We are excited to bring you along for the journey. On this blog you will find a ton of posts about goats, canning and homesteading and more. We wanted to let other people know that you don’t have to have hundreds of acres, tons of livestock or even generations of knowledge. We wanted our blog to be different, so we did. We created our homestead and our blog to be not only a way to look back at what we have done and learned but so that others could learn from us.
Something different
Both Jared and I grew up as city kids. The hustle and bustle something that we grew up in. As time went on and we got older, we realized that city life is not what we want. It is not what we wanted for our boys. So we decided to do something about it. We were breaking our back trying to save as much money as possible to get our homestead. We are both paramedics and after working 36-60 hour shifts for two years, we finally did it. We purchased our homestead.
Shortly after buying the homestead, we got our first chickens. They are pretty cool little critters and really, what homestead is complete without a couple chickens. We started with 15 and lost a couple. But chicken math is a thing and now we are in the ballpark of 50. But I still wanted something a little different. So I started looking into other critters that would be low maintenance while also being semi profitable.
The Goats On Our Homestead
I’m not going to lie, I didn’t want goats. I had heard the horror stories. They are escape artists, they die easily, they can’t actually eat everything, and so on. They are pretty much everything BUT low maintenance and semi profitable. But Jared wanted goats, so we got the goats. Man, I was so wrong! I love those critters! They are seriously the best. Bella is a challenge and I am going to make her love me. But Champ? The girl below? She is the best girl. She is actually going to be giving us babies soon!
After adding our first couple goats, we wanted even more. So we added more goats, then some goats had babies and now we are at 12…. I think. We are hoping to have a few more and that will allow us to start milking regularly. That milk will then help us reduce our dependence on the grocery store.
On To The Ducks
Ever since I was a kid, I have loved ducks. They are such cool creatures. Jared finally okayed a few ducks and meat ducks. While they are messy and their pool stinks to high heaven, no matter how often we drain it, I love those guys. We also gained our neighbors guinea. Apparently she was unhappy living with them.
The Garden
We have also been working hard on our gardens and general clean up of the property. Our property was not set up for homesteading before we bought it. So we have been slowly but surely working through the property and clearing out old debris, trash, and other things. We are hoping to have it safe enough soon to let the goats roam bigger areas to keep the brush in line.
The garden has been a huge pain in the backside as well. Between not being able to get all my seedlings started and then the ducks eating what I managed to plant, the garden is finally in. I was also able to harvest our first cucumbers!
We are gearing up to start our fall garden and I am ridiculously excited! Our summer harvest has been good, considering it’s our first garden here, but I’m hoping the fall garden will be even better.
We will be adding to our homestead as this blog progresses and we want you to be along for the ride. You can sign up below for our newsletter! And don’t forget to share and follow us on social media. Welcome to the Homestead!
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My name is Leigh and I am the owner of Steel Raven Farms. I am also the mom of two wonderful boys, wife to a pretty nifty man for the last 15 years and paramedic to boot. We want to bring you along on our crazy journey of Homesteading and all that entails!