One of the first “homestead-y” tasks I added to my repertoire once we moved to our cabin was soap-making. Matt and I love goat’s milk soap, but were tired of buying bars at the grocery store when it was something I KNEW I could do myself. I was really apprehensive once I started scouring the… Continue reading My Favorite Soap Recipe & Kitchen Chemistry
Whew, can anyone tell me where the heck 2018 has gone?! I cannot believe that I blinked and it is the middle of the year! Tonight is the New Strawberry Moon (the beginning of a phase of three supermoons in a row) and mid-summer is just a little over a week away – a perfect… Continue reading (Almost) Mid-Summer 2018: Updates, Reality, and New Moon Intentions
I cannot believe it is APRIL and I am just now getting around to posting updates! As you can imagine, things have been busy around here preparing for Spring. In addition to getting the garden ready for planting and planting seeds and transplants, we have said goodbye to a member of the household and welcomed… Continue reading Horsing Around at Emerald Moon
Hello 2018 and Happy New Year everyone! I have a great feeling about this year and can’t wait for the adventure to begin. Matt and I cannot believe that two years ago we were still unpacking and getting things settled at our little cabin. At that time we were just a family of two humans,… Continue reading Hello, 2018! (And a Wrap Up of Year Two @ Emerald Moon)
I took a little break from writing over the past month or so to go on a quick vacation with the hubby to see “Hamilton” in Chicago for an early holiday treat. (It was fabulous! I recommend seeing it if you can.) We spent a relatively relaxing Thanksgiving at home with family and are just… Continue reading Setting Intentions for 2018
Bees are fascinating. They exist in a matriarchal society where the main goal is to protect the queen, feed the brood, and collect food stores to survive, then wash-rinse-repeat. All of the bees in the hive are children of the queen bee. The workers are her daughters who do everything from gather nectar and pollen,… Continue reading Game of Thrones: Re-Queening Your Hive
Mmmmmm….honey. Honey on biscuits, honey in tea, honey as a sugar substitute, honey for mead, honey…sorry, y’all, I got distracted there. Let’s be honest, most people keep bees for the honey. It is a wonderful alternative to using sugar and has the benefit of combating allergies when you eat raw, local honey, plus it’s delicious!… Continue reading Oh, Honey!
If you are anything like us, we love getting a good deal on useful things – you, too? Yes? Good, then you will understand how we ended up with an accidental extra hive of bees by Fall 2016. We follow our local beekeeping group on Facebook and Matt saw that someone had posted an ad… Continue reading Un(bee)lievable Chaos
We love pollinators at our house. They are so vital to our food supply, environment, and ecosystems that we have tried to always have some type of native plant that benefits butterflies and bees in our yard. They are especially helpful in pollinating my garden and fruit trees so I want as many around as… Continue reading Hives at the Homestead
As mentioned in my last post about our hens, I have added to my flock a couple of times now, but I am still at eight layers to date. Chickens were my gateway animal to homestead animal keeping, but they were also my first experience with making the right, albeit hard, choices here at home.… Continue reading The Circle of Life – As Taught By Chickens
