July 2024 On The Homestead
I hope you’re enjoying summer as much as we are! The summer is always a great time on a homestead; garden’s happy, we’re soaking in the fresh air, and sunshine. We’re not on any real schedule. Below you’ll find July 2024 on the homestead!
FYI these homestead recaps tend to be photo heavy, and may contain affiliate links.
CLEAN UP & PROJECTS
Summer means general “work”, all the time! Cleaning up kid messes, lots of animal waste to scoop, weeding garden beds, filling animal water bowls, and endless watering of plants.
One of the main projects we worked on was the garage roof. The original person who built it didn’t do it well, and all the plywood under the metal roof was leaking, and moldy. New plywood, ice and water shield was put on, and then the metal roofing back on. We still have a lot of clean up to do, but it’s getting there.
Summer mornings are my everything! I love enjoying my coffee outside in the peace, and quiet. Birds chirping, watering the garden, harvesting along the way, the sun shining through the maple trees. Doing farm/garden chores before the heat comes.
My dad also completed the garden bed by the shed, just need to level off the wood, and finish filling with soil. Haven’t decided what I’ll be planting next year. Probably some perennials that the animals will stay out of without a fence around.
Most of the wildflowers were done for the season, so I trimmed everything down in the food forest. Everything’s growing well in the food forest, this year I only added dahlias, next year I plan on adding more flowers, another blueberry, and hopefully bees.
IN THE GARDEN
Everything is growing so beautifully. This past month we’ve harvested; kohlrabi, lettuce, garlic scapes, garlic, lots of herbs(lavender, chives, oregano, mint, sage, lemon balm, thyme), potatoes, raspberries, last of the strawberries, few green beans, calendula flowers, chamomile flowers, anise hyssop leaves, borage leaves and seeds.
This winter I’ll be working on more no-till garden spaces to get more of a harvest. And I need to figure out a better fence situation to keep the wild life out, but easy for me to get by. I’d love any suggestions you may have; not a tall one to block the solar panels, but not short enough for the chickens to jump it, something reasonably priced, and I can build.
Anise Hyssop; leaves for me, flowers for the pollinators!
Drying lavender! Crazy fact, my whole life I’ve been allergic to lavender. If I touched it – rash within minutes. Not sure what has changed, but I can now touch the plant without getting a rash all over.
Of course, I can’t not talk about my wild plants growing on the property. It’s been so fun learning about foraging and identifying plants. Come September we’re going to have a lot of blackberries to pick, there is a huge patch of oregano growing in the backyard, and I just noticed a few mullein plants from last years plant that went to seed.
Queen Anne’s Lace popping up everywhere in my garden. Next year I’m going to learn how to use it medicinally.
Drying Calendula flower petals is so easy. I just continually cut flowers, dry them upside down and when they’re dry(easily to pull out) I just throw them into a jar. I make tea with them all year, this year I’m going to make a tincture and salve with them too.
ANIMALS ON THE HOMESTEAD
Animals on our homestead are doing good, enjoying the summer.
RIP our Brownie & Honey Girl
We sadly found the feathers(& pile of eggs) of our two girls that went broody back in June. They’ll be missed!
IN THE KITCHEN
We’ve been eating a lot “summer” foods; fruit, vegetables, BBQ, sandwiches and salads. We spent the 4th of July relaxing at home, working on stuff around the homestead, playing cards, and eating some yummy foods. Had burgers, pasta salad, watermelon, chips/salsa, and strawberry shortcake cake.
Breakfast is always a favorite in our house; we do a lot of protein pancakes, sourdough waffles, eggs, and one of our favs – german pancake with powdered sugar and lemon juice.
LIFE & WHAT I’M LOVING
Summer is always one of my favorite seasons, okay I probably like them all equally, but I really enjoy the sunshine, gardening, and freedom of our schedule.
We started the month off with celebrating Independence Day, we opted to spend it at home, which is okay with me as I’ve never been a huge fan of fireworks. Then it was my daughter’s birthday. She chose the Old Spaghetti Factory for her birthday dinner, then we had her birthday at a park with some friends and family.
Birthday girl also got her ears pierced, she did amazing and said it didn’t even hurt. Tacoma’s Best Piercing did such a wonderful job, we haven’t had any problems with the piercing at all. Even after swimming/splashpads, just be sure to wear a Tegaderm band-aid.
She had a “Groovy” themed birthday party! Stickers, Notepads, Candy, Random Goody Bag fillers from Walmart, and Bags that we just closed with a Groovy stickers.
We’ve also done lots of hikes this summer. It’s been such a fun activity for us, it entertains the teen and the kiddo. We’ve taken the dog on a couple too. Our favorite has quickly become the Dickerson Creek Waterfalls in Bremerton. It’s easy, a manageable length, and beautiful!
Manchester State Park
Another thing we’ve really enjoyed this summer is, beach exploring. You can find so many amazing sea life when it’s low tide. We recently saw a “christmas anemone”(pictured below), one of the beach guides was telling us that it’s been around for about 60 years. How cool is that?!
First time ever walking the Tacoma Narrows
We also took a family road trip to Yakima, and ate at Miner’s Burger for my Grandpa’s 89th birthday. Back to his old stomping grounds.
We have also played many card games, went to the zoo, bowling, and movies.
One of the downsides of summer time is the wildfires
Hope you’re enjoying the last bit of summer! I know we will be, since school starts for us end of August. We are soaking it all in. Let me know in the comments below with what you’ve been up to.
