This Week on the Homestead

We have been quite busy over here on the Stone Homestead.

I have been working non stop trying to get our garden in over at the farm, while also moving our raised beds from last year from the back of our yard up closer to the house.

My arms are still killing me from all the dirt I moved. *He-Woman over here!

Anyway, we have had a lot going on this week and last so I wanted to share everything that has happened!

Homestead Update

Like I said we have had super busy weeks behind us and we’re still not done.

Last week we actually brought home a brand new travel trailer camper! I think this shocked a lot of people, myself included.

New Camper

Ray has wanted a camper for as long as I can remember, and of course I have wanted one too, but I also would have settled with a new giant tent. Ha! Anyway, this was actually just a random on a whim event that turned out pretty great!

Ray grew up camping a lot with his family, and I camped as well, but always with other families. We both really enjoyed being able to just disappear from the world and wanted that for our kids as well. So for us to be able to have a camper for our family, really means a lot.

Side Note: When we first brought it home it sat smack dab in the middle of our driveway for 3 days and it was just ridiculous haha! Luckily, Ray was able to get the side of our garage all cleared out to park/store the camper and not have to take it to the farm.

If you are curious, we got a 2021 Heartland Mallard travel trailer. We got the travel trailer instead of a 5th wheel because 1 – Ray would have had to get a bigger truck for a 5th wheel (plans for our next camper in the very far future). And 2 – because our van can pull a travel trailer while our whole family can ride together instead of splitting us up and having to take two vehicles.

And if you are wondering, our van, aka a bus, is a Nissan NV3500 12 passenger van. Basically a truck with seats, so were good to pull up to I believe almost 10,000 pounds. Perfect for our camper.

I can not wait to take this camper out and make all the memories with our babies!

Gardening

This week has been all about the gardens.

If you recall, we put a garden in over at my father and brother in laws farm. Just a basic in ground garden, nothing too fancy. Well, this week we actually got to planting and that was some work!

Like I said, it’s nothing fancy and right now looks like a big square of dirt.

You see, we were supposed to plant sweet corn all to the left of the tree but were told that it would cross pollinate with the field corn that is to be planted. So, we opted for a row of potatoes instead. Maybe next year we can do corn, we’ll see.

So far I have planted:

• Potatoes
• 2 Rows of green beans – 2 more to be planted
• Butternut squash
• Spaghetti squash
• 16 Tomato plants – mostly paste tomatoes for sauces
• 22 Various pepper plants
• Zucchini
• Red cabbage
• Broccoli
• Cauliflower

Weed Prevention

If you look at the picture above, you may be wondering how I am going to prevent all this from becoming a weed patch. Well, I found an article that said you could do a layer of newspaper and then straw over top. Which, I am kinda kicking myself for not thinking of it myself because this is what we did for our landscaping at home but with mulch.

So, we need to get over probably tonight and get everything squared away with the added rows of beans and weed prevention. We also need to get our cabbage, broccoli, and cauliflower covered to prevent any bugs from eating everything.

Raised Beds

Now, last what we have been working our butts off for is our backyard. We recently had two trees taken down in our backyard for some more sun. Our backyard is pretty shaded with plenty of trees, but I really wanted a garden in my own backyard that I could walk out to whenever. But because of all the trees, this is why we have the garden at the farm.

Anyway, hubs had two trees taken down to open up the yard and it allowed my raised beds to be moved to the open area.

Originally, we had cleared some trees behind our shed that allowed us to put the chickens in and a garden, but being first time chicken “farmers” our garden was destroyed because the fencing was too short for the chickens. So our garden last year was a flop, which is why we are taking it so seriously this year. We spent a lot of time and money last year that was wasted so we really wanted to do everything right this year.

With that said, I was able to disassemble and move our raised beds, hubs put them back together, and I moved all the dirt – 20+ wheel barrows full all by myself. That was some work and my shoulders are thanking me! And yes, I am pretty proud of that because I could hardly move any of the dirt last year haha! So this is a win for me!

So now, I have pretty beds, or should I say, will be pretty beds up close to the house that I can keep an eye on and have fresh herbs!

In the beds we planted:

• A whole bed of strawberries
• Thyme
• Rosemary
• Oregano
• Dill
• Basil
• Lavender
• Chives
• Eggplant
• Brussel Sprouts – not sure how this will turn out
• Cucumbers – not planted yet, still trying to figure out a trellis system
• Lettuce varieties – not planted yet, waiting on cucumber trellis system
• Peas – may plant these pending on room

I can’t tell you how awesome it is to have a little garden set up in my own backyard. Honestly, I was on such a kick of needing to move to have more space, but a simple cut of two trees and our backyard has totally transformed. Seriously. We even moved our fire pit so that we can actually have a fire without worrying about burning the tree line down haha.

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Well, that’s all I have for now for updates on the homestead. I can’t wait for more work to be done and our little backyard and in ground garden to produce food for us. Hopefully, I will be able to make delicious sauces and salsas to can to enjoy all winter. That’s the goal anyway with all those peppers and tomatoes!

Until next time,