Saw Greenbriar (or pokey vine as I call it!)

OK I have had my feet, legs and ankles completely torn up by this vine on my property, and I finally found what it is! Turns out it is actually quite useful, so I guess I will stop hating it lol. Saw Greenbriar grows like crazy on my property and is very much like a chain saw when it gets wrapped around my ankle or foot.  I have a bunch of deep cuts thanks to this thing!  Turns out it is the plant that is used to make root beer... who would have guessed!

We are here...

I haven't been posting much, but it is only because I have been SUPER busy! We are here, living on the property, and we love it! It is a bit rough, the only dry spot we found is on the very back end of the property (a 648 foot trek through the forest) and while our neighbors to our right are completely awesome, our backside neighbor is...well, a backside lol.  He is a complete jerk and we are hoping he moves to Palm Bay like he said he was going to be doing, QUICKLY! I will post pics soon, we have been working hard to get everything in place and trying to stay dry!

Water is *mostly* gone!

We went back up to the property Friday 7/20 and the water is mostly gone! YAY

I took down the for sale sign and put up a no trespassing sign, and marked the back side of the  property.  There is still some water in the center of the property, but it is showing me the area where the pond needs to go, and it isn't causing any serious problems.

We roughed out the goat area and cut down some of the small trees in it so we can get some more light in there for growing grass and wild flowers for them! Here is my hubby chopping down one of the small oaks:

he decided the chainsaw would be much faster! 

and it was, except the trees have so many vines wrapped around them that we had a super hard time pulling down the trees after they were cut , it was kinda funny because we would  jump back expecting it to fall, but it just hung there lol.  So now we have to get the fence up for the goats and the shed put together for our stuff! YAY so ready :)

Flooded :(

Slight setback - we visited our property last week, and it is flooded in the front.  There is 6-10 inches almost completely across the front of the property.  and the mosquitoes are like almost an inch long :/  on the plus side, we don't have to worry about the water table for the well point we will be driving, and we know where NOT to put the goat pen!  back to the drawing board lol

It's ours!!

Well, we got the last bit of paperwork in the mail on Friday - WE OWN IT! YAY!

Now moving all our stuff.. lol

WOOHOO!!

Almost done!

Paper work is on its way to the title company, mortgage deed should be recorded and on its way to us tomorrow!!

New baby!

Little One

My chickie, Little One hatched herself a little one today!  So cute and tiny :)  Since I raised Little One from a little chick and held her all the time, she is used to me so she lets me pick up her baby - I got to give soft little fluff ball kisses!  I have them enclosed so I don't have to take her baby away and it will be safe from predators.   Little One's mommy, Dottie hatched 4 babies about a month ago but she isn't very tame and so I had to take them away so they would be safe - they are doing good and getting big :)  I hate taking them away from their mommies but I also hate to see them go missing one by one.  I will take pics of mommy and baby tomorrow!  Think I will name it Floof :) pics of mommy and baby Floof

Whatcha doin Mommy?

Good News!

Looks like we will be closing on the 1st!!  So nervous, and excited....

Property Revisited

So we went to Ocala this weekend, to get a P.O. box (which I found out from the form they gave me to fill out, that I could have done it online...thanks USPS!) and do some measurements on the property.  OMG it is gorgeous now that everything is growing again, last time we saw it was February, and everything was kinda dead.  Of course I forgot to snap a pic, I was so into measuring and trying not to get snagged by thorn bushes... oh well, we will be back there again soon!  I brought the stakes to mark the areas we want to use for this or that, but I forgot the string :/  geeze where was my mind?  but oh well again...at least we got to see the little town we are close to, Williston, FL.  It is about 10 miles from where we live and has CVS, grocery stores, and a HOSPITAL! Always good to know where those are!
Since we will be starting with nothing, we will still need to buy food until we get our garden established, and we have a nice little farmer's market down the street from us, also Ocala has a big farmer's market downtown every Saturday - we checked it out after our trip to the post office...it is pretty nice :)
All in all, I just can't wait to move, and now I am even more ancy!  The goats are going to love the diversity of grub they are going to have up there - the property is pretty overgrown with vines right now!  They will also get to eat all the small trees in their area and trim up the low branches - goats are awesome gardeners, and they work for love, and treats lol.

I promise pics will be coming soon!

:(

Bad day today - house on the back side of us has big dogs, they go over their fence and get into my neighbor's yard all the time....today their new dog got into my yard and killed one of my babies :(  R.I.P. Buster.  His momma Clover is yelling for him - I feel so bad... well gotta finish work and then dig a grave.
Can't wait to get out of here....

Possible road trip...ohhhh yeahhh!

So our moving date was postponed because the guy we are buying the property from has a bunch of other closings in other states and he asked me if we could wait until the end of May or June, well I was still a bit short on the $10,000 down payment so I was more than happy to take the extension!  Not to mention we still have a bunch of stuff that hasn't sold yet and are still packing and trimming down our belongings, so a bit more time was a bit of a relief :)
I am getting ancy and want to see the property again, this time it will be in full bloom (last time we were up there it was February and everything was deadish) and we also want to mark out some stuff and make some plans on placement of  our stuff.  I emailed the property guy and hopefully he is cool with us going up to mark out some areas, but my stupid email is down and I don't know if he has replied :/  oh well, hopefully this weekend we will be hitting the road to see our property (and getting a P.O. box, and getting some applications in, and maybe visiting Ocala's awesome downtown area!

My hubby walking past the Marion Theatre in downtown Ocala

I made my first attempt at doing laundry in the washtub on Monday...it wasn't bad at all! I used a plunger to help agitate the clothes around and improvised a wringer from a screw in hitch on my porch and a plastic clamp. At least it doesn't hurt my hands! I need to get a wringer from Lehman's. And maybe a proper agitator, they sell them there too :)

The Journey Begins

Our Paradise!

  So my husband and I have decided that we are tired of  the modern "conveniences" that are destroying the planet, tired of the poison in our food,  tired of working our lives away for nothing that is beneficial to our world or existence.  I mean my "job" is to help ignorant people reset their router so their internet will work (honestly that is like 85% of the calls I get) and all they had to do is pull the power out of it for 5 seconds and plug it back in....seriously...couldn't figure that one out?  I am contributing to the stupidity I despise and I can't do it anymore.  I hate television and the people who are so enthralled by stupid shows like "Dancing with the Stars" and "American Idol" that they have literally wished me a horrible death if their service isn't working so they can watch it...honestly people!  When I tell them I haven't watched TV in 4 years, they just about have an aneurysm! But, enough of my work rant, I could go on about it for days!
   We are going to be "roughing it" for a while, no power, living in a tent....it will be interesting to say the least, and honestly I am looking forward to it!  Our well will have a hand pump, eventually we will have solar power, but will still be using mostly hand tools and appliances.  You would be amazed how much power the devices people can't seem to live without use and waste! Way too much to run on the system we will build - we don't want to spend the $30,000 it would take to power an entire houseful of appliances!  Honestly we haven't used the air conditioner in 4 years, and we don't miss it!  Being outside, in the fresh air - that is living....Reading, working on things that will benefit MY life, crafting, this is more important to me that a "job" that will destroy my soul.  Money has never been incredibly important to us, we don't buy new cars or big TVs or jewelry or anything like that - we just want to LIVE!
   Counting down about 3 weeks till we move...nervous and excited!  I will be documenting our "adventures" here....stay tuned!