Anyone else?

 I know its only Febraury, but man I am in that mood already for spring! The smell of fresh cut grass, my hands in the dirt and a warm breeze coming through the front window. 

Anyone else?

It could be the seed catalogs or the chicks catalogs that are starting to show up in the mail. The dreams of the garden I want to have or the sound of baby chicks again. 

Anyone else? 

Maybe its the spring like weather we are having this week and the sneak peak of what is to come that makes the yearning for spring more intense. 

So in the mean time, I will get out my paper and pencil to sketch out the dreams I have for the garden.  I will look through the chick catalogs and wonder if we should get some :) . 

But most of all, I will enjoying being out in this warmer weather for as long as we have it!  ( aka- getting the chicken coop and goat barn cleaned out. haha) 

Don't give up on those dream because of the cold weather, use this time to plan out those dreams so you can make them happen in the spring! 

~ Katie

Our Goals for 2021

I'm sure your saying......" Uh, Katie it isn't even Thanksgiving yet and your working on next years goals?

    Haha! Yes, we are working on it! Never to early to start thinking of your goals! Plus, hey it's 2020 right! People already have their trees up, so why not! :) 

Here are some of the goals I personally have for myself and some hubby and I have together. 

    Financial goals: 

So many of you know my husband and I work the Dave Ramsey Plan. If you don't know who that is take a minute and good him and the baby steps and hop on board, you won't regret it! If you want me to do a post about our financial journey and our debt free journey let me know! We are on baby step 6 right now which is to pay off your mortgage as fast as you can and we are working on it! Any other Baby step 6 people here? Comment down below! Okay so here is what we have so far as our goals. 

     Working on continuing to knock down our mortgage as much as we can! Paying our home off as soon and as quickly as possible is a huge goal for us! 

    Bump up our emergency fund another month's worth of our living expenses.( we currently have 3/4 months of living expenses saved)

    Bump up retirement contributions more then we already are. 

    Cash flow house projects we would like to get done. We currently have a bathroom project that needs to get completed :). Also have some outside projects we would like to do. 

    Keeping our grocery budget where it is($450/month) and even challenge myself to see if I can get it lower. ( I will keep you updated on this in future posts) 

    Continue to add to our replacement car fund.  Both our cars are doing great and don't see the need to replace them for a few years, but we like to start saving now so we have a good chunk saved to pay cash for the next one. Have you ever paid cash for a vehicle before? Let me tell you it is the best feeling in the world to write a check, leave with the vehicle and know we don't have any payments to worry about. It is just such a cool feeling! I challenge you all to do this! So worth it! 

  Personal goals:

    I would like to read more books. I love financial/ business books. :)  So setting a goal of reading or listening to at least one book a month. 

    Continuing having my morning time with the Lord. Diving deeper into his word through reading the bible, Bible studies, and listening to speakers. Continue to keep a prayer journal. ( I have really loved doing this and highly recommend it! 

 

   I would love to better my career. I intend to do this by reading / watching videos and listening to podcasts on business and careers and just evaluating how I can make myself better at my job and maybe ways to advance  in my career. 

    Keep reaching my goal of 10,000+ steps a day. 

    Continue to volunteer at least once a month. 

    Make time to hang out and strengthen/ grow my friendships! ( really looking forward to this one! :)) 

    Continue to homeschool our boys ( I will have a High Schooler (9th) next year! How is this possible?! and a Middle Schooler(6th)!?) I absolutely love doing this. Yes, there are hard days, but the good days so out way the bad. So excited what the new year brings with teaching and learning, but God is at the wheel and at the center of it all so I know it will be great! I will be doing more posts on homeschooling for us as well. Let me know if you would be interested in this as well. 

    Start back to blogging on a regular basis. I am going to really work on this in the coming year. I love to have a place to write all my thoughts and the events that happen in our life. It is a fun way for me to document our life together as a family. 

That is it for now. I know these aren't massive goals, but we/I wanted to make them manageable and achievable as well. It is not fun to make goals that you will never reach.  So let me know do you have any fun goals for next year? Have you started working on them yet? 

Thank you for taking the time to join me on this post and don't forget to share with your friends! 

~Katie

    

    

December Monthly Meal Plan

Here is my monthly meal plan for our family for the month of December. 

1st- Pancakes and Bacon/ fruit

2nd- Homemade Calzones/ salads

3rd- Soup/ crackers/ cut up veggies

4th- Crockpot pork chops/ mashed pot./ veggie

5th- leftovers

6th- Tacos

7th- Oatmeal night with all the toppings

8th- Pocket Sandwiches( homemade hot pockets) 

9th- Fish sticks, fries and veggie

10th- Breakfast for dinner ( either eggs, french toast, bagel sandwiches, quiche)

11th- Crockpot chicken and dumplings

12th- Spaghetti

13th-Chicken Patty Sandwiches

14th-Baked Potato night with toppings

15th- Ham , mac and cheese, veggie

16th-Homemade pizzas

17th-Beef Stroganoff, egg noodles, veg

18th-Potato soup/ homemade roll or biscuits

19th- Crispy chicken casserole, salad

20th- Lasagna, garlic bread

21st-Breakfast for dinner

22nd- Sloppy Joe Sandwiches

23rd- Not yet determined ( would love a suggestion)

24th-Christmas Eve

25th- Christmas Dinner with family

26th- Tomato soup/ grilled cheese sandwiches

27th- Beef stew, cornbread

28th- Bagel Sandwiches

29th-Not yet determined ( would love a suggestion) 

30th-Not yet determined ( would love a suggestion)

31st- Fried Shrimp, Salad 

Would love to hear what you are having for the month of December! Do you have any traditional meals during this month? 

Let me know in the comments what your monthly meal plan looks like! 

~ Katie

What has been happening on our homestead?

I have had a few readers ask me what is new on our homestead since I last posted. 

Well during my time away from blogging, we downsized our goats. We no longer have meat goats. All we have now are 3 goats. My mom's pygmy goat, Tyler's white and brown Nigerian dwarf and Kyle's Black/brown Nigerian dwarf. We also downsized our layers. At the time that was what we needed to do. We had a lot on our plate and a lot going on. 

We have since gotten more layers and are excited to be getting our egg business up and running! ( Even getting our business stamp made and should be here by the end of the week! Also, got our order of 100 new cartons.) We just got an order of layer chicks to help replace a good bit of our older birds come this fall/winter. We are super excited about this part of our journey and how we are looking to hopefully continue to expand.And talking about expanding,  I have an incubator coming this month ( Happy Mother's day to me! :) ) to also start the next  new adventure into hatching/ raising our own replacement layers, as well as selling some of the chicks we hatch and raise.  I will be sure to do a post on this, showing which incubator we chose and as we go through this adventure , so stay tuned!

We have put in a small orchard in our backyard! We put in 2 peach trees and 2 pear trees. We will be excited for them to start producing fruit in a few years. The boys have also put in a small pond in the middle of the orchard for the next  new additions. Any guesses? 

And last we have put our garden in for this year. We are already enjoying lettuce , strawberries and even some broccoli from it. We planted lettuce( 2 types), broccoli, sugar peas, green beans, dry beans, zucchini, 3 types of tomatoes), beets, onions ( red and white) and a lot of red potatoes. We also transplanted 2 blueberry bushes that were Tom's dad's. We are very excited to have these and see they already have some fruit started grow on them. 

Did / or are you getting anything new or excited to add to your farm/homestead/property? I would love to hear about it. Leave it in the comments! 

~ Katie

Back at it again!

 After a long while off, I have decided to start blogging again. I hope you all are doing well.

 A lot has happened since I blogged last and a lot in this world is going on as well.

   There has been happiness, stress, sadness, mourning, doubt, prayer,  growth, seeking and planning in our journey during this time. But during this time I keep coming back to Jeremiah 29:11. That verse says so much and it is wonderful to think God has it all planned for us!

 I am very happy to be back  to share all that is going on and  somethings we have planned for the future.

I hope you will join me ( and my family) as we get back on this journey.

Feel free to share my posts, I would greatly appreciate it!

~ Katie

A New Year and new goals

It is that time of year, when we all set goals. I love reading others posts about their goals, whether it be homestead, personal, faith, financial, etc.

I sit down every year and make a list of my goals. I usually have a set of homestead goals, personal goals and faith goals. I like sharing these with you all so I can stay accountable to them. I have decided to only have a few in each section. I have noticed in years past I have made these big lists and sadly don't get a lot of them done. So I want to make it more manageable, so I can meet more of those goals. 

Here are my goals for this year:

Faith Goals:

To be more consistent with my devotions and quiet time with God. 

Find a good bible study (studies) and be intentional with doing them.

Personal goals:

Make more memories with my family :) ( whether this be fun trips, game nights, or just snuggling on the couch reading books.) 

Continue to do my best and grow at my job ( I do wedding coordinating  part- time).

To grow my friendships stronger and to make more time for coffee, chats, etc.

Read 36 books this coming year. ( fiction and non fiction included)

Do something every month for my husband ( encouraging notes, coffee in bed, etc. )

Homestead goals:

Grow our flock to 20 chickens, to grow our egg business. :) 

Get a pig to raise this spring and summer. ( still working to see if we can make this happen)

Stock the freezer: buy a half or whole cow for the year. 

Those are my goals for this year. We have financial goals but as of now we won't be sharing those. But when we accomplish one of them I may share them then.  :) 

Do you have any goals for this coming year? I would love to hear them! 

Happy New Year everyone and here is to a new year of homesteading goals! 

~ Katie

Dreams

Dreams. We all have them. Whether it to be to learn to can our own food. To having a garden that sustains your family and maybe someone else's. To raise all your own meat. To have chickens. To have a dairy cow ( we all know that is one of mine ;) ). To pay off your debt. To pay off your house. To go on a certain vacation. Whatever it is...

I wanted to say, " DON'T GIVE UP ON YOUR DREAMS!". Tom and I have many dreams to expand our homestead. Will they all happen? Maybe not. Will we ever expand? We hope so!

We have these dreams, but we pray and ask God to lead us where He would want us. It may not be what we had in mind. But we have to remember His Plan is far greater then what we can dream of. He has a purpose for our little homestead . Whether that be to just to feed our family and friends. Or to be able to feed many others.

3 years ago, we had a dream  to move out of our 650sq.ft. home on .05 acres in the middle of our town  and to a larger piece of land to grow our food. God blessed us with the house and land we are at now. Yes we have had struggles and our jobs take a lot of time from our homestead , but we still have the dream of raising our own food. It is happening slowly but surely. And we are not giving up on our dream!

So don't give up on your dreams. No matter how little you may think they are!


Here is to a New Year full of Dreams!

~Katie