birthday Moon. Good one. Happy birthday, Moon. What happened, Mr. Brown? You didn't help me milk. Oh, that audiobook's got pictures. Yeah. Oh, that's what it is. Hey, just in time for our compost turning. Oh yeah, there we go.

All right.

Yeah, what? Sure, then hurry up, put these cows out. What's going on, buddy?

Pony's in Faultland.

Oh, where's Faultland?

Faultland. Fartland.

Fartland. Yeah. What is going on in here? I guess I can't keep you guys outside. A little too chilly for them.

Justin, look at this ship I built.

Oh, that's a good shift. Process that milk 20 minutes. Beauty's gonna get started. I'm gonna— I gotta go throw hay. I forgot about the hay. Now this one's taking a photo. Hey, where'd you guys get all this photogenetics? You still want me to get hay from underneath?

Yeah.

Dad, bring the camera down here right now. I'm aiming for some pictures.

Really good pictures. Let's see if Beedi's out there. If she got me a pitchfork, I mean, be a 5-minute warm-up before we plunge. There's the Hardcore. Good little warm-up there, right? Yeah, I think we're a quarter of the way down maybe. This would have been good to break over 2 or 3 days, but yesterday we're too busy watching a friend's race in the snow. Good job! Come on, everybody! Hello, any of you chiddlers going plunging?

No.

Now we're gonna do this. 12 o'clock, we get this done by 1, we have like 3 hours out there to clear forest. I think I gotta go to the bathroom, you know. Happens to the best of us, you know. She gonna get mad at me though because she gonna go and I'm gonna be in here. Hopefully she's rounded up some kids. Oh, she has! This is gonna take no time. You kind of come with?

I just gotta get a pencil.

All right, come on. This is the poop. You guys are hustling.

You got a huge pile.

Good job, guys. Yeehaw! Okay, good job. Look, look, they're so excited about what we've uncovered over here. So crazy what they're finding in here, and they've broken this down so much already. Holy smokes, you guys are good partners. They help us turn this. This is hard to turn. It took us about an hour. It's a once-a-week chore. If it weren't for them though, it'd probably be 2 hours. So thank you. Oh, look, she just got something out of there. What'd you get? What'd you get? Jonah's loaded our wagon full of useful tools. More useful tools over here. The most useful tools right here. Thanks for getting all that stuff for us. Taking a little break. When I say little— stay with me, guys. I haven't— we haven't even stopped. We just grabbed some cups. Water bottle. That's, that's what a break looks like on Sunday seed day. She drives us hard.

Who, me?

You.

I do.

She's not denying it. Nope. Well, I'm excited about this next crop project because I think we can literally add 2 acres to our 8. Well, I'm like 10 grazeable acres.

I'm excited about it because we have been saying like we're gonna do this and then we're gonna do this and then we're gonna do this, and this was on— this is like on our list. And now once that's done, then we have another project that we want to do, and when that's done, we have another part. And so I like it. I like just keeping on getting projects done.

Big difference from this morning. We'll see you guys there. Mom, you got all the kids? I got the mower. I couldn't make it. I had to go up that way, the pasture. Hopefully she can make it. Put it forward drive. Oh yeah.

You got it, no problem.

There's where the pigs were. This is bramble that just needs to be cut and piled up. I'm kind of wondering if I can get the mower, just drive downhill and clear a lot of that here though. There's no going in, so that's where they can get.

Jeans with my boots, and then it's time to make that corn and dry. Work all day until I'm totally beat, get back home and fall right to sleep.

We've got enough to get our pigs in there. We're gonna, uh, just try to get some big satisfaction out of today. And mow and cut in there because it's not nearly as thick. And I think we'll walk away feeling a lot better. Feeling real good about it.

Somewhere up the line, I forgot what I was working for.

Yeah, there goes life.

Looks like that ain't slowing down for me. All I ever do is work, sleep, Wow, I'm extremely happy about that.

Art came out and helped. Thank you, Art. Yeah, you're welcome. And look at that, perimeter fence was right here, now it's way over there. You can't see it. We're gonna gain probably 2 acres easy today. We gained, what would you say, half? Maybe half if you count this. Yeah, nice. Okay, look at all that brush pile, brush they piled up. One brush pile, two brush pile. We're gonna go hook up to the trailer and then I'll get all this into the trailer and we'll be all right. Trailer's down there. Mom must have took Sally and took the boys to do the chores. That's nice. Looks like the kids are spreading the hay and, uh, we're going on double date. Wow, we have a fifth wheel.

We do.

We're gonna go check it out. We got Wilder. Look at this, guys. Isn't this nice? We're gonna cut it down to about 30% of this in trees, and they'll have shade. Like, we'll keep these walnuts. Holy smokes, there's 3 walnuts right there, 2 right there. It's a walnut grove. That's good because that's our favorite nut. So this is gonna look like this. All right, you ready to go? You like to ride Sally?