#homestead — Public Fediverse posts
Live and recent posts from across the Fediverse tagged #homestead, aggregated by home.social.
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Waited half a day for the mud to dry out a little and then squished around in it to drill a bunch more holes into the rocks, installed rebar, an end piece so the concrete doesn't run out and then the vertical part of the insulation, which are always a bit tricky to align.
In this section there were a lot of protruding rocks to be insulated around.
Then the extended footing on the bottom and the sun went down again.
Horizontal part tomorrow, I hope!
#Homestead #Renovation #DIY #LogHouse #Foundation #Insulation #Mud
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Since that's no good, I've been doing some other jobs this morning and hoping for it to dry a bit.
Under the old harrow I hauled away were several small Linden saplings. I dug them up and replanted them by the forest edge near the spring. Planting trees brightens the mood.
Then hauled some more junk up from the valley shack, including parts of this tiny hut that fell down. I found a message, someone had written "pasaku namelis" (little fairy house) on the inside above the door. Curious. Always wondered what that thing was for. Fairies, apparently. They seem to have moved out a while ago.
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Since that's no good, I've been doing some other jobs this morning and hoping for it to dry a bit.
Under the old harrow I hauled away were several small Linden saplings. I dug them up and replanted them by the forest edge near the spring. Planting trees brightens the mood.
Then hauled some more junk up from the valley shack, including parts of this tiny hut that fell down. I found a message, someone had written "pasaku namelis" (little fairy house) on the inside above the door. Curious. Always wondered what that thing was for. Fairies, apparently. They seem to have moved out a while ago.
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Since that's no good, I've been doing some other jobs this morning and hoping for it to dry a bit.
Under the old harrow I hauled away were several small Linden saplings. I dug them up and replanted them by the forest edge near the spring. Planting trees brightens the mood.
Then hauled some more junk up from the valley shack, including parts of this tiny hut that fell down. I found a message, someone had written "pasaku namelis" (little fairy house) on the inside above the door. Curious. Always wondered what that thing was for. Fairies, apparently. They seem to have moved out a while ago.
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Since that's no good, I've been doing some other jobs this morning and hoping for it to dry a bit.
Under the old harrow I hauled away were several small Linden saplings. I dug them up and replanted them by the forest edge near the spring. Planting trees brightens the mood.
Then hauled some more junk up from the valley shack, including parts of this tiny hut that fell down. I found a message, someone had written "pasaku namelis" (little fairy house) on the inside above the door. Curious. Always wondered what that thing was for. Fairies, apparently. They seem to have moved out a while ago.
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Since that's no good, I've been doing some other jobs this morning and hoping for it to dry a bit.
Under the old harrow I hauled away were several small Linden saplings. I dug them up and replanted them by the forest edge near the spring. Planting trees brightens the mood.
Then hauled some more junk up from the valley shack, including parts of this tiny hut that fell down. I found a message, someone had written "pasaku namelis" (little fairy house) on the inside above the door. Curious. Always wondered what that thing was for. Fairies, apparently. They seem to have moved out a while ago.
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Well, that cover sure kept the rain out of the trench and it didn't get muddy at all 😬
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Well, that cover sure kept the rain out of the trench and it didn't get muddy at all 😬
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Well, that cover sure kept the rain out of the trench and it didn't get muddy at all 😬
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Well, that cover sure kept the rain out of the trench and it didn't get muddy at all 😬
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Well, that cover sure kept the rain out of the trench and it didn't get muddy at all 😬
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Another thing that was in the crooked shack (the one with the useful beams) was this pile of dried bundles of reeds.
No idea what these were collected for here. Don't think I've seen many thatched roofs around. No, I don't want to build one either.
What to do with this? Someone spent a lot of effort gathering and bundling them.
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Another thing that was in the crooked shack (the one with the useful beams) was this pile of dried bundles of reeds.
No idea what these were collected for here. Don't think I've seen many thatched roofs around. No, I don't want to build one either.
What to do with this? Someone spent a lot of effort gathering and bundling them.
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Another thing that was in the crooked shack (the one with the useful beams) was this pile of dried bundles of reeds.
No idea what these were collected for here. Don't think I've seen many thatched roofs around. No, I don't want to build one either.
What to do with this? Someone spent a lot of effort gathering and bundling them.
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Another thing that was in the crooked shack (the one with the useful beams) was this pile of dried bundles of reeds.
No idea what these were collected for here. Don't think I've seen many thatched roofs around. No, I don't want to build one either.
What to do with this? Someone spent a lot of effort gathering and bundling them.
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Another thing that was in the crooked shack (the one with the useful beams) was this pile of dried bundles of reeds.
No idea what these were collected for here. Don't think I've seen many thatched roofs around. No, I don't want to build one either.
What to do with this? Someone spent a lot of effort gathering and bundling them.
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Back to foundation work. Guide string and depth gauge out and hacked away the clay to the right level. That last bit is always manual work.
Pulled out the grounding rod for the old phone line, which was pounded in deep along the foundation.
Then some rock drilling and hammering anchors for connecting rock and concrete and I even got the long glass rebar pieces in before it got too dark.
Finally threw some improvised cover over the hole as tomorrows forecast is for heavy rain and I don't need to wade around in a mud pit the day after.
Oh, those Colorado spruces I felled because they were too close? Found their roots. Under the foundation rocks. So they did indeed have to go.
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Looks seedy.
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Another sleep deprived night, this time on account of #Knirps having a 4am dance party.
Strong morning coffee and back into the trench, patching the poor house up.
Cleaned out most of the rot and fitted a support for the window post that is somehow still intact, then moved the exterior brace over to a smarter place, after much thought.
Mortared the back gaps a bit, stuffed in some reclaimed slag wool, OSB on top and cladding back on to hide my bodge.
Its not great, obviously the beams still need replacing once we find some and are ready to make a huge hole in the living room wall. But it'll last the winter.
Ready to resume work on the foundation, which is what I actually was planning to do. Alas, tomorrow the usual flood resumes. 😫
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The chimney for the bedroom stove is open to the sky and rain just falls in. That's been bothering me a lot and now that I have the ladders to get up there, I can fix it.
So another quick scrapmetal art project: A chimney hood.
Bang a nail into a piece of old sheet metal, mark a circle, snip along, cut a slit, overlap into a conical hat, drill holes, rivet together.
Rusty round bar bent around a bucket, ends welded together, three flat bar legs bent in the vise joined onto that.
Finally tangs with holes for riveting the hat on top and stops to keep the feet from sliding down.
Having an cracked chimney pipe section helped a lot with dry fitting.
Ducking out some rain and when that's dried it can go up there.
#Chimney #DIY #Homestead #Welding #Metalworking #Hood #SalvagePunk #Heating
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I strained it through a cloth to catch all solid bits (#walnuts) while letting the #alcohol part through. Result: 1.5L of pure #homemade #nocino
Not satisfied, I decided to experiment some more by mixing 1L of milk to .5L of pure #liqueur to make nocino #cream.
Pure liqueur -> root cellar
Cream -> freezer -
Potato harvest day, after being rudely interrupted by various roofs and trees flying around.
First I decapitated everything and pitchforked it into some big piles.
Iseki got the DIY potato digger attached. Hung some more junk onto it for extra down pressure and invited the troops for picking.
The soil was still too wet, but it will never be drier, tomorrow brings rain again. The digger did ok, it bounced off some gloopy parts but I just ran it two or even three times through a row and out came the taters.
The row by the beetroots had huge potatoes!
A lot of picking, some dirt removal (wet dirt sucks) and distributing them in airy crates in the barn (now without skylight) to cure.
We got enough for a year this time, I think.
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Cut down the potato jungle which was completely obscuring the dead potato tops and hauled two big carts to the compost pile.
Then a lot of fiddling with depth and angle. Basically anchor design but on land. Angle of attack is everything and a single turn of the top link can make all the difference.
I got a lot of clogging as the soil is still too wet and the weeds left too many roots. A foundation stone was added to provide some downforce.
Then the toplink got replaced with a longer one, shallowing the angle, which made a big difference.
Finally a hotfix was applied to the spines, meaning I got a fence pole and bent them all ~15° down.
Weed roots still make trouble but I got the first crate filled.
#DIY #Homestead #PotatoDigger #TractorAttachment #Metalworking #Harvest #Potato
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Prototyping hard. I guess I'm a kolkhoz level farm mechanic now.
Found a bunch of clamps in the treasure shack and just used those, with some "spacers" instead of spending time I don't have to make my own clamps.
It works after some fine tuning of depth and angle of attack, but there is a significant problem - it doesn't lift high enough to reposition. For that I need to extend the frame further outwards. Oops.
I think we'll manage like this for this season and fix it before next. I'm sure in a rush again.
The soil is far too wet today and I still need to lob off the potato tops and weeds anyways, so I just tested on the already harvested garlic bed.
#DIY #PotatoDigger #TractorAttachment #SalvagePunk #Metalworking #Homestead
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Sparkled the top fitting onto the frame and after thinking up various more or less convoluted clamp designs I went for a rummage in the tractor parts shed and found some almost suitable clamps.
Just one backing plate short. I'll find something or make one and we should be ready for a test drive. The weather is being quite wet again so its not potato digging time.
#PotatoDigger #TractorAttachment #DIY #Welding #Metalworking #Homestead #SalvagePunk
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Spiked!
A few designs have the spikes bent upwards at the ends but I don't see what that is supposed to achieve.
The spikes are for guiding the potatoes up while the soil falls between them and then drop them on top for easy picking. Any upward bend will just get them stuck.
So that's basically it. The angle of attack looks too steep now, before it looked too shallow. But since it goes on a three-point hitch, I can adjust it some by tilting the frame.
Next for some clamps to attach it to said frame.
#PotatoDigger #TractorAttachment #DIY #Welding #Metalworking #Homestead #SalvagePunk
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Progress on the actual potato digger part.
Some scribbling on the workbench, two old plough blades (tough to cut but welded easily) and a double spring from a harrow for a neck.
The spring steel is difficult to weld. If it doesn't hold, I'll replace it with something else, but the curve was just too perfect not to try. Added a reinforcement piece to help.
Everything on the front got a visit from the grinder to smooth it over. Not to hide my welds but to protect the potato skins from damage.
Lots of guesswork here. V-angle, diving angle, width, etc.
It's a prototype :)
#PotatoDigger #TractorAttachment #DIY #Welding #Metalworking #Homestead #Recycling
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Cut, cut, grind, grind, sparkle, sparkle. Frame for tractor attachment slapped together in a hurry.
Part is recycled from the old drawbar I bent last year. The bar itself is a massively thick chunk of steel and has the lower pins already on it. I cleaned off the welds where the bent, flimsy frame was welded on, recycled the hitch into a top link fitting (no drilling holes, yay) and built the rest from C-channels that used to be somewhat overly sturdy fenceposts.
The top link fitting is also bent from its previous life but I'm hopeful if I throw it in the sauna-forge tomorrow I can straighten it out.
Yes, the top bar is super wide and there's a good reason for that.
#DIY #Welding #Metalworking #TractorAttachment #PotatoDigger #Homestead
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The thinking phase. Scrapmetal aided design and a lot of going "hmm".
A plan is forming.
Need a frame, this time I'll make a square one and general purpose because I've been wanting to do that for a while and then it can carry any number of simple tools like this potato digger, a furrower and maybe even pallet forks 2.0. 💡
I think I might also manage to get drawbar functionality out of it, for both types of hitch. The goal here is to reduce the time spent swapping attachments around. Especially changing between drawbar and pallet fork wastes a lot of time.
#DIY #TractorAttachment #Metalworking #Welding #Homestead #PotatoDigger
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Next up, potato harvest. Since nobody wants to dig a small field of loamy soil by hand, that means welding something like this tractor attachment together from the scrap metal pile.
I've spotted some plough blades that might suit.
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Rest of the garlic harvest done.
🧄
Definitely won't have any vampires around the house tonight.
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Found me some sawmill junk and with a bit of tablesaw work and a few screws turned it into two more frames for drying racks.
Then some fence maples got a draft letter and before long were chopped up and nailed to the frame on one end. Green maple doesn't split when nailing, unlike dry sticks. And they do grow fast and furious here.
Can dig more garlic now.
#Garlic #Harvest #Drying #Curing #Rack #DIY #Homestead #Garden
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Garlic harvest. Only half of it because all the drying racks are full, even the Volkswagen one.
Yes, the garden is weedy as fuck. That doesn't matter and may even be beneficial. I strimmed the weeds down to the level of the garlic leaves so I could see it and went digging.
This is winter garlic, planted in October. Voles dug tunnels under the snow and mulch all over this bed but didn't touch a single garlic bulb.
Need to build more drying racks before I can get the rest out. And next year plant less of it :)
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A Day in the Life at Duffney’s Bird Barn
How I balance a remote career, homesteading, crochet, writing, and motherhood—one day at a time. People often ask me how I find time to do everything. Honestly... Some days I wonder the same thing. The weeds don't always get pulled. The laundry doesn't always get folded. The dishes aren't always done when I want them to be. Some crochet projects take longer than I planned, and there are days when my to-do list is still staring back at me when it's time for bed. I've learned that's […]https://duffneysbirdbarn.wordpress.com/2026/07/13/a-day-in-the-life-at-duffneys-bird-barn/
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Hmm, could use some kind of dumper right about now 😅
Also some new wheels and tyres for this thing. Those are really hard to find (at a non-ridiculous price, that is).
Anyone got some Simson moped wheels laying around they don't need?
#Digging #Hauling #Dirt #Homestead #DIY #Dumper #Wheelbarrow #Simson
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Stay off my lawn, err, corn patch. Damn weeds.
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You've been waiting a long time, and I finally remembered to bring my phone out with me for chores, so here are a few fun photos of the baby pigs :)
#Pigs #Pigstodon #SmallFarm #RanchoDeLaLibertad #Permaculture #Homestead
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As it is tradition for this time of year, though a bit early due to the hot spring making the walnuts mature faster, I am making Nocino (walnut liqueur) with the walnuts from my land. This is my first time trying, and I chose to follow the recipe attributed to the city of Modena.
Too bad it'll have to sit there until after Christmas, though I will probably at least give a taste test during those festivities.
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Looking for some wheel bolts. There's several buckets of bolts, nuts, springs, nails, miscellaneous junk and the odd dead mouse.
I've sorted five buckets and found one of the bolts I need so far, but at least the garbarn gets dejunked and my scrapmetal bins fill back up. Keeping the intact nuts and bolts, of course. They fit the old stuff I'm repairing here.
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so, this little pile of ash, sycamore and beech logs are waiting to be split and stacked in the next weeks.
Bluetooth speaker with very Loud Tiesto at 7am awaits me thinks.
#goodweather #homestead #woodstove -
so, this little pile of ash, sycamore and beech logs are waiting to be split and stacked in the next weeks.
Bluetooth speaker with very Loud Tiesto at 7am awaits me thinks.
#goodweather #homestead #woodstove -
so, this little pile of ash, sycamore and beech logs are waiting to be split and stacked in the next weeks.
Bluetooth speaker with very Loud Tiesto at 7am awaits me thinks.
#goodweather #homestead #woodstove -
so, this little pile of ash, sycamore and beech logs are waiting to be split and stacked in the next weeks.
Bluetooth speaker with very Loud Tiesto at 7am awaits me thinks.
#goodweather #homestead #woodstove -
so, this little pile of ash, sycamore and beech logs are waiting to be split and stacked in the next weeks.
Bluetooth speaker with very Loud Tiesto at 7am awaits me thinks.
#goodweather #homestead #woodstove -
Hello, all! Checking in here, it's been a while! We're much more active on our self-hosted instance: @stewards
There has been a lot going on this season. We have sunflowers the size of us opening now, we brought home rabbits (rabbits!), we processed our first pig, and there is a lot to consider about the world as it is right now and how we fit into it.
There was an extremely stressful few months where it looked very much like we might lose the Ranch, but we recovered and it looks like we'll be here to stay. There are still some plans in the works as we consider the viability of certain projects here, and the shifting climate, and the longevity of our family's survival -- all of which are very exciting and which I hope to be in a position to finally share more about soon.
Our next newsletter, to be released sometime in the next week or so, is going to be on the most critical survival skills for either socioeconomic collapse or increasing supply chain pressure -- inspired by a question @fey asked us on the other server. Trust us, it won't be the things you're expecting, and I think it'll be worth the read.
Anyway, if you're still interested in following along with us feel free to subscribe to the newsletter or join us at the other instance. Any support helps at this vital juncture, and we look forward to continuing to share what is hopefully useful knowledge.
Hoping your early Spring is abundant and the appropriate temperature for your climate ~
#RanchoDeLaLibertad #Sovereignty #Community #Farm #Ranch #Homestead #Commune #ClimateAction #Degrowth
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Done digitizing the house. Well, apart from roof and attic which aren't very interesting right now.
Now to plan a bunch of stuff so we can decide if our ideas will work and what to do about doors, windows, etc.
#Homestead #House #Renovation #DIY #SweetHome3D #OurHouse #LogHouse
