Surprise (hidden) Lofts added to Our House Remodel

Oh, our chickens aren't keeping up. And this might be why. Cake for Leah's goodbye party. Brownies for the party tonight. That's a big watermelon. Organic too, that's rare. Eggs. Where are they at? 2 dozen eggs. From the acupuncturist. Organic. Just $6 a dozen. Hey, get off the internet.

I'm out shopping.

That's only a little bit more expensive than if we can grow ourselves. That's a deal around here. That's a deal. Organic pastured eggs are like $9 a dozen. You're still shopping? Get off! I got unlimited Toys R Us for children. Guys, remember Toys R Us?

I don't want to grow up. Fun toys, look at—

Hey, no, be quiet. Mom and baby are asleep.

I didn't know that thing was that loud.

Y'all want to do an unboxing? Let's do an unboxing. Oh, we, we win sometimes, we lose sometimes. It's a checkbook cover. Can you carry that? You can't carry those milks without clanging them together.

Hold up, Papa, it's cold.

If we entered that in a fair, it probably would first place.

It's huge.

You know why the chicks are so thirsty?

Because we filled it up.

Was it empty?

Yeah.

Oh gosh, we got to keep it full. All right, why is there feed on the ground?

Because they spread some there.

What is our compost up to? Oh, 110. Gotta get our chickens on, but first let's get their eggs. What's wrong?

3 eggs.

Only 3 eggs? We've got the chickens. Fed and watered. Now we've got to get them on this compost. That's definitely going to be part of their food system. In 2017, I went to the famous Carl Hammers Vermont Composting, where he raises hundreds of chickens without grain. Tell us more about how in the world you don't buy grain.

Well, so this, um, feeding mix is a combination of cow manure, horse manure, our own donkey and mule manure, and food residuals from area schools, supermarkets, co-op, restaurants. So we last, I think in 2016, we accepted for management about 1,200 wet tons of community food scraps. And all of that got blended. We can go up where the blending happens.

How much of the compost pile is actual food residual?

Well, a starting ratio is never more than about 20%.

So what do you think they're eating in there?

Well, I think they're eating all kinds of things because they're eating all of the— all of the componentry is in transition as soon as it gets blended. So they're eating protein and, and carbohydrates from the food itself. They're eating bacterial and fungal components. They're eating bugs and grubs.

So now what I'm doing is on a smaller scale, large homestead scale, and I used to do this on a really small homestead scale with a pallet bin of compost. What you doing? Good for you. Throw it on this compost pile. See, and spot me right here. I'm gonna open this up, just make sure the chickens don't get up right here. Look at this, their food's out. Once we open it up to the compost, here they come. Look at the steam coming off that thing. Does it? Compost shouldn't stink. It's probably a little nitrogeny. Since this is basically hay and manure. There's something to eat in there. Look at that one. That could be why I got nothing. They didn't get compost yesterday. I figured it'd be my Jerry. Big Daddy's here, I think, meeting the concrete guy. No, he's a carpenter.

Where's your guy? Yeah, see what I mean? I'm stuck again. We also need some footings poured down here to support that deck.

That's right, you got to bring that up to code. Too many babies? No más. No más. Just dead? No más niños?

No? No.

Terminado.

Terminado.

Solo 5 niños. Uno más.

Need the engineer to tell us. We may need to add more. He may.

Or try to do a bigger beam.

Or maybe, maybe they'll make us put something on the outside. We want to keep that garage down there because they want to keep the garage. That's why it's like that. I found out. I said, why is it that this bigger? Be careful.

He just walks right on that like he's walking on floor.

Yeah, so then the other one is 12.

It might be different.

They're gonna make us put LVLs in there or something.

Fine. Guess the rooms. Master. That's right, we're walking through walls here, guys. Whose room is this? You're in a bathroom right now. Is this the bedroom? That's the bedroom.

Uh, um, John and Josiah's?

Oh, Lily's. Yours, isn't it? It's mine. This is this big old room.

Uh, kitchen? John and Josiah's?

That's all that's left. They're gonna have an attic up there. Where the teenagers are gonna sleep.

Check out the last one.

That is a good guard goose. That might be the best goose we've ever had. Now that's a man. He's getting it done. Hey, he's gonna hurt the chicken, Lily. No! It got stuck in the fence! Okay, stop it! Get the chicken, please.

I think it's trying to get it through the fence. It's overly protective.

If you ever have to grab a goose, just grab it by its neck. It won't hurt you. Well, our steers and sheep are happier following the cows back to their routine. What's going on? Now to move the milk sled. I would have turned it. Look at that colostrum poop. Let's work. And talk at the same time as I've got something on my mind. I just got a call from my assistant. I took it a little earlier. Super excited because inside of Abundance Plus, for the first time, we're able to blend the community and the video in just one app. In the past, we've had to have two apps. Who wants another dang app? Members are like family to me, and so I just want to get everybody together. The thing is, when we first started, all we had for groups was a private Facebook group. That became problematic because Facebook began censoring things like canning posts and wouldn't let you sell things on it. It's, it's a different— like, it's not all-in-one. And so we ended up creating our own private community platform. Now here's where the phone call came, came from. Of course, we're letting our members know, hey, we're shutting down Facebook, we're shutting down the, uh, the community platform. It's not going to be all in one. It's gonna be easier in the long run. Back up and then come more this way. Milk sled is tough, but it's only so tough. I'm gonna find out a lot of people that really enjoy the Facebook group. We have like 3,500 people in there. You know, they see it because they're already on Facebook, it pops up in their feed. Maybe they don't even download the Abundance Plus app, but— and that alone is worth the value of membership. But what about the Facebook. Okay, we've heard you, we've heard you. I think I have a happy medium. I think I can incentivize members to come over to Abundance Plus because it's a more intimate— I mean, everybody paid to be in there. It's a more intimate family feel inside of there. And the Facebook group, I don't know, let's, let's, let's turn this problem into a solution. Let's rebrand it to Abundant Permaculture, my main Umbrella brand. I won't be the Abundance Plus anymore, and it'll be public. So the Abundant Permaculture Facebook group will be public. That means y'all listening could, if you're into Facebook, go in and join that group.

Where are you going with that?

Oh, wrong way, aren't I? Sometimes I can walk and talk, sometimes I can't. You know, I hope it will be a connection for people Basically, to sum all this up, members, just go to Abundance Plus. It's all under one app. Watch videos, get in the community, all in one place. It's intimate, it's fun, it's family. Non-members, you're on the fence, you're not sure you want to join, Abundant Permaculture Facebook group. You having a good time staying cool in the South, Sally?

Or if we're going to do under decking.

Got to make some decisions about the decking here.

What's going on, man?

What's going on?

She sent me like 5 different things we could do, but we're doing the poplar and locust on this, right?

Yes.

Right here at this corner, I can cut this roof off, uh-huh, and I think we can drop the pitch down, okay, and gain, uh, whatever we need to gain. Oh, because we, we don't have enough Yeah, because see, you know, you got the deck, you got the deck, you know, out back there we had plenty of room to step down, you know. Here we're right here. You can just get like galvanized. Oh yeah, that's just protecting, you know, go underneath. Because basically all we're trying to do is protect that garage area. You were talking about maybe like a, like a little library kind of deal, kind of do this whole area, huh?

Yeah.

Just a big square area.

Yeah, I don't see why not.

The only— my only thoughts is, is on your side, maybe we drop the loft a little bit lower.

Okay.

My thoughts are is you could put you some bookshelves, you know, and then you could actually set a desk right there, and you know, at the highest point you'd be able to stand up.

Lunchtime leftovers, pork shepherd's pie. How is it, Henry? Are you stealing some of mine? Look at him shoving it in. Mama's got to pay the bills. Look at these old men chilling on the porch. What are you gossiping about? All the neighbors and all their doings?

No, we're talking about guns.

Oh, guns. This one too. You telling the biggest lies? Are you telling the biggest lies? Are you coming to dinner or what? Yes. All right, we are on it. The party has arrived. Ruth, the mother of Sam and John and Lois.

Oh yes, yes.

Rebecca's making a bean dip. You guys like Mexican?

Yeah, we love it.

Or want to be Mexican?

I told Sam, I was like, it's American Mexican.

You've come back recently from Texas.

Yes.

Well, you're not even from Texas.

So you've only been here 2 weeks.

Where are you from, Minnesota?

I am from Minnesota.

So where's home? Yeah, she's just said yeah. Because you're from Africa too. So we don't know if home's Minnesota, Africa, North Carolina.

How do you say roof? Get confused. How would you say roof?

I don't know what that means.

Roof?

Like your roof.

Oh, roof.

Ah, there you go. Give us some African words. Say you look beautiful.

Oh, boy, you could have said, boy, you should have gotten dressed today.

I know. Could you not have washed your hair?

You can ask Adam too, he can confirm. He's admiring our floor. That is crazy. So funny because you put in a dishwasher, we took out our dishwasher.

You did?

They had actually put it into the house.

You guys like doing it by hand.

Yeah.

How you doing?

Good, good.

Good to see you, buddy.

Good. We want you to say roof in your African— in as many languages as you can. Don't you know like 6 languages?

I was trying to think how to say it and I guess I know how to say it in French, but I don't know how to say it.

Well, how do you say roof in English? Um, roof. What? Wait a minute, you're from here? I trained you, Justin. Aren't you from here? I say what y'all say. Oh, you've been training us. How do you say that drink? You spell it R-R-O-O-T?

Beer?

Root beer?

Root beer?

Is that what you meant?

Yeah. Say hello in as many different languages as you can. Hi, good. Uh, baro. Bonjour.

Hello.

Uh, meng.

Eh? Blue? Blah?

Flu? Fleck?

That was Bogotá, Sango, French, Bahia, and Spanish. Couldn't you say it in Hebrew and Greek too?

He said Hebrew, I think.

You're a Bible translator, so you really know a lot of languages. It is ready. We're gonna quietly— it got real quiet. Start eating and let the kids figure it out. So we have a head start.

Yeah, like to start eating and like let all the kids— so all the adults go outside and we start eating, and then the kids find us like 15 minutes into it. We've had like 15 minutes of amazing adult conversation.

The world's healthiest corn chip right there. 3 ingredients: tallow, salt, and organic corn. Which chip do you like, Mr. Henry? Hey, they're heading over there. We gotta catch them.

This will have a table. Our deck is gonna extend out into the front door. There'll be another kitchen down there, another laundry room down there.

Wow.

My cold room and like storage, our freezers and fridges will be down there.

Lily can have her little bakery there. How tall is it up there? Oh, it's, uh, it's 4'16".

So this is gonna be— you're just gonna have high ceilings in there.

Oh yeah. This is gonna be the sunroom. So then we'll have a deck that comes out here as well. Kitchen. This is where my sink will be with my 2 dishwashers.

Aww. Double dishwashers to make up for mine.

And then I'm gonna have an 11-foot island.

You can just throw a lot of people in here and feed them. Oh yeah.

And that's my pantry.

Okay.

Oh, here?

It's a homesteader's pantry right here.

I store—

I mean, I do 5-gallon buckets.

Of food.

We're thinking we're probably gonna do like a set of stairs that goes up and we're gonna let them sleep up there.

See that ceiling? See that ceiling in there? That's the floor to the attic. I mean, they got to remove the 2x4s right here, but I mean, they're gonna have an attic. Up into the attic to sleep, right? This is my office. There's my library. So ladder, a ladder, or a— yeah, short stairs. This is the hot tub place. And stairs, stairs down, because if in the night The animals in the pole barn need my help. I can just walk straight out to them. If anything is cooler than the library, it's this. King Jonah.

Yeah, I don't know, it's scary.

Now those are some true friends. Round 2. Yep, tacos. We got 3 courses tonight. Mexican rice.

No, no, no, no.

Oh, Billy, you're gonna be the hit of the party. Brownie time. How's that brownie?

It was good stuff.

Bye-bye, neighbors.

It was fun.