Back to the Start....

"Hey it’s good to be back home again
Sometimes this old farm feels like a long-lost friend
Yes ’n’ hey, it’s good to be back home again" ~John Denver

Sometimes, things just get out of control, and you have to go back to where it started. I have realized over the last few weeks that where I was wasn't where I wanted to be. When we moved to this little farm, I had no intention of starting any kind of business. I just wanted to raise our family and some food. Somehow along the way, I got derailed. 
     I said, more than once, that making soap was my passion.  I had even started thinking that I would sell tons of soap and have this huge business and quit my day job someday. I gave that idea up, then I started making clay things, and even started thinking about doing that for a living. But the real truth is, my family is my passion, and my kids will only grow up once. I have spent way too much time at craft fairs chasing a dollar, while my kids opted to stay at grannys house. I am blessed to have an amazing day job that I love and that allows me to work from home, provide for, and spend time with my family. I don't have to be a super amazing business owner. I just have to be me, after all, that is what I know how to do best. 
    So, today,  I'm starting to get back on track. I am letting go of all the should have, would have, could have. And I am breathing in this farm and this farm family. I am passionate about this farm. I am passionate about real food, healthy food, that we grow ourselves. I am passionate about teaching our kids, and learning with them.  There is no place I would rather be than right here on this farm with my husband and kids. So we are starting over, and rebuilding our barnyard. For almost 2 weeks it was completely quiet outside, with no livestock, no animals, except our 3 faithful cats. Today, we have 3 hens, some chicks, a few pigeons (thats a new adventure!), and one little piglet (also new!). This weekend we will hopefully add a few rabbits. We will go back to a slower life, and I won't miss all the trips to the craft store or the Friday night insanity of preparing for a Saturday craft show. Instead, I will enjoy more time with my family, and I will probably even take time to sit out and look at the stars some nights. I will listen to what my heart says, instead of what my head says I should be doing. And I will be the best farm mom and farm wife I can be. 

New Adventures

"When I stand before God at the end of my life, I would hope that I would not have a single bit of talent left, and could say, 'I used everything you gave me'."
Erma Bombeck

     I have been making soap for a few years now. I love it. It's the first creative sort of thing I found that I was good at. However, I am burned out. There are hundreds, maybe thousands of soap makers, and more learning every day. It's a great skill to know in that "end of the world" sort of situation. I mean, everyone will still want to be clean right? 

     So, I recently decided to take a break from making soap for a while, and while talking to a friend about what sort of craft I should take up to occupy some of the time soaping usually takes up, she mentioned polymer clay. I went to our local-ish Hobby Lobby the next day, and, like some sort of divine sign, they had a boat load of polymer clay on clearance. So of course, I bought about half of it. I absolutely love this stuff! It is so much fun! And my favorite part? If I don't like it, I can just squish it and start all over again! How great is that?! I have been spending hours making things like this: 

and these:  

And my newest favorite: 

Did I mention how much fun clay is?! I will be having a giveaway soon for a gift certificate to my new shop over at Craft Cafe. I will still be making (and selling!) soap, and some other bath n body products, along with my new clay creations, with more fun stuff being added every day, so keep checking back!

Public School Dropouts...Again....

     Part of my parenting philosophy is that my kids should be able to make their own choices about some things. They are, after all, 8 and 12, and bright enough to realize that there are consequences to choices. So right before Labor Day, they decided they wanted to go back to public school. They had been homeschooled (mostly unschooled) the last 2 years. I think I was as shocked as they were when I agreed to let them go back. 
     That Tuesday, Mr Farmer loaded them up in the van and registered them for public school. The first 4 days were great, the farmer kids were happy and seemed to be doing well. Monday came and Mr Farmer went to school to help the little girl farmer work on her locker, since she was having problems with it. Tuesday came and little girl farmer wasn't feeling well, and didn't want to go, but she went anyway. She came home and told us the teacher wouldn't let her call home to get allergy meds brought to her. Wednesday night her teacher called, and said that she was behind in math and they were working on getting her caught up, and she needed to be better organized at writing down homework and bringing her assignments home and back to school. I mentioned that her attention span still isn't really great, but we would work with her here at home. After I hung up the phone, I said to Mr. Farmer, "You did mention to this teacher that little girl farmer has ADHD right?" He assured me he had.  By Thursday, little boy farmer wasn't feeling well either, but off to school he went anyway. Thursday he comes home and said the teacher wouldn't let him call home for Tylenol, but sent him to the nurse for a cough drop. He brought home an assignment that had a note on it saying he had to stay in from recess to finish it. Then, I checked my email. Apparently little girl farmer had forgotten to bring home a science assignment, and got a ZAP (Zeroes aren't permitted) and was assigned to lunch detention the next day. The teacher had not mentioned this to little girl farmer. 
     So now our kids are public school dropouts, once again. On Monday, Mr Farmer will deliver a letter to both principals stating they will be homeschooled, again. It's not all bad, we have learned a few things from all this. I am fairly certain they will never mention public school again, at least not in the "we might like to try to go back" kind of way. 
     My kids are gonna grow up and do amazing things, and it's all gonna happen in the blink of an eye. I don't want to miss out on one second of it.

The Waiting Game....

Every morning, we wonder, have they had their babies yet? We have 2 doe rabbits, both were sold to us as bred, but neither have delivered yet. Starting to think they weren't really bred. But I guess we will wait till after this weekend to find a buck. That would (should) be the latest they would deliver, if my math is right. 
I suppose I should find a tom turkey, as I have 3 hens now and at least 1 of them is laying eggs. Would love to finally have some turkeys hatch out here. 

Back in the Goat Business

Just like that, we are goat farmers again. Several months ago, we sold all of our goats. We recently decided it was too quiet outside, so today we purchased 2  Saanen does and a young Alpine buck. They seem very sweet so far, and I will get to know them better tomorrow. It was late when they got here today, and we had to do some quick work on the fencing in the almost dark. The chickens are not happy about sharing the barn again, but I expect they will get used to it. Looking forward to sharing more goat adventures!

New Blog

Just a note to mention my brand new blog for my soap business over at http://www.mayfinnfarmsoapandsundries.blogspot.com. So new, in fact, that as of this moment, there isn't even a post there yet. But there will be, later today, announcing FREE STUFF!! That's right, my very first blog giveaway! I love FREE STUFF, and I'm betting y'all do too! So make sure you come on over and check it out!

Visiting

Little Girl Farmer is spending the night at her granny's and Little Boy Farmer is spending the night with a friend, so Mr Farmer and I took some time to go visiting with some local Amish folks. First to visit the Schmidt's to see if they had any buck rabbits for sale. They did, so we bought one, then checked out their brand new Craft and Gift Shop, and bought a pint of honey there. Saw a ginormous ram who was shedding like crazy. If he hadn't started making snorting sounds at me, I was gonna yank off a handful of that wool to bring home and see if I could spin it. Changed my mind about that the second he turned towards me and started those crazy sounds.
Next we saw a sign that said "Vegetable plants--Marked down". Turned down the gravel lane, went past another Schmidt's house, kept going, that lane seemed to go forever, then found another house, with a Greenhouse sign. Bought a pepper plant, some late cabbage plants, and a lemon balm plant. Talked to the lady of that house about gardening for a little bit, found out her sister is married to the Schmidt from the first house we went to.
Then we decided to try to find an Amish house where we had bought some stuff before. Finally found them, just in time too, as they were loading up a truck with fishing poles. They had apparently hired a driver to take them wherever they were going fishing at, so we got a gallon of milk and scooted on out so they could get going. I have heard you can make soap with cows milk the same as goats milk, so I think I will try that.
It started raining after that, so we came on home.  Found the newest outdoor puppy, Scraps, who is an Australian Shepherd all cuddled up in the shed by the cage where we are keeping Sugar and her chicks till they get a little bigger. I guess he thinks his job is to watch after them. We had found 5 tomato plants in the old pig pen this week, and found a couple potato plants by the new pig pen today when I was pulling some weeds to feed the pigs. Those pigs are better gardeners than we are, I think. I do have a couple yellow squash coming on, and several teeny tiny zucchini. Counting the tomato plants we transplanted from the old pig pen, we have 23. That will be a good start. ;)
Lots going on around here, and I am sure tomorrow morning will start like every morning for the last week...checking to see if Flower, the potbelly pig has had her  piglets yet. Maybe tomorrow will be the day. :)

Soap for sale....

If you would like to purchase our goat milk soap, please go to our online store at http://www.mayfinnfarm.com/
If you are looking for something in particular that you don't see there, feel free to use the Contact Us form, send an email to mayfinnfarm@gmail.com, or give us a call at 812-967-1350.


I am currently working on soap for an art fair in Ferdinand, Indiana this weekend, along with 100 soaps for a wedding on April 24.  We will also be at the Washington County Farmers Market opening April 30, 2011. This is a first for us, so hoping it goes well.  More updates to come, just busy, busy, busy here. 

Wordless Wednesday

Soap, soap, and....more soap!

It's official...Mayfinn Farm is an official small business. I am so incredibly excited about this, and terrified at the same time. I know a business is only as successful as the work put into it, and I see a lot of festivals in my future. I actually already have a few planned out. I have set up a booth of a few things for sale here.

Rightnow I have to get prepared for a Maple Syrup Festival here locally in Salem. More info on their website here: http://www.lmsugarbush.com/ourfestival.html. I will be there with my Great Wheel spinning wheel, my ram lamb Ollie, and some hand knit items for sale. Come on out and pet Ollie, or try your hand at spinning on the Great Wheel. Or you can just come buy some dishcloths or a scarf or two. :) We will not be selling soap at this event, as they already have a soapmaker that has been doing this festival for several years. I actually should be knitting now to prepare for this event, but wanted to take a break to update the latest news here.

This is what happens when winter has set in and doesn't look like it is going away anytime soon. I can't wait to be playing in the dirt again, and am praying for more rain than we had last summer. For now, I will make soap...and knit. :)

More fun stuff on the farm to come soon .

Barnyard changes

I found my spinning wheel. It's an antique Great Wheel, or Walking Wheel. I haven't had time to spin on it though, due to all the Christmas knitting I have been doing.

Also bought my first sheep, a little bottle baby ram lamb. He is sort of spoiled, but hopefully that will keep him nice as he gets bigger. We got rid of the potbelly piglets, and decided to just keep the two adults that we started with. They are lots of fun. We have also decided to get rid of most of the chickens for the winter. Now that the goats are using the hen house, we are unable to put a heat light in there, so they are on strike. We found 2 free Nigerian dwarf goats on Craigslist and they threw in 3 Pekin ducks too. The youngest doe has blue eyes, and I would love to find a blue eyed buck to add to the herd. We lost our oldest doe a few days ago. Seems like constant change in the barnyard.

We have about a quarter inch of ice on the ground now, mixed with a dusting of snow..good time for the seed catalogs to start coming in. Planning on doing some raised beds and container gardening this year. Hopefully it will mean less weeding, and easier gardening all around. For now, I am enjoying deciding what to plant, and have several new things in mind. Not sure where this year went, Christmas is only a short week away. Hope you all enjoy it with those you love.

The good life....

Well, no fall garden, as I ended up having surgery a few days after my last post, and was out of commission for a few weeks. It's okay though, more time to plan for the spring. :) We now have turkeys again, and some guineas, who seem to be smarter than the last ones we had, thank goodness. We have 7 potbelly piglets, and haven't decided yet if we are keeping just one or two, but its time for the rest to find new homes. Flower is a great mom, but I think she is tired of them now.
Went to the Southern Indiana Fiber Arts Festival a couple weekends ago, and was completely blown away by all that fibery fun. I also came away with an absolute NEED to learn to spin. I am now on a quest for a spinning wheel. Met quite a few local people while we were at the festival, and are now in the market for an angora goat or two to add to the herd.
This past Saturday, our local Beck's Mill had Oktoberfest. We sat up a booth there, and had a fantastic day selling our goats milk soap, candles and knitted items. Met some more local folks there too, including the photographer for our local paper, who got a shot of Boy Farmer listening to a storyteller, and Girl Farmer holding the new puppy. She seems to think our little farm might make a good story, after all the election stories are over for the year. So we shall see if she comes around for an interview.
Busy week ahead..we are going to a semi local farmers market on Saturday, and I was instructed by the local yarn store owner to bring some of my stuff. She will introduce me to the market masters and see about us setting up there every weekend. This is one of the top markets in the US I'm told. Little nervous about that, but I'm sure it will all work out.

Busy Saturday

So, I am making soap today. Got several different scents and colors going on in the kitchen. As soon as Mr. Farmer and Shorty Girl Farmer get back from Miller's Hardware, we will be making laundry soap. They have both Borax and washing soda, and Ruler Foods has bars of Fels Naptha.
The plan for today was putting out a fall garden, but we had a good thunderstorm last night, with quite a bit of much needed rain, so it's a bit too wet to till. Hopefully we will get to that this week. This mornings breakfast was home grown watermelon...so yummy. And Mr Farmer took the other ripe one over to Mr H.
So the rest of today will likely be spent indoors, knitting, soap making, and creating. We are so very blessed!

Foooood!!

We have canned 17 quarts of pickles, 21 quarts of green beans, and 14 quarts of dried beans, and froze 5 or so quart bags of squash in the last few days. Today I went to the garden and picked 3 more yellow squash, and some zinnias for a pretty bouquet. I am still working up tomatoes and making sauce, and hoping to get some blackberries to freeze this week. Mr. Farmer just walked in the door with 10 eggs. I have used both grandma's old canner, and my new to me canner, along with the new water bath canner. It's been busy and kind of hectic, but it will be sooo worth it when we can pop open a jar this winter and have fresh food. Next on the agenda is tilling up the middle of the garden and planting cauliflower, broccoli, cabbage and fall peas. Most of that will go in the freezer at harvest time though.

We started back to homeschool today which went well. Need to get back on a schedule though, because the little farmers were exhausted at wake up time this morning. Tomorrow will be easier...it always is. :)

Piggies!! :)

It's been busy, busy, busy here. Finally got our garden in, now it's a battle to keep up with the weeds
Thanks to a great new friend, we have 2 Potbelly Pigs. One boar and one sow, bought the sow and traded for the boar. And in a few months, we will have piglets too! :)

We have sold/traded all our rabbits except one house pet, so we are now out of the rabbit business completely. They were fun, but so very time consuming. We also traded the billy goat. So we are back to 4 goats, and 2 of those are bred does. And of course all the chickens. Animal control called us this week, and asked Mr Farmer if he wanted a couple geese. DNR rounded up some Canada geese, and got some domestic geese in the process, 2 of which they gave to our friend Jim at the shelter. Mr Farmer of course picked them up, so we now have a total of 6 geese, and 4 ducks.

Spent some time outside this afternoon watching the pigs root, and the goats play, and thanking God for this place, and everyone and everything that lives here. It's a good life.

New Chicks

Our momma hen, Jet, a tiny little bantam, hatched out 3 chicks so far. Mr Farmer is sick, so the little farmers and I went out to check on them this afternoon, and one of the chicks was laying on the ground in the henhouse, completely motionless. I came in to get Mr Farmer so we could move the nest, so the other chicks would be safe. I told him one chick was dead, we had to figure out how to save the others. He walked out and picked up the little dead chick...only it wasn't dead. It moved. It took a breath. So he handed it to me...here, take care of it...a little sugar water and some time under a heat lamp, and the baby is now back outside with its momma. I honestly thought the poor little thing didn't have a chance. I'm so glad God is still in control, instead of me.

And then there were none...

Turkeys, that is. We butchered the last one. The mean blue slate tom that I had tried to sell, but decided to give another chance. He blew it today. There is a very sweet, small chick that follows Mr Farmer around, and jumps up on him whenever he leans down. Today, for whatever reason, that mean turkey decided to peck that chick till she bled. He is gonna taste fabulous with some green beans, mashed potatoes and stuffing. :)

Better Days

So, I was right, and it is better. Yesterday Mr Farmer and I spent some time looking through the poultry catalog and deciding what we would like to order. So many choices! Today we have spent a fairly quiet day on the farm. We have a sick rabbit in the house, hoping she gets well and can go back outside soon. We have a new addition to the farm, a 12 week old Great Pyrenees puppy named Elvis. He is taking up some time, trying to get him housebroken. And we have had him out around the animals, which he doesn't seem to notice much. Lady, our little house dog, is trying to love him, but still growls and snaps at him occasionally.

Got a couple inches of snow Friday night, its almost all melted now. Back to school for the little farmers tomorrow, and back to work for me and Mr Farmer. I think I will start some tomato seeds sometime this week. I am anxious for spring to get here. Nothing like playing in the dirt to soothe a soul.

Simple Life??

Our donkey, Hugo, died this morning. So, we spent a huge part of our day trying to figure out what to do with his body. Thanks to some fantastic neighbors, it is done, and we are trying to move forward. It has been a hard day and I keep wondering again why people call this the simple life. What we do here is hardly ever simple. It is our choice, and we love this life, but easy, it is not. Days like today, I focus on all the good things, and pray hard. Tomorrow will be better.

rabbits and a mean turkey

We sold two of our little lionhead rabbits today...they are going to a nice new home as 4H projects, what fun! I think I might be at a point where I will keep the rest of the rabbits, and add on some new meat rabbit breeding stock. Still have 2 turkeys to get rid of, the big blue slate tom is not a nice turkey at all. I have been known to sell chickens just because they have no personality, and this mean boy definitely needs to find a new home. Well, either that or he goes to freezer camp soon.

We are expecting our first real snow of this winter tonight and tomorrow and I can't wait. The kids are excited and hoping for a snow day. I love watching them sled down the big hill.

On a sad note, just over a year since the chicken attack, I found myself trying to save Heckle once again. It was not to be. Heckle the boss roo left for rooster Heaven today from his spot on top of the washing machine.