Newsletter #272 2024 Aug 23 Friday
Newsletter #272 2024 Aug 23 Friday
A big milling job this week, new guests at the Farmhouse, and preparations for the meat bird processing tomorrow. A full, good week, start to finish.
<Note: most of my Newsletters are “too long for email” according to Substack, which means they might be truncated in your inbox. If so, just click on the “Newsletter #272…” above and it will take you to the full post on Substack. While you are there, check out a few of the great content creators!>
Primal Woods
I had my middle child, Zach, out to the Homestead for his birthday last week. Below is the obligatory selfie at South Haven’s South Beach.
We had a great time doing the chores, preparing the sawmill for this week’s work, and changing the oil on the F150.
Sawmill Services
A three-day job with Wayne this week; 64 logs just the two of us and a tractor, over 3,000 board feet of mostly Black Cherry and Black Walnut. In addition to that, we milled several logs of unknown species, that yield some truly beautiful lumber and slabs. Wayne, who has a couple of years on me, lifted, carried and stacked over 15,000 lbs of lumber, one board at a time. Damn impressive I must say.
The mill in front of the Black Cherry logs, sometime on Day 1. We finished up the Cherry on Day 2, and moved the mill to in front of the Black Walnut stack. Below is a 40 second video of the results of our work.
Homestead Rebel Farm
The Cornish X have had their “last supper” today, with the butchering scheduled for tomorrow; maybe a little snack of some “chicken scratch” tomorrow morning.
The meat birds are looking good. I did some work today, refreshing my memory on how to slaughter and butcher chickens. Fortunately I documented what I learned 8 years ago in a process flow diagram and four videos. I posted all of that on Substack today; you can start with the process flow diagram, and then links will take you anywhere you want to go from there.
Both sets of pigs are in good shape.
Men’s Retreat
The dates for the next Men’s Retreat have been moved out to 26-29 September. The 2025 dates are unchanged; 20-23 Feb, 5-8 Jun, and 4-7 Sep. If you or someone you know might be interested, please don’t hesitate to reach out.
Farmhouse
I’ve got some work to do on the dock, but not this week. The floating section has decking that is probably of couple of decades old, and needs to be replaced. I have not decided whether to mill that myself, or buy treated lumber; probably the latter. Having said that, aside from providing farm tours, which are always enjoyable, I’ve not had to do any work on the Farmhouse itself. Eureka! Geri’s hosting is resulting in the consistent improvement of our Airbnb “score,” not that there’s much room left for improvement!
Of course we are generating a list of improvements to be made before next spring. Of course.
News
Books
I set aside Churchill, Hitler and the Unnecessary War for the moment, and picked up JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters. I’m already having thoughts on a post…so there will definitely be more to come on this book, and the subject matter.
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All the best, and may God bless you and yours,
John & Geri
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