[KansasTerri]

WOW! 3 PAGES!

I am gonna chime in, here.

My dream was to disappear into the Redwood forests and only come out once or twice a year. Yes that is impractical, so I decided to farm.

HIS dream was to watch cities grow.

And we were in love. We did a LOT of talking, and each of us compromised as best we were able.

Once he got his degree in City and Regional planning, we moved out to small cities and we both worked and saved. Life kicked us in the teeth a few times, but we lived at the edge of a small city. I looked West to the countryside and he looked East to his job at at a local city.

And now to answer your question: BETTER LIVING THROUGH BETTER TOOLS! I figure to do things myself, and I do not ask his help very often. I do ask at times, of course

I am in the process of harvesting my third fruit tree. First I harvest from the ground. THEN I use my cane (I am older) to hook the branches to within my reach. THEN I get out my little tractor and use my cane to hook more branches within reach. THEN I get down what I can with a fruit-picking tool (a basked on a stick, sold at most hardware stores. ). THEN I ask for help for the ones that I could not reach and then DH climbs up on the tractor and hands the fruit down.

I see that you turn your compost pile. Really, you do not have to. Personally I put most of the vegetation around the larger plants like tomatos. If it is a few inches deep it keeps the weeds down, and while it rots more slowly, it does rot.

Chicken feed. Now that DH is retired he INSISTS on unloading the feed for me. Honestly, though, I was lucky enough to get an electric scooter chair at a yard sale, and it will pull a little cart. So I used to have the staff put the feed in the back of my little pickup and I would go home. I put the little cart under the tailgate of my pick up and I slide the bags off and they fall onto the cart. I then use my scooter chair to pull the cart to the hen house, and I pull the bags off directly off the cart onto the floor. I then scoop the feed into the mouse-proof garbage cans. At no time do I lift the bags: I did once but I am older now.

Some older people will have the feed put on the passenger side of the car and they will move the feed to the hen house one bucket full at a time. But my way is faster.

LASTLY, I got really sick at one point of my life, and if it were not for my husband’s job with good insurance we would have lost everything. It turned out for the best that he is a die-hard city boy. Good tools are expensive-the tractor cost $6000- but the insurance that my husband carried was priceless.

We have been married for 47 years, now.

[KansasTerri]

I take it that you do not have a freezer? I cut some apples into chunks and froze them. to make fried apples this winter, or apple pie, or baked apples., or put them through a blender with sugar and cinnamon and dehydrate the puree to make sweet fruit leather. Or I can cut them up into smaller bits and pour spice cake batter over them and then it is an apple-spice cake.

Also, just dried apples are not my favorite, but if you soak them until they are tender then you can stir them into muffin batter or spice cake batter, and they are good that way

• This reply was modified 2 years, 1 month ago by  KansasTerri.

[KansasTerri]

How cold is cold? I live in zone 5 and I will be bringing my pineapples inside because it easily goes down to zero where I live. I could not keep a greenhouse warm enough. This is the first year I have succeeded with pineapples: I have rooted 2 tops and I did get a seed started. The seedling might not make it because it has been growing for 2 months now and is only 1 inch tall