In this informal home‑vlog, the narrator walks through a packed day of homestead and house‑move‑in tasks, highlighting a central decision point between following a group’s suggested method versus the narrator’s own approach. The first half focuses on securing their 700‑800 lb cow, Vanilla, for a pregnancy check, debating the use of a stanchion, gates, ratchet straps, and a makeshift squeeze board while attempting a blood draw to confirm pregnancy. The second half shifts to the family’s house‑move‑in preparation: painters arrive, an electrical inspection passes, a CO inspection is pending, and the crew installs locks, a rain‑chain gutter system, and other finishing touches (e.g., a “ram board,” floor‑prep, and a diving‑board‑style feature). Throughout, family members (Jonah, Randolph, Sally, Brant, Lily, Henry) coordinate chores, bike upgrades, and personal appointments, all under a ten‑day deadline before the certificate of occupancy is obtained and the family can officially move into their dream homestead house. The tone is conversational, pragmatic, and mildly stressed but optimistic, reflecting hands‑on problem solving and collaborative decision‑making.
Chapters
Happy day. This right outside my wind— my front door. Look at that. Did you guys get milk this morning? Yeah. That's it? No, we got another. Got some reservoir? Okay, good job. I'm glad we got the fence figured out. We've got to figure out Vanilla figured out, make sure she's getting pregnant or this isn't going to last. I got an idea to Secure vanilla. I mean, try to make a 700-800 pound cow stand still while you stick a needle in her tail. I got me some help. Painters are here. 10 days to moving in. We're claiming it today. Painters today, electrical inspection. Would we pass? I don't see why we wouldn't. That's 10 days until we move back into our house, which is now our homestead dream house. What was your question? I don't remember. You said, why aren't we using the stanchion? We're gonna use the stanchion, but there's no squeeze on it, so she can move around like this. That's what I learned the other day. I gotta have her tail hooked. We put gate on either side. Why don't we just ratchet strap her We have a conflict here because they have an idea to do this, but I don't think they know what's entailed. Yeah, so imagine this cow right here had its head locked. Okay, we have the headlock down, there's no problem. We have the headlock down. It's the tail end that she can move around and swing. Yeah. Okay, so I'm just gonna get— what's wrong with just getting two red gates and two T-posts? Because I have an idea. Squeezing her with that. I have an idea that you can use two things. What's your idea? Strapping a board. You gotta see what I'm doing. But how are you gonna mount the board? The stanchion is right next to the post. I'll mount the board from that post to the post that's behind it and then tie the tail end up. Part of this is they, they don't want to go through the effort. It's a little hard to trust their idea because I'm afraid they're just trying to cut corners. But every time we do something like this, it works. I don't know about that. Yeah. Way this already did not work. I'm not counting. I don't really like the idea of strapping her. We'll get her in the stanchion. We're now taking time to do— to go over the idea as opposed to just going to get the panels. You think that's easier? Two gates, 40 posts, and pounding it all in, setting the hole up and taking it all in. Yes. And then, uh, tying a gate there and then just using that gate as a squeeze bar. The gates don't fit in here. They're like out to here, the gates. This is maybe when I say you guys can go split wood and I go do this. You don't think the gates fit? We don't have a fence tester. He does. I found it. Okay, they found a fence tester. Okay, I have two choices. One, send them away to split wood and I do it my way, or keep them with me and do it their way. Okay, and then what happens if that doesn't work? It's gonna work. Then we'll do it my way. Sure. Okay, you want to go get the board and I'll start setting up the net around this to keep the other cows out? Sure. It's not bad. I like what this has evolved into. Good job, guys. If you want to, we can leave. I did not like the ratchet strap idea, but I was willing to do it, for the record. I like that they can exit, so that's why I think it should just be temporary. Okay, because then somebody picks on somebody, nobody's getting trapped, you know? Some subordinate cow isn't getting trapped. Don't get her excited. Get her in through here. All right, good. She was running away with me. It's perfect. Try to get her hip bones, Papa. I'd rather get her stomach because she'll— I'm afraid she'll go under it. Gosh, let's put it down. It's fine. Let's fall down. I'm sorry. We've got her head locked. We've got what we call a squeeze bar. You have one solid wall on one side and then a bar on a hinge. We used to do this when we milk— when we had the stanchion. Stanchion. Jonah, this has already come undone. Was this just a hook? Yeah. Okay, hopefully that'll hold. Tie it up at the top. No, the top. It doesn't work. It doesn't work. There's gonna be more pressure. The lower you go down that pole, the harder it is to hold. I don't know, physics. I think it's poopy right where I need it. All right, I gotta get something to wipe her tail. Do you guys have cloths and soap in this truck? Uh, yeah. No, I think Sally— all the claws are still there though. Hey, what? Can one of y'all come help me hold the tail? I have never done this. I've always been able to see signs of mating. Honey's kind of discreet too, so it gives me hope that Vanilla might actually be pregnant. Usually it's more obvious. Bull dances with them for 3 days. It's very obvious. How do you know where you're going? There's— I think it's just in between the crack right there. Then you're not gonna see a vein in there. Try right in that crack then. Right there in that crack. That— how'd you do that? I don't know. Did he get blood? Yeah, he got blood. There you go. I must say, that's enough. All right, just leave it to the, uh, the bold kid. Let's go do this test. There's like a crevice that I guess you just blindly go into. I was trying to feel a vein, but I guess you can't feel a vein. Can't feel a vein on me, that's for sure. That sits there for 20 minutes. Hopefully we don't need any of this EDTA stuff they're talking about. Yeah. It's just the C-line and nothing below it, but this is just whole blood. This one has the other stuff mixed in with it. So what does it mean if it's just the C-line? It means it's negative. If it's just the sealant, but you have to give it 20 minutes. All right, Randolph is in the back. Randolph, hey, we have CO inspection tomorrow. You think we're ready? I think we're getting pretty dead gym close. I think we're gonna have to put the door— the locks on these doors. Loft door? What do you think? No, these doors. They probably won't pass us with that, will they? Let's put those on. So they were painting out here Yeah, it does. Looks good, doesn't it? Yeah, it does. Hey, why you got a shirt on? I got that sweater started. All right, guess we're doing all the projects together today, aren't we? We tackle this? Sure. Let's tackle this. The more we can do for the cleaning people, the sooner we can get in here, Jonah. Let's set you guys up here. Is that a pot filler? Yeah. What? We don't get anything. It's on the stove. Oh my gosh, we don't have to fill up a stove in the sink. There's a faucet above the— where it's going to be. Oh my gosh, that's going to save so much time, just that right there. Hey, look who's there. This is starting to turn into a real home, isn't it? 10 days. Is that an easy or hard job, Brant? It's a little bit rough. Putting in the coated locks. All right, pretty sure that's gonna have to get done for tomorrow's inspection. CO. Let's get this paper up. This doesn't matter for CO, but trash comes tomorrow, so we'll have this out to the curb. I think once the painters are done, we'll be able to get the, uh, the, the, what you call, uh, what do you call that? The ram board. We'll get the Ram board up and we'll be ready for the floor guy coming this Thursday or Friday. The four-wheeler diving board. They got a diving board and then they got the high dive. Somebody gonna do the high dive? We can. Our hot days are numbered, y'all. Winter's coming. All right, go ahead, Lily. Kids are swimming. We're gonna take Jonah to get his bike. He upgraded his mountain bike. REI let him turn in his old bike, full refund, and upgrade to a dual suspension. It was $700. Yeah, that's pretty good. You ready, Henry? You gotta get strapped in. Look, look what brother got. You like it? We're on a mission now, aren't we, Randall? Kids are busy. This is a rain chain. This is what you do when you have a gutter that's gonna have to go right down in front of everything and not nice and tidy off to the side. We passed electrical inspection today. That means we can call in the— I'm not stopping it. Means we could call certificate of occupancy tomorrow, which means legally we could move in. You got it. And what we're going to do is install a box right there and drains, drains down into that. It's good for when you have— it's— you need a gutter like right in the middle of the house like that. I better be real pretty when it rains. It's about like a little sound, but yeah, it might be a little waterfall feature probably. That was a big day on the homestead. 9 days until we get into our house and we got big homework, you and I. We've got to get, um, in order to get our inspection, I missed the call for today, so it's gonna have to be the next day. But we got a lot of work to do to get ready for it, including burying a gutter. Burying a gutter. Jonah is his 1-year checkup from his hip replacement surgery tomorrow, and Lily has a special riding event with friends, so it's gonna be a big day as always these summer days. Happy day.
