A Peak Inside

I know I haven't been writing anything but puppy news, that's because my life took a very different turn a few years ago and my writing followed. My main blog is now Our Bit of Dirt.
After years of thinking all I wanted was a small garden, I came to realize what I truly love.

Homesteading.

For those that liked my writing, family or hilarity; feel free to drop by the new blog.

From new eggs to meeting our new hens.

To the amazing finds I've been able to snag this Spring!
Free tomatoes to a driveway full of bricks!

My life is full of new fruit trees, berries, grapes, potatoes and so much more!
I've met some truly amazing people along the way.
Learned more than I thought I would in a short span of time and have continued to find new loves!
Jams, jellies, wine and pies are in our fresh future!

Last winter I started repairing two of my quilts that are getting thread bare and have started to repair them.
We continue to build, add and grow new things.

In the last two years our lives have changed so very much - feel free to watch the crazy ride!

Moving Homestead!

Ever since we bought our home five in a half years ago we have been working on adding to it! Changing the weed choked over grown back yard into a multi use space.
As you can see from my first two blogs on our house to be back in 2010 House & House part 2 we have worked hard to create a viable space, one for us, our kids and our mini farm.

Over time this blog has been filled with all my drama! Family, friends, kids, outings, camping, trips, pets, projects, rants, movies, books, recipes and other nonsensical tidbits.
Trying to get any type of sense, or reason for my mash up was impossible. Good news for all, I am moving the main bulk of what I've focused on for the last few years - our growing urban homestead.
My gardens, chickens and rabbits - plus all my future homestead projects to a more focused blog.

So if growing things - animals or plants, composting, green houses, building the items your self or doing it all on a small bit of land on a very tight budget is something you are interested in please follow my new blog over at Our Bit of Dirt.

This blog, Blessed Rain, will focus on family and friends - I will warn you that I won't be posting here as often but its not going completely dormant.
You have been the best and the most amazing people! Thank you so much for your friendship and support over the years.

When we first moved into our home I couldn't imagine raising chickens or rabbits but couldn't wait to get my fingers into the dirt!
Now I can't imagine my life without them! We hope to add many new things to both our yard and our lives - bee keeping, aquaponics, a green house, rain barrels and fingers crossed learning how to distill oils!
See you there!

Our Urban Farm

We have the very large back garden where we grow the large things, zucchini, squash, cucumbers, pumpkins, corn, peas ect. (The list is varied and changes yearly but those are the basics)

The upper photo of the lettuce is my wonderful and amazing grow box, showing only one of four sections. Its growing fabulous this year and I can't wait until I can start to harvest it sometime next month. We start it in March, replant it in summer and enjoy lettuce until late fall.

The lower large photo is my kitchen garden. The blog to how we made it is here. Last year we planted carrots, onions, dill, radishes and cilantro in it.
This year we've planted two large sections of carrots (raising rabbits has increased my desire for lots of carrots). We moved the garlic from the upper garden into the middle sections and they are growing amazingly!
Last years dill is coming up around the garlic and they seem to be growing well together! By the time the dill needs more room the garlic will be ready to be harvested (normally mid-July). So we will see how well it does when I pull them out.
The lower photo of the plants came as a surprise, this year when tilling our back garden we found wild scallions growing!
I've already chopped up a handful and cooked them up with pork chops! Very yummy!

As I blogged before (here) we have added meat rabbits to our family. These are the breeders so they have been named and will continue to be doted on. The kids have permission to fall in love with them (as we hope and pray they all turn out to be good breeders)
Hubby designed and built the hutch all on his own from mostly reclaimed wood we were given for free!
On top we built a grow box and are currently growing wheat grass for the rabbits! Up next we will be building the grow out boxes for the babies we hope to have later on this year when these four are old enough.
Fun facts about rabbits - the males are the sweet ones! With many species the males are dominant and aggressive - not so with rabbits! If you are looking for a pet rabbit, choose a male! They are the sweetest things ever, I ADORE Zorro! Such a love!

Then come my ladies! I adore my hens! All 9 are well, we are getting 7-9 eggs daily now that its warmed up. We've been getting so many eggs I've started to sell them, 1-2 dozen a week!
Also I've added Mukluks, the latest in Chicken Couture - in spring and fall when the rain pours down (as it did ALL week this week) these are a must! 

My girls are the sweetest, fluffiest nutters! When hubs wanted chickens a few years ago I couldn't fathom raising them (he hadn't even mentioned rabbits!). Gardening, I was good with. I love playing in the dirt! 

Love the feel of earth, love fresh lettuce, carrots and our first harvest of garlic last year might actually last us until we can harvest in July - but I've been milking them along! We love garlic!

Raising chickens scared me! I was worried about the amount of care, time and health of taking care of them in such a mixed climate as Northern Utah has - bitter raging cold in winter and fiery hot summers.

They have been a joy!

I can't even believe it took me so long to get them! I don't know why more people don't have chickens in places its legal to raise them!

Next year (or the year after, life always throws odd things at us) we hope to add honey bees. We are also working on converting our small shed or even building a green house for an aquaponics system. Hopefully in the future we will have lettuce all year round, along with duck weed and fish.

So we have a bit of land, not much at all really, but manage to have a small homestead set up. The key is to take it one step at a time. I'm not overwhelmed with everything because we've slowly added one thing at a time.

Until next time ;) stay safe and healthy!

Meet our Meat Rabbits

The top two bays of the rabbit hutch

Yes, the title really did read rabbit. No, its no longer a popular meat here in the USA. However, for many years it was a dietary staple.
After getting chickens last year, my darling hubby decided we were also getting rabbits.

When I say decided I mean he started creating plans, figuring out where he was going to put them and then of course finding us local meat breeders willing to sell us a few young breeders!

Meet Stormy & Misty our Does

Zorro our Buck

My only chore is making sure they are fed, watered and then finding ways to cook them up!
This week we butchered our practice bunny. An adorable white bunny we had named Bonnie, until we realized that Bonnie was indeed Bubba.
I cooked rabbit for the first time! It turned out amazing! Here is a link to the recipe.

Now Zorro is only 13 weeks and the Does are only 7 so it will be several months until we can think about baby bunnies. For now we are going to finish building the bottom two bays of the hutch, Then build out the growing pen.

The wood for the hutch we received from a friend of ours, it used to be fencing but had been damaged. We were able to salvage much of the wood and create a beautiful hutch all at the same time.

For those interested, my husband and daughter are making a video of building the hutch. It will be posted to their blog in a few weeks when the bottom is completed.

As for us, we've been busy. We have several spring projects we are hard at work on and will be planting the cinder block garden this weekend. I already have lettuce growing and raspberries to plant!
Our chickens are all healthy, fine and laying! We got a full 9 eggs the other day so Spring is truly here!

Blessing to all, may your life be full!