The husband and I were discussing the end of 2009 and the previous decade. The biggest life changes for us happened in the 00’s. We bought land, built a house, built a sheep shed and pasture, built a chicken house and a barn. We filled up all these buildings with the appropriate animals. We had our child. I quit my job. On paper the past decade was awful for a LOT of people. For us, it was a culmination of years of dreaming and planning. Most everything has gone our way. I don’t know about my husband, but I have a little bit of survivor’s guilt.

For this New Year’s resolutions I have a few things I would like to try for. All of them are related. They are in no particular order:
1. I want to get my homesteader enthusiasm back.
2. I want to preserve more of my garden for winter use.
3. I want to make a bed sized quilt.
4. I want to waste less.
5. I want to drive less.
6. I want to do more hunting.
7. I want to get a dog to train for hunting (I’ll need more than moral support for this).

This past year our son started pre-school. The program he is in has the best of intentions, but, I can see the worker drone curriculum shining through. We do our best to help the boy think critically. I really understand why people home school every time I hear “WHATEVER” from my 4 year old. It seems to me that the school system is designed to suck in the parents and families too and turn us all into consumers. I’m fighting it without much success yet.

With regards to no. 4 above, I did order less seeds this year. Hopefully, I’ll get some tomatoes and we’ll have put the late blight behind us. H1N1 doesn’t worry me as much as tomato blight.

I usually fizzle

Every year I start out in January with big plans. I want to expand my fruit production. Last year I had raspberries and they were very successful. This year I want to do blueberries. Plants are expensive but the county will have them for the plant sale.

I try to draw out where things are going to go in the garden. Then a nice day appears in March or April and I plant lettuce and peas. Then I totally forget about my plan. I try and squeeze in one more tomato plant. I plant kale and never eat it or freeze it. The rabbits eat it. I SHOULD plant kale. It's easy to grow. I SHOULD eat kale. It's really good for me.

This year the goal is to not over do. I'll use my space efficiently. I'll do succession planting and I won't expand by more than one bed.

Watch me fizzle!