I wasn’t going to do a “New Year’s Resolutions” post because, frankly, I’ve reached the age where I know nothing I say after three cocktails on December 31st is going to have any impact on my life or decisions on March 1st. I’ve learned that if something in my life needs improvement or change or more attention, it’s not grand resolutions that will get me there, it’s boring everyday habits.
But it can be nice to have goals, and in chatting with Homebrew Husband about how we did in energy conservation in 2014, I realized we do have some. So, these are the areas of focus for our homestead in the upcoming year.
Energy
Live within our on-site solar production in 2015. We ended up using about a months worth of electricity more than we generated from when our panels were installed in April 2014 through to the end of the year. When we installed the panels, it was expected that they would cover about 45% of our energy use. As it is, they covered 90% of our energy use over that time period.
That’s not terrible, but I think we can do better. Winter requires more light, more heat, more inside energy burn in general. But a huge part of our failure to maintain the most energy-thrifty habits was the constant cooking, dishwashing and laundry that accompanied the testing process for the book manuscript. The shift in focus went from, “do things in the most energy saving way even if it takes 3 extra minutes” to “don’t worry if you’re running seven loads of kitchen towels in the electric drier a week – just get the towels done.” So, moving forward in 2015 we’re eager to recapture that spirit of energy conservation.
Garden
The name of the game in garden goals is simple, simple, simple. My goal in 2015 is to plant a garden that is simple to maintain and simple to harvest from. Oh, and I don’t want to spend very much money on it. Whereas many years I get carried away and try to grow 4 varieties of everything, this year I’m really interested in a more back-to-basics approach that will keep me well supplied with stalwarts: salad and cooking greens, cabbage, broccoli and cauliflower, peas and beans – easily grown veg the whole family likes.
Knowing me, the seed catalog fervor will hit and all my good intensions will go out the window, but honestly, all I want this year is a simple garden that will keep me in greens without too much work.
Financial Stuff, Income Quilt and Savings
We are debt free and do pretty well in the savings department. Hat tip to Mr. Money Mustache for the constant inspiration to do better in this. But there is room for improvement and the first part of this year is the time to improve.
Homebrew Husband’s employment contract ends in September. While it’s possible that he’ll roll right into another contracting gig, it’s far more likely that he’ll take three to 6 months off from primary-gig paid work. We need to be fully prepared for that, and so you’ll likely see more No Spend Month or Eat From The Larder type challenges.
In addition to trimming what fat we can and using what we already have, focusing on expanding and strengthening our income quilt is important. I continue to struggle with appropriate, ethical monetization of this blog and finding a long-term way to resolve that is a key goal of mine this year.
Animals
This is a reverse goal: no new animals this year. None. Keep me honest here, guys. Cause here’s what happens. I buy half a pig and call dibs on the liver, then go on a pate-making spree before Christmas. I get so excited by working with fresh liver that this series of thoughts happens:
“I love pate. Oh my gosh I need more. I need a way to have truly fresh liver more often!”
“I wish I could have a pig. Novella Carpenter got a pig in Farm City. I could dumpster dive to feed my pig.”
“You cannot have a pig. Don’t even consider it. Not enough space, way too much work, and illegal in a big, noticeable way.”
“But…pate.”
“So get some rabbits. Rabbit liver is incredible. It makes fantastic pate. Remember that pate you had in that French-themed bistro? That was amaze-balls.”
“Oooh….possibilities!”
No! No! No!
And then I go find the Storey’s Guide to Rabbits (which naturally I already own from some prior round of some similar internal debate) and read it for 4 hours straight and start sketching the rabbit hutch I’m sure will work in our space when I should be sleeping. Bottom line: no new animals. No rabbits, no honeybees, no mini goats. Definitely no pig. Mason Bees and other beneficial insects like ladybugs are ok.
Your turn! What are your goals, areas of focus or (if you prefer) resolutions for this year?
2
Love this! We actually want more animals, but we’re just getting started on this whole homesteading/minifarm thing.
I definitely want to do better with my garden this year, and do it right. As in getting my seeds started properly, building my raised beds on time and prepping the dirt as soon as I can so I’m not putting my tomatoes in dirt in July and then losing the last few to frost.
We’re looking into solar energy too, but I think that will be awhile before we’re ready to dive into that. But who knows!
Happy New Year, glad to have found your blog and here’s to a great 2015!
Happy New Year to you, too! Have fun with the garden, even if the tomatoes freeze. 🙂
And I was all ready to read about how to raise a Thanksgiving turkey in your back yard. . . . I guess not this year!
I have a lovely top bar hive in the back yard and I’m really hoping that a swarm moves in, but I’m not going to buy a package of bees. I’m not.
No turkey for me! But you should get bees. You have a hive and everything! (Sorry, not helping, right?)
We raised a bunch of turkeys year before last, but skipped last year. Our daughter got married in our yard and had a reasonable objection to the sound of gobbling during the ceremony. We’ll get back to it this year.
I’m chuckling inside at the thought of goals. Honestly my main “focus” is to stay focused on working. It’s easy to get sidetracked when working from home, but Hubs and I are brainstorming ideas to help us get more done. 🙂 My “goal” is to make more progress then every before, even if I don’t know what that looks like right now. Good luck on your resolutions this year 🙂
As a fellow work-from-home’r, if you get sucked into email or internet blackholes, check out Freedom. It’s like $10, worth 10-times that at least, and is honestly one my biggest productivity tools.
I hear you on simple! I’m having our second kid sometime in July. Thank GOD we got the drip irrigation set up last summer or I’d have NO garden this year. I will still have a large garden, but I’m doing a bit more of willy nilly planting. I.E. I give my 3 year old daughter lettuce seeds (cheap) and set her loose. They go in the sun, partial shade, full shade and I get little surprises of lettuce all summer long as they take longer to germinate and grow in some areas. She has a full bag of calendula to plant this year again and we sure loved those lovely flowers as a surprise! Simple means less micromanaging, buying starts, doing more sprouts, growing food I actually like (not lemon cucumber ;S).
We lost our 5 chickens to a nasty raccoon so we will build a new coop in 2015. We thought our set up was good, but it found a way in. And my heart was broken. We’ll settle on 16 new chickens MAX.
I will finally plant all my potted blueberries and trees. Create 3 raised beds for thornless blackberries and raspberries. Transplant my nursery bed of strawberries. I eat pounds and pounds of fruit pregnant. I want so many berries it’ll be an issue.
Set up my season extension in September. We have two nifty little greenhouses with hydrolic sides. Plus some pvc/row cover, we’ll be set. We had several severe cold snaps.
We’ll also empty the house of JUNK and paint three rooms we’ve waited 3 years to remodel. 😀 Paying off debt is also a goal… So many goals!!
Congratulations! Kids doing the planting can be the best. I love your goals and energy – just promise me you won’t beat yourself up if it all goes sideways for a bit after baby #2? (Speaking as someone whose second kid didn’t sleep for 2 years.)
Basically this all should get done by July. If it isn’t done, it’ll have to wait!! This time around we have a much more robust support network. So I promise to compromise and not beat myself up! I have a lot of friends who don’t have gardens and have offered to help harvest and glean when I can’t. A close gardening friend is also expecting so we are going to share the 3 year olds and do garden playdates with friends so we can do somethings here and there. Thank goodness the garden is so forgiving and so flexible :D.
Oooh! I like the idea of giving toddlers/preschoolers cheep seeds to plant where they will. My son will be one and a half this summer, and I think I’ll be trying this. Thank you for the idea!
Congratulations on expecting #2. When planning the new coop, be sure and check out the design that Erica used. We built ours off of that design (thankfully the husband is very handy!), and I’m pretty sure it’ll keep out even the nastiest of raccoons (as well a coyotes, which we personally have a bigger problem with). Oh, and with the 3 nest boxes, I figured we could have up to 12 chickens (4 layers per box), but I’d only go with that many if they were able to free range (ours don’t much any more…..again, the coyotes….losing chickens to those &!%@!s makes me cry).
Barb
Great goals! I’m jealous of your solar panels. We have ‘renewable’ hydro here but it’s not energy independence like I’d like it to be.
I’m in the same boat with the variety thing, I grew 135 varieties last year which is sort of complete madness (& wrote this recently because of it http://familyfoodproduction.com/the-world-of-the-obsessive-seed-collector/)
I’m going to also *try* and grow far less varieties this year but more of each. Will power. Will power.
We will be getting more animals this year but only because we lost our chickens last year. Although I do contemplate nigerian dwarf goats (surely our dairy costs are high enough to warrant it 😉 )
Happy New Years to you & best of luck accomplishing these goals!
I have it on good authority that goats aren’t exactly a high margin addition to the homestead. 😉 The fencing costs alone…oooh, boy! But they sure are cute and goat cheese is the best. Happy New Years!
I too want to simply-fy, grow fewer plants, but in the name of science, grow something that I have never tried before.
I grew an heirloom potato last year called Makah ozette. It’s got a cool story and grew really well, and long into fall. Tastes great, too. Something to consider, you know, for science.
Life and Death, woman, don’t get a pig. Duck liver is also amazeballs and you have ducks. For eggs and compost and slug-eating-duty, I realize, but they do eventually need culling. duck liver for you. Chicken liver, too. Maybe try a mix as you have the opportunity?
No New Animals.
All that being said: Good choice of goals. I’m looking forward to doing more Eat From The Larder stuff, myself, and it’s always nice to have people to do them alongside. 🙂
Mine are:
Grow some veggies myself: kale, chard, various tomatoes, winter squash, snap/shelling beans, and hopefully get a perenial food bed started with a cutting of my father-in-law’s rhubarb plus some sunchokes and peppermint – yes, the idea is TOTALLY to have them duke it out and keep each other in check. Maaaaaaaaaybe also potatoes in a barel or similar, but it’ll all be pretty dependent on how many BIG containers we can get our hands on).
Track how much of which preserves we go through and budget to make enough of same (particularly tomato products and fruit butters, since that’s kind of where we live) to not need to buy canned tomatoes and similar from a store next winter/spring. Being able to grow at least some of the required produce myself would be awesome.
Majorly reduce our disposable plastics. I’m not saying ZERO because toilet paper comes in a plastic wrapper. But no more zip-lock bags, no more plastic tupperware (glass with plastic snap-on lids are a bit of a stop-gap, mind you), replace plastic containers with glass and (maybe) metal, as they wear out.
Put up a clothes line (or a series of drying racks, either way) now that we have a YARD + eat outdoors more often.
Sign up for a Meat CSA half-share (though I suspect that a full share would do us better, if I’m honest) and – hopefully – a Veggie CSA half-share as well (probably a full-share that I split with someone else, since a half-sized share once a week would do us better than a full-sized share once every two weeks).
Eat more beans-and-grains-based dishes in order to counter the cost of the Meat CSA and make the critter products stretch further. (Wish me luck on that one…) This will tie in nicely with trying to eat more From The Larder as well.
Attemp to lactoferment something. Probably turnips + beets.
Attempt to catch 1+ bass on Canada Day (when I don’t need a fishing license to fish in the Ottawa) and, if successful, quickly kill and carefully gut them appropriately.
Um, duck liver. I’m an idiot. You are totally right! But they’ve become kinda-sorta pets. Shit.
Good goals you’ve got! LF Spicy Turnips (pseudo-Korean-style) are my favorite.
I don’t think you’d have any trouble finding extra drakes in the summer or fall for processing. It’d be less personal if they’re not your own.
Totally true. It’s not ducks per se, it’s these three. I’ll check Craigslist in summer and keep my ear to the ground.
If your duck hens get broody and hatch out a bunch of drakes, it might be easier/kinda necessary to start making duck pate. When we got ducklings this year seven out of the ten were drakes…and then some large predator made off with one of our three hens. All of a sudden it was rather necessary (though really sad) to have duck for dinner.
Oh, wouldn’t that be wonderful! (Not the cull of the drakes of course, but the hatching….) We’ve actually contemplated getting a table-top incubator to help successfully get those eggs to chicks. Sorry about your flock. 🙁
LOL! That’s what stops me from getting rabbits (you, know, for raising my own meat)!
Barb
First of all: what a pleasure to have your blog back. We know you were working on a book, but you were missed. I started simplyfying last year, with fewer varieties. I got quite a few large packages of tried and true seeds and there is lots left. I never did get everything done, does one ever? but it was a decent garden. The intention this year is to slowly make the garden more age friendly. I feel almost ready to move from our acreage to the village and enjoy a small, intensive, deer proof garden with a longer growing season and never mind chickens. For reasons I will not go into moving is not an option right now. However, changing things here is. I feel as if summer slipped through my fingers last year with too much busyness. This year I am prepared: part of the income from increased reflexology work will be spent on hiring the boy next door for things like lawn mowing, weed wacking, and mulching. There may be other cooperations with those neighbours. Sharing resources is where it is at.
Thank’s as always, Ien. Your sustainable life has to be sustainable. So true. Hire out the manual stuff – weed wacking is young people’s work, anyway. 😉
More: green/wax beans, big tomatoes, sweet and regular potatoes, cilantro, strawberries
Less: winter squash (I like sweet potatoes better and they store the same), summer squash (really, who needs 12 hills of summer squash?), eggplant
Freeze things for later processing. I let too much stuff go bad before I get to it, as with a full time job, an hour one way commute every other day, and 3 year old, I can’t just live in the kitchen. Thinking particularly of tomatoes and sand hill plums.
Clean out my cellar and put some stairs in it so we can actually get down to it. Put in some shelves for storage.
Do my daily house chores every day. Exercise. Eat meat, fruits and vegetables, healthy fats, vinegar, spices, and not much else.
The freezer trick is a great way to go. I agree with you about things going to waste. Sometimes growing the stuff is easy; it’s dealing with it when everything is ripe at once that gets you. I’m also trying to get back on top of my chores. I feel so, so much better in my space and body when I enforce daily chores and daily exercise upon myself.
and fewer cherry tomatoes.
I’m with you on the “simple to maintain” garden! This year I am putting soaker hoses in each of my raised beds to make my life easier. I also plan to have better self control when it comes to seed purchases, we will see how that goes!
I wind soaker hose through all my beds. It’s the only irrigation method I use and I love it. My soaker hose has lasted for over ten years.
+2 on the soaker hose.
Being a rabbit breeder myself, I can definitely tell you that rabbit liver pate is amazing. I know you just said you do not want to get more animals, but if you should decide to get into rabbits, I wholeheartedly recommend colony raising your rabbits. It’s a wonderful, more natural alternative to traditional cage-raised rabbits. I raise French, English, and Satin Angoras in a colony and admin a group on Facebook for information related to colonies.
No argument from me on the flavor of rabbit liver! Thanks for the recommendations – I will definitely look into colony raising before making any rabbit-keeping plunges.
Ahum… You did say No New Animals… (just keeping you honest. You asked! lol) Sooo… glad your back online. I really missed your posts 😉 <3
Thank you for getting me to formulate and write down my goals for the year. I want to get a lot done this year, as I’m not pregnant nor have a have newboran and can actually—hopefully—get a lot done with my 1.5 year old! I really want to be growing a lot more of our food, to cut down our grocery spending so my husband doesn’t have to work so much overtime.
First off, I want to get more laying ducks (we only have two, and my husband eats 6 eggs a day!), and I’d like to figure out more ways to feed them more sustainably. I also want to make a mountain huckleberry and lingonberry hugel mound (thank you Snohomish Conservation District Plant Sale http://snohomishcd.org/plant-sale for affordable berries!). Speaking of hugelkulture, I want to make another hugel mound to grow vegetables on. I also want to grow more vegetables and other edibles around our fruit trees (green beans, peas, strawberries, nasturtium, etc.). I also want to plant some more edible natives in the woods behind our house. It’d also be nice to get some grape or kiwi vines going, but that’s low on the list of priories.
Last but not least: Kill the grass! Kill ALL the grass! … at least all the grass that grows around my fruit tress and in my garden beds. I hate you, grass, and we don’t have enough time/money to have sheep to eat you yet!
I am definitely scaling back the garden this year. Last year I planted way too much for just the two of us and gave away or lost more than we ate. Sad! So sad! We did get a garden pump installed in the garden area last year, so this year we’ll install the drip irrigation (yes, yes, yes!) which will free up a considerable amount of time. I’m retired, so time isn’t really an issue – but I went WAY overboard and it was just too much for me – so this year: simplify, simplify, simplify. Basil up the wazoo because I use a ton (pesto!), beans, peas, lettuces, broccoli, poblanos, tomatoes…small stuff. I planted three blueberry bushes last year, so hopefully will have some nice production this year. Bottom line though: simple, easy (easier) and calm – that’s what I’m seeking this year.
Prime growing season in Florida is end of September through March/April so I am planning to continue growing my lettuce inside because I really do get tired of having to buy from the grocer and it going bad quickly. So one goal is to grow more greens inside during the hell that is Florida summers. We have plenty of rain during those months but the sun just wrecks greens of any kind. Also searching for a better way to water my container plants, such as blueberry and lemon tree. We live in an apartment so it makes it difficult for irrigation.
My main goal is to keep our apartment cleaner than I usually do… it’s amazing how much two people can accumulate. Less clutter, a deep cleaning then a schedule of regular maintenance cleaning. We are almost debt free, car payment is being doubled or extra added each month as allows, once it’s paid off we will only have rent and utilities. I know Dave Ramsey is all about buying your own house, but I don’t think where we live it’s advisable. The company my husband works for is the only tech company here that employs software testers, so if his job were to vanish we would have to move and I certainly do not want to move and try to sell a house in the process.
I realize I am rambling.. so I will end with another goal is to buy and eat locally. Eggs and chicken have been marked off that list as we have an excellent supplier of organic, free range/pasture chicken meat and eggs. Next goal.. find beef and pork.
Awesome post, I hope you have a great year!
Simplify the garden:
Last year I finally convinced my husband to help me haul 20 yards of alpaca poo from a neighbor so that I could install my dream perennial border (the area is so rocky that you hurt your wrist trying to dig). I am now looking at this mountain of poo and realizing that a. I am adding way to much work to my already over-loaded schedule, and b. it’s too formal of a design for my yard. Now I need to haul the poo up hill to the sunniest part of my garden for veggies. **I plan to get this done before the growing season begins….
Animals:
Too funny. I added rabbits in the fall and had hoped to also add goats at the same time — so glad the goat deal I had worked out fell through! The rabbits have been more work than I had anticipated. I decided two days after bringing the rabbits home that I wanted to raise them in a colony. Not to derail your plans…. I enjoy caring for them more than the chickens. **I will not add goats until I have installed an automatic watering system for all of the animals. I am always hauling water, which is not fun, and it is stressful to constantly worry that they do not have enough fresh water….keeps me up at night.
De clutter my house:
The biggest thing on my list. Has anyone read this article: http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/decluttering-mantras-from-japans-leading-organizer-212794
It has changed my life. forever. ** If it does not spark joy — get rid of it. paper never sparks joy.
This is what I learned about simplicity last year: anything finicky or that requires daily attention can be bought happily and ethically at the farmers’ market.
My garden is still in the expansion phase, but last year taught me a huge amount about what I actually like gardening. I like perennials that establish root systems that do not require constant watering in August. I like hearty greens that take care of themselves, i.e. kale and chard. Lettuce and spinach is just too finicky in my new yard. I like things with a large harvest window that are not going to represent wasted time, materials, and effort if I leave it on the vine an extra day or three.
Oy! I need to learn how to be more grateful for what I have quit whining so much about how hard everything is. I’ve been so busy hating my life since I went back to work a year and a half ago that really let myself disengage from everyday joy of having a great family and truly a pretty great life.
Actual goals would include, actually getting stuff planted, even if it is just in pots, building the addition to the chicken run so I can have 4 more chickens and not feel guilty about not letting them have as much free-range time as I’d like (or get a Great Pyrenees so they can free range a bunch), spreading out the probably 40-50 yards of woodchips that a friendly arborist keeps dropping by for us…..and I don’t care if “but I was thinking I would bulldoze that area for (insert whatever),” cause you know that shit is going to get pushed out and probably won’t happen for another year or two, and at least the woodchips keep down the mud and/or weeds and keep the sorry excuse for a yard that we have looking so much tidier.
Oh, and I’m going to try and quit writing so many run-on sentences. 🙂
Barb
My hubby says “no new animals for me either”, no visits to the small animal flea market with out supervision. Last year it was no trips to the book store accompanied by a credit card. 2014 was the first time I ever bought animals, (except for our dogs) we have always been blessed with SPCA rescues.
( https://bernecho.wordpress.com/2013/03/05/sophie-the-pig/ ) Yes we got a piglet from them and this year we got a duck ( https://bernecho.wordpress.com/2014/09/08/spread-your-wings/ )
I am hoping he doesn’t consider bees animals.
Mimi
Yeah! Erica is back!
Great goals, but bees are totally do-able and often take a year to get really established (at least here where we have a shorter growing season) and start producing enough to harvest. Once setup they take very little of your time. I use a cheap Tyvek suit and heavy duty dishwashing gloves instead of a bee suit and bulky gloves as it costs less and stuffs small enough to fit into my veil/hat for storage. Besides, bees won’t break the “no new animals” rule being insects and all. 😉
Just wanted to add:
I do know that insects are technically animals, but not in the feed/water/check on daily category.
Glad you’re back to blogging!
Garden goal: I lost all my tomatoes to blit last year so I’m going to concentrate on the raised beds. And building a fence. none of this loose chicken wire around everything that I trip over.
Bees : NO net cost! Really, including that widget, no net cost! Sell the nuc colonies that make it through winter and go into honey production with the rest. You have 10 colonies for crying out loud. Do not make more. No I don’t care if they swarm another 6 times and you capture them, 4 bee hives is a hobby, 10 is another job!
Haha, I get you on the no new animals pledge! We sold our cows this fall and while it was a bit sad at the time, I am so happy to be free of the responsibility of making sure they had water, food, and stayed in the fence. Not to mention the stressful calving time.
Goal for year in a word: SIMPLIFY. I still consider myself as a beginner in most homesteading activities (except water bath canning) but I have grand ideas of what I should be growing, cooking, constructing, sowing, and creating. Back to the basics for me, how are we going to consistently keep things reasonably clean, house and possessions maintained, animals happy, and eat reasonably well while working full time. Before I start dreaming of rabbits, advanced rain water collection, homemade ravioli and all new hand made curtains I need to pull back. Bake some banana bread, clean consistently and not in a hurried frenzy once a week, walk the dog, grow 2 kinds of tomatoes.
One of my biggest garden goals is to move all of my gardening to my own yard. I’ve had a community garden plot for the past 10 years and we now live a bit farther away from it. It’s going to be a pain to get there, so I want to bid farewell to that plot and have all my gardens at home. We bought a new house this year and installed a lot of garden beds, so I think we can do it!