So I’m apparently a master at changing plans. It must be a strong skill set because here we are changing things again. And not changing things we thought we were going to.
We thought we were going to move. Simplify, downsize, but I kind of panicked and there are a lot of reasons we shouldn’t do that right now. There will be plenty of time to change our lives later and it may even be better and more specifically what we want when our kids are grown and we don’t have to take all of their wants and needs into consideration. I’ve wanted to be “off grid” for a while and I’m not saying it can’t be done with children, it absolutely can. But mine are used to on-grid living and our planned move wasn’t going to be off grid because we didn’t want to radically change their lives. Plans change though and before we know it our kids are going to be adults. And maybe we will want to something else entirely. By the time they are grown perhaps I won’t want to necessarily be off grid… depends on my physical ability and a million other things I’m sure.
I had a pretty shit day yesterday. Woke up with a migraine and it just wouldn’t go away. I took medications, breathed in steamy water with essential oils, went outside and let the cool moist air do its thing on my sinuses, drank some coffee, cuddled some dogs. Along the way something finally relieved my head probably a little bit of everything, especially the dog cuddling. But in the process of being absolutely miserable my chickens, ducks, turkey, and goats had to wait until afternoon to get food. Which makes me feel guilty, it makes me feel like I have no business having animals if I cannot get out there to tend to them. Maybe we all have bad days like this… but I feel downright worthless at times when I’m struggling. I tell myself that these things happen and everyone is fine. It makes me wish I had a better feeding and watering system in place so that my animals could go longer but they’d probably just binge eat instead and still be without food. Do animals binge eat? My dogs cannot have access to food at all times. They’ll make themselves sick. But there is another factor… rats. Every winter rats set up their homes near the animal shelters and I really don’t want them having access to food more than they already do. Last year they started stealing eggs. We had to put poison out and that was nerve wracking. I was so worried that the chickens were going to get into it. And now we have naughty goats and I really don’t think poison is an option so they’re just going to have to wait for their daily meal sometimes I guess.
Our goats are old enough and big enough to breed but I cannot for the life of me tell when they are in heat. I’m going to have to pay closer attention every day and figure it out. I’m excited to start getting goat milk, that’s the whole reason we got those naughty little goat girls. They’re not all bad, but they will eat everything which is problematic when it comes to weatherizing coops. They’ve eaten insulation and paneling that was put up to keep them all warmer out there. We’re going to have to get more creative for next winter and probably just use solid boards for the inner walls. Another thing… they stay in the chicken coop instead of the shelter that we built just for them. I guess that will be ok…. we can use the goat barn for milking and kidding.
We have a closed off coop in the animal enclosure. It used to be for the chickens but it was a real pain to get into, to collect eggs so we closed it up when the new one was built. My daughter wants to use it as a play house, the goats get on the roof and scream haha. Maybe it will be a good place to keep some meat birds next year.
We also need to get some rabbit hutches build soon. We are going to be raising meat rabbits and a friend has a few that will be ready to go in about 4 weeks. I have no idea where to set them up at. They can’t be near chickens because they can get coccidosis. Goats are susceptible to coccidosis as well but we have not had any issues. I’m not sure if that means we’ve got healthy chickens or if we’re just lucky. Chickens carry the coccidosis organism in their digestive tracts but do not usually become sick from it. However, since they are carriers other animals are at risk. Coccidosis in rabbits is more severe and you want to limit exposure as much as possible.
Other news, I’m planning to start studying herbalism in the next few months. I’m very excited to start. I’m going to be doing online classes through Chestnut School of Herbal Medicine. There is so much that I don’t know and I want to learn it all the best way possible.
I haven’t been doing any YouTube videos lately. This is definitely a side effect of stress, a lot of things I was doing are now just chilling on the back burner or maybe boiling over. I’m not sure. But I know they are there and when I’m in a better place I’ll get back to it all. I’m glad that I have that freedom and that I have options. Maybe that’s why I struggle so much with everything in my life that I try to do… projects, work, crafty things, selling on etsy… all of it sooner or later gets shoved to the back burner and all that work I put in is really just for nothing because if you aren’t consistent even through horrible depression… I think your dreams just fade away for the most part. Or at the very least people don’t take you seriously, because you’re kind of flaky. I don’t know how other people do it all the time. Maybe they don’t have mental illness, maybe they have different supports in place. I’m just trying to focus right now on getting my mind and soul back into a rhythm that says “this is good, everything is ok” because I’m coming down from stress that has had me in fight or flight mode every time something else popped up.
And its the holidays. When I’m feeling crafty I’ve been crafting cookies instead of digital things. Like these super cute cookies.
My daughters really enjoy helping to decorate them too.
