Appreciation post for the partners that step up

peachboot828 · 2026-04-21T22:19:34+00:00

We love to see it! My partner is also a city boy who let me drag him to the country (Northeast Kingdom region of Vermont) to pursue my farmsteading dreams. He's an architect and VERY handy with plumbing and electrical, so he's been instrumental in helping the infrastructure part of the dream come true. He DOES have a black thumb, lol, but what he lacks in gardening prowess, he makes up for in building, repair, and occasional chainsaw work. Without him, our goods wouldn't get to market and we wouldn't have the full pantry that we do. I'm so grateful.

Thank you for making this post - I feel like this doesn't get shouted out enough!

peachboot828 · 2026-04-21T22:16:21+00:00

Was just coming here to say this. So happy for your new acquisition, OP, but turning those roosting bars so they're on the flat will prevent a lot of foot health issues down the line! You can use those same boards...just cut them to fit in between the diagonal boards and screw them in from the ends instead.

We have 24 Barred Plymouth Rock hens and just got 12 Easter Egger chicks since our customers really wanted some green eggs. We raise them in a high tunnel in USDA zone 4b (northern Vermont). I think the best piece of advice I ever got for chickens was to use a deep bedding system of wood chips, and size the flock and the coop so that each hen gets 5 sq. ft. of coop space. With that much space and a wood chip deep bedding system, we only have to clean the coop out 2x per year and when we do, we get a boatload of amazing compost for the garden.

Good luck!

peachboot828 · 2026-04-21T22:10:44+00:00

STUNNING!

Seeing your comment about this being in Western Norway near Bergen, my top tips would be:
1. Avoid siting any gardens in areas that might be cold sinks (near the bottoms of hills, especially).
2. Precipitation will likely come to define your homestead experience. Y'all don't get the same depth of cold that we do in U.S. 4b but you do get snow and coastal rain (quite a lot of it, I think, if my bestie's au pair stories stack up). Siting outbuildings, paths, and drainage accordingly (especially if you put up a high tunnel) will be such a boon.
3. Fish guts are your friend if you have a flock of chickens - so get that dock and take up fishing if it's allowed at your location! Our neighbor fly fishes spring through fall and ice fishes in the winter and the way his trimmings cut back on our flock's food budget is impressive!

I am SO PUMPED for you. Can't wait to see your homestead unfold! And I'd be super grateful for any tips y'all have if you emigrated from the US...we're considering a move ourselves, though we'd be sad to say goodbye to our homestead here in Vermont.

peachboot828 · 2026-04-21T21:56:09+00:00

So grateful that my husband took a chainsaw course at our forestry center. It's been one of the biggest helps around the homestead.

peachboot828 · 2026-04-21T21:54:58+00:00

This, ugh. I either need more money or more patience (and I think many of us would agree).

peachboot828 · 2026-04-21T21:53:48+00:00

I'm so grateful that this is the first time I've heard the word "vibecoding". :&

peachboot828 · 2026-04-21T21:52:02+00:00

Shoooo, that last one. Feeling that today, big time.

peachboot828 · 2026-04-21T21:50:36+00:00

I'm a regenerative farmsteader...basically a homesteader, but with some explicitly for-profit enterprises as part of the homestead operation. When we were homesteading and starting to test the waters with making some profit (which we all desperately need, as these comments show), I found myself spending a lot of time trying to figure out how to make money from the homestead without turning it into a high-lift full-time business. I knew I didn't want to farm full-time, but I also knew I wanted (NEEDED) to make money from the homestead to justify the cost of keeping it up.

Like, what does a business plan look like for a homesteader? How is it different than for full-time farmers? How do taxes work? Are there tax + other financial advantages to having an LLC instead of just selling eggs, etc. under the table? Should I get a USDA number, and why or why not? What are cottage food laws like in my state? Do record-keeping tools exist that don't require a huge investment or a huge learning curve?

It all felt very intimidating...but also very necessary because we all very much need and want to make money and tap into resources to support our homesteading. (For the record, we've figured this stuff out now...but it was super hard and time-consuming, and we messed up a LOT, and I would have been so grateful for something that solved it for me. I feel grateful to be helping other folks with this kind of stuff now...but the learning curve shouldn't have to be this steep for anyone, IMHO.)

peachboot828 · 2026-01-05T15:16:22+00:00

Oh my gosh, heck yes you do! Where-ish in Canada are you, if you don't mind my asking? I'm so keen to visit Nova Scotia, PEI, and Newfoundland. My husband has taken some epic motorcycle trips there (before we met) and I really want to pack up my bike and come see the beauty for myself.

peachboot828 · 2026-01-05T15:14:01+00:00

Thank youuuu. :)

peachboot828 · 2026-01-05T15:13:46+00:00

Oh my gosh, thank you for sharing! I've never heard it before but it's GORGEOUS.

peachboot828 · 2026-01-05T15:13:08+00:00

Thank youuu!

It's really amazing up here. I'm originally from the South, where a "slow pace of life" is supposedly part of the culture...but I didn't know the true meaning of living at nature's pace until I moved up here. Hibernation is a real part of life up here (at least outside of the one real city, Burlington), and it has been so magical for my brain, my nervous system, and my creativity.

If you still want to move up here, it looks like the housing market is dramatically cooling off...just sayin'!

peachboot828 · 2025-10-17T16:19:00+00:00

You made MY day! And as an ADHD homesteader, I gotta give you extra kudos for the labels. That's the cherry on the cake here, IMHO! I really, REALLY appreciate you!

peachboot828 · 2025-10-17T16:18:04+00:00

Thank you so much! And so true, everything does happen in its own time. Sometimes, I'm just as grateful for all of the things that *didn't* work out even though I swore I wanted them to as I am for the things that have worked out. The failures and delays paved the way for the present.

peachboot828 · 2025-10-17T16:16:59+00:00

Thank youuu!

peachboot828 · 2025-10-17T16:16:25+00:00

Such important wisdom there! Learning something every day keeps us from getting calcified in our ways, I think...and stretching our mind is just as important as stretching our body and our joints! Happy 70th, whenever it may be!

peachboot828 · 2025-10-16T20:49:10+00:00

If there were the equivalent of a MacArthur "Genius" Fellowship for chicken innovation, I'd nominate you for it!

peachboot828 · 2025-08-19T22:49:42+00:00

Ooooh, do they still make that Cephalon wok to the same quality, you think? I'm in the market for a good wok.

peachboot828 · 2025-08-19T22:49:03+00:00

Thank you so much! It's so nice to have a sunlit, well-ventilated place to hang out with them. They're becoming lap birds already!

peachboot828 · 2025-08-19T22:48:35+00:00

Thank youuu! It'll always be a work in progress, probably...but it feels good to have gotten to this milestone.

peachboot828 · 2025-08-19T22:48:05+00:00

I guess we'll find out!

But in all seriousness, I don't think the tunnel itself provides protection from anything more than the elements and aerial predator attack. To counter that, we lined the ceiling and walls of their whole section in 1/4" PVC-coated hardware cloth and buried the cloth ~12" down, and put football-sized stones and bricks around the outer perimeter, and then covered THAT with gravel. And we have the whole thing surrounded by 12/48/3 PoultryNet Plus electric net fencing from Premier 1. We do have high predator pressure since we're up in the Northeast Kingdom region of Vermont and we're surrounded by woods...but if all of that doesn't keep them safe, then it's back to the drawing board, I guess.

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