Find a comfy chair, pour a cup of coffee and enjoy reading about our diary from May 10 - June 10, 2001 that was featured in the Farm and Ranch Living Magazine. When you're done with this you may be interested in the Diary Update Farm and Ranch featured on their new web site ( http://www.farmandranchliving.com) for May and June of 2002.
Week 1
Week 2
Week 3
Week 4
thanks for coming by,
Debbie & John

Profile –

John and Debbie Burns homestead on 55-acres aptly named Beulah Land in northeastern Texas along with their three lovable Labs and one small mixed breed dog. John supports the homestead with his home based Web design and hosting business while Debbie adds with her soap making business. The homestead produces and sells natural meat from chickens and rabbits, eggs and organic vegetables along with Dwarf Nigerian Milk Goats and White New Zealand Rabbits as breeding stock and/or pets. Debbie kept this diary from May 10 – June 10, 2001.

May 10, 2001
Welcome to Beulah Land, our north Texas homestead, just outside of Bells. We are located close to the Oklahoma border and have scenic views from every direction on top of the hill where our house sits. Our part of Texas is green and hilly, with trees and wildflowers blooming wildly in the springtime. The summer heat and dryness will come later, but right now spring is in the air and everything is growing.

Our homesteading adventure (living off the land as much as possible and as simply as possible) rather evolved on it's own for us. It began with a love of the land and all living things. I was raised in the country but John wasn't. He was a city boy all the way through – or thought he was until we moved out to our country home, almost 8 years ago. Now it's John who's eyeing all those old tractors and farm equipment. His newest dream is to restore an old tractor. Mine is to grow vegetables year round.

We originally bought only 5 acres with the house, hay shed and workshop with attached stable. The stable and round pen, along with the views, is what sold us on this house. We were concerned with the distance (65 miles one way) from John's place of employment but John felt it was worth the risk. 3 years ago we were able to purchase 50 more acres to add to our homestead and two years ago John began working from home full time, relieving him of the daily 3 hour drive.

Our first ventures into homesteading were very common ones for "city people" who move to the country – a horse and chickens. We were blessed to have the horse until this past January and the chicken venture has grown along with others we've added. Homesteading has become a lifestyle with us and not just a word.

We love to see our grandkids' expression when they hold a newborn baby goat or gently touch a newly hatched chick. There's nothing to compare with that. We currently have four grandchildren. Our son, John, Burns, Jr. and his wife, Jennifer, have Christian (7) and Hayley (4). Our daughter, Debbie Jean and her husband, Tommy Miller, have twins, Kate and Maggie (7) and will be having our next grandson in August. Each grandchild has something special they love to do while visiting – Hayley loves to milk the goats; Maggie to collect the eggs; Kate to love on the dogs; and Christian to feed the goats.

Today started very early, but John did get to sleep in until 5:00. As always, he awoke me with a cup of coffee. Our days start slowly with our own personal devotion time and then pick up the speed of a snowball rolling downhill! Today was no different; the list of chores was extra long as we are preparing for our annual Homesteaders' gathering this weekend.

Our daily morning chores began with feeding the animals. John tended to the four dogs, BJ, Bud, Heide and Burnsie while I headed out to the barn (converted from the stable). There's no doubt its morning time – all the goats were crying, "Feed me! Feed me." It sounded like they had not been fed in months, and they were afraid that they might actually starve to death before I could reach them. Feeding began with the White New Zealand meat rabbits, four does and one buck.  These are our breeding stock so they have names – Jane Doe, Snowflake, Prissy, Bluebonnet and Rusty. The offspring are not named (except for "supper" and "lunch", etc.). We currently have one meat chicken in a "hospital" cage. I accidentally set the feeder on her and injured her leg. I help steady her until she can gain her balance to eat. The other 48 meat chickens joined in the "feed me" chorus and were cheeping as loudly as they could, which caused the laying flock beside them to scatter around the hen house. There's nothing quiet about the homestead in the morning; everyone wants a piece of me at the same time.

The rabbits and chickens quieted down as they gobbled up their food but all the goats were demanding their turn. It's like a circus extracting the two milking does from the others in the adult doe stall; everyone ran out and back in again when I dropped the feed in the pan. I quickly grasped Rhinestone, who I milk only once a day now and put a leash on her to go to the milking stand. While I milked, John fed Raleigh, our herd sire and watered all of the animals. John bottle-fed all three baby goats while I cleaned up the milking pans and strainer.

Well, that's how our mornings usually begin! John spent the rest of the day working at the computer. My day circled around the homesteading needs, inside and out. I picked the veggies for a customer order as well as for our own lunch, and hung clothes on the line before running to the grocery and feed stores. The day ended as it began, with milking and feeding.

May 11, 2001
Life here is never dull or boring. This morning after feeding and milking we split up the other chores to be completed for the Gathering tomorrow. John took care of the yard mowing and I mowed some of the goat pastures. Heide, our female Black Lab, took her job of watchdog very seriously today. We always check when she's barking, but she was insistently barking down the drive and we saw nothing out of the ordinary. Finally, in frustration, I went over to talk to her and looked down into the cattle guard. I saw what she'd been trying to tell us – two snapping turtles were stuck in the cattle guard. They crawled down in there and could not get back up. If left, they would die a very painfully slow death and be eaten by the fire ants. John climbed off the riding mower to help me move the turtles on their way down to the pond. Good ol' Heidi!

This was the last full day of prep before our Homesteaders Gathering. The two hams were waiting in the back refrigerator along with the brisket that John had marinating. I boiled eggs, ready to devil at the last minute and baked a Pina Colada cake, made with our soft goats milk cheese. Everyone brings a covered dish – true potluck style, whatever comes is what we eat. That's life on the edge! We provide the meats, a pot of beans, paper goods, tea, limeade and some soft drinks.

Housecleaning, mowing, trimming and food prep were our focus for today. Tomorrow we will reap the fun of today's workload. That waterbed will sure feel great tonight.

Some friends stopped by to borrow our tiller and admire the six-week-old baby goats.

May 12, 2001, Saturday.
The Third Annual Homesteaders Gathering at Beulah Land! This was one of the best and busiest days of our year here at Beulah Land. We love homesteading and we love fellowshipping with other homesteaders, sharing new ideas and thoughts. Yesterday's main focus was work, but today's was fun! Our Gathering is open to any homesteader or homesteader "wanna-be", so there were several new faces this year.

For our first group activity of the day, Marvin Brown introduced his wife, Waynetta Ausmus. Both are professional storytellers. Waynetta wove the tales, "How the Box Turtle Got the Cracks on His Shell" and "Three Billy Goats Gruff Go to the Burns' Gathering" as twelve other adults sat spellbound. Waynetta was definitely the highlight of the day for us!

Our dining room table groaned under the weight of the "pot luck" dinner – ham, brisket, deviled eggs, two cakes, "green gumbo", corn casserole, fresh fruit, homemade bread, goat cheese spread, crackers, 4 bean soup, bags of chips and dip, corn on the cob, sliced tomatoes, baked beans and potato salad. What a glorious feast! Homesteaders know how to eat, if nothing else!

After a barn and garden tour and bottle feeding the baby goats, we trooped back inside for several demos - a comfrey salve making demo by Sharry Buckner; spinning and carding wool by Steve Casey; and playing on the hand-crafted hammered dulcimer by Steve also. Outside, some of the men enjoyed a game of horseshoes. Talk, talk and more talk, all day long. Thirteen people, many of who had not met before, hated to part by the end of the day.  All in all, it was a very successful Homesteaders' Gathering!

May 13, 2001
Happy Mother's Day to all the mothers out there!

It was hard to drag ourselves out of bed for feeding and milking this morning. One of the benefits of having milk goats is the forced discipline it requires. They require feeding and milking regardless of what day it is or how much you want to sleep in! I have two does in milk right now. Rhinestone freshened last Sept. and is milked once a day. The other, Sunshine, was a first freshener on March 30 and is milked morning and night. She is giving ½ gallon a day, which is really good for a Nigerian Dwarf, especially a first freshener. We do our best to maintain a grade A home dairy – correctly sanitizing all the utensils and cooling the milk within a 30-minute period. It's a lot of work every day, but one taste of the milk makes it worth it! Not to mention playing with the baby goats – Nigerian Dwarf Milk goats are fantastic dairy animals, but also make wonderful pets due to their small size and sweet personalities. Four of our spring kids will be for sale after weaning. It's so hard for me to sell those babies, but I know I can't keep them all.

Our day's plans are never set in stone as they can change by just going out to the garden or barn. Today we found an injured meat chicken that required butchering before church this morning. Since we had to butcher one anyway, we went ahead and butchered the "hospital chicken" as well. Leg injuries are not uncommon in the Cornish Cross meat chickens. Thank goodness we hadn't slept in very long, just until 5:45 am, so we were only a little late to church. The meat chickens and the laying flock both free ranged in the pasture and main garden during the daytime, eating bugs and grass.

Either some of the chickens took the day off or we had another snake visit the nest boxes – only 8 eggs tonight. We usually collect a dozen a day. Last week we killed a snake laying in the hen house, full of eggs. I hate to kill the snakes because they eat the mice, but we draw the line when they start eating the eggs. I put some ceramic eggs in the nest boxes just in case it was a snake.

Monday, May 13, 2001
Another brand new week! And another busy day. Before chores, I answered some email inquiries on our meat rabbits and chickens along with some for the soap business. A customer came today to pick up eggs and other farm produce and I attended a Master Gardeners' monthly meeting. I ran to a nursery for organic pest control – the grasshoppers and caterpillars are coming in full force. The chickens were back up to 14 eggs today so yesterday's drop must have just been a fluke. The gardens are bursting at the seams with results from the spring plantings. Supper was a veggie feast – peas, broccoli, steamed turnips, salad with arugula, spinach, cress, red sails leaf lettuce and red onions. It was hard to find room for the left over brisket to go with it.

The customer who came today is one that makes it all worthwhile. She is always so respectful of our time and home. Her boys are well-behaved young children. And she realizes the work involved in producing the farm goods and expresses such kind gratitude for it.

This evening John and I actually took time to swim for a few minutes before watching the sun set. Sometimes we have to make ourselves stop and realize life cannot be all work. It's hard when there's always another project, or ten, waiting on the back burner.

Tuesday, May 15, 2001
Each day I try to focus on a major area of the homestead and today's focus was the gardens. Of course, as any gardener knows, it's a never ending story! We constantly fight the pasture Bermuda grass encroaching on our gardens – chopping it with the hoe just spreads it even more. So I've been working my way down the garden rows mulching heavily with newspaper, feed sacks or cardboard boxes, anything heavy enough to stunt the grass' invasion. On top of this we layer chicken bedding and old hay from the goat housing. We never have enough mulch, time or energy it seems. Today I hoed several rows and pulled the grass out by the roots, then hand watered a few new rows to help germination. I watered with drip hoses over already mulched areas, such as the tomato beds. The unmulched ground is as dry as if we'd never gotten rain last Friday.

Our gardens are spread throughout the yard but our main garden is on the east side, between the goat pasture and the baby goat area that is in our side yard. The strawberry bed, blackberries and herbs are in the yard gardens, to the north and west. These gardens are in raised beds so I can plant during the wet spring and fall times.

Our compost piles are all over as well. We use various methods of compost piles, from the very basic 6 x 30-foot pile in the main garden to the black plastic compost bin we had when we lived in town. We keep two separate compost bins just for rabbit manure and bedding. I planted my extra seed potato in these bins and the potatoes just love it. We compost with earthworms under the hanging rabbit cages. The rabbit droppings and hay feed the worms. Today I fed the worms some of our kitchen scraps. They need egg shells and coffee grounds to help with digestion. The worms also love banana peels. This spring I taught several Junior Master Gardener classes at our local elementary schools on vermi-composting as part of my Master Gardener volunteer hours. Worm boxes are one way even an apartment dweller can recycle. The worms help supplement our homestead income as well – the proceeds from worm sales paid for our new living room curtains. Part of homesteading to me is that the homestead helps to provide for itself.

May 16, 2001
Off today to help Waynetta trim her goats' feet and to check on her nursing doe. Waynetta and Marvin bought three of our goats this spring, one with a three-day-old kid. Waynetta and I spent a lot of time talking about everything and anything and rehashing the Gathering. It was such a refreshing visit.

Sometimes John and I wonder why there is such an interest in homesteading, or as we think of it, simply living simply. We get a lot of inquiries from our homesteading web site (www.beulahland.com/homestead) – questions on specific areas and just talk and dreams of homesteading. When we look around our place, we see just our lives; how we live everyday. We're not a major farm concern, nor do we produce one particular crop, yet we have seen, heard and felt a tremendous amount of interest from people on how we live and what we do here. I started keeping a homestead journal a few years back, to go with the garden journal and the goat journal, and in the journal I started listing all the visitors to Beulah Land. Just a quick glance totaled 115 people who have come to Beulah Land at least once in the past two years alone. That's not counting the repeat visits.

Before church tonight, John and I made time to sit on the back glider, watching the butterflies dancing around the flowers and the birds swooping down for bugs. Each year we have more birds and butterflies up close to the house, one of the best benefits of being organic. We're very protective of our natural pest controls, never killing the "Charlotte" garden spiders nor the non-aggressive wasps and putting up more bird houses and feeders.

May 17, 2001, Thursday
John took time away from the computer work to till in the main garden, do some brick work on our new sitting area and trim. I mowed the 1/3-mile long driveway. We worked in the earliest part of the day, as our Texas heat comes in early in the season.

It was so windy today, which is not unusual, that the clothespins barely held the clothes on the line. When the temperatures rise in the summer, I hang the clothes out overnight to avoid sun light damage to the material. During the dead of summer we seldom have dew overnight to dampen the clothes.

Made two batches of soap today, goats milk peppermint and lilac, making the house smell wonderful! I use the cold process method of making soap so it's not cooked upon the stove, but it's still hot work in a west-facing kitchen in the afternoon. The soap will sit in the molds for 24 hours and then I'll cut it and place it on the drying racks to cure for four weeks. I plan my soap making to allow the dining room to be used as the soap curing and drying room.

top of page

Diary – week 2
May 18, 2001 Friday
We started the morning working outside again today. John finished tilling in the garden and trimming. He gave me a special treat by doing all the feeding so all I had to do was milk the two does for morning chores.

I made mozzarella cheese today. We love the goats milk cheeses and I make them as often as possible. The whey left over from the mozzarella is boiled to make ricotta cheese – two cheeses from one gallon of milk! The whey remaining from the ricotta is fed to the chickens.

I make mostly soft or soft molded cheeses except during the winter time when I have enough time to invest in the hard pressed cheeses, such as brick or farmer cheese. Late fall is perfect for making goats milk fudges for great Christmas gifts.

I can't believe how fast the time is flying. It seems like we never finish our "to-do" list and there's always something more to add to it. This year is the first year I've had time to make a bed just for flowers. We have sitting areas facing every direction and the flower bed sitting area (or "haven" as we like to call it) faces north. John worked on the brickwork for the haven yesterday but ran out of time and bricks to complete it. Some friends of ours are recycling some bricks – they pulled them out of their yard and we're putting them in ours! We hunt for any way to recycle or reuse. We have to plan a trip to pick up more bricks, possibly next week.

Saturday, May 19, 2001
One of our best egg customers came to pick up 3 dozen eggs this morning.

We spent a wonderful day with the F&R photographer, Ray Bankston and his beautiful wife, Joyce. Both of them are a wealth of knowledge – I picked Joyce's brain about canning and past country life.

Joyce and I headed to the garden and stole a few new potatoes for lunch. John barbecued some of our home grown chicken and I added a big packet of our potatoes, turnips and onions in foil on the grill. While the veggies were melding together, I steamed some cabbage to finish out the menu. John ground wheat berries and I made wheat bread and put into the sun oven to bake. John cultivated the corn with the big wheel cultivator. Thunderstorms with sprinklings of hail in the early evening gave us 1 inch of much needed rain – the rain barrels are full again.

Sunday, May 20, 2001
John fixed breakfast – bacon, fresh eggs and toast with strawberry jam. I cut soap into bars and put on the drying rack before church. We had a special singer for service today. After church, a couple of friends dropped off two pet rabbits they could no longer keep. I occasionally substitute teach at the local elementary school and met these friends through school. John took care of everything except milking and meals, giving me the day off – wonderful relief for a tired wife!

Monday, May 21, 2001
As John worked most of the night last night I did all of the morning chores and he caught up on some much needed sleep. Another thunderstorm came in this morning about 5:00 am, bringing more rain and a greatly appreciated cool front – temps today in the high 60's and windy.

I made bread again while John worked in his office. I finished reading (for the umpteenth time) "The Book of Stillmeadow" by Gladys Tabor and started on another one. Some books are like old friends; I just can't let them go. Later on I finished crocheting a string bag made out of rug yarn and glued a few roof shingles on the dollhouse I've been working on for the last year or so. I find there is little time for hobbies, but I don't want to completely give them up. I answered several emails concerning homesteading. It was a slow day, which we both needed to catch up on some rest. It was such a relaxing day, a rare treat in the springtime here.

For supper I picked Swiss Chard, spinach, onions (cooked with a few bacon strips) and turnips (steamed with butter) from the garden. Added some cooked chicken, homemade bread, strawberry jam and pickled beets – what a feast!

Tuesday, May 22, 2001
So glad yesterday was a slow day – today made up for it. After feeding I weeded gardens and topdressed the strawberry bed with composted chicken bedding. Our chickens compost everything for us in the "chicken run" – all of our kitchen scraps (except the coffee grounds, egg shells and banana peels that go to the worm beds) and excess garden vegetation go into the chicken run. What they don't eat, they scratch into the bedding and it decomposes nicely. John ran the tiller in there over the weekend to help the decomposition.

I pulled the remaining sugar snap pea vines, picked the peas off to shell and cook for lunch and fed the vines to the rabbits and chickens. Picked lemon balm and spearmint to dry to put into soap later. Mixed up an organic bug spray (citrus oil, garlic, molasses, few drops of soap, seaweed and rainwater) to help knock out the grasshoppers on the turnips. Planted 6 pepper plants and the sweet potato slips I had started on the windowsill. After his workday, John finished raking the yard and mulched one of the asparagus beds with it. He weeded the bed before mulching. I crocheted another string bag for a friend. Brushed Sunshine after milking her. Did laundry and hung on the line. Our dryer died a few years ago and we decided against replacing or repairing it as a way of conservation as well as keeping one more item out of the landfills. The air cycle still works so we keep it for guests to fluff up their clothes. We don't mess with that for our own clothes.

I switched the rabbits over to a more natural diet – less pelleted feed and more greens/veggies and hay. One doe is not a happy camper about this and is very vocal about it.

Wednesday, May 23, 2001
Well, the dogs did a good job of keeping us awake last night. John let them in and out 3 or 4 times and went out to check with them.  We thought it was because air was so clear that the coyotes howls carried from far distances to aggravate the dogs but we found dog prints in the garden this morning. The prints stopped before they reached the hen house and rabbitry – good dogs! Who needs to sleep anyway?

Zack and Victoria went home to Suisan City, California today. Zack and Victoria are Flat Friends who came to visit us last fall. They represent two real students at Crescent Elementary school who are learning about other areas in the United States. The Flat Friend idea is based on the book, Flat Stanley, a story about a boy who is flattened by his bulletin board one day and finds he is able to fit into an envelope and can go visiting via the postal system. Our Flat Friends went from here to Virginia, Florida and Ohio to visit John's scattered family and then came back to us last month. They had many great adventures, including a trek to the mountain tops around Roanoke, Virginia, a day with homeschoolers in Ashley, Ohio, and even got to go behind the scenes with John's stepdad, who is a security guard at the Kennedy Space Center. Flat Zack and Flat Victoria are taking home a lot of "loot" with them – a full box of information, photo albums and souvenirs, including space ice cream – wow! John's Mom even made up Flat Friend images of two of John's sisters, Barbie and Juli (the hosts in Ohio and Virginia). Flat Juli and Flat Barbie took the trip back with Flat Zack and Flat Victoria to keep them company in the box. It was fun hosting the Flat Friends and we were sorry to see them go!

Donk, the neighbor's white guard donkey, passed by with his small herd of cows this morning. We lease 49 of our acres out for cattle and sometimes the neighbors cows come to visit (we're not responsible for the fencing). We're just happy Donk comes, too. Donk's a beautiful sight, startling pure white on the green hills.

I shredded the mozzarella cheese I made the other day and made lasagna. The mozzarella, ricotta, Swiss Chard (steamed), tomato sauce, garlic, basil, and egg were all from our bounty – we feel so blessed. Baked a Blue Berry Pudding Cake, which we served warm with vanilla ice cream. Sometimes it is more difficult than others to be diabetic!

May 24, 2001, Thursday
A neighbor friend and egg customer came by for breakfast this morning. It's always good to visit with Jim.

John took the morning off from computer work to help finish planting the main garden – more green beans, corn, amaranth, bok choy, and asparagus bean. I sprayed citrus oil again for grasshoppers and watered the newly planted sweet potatoes.

May 25, 2001, Friday
One of our favorite customers came to pick up farm produce. John went to the hospital to be with a friend whose husband was having surgery. I shredded newspapers for the worm bed and a new compost pile. The rain barrels are getting low with all the hand watering we've done in the raised bed gardens and potted plants on the patio. Hopefully rain will come this weekend.

John took the afternoon off to be with me. We drove up to pick up feed at our favorite feed store, Art's Saddle Shop, in Denison. Friday night is "date night" for us. We don't always get free, but we try to keep Friday night for just the two of us. After all the chores we watched some old movie videos (no TV antenna by choice), pigged out on popcorn, and played gin rummy.

top of page

Diary  week 3

May 26, 2001, Saturday
We replanted the corn after finding crows eating the seeds today. This time we also covered it with a floating row/insect cover. I don't know if the crows dug up the bean seeds also or not. I covered more cucumbers with shade cloth and mowed another pasture today.

It was wonderfully cool and cloudy today. We've had an unusually cool spring. We have been able to go without the air conditioner so far, which is a first in the last three or four years. It was nice just sitting around reading old gardening magazines and getting more ideas. This evening I started planning out the fall garden and where we'll put the plastic covered hoop house to grow winter veggies and greens. 

During the school year John and I go to local elementary schools to give Homesteading talks. We talk about recycling or composting and animals here on the homestead and lead into permaculture – a circle of life. We usually take in one or two of the animal babies and a ton of veggies/herbs to show the kids. This past spring we took a rabbit, a chick and two baby goats into the local library for "Farm Animal" day. It was so neat to watch the kids' faces as they gently touched the animals. We have classes on the homestead during "off season" – bread baking, soap making, and any other homesteading skill we can share.

May 27, 2001, Sunday
Since it was the last Sunday of the month, we had a 2:00 church service instead of our normal 10:00am and 6:00pm services. The afternoon service allowed John to join some of the other men from the church for breakfast at a local restaurant. While he was gone I mowed yet another pasture and baked an angel food cake for the person who had surgery on Friday. I also made some chocolate chip cookies for when the grandkids come this week – school's finally out!

After church John did the feeding while I fried chicken, steamed new potatoes and reheated some left over Swiss Chard. I milked while supper was cooking. It felt good to sit down to supper before dark. We ate cookies while enjoying the sunset.

May 28, 2001, Monday
A terrific thunderstorm came in during the night, dropping 1.1 inches of rain. High winds left us with minor storm damage, but nothing that couldn't be fixed.

This was chicken butchering day, or as John likes to say, chicken promotion day; the chickens are promoted to their destiny - our freezer. After the normal chores/milking, I stripped down the kitchen counter tops and sanitized them, scoured out the sinks and sanitized them also. John took care of setting up outside; putting up the killing cones and the chicken plucker. Two large pots of water heated on the stovetop. John scalded the chickens outside in a pot of water over the Coleman stove but we kept two pots heated in the kitchen for a clean hot water source as needed. We did 20 chickens today and left the other 27 to fatten a little more. Weights were from 3 ½ to 4 ¼ pounds at 8 weeks old. I sent emails letting a couple of customers know their order was ready for pick up. Preparation and clean up was as time consuming as the actual butchering, but at least I ended up with a super clean kitchen since all the counter tops were scoured and sanitized both before and after butchering.

We found another rat snake – in the carport supports, right above our heads where we were butchering. We killed it; it was full of our baby songbirds. I wish it had stayed with mice and rats. The rat snakes are normally great to have around to help keep down the rodent population on the farm, but when they start climbing around the house (or eating the eggs in the chicken coop), they have to go.  I must have run it out of the pasture when I mowed yesterday. John says he wouldn't know a dull moment if someone gift wrapped it and gave it to him.

May 29, 2001, Tuesday
I was hard pressed to find any energy today after yesterday's activities; being diabetic sometimes leaves me worn out. I cleaned house lightly and grocery shopped for a few items for company coming tonight. For dessert I made a banana cake with caramel icing. We dug new potatoes and picked zucchini and onions to grill with hamburgers and Polish Sausages. I picked one of the last cabbages and the first corn on the cob for supper.

I did a little laundry, but not too much since we're threatened with possible thunderstorms again. The blackberries have started ripening. We won't have many since we just started a new patch. The last two years of drought did in the old patch. Better get rested up - the Grandkids are coming tomorrow!

May 30, 2001, Wednesday
Our daughter brought up all 4 Grandkids today (Kate & Maggie – 7 year old twin granddaughters; Christian – 7 year old grandson; Hayley – 4 year old granddaughter). The kids will stay with us until Friday afternoon. Hayley instantly went to the gardens in the yard to check out what was growing. She was amazed with the blackberry vines, calling the red (unripe) ones raspberries, the black one blackberries and the green ones grapes – all three fruits on one vine. I might have a moneymaker here! All the kids oo'ed and aa'ed over the new pet bunnies and helped me pick greens to feed all the rabbits, but the main attraction was, as always, the baby goats. They're not too sure about Chicken Little, the rooster who runs loose in the barn; "Is he mean?" They wanted to see the baby chicks that grew into the meat chickens in just 8 weeks time. They had a tea party up in the clubhouse. An appropriate video, "Babe", was picked for quiet time.

Grandma and Grandpa were sure ready for bed at the end of the day!

May 31, 2001, Thursday
Christian woke early and helped out in the barn this morning. Hayley joined us just minutes after feeding and in time to squirt out some milk from Rhinestone. She especially liked having a chance to squirt Grandpa! After everyone was up and breakfast dishes cleaned up, the kids and I went to Bonham, just 15 miles east of us. We stopped at the Sam Rayburn Museum, where the kids saw some turkeys strutting around in the back yard, and we went to Fort Inglish where they ground some corn into corn meal. A full morning – back home for lunch and quiet time! Maggie picked out a "Little House on the Prairie" video for quiet time.

At suppertime, Kate wanted to dig some potatoes so after I loosened the soil around some plants all the kids dug up the potatoes. Grandpa cooked them on the grill with hot dogs. The kids were amazed at the difference in taste of homegrown potatoes and carrots compared to store bought veggies.

June 1, 2001, Friday
June 1st already! Time to start the fall garden's seedlings.

John trimmed a tree whose branches had been lying on my clothesline. The kids drug the branches out to feed the goats. I mulched in the garden while the kids played with the goats. The kids saw "Donk", the neighbors white donkey, out in the fields this morning but couldn't understand why the donkey wouldn't come to four little kids he had never seen before sitting on the fence top screaming, "Here Donk!" over and over. They finally gave up and tossed the apple pieces out in the pasture for him to find later. Hayley handed eggs to a customer who came to pick up 2 dozen.

John took Christian to pick up a load of hay in Colbert, OK and to the store for him to pick out a late birthday present. The girls stayed with me and played with the bike and wagon while I hung clothes on the line. All the kids played with the dollhouse while they were here. It's completely furnished and has a lot of neat little pieces kids love – like kittens and dogs inside and a rabbit and chickens on the front porch. Our daughter picked the kids up after lunch and John and I settled in for a long summer's nap!

top of page

Diary – week 4

June 2, 2001, Saturday
After the feeding and milking, John took off for the Mesquite Tractor show at Samuel Farm. I stayed home, just couldn't face a crowd today. I'm a homebody for sure! Fixed up the shade cloth the thunderstorms had damaged this week and put some laundry on the line. Scheduled via email two chicken pickups for next week. Trimmed some of the goats' hooves (a monthly chore). Started mowing the grass but temperatures climbed in the high 90's and ended that. We turned the air conditioning on for the summer. John came home thoroughly excited about the tractor show.

June 3, 2001, Sunday
We took advantage of the cooler morning temperatures and cut the grass before church this morning. I dug some more new potatoes, washed and cubed them for the veggie medley – potatoes, turnips, onions, garlic, carrots and cabbage – and put it in a solar oven. In the other solar oven went the whole chicken, brushed down with olive oil and herbs. Lunch will be cooked and ready for us after church with no additional energy expense. Dessert will be a zucchini cake I canned two years ago. The broccoli is still producing; I picked it for broccoli cheese soup for supper.

High winds again today tore down the shade cloth I fixed yesterday. Since we're on the top of a hill we always have strong winds. It's great for cooling the house down, but so easily dehydrates and bruises the plants.

June 4, 2001, Monday
We raided the garden early this morning so I could can mixed vegetables.  I cooked the left over veggies with a ham for soup. Days like today are when I really appreciate having bread already baked and in the freezer!

One of the baby goats, Sweetie, had diarrhea so we doctored her with Pepto. Scraped off the chicken coop roosts and put new hay in the nest boxes. The chickens love to take dust baths to clean themselves so we sprinkle diatomaceous earth on the floor of their coop – helps to reduce external parasites.

June 5, 2001, Tuesday
High winds limited our outside work – no laundry on the lines today! So I started the day doing housework, not my most favorite chore. Took care of an order for the tape ministry that we voluntarily manage. John printed the labels off the computer printer and I did the duplicating. Returned a call regarding a 4-H dairy tour.

The one baby goat we'd given Pepto yesterday had perked up and was doing fine, but Sunny (the buckling) seemed down and not as aggressive in his eating as I would like. We cut short a visit with an understanding customer-friend who came to pick up some dressed meat chickens to run Sunny into the vets on an emergency call. One of the hardest things on any farm is seeing the animals hurt. Sunny seemed much improved by evening. Thank goodness for a compassionate vet.

John ran errands to the feed store, hardware store and grocery for some needed items. He also picked up some more bricks for our new "haven" pathway. I laid some of the bricks while John unloaded the feed.

June 6, 2001, Wednesday
Started the day extra early to "doctor" up Sunny; he's almost back to normal. My day consisted of the normal homesteading things – gardening, cleaning and canning so John will take today's diary to explain his work here at Beulah Land.

Hi! This is John finishing out today's diary entry. I thought of Debbie's comment about "normal" in the last paragraph and wanted to describe what a "normal" day is like on my side of homesteading. Unfortunately, in the last 2 years I've spent working from home I don't think I've seen what "normal" is yet!

Debbie has already described what our mornings are like – quiet time, breakfast, etc. Most folks can relate to "get ready for work, travel to work, work, take a few breaks at work, travel home from work".  My day is similar, but there are some variances. Instead of travel time, I have "help get the animals fed" time. Instead of a coffee breaks, I may have to go check the chicken water… or see how close the pregnant goat is to delivering… or take ice bottles out to the rabbits to help keep them cool… or maybe even spend a few minutes tossing the ball with the dogs. After all, they need their exercise, too! And as far as "work" goes, I try to get started on my web design work early in the morning, but there are mornings where it is critical to get things done on the homestead first. This is especially important in the heat of summer when we have to get our outside work done before the heat becomes absolutely unbearable. On those days, the web work usually gets pushed to the afternoon and, quite often, the evening. There are even some days when I just keep going well into the night and early next morning.

Once I finally get to work, the tasks are quite varied. In addition to the administrative and management tasks necessary to keep the business running, the web work includes designing and building new sites, handling domain name registrations, maintaining existing sites and setting up new hosting clients. I also deal with the technical aspects of server maintenance, security monitoring, programming, research, tool evaluations, problem resolution, system backups and keeping up with what's going on in the industry.

Today's work day started typically with checking email, making sure my customers' sites were working and putting out any fires that may have come up.  Things were actually pretty quiet today, so I was able to move on to working on my current projects and making as much progress as possible before stopping for supper. After a supper break and getting a few administrative items handled, it was back to full bore development. Since our church schedule was changed this week, I had an unusual free Wednesday night, so I took full advantage of it and snuck in a few more hours of work before bed.

I invite you to stop by my website at www.beulahland.com to check out the web design business and take a stroll through our portfolio.

Well, Debbie went to bed a couple of hours ago, so I better close this off and head in myself. She'll start back up with the diary tomorrow.  Thanks for letting me get my ramble in!

June 7, 2001, Thursday
Got a little further on housecleaning. Housecleaning is done as needed and as seen during our busiest times; sweeping and dusting are done each week, but the rest is done as soon as we can get to it! Ran some errands and did some light grocery shopping. One of the best things about gardening is having a grocery store in our own back yard.

After lunch I did a little weeding, the eternal laundry and sprayed some more citrus oil for grasshoppers. The hoppers are reduced in the areas where I sprayed Red Pepper Wax yesterday, but not gone. It's hard to explain how many grasshoppers we've had over the last 3 years – literally hundreds of thousands per acre each year. Walking in the fields is like a sci-fi movie, "The Invasion of the Grasshoppers". If you don't live with it, it's hard to believe the number of them, but some of our neighbor's have lost full sized trees from the grasshoppers. They even ate the screens off one person's windows. Two of our Texas organic growers lost whole fields of crop last year. I'll have to be more aggressive and spray every day instead of every few days now as the citrus oil only works upon contact with the pests.

June 8, 2001, Friday
Happy birthday to my sister, Shirley, in Ohio!

It's been nice having a few slow days this week, but I'm back up to "go mode" again. Sprayed in the morning and evening for grasshoppers. Watered some of the tender veggies – the weatherman keeps teasing us with possible rains but none have shown up this month yet. Started weeding gardens again. Dug carrots and potatoes and picked green beans. Did more laundry – hoping to guarantee rain, but it didn't work, just a sprinkling. All the baby goats are back to normal, but they want their bottles of flavored electrolytes they received when not feeling well – once again the wailing and baaa-ing of goats is heard throughout the Land.

Date night! Homemade pizza, an old movie on the VCR and plenty of popcorn set the stage for a great night. It may not sound like much to some folks, but just slowing down enough to enjoy each others company really makes the night special.

June 9, 2001, Saturday
Another busy day! Started with more canning – beef broth this time. Put a pot of beef in the sun oven and made egg noodles to cook into it later.  John cleaned the garage. A customer came to pick up farm produce. The customer's son was afraid of the mud daubers flying around so John explained to him how beneficial they are in catching spiders and grasshoppers. Still no rain, so I watered more of the garden and fruit beds. Put a macaroni & cheese casserole in the sun oven for supper and then went to a wedding for a young couple in our church in the afternoon. It sure is nice to come home to a ready meal.

We keep record of all of our animals, gardens and other homesteading ventures; journals for the animal care and gardens, ledgers for income and expenses on everything. Sometimes it feels like I get swamped in paperwork, especially when 15 things need done immediately and I have to write down the purchase of a dozen eggs, but it's the only way to show the bottom line. Homesteading animals aren't pets and if they can't at least cover their own expenses, then we have to reevaluate the situation.

June 10, 2001, Sunday
Well, this was a typical Sunday morning – fed the animals, milked the goats and squeezed in a few other outside chores before getting cleaned up and heading into church. We actually took a break and had a long nap this afternoon to catch our breath and get ready to hit the deck running again in the new week.

It's hard to believe a whole month has zipped by again. We're so glad we were able to keep the diary and hope you've enjoyed reading about homesteading here at Beulah Land. If you have access to the web, come and visit us at http://www.beulahland.com/homestead. Drop us an email at debbie@beulahland.com

top of page