Meow and cheek, cheeck chicks!

Uncle Eric has hatched us a bunch of chicks!! The kids absolutely love playing with them. I love watching them. This past weekend we set up our coop to have the chicks in it, instead of in the house. It was becoming very tiring for me to have 10 cats inside plus 15 baby chicks. Now that the chicks are outside we have lost a few but we still have 13 and the first batch have doubled in size since these pics. We are having a blast with all these new critters!






You will notice in some pics my boys are shirtless.. They all like their shirts off. Sometimes I don't even fight it and they run around shirtless.



My niece Riley is currently hatching 48 chicks on her own she plans on selling them. She has taught me more about the chickens then most books! I love this sweet face of hers, she is a doll!
These are Poker # 1 baby chicks so we are hoping one is a rooster!

Mama cat Nibbles had 5 Kitties on May 1st! There is a girl kitty that is all white and we possibly think she is an Albino kitty. Yesterday Ayden named her Lily. I asked him why Lily and he said, "I just think it's a pretty name". I thought it was neat because Lillie's(flower) are white :)
Mama cat Twix had 4 babies and one that we named Stripes didn't make it. Twix is Nibbles Mom and these are the two of the cats that have survived after we brought home 4 cats originally. Twix had Nibbles, Thunder and Freckles. After letting Thunder and Freckles outside Nibbles is the only kitten that survived from Twix's first litter.

RIp Poker, Stripes, Thunder, Freckles ect.

It is always hard to deal with the loss of things which bring us joy in this life. As much work goes into our recent animals we have lost a few and I know we will continue to lose more. It is the circle of life and it is teaching us alot of new feelings and ways to handle those emotions.

I never thought chickens could bring so much fun and joy but they have! I have always been a cat lover and now currently we have 2 Mama cats and 8 babies. The pics of the boys here were taken right after we found our rooster dead. I feel it is important to let the boys get sad and cry and deal with the loss in their own way. Thayne is very sensitive and cried most of the day. We comforted him and said it is ok to be sad. After he let all his emotions out he went back to playing. I also tell the kids the animals are in a safe place where their is no pain. Where they can never experience death again and hopefully we will see them again someday. I also tell them to not dwell on the pain of the loss but to put that energy into the animals we still have. It has been hard at times and even I have to cry to let the emotions heal. We miss our animals but we are still currently joyful of the animals we still have :)

Our Garden and the first steps to self reliance!

We have been a busy bunch getting this garden started. This is officially the third time that I have planted my own garden. It has been a gradual process getting everything accomplished. I have not measured precisely but our garden area is at least a 250 square foot area.

We started with the land and finding what place would be good with enough sunshine. We have alot of tree's on our property and we had to factor that in. We finally got the area picked up and our neighbors borrowed a tractor so we could plow and till the land. In trade we will be giving them food this summer for the help with the tractor. Having the tractor saved us days of work and also saved our bodies/backs from all the hard labor. I can tell you moving dirt will get you strong. I have lost a total of 60 lbs here in Tx. I am doing a lite exercise routine but I can tell you I have lost most of the weight by working outside doing hard labor all day. I now know why there was never a problem with obesity in pioneer days.

The garden has been an enjoyable process for me. I have always loved doing it which makes it so much easier. I studied on the clay soil and it has been mostly my pet project. When we lived in California I never had to worry to much about the soil. The area in Nipomo had great soil even in our apartment patio. Here in Texas it is clay soil and you have to make sure your water will drain from the root. I decided to use the Dr. Mittleider Methods for treating the soil. I also invested in heirloom (non-hyprbrid GMO) seeds. http://foodforeveryone.org/index.php

Since I had been using all my time to learn about the soil. I decided to put starter plants in the first 3 raised garden beds. In one bed I have Zuchini and yellow Squashes. I planted different types so we can find out which ones that we like more. Most likely we will enjoy all of them because we love fresh veggies! In the other bed I have Tomato plants(8) which I plan on canning a lot of sauces, salsa and soup. in the other beds I have all my cooking and medicinal herbs. I love these because they are perennials, which means they will die in the winter but come back on their own in the Spring. I also planted egg plant, Okra, cucumbers and 10 different types of Peppers from starter plants.

This week I planted some of the heirloom seeds. This is officially my first time planting from seeds. I planted enough to eat and also enough to harvest the seeds for next years crop. I will have some updated pics of my recent progress but this a start to a life long project of going back to basics. Living and relying on ourselves for food. People ask me what my future goals are with this garden. I plan on helping my neighbors and my friends. I plan on teaching and educating people that we can not rely on stores and super markets to take care of us. We must learn what God intended for us. Adam and Eve were first placed in a garden and we must delve into the hidden meaning behind that. I know everyone can not have a full fledged garden but you can start small and do your best with what you have available. You can buy from local farmers instead of buying imported unhealthy goods from the super markets. You can plant some plants and give it try.

I plan on donating some food to food shelters and churches. We must serve one another and what better way to do so. In the future I plan on gathering heirloom seeds from my crop for friends, family and neighbors. In the future I will not have to buy seeds. I also plan on buying a Dairy Cow, a Horse to work my land and the list goes on. I'm starting small but we will continue to have big hopes and dreams for the future! I feel truly blessed and will continue to share our progress!

The handy dandy chicken coop!

My handy Zachy built a coop with our neighbor Warren a few months ago. Zach designed a 3D model of it and then built it. We are really happy with the design. I have trained the chickens to go in the coop at night. I should call it bribing cause you can do a lot with chicken scrap, lol. This saves me a lot of time because I can not catch them until after dark( they can't see in the dark). If I do need to round them up Keynan can catch them fairly quick. The twins can too if they try for a bit but it is just easier to send Keynan out and catch them.

We currently have lost 4 chickens due to some neighbors up the road letting their dogs roam free. We were all really sad when our Rooster (Poker) got killed. The kids wanted to name him Pecker but I told them Poker was more appropriate if we named him. The kids came up with the hens name which is sneaks. The neighbors dog got Poker in the day time, seeing a trial of feathers of our first rooster that inspired our coop was hard for the kids. I luckily took a bunch of pictures of him the day before he got killed. Warren next door had recently got Poker's cousin Baby so Warren gave the kids Baby which is now Poker #2. Even though Poker #2 looks the same as Poker #1 they have completely different personalities. I honestly can sit and watch the chickens all day, they are so fun to watch! I love having them to eat up the bug population and of course having fresh eggs on hand. We have An Americana hen and she lays green eggs. We our now country folk and loosing animals to prey is common. I have a rifle now and the next time the dog enters my property I will have to shoot :( I can tell you there have been moments where I wanted to run back to the city. I love it though and just have to get use to the down side of this life style. Our coop has proven to hold up at night when all the raccoons, coyotes, and wild hogs are out. Now we just need to paint the coop and put a roof on it!

Ditching the Dollar

I think I am on a new record posting more then 3 posts in one week. I wanted to let friends and family know of some recent changes my family and I have made.
About 8 years ago if you would of asked me what a gold standard was I wouldn't be able to tell you. Today I can say I can, due to a well known Congressman in Texas named Ron Paul. Ron Paul has announced his run for Presidency for 2012 and my family and immediate family are super excited! With that being said I want to tell you what Dr. Ron Paul has inspired me and our family to learn. I am thrilled to use the word inspire because it is what I am trying to do with my children with their homeschooling (inspire, not require). I am fortunate I learned of Ron Paul 8 years ago and he has led me down a path to discover what free market principles are all about. Dr. Ron Paul got into Politics due to his economic interests and he discovered a book called The Road to Serfdom http://www.amazon.com/Road-Serfdom-Documents---Definitive-Collected/dp/0226320553/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1305317894&sr=8-1 .
This is where my journey began with economics. I was always into history due to my Fathers interest in the Civil War. I was never really interested in economic principles or history until I read The road to serfdom. I had the most conversational time in my sophomore and junior year flunking US history x2 due to the fact that I had studied and knew what they were teaching me were lies. If only I could of shut my mouth during my teachers racial and inaccurate lectures. That was one of the lovely teachers that claimed I would never graduate High School.. To my surprise I took Us History again my 12th grade year and aced the class(for me that is big, acing a class is really not my style). I had 2 economic courses in high school and did okay but I don't feel they were teaching free market values. Now that I look back I don't think the teachers knew much about basic free market values and either did I . It reminds me of all the people on Wall Street today and of course our Fed chair Bernanke saying that there was no way to predict the economic meltdown of 2008. Well that is also another blatantly lie because Peter Schiff's books were out long before the economy crashed..http://www.amazon.com/Crash-Proof-Profit-Economic-Collapse/dp/0470043601/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1305318956&sr=1-4 and he predicted everything!

To make a long story short my family and I have ditched the dollar. Since our savings is minimal we decided to pull all Cd's, 401k, IRA's etc out of federal reserve notes. I'm not suggesting anyone doing this, this is just what we have chosen to do. We are younger and to pull a few thousand from a 401k has minimal tax consequences.
I urge everyone to start buying physical gold and silver. Since we are on a minimal budget, now that I no longer work outside the home we buy more silver then we do gold. With the CME trading 3 times last week bringing silver down 27% in one week. We will see silver drop even further and this is when all of us in America should be buying. This is the time now to buy and buy it up as quick as you can. Be careful to not listen to some televised people. You can get ripped off heavily if you do not do your research.. DO NOT PAY MORE THEN $4.00 OVER SPOT PRICE! I suggest buying in bullion because this will holds it's value. We buy both coin and bullion. Coin will be easier to use when the next crash occurs(or when the dollar looses it's reserve currency). This could happen soon or within the next 10 years. I really feel it will happen at the end of 2012. Silver will also be your best bet when we see more inflation and then into hyper inflation by 2015.

One last thought or maybe a few.. Thou shall not steal and paper money is stealing in my opinion. I listened to this wonderful podcast the other day on one of my favorite websites http://www.offthegridnews.com/author/radio1/
Our Country will have to make some serious changes to get us back on course. If we don't China will become the top economy in 2016. We will have to learn true principals of self reliance and saving.. I am speaking from experience because 11 months ago I had to walk away from everything I've ever worked for. I left my furniture, my piano, my cloths my car and the list goes on. I know what it is to be greedy because I was living that way. Living far above our means just because we had a good credit score. Trying to keep it all together but we eventually were forced to walk away from everything. I did not listen to Ron Paul even though I had read his books. My Husband also urged me but I persistently said that what we were thinking of doing is wrong. We were left with no choice when Zach lost his job in 2008. I continued on the road of this generation of using credit and living in a perpetual cycle of failure until finally I stopped and listened.

P.s. eventually I will learn how to make these links look more pretty,lol :)

I turned 30!!!

A few months late but the big 30 happened in February! I had a great day besides having a sinus infection that left me not tasting and smelling anything. My friend Krissie made my cake and friends and family were here to celebrate my day. We had a total of 22 kids running around and it was nice to spend the day with everyone. I had more on my accomplish list before I turned 30. It's funny though how your life can change overnight. I never thought I would have twins and I never knew I would be so passionate about homeschooling. Those two things alone have set back some of the plans I had for myself. I am looking forward to many more birthdays and looking back on the growth of myself and my family. We truly are blessed to be alive. I appreciate my life and the chance to discover all there is to discover. My Mom and Dad tried for almost 9 years to get pregnant with me. I'm so glad they did because even though I have had many trials in my life, I wouldn't trade them for anything. Here's to hopefully at least 50 more years of trials, heartache, love, laughter and of course progression :)

A Tribute Book To My Aunt Sue

Click here to view this photo book larger