Mom + Daughter Learn to Sow

Sewing lessons today for the beautiful one. Could be part of our Rooted Life self-sustaining journey. I'm excited about that. Gotta get out there. It's getting, it's getting light. Oh, these are going to come in handy when we try to train, continue to train our heifer. Gotta train our heifer to milk, but first we've got to put a collar on her, which has been failing us. Has failed us twice, and now it's very difficult to get it on her. Good job getting up early. They've got a men's pickup game on Friday mornings, 8 o'clock, in town. That's where I want to be. That's where I want to be. If all goes well, I want to harvest those tomatoes. If it goes really well, I'm pulling up some of the weed fabric for the chicken, because guys, we got to get those chickens in there by Monday. It could snow, but if it doesn't snow, it's going to be really cold. Which means we prep it today, Friday, we take the Sabbath on Saturday, and then we move the chickens in there Sunday morning. So that means tomatoes harvested, tomato plants pulled. Should we even pull the potato tomato plants? Well, we have to to get up the weed fabric, and then we have to pull up the weed fabric for half of it. We don't have to do it the other half. Adam said it was supposed to snow, which is hard to believe because it was 65 last night. The weather is just trying to get people to buy gloves.

You think?

Yeah. Probably get clicks and watch their program on how it's going to snow. It doesn't snow that much here. That'd be crazy. Uh, guys, you got to get this— do the cream separating too, okay? Oh, and what a fun Friday! You got friends coming over. Okay, I got some blankets going for you, more sheets and bedding. That means cooking some big meals because I think it's 4 boys plus I have 4 boys and a girl and 3 adults. Hey, okay, I'm reheating breakfast. It's been so busy. We got to get out there, buddy. We got to get that light in our eyes. You want to help me? I was looking forward to a turkey soup this morning. That will have to save for lunch. Trying to do a little Instagram and trying to make a post, have a little bit of tech problems. That's the problem sometimes with being a homestead content creator. You have to know these old-fashioned ways of homesteading, but then if we're content creators, we've got to figure out technology. And it drives me crazy sometimes. Supposed to be able to put clickable links in my reels and it's not working out. Forget about it. I can't live my life like this, but I'm paying for it. I'm paying for 2 links a month and it used one. But it's not clickable. Are you ready to go? You want to go with me to do chores? Hey, hey, okay, washing bedding. How many pounds of meat should I set out for the Lost Boys? 6 pounds. 8. Okay. All right, times we wait too long to get into that third stage. We want to make them do something. They've got to do it. We're going to do it. You got to do what I say. If they're just doing something that's good and productive, then that's okay. I may want him to come with me and do my chores, but the table also needs to be wiped down. So good for you, Henry. You want to clean while I go? Yeah. First things first, a plan. Good news and bad news, it's all in one. More to do than I have time. That's bad news because I won't get done everything I want to do. The good news is I've got always something to do and plenty of purpose in my life, so long as I have something to do. But do we need lights at all? No. Make this weekend nice for the Lost Boys. Seems I barely made a dent in that. What's this? I guess they forget to— forgot to put this in the fridge. How am I gonna remember everything? Set a timer for 1 hour to change the dishwasher. 1 hour change the dishwasher timer. Prep meals. Do the chores. Prep gigantic meals. Get the high tunnel ready for the chickens. Harvest any tomatoes we have left. Can— I'm just laughing at this list. I think I can do can tomato sauce.

This—

I mean, make tomato salsa and can it. Okay, for once I, uh, actually have too much liquid into this, which is good. That means it got a really proper soak. 3 reasons I've got to get these chickens out of here and into the high tunnel, and before Monday. Uh, it's kind of hard for the fence to work. Get in if you don't leave the Energizer behind. And how did you not get over? Gotta get these chickens off this pasture. They're just making dust baths and tearing it up. I like chicken, but beef and dairy is by far our priority and centerpiece, and you guys don't need to be tearing up the cow's pasture. Secondly, we have two posses.

Okay, let's do this and we'll save them.

Soaked this in milk, so we can reuse it. Protein for the birds, farm-sourced protein. What was the second reason? Second reason, we got two posses, and if we consolidate to one, we'll only have one set of chicken chores instead of two, which is one benefit of winter.

Chores are a little easier.

That's probably enough. We forgot to get eggs yesterday evening. I hope it's okay. The third thing— are we on third? Yeah, we're on the third— is these chickens. Maybe we got eggs. I hope we got eggs because there's only one in here. Is these chickens will be happier in a high tunnel. They won't get wet when it rains. They'll be able to get out and about, or if it snows I hope somebody got the eggs yesterday because we're screwed if we only got one egg from all these birds. Although they are a year old, look at them, they're definitely molting. Look at that one, looks terrible. So that's an 8 to 12 week process of no eggs. Is that just to vent something nice? Put it in that Somebody's got these. That'd be a miracle because I didn't tell Gideon to go get them, that he would get them on his own. That would be a Festivus miracle. Another Festivus miracle. The timer goes off, you got to stop what you're doing, call the permit office. We're at the home stretch on the guest cabin. We're calling in final permits. That was 3 reasons, but I just thought of a 4th, and that is if we get these chickens in there They'll help us build our garden for the spring in there. Question is, did Gideon get those eggs? I mean, we'll take this. There's one in there too. If there's a bunch of eggs in this, that means he did not get eggs yesterday, and that means those hens out in the pasture only laid us one egg and ate about 6 pounds of feed. Which is nearly $6. So I just paid, let's say, $5. I just paid $5 for one egg. Okay, 3. It's not egg season. Yeah, he didn't get the eggs. I mean, he didn't get the eggs. There's 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. So, um, I mean, we got, uh, 11 in here. Not bad for middle of November or early November. Well, maybe getting them more comfortable in the high tunnel too. A little warmer during the day, a little more room. There's too many chickens for what's in that pretty shawl. Let me check on our winter harvest garden, see what we have before this cold sets in. We got to get this to maturity by Christmas. It's not going to grow anymore or, sorry, by Thanksgiving. There's not enough light after that for it to grow. I think I can see it. I think we're there with lettuce. Whoa! Put salad on the menu all winter long. That lettuce is there. Should I even water that? Some of it's bolted. No way. Hey, Gideon, did you get eggs yesterday? You think you did? Where are they?

Ah, I think I did it.

No, you didn't. Do you ever get them without me asking?

I have more. Do you set a timer on the phone?

That's not a bad idea. Touché, touché. Set a daily alarm every day for 1:30 PM to put up the calf and get the eggs. Yeah, first get off Mom's boots. Do not, do not get Mama's boots. Yeah, you do. Get somebody else's big feet, anybody but Mama's. Is your coach there? Yep. Good, scoring some points. Going to the boat. The coach, did you score any points in the goal? Yeah, you did? Did it count? Did it hit the side of the net? Yeah. What did you— what did you— Jonah too? Yeah, Jonah hit one too. Yeah, man, what the heck was I thinking about that? Nice. What'd the coach say? Uh, he didn't say anything. Wow.

What happened?

Their coach happens to go to this Friday pickup came. Hey, the only way I can get all this done, guys, including your boys' blankets and sheets, if you help me with the project, we're gonna get this done. We need to do some dividing and conquering. Let's check in on their sewing. Okay, it's not gonna work, Gideon. Get a bowl out for rinsing it when you're done. Pour the buttermilk in this. Look, any that's left over, pour in the chicken. Okay, let's check in on their sewing here in a second. You up next?

Sewing?

What are you learning how to sew?

So we're sewing this.

Okay, that's good.

Now I'm going to start. That's a good learning thing?

Yeah, because we're learning how to like do corners and stuff like that.

So you could make a quilt.

Yeah, I think we are going to make a quilt-ish thing.

Wow.

I don't know what we're making. I'm trusting.

This is your mom's old sewing machine. This is my mom's old sewing machine.

How cool is that? I like it.

I was gonna steal it from the basement. I don't think anyone else wants it, so.

No, it makes sense that you have it. Homesteader. It's fun how Lily just jumped right into this.

Once it disappears under that bar, then you reverse. Now reverse it.

So where did you learn how to sew, Dorcas?

I actually learned because my mom let me use her machine.

She saw an interest.

We were homeschooled and she saw I was interested she didn't enjoy it, so she just said sure, and she kept rethreading it for me and just kept encouraging me to do it.

Yeah.

So now go ahead and you can take this pin out now and iron this down.

We gotta screw that in. Yeah, we gotta see that.

Higher. Yeah.

Oh, you gotta squeeze it hard while you do it, else you'll strip it. There ain't no ripe tomatoes in here. Uh, yeah, there are. Here's one. Look, here's two, here's three. Come on. What do we do? Chickens don't need a whole lot. They only need 3 square feet. You could probably literally go to right here. 10 feet would be 250 feet. So yeah, that'd be plenty of space. And then we'd have to only rebuild beds from there down. So I guess just to make sure we get them in to harvest tomatoes— well, there's no way we're going to be doing salsa, is there? Yeah, only go to that pole. So get this, all this cleared up. We need to get the bags and pick get the sweet potatoes in, get the tomatoes up, get silage tarps up, get the sweet potatoes up, get the green beans up, take them down. Their work cut out for them. They don't seem too intimidated. They're throwing tomatoes at each other. Let's stop putting this off. Let's go do Harriet. I haven't forgotten you. I haven't forgotten you, girl. We're gonna get you. We've added more dots to— there are more holes to this. You'd make me really happy if we could get this on her. It's getting more and more difficult. I've tightened it up, but here's the problem: that much is hanging off. Yeah, and it just comes undone. I'm pretty sure we've lost the little something or another leather thing that holds this in place. Oh, we can do this with one zip tie. Let's keep this loose, and then when we do get this on her, we can, we can tighten that up. Okay, I like it. I don't know if I would pray for things to go my way because I don't know if I know the best way for me. And I think there's a role of suffering in our lives, and God's not a genie in the bottle. You going to let me do it today? I got some big old helping of of alfalfa. I didn't even put apple cider vinegar in it so that you'll really enjoy it. Hey, this is good, this is good.

Got it.

It's hanging off. Maybe it'll stay on. There's no way I was gonna hold her though. All right, well, there's blessing in the struggle too, folks. Blessing in the struggle. Let's go do this butter.

Did you see the noise?

Yeah, I know. Can you get a string and tie that up or something?

Yeah, I'll fix it.

Yep, you can do it. Probably. Look, grab a string, wrap it around it, just tie it up.

Yeah.

Hey, let's go do that butter you, you didn't do.

I already did it.

You did it?

Yeah.

He told me out in the field. Did you really believe me? Apparently he was just kidding. He did the butter. Good job. What'd you do with the finished butter?

Uh, I put it in the freezer.

Let's go deal with the buttermilk. You don't know how to do that, do you?

I'm doing it.

Dorcas, what is the most important thing you've ever sewed?

Um, probably my sister's dresses for my wedding.

Oh wow.

Oh my word.

We did all of our own sewing, and I had a friend make my dress, and I made my mom's and my sister's Hey, you got robot boy helping you.

2 tablespoons of yogurt. All right, I'm excited. You excited? For what? To get on this project. I miss outside projects dearly.

Top and bottom. Both.

You did them?

Both.

What?

We have to move both into the greenhouse.

I know, I know. Sunday.

I only have one potty to take care of right now.

That's if we get done with this today. Because of my fast and a lot of broth projects and everything that's going on. I haven't been able to do the outside projects like I would maybe prefer. Let's do things they won't do. We'll roll up this tarp. We talked to the guys at Farmer's Friend because we were concerned about leaching plastic. They said it's rated for 5 years, use it for 4. He said they've had some that people have used for 20 years. Okay, nice. Is this all the tomatoes? What, are we supposed to harvest the beans to throw? No. And are there any good ones? I feel like they're too big. Leave them for the chickens. There we go, there we go. Got the tape out of here. Let's get the T-posts out. Let's get the poultry net set up. How are we gonna get the machine in there with the wood chips?

Playhouse.

Should we get enough wood chips in there right now for our winter? That's what Joel does. How are you gonna get them in? Start the gate right there. All right, but what if there's an overlap right here? Oh, you'll just go over the fence with the bucket? Okay.

I struggle so bad because I'm tiny.

Well, technically we could put these chickens in here, so we did We, we made some progress. It's time to go and make lunch. We do have to pick up all this stuff. Why did they think they were done? We still gotta— we still got a ways to go. We need to button up that corner. We need to install the Premier One gate. It's going to change everything. I can't wait for you guys to see that. They have a new gate for getting in inside of these nets. Shut this in case the cows get out. If that's not enough for them, they can just Sleep on the ground like they do at Joel's. Let's regroup at lunch, although it's looking like there's light at the end of the tunnel. Hey, sewing boy, are you done sewing?

No, I did so—

hmm, this is 7 pounds. 8 pounds just seemed crazy, but if we have leftover, we could just super cube it. I didn't want to use too much of our pork. This is spaghetti. Okay, I only did 2 pounds of pork. Yeah, that's fine. I did 2 pounds of lamb and 3 pounds of beef.

Spaghetti. I don't think I like lamb in the spaghetti.

I just— just beef. That face. Sorry. Now weren't lamb meatballs the best? I'm not going to push it. I'll put it— I'll put it away. What about lamb for the, uh, chili?

No, I would rather have lamb like in lamb meatballs like that. I would rather not have it in— we have so little lamb.

Okay.

Or ground lamb burgers.

8 pounds for each day. Hope we have enough for leftovers. And then That's a lot of food, but it's a lot of boys. Good job. You know what this means? It means you could make a quilt.

Well, this is gonna be a quilt.

Oh nice, you're gonna—

I'm gonna attach this fabric to this and then I can put it inside of this and turn it into a pillow. I'll show you at the end. I'll show you later.

Meatball special. Poor kids, they don't like soup, but now we eat it every day for lunch. Squeeze in around here. This is sewing equipment. They can't get enough.

I think I'm gonna make curtains.

Oh good, make our curtains. Why not soundproof it in here?

Yeah baby.

I am crushing this list, y'all. Freeze this turkey broth. Look how gelatinous. I'm doing a second lunch. It looks so good, this time with turkey bits. It's gonna be my last meal. We're gonna intermittent fast for the rest of the evening. Get that food digested for the evening sleep. Solid as a rock. Hey, sleep is good as a teenager. This Sabbath evening, no movie tonight. They're gonna do their Lost Boy thing. Lily's going to a horse 4-H meeting. You know what us older 40-year-olds get excited about?

Some games with the younger two, and then we're going to bed.

We get excited about a Early bedtime on a Friday night. Boys' laundry. I'm gonna go switch that over for you, okay? Man, I'm on it. Josiah, oh, here you go. Let's go through these. Preference these, okay? You could take some of those towels and put them in your bathroom too. You guys are gonna be good hosts. When we have group Mighty Man Camp next week, all the wives of the leaders of this camp camp, the Meeks. Every single one of them coming, including Steve, my mentor's, uh, widow, including their sister, and then his husband. This is going to be awesome. Jonah's doing super cute. Jonah, he did this. It's not that much, even though he doesn't like them. You know he doesn't like them. When it's 10 gallons of broth, Papa has picked up in here. They're shelling up a storm after lunch. Kefir sweetened with blueberries and a little bit of honey. They're playing soccer.

I found a necklace! I found a necklace!

They're going to get quite good at soccer. I can't wait for these boys to score a goal in a real game. Oh, it's, it's one of the best feelings. It's in one of the top 5 feelings of my life, right up there with Getting married, right up there with getting married, child being born, first egg, first glass of raw milk that you harvested.

I'll take a—

what's that? How's that saying go? Took a trick out of their bag? It's not how it goes. Uh, anyway, just took a break. It's the end of the week. Just sat down, enjoyed the sun. But then I started to think, you know, I could do this Sunday morning for these chickens, but the best out of 5 wins. I feel rushed. And I'll— or I could move the chickens over and then do it, secure the fence, but then I'd be contending with chickens. Let's do it right now. All right, let's just take our time. The ladies are occupied sewing. The boys are playing. Jonah says he'll join me later. Yeah, y'all get in when you're done playing soccer. Come join me. Plus, I'm anxious to try this brand new Premier One net fence. Here we go. Instructions. Bring all the parts out. They've had these before, but they've made some improvements on it. Can you go get me the Allen key? You gotta zigzag those in between. Did you zigzag between? Okay, hold on.

It's not fit.

It'll fit. Are you crazy? What do you want me to say?

I don't know, in case you want to say something.

I'll say, enjoy working in the sun, this warm sun, with my son Gideon. Is that good? Sure. This is nice that it's on a frame. It used to not be on a frame, so no, the double post goes in this one. Get in.

No, no.

Yes, it does.

It does.

I am looking at the instructions. Look, you see how this has the— that clip? That— that's the only way this can get drove into the ground. All right, double spike. Get in. Uh, you gotta take the— wait, you gotta take the— these are for shipping. Thank you Premier One Systems for sending me this. By the way, that's all— that's all the netting that we use for sheep, chickens, everything. You guys want to see how this gate works?

What?

You— you've turned it off. You lift it up and over this. No more stepping over these gates. That'll be nice. You lift it back over it. Nope, no tripping over the fence anymore. And look who came together. I like that mallet too, Jordan. I don't know where any more are. They're all right here. Look at this guy. Can you do it? Hey, are you leaving? Uh, you look so nice, your bell bottoms. That's what you want to do on a Friday night. I'll be in the Epsom salt bath in the sauna and honking my shoes. I know I'm old now if on Friday night I look forward to going to bed early. Let's pick up our stuff. Don't put off tomorrow what we can do today. Shoot, I done secured all that and I've got to get the turkey shaw and stuff in. Whoops. Okay, well, at least I know how it works. I'm pretty sure I feel good going into the Sabbath of getting everything done today. I really did not think we would. I gotta double check. Did I really? Oh no, I didn't make salsa, but we didn't have enough tomatoes to make salsa. That's why you aim for the impossible, because you never know what'll happen. Cheats. Shoot. Okay boys, still more one thing to do today, and that's feed the lost boys. Let me see the bedding situation. Jonah, Josiah, here's one. That's good. Does everybody have a pillow and a case?

Yep.

There's 2 more boys. Is there 2 more up there with pillows and cases and blankets? Yeah. Okay. If people want to learn how to sew from you, where do they go?

Um, delightfulcottage.com.

All right.

Or the Delightful Cottage on Instagram.

You're gonna show us what you made? Yeah, it's a pillow.

It can be a pillow, or I don't want to chunk it out, but I'll take it out.

It almost looks like a book.

It's a blanket sleeve. It's a blanket.

Oh wow. And then you made this today?

Yeah.

Oh, okay. Yeah, yeah, it has to be flipped inside out.

Dang.

It's the first time I'm using it.

A pillow or a blanket? Or a blanket. That's a permaculture—

isn't that nice?

That's right there.

It's so nice.

It's Lost Boy time. There are 7 teenage boys in my house right now. 6. 6. Plus Lily's a girl. So we have 7 teenagers, 6 are boys. Oh my gosh, I hope we have food left after this weekend. You might have some. Just a little bit. Good boys. It's gonna be a good weekend. Shabbat shalom. The sun is down. It is time to rest. And no vlog tomorrow. To rest tomorrow. But we do have Barbara O'Neal's podcast tomorrow. It'll— I'll put it up. Let's go.