Settling in to Alamosa

So we are about a month into the new rental now. The llamas are all here with us as is Chloe, the pot belly pig. We sold one turkey and the rest went into the freezer. The same for the chickens who haven't laid for months.

Chloe

Then we had to buy store eggs. I didn't mind paying the cost for the  organic eggs, it's what we charge when we sell eggs. But one day no one in town had any, and this last time, I just decided that the "organic" eggs are not living up to my expectations. So I began the search for laying hens. Found some too. I hope they are only one year old as the woman we got them from believed them to be. I traded a box of children's board and picture books for a bunch of chickens. We got three roosters in the mix. Mostly they are Houdans, which is not a breed I am familiar with, so we will see if and how they lay eggs through the winter. So far, they aren't laying at all.

Houdans

We cleaned out the shed on the rental property. Then Richard fixed it up a little and now we have a working chicken coop for the new birds.

shed turned coop

Patty still has not dropped her cria. Leo the haurizo, Taylor's cria is doing great, testing the boundaries of his freedom in the big field that is now his home, along with all of the female llamas. Leo runs circles around his mom, jumping and kicking and having a grand time, I think I even saw him trying to spit, posturing to mom, trying again and again. It sure seems like she was encouraging him...a lesson in llama spitting perhaps.

Llama girls

We have been considering re-homing some of the llamas. And downsizing many things. Richard's new salary is starting to catch up to us and we are not fairing so well financially. I have listed the camper, and both parcels of land for sale. I don't want to give up the dream, but I'm not sure how else we can pay the bills off that we can no longer afford. I'm trying to find like-minded people to perhaps buy into either piece of land and help us form sustainable communities, but interest and funding seems to be lacking.

Llama boys

We did get our first recycle customer this past week, but at $2 a month for his pickup, that will not go far. I hope more people sign up and we can get this thing going. It seems like a good idea for us, for others and for the planet.

We are still trying to sort and clean up our lives in boxes. Some of our stuff we have not seen for years. It's been packed up and stored away. As a result we are purging everything we don't really need or have outgrown. It's a process. It seems I just finish emptying boxes, sorting and cleaning up and a new batch of boxes shows up. On the positive, our storage rental in town is almost empty and we will be done with that at the end of the month.

We have managed to raise a few dollars by selling off some of these bigger items, which has helped a lot.

I passed my first level shaman course and Richard just got his Permaculture Certification. We are always continuing to educate ourselves as the funding allows. It may be a while before we can start anything new.

I have acquired two clients in my healing business, and I expect that will grow over time.

The new rental

We moved into this great rental on five acres.

Rental house outside of Alamosa

It has this lovely passive solar design that heats the entire house. We have not used the heat yet, nor the wood stove. I think we will be just fine in this house over the winter.

We still have to set up fencing for the llamas and get them moved. It's depressing having so much to do and not enough time to get it done.

We are also struggling now with trying to find a new balance with Richard's new income level, which is quite a drop from what it was before. We have both applied for pizza delivery jobs to no avail. Sad, with all of our pizza experience.

I am trying to sell art, trying to get my healing practice up and going, and writing when I can. The kids' online school is taking up most of my life now. And they told me it would be easier. We have been struggling and have decided to move our daughter back into 1st grade with our son. Her ASD (autism spectrum disorder) is wreaking havoc on our schedule, on her attitude and on my patience. Hopefully we can get it sorted out and this adjustment will be better for all of us.

We are trying to decide what to do next. We may have to sell our Taos land, if not our Alamosa land too. It has been a trying time and I suspect we have a ways to go before we figure out our new life situation.

Leonardo the baby llama

We just had a baby llama/alpaca...huarizo cria. A mix between an alpaca and a llama is a haurizo.

New cria

Taylor our black female llama had her baby this morning, or about noon. He just showed up in the field. No problems, no stress. Llamas give birth so easily. It took him about an hour or so to get to his feet.

Baby llama/alpaca born in the sand

He's so cute!

Nursing

We relocated Taylor and baby to a separate pen and put Patty in there with them, expecting her to give birth any day now. I think they are early though. 350 day gestation. I think we got Alonso last October, but I suppose we are within a couple of weeks of due date.

Staying close to Mom.

In any case, here he is...Leonardo, the newest addition to the farmstead. 26 pounds of legs and fluff.

Leonardo

One loft done, but winter is coming fast

One loft is done in the shed/tiny house. The sub floor is down, and now we need some kind of cheap but clean flooring. We may be looking at making our own hardwood flooring our of 1 x 6" boards. While pallet flooring seems like a cool idea, it would be a lot of work, and yet that may be the only real option.

lumber for the loft and wall

building the bath/kitchen wall

loft

Richard putting down subfloor.

loft with bath/kitchen underneath

Richard and the kids have been painting the shed. It turns out our leftover paint is a Mauve sort of sand color. Was the Earthship we rented really that color? We bought it to paint our tin barn roofs as the covenants in that community would not allow reflective material of any kind. It was Oops paint with some added color, so it is interesting.

Kids painting the shed/tiny house

Richard painting the shed/tiny house

So, I have been on the hunt for cheap, re-usable building materials. We may have a new source for some things.

We are seriously considering a rental farm/house with acreage for the winter. Things are just not moving as fast as I would have hoped. Richard has had a job change with a 20K pay cut. Yes, really. I have to get out there and find a job. Unless by some miracle people start buying my art. Check it out at these links.(http://kerryabennettart.blogspot.com/, http://fineartamerica.com/profiles/kerry-bennett.html)

So, we are looking at the rental property on Tuesday and will make our decision on that. Otherwise, we keep plugging away on the tiny house, hoping to find some money to get insulation in. That's a big one. $1500+ for the spray foam for the roof and walls. Good stuff, but expensive.

We are most likely going to process our remaining 6 chickens and turn them into soup stock. They are molting now, two plus years old and not laying. It is too expensive to keep feeding them high price organic feed with no return. Plus trying to keep them warm through winter. Not worth it. The same may be true of our 4 turkeys. If we get the rental, we can turn our freezer back into a freezer, instead of the fridge it is now, and freeze the turkeys. We will even have a working oven for a turkey on our Day of Gratitude.

The rental is sounding pretty good right now. And, I'd really like a nice long soak in a bath. We could eliminate our storage, I could find my art stuff and maybe begin painting again...or whatever.

The kids have started the online school this past week. It has been a nightmare, trying to figure out schedules and share our one laptop, which will not download any apps. We are supposed to be getting two laptops, one for each, but they have not arrived yet. In any case, the volume of stuff they have to do, and even worse, the volume of stuff I have to do... is intense. I'm beginning to wonder if this was the better choice. I thought it would make things easier with a schedule and actual assignments. Poor kids these days. The crazy stuff they have to learn to be indoctrinated into a society that is failing. But, I'll give it some time before I bail on it. I am pleased the kids seem to be about where they are supposed to be as far as grade level.

And, in my spare time, I'm still sorting hemp seed, trying to clean it out of the other plant matter.

The neighbor dog has been to visit a few times. He's a sweet thing, but I worry about him chasing chickens. My dogs don't like him coming around and neither do the llamas. It turns out he's been having seizures and just wanders off in confusion. So, I gave neighbor Larry some Cannabis oil to give him about two weeks ago. I also did an energy healing on the dog and walked him through the labyrinth when he was here one day. The dog has not had any more seizures, but still comes to visit. I worry, as Larry said if he has another big seizure, he will have him put down. Sad. Please let the natural medicine work for him. I believe in the power and healing properties of the Cannabis oil. So far so good, as long as they keep giving him the oil.

We also picked up the stove that was in Larry's barn. It needs some work.

the stove

The tiny house has arrived.

The shed/tiny house came yesterday. That was exciting. I could see it rolling down the road about a mile away, and shouted "here comes our house!"

 
Thankfully Richard put a new sign at the end of our road, where previously there had been none. We didn't want our house to get lost. (The driver still got lost...turned down the road I told him specifically not to. That's happened before.)

But, the tiny house arrived and it was interesting watching the driver unload it. That trailer had all kinds of bells and whistles and could move independently of the truck. With special hydraulics, and another cross axle, he placed the house exactly where we wanted it.

Our gravel pad was perfectly level too! The house is sitting in its new home now, waiting to be finished.

Since we opted not to get any extras, we have a lot to do. The first thing Richard did was install electrical outlet boxes and light switch boxes. We have to run the wire before we can insulate. Someone is coming today to give us an estimate on spray foam insulation for both the tiny house and the office.

Interior (Exterior dimensions: 14' x 20')

We are going to try and install another door on the west side, in what will be the tiny kitchen. We already have a nice glass door (actually we have three of them) that we have been moving around with us. With a little bit of lumber, some hinges, some cutting and building (a header, footer) we can have our second door in. Ultimately this door will lead to an enclosed porch that will wrap around the west and south sides, giving us passive solar heat, and expanding our living space.

We also have to start building the lofts. But first, the bathroom wall has to go in, which is pretty dependent upon finding a bathtub, so we can make sure it fits. I guess we can build to spec and buy the tub from a box store later.

Actually, we have to paint the outside to make it weather tight. We skipped the paint for a savings of $175. We have a five gallon bucket of paint we used for the roofs and barns at the rented Earthship a couple of years ago. We can use that and some stain we having been using on the wood trim of the office. That needs to be done in the next few days.

I know it's not much to look at now, but we are all super excited. It is so much bigger than the RV we have been living in for three months. We can't wait to get in there.

We are also going to pick up an old woodstove from Neighbor Larry and see if we can get the north/east corner fitted to hold it (fireproof walls and flooring) plus get some stove pipe. We will probably have to paint the stove too, but it would be nice to get it in and ready to go. Then we can at least move our beds in and sleep in a warm space.

Windows. We also need windows. Not much to choose from at the local restore. I'm still looking.