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Dreamweavers Homestead
Manage episode 442968768 series 3511941
Today I'm talking with Victoria at Dreamweavers Homestead.
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00:00
This is Mary Lewis at A Tiny Homestead, the podcast comprised entirely of conversations with homesteaders, cottage food producers, and crafters. If you're enjoying this podcast, please like, subscribe, share it with a friend, or leave a comment. Thank you. Today I'm talking with Victoria at Dreamweavers Homestead. Good morning, Victoria. How are you? Good morning. I'm good. How are you? I'm great. Where are you located again?
00:29
Missouri Ozarks, but you are the first to know that we are now actually in the Arkansas Ozarks. Oh, okay. All right, cool. Yeah, a little inside scoop there. All righty. Well, you're not in the line of the hurricane that's hitting Florida today, so that's good. Yeah, we just get the residual rains, that's all. And so we've got a lot of people down there in Florida, so we're thinking of them.
00:59
Yeah, me too. My daughter is in St. Petersburg and she called yesterday and she was like, we should be okay. I'm like, okay, good. Please stay okay. I know. I'm always anxious when they start to get those this Louisiana and Texas. We get those heavy rains. Yeah. Yup. I'm not happy about the hurricane situation, but it will blow through. It will be okay. I think she'll survive it. It'll be okay. That's what I'm telling myself today. Yes, it will. So.
01:27
So anyway, tell me about yourself and what you guys do at Dreamweavers Homestead. Oh gosh. A shorter list is what we don't do, probably. Most people, if they know me, they're knowing me from rabbits. They're knowing me from permaculture and learning in those types of ways. We do strive to have a permaculture homestead. Obviously, we've recently moved.
01:54
So we're starting from the ground up, which is actually a beautiful thing because people are going to get to see it from the very ground of everything from the gardens to the animals to the theme to the food forest, they will be seeing it. So all of these things that we've been teaching about and talking about, I'll be implementing them in real time. So that's going to be really nice for people to see. But we do heavily.
02:23
focus on poultry, rabbits, we have dairy goats, we did pigs, not a favorite, but they'll probably be back with a different breed. When we do permaculture, it's not just an element, I'm actually certified in design, we're very passionate about that. My husband is currently going through the course himself to be certified for that, so we really are trying to focus on closing the loops on our property to really be sustainable. So when we go into this,
02:52
project there's a lot of things that everybody will have to pay their rent as people like to say for their animals and their things in their system. So there's a lot of things that we do but they fall under those umbrellas. Okay, how excited are you to start from scratch? Beyond. Beyond. They actually just put in our driveway and I...
03:19
already I'm just seeing okay this goes here this goes here we've been working on our design so I've been getting that all mapped out and everything so we can get that ready. I'm pumped very pumped and it is a decent size it's 25 acres. Cool awesome. Yeah so it is a decent size and one of the huge goals which a lot of people don't know I haven't even released this on my social media or anything yet but a goal that we've had for years has been
03:48
to have the largest food forest, the continuous food forest in the US that is quote unquote recorded. I'm not going to report it, but it's personal goal. The largest recorded public or private is 7.2 acres. So my goal is 7.3 of continuous. And I'm very excited with that. Multiple caveats with that. Not only will we be teaching about it and actually implementing it in.
04:16
but we will be able to transform our property all the way around and just really be a good steward of that land. But also in our area, some areas are a little bit more low income and things. Having that much food for us, especially all those perennials and things, we should be able to feed the community, also provide cuttings and plant starts and all these things so other people can do it as well.
04:46
So we really hope to contribute to feeding the Ozarks. Wow. That is fantastic. That's all very, very exciting and very helping the world news. And Victoria, I got to tell you, I get told stuff first on this podcast a lot. I had a lady announce her ninth pregnancy on the episode that we recorded that no one else really knew about yet.
05:16
another lady told me that she hadn't told anybody else yet that she was getting out of one aspect of her homesteading because she just doesn't have the energy and the push to keep doing this one particular segment. And so I'm at the point now when people are like, so I haven't said this anywhere else yet, we're going to share it with you. Like, okay, lay it on me. You're like, I'm ready, hit me. Yeah. Yeah. We...
05:46
We have leaked a little bit of some sneak peek pictures on like Instagram, Snapchat, our TikTok, but our Facebook is kind of our main thing and then here locally and we haven't quite let people know what's going on. We wanted to have that element of, okay, look what we're doing and then people don't have to deal with the transition.
06:14
the chaos that comes with transition, but we're so, so, so, so excited about it. Our initial property, we worked really hard on it actually for years, did a lot of work, especially with the soil and doing all that. We utilized the rabbits and the goats, which are both a cold manure, and then the duck manure, which is not hot like chickens, which a lot of people don't.
06:42
realized that because of the high water content of their poop, essentially. That is why. So we use that, their water and everything. And so we like accelerated that property, things that should have taken three, four years, you know, it was only like one or two years, and that was really working out well. Yeah, this new property does have a pond that we get to revitalize. So very excited about that. Because then we can add
07:09
fish, which is something that we wanted to do and fiddle with aquaponics, which is something else that we wanted to do on a larger scale. But we worked really hard on that. We had to go into a transitional property, but unfortunately there was some scammy stuff that happened there. We lost that. And that's why we have moved on to this. But realistically, it was just paving the way because this property ticks all the boxes. So we're very excited about that.
07:39
Nope. That's another thing. Yes, it. We are doing another shabin, which for those of you don't know, that is shed house or shed cabin. So they deliver the shell and then we need to finish the inside ours will be unique in the fact of the initial building that is being placed, we will be finishing that out and living in it correct. But actually,
08:05
our house will be a series of three houses that will be connected together through a completely see-through sunroom. And so this initial building will actually be transferred over into just the kitchen and preservation pantry when the other buildings are there and finished. Okay. So... So a lot going into this, you know, years of this is what we always wanted to do and now we finally have the opportunity and the space to do it.
08:34
And so, yeah, people will want to follow along with that. I want to, I want to see how this goes. This sounds very exciting and very nerve wracking. Oh yes, very, because I forgot to say that because of the situation with this house that we kind of got surprised with, we only had 90 days notice and now we are under, I think we're at 47 days. And it is, you know, I just, we're just at the driveway stage.
09:04
Wow. Okay. So how many people in your family, like how many people will be living in the new home? There is three of us full time. My husband and I have had infertility issues. So we just had our daughter. She's eight months old, but we tried for her for like 13 years. Wow. Yeah, that was crazy. My son.
09:29
is 15. He's over 15 years old. If I say he's 15, he says I'm older than 15. He's 15. He actually doesn't live with us full time. That's by his choice. He is a teenager. But also, he just has different interests. And so he chooses to stay with his dad, most of the time, because his dad lives in the city. And his dad is also a gamer. And my son is a gamer. And it's
09:58
that kind of thing. So with him being so old, he's kind of calling his own shots there. Sure. Yeah, absolutely. So part-time, yes, but full-time, there's just the three of us. If we were blessed with more children, who knows? Okay. So a smaller home situation to start with is not going to be terribly hard on you. It's going to be hard on you, but it's not going to be a hardship on you. No. And our previous, we've always lived tiny. So our first property...
10:27
Same thing, tiny. Here, we do have a house that's transitional property, but we do not use three fourths of it. Literally, they're just empty rooms because we don't have anything to put it up, and we just are so used to always being together in one or two rooms that, other than the kitchen, the living room, and a bedroom, we just don't use it, barely. We do have family locally, and so they're at their own house, but they are local, so we do spend a good bit of time.
10:57
I will say my friends, I have a lot of friends who live tiny, but some of them have very big families, you know, six, seven, eight people, and they're living in the same size tiny as us. So it's awesome to see how they navigate that with all the kids and all that great use of space.
11:27
And it was tight. And when we moved to our new place four years ago, we went from 850 square feet to over 1400 square feet, which is my husband, my son and I. And it's so weird being able to actually walk through a room and not touch an opposite wall. You know? Yes. Yeah. This one, this building is the same size as what we moved.
11:52
from thankfully so no shock there but it's a 12 by 32 so 300 and what is that 86 square feet or so? Yep, that's small. I commend you. My husband for years was like once the kids are grown we should look at a tiny house and I was like absolutely not. And he was like why and I said honey I love you.
12:17
but we need our own spaces. We need to be able to step away from each other and a tiny space is not gonna allow for that. And he was like, but it'd be so much fun. And I'm like, no, no, no, no, it would not be fun, no. In our house, two yeses are a yes, one no is a no. Yeah, we have. Yeah, I can't. Yeah, for us, it's like.
12:43
We have that bedroom space and the living room space in my brain that is two separate spaces. So, if he's in the living room watching a movie or something and I go to bed, which is how it was before, I was like, oh, I'm in the bedroom. I totally separated that out, but I can definitely see because my mom's the same way. My mom's like, absolutely not. I could never.
13:10
Yeah, and the other thing is that I've said this a couple times on the podcast my husband snores like crazy even when he's just napping he snores and I have to listen to it all night when I'm trying to sleep I don't want to listen to it during the daytime too. So that's the other reason no on a tiny house. No Yeah, well, I love the concepts. Right Good thing you're interviewing me and not my husband
13:36
because then he would have had to sit here with you on the snoring part because I snore really bad, really bad. My daughter sleeps through it, you know, she's adjusted. But he's a snorer, but it's circumstantial. It depends. I am just, if my eyes are closed, I'm snoring. And I'm like, well, I can't hear myself. And he's like, yeah, good thing. He's like, you take the roof off the house.
14:06
Yeah, he's probably with you there. We just spend a lot of time outside and stuff.
14:16
Yes, and we're lucky here because we have a huge pole barn, we have a greenhouse, we have a farm stand. So my husband is outside a lot and that's awesome because he's doing what he absolutely loves and I'm inside doing things I absolutely love. And then we actually get to talk to each other about different things. So we're not talking about the same thing daily, you know? Oh yeah. But either way, I don't want to get into a marriage counseling discussion here because it's not worth it. So...
14:46
So what does this first year look like for you at the new place? Tell me about that. Well, because it's transitional and not a startup, it's going to look different. Normally, you know, you'd want to do it in a different order than we're going to do it. But the barn, so we do have that milking space and kidding space, that's going to be important because we already have Dairy Goats and they're already, you know,
15:17
going to be kidding and those things are already happening. So normally we would have set all these things up before we got livestock but we already have livestock. So for us getting all that the livestock shelters put up for what we already have and then focusing on our perennials that's going to be a huge thing. Our annual garden we know where the spot is going to be we're going to just do it at a certain size this year.
15:45
because we're going to be heavily focused on the perennials. Now, when I say that, most people are thinking, oh, she's just going to put in a handful of each type of plant and she's going to go about her day. No, I just mean that we're probably going to only have five or six 50-foot rows, or we're going to have just that smaller space instead of instantly putting in an acre annual garden. That's not how it's going to be.
16:13
especially for our design, but those are the main things. We have had, we know the area, that helps, so we don't have to get used to the area. I know the topography, we've walked it several times. We've been able to see it into a couple of seasons because we actually had had this land where we had an inkling, something might be funky. And then it's not our first rodeo, which I had before. So we're just gonna go into it.
16:42
focused on those things. And next year, we will resume with our full rabbitry and our poultry breeding stock coming back in. I've already gotten myself on a waiting list for all of my stock to come back in from people who I'd used before or who are really good, excuse me, who have excellent stock because...
17:10
We were an MPIP poultry breeder, which I mean, technically we are, but I sold my stock. We are on Murray McMurray Hatchery's website in their marketplace as someone who has poultry and things like that. Those are a heavy focus for us to get on. Things that we'd like to do are getting some of the pasture areas seeded out.
17:40
and create those silvopastures instead of just dense forests, because a lot of the forests that we have essentially monocropped itself through lack of management. There was no management, so it's just, you know, you've got like 50,000 oaks, you know, and everything else is struggling and the canopy is so dense that now you have issues on the floor where it's not getting any sun, it's not drying out, you know, things like that. So we're going to really be focusing on that management.
18:10
after all these things are initially set up and all that, then we'll get into other things such as expanding the goats, cattle, things like that down the road. Thank you for telling me all that because most people don't know that there kind of needs to be at least a loose knit plan when you do something like this because you can't
18:36
I mean, I suppose you can just go buy 25 acres and be like, I don't know what we're going to do with it, but we're going to buy it. But then I feel like you spend the first couple of years doing a lot of trial and error to see what works. Yes. And they will tell you, heck, even I do when people ask me, and especially they tell you in permaculture to watch your land, know your seasons, know your patterns. And if you were moving to somewhere new, I would also agree with that. For us.
19:06
since we're only living 20 minutes from where we were in the same environment in an area that we frequent, it's a little bit different, you know? But some people move here to the Ozarks and they do not prepare themselves to handle the amount of rains that we get and things wash out for them or something like that. And then on the flip side, they're not prepared for the severe droughts that we get then after the rains.
19:35
So for us, that was a big thing. In this property, we did think about it. We wanted to have our boxes checked because we already knew what we wanted. There's a spring head on the property. We hope to be able to tap that open. Instead of it being seasonal creek, then we could get some flow all the time. The pond was a bonus because we need to put, otherwise we'd have to put another one in. The way that it kind of all lays at a slope.
20:04
For us, we weren't looking for something completely flat, because then I have to do even more earthwork than I was going to have to do. But I will say, having done so many of the designs, I also work with a permaculture firm out of Omaha, I'm part of their team. So they've done their designs and I've been in with them and all these things. I think we had a leg up there.
20:31
But my advice to people when they get these huge pieces of property is to just focus on zones 0 through 2, which is the house, the immediate area of the house, and then right outside of that. Just focus on those couple acres so that you can get your bearings and stuff before you just start wiping out trees or doing this or putting a pond here and all this. People get very excited and they move very quickly. And then they're like, oh crap.
21:00
and then they have to move things around because it wasn't good. Our first place, we ended up having to move some stuff around like, oh, this doesn't work in this spot, I gotta move it. That's because on our initial place, we bought from out of state. So even though we knew what we were doing, we didn't know how this piece of property would be. And then we had to deal with the repercussions of that. So that's what I would suggest. A lot of people are...
21:29
living in their campers and stuff now while they watch their property. And we're thankful that we don't have to just have that watch period. But yeah, I'm glad you pointed that out because some people will just be like, I think I'm just going to go ahead and run. No walking. I'm just going to run. Yeah. And the other thing is, is that even if you do sort of know the property that you're getting and you have been able to do the research and get some early answers.
21:58
Sometimes things will surprise you because we put in like, I don't know, 100 asparagus crowns in the first year that we were here. And this past spring, they came up like crazy. Like I was so excited. It takes two to three years to get your first yield from asparagus because that's how long it takes from putting the crowns in the ground to having edible yummy asparagus. And it did really well, but there wasn't enough to sell any really yet.
22:29
I keep debating whether we should get more asparagus crowns and put them in because they do really well. We could be selling tons of asparagus in three years from now. And then I'm like, but what happens if that doesn't actually pan out? You know, it's just stuff. And like we bought, no, we were given strawberry roots the first summer over here and the strawberries do okay.
22:56
We're just not really good at paying attention to them because we forget that we put them in because we're crazy. And so we had some really yummy strawberries this spring as well. And I keep debating saying to my husband, why don't we just stop with all the freaking tomatoes and cucumbers and make half the garden of asparagus and strawberries because they grow really well and then we could focus on that. But he really loves having a diverse garden, veggie garden as it were. So.
23:25
I'm trying to figure out how to broach this to him so that it seems like a good idea. I haven't quite figured out how to do it yet. Well positive news is that strawberries are such an excellent ground cover that you can just sell them on the ground cover. He can still have all of his plant diversity and the strawberries will crawl around the whole ground. So you'll still get a bigger crop and actually a better yield. Plus you'll have to water less because it's in its shades out and keeps your soil.
23:54
You know, from burning up there in the summer, there's so many things and then you can sell off your runners and all those. As far as the asparagus go, oh man, they're so beautiful. I love asparagus. I put in 40 crowns here at the temporary place until I realized what was going on. So I was going to put in my next 40 but when I obviously waited. So we're going to be.
24:20
putting in a lot of crowns because, but I will probably cheat and do two year crowns this time because I've had to move and I don't wanna start all the way back over. Yeah, but yeah, they're an excellent border plant and all those things too. So they'll help with a lot of the shading and he can plant up his greens and lettuces underneath them and extend his season.
24:46
Okay, thank you. You just helped me more than you could possibly know. Because I've been trying to figure out how to float this without having him be like, no, I don't want to do that. Because I really want him to think about it. For he says no. So, and I also, if I had my way, our whole property would be peony plants, asparagus, and strawberries. Because I know those all do really, really well. But that's not what he's going to want to do. So I'm hoping to get him to cut the
25:15
the annual stuff down to about half of what he's got going now. And then have these perennials, big perennials come back every year and less craziness. Yeah, we're going to just heavily focus on, we will have the annuals like I said, but I will intentionally let some of my annuals self seed. So that well, and I guess for anybody listening, that means I'm just going to leave them. Let them go.
25:43
so that they can come back up the next year on their own time. I do that with tomatoes and stuff in my last place because then they would just pop up and then I can just pluck them and put them where I need them instead of focusing on doing so many starts because we were off grade at the last place. But I am like your husband in the fact that we'll grow anything because I'm all about season extension or micro climate or do this, do that, whatever.
26:14
He likes some of the things that are super non-traditional like pineapple, pomegranate, mango, things like that. So we're looking at alternative varieties, how cold can they handle, what are the hardier varieties and then we'll be putting some of those in. I did just post on Facebook recently about compost heating for structures as well as hot water using your compost pile.
26:43
as its own hotbed so that it can heat your pipes. Well, that's the method that we're going to start with for our initial greenhouse. But we will have another greenhouse where we will likely heat it with wood because he is wanting some of these things to keep the trees pruned down, but it'll essentially be like a tropical greenhouse. It's just something that he really, really wants.
27:11
And so albeit they're perennial, they will have to be a bit baby. But fortunately, as far south as we will be, they don't need like a ton of babying. Um, where we'll be is seven B, but it's very close to eight A, um, with some season extension, like some extra layers, we'll be able to create, um, that AA eight B environment.
27:39
without heat and then if we add heat that'll push us down into those zones that he's needing. I've got some friends that are doing bananas and pomegranates and things here. Where they are here in Missouri, they're actually like the 6B7A line and they're able to grow those things outside. So there's so many options. So I'm with you. I think you should push the perennial envelope. See how far you can push it.
28:07
Yes, I'm gonna I'm gonna try he's doing I think the last farmers market of the season for him is this Saturday So I'm hoping next weekend not this coming to take Sunday afternoon be like, okay so can we sit down and talk about our plan for the Produce and the gardens and stuff for for 2025 now that you have some time to think about it because he's been so busy and
28:34
and stressed and I'm like, I don't want to introduce a new concept or a new idea until things are a little less nuts around here. So I was going to say, so he's a market gardener then? Yes. Oh, yes. Yes. I hear him then. You should suggest to him also those perennial lettuces and perennial kales. Then he can, you know, kind of have those to fall back on if he puts enough in.
29:03
and kind of buy him some time on some of his succession planting if he's somebody who sells greens. Yes, exactly. So this is the reason I love the podcast so much, Victoria, because I get to talk to people like you who know about this stuff. And that way I can go to him and be like, you need to listen to episode 122, 154 and 96 because those are important information for you to know about. And he will go listen and he takes notes. So
29:34
That's good. I always love to talk to market gardeners, pick the brain of a market gardener. I used to think I'm going to do that, but my husband and I had this conversation yesterday, which is interesting you bring this up. We just said we were going to do market and then we did find some places where we could do market privately so that we wouldn't have to be part of the farmers market.
30:04
and all that and just do our own booths. But we talked and we decided, no, we're gonna do our annuals to really get ourselves put up and feed all of the livestock, anything extra we hope to give to people who are in need of it, or if we have like some huge bulk.
30:28
try to discount that down for people who maybe live in town and they want to do some canning or something. But our main focus is not that. That's just if we have extra. We really wanted to just focus on trying to offer those type of things through the perennials. We really just wanted to focus more in on that fair share and people care part of the permaculture ethics because I get
30:58
I'm one of those people with people listening, I'm sure they'll resonate. I'm one of those people that will just do and do and do and do and do. And I'm like, okay, well, we have this, we'll try to make money off this, we'll try to make money off this, and we can do this, we can do this, we can do this. And I think that's one thing that we're going to change going into this property is I like the teaching aspect. Because I like to do the public speaking.
31:25
or the podcast if somebody asks, I'll do that. I've been asked to teach about rabbits and things to homeschool groups. I'm very big into that. And I like to do all of it on social media as well. Answer questions, share knowledge. That's my passion there. Not like getting rich or making that type of money on these things. So I know a lot of people ask me, they said, well, aren't you gonna...
31:50
sell all this stuff from your food forest. We would sell some, I mean, obviously, but we really want to have that at that lower cost. Of course, if you have a food forest that's even an acre, half acre, the cuttings and the plants and everything that you would have on that would be just exponential. So we really want to try to hone in on those things. So now I'm going to be watching my market gardening friends.
32:19
from afar, they work so hard, they do so much. But I just decided that that is just something that is, that's hard for me to do because I'm so type A. And it just I get so overwhelmed about it. I'm like, oh my gosh, I have five less cucumbers than last week. And I start to panic. So we had this conversation yesterday about how to scale back and I had to cut the market out of my plan. Yep. We
32:48
It's been a rough year here for the farmers market. I don't know if you know anything about what the weather did in Minnesota this spring. And I have talked ad nauseum on the episodes all summer about what a terrible wet spring it was here. And so basically we didn't have any tomatoes until the very first of August to sell at the farmers market. And luckily we had candles and lip balms and wax melts and soaps.
33:15
So that kind of tied us over until we had any produce to sell. So what we usually do, the first three summers we were here, we sold from our property, donated a bunch to the food shelf, and shared with friends. This second summer, sold from the property, shared with friends, canned. We canned a bunch for ourselves finally. Third summer, which was last summer,
33:45
the farm stand, the farmer's market for the first year, I think, and canned and gave a whole bunch to the food shelf. So we have like four places we're dispersing the produce and it's great. The thing is, we feel like we kind of failed our community this year because the garden didn't do well. So we're going to make it better next year. It's going to be better next year.
34:11
Well, seeing that attitude you have, like, you're like, no, we're going to do it better, you know, this and that. And for me, I just am like, oh my gosh, I messed up. That's like how my brain works. So I would just be so frantic. So that's why my husband was like, no, I'm going to put a full stop on you. Reel it in because he's like, if you want to focus on the teaching, you want to be building up the whole property, you know, he's like, let's do that.
34:37
And he was like, and then whatever's extra because in my brain that I'm like, okay, it's extra. You know, so that was that. So maybe we'll circle back in the future and go back to that. But you know, I had some people who were actually kind of mean. You know, if I ran out of something or I didn't have anything and not only it's even just like the plants like we had pruned our trees, I had cuttings and things like that. People just get really sassy when you ran out of stuff. And so I think that's where I had all that extra.
35:07
The pressure, it was like that with my birds too. As soon as I ran out of birds, I'm like, oh my gosh. So, cause I always like everybody to be happy. I want everybody to be happy. Everybody get what they have, what they need and all those things. So I'm hoping to dive more into that, you know, on the ground teaching stuff.
35:30
I think you are going to be a massive success once you get through this year of transition. I think you're going to do great. We actually had people concerned in June. When my husband went to the farmers market, they were like, are you guys okay? My husband said, why? He said, because you don't have your signs out at the end of the driveway. You don't have your banner up on your farm stand shed. Is everything okay?
35:57
My husband was like, everything's fine except that you have noticed all it's done is rain for a month and a half, right? And they were like, well, yes. And he said, the garden is soup. If I step into the garden, I'm up to my ankles in mud. That's how bad the flooding is in our garden. And they were like, oh, okay, so nobody's sick or broken or anything. It's just that it's terrible growing conditions. And he has, my husband was like, yeah, it's not great.
36:27
We were really fortunate that part of the garden dried out enough. We have been pulling tomatoes in for a month and we've been able to sell some. We actually have, I think, 12 gallon size ziplocks of frozen tomatoes in our freezer that we will be canning for ourselves because we're almost out of tomato sauce from last two summers. This can't stand. This cannot stand. So. Yeah. My.
36:53
Probably the plot twist behind all of this is that my husband doesn't want to share cucumbers and tomatoes. That's probably really what's happening this year. Any of the tomatoes that we got, he was eating them as fast as they were coming on. Since we just this year, as we were on transition, we just did the containers. And not only were we on transition for the property, but also the baby's eight months old.
37:19
So obviously if you backtrack to planting season, you'll see how young she was. And like I said in the beginning of this, we waited 13 years trying for her and my son's 15. So having, he was 14 when she was born. So it's like, I had not done that in a long time. And let me tell you, it's not like riding a bike after you're a little bit older. I was tired. I was exhausted. So
37:48
But next season should be pretty good. I'm pretty excited about that. Pull all my stuff out. I even made a post yesterday on Instagram and I was like, who's ready for spring? Because we're already winding the season down and I'm like, nope, I'm ready for the next one. Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. I love fall. We can't take fall away from me. I will die.
38:16
That's how my husband feels. But after fall comes winter and I am not a fan. Yeah. Well, I understand that. And I applaud you for your your wanting it to be spring. But I really, really need December, January and February to do some planning and some resting and some thinking for next year and for the podcast stuff and a bunch of other things. So.
38:42
I need that three months. My husband needs that three months where he's not running around like a chicken with his head cut off with all the stuff outside. So I probably needed it too. I definitely probably need that as well. We hopefully next year, honestly, I hope next year doesn't go quite as fast as this year. I just feel like this year was, I mean, we're talking it's the end of September. I mean, yeah.
39:12
Yeah, the end of September. Yeah, man, I almost said the beginning, but no, I mean, this is closing in. And then once we get to those birth months, it's like, they're just one continuous, it seems like, oh, but it's been two weeks and it's New Year's. Uh-huh. So that's already gone a little bit fast. So I'm hoping next year is a little bit slower. I hope so too, because I hope you have time to slow down and enjoy your toddler, because she'll be a toddler by then.
39:42
Yes. Yes. Well, we are fortunate too that we work from home and not work from home like being work from home. We work from home because we're self-employed. So that does help because we don't have to, you know, we're not sitting on phones all day. You know, we do have a lot of independent work and stuff like that. So we've been able to be here for these milestones, these things, which is a lot different from when my son was growing up. Obviously I had
40:12
a job outside of the home and I was young and we didn't have property back then. So very different, very, very different. All right, Victoria, I am so happy that you took the time to talk with me today and we're at 40 minutes and I told you like 30 minutes, so I'm going to wrap it up. Thank you again. You are the perfect person to talk to if you're going to start.
40:39
again on something like this or if you're just starting new because you know all the stuff. I try and I love research so if I don't know we'll learn together. Absolutely. All right you have a fantastic day and kiss that baby for me. I will you have a wonderful day. All right bye.
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Today I'm talking with Victoria at Dreamweavers Homestead.
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00:00
This is Mary Lewis at A Tiny Homestead, the podcast comprised entirely of conversations with homesteaders, cottage food producers, and crafters. If you're enjoying this podcast, please like, subscribe, share it with a friend, or leave a comment. Thank you. Today I'm talking with Victoria at Dreamweavers Homestead. Good morning, Victoria. How are you? Good morning. I'm good. How are you? I'm great. Where are you located again?
00:29
Missouri Ozarks, but you are the first to know that we are now actually in the Arkansas Ozarks. Oh, okay. All right, cool. Yeah, a little inside scoop there. All righty. Well, you're not in the line of the hurricane that's hitting Florida today, so that's good. Yeah, we just get the residual rains, that's all. And so we've got a lot of people down there in Florida, so we're thinking of them.
00:59
Yeah, me too. My daughter is in St. Petersburg and she called yesterday and she was like, we should be okay. I'm like, okay, good. Please stay okay. I know. I'm always anxious when they start to get those this Louisiana and Texas. We get those heavy rains. Yeah. Yup. I'm not happy about the hurricane situation, but it will blow through. It will be okay. I think she'll survive it. It'll be okay. That's what I'm telling myself today. Yes, it will. So.
01:27
So anyway, tell me about yourself and what you guys do at Dreamweavers Homestead. Oh gosh. A shorter list is what we don't do, probably. Most people, if they know me, they're knowing me from rabbits. They're knowing me from permaculture and learning in those types of ways. We do strive to have a permaculture homestead. Obviously, we've recently moved.
01:54
So we're starting from the ground up, which is actually a beautiful thing because people are going to get to see it from the very ground of everything from the gardens to the animals to the theme to the food forest, they will be seeing it. So all of these things that we've been teaching about and talking about, I'll be implementing them in real time. So that's going to be really nice for people to see. But we do heavily.
02:23
focus on poultry, rabbits, we have dairy goats, we did pigs, not a favorite, but they'll probably be back with a different breed. When we do permaculture, it's not just an element, I'm actually certified in design, we're very passionate about that. My husband is currently going through the course himself to be certified for that, so we really are trying to focus on closing the loops on our property to really be sustainable. So when we go into this,
02:52
project there's a lot of things that everybody will have to pay their rent as people like to say for their animals and their things in their system. So there's a lot of things that we do but they fall under those umbrellas. Okay, how excited are you to start from scratch? Beyond. Beyond. They actually just put in our driveway and I...
03:19
already I'm just seeing okay this goes here this goes here we've been working on our design so I've been getting that all mapped out and everything so we can get that ready. I'm pumped very pumped and it is a decent size it's 25 acres. Cool awesome. Yeah so it is a decent size and one of the huge goals which a lot of people don't know I haven't even released this on my social media or anything yet but a goal that we've had for years has been
03:48
to have the largest food forest, the continuous food forest in the US that is quote unquote recorded. I'm not going to report it, but it's personal goal. The largest recorded public or private is 7.2 acres. So my goal is 7.3 of continuous. And I'm very excited with that. Multiple caveats with that. Not only will we be teaching about it and actually implementing it in.
04:16
but we will be able to transform our property all the way around and just really be a good steward of that land. But also in our area, some areas are a little bit more low income and things. Having that much food for us, especially all those perennials and things, we should be able to feed the community, also provide cuttings and plant starts and all these things so other people can do it as well.
04:46
So we really hope to contribute to feeding the Ozarks. Wow. That is fantastic. That's all very, very exciting and very helping the world news. And Victoria, I got to tell you, I get told stuff first on this podcast a lot. I had a lady announce her ninth pregnancy on the episode that we recorded that no one else really knew about yet.
05:16
another lady told me that she hadn't told anybody else yet that she was getting out of one aspect of her homesteading because she just doesn't have the energy and the push to keep doing this one particular segment. And so I'm at the point now when people are like, so I haven't said this anywhere else yet, we're going to share it with you. Like, okay, lay it on me. You're like, I'm ready, hit me. Yeah. Yeah. We...
05:46
We have leaked a little bit of some sneak peek pictures on like Instagram, Snapchat, our TikTok, but our Facebook is kind of our main thing and then here locally and we haven't quite let people know what's going on. We wanted to have that element of, okay, look what we're doing and then people don't have to deal with the transition.
06:14
the chaos that comes with transition, but we're so, so, so, so excited about it. Our initial property, we worked really hard on it actually for years, did a lot of work, especially with the soil and doing all that. We utilized the rabbits and the goats, which are both a cold manure, and then the duck manure, which is not hot like chickens, which a lot of people don't.
06:42
realized that because of the high water content of their poop, essentially. That is why. So we use that, their water and everything. And so we like accelerated that property, things that should have taken three, four years, you know, it was only like one or two years, and that was really working out well. Yeah, this new property does have a pond that we get to revitalize. So very excited about that. Because then we can add
07:09
fish, which is something that we wanted to do and fiddle with aquaponics, which is something else that we wanted to do on a larger scale. But we worked really hard on that. We had to go into a transitional property, but unfortunately there was some scammy stuff that happened there. We lost that. And that's why we have moved on to this. But realistically, it was just paving the way because this property ticks all the boxes. So we're very excited about that.
07:39
Nope. That's another thing. Yes, it. We are doing another shabin, which for those of you don't know, that is shed house or shed cabin. So they deliver the shell and then we need to finish the inside ours will be unique in the fact of the initial building that is being placed, we will be finishing that out and living in it correct. But actually,
08:05
our house will be a series of three houses that will be connected together through a completely see-through sunroom. And so this initial building will actually be transferred over into just the kitchen and preservation pantry when the other buildings are there and finished. Okay. So... So a lot going into this, you know, years of this is what we always wanted to do and now we finally have the opportunity and the space to do it.
08:34
And so, yeah, people will want to follow along with that. I want to, I want to see how this goes. This sounds very exciting and very nerve wracking. Oh yes, very, because I forgot to say that because of the situation with this house that we kind of got surprised with, we only had 90 days notice and now we are under, I think we're at 47 days. And it is, you know, I just, we're just at the driveway stage.
09:04
Wow. Okay. So how many people in your family, like how many people will be living in the new home? There is three of us full time. My husband and I have had infertility issues. So we just had our daughter. She's eight months old, but we tried for her for like 13 years. Wow. Yeah, that was crazy. My son.
09:29
is 15. He's over 15 years old. If I say he's 15, he says I'm older than 15. He's 15. He actually doesn't live with us full time. That's by his choice. He is a teenager. But also, he just has different interests. And so he chooses to stay with his dad, most of the time, because his dad lives in the city. And his dad is also a gamer. And my son is a gamer. And it's
09:58
that kind of thing. So with him being so old, he's kind of calling his own shots there. Sure. Yeah, absolutely. So part-time, yes, but full-time, there's just the three of us. If we were blessed with more children, who knows? Okay. So a smaller home situation to start with is not going to be terribly hard on you. It's going to be hard on you, but it's not going to be a hardship on you. No. And our previous, we've always lived tiny. So our first property...
10:27
Same thing, tiny. Here, we do have a house that's transitional property, but we do not use three fourths of it. Literally, they're just empty rooms because we don't have anything to put it up, and we just are so used to always being together in one or two rooms that, other than the kitchen, the living room, and a bedroom, we just don't use it, barely. We do have family locally, and so they're at their own house, but they are local, so we do spend a good bit of time.
10:57
I will say my friends, I have a lot of friends who live tiny, but some of them have very big families, you know, six, seven, eight people, and they're living in the same size tiny as us. So it's awesome to see how they navigate that with all the kids and all that great use of space.
11:27
And it was tight. And when we moved to our new place four years ago, we went from 850 square feet to over 1400 square feet, which is my husband, my son and I. And it's so weird being able to actually walk through a room and not touch an opposite wall. You know? Yes. Yeah. This one, this building is the same size as what we moved.
11:52
from thankfully so no shock there but it's a 12 by 32 so 300 and what is that 86 square feet or so? Yep, that's small. I commend you. My husband for years was like once the kids are grown we should look at a tiny house and I was like absolutely not. And he was like why and I said honey I love you.
12:17
but we need our own spaces. We need to be able to step away from each other and a tiny space is not gonna allow for that. And he was like, but it'd be so much fun. And I'm like, no, no, no, no, it would not be fun, no. In our house, two yeses are a yes, one no is a no. Yeah, we have. Yeah, I can't. Yeah, for us, it's like.
12:43
We have that bedroom space and the living room space in my brain that is two separate spaces. So, if he's in the living room watching a movie or something and I go to bed, which is how it was before, I was like, oh, I'm in the bedroom. I totally separated that out, but I can definitely see because my mom's the same way. My mom's like, absolutely not. I could never.
13:10
Yeah, and the other thing is that I've said this a couple times on the podcast my husband snores like crazy even when he's just napping he snores and I have to listen to it all night when I'm trying to sleep I don't want to listen to it during the daytime too. So that's the other reason no on a tiny house. No Yeah, well, I love the concepts. Right Good thing you're interviewing me and not my husband
13:36
because then he would have had to sit here with you on the snoring part because I snore really bad, really bad. My daughter sleeps through it, you know, she's adjusted. But he's a snorer, but it's circumstantial. It depends. I am just, if my eyes are closed, I'm snoring. And I'm like, well, I can't hear myself. And he's like, yeah, good thing. He's like, you take the roof off the house.
14:06
Yeah, he's probably with you there. We just spend a lot of time outside and stuff.
14:16
Yes, and we're lucky here because we have a huge pole barn, we have a greenhouse, we have a farm stand. So my husband is outside a lot and that's awesome because he's doing what he absolutely loves and I'm inside doing things I absolutely love. And then we actually get to talk to each other about different things. So we're not talking about the same thing daily, you know? Oh yeah. But either way, I don't want to get into a marriage counseling discussion here because it's not worth it. So...
14:46
So what does this first year look like for you at the new place? Tell me about that. Well, because it's transitional and not a startup, it's going to look different. Normally, you know, you'd want to do it in a different order than we're going to do it. But the barn, so we do have that milking space and kidding space, that's going to be important because we already have Dairy Goats and they're already, you know,
15:17
going to be kidding and those things are already happening. So normally we would have set all these things up before we got livestock but we already have livestock. So for us getting all that the livestock shelters put up for what we already have and then focusing on our perennials that's going to be a huge thing. Our annual garden we know where the spot is going to be we're going to just do it at a certain size this year.
15:45
because we're going to be heavily focused on the perennials. Now, when I say that, most people are thinking, oh, she's just going to put in a handful of each type of plant and she's going to go about her day. No, I just mean that we're probably going to only have five or six 50-foot rows, or we're going to have just that smaller space instead of instantly putting in an acre annual garden. That's not how it's going to be.
16:13
especially for our design, but those are the main things. We have had, we know the area, that helps, so we don't have to get used to the area. I know the topography, we've walked it several times. We've been able to see it into a couple of seasons because we actually had had this land where we had an inkling, something might be funky. And then it's not our first rodeo, which I had before. So we're just gonna go into it.
16:42
focused on those things. And next year, we will resume with our full rabbitry and our poultry breeding stock coming back in. I've already gotten myself on a waiting list for all of my stock to come back in from people who I'd used before or who are really good, excuse me, who have excellent stock because...
17:10
We were an MPIP poultry breeder, which I mean, technically we are, but I sold my stock. We are on Murray McMurray Hatchery's website in their marketplace as someone who has poultry and things like that. Those are a heavy focus for us to get on. Things that we'd like to do are getting some of the pasture areas seeded out.
17:40
and create those silvopastures instead of just dense forests, because a lot of the forests that we have essentially monocropped itself through lack of management. There was no management, so it's just, you know, you've got like 50,000 oaks, you know, and everything else is struggling and the canopy is so dense that now you have issues on the floor where it's not getting any sun, it's not drying out, you know, things like that. So we're going to really be focusing on that management.
18:10
after all these things are initially set up and all that, then we'll get into other things such as expanding the goats, cattle, things like that down the road. Thank you for telling me all that because most people don't know that there kind of needs to be at least a loose knit plan when you do something like this because you can't
18:36
I mean, I suppose you can just go buy 25 acres and be like, I don't know what we're going to do with it, but we're going to buy it. But then I feel like you spend the first couple of years doing a lot of trial and error to see what works. Yes. And they will tell you, heck, even I do when people ask me, and especially they tell you in permaculture to watch your land, know your seasons, know your patterns. And if you were moving to somewhere new, I would also agree with that. For us.
19:06
since we're only living 20 minutes from where we were in the same environment in an area that we frequent, it's a little bit different, you know? But some people move here to the Ozarks and they do not prepare themselves to handle the amount of rains that we get and things wash out for them or something like that. And then on the flip side, they're not prepared for the severe droughts that we get then after the rains.
19:35
So for us, that was a big thing. In this property, we did think about it. We wanted to have our boxes checked because we already knew what we wanted. There's a spring head on the property. We hope to be able to tap that open. Instead of it being seasonal creek, then we could get some flow all the time. The pond was a bonus because we need to put, otherwise we'd have to put another one in. The way that it kind of all lays at a slope.
20:04
For us, we weren't looking for something completely flat, because then I have to do even more earthwork than I was going to have to do. But I will say, having done so many of the designs, I also work with a permaculture firm out of Omaha, I'm part of their team. So they've done their designs and I've been in with them and all these things. I think we had a leg up there.
20:31
But my advice to people when they get these huge pieces of property is to just focus on zones 0 through 2, which is the house, the immediate area of the house, and then right outside of that. Just focus on those couple acres so that you can get your bearings and stuff before you just start wiping out trees or doing this or putting a pond here and all this. People get very excited and they move very quickly. And then they're like, oh crap.
21:00
and then they have to move things around because it wasn't good. Our first place, we ended up having to move some stuff around like, oh, this doesn't work in this spot, I gotta move it. That's because on our initial place, we bought from out of state. So even though we knew what we were doing, we didn't know how this piece of property would be. And then we had to deal with the repercussions of that. So that's what I would suggest. A lot of people are...
21:29
living in their campers and stuff now while they watch their property. And we're thankful that we don't have to just have that watch period. But yeah, I'm glad you pointed that out because some people will just be like, I think I'm just going to go ahead and run. No walking. I'm just going to run. Yeah. And the other thing is, is that even if you do sort of know the property that you're getting and you have been able to do the research and get some early answers.
21:58
Sometimes things will surprise you because we put in like, I don't know, 100 asparagus crowns in the first year that we were here. And this past spring, they came up like crazy. Like I was so excited. It takes two to three years to get your first yield from asparagus because that's how long it takes from putting the crowns in the ground to having edible yummy asparagus. And it did really well, but there wasn't enough to sell any really yet.
22:29
I keep debating whether we should get more asparagus crowns and put them in because they do really well. We could be selling tons of asparagus in three years from now. And then I'm like, but what happens if that doesn't actually pan out? You know, it's just stuff. And like we bought, no, we were given strawberry roots the first summer over here and the strawberries do okay.
22:56
We're just not really good at paying attention to them because we forget that we put them in because we're crazy. And so we had some really yummy strawberries this spring as well. And I keep debating saying to my husband, why don't we just stop with all the freaking tomatoes and cucumbers and make half the garden of asparagus and strawberries because they grow really well and then we could focus on that. But he really loves having a diverse garden, veggie garden as it were. So.
23:25
I'm trying to figure out how to broach this to him so that it seems like a good idea. I haven't quite figured out how to do it yet. Well positive news is that strawberries are such an excellent ground cover that you can just sell them on the ground cover. He can still have all of his plant diversity and the strawberries will crawl around the whole ground. So you'll still get a bigger crop and actually a better yield. Plus you'll have to water less because it's in its shades out and keeps your soil.
23:54
You know, from burning up there in the summer, there's so many things and then you can sell off your runners and all those. As far as the asparagus go, oh man, they're so beautiful. I love asparagus. I put in 40 crowns here at the temporary place until I realized what was going on. So I was going to put in my next 40 but when I obviously waited. So we're going to be.
24:20
putting in a lot of crowns because, but I will probably cheat and do two year crowns this time because I've had to move and I don't wanna start all the way back over. Yeah, but yeah, they're an excellent border plant and all those things too. So they'll help with a lot of the shading and he can plant up his greens and lettuces underneath them and extend his season.
24:46
Okay, thank you. You just helped me more than you could possibly know. Because I've been trying to figure out how to float this without having him be like, no, I don't want to do that. Because I really want him to think about it. For he says no. So, and I also, if I had my way, our whole property would be peony plants, asparagus, and strawberries. Because I know those all do really, really well. But that's not what he's going to want to do. So I'm hoping to get him to cut the
25:15
the annual stuff down to about half of what he's got going now. And then have these perennials, big perennials come back every year and less craziness. Yeah, we're going to just heavily focus on, we will have the annuals like I said, but I will intentionally let some of my annuals self seed. So that well, and I guess for anybody listening, that means I'm just going to leave them. Let them go.
25:43
so that they can come back up the next year on their own time. I do that with tomatoes and stuff in my last place because then they would just pop up and then I can just pluck them and put them where I need them instead of focusing on doing so many starts because we were off grade at the last place. But I am like your husband in the fact that we'll grow anything because I'm all about season extension or micro climate or do this, do that, whatever.
26:14
He likes some of the things that are super non-traditional like pineapple, pomegranate, mango, things like that. So we're looking at alternative varieties, how cold can they handle, what are the hardier varieties and then we'll be putting some of those in. I did just post on Facebook recently about compost heating for structures as well as hot water using your compost pile.
26:43
as its own hotbed so that it can heat your pipes. Well, that's the method that we're going to start with for our initial greenhouse. But we will have another greenhouse where we will likely heat it with wood because he is wanting some of these things to keep the trees pruned down, but it'll essentially be like a tropical greenhouse. It's just something that he really, really wants.
27:11
And so albeit they're perennial, they will have to be a bit baby. But fortunately, as far south as we will be, they don't need like a ton of babying. Um, where we'll be is seven B, but it's very close to eight A, um, with some season extension, like some extra layers, we'll be able to create, um, that AA eight B environment.
27:39
without heat and then if we add heat that'll push us down into those zones that he's needing. I've got some friends that are doing bananas and pomegranates and things here. Where they are here in Missouri, they're actually like the 6B7A line and they're able to grow those things outside. So there's so many options. So I'm with you. I think you should push the perennial envelope. See how far you can push it.
28:07
Yes, I'm gonna I'm gonna try he's doing I think the last farmers market of the season for him is this Saturday So I'm hoping next weekend not this coming to take Sunday afternoon be like, okay so can we sit down and talk about our plan for the Produce and the gardens and stuff for for 2025 now that you have some time to think about it because he's been so busy and
28:34
and stressed and I'm like, I don't want to introduce a new concept or a new idea until things are a little less nuts around here. So I was going to say, so he's a market gardener then? Yes. Oh, yes. Yes. I hear him then. You should suggest to him also those perennial lettuces and perennial kales. Then he can, you know, kind of have those to fall back on if he puts enough in.
29:03
and kind of buy him some time on some of his succession planting if he's somebody who sells greens. Yes, exactly. So this is the reason I love the podcast so much, Victoria, because I get to talk to people like you who know about this stuff. And that way I can go to him and be like, you need to listen to episode 122, 154 and 96 because those are important information for you to know about. And he will go listen and he takes notes. So
29:34
That's good. I always love to talk to market gardeners, pick the brain of a market gardener. I used to think I'm going to do that, but my husband and I had this conversation yesterday, which is interesting you bring this up. We just said we were going to do market and then we did find some places where we could do market privately so that we wouldn't have to be part of the farmers market.
30:04
and all that and just do our own booths. But we talked and we decided, no, we're gonna do our annuals to really get ourselves put up and feed all of the livestock, anything extra we hope to give to people who are in need of it, or if we have like some huge bulk.
30:28
try to discount that down for people who maybe live in town and they want to do some canning or something. But our main focus is not that. That's just if we have extra. We really wanted to just focus on trying to offer those type of things through the perennials. We really just wanted to focus more in on that fair share and people care part of the permaculture ethics because I get
30:58
I'm one of those people with people listening, I'm sure they'll resonate. I'm one of those people that will just do and do and do and do and do. And I'm like, okay, well, we have this, we'll try to make money off this, we'll try to make money off this, and we can do this, we can do this, we can do this. And I think that's one thing that we're going to change going into this property is I like the teaching aspect. Because I like to do the public speaking.
31:25
or the podcast if somebody asks, I'll do that. I've been asked to teach about rabbits and things to homeschool groups. I'm very big into that. And I like to do all of it on social media as well. Answer questions, share knowledge. That's my passion there. Not like getting rich or making that type of money on these things. So I know a lot of people ask me, they said, well, aren't you gonna...
31:50
sell all this stuff from your food forest. We would sell some, I mean, obviously, but we really want to have that at that lower cost. Of course, if you have a food forest that's even an acre, half acre, the cuttings and the plants and everything that you would have on that would be just exponential. So we really want to try to hone in on those things. So now I'm going to be watching my market gardening friends.
32:19
from afar, they work so hard, they do so much. But I just decided that that is just something that is, that's hard for me to do because I'm so type A. And it just I get so overwhelmed about it. I'm like, oh my gosh, I have five less cucumbers than last week. And I start to panic. So we had this conversation yesterday about how to scale back and I had to cut the market out of my plan. Yep. We
32:48
It's been a rough year here for the farmers market. I don't know if you know anything about what the weather did in Minnesota this spring. And I have talked ad nauseum on the episodes all summer about what a terrible wet spring it was here. And so basically we didn't have any tomatoes until the very first of August to sell at the farmers market. And luckily we had candles and lip balms and wax melts and soaps.
33:15
So that kind of tied us over until we had any produce to sell. So what we usually do, the first three summers we were here, we sold from our property, donated a bunch to the food shelf, and shared with friends. This second summer, sold from the property, shared with friends, canned. We canned a bunch for ourselves finally. Third summer, which was last summer,
33:45
the farm stand, the farmer's market for the first year, I think, and canned and gave a whole bunch to the food shelf. So we have like four places we're dispersing the produce and it's great. The thing is, we feel like we kind of failed our community this year because the garden didn't do well. So we're going to make it better next year. It's going to be better next year.
34:11
Well, seeing that attitude you have, like, you're like, no, we're going to do it better, you know, this and that. And for me, I just am like, oh my gosh, I messed up. That's like how my brain works. So I would just be so frantic. So that's why my husband was like, no, I'm going to put a full stop on you. Reel it in because he's like, if you want to focus on the teaching, you want to be building up the whole property, you know, he's like, let's do that.
34:37
And he was like, and then whatever's extra because in my brain that I'm like, okay, it's extra. You know, so that was that. So maybe we'll circle back in the future and go back to that. But you know, I had some people who were actually kind of mean. You know, if I ran out of something or I didn't have anything and not only it's even just like the plants like we had pruned our trees, I had cuttings and things like that. People just get really sassy when you ran out of stuff. And so I think that's where I had all that extra.
35:07
The pressure, it was like that with my birds too. As soon as I ran out of birds, I'm like, oh my gosh. So, cause I always like everybody to be happy. I want everybody to be happy. Everybody get what they have, what they need and all those things. So I'm hoping to dive more into that, you know, on the ground teaching stuff.
35:30
I think you are going to be a massive success once you get through this year of transition. I think you're going to do great. We actually had people concerned in June. When my husband went to the farmers market, they were like, are you guys okay? My husband said, why? He said, because you don't have your signs out at the end of the driveway. You don't have your banner up on your farm stand shed. Is everything okay?
35:57
My husband was like, everything's fine except that you have noticed all it's done is rain for a month and a half, right? And they were like, well, yes. And he said, the garden is soup. If I step into the garden, I'm up to my ankles in mud. That's how bad the flooding is in our garden. And they were like, oh, okay, so nobody's sick or broken or anything. It's just that it's terrible growing conditions. And he has, my husband was like, yeah, it's not great.
36:27
We were really fortunate that part of the garden dried out enough. We have been pulling tomatoes in for a month and we've been able to sell some. We actually have, I think, 12 gallon size ziplocks of frozen tomatoes in our freezer that we will be canning for ourselves because we're almost out of tomato sauce from last two summers. This can't stand. This cannot stand. So. Yeah. My.
36:53
Probably the plot twist behind all of this is that my husband doesn't want to share cucumbers and tomatoes. That's probably really what's happening this year. Any of the tomatoes that we got, he was eating them as fast as they were coming on. Since we just this year, as we were on transition, we just did the containers. And not only were we on transition for the property, but also the baby's eight months old.
37:19
So obviously if you backtrack to planting season, you'll see how young she was. And like I said in the beginning of this, we waited 13 years trying for her and my son's 15. So having, he was 14 when she was born. So it's like, I had not done that in a long time. And let me tell you, it's not like riding a bike after you're a little bit older. I was tired. I was exhausted. So
37:48
But next season should be pretty good. I'm pretty excited about that. Pull all my stuff out. I even made a post yesterday on Instagram and I was like, who's ready for spring? Because we're already winding the season down and I'm like, nope, I'm ready for the next one. Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. I love fall. We can't take fall away from me. I will die.
38:16
That's how my husband feels. But after fall comes winter and I am not a fan. Yeah. Well, I understand that. And I applaud you for your your wanting it to be spring. But I really, really need December, January and February to do some planning and some resting and some thinking for next year and for the podcast stuff and a bunch of other things. So.
38:42
I need that three months. My husband needs that three months where he's not running around like a chicken with his head cut off with all the stuff outside. So I probably needed it too. I definitely probably need that as well. We hopefully next year, honestly, I hope next year doesn't go quite as fast as this year. I just feel like this year was, I mean, we're talking it's the end of September. I mean, yeah.
39:12
Yeah, the end of September. Yeah, man, I almost said the beginning, but no, I mean, this is closing in. And then once we get to those birth months, it's like, they're just one continuous, it seems like, oh, but it's been two weeks and it's New Year's. Uh-huh. So that's already gone a little bit fast. So I'm hoping next year is a little bit slower. I hope so too, because I hope you have time to slow down and enjoy your toddler, because she'll be a toddler by then.
39:42
Yes. Yes. Well, we are fortunate too that we work from home and not work from home like being work from home. We work from home because we're self-employed. So that does help because we don't have to, you know, we're not sitting on phones all day. You know, we do have a lot of independent work and stuff like that. So we've been able to be here for these milestones, these things, which is a lot different from when my son was growing up. Obviously I had
40:12
a job outside of the home and I was young and we didn't have property back then. So very different, very, very different. All right, Victoria, I am so happy that you took the time to talk with me today and we're at 40 minutes and I told you like 30 minutes, so I'm going to wrap it up. Thank you again. You are the perfect person to talk to if you're going to start.
40:39
again on something like this or if you're just starting new because you know all the stuff. I try and I love research so if I don't know we'll learn together. Absolutely. All right you have a fantastic day and kiss that baby for me. I will you have a wonderful day. All right bye.
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