We've had five inches of rain in the past five days.

Am I complaining?  Sure I am.

I met with one of my friends to meet up for carpooling our teenagers to a track meet, and as she emerged from her truck and I from my minivan, we just looked at each other bleary-eyed, falling into each other's arms and both bursting out "I can't stand this #^*# anymore!"

So, yes, you could say we're sick of the rain.  

It did melt the snow, though.  I show the progression from full-on winter-blizzard-wonderland to planting garlic in our bare garden beds in my newest short movie "Homesteading in Paradise - March Highlights".

I hope you have fun watching it!

Homesteading in paradise - December highlights

Dear friends,

I had so much fun putting together this month's short little video about highlights on our homestead.

This month of December has been magical.

Watch our homestead transform from green to winter wonderland!

Click here to watch my movie.

Have a wonderful rest of the month and a happy start into the new year!

A new thing. I think you'll like it!

So I came up with an idea, and I hope you'll like it.  Many of you have told me you love my pictures, and that you live vicariously through my family and our homestead.  It makes me happy to inspire, teach and empower people to live a simpler, more healthy, wholesome life.

Many people who follow me on Instagram (come over and follow me there, too!) love the short videos I post of scenes of our life, so I decided to do monthly short videos to recap each month, to highlight some special moments and give you a glimpse of what it's like to live like we do, connected with nature, joy, animals, and each other.

I made one for June!  It's very short but sweet, and you can watch it here on my youtube channel.

Let me know what you think!

Part two of my onion movie, and a little pep talk for all my snowbound readers

Hey ya'll, I don't know if you watched my first onion movie yet.  It's getting rave reviews in my Facebook community!  People are learning new tricks from me and are inspired.  Yeah!  My first movie was about how to plant onions from seed, the second one is about what to do once they are germinated.  Here it is:

I am loving all the green shoots that are coming up everywhere - cultivated and wild.  Things are happening here in the Pacific Northwest, and I am ever so sorry for you Midwesteners and East Coasters.  I really am.  All that snow!  All that cold, while we sun ourselves in T-Shirts.  Just hang in there!  Spring will come!  You will probably feel sorry for us in two months, when all our little baby seedlings are getting their butts kicked in a late frost.

We are busy on our homestead.  My energizer-bunny husband Steve cut five huge Alders out of the goat enclosure, because some of those trees were quite dead and posed a risk to the goat barn in a storm.  We now have three years worth of fire wood cut and split, thanks to all the man-and-boy-power we have around here (...and woman-power, thank you very much).  Our ten and twelve year old sons spit wood like nobody's business.  You can see their muscles growing beefier every day (and their appetites as well).

The bed of coals and almost full moon.

We are loving our moveable greenhouse, because it harbors kale and collard plants that would have frozen in the winter if it wasn't for its sheltered protection.  The plants have been kicking in after being dormant for a few months, and we've been eating plenty of fresh greens.
To supplement our diet with other green stuff, I am sprouting different seeds like alfalfa, clover, and lentils.  These crunchy sprouts are great on sandwiches and salads.
I also got a batch of Sauerkraut going, quietly fermenting and bubbling on the kitchen counter, emitting its distinctive scent.

I leave you with an image of Lukas, who - after splitting wood all day - somehow finds the energy to do backflips on the trampoline. I wish we could bottle up all this energy, so I could take swigs of it during the day!

What are you up to these days?