And Then It Was...September?!?!

What an exciting summer it has been on Faithfulness Farm! It is hard to believe that soon we will be back to show season and submitting plans for a permit to build our new house.  There are several different avenues our summer has taken so this blog post will be a bit of a summary of our adventurous and productive happenings over the last several months.


First off, the girls move!! Although a tropical storm surrounded us, we were able to work with the county to get our deadline extended a few days so that the girl goats could be transferred to the new farm safely.  This resulted in "Nolle Prosequi!!!" That means CASE DISMISSED. It has been almost a year of working with the county about our goats on the old property and we are now finished! Praise the Lord!

The girls love their new pens, new shelters, and especially love the NEW TRAILS! We borrowed the neighbor's mower and Gabe spent some time carving out trails all around the eight acres.  The human kids, milking does, yearlings, and goat kids all enjoy walking the property enjoying fresh plants, checking out butterflies, and watching beautiful sunsets.  One family that joined us told us we could market these great walks!  It is a treasure to spend those hours with each other.




Kaleb watching us leave at
the corner of the property.

The chickens and Kaleb were also moved.  Kaleb LOVES the new property. You can see this is what God designed him for.  He patrols and keeps things safe and is slowly growing out of the crazy puppy stage.    The chickens are also happy is their new home although they prefer to lay their eggs in several different spots.  One Saturday, Isabel went on her own egg hunt and found 50 eggs!

 The last animals to be moved were the bucks! Although their structure isn't the permanent one they will eventually have, they are very content enjoying the fresh forage and the breeze of their new home. 

ALMOST FINISHED!  We have gotten almost everything complete to put the Wesley Chapel house on the market.  What a blessing it has been to simplify, simplify, simplify.  While it has been a lot of work, we are seeing the end in sight and looking forward to our next big step...COB!!  What is cob you say? It is a sand, clay, straw, and water mixture that we plan on building our new house out of!

Dawn and Gabe making bricks!

Gabe is busy working on the design and, Lord willing, the permit will be submitted in November.  Currently, the plan is that the house will consist of a wood frame and then have cob walls.  We have started experimenting already, making several bricks to find out which ratio of straw, clay, sand and water works the best.  Get ready! You mix the cob with your feet and then build it up...we are recruiting volunteers now!



Isabel and Melina stomping out the cob!

Two of the new bricks!

While this year has been one of the toughest years yet, we enjoyed the hard work and the Lord's blessing.  Next month, we will be starting school and are looking forward to seeing fruit from all of our spring and summer labor.  It is a beautiful farm life, stayed tuned to our blog to see how we enjoy it and press ahead!