The day of a farm wife

I’ve always said we live on a farm, not a ranch, despite the horses and donkeys. The majority of our energy goes to taking care of the chickens, goats, rabbits, a turtle, and the dog. I step out my back door to toss out potato peelings and crushed egg shells and it looks like a scene from “The Birds”. Instead of crows we have a large flock of Rhode Island Reds and Domineckers (hmm probably don’t have that last one right, but that’s what my husband calls them).

If you have to be wary of poop out the back door I think it’s more a farm.
Anyways! Yesterday I felt I had a day of accomplishment. I started the day making costumes for the church play this weekend. That may not sound like farm stuff, but my sewing machine had a workout rather than buying costumes. Then I gave my husband and son haircuts. Next I finished cutting all the squares I need for the quilt project I’m working on. This is my first foray into quilting and I can chalk it up to learning a new skill and repurposing out grows and fabric scraps. Oh! By this point I’ve cooked two meals. Next we harvested and plucked 4 roosters that were giving our big boy hassles. We rotated some of the “harem hens” to see if we have another good setter. By this point it was dark so we cleaned all the plucking area to try to not entice the raccoons (blasted things keep avoiding the traps and getting into the trash).
Once we moved into the house I did a good scrubbing of my arms up to the shoulder (no time for a shower, yet). Next I cooked dinner, put away dishes and cleaned those in the sink, and quarter the chickens. Did I mention I did all 3 of those at the same time? Or that I sliced my finger pretty good in the process? I set up plates for the kids and let my husband and a visiting friend that dinner was ready and jumped in the shower (half of that was cold after doing those dishes). Finally, I sat down to eat. Then bathed the kids.
Today I am canning those chickens, and starting to piece together the quilts.
Some people don’t seem to realize how much work goes into those “free eggs and meat”.
Lest you think I’m complaining, I’m not. I’m bragging. I feel a definite feeling of accomplishment. My 4 year old daughter ran up and told me I was the best Mommy ever. She also said the plucked chickens looked like rabbits. Now, let’s just see how today goes!

Is there an app for that?

Sure, when TEOTW comes we may no longer have apps and smartphones, but until it does I fully intend to take advantage of every resource I have available. Now that we have finally had a rabbit successfully breed (more difficult than their reputation would imply) it has crossed my mind that I would like a comprehensive app that would allow me to track all of our animals. I must say, that the apps available have left me sorely disappointed.
On the homestead (includes my parents and sister’s family) we have 4 horses, 3 donkeys, 5 goats, 3 rabbits, 16 hens, 1 rooster, 12 chicks, 1 dog, 4 pups, 1 parrokeet, 1 beta and 1 turtle – oh, and I might as well add the half dozen or so goldfish in the water troughs.
We also have a garden for personal use. With all of the above, I lose a bit of track when it comes to worming, shots, vet visits, hoof cleaning, baths (hmm, maybe I should add the 6 kids?), drenches, breeding, gestations, fertilizing, watering, mineral blocks, ETC.
SURE, I could put it all in my calendar. Some things are on there now. However, I am hoping for something that allows me to track (and keep a history) on individuals. How often has rabbit Alpha been bred?, how large are her litters?, how many lived? This could all be in notes within each “breeding” she has had.
I have found some comprehensive livestock trackers. Some of these costing as much as $50 or having monthly fees of $25, while there are even some for free and in the .99 range. Unfortunately, those are usually specific to cattle and only occasionally offer support of goats / horses. For what I would call a “ranch”, these are perfect. For a homestead or small farm situation they just don’t cover the variety found in common situations.
I have looked into database apps, and I can adapt one to cover much of what I want. However, I would really like to have it generate notifications to warn of upcoming events.
Hmm, not asking for much, am I?
So here’s my question. How many of you could use an app like that?
Do any of you have knowledge /resources to create such an app?
What capabilities would YOU like to see in a “homestead helper” app?

Prepper Souviners

I wanted to share my souviners from a day spent “working” on skills to be more self sufficient. First of all, we live on my parents property, but our houses are about 75 yards apart past a large metal building (quanset hut), over a canal, and past my sister’s house. In some ways it isn’t that far, but for my two little ones (who will be turning 3 and 4 this summer). There are many twists and turns that can lead to disaster. They walk the path at least once a day with me, but we’ve had concerns about them trying to take the way on their own – but there may come a time that they need to be able to do it. So, yesterday I called ahead and sent them on their way. With the comfort of cell phones I knew when they had made it. The plan is that through familiarity of knowing they are expected that they are less likely to divert from the path in an emergency situation.
While the kids were visiting their MawMaw, my husband and I took the shotguns to the back end of the property and set up some targets with clay pigeons. I found that the more I aimed the worse I did! My husband bought me a Winchester 20 gauge for Christmas (the first gun I’ve owned) and it seems that some days I’m great with it, and some I’m not. I did marginally better when he threw the targets. However, I moved to quick and didn’t get it settled correctly before one of my shots – and I have a colorful reminder today.

while we were out there i confirmed that we have loads of Broadleaf Plantain if we need it, and tasted a few leaves to decide if I’d be adding it to salads or just mote it for medicinal use. Although the clay pigeons didn’t have much to fear from me, I did shoot my first water moccasin. It was in the canal by our house and I got it with one shot! I didn’t get a picture of that one, but here is a six footer my husband shot this afternoon. It was in some grass about 10 feet from our door. He came across it while hunting eggs from our chickens in the deeper grass.

He’s a much better shot than me (with a lifetime of experience) and shot it through the head with a .22. Happy for me, he also found where the hens were laying their eggs!
While we had been in the back shooting we came across a great blackberry patch. So we took the kids back out and picked about 5 cups of blackberrys (called Dewberrys around here).

So today I made a blackberry cobbler. And a jar of blackberry syrup.

All in all, we worked on skills all across the board. What is amazing to me is how shocked some friends are of what I considered just a normal day.