March and April Goal Updates

How has 2 months gone by?! Craziness! I started a temporary position, quit that position and earned a sweet and exciting full time gig already in momentum! I’m pretty sure this windy road is leading me to something pretty great!

And, here’s what all we have managed to achieve over the last 2 months:

1. Anniversary Plan! Plan something to commemorate being married for 20 years! I was a whopping 20 when I got married. We were young and broke. I’d love to be able to celebrate this anniversary in a special way! No updates yet! But, we would love recommendations! Anyone been to Mackinac Island? (Yes, it could be that I intrigued by the butterfly houses and biking there!)

2. Can 100 jars- Last year we only canned tomato sauce, green beans and a couple pickles. This year, I’d like to do more! Nothing to can, yet! But, we enjoyed opening a jar of raspberry jam last night for our rolls!

3. Grow 1,000 pounds of food! I love a lofty goal and I hope to have extras in order to offset the chicken feed bill! We still have lots of eggs and now lettuce is coming in fast!

4. Make 20 quilted things this year! Last year I really got into quilting. (I inherited my Mom’s supplies!) I’m hoping to have many extras to sell! I finished up a pretty red, white and blue Maryland quilt! I love it! This one will be for sale!

5. Get the bonus house ready to be rented! So, we got tired of looking at the neighbor’s house that has been abandoned for 10 years. We picked it up for a great price and now we need to fix it up! The yard is all cleared! I might have got the worst case of poison ivy rash in my entire life, but it’s looking so much better! And, we are planning on using the area to try to grow a huge pumpkin!

Used to be a huge pile of debris!

6. Go on a hike! This fall I taught outdoor school and hiked through the swamp daily. It reminded me how much I love hiking. Something about being outside and taking in nature. I think I’m going to change this from hiking to growing that huge pumpkin. We just haven’t been hiking! We do work out together it’s evenings though!

7. Finish our own bathroom remodel. We have been working on our remodel for too long! All that is left is new flooring and a new sink. I don’t mind that they’re out of style, but they’ve been in rough shape for a while. I’m putting a ✅ next to this! It’s so much easy to clean and the floor is nice and shiny!

I love this flooring! 

8. 2023 in 2023! We did this minimalising challenge before, but we are hoping to do it again. It’s purging the house of 2,023 things over the course of the year. That’s almost 170 things per month! We have been continuing to clean out so much! 811 things are out of here! I’m hoping to hit halfway by June!

10. Grow something new! Last year I grew a couple new flower varieties and found out how delicious honey nut squash taste! This year, I’m hoping to grow something new to us! I just started canary melons and a few varieties of pumpkins. My Atlantic giant pumpkin is below!

9. Grow mushrooms! I’m hoping to find newly fallen hardwood logs to inoculate. But, if not, I’ll find another way to grow some! Everything was innoculated! So now to wait to see if they grow!

11. Start a YouTube! I’m kind of nervous about this one. I’m not sure if my tech skills are up to par, but I’m going to give it a try! Between baking sourdough, making rugs, raising chickens and greenhouse growing. I’m still at it! I’ve shared gourd lamp making and the Mason bees checking out the tubes! I’m up to 84 subscribers!

Making newspaper pots!

12. Date a month! This is a fun goal. Like I stated above, we’ve been married quite a while. I’m looking forward to planning to do more fun things together. We are guilty of not doing that enough. We have weirdly enjoyed lots of dates lately! Shopping out of town, grabbing a few lunches/dinners and tackling projects together. I love our time together.

13. Make 50 flower arrangements! I love growing and arranging flowers. And, I love sharing their beauty with others! Come on Spring! I have a few beauties popping up in the greenhouse!

I love accomplishing goals! Checking things off of a list helps me! Comment with any goals that you are accomplishing! I love hearing about it! I’m rooting for you!

2023 Yearly Goals!

Oh my goodness, it has been so long since I blogged! Covid happened. My Mom’s cancer returned and we lost her after so many radiation’s, chemos and surgeries. I left teaching after a 17 year career. I did get a new greenhouse. And, that should have you caught up!

As for my goals for 2023, I’m feeling weirdly positive this year. So, here’s what I’m hoping to achieve

1. Anniversary Plan! Plan something to commemorate being married for 20 years! I was a whopping 20 when I got married. We were young and broke. I’d love to be able to celebrate this anniversary in a special way!

2. Can 100 jars- Last year we only canned tomato sauce, green beans and a couple pickles. This year, I’d like to do more!

3. Grow 1,000 pounds of food! I love a lofty goal and I hope to have extras in order to offset the chicken feed bill!

4. Make 20 quilted things this year! Last year I really got into quilting. (I inherited my Mom’s supplies!) I’m hoping to have many extras to sell!

5. Get the bonus house ready to be rented! So, we got tired of looking at the neighbor’s house that has been abandoned for 10 years. So, we picked it up for a great price and now we need to fix it up!

6. Go on a hike! This fall I taught outdoor school and hiked through the swamp daily. It reminded me how much I love hiking. Something about being outside and taking in nature.

7. Finish our own bathroom remodel. We have been working on our remodel for too long! All that is left is new flooring and a new sink. I don’t mind that they’re out of style, but they’ve been in rough shape for a while.

8. 2023 in 2023! We did this minimalising challenge before, but we are hoping to do it again. It’s purging the house of 2,023 things over the course of the year. That’s almost 170 things per month!

9. Grow mushrooms! I’m hoping to find newly fallen hardwood logs to inoculate. But, if not, I’ll find another way to grow some!

10. Grow something new! Last year I grew a couple new flower varieties and found out how delicious honey nut squash taste! This year, I’m hoping to grow something new to us!

11. Start a YouTube! I’m kind of nervous about this one. I’m not sure if my tech skills are up to par, but I’m going to give it a try! Between baking sourdough, making rugs, raising chickens and greenhouse growing, I’ll be looking forward to sharing our progress!

12. Date a month! This is a fun goal. Like I stated above, we’ve been married quite a while. I’m looking forward to planning to do more fun things together. We are guilty of not doing that enough.

13. Make 50 flower arrangements! I love growing and arranging flowers. And, I love sharing their beauty with others!

I hope that you’ve all been well, and I’m looking forward to finding my way back to blogging more!

Keep blooming!

You’re right, we aren’t living on Little House on the Prairie

Last month I had an unkind message sent to me saying that I needed to stop pretending that I live this little house on the prairie life. That hurt. It didn’t really hurt because I thought that I am living a lifestyle like that. It hurt because someone took time out of their schedule to to try to hurt me. But, good news, it gave me time to reflect instead.

So, even though we don’t live that yesteryear kind of life, we do have some similarities. (Weirdly enough)

1.I’ve always been transparent that we don’t have much land, but use what we have! We have less than an acre, but managed to grow and harvest over 1,000 pounds of food this summer!

Our main garden

The huge cushaw squash we harvested

Honey from our hives

2. We also don’t have a large amount of farm animals, so that’s true. We raise hens for their eggs and have a couple ducks for the same reason. We use our eggs, share some and even use them for making deliciousness like egg noodles!

Thanks ladies!

3. We don’t live solely off of our food, but we did can over 100 jars of food. Plus, we spun lots of honey, made so many loaves of sourdough bread, homemade noodles and lots of other yumminess!

Homemade bread!

Over 100 jars canned this year!

4. Everything we own isn’t homemade. But, the Mr can fix almost anything and he has been forging a lot! I have been working on teaching myself skills and I have been quilting, crocheting, making salves and lip balms and sewing in general.

All made by the Mr

I love our new curtain rods

Homemade gathering apron

Calendula salve

Crocheted dishcloths

5. We don’t have beautiful fields of wildflowers, but we do have a pretty certified wildlife habitat/monarch waystation/pollinator garden.

Pollinator garden

Raising monarchs

Sharing some blooms

6. I don’t have to cook over an open flame or wear an apron. But, I do wear an apron in the garden. I also hang my laundry anytime that I can. And, I’m big on reusing what we have avoiding anything disposable.

Sunflower gathering apron

Clothes drying the old fashioned way!

So, I figured I would end this up with my homestead kind of life photo:

So, let it be known that I do not live on a prairie, I live in a small town in Appalachia. I don’t have a huge garden or farm when compared to others, but it provides well for us. I own less than an acre, but use what we have well.

No matter what you have going on, who you compare yourself to or what others think about you, keep blooming where you are planted! 🌸❤️

2020 Goals update

I’m proud to say that even though our life has been much different, we have still been able to do so much! Here’s where we are at since the last update:

1. Get rid of more, use less and be more minimalistic– Since the last update, we have put work into cleaning up the garage. I have also been letting go of a lot of clothes that I have no idea why I was holding on to them. Over covid break the Mr. lost about 20 pounds and I lost 10. So, goodbye lots of poorly fitting clothes!

2. Do good, be a good person and spread kindness– Masks, masks and more masks. I made and gave away a ton of them. The money that I did receive will be going towards creating a free seed library for our town! I’m so looking forward to seeing people enjoying growing their own food and flowers!

I made hundreds of masks and many scrub hats too!

The future seed library! I’m so excited about this idea!

3. Grow food, flowers and enjoy new plants– This year I definitely had a bounty! My best growers were the cushaw squash, but I did get a monster Dickinson pumpkin! Plus, the pollinator garden turned out beautiful. I actually starting clipping blooms and sharing their beauty! Overall, I grew around 1,000 pounds of food!

We grew about 5 that size!

What a huge pumpkin!

Our beautiful blooms!

4. Be creative! Craft, forge, sew and do whatever makes our creative souls happy!– I spent so much time sewing masks, that I took a long break from sewing! I started baking everything sourdough, and I love it! I also started making my own calendula salve from my blooms! That’s fun too!

Sourdough bread

And the Mr. has been making so much in the forge too!

5. Travel, spend as much quality time that we can with our ever growing teen. Time is precious. There were no big trips, unfortunately! We spent most of our time here, enjoying sitting on our newly created patio. We did get to go to Northbay and do zip lining and a ropes course. That was a great time!

Our little patio that we made!

We had so much fun!

Secret goal! We accomplished this a month or 2 early! We are debt free! We are super excited about this! Read about it: https://littlellewellynhomestead.com/2020/02/16/were-debt-free/

Even though everything has been strange and different, the garden brought me to my happy place daily!

Never a dull moment in there!

The world is weird right now, but I know that we have found a lot to smile about!

Keep blooming!

Amazing photo of my sulphur cosmos by tydrew photography!

Finally, a new post!

Wow! June was my last post! I am back and hoping to start sharing more of what I have been up to!

Over the summer, the garden produced all kinds of huge fruits! I grew cushaw squash that were over 20 pounds:

Monster cushaw

My Dickinson pumpkin plant decided that one pumpkin was enough, but that pumpkin is close to 50 pounds!

It was so heavy!

And my newest hobby, after taking way too long to get it started, is making sourdough bread!

So delicious!

Over the weekend, I met so many people who wanted to learn more about our way of living. They asked questions about plants that we grow, questions about honeybees and chickens. They wanted to know how to grow more plants for the pollinators and how to grow milkweed. I loved talking plants and sourdough!

I met so many great people at the craft show this weekend!

I’m looking forward to get back to writing about how our goals have been coming along. I want to share some of our exciting plans for next year. And I want to start sharing more of my favorite things that we have been up to around here!

Keep blooming friends!

Walk through the garden 6/30/20

It’s the last day of the month, so I wanted to share what’s going well and what’s a work in progress!

View from the bottom (and newly added green bean teepee)

The onions are some of my best

Only a couple pretty tomatoes, so far.

The beans are flowering!

Cucamelons are enjoying the cattle panel

Delicata squash coming along!

A bumblebee kicked back enjoying the squash bloom

The San Marzano tomatoes are growing the best. The cucumbers are growing well, so far this year! I will totally admit that I am not a great cucumber grower! The flea beetles are being terrible pests this year.

What’s growing great in your neck of the woods? Are you dealing with some pests? Keep celebrating the positives and know that every year something will be a challenge. And, keep blooming! 🌼

Walk through the garden 6/25

Does anyone else see other gardens and then get worried that yours isn’t great enough? Like garden envy? Turns out that social media is pretty great at only showing the pretty pictures! So, before I show my pretty pictures, know that flea beetles are trying to eat everything in my garden. It has taken me replanting several squash plants so many times because either they didn’t germinate or something are them. Oh, and the ants are trying to farm aphids on everything. EVERYTHING!!!!

And now, here are my pretty pictures!

Pole beans (with lots of weeds in the background!)

Cantaloupe

Delicata squash

My first ever kohlrabi

San marzano tomatoes

Rows of Bush beans

My onions actually look pretty good!

I think the last several days of rain have helped to get the garden growing! Today my goal is to dig up the garlic! Anyone else dealing with some pests? Do your best to keep blooming!!

March to May Goals Update

So, I haven’t been updating in a really long time! My momma was in the hospital for all of April. It was scary times for sure. It’s like life was the same every single day! But, goals are still being worked on and checked off!

1. Get rid of more, use less and be more minimalistic– We spent a nice chunk of quarantine decluttering. We majorly cleaned out the garage. We cleaned out closets and even gave away the teen’s bike that he’s too big for. It’s been great knowing that so many are getting things that they want and we are getting rid of clutter!

2. Do good, be a good person and spread kindness– I made several seed giveaways, since seeds were hard to find. I also made face masks for sooo many people. I’m so tired of sewing them!

Seed share at the master gardener little free library! (We had one in our little free library too!)

I’m sure that I made well over 100 masks! And then some surgical hats too!

3. Grow food, flowers and enjoy new plants– I have planted out the backyard garden, the big garden and pollinator garden! Everything is growing!

The big garden

Pollinator garden

Backyard garden

4. Be creative! Craft, forge, sew and do whatever makes our creative souls happy!– I mainly spent my time making masks! The two guys in the house built our new patio area and the Mr. blacksmithed a kindling cutter and wood rack.

For chopping kindling
(And he put a new handle on that hatchet too!)

Firewood rack (with some of my old derby wheels!)

New patio area! (I love that I can see my boy’s fingerprints all through it!)

5. Travel, spend as much quality time that we can with our ever growing teen. Time is precious. Oh my! This is hard to achieve over quarantine times! We did take a couple little trips out hiking locally! Great times!

Rocky Gap

Dan’s Rock

Secret goal! We accomplished this a month or 2 early! We are debt free! We are super excited about this! Read about it: https://littlellewellynhomestead.com/2020/02/16/were-debt-free/

Overall, goals are still being checked off. I hope that you all are staying healthy and happy! Let me know what you’re growing at your place and if you’re still accomplishing goals!

Keep blooming! 🌸🌱💚❤️

Weekend walk through the garden 6/14/20

Hello all! I have been gone for a little while! I have been teaching from home and basically hibernating. But, I have still been planting tons of plants in hopes of harvesting lots of food! So, I figured that I would show how well some of the plants are doing!

Zucchini

Little Roma tomato

Ground cherries

Chili pepper

Delicata squash

Onion!

Blueberries

Tiny box turtle by the garden (eating a worm!)

It’s been a weird time, but we are still growing lots of food, and even have a goal of harvesting 500 pounds of food from our less than an acre! So far, we have a long way to go!

Keep blooming friends, even through 2020!

Exciting project and walk through the garden Wednesday!

Are you having a seed shortage where you live too? It’s hard to find anything that you may want to grow! I’m so lucky that I got my seeds early! But, I decided to share lots of my seeds in my little free library! It’s like a seed share!

I have organized it, so that hopefully people can find what they are looking for!

It’s out there chilling with the books!

I’m really hoping that it is used and that people are able to grow some of their own yummy food!

I also decided to walk through the greenhouse and gardens and get a few pictures of what’s growing so far!

Potatoes popping up! (And I saved the seed potatoes from what I grew last year!)

The onions are happy!

My first strawberry bloom!

Lots of seedlings slowly growing in the greenhouse!

And I just love the beautiful redbud tree! (and I can’t wait until the garden isn’t so naked!)

I need to start the melons in the next weeks and then lastly the squashes! It’s getting to be my busy time of year! Happy gardening and keep blooming! 🌱🌼❤️