Building a Barn

                                              

We brought some of our animals with us to this one acre lot (with a bit of the land including a slope down to a brook that isn't usable) - 6 goats, 8 chickens, 2 ducks and our guinea hen. Already on the property was a cinderblock building (used to be a chicken incinerator when meat chickens were a huge thing in the is part of Maine) with a large overhang. Mike and I drove over to Maine a week before closing on the house to make two stalls under the overhang for the goats and also build a simple greenhouse structure for the birds.

The animals had to wait until our new septic system could be installed before we could work on their permanent housing and fenced in area. In the meantime Mike added a small bit of fencing on each side of the stalls for the goats.

Before the new barn was finished my sweet goat of 14 1/2 years, Madeline, died. Sad for sure but she lived a long and healthy life until the end.

Here is the barn that Mike built. It has three sections - two for goats and one for the chickens - and is 12' x 12"

Off the front is a large fenced in area that the small goats, chickens and ducks share.

Inside the chicken coop part of the barn:

The hay feeder in the goats' stall:

Next up is to remove the large overhang as it is not attractive and it will let us have a view of the animals' fenced in area and provide a bit more open land.

Living in the Moment

 

In a phone conversation with my 75 year old father yesterday morning he commented that he needs to plan his next vacation trip this fall instead of waiting until the spring because he turns 76 in late October and no man in his family has ever lived past the age of 76. I told him that he will be the first and no matter how old we are, all each of us has is this very moment.

Later the same day I was face timing with a friend who turns 70 this year and although she has a strong faith and is generally optimistic, she admitted it is hard not to think about her "shelf time" getting shorter.

Myself, I will be turning 56 next month and will be closer to 60 than 50. Maybe it is hormones, maybe it is getting older and these thoughts are normal - but I also feel a bit of selfishness creeping in about how I spend my moments. 

Last night was date night - as it has been for years. On date nights we tend to get a little dressed up and pay a little more attention to how we look - generally the only night I will put on more than just mascara. Through the years with young children it would mean getting them fed early and watching a movie, while we would enjoy a quiet dinner and then get them to bed and enjoy wine and a movie ourselves. Now that we live close to a sweet coastal town, we have been generally going out  - hoping to get seats right by the water and have a locally made beer with some live music playing. 

Last night was one of the rare nights where the air was even warmer than 12 minutes inland where we live and the sun was shining and the sky a clear blue with a warm breeze blowing - truly perfect. After we left the wharf restaurant we walked a bit and found some more local music playing at another restaurant outside. We were able to stand on the outskirts with the bay behind us and the sun setting on our right side and Mike (my husband) was standing on the curbing elevated behind me, massaging my shoulders. For those moments everything felt perfect - like a slice of heaven.

Change Happens Even When You Fight It

Taken on moving day - March 31, 2025

Our family moved from our small farmstead in central Vermont back to midcoast Maine on March 31. We now live just a 12 minute drive from our daughter, son-in-law and 19 month old grandson and about 20 minutes from where we lived in Maine 6 1/2 years ago (albeit for only 2 1/2 years).

This was a very hard move for me. I was dearly attached to our home in the rural town of Vershire, Vermont. The house was built in 1839 and the property was very beautiful having a stream as the back border, an acre of fenced in pasture/yard, and a perfectly flat meadow that we converted to our market garden. Oh, and the “sugarshack” - this we converted to a farmstand, a place to set up food for gatherings, and a small private guest room complete with a woodstove. We had spent 6 seasons lovingly cultivating the property - building a greenhouse, improving the soil each season, adding perennials and more. The even harder part about moving was leaving dear friends. Never in my adult life had I had such strong friendships. These are wonderful authentic people that formed a small community when covid hit and our home was the meeting spot for regular potlucks. Because our house was along a main room, we also had friends stopping by frequently to drop off a plant, say hello, ask if our daughter might want to join them on an outing. These are individuals that I trust, love, and admire for their strength, wisdom, courage, and thoughtfulness.

Back to our move….

With the housing market seemingly nearing a peak in central Vermont we realized that we could probably sell our house and buy a fixer upper for cash near our daughter in Maine as well as pay off our debt and spend 6 months fixing up the house. We decided to put the house on the market in February because we wanted to take advantage of having as much nice weather as possible to spend fixing up the house we would buy. Within 5 days, we had an offer on our house for even a bit more than we were asking. Our next job was to see what we could find in Maine. This is when the sadness began to really creep in for myself. It became clear that to find a house for the price we needed to follow through on our plans, the house would not be very nice at all and it may be impossible to find something with land as well, and be with a 15 minute drive to two towns for each of our children’s needs. Later I would learn that being just a 12 minute drive to Belfast would fill one of my own needs.

Mike and I made 3 trips out (a five hour drive each way) to Maine as soon as our house went under contract in Vermont and after our 3rd trip, we were very discouraged. The next day I noticed that one of the houses we had looked at had been reduced $50,000. This put things in a new perspective and although we had only seen the house for 10 minutes (which I, at the time, had 100% disqualified), we put an offer on it. We had some slight back and forth, but we got the sellers to agree to $150,000 which was our goal. So we were going from 3 beautiful acres, a house perfect for hosting (which is one of my gifts), a market garden, etc.. to a very ugly house whose updates were all cheap and from at least the 1980s, just 1 acre (with some of that being a slope to a brook);no suitable barn or fencing (although we did make an out building work temporarily for the animals), very close to the road (yes, the traffic is loud), and really a house with absolutely no character.

My mental health suffered a bit in those interim weeks between being under contract and moving. Every ounce of my body kept hoping it would fall through. Our buyers asked for yet another inspection, for example, and I would think to myself “maybe this will be it”. Yet each time the buyers still wanted it. I would remind myself that God has a plan for all of this and tell myself to practice gratitude and remember all the positive reasons for moving. The day of the move was long and hard but we had good friends and family helping us. I still remember the raw feeling of that day - still mourning over all that we had left as we moved most our items into the garage as they would need to stay there while we fixed up the house. Every ounce of energy nearly drained as I helped to pull up carpet in the bedrooms so we could at least get mattresses down to sleep on that first night. (Thankfully the bedrooms had carpet that was easily removed with hardwood floors underneath. Not beautiful by any stretch of the imagination, but definitely passable. This was in sharp contrast to the very hard job of removing two layers of dirty carpet in the living room with a layer of black glue that had to be scraped.)

I will share more of my own personal challenges as well as accomplishments in the coming posts.

A New Path

 I wrote and published what I have cut and pasted below, on a new blog I was going to start on November 3, 2018.  Over the years since, much has changed yet much remains the same.  This will be more of the direction that this blog will take as my children are getting older now - Emily, our youngest, turns 12 this year.  We are still on our farm in Vermont, have one grandson with another on the way and life, overall, is wonderful.  But so much happened over the pandemic that has changed me in so many ways and has  made me stronger - I plan to  share my story, share my research, and share my quest for creating as Charles Eisenstein says, "the more beautiful world our hearts know is possible".  

Here is what I wrote on November 3, 2018 - 

As I sit writing from our living room on this rainy dark November afternoon, many thoughts are going through my head.  It seems that so many people, including myself, take what the media says at face value and that the media has become so polarized that many of us are simply left wondering what to believe.   I am  starting a blog to post my thoughts and articles I plan to write as I spend time researching areas of interest.  I am specifically interested in exposing hypocrisy, questioning norms, and creating thoughtful discussion by asking questions which I am sure I will often not be able to answer.

At the age of 49, our youngest child of 7 is now 7 years old.  We still homeschool the three youngest and run our online handwork business and are starting a small farm on our new farm in central Vermont.  Over many of the last 20 years, our family has often chosen a nonconventional path.  We have been mostly home based as far as work and school and have not chosen to put the acquisition of status or stuff as a priority. 

During the 2016 presidential primaries, Bernie Sanders woke me up politically.  I had been only marginally following any type of governmental race in the past.  My husband and I watched rally after rally.  While the mainstream media were not covering them, we found them on youtube and kept up with his schedule.   When we learned of the extreme corruption in the Democratic party that potentially denied Bernie Sanders the nomination, I became angry and determined to do something.  With my family and business obligations taking up most of my time, I didn't do anything much concrete except reply to some tweets or instagram posts or wrote up some blog posts and social media posts of my own.

I don't know if I will run for office someday, but that is a possibility.  At this time, I just want to share an alternative view that perhaps you might not hear from many other outlets. 

Warmly,
Tonya

Paul Kingsnorth

Excellent conversation:

Paul Kingsnorth: Why I Changed Sides in the Vaccine Wars

Nothing Will Change After November 3rd

Ink and Pen by Sarah

Nothing Will Change After November 3rd

Baking and Beeswax Candle Making

This morning I baked a loaf of bread and a Gluten-Free Apple Cake.  My friend gave us some apples yesterday as they own an orchard and have a business selling hard cider.  I thought I would share the recipe.  You can find it here.

I also poured some more beeswax candles as our stock was running low and I also like to give them for small Christmas gifts when attending a gathering or when I need a little something to express my gratitude.

Warm wishes,
Tonya

Monday, December 2nd

Hello friends,
Today we woke to a few inches of freshly fallen snow and all looks beautiful.

I thought I would share a little bit about our handmade and simple advent season during the days of December leading up to Christmas.

Today, it was Abe's turn to open our little advent calendar filled with milk chocolate pieces.  I bought it at our coop food store for $3.00.  This was an example of a compromise.  Not being able to buy a more expensive fair trade chocolate calendar, I did buy it at our local food coop store so that we can continue this tradition.

Each morning, Emily finds a Christmas story book wrapped under our Christmas tree for us to read and add to our Christmas book basket.  This makes it nice for me because I don't have to wrap 24 books at one time and I can also re-use the wrapping paper and yarn tie each night.

After they came in from helping to shovel and playing, I made them some hot cocoa.  For each cup of milk, add 2 Tablespoons of cocoa and 1 - 2 Tablespoons of sugar.  Whisk all ingredients in a saucepan over low heat until hot.

I baked a loaf of bread and Emily made some sugar cookies.  I finished the turkey soup that was made from our Thanksgiving turkey and that is what we are having for dinner tonight.

I have added little bits of Christmas decorations throughout our home and will add more throughout the month.

Our homeschooling lessons were cut short today when a friend called to see if Emily and Abraham wanted to play as he had a snow day.  He came over to our house and then they went over to his.

The turkey soup was delicious and now I am at my secretary wood burning more ornaments.

Would love to hear about what you are making and doing during this beautiful season.

Warm wishes,
Tonya

Handmade Holiday 2019

So excited to be sharing another year of a mostly handmade holiday with you.

Let me start by sharing why I believe in making handmade or supporting other small businesses.   

• Shopping local, supporting small businesses, and making for yourself is good for the environment.  Think about all the miles saved with transportation, giant warehouses, less packaging.
• I challenge you to not support Amazon or Walmart.  When money and power is consolidated in the hands of a few, by default we lose some of our freedoms - freedom of choice, whether it is in our political candidates through financial influence or the fact that they become a monopoly.  Amazon is getting in the business of elections (through the cloud) and military supplies.  Amazon has a contract with the CIA.  Amazon continues to buy out smaller businesses which means that Amazon will determine pay scales, products and so much more.  It is a scary situation and I challenge you to boycott them.  I know it is hard.  Sometimes I think how easy it would be to just place an order for that book I would love, or that product I need within 2 days, or the fact that Amazon is offering that product for much less than anywhere else.  Our family lives on very little financially (perhaps might even be considered to live in poverty for a family our size) but we consider boycotting Amazon to be a principled sacrifice.  Walmart is much the same with so them pricing out smaller businesses putting them out of business and much of their products being imported.
• There is something intrinsically special about making a gift for someone.  As it is being made, it is fun to think about them and just the act of making is so satisfying. 
• Supporting local businesses helps to feed a local family that is using their gifts to offer something unique to your community.  
• There is something much more human about walking into a local store, seeing another human being, speaking to them, creating small talk, and getting to know others in your community.  I am so afraid that we are losing some of our basic aspects of being human when we choose to do so much online out of convenience or to save money.

There are so many more reasons and I would love to hear yours.

If you search this blog in the search box, Handmade Holiday, you will find many posts of handmade ideas from years ago of sharing from blog readers.  It is very inspiring!  

Finally, please use #handmadeholiday2019 to share on instagram and/or leave your ideas in the comments with links if you have them!

Warm wishes,

Tonya

Edited to add:  These are my views and I do not judge others that choose to live or shop differently.  Some of my adult children use Amazon and I still love them!!

Harvest Festival

Sarah with brought one of her chickens.

 Abe and Emily

 needlefelting

 Emily doing the pumpkin on a spoon race.

 Emily

Abe

 Friends working on the cider pressing.

Emily hugging the sweet baby goat.

We moved to the most amazing small town in the world.... at least I think so.   The community is full of caring, involved people that work hard to serve one another.  This past Saturday, the non profit organization in town (which Mike and I have become involved with), but on a Harvest Festival that is geared toward the children. 

There was the cider pressing, the reading of Stone Soup while two cast iron pots of soup boiled over the open fire.  There were donuts from a string, fiddlers, a petting zoo with the sweetest little baby goats, caramel apples, a bouncy house, and more.   I brought wool to do needle felting and it was truly rewarding to see the joy in the children's faces (and adults!) as the wool became a work of art.

Updates

I thought I would post some updates from the last couple of weeks here at our little farm in central Vermont.

We tapped our big maple tree in front of our house, but do not have anything, yet, set up to cook off the sap outside, so we did use the stove top.  It was still worth it.

A little spring knitting with some beautiful small farm yarn that was hand dyed by my friend, Jules

A little pattern you can find here in my blog.

A little doll's vest.

We celebrated Sarah's 15th birthday with my father and a family friend from Massachusetts, and with Thomas.  We went up to Montpelier, where Thomas lives, to walk around and then have dinner at Positive Pie (Sarah's request).

And just now, with a huge rainfall last night,the snow is gone!  Mike worked on putting in a stone walkway going into the farm store over the weekend.   We hope to be planting by the end of the week!

When I was making a post on instagram for Sarah's birthday, I came to my blog to borrow pictures and it made me sad that I wasn't keeping up with documenting our children's growth and changes, as well as my thoughts over the last couple of years.  My goal is to blog here regularly again to have a record of our days.

Warm wishes,

Tonya

.