House concrete work done

The concrete slab has been poured, so now we have a floor and a wall.  Temporary electrical service will be installed by the beginning of next week, so that the work of framing in the house can begin.

We are now down to three goats: an all-white herd, including the two guardian dogs.  Timbuktu went to a new home, and this year's two male kids were harvested this past weekend.  Jeff and a friend (thanks, Patrick!) did the slaughtering and processing.  Raine was a little sad about saying goodbye to Timbuktu, but he expressed some relief as well about not having to watch out for him anymore, re: getting "Timbuked," as Raine put it. There was a time or two when the buck reared up at Raine in warning, when Raine's play with him became too rough.  Raine's thoughts about the slaughter ranged from planning to help the goats escape to wondering when he would be old enough to shoot the gun .  We discussed our process in terms of how we try to minimize any pain and suffering, and Raine sweetly asked for a photo of the two goats so he could remember and keep them with him.

A White Christmas, Twisted Oak-Style

Happy Holidays,
Annie

House Construction Begins!

The pole barn has been completed, and it finally stopped raining long enough to begin concrete work on the house.  The concrete wall on the north side of the house has now been poured and water-proofed.  The concrete wall is 6 feet high, and it will be largely underground, when construction is complete.

Raine was excited about the cement mixer trucks coming

Interior View of Wall

Exterior View of Wall

The next step in construction is to have the plumbing and electrical work done that will go into the concrete slab, which we hope can be poured in the next couple of weeks.  However, we just got about another inch of rain last night, and the forecast is not entirely favorable.

The heavy fall rains did not appear to negatively affect the new fescue pasture we planted, and we will see how the ryegrass planting around the garden and barn areas does, given last night's heavy rain.  In other farm news, we have been busy with the fall harvest (mostly pumpkins, carrots, and beets), planting garlic, and selling some goats.  We decided to downsize our herd, while we focus on the construction, so we've sold our two Spanish does, and we will soon sell the Kiko buck.  We're keeping the three Kiko does, one of whom will hopefully have been bred by the buck, before he goes to a new home.  We're looking into the possibility of using a provider of artificial insemination services to breed the does in the future instead of getting another buck.  It would be nice to not have to manage a buck and to better plan the timing of kidding.  No more surprise kids while we're on vacation!

-Annie

Barn Roof

Our pole barn now has a roof on it!  We can start storing things in it like our loaner Bobcat and the wood, milled from trees on our property, for our house.  I also hope to use some of it for animal shelter soon, so I can move the goats off of old pastures, which need reseeding.  With the addition of some metal braces and gutters, the pole barn will be complete.  However, we will eventually put in some walls and partitions in the barn, and we are looking for large water tanks so we can catch and use the rain water for animals and crop irrigation.

We are finally getting some rain now.  A lot of rain.  Hopefully, the acre of grass seed we spread last week will not be washed away but rather soon germinate and make a nice tall fescue pasture, providing good cool season forage for our goats.  We also hope the rains don't cause long delays in the concrete work on the house.  Some prep work for making the concrete wall on the back of house was done last week.

Otherwise, we are enjoying the beautiful fall colors and cooler temps, and we are getting excited about celebrating Halloween.

-Annie

New Beginnings

Dear Blog, we are sorry that we have neglected you.  I promise to do better, and I have started by giving you a new name: Twisted Oak Telegraph.  The Davises have been busy, and a lot of that has involved new developments at Twisted Oak Farm.  Let's try to do some catching up.

I put in my first veggie garden at Twisted Oak this summer.  This photo is from June.  Now, the okra plants are tall, and all the sweet potatoes, beans and sunflower heads have been harvested.  The inaugural season of this garden was quite bountiful.  For the fall, I recently planted a number of rows of beets.  I love this little garden.  I have done a lot of work mulching the beds, aisles, and perimeter fencing to keep the weeds well controlled and the plants happy.  This garden is beautiful to me.  :-)  Oh, and there's also a big pumpkin patch that volunteered in the old pig pen.  I can't wait for more pumpkin pie!  And pumpkin cake roll and pumpkin bread....

Our friend, Forrest, and his crew are building a big pole barn for us.  It will be 40' x 50' and strong enough to hold a lot of solar panels on its roof.  A neighbor did the clearing and grading, and we worked out a deal with another friend for use of her Bobcat (thanks, Jacqueline!).   It will be nice to have a place big enough to store the tractor and other big equipment as well as some of the materials we will soon start to gather for the construction of our house.

The northeast corner of our land was also cleared.  We plan to plant fruit and nut trees there.  As I type, Jeff is on the tractor, preparing to lime and seed the new pasture.

 Did you notice the sign posted by the fence in that photo?  It's our house building permit!  The house site has already been cleared and graded, and some concrete work will begin next week.  We're hoping to get the foundation in and concrete wall and slab poured before the weather gets too cold.

After much deliberation, we decided to build an earth bermed, passive solar home using conventional materials.  Maybe there will be some outbuildings someday constructed with earthen building methods.  Nonetheless, we have designed the home to be energy efficient, and it will be largely solar powered and have a rain catchment system for water.  We also plan to use a lot of salvaged materials for the interior finishing, which we can start collecting when the barn is done.  Stay tuned for more construction news!

-Annie