This summer a massive heat wave killed off all of our chickens but three, leaving us with just one rooster and two hens.

We fortunately had eggs in the incubator at the time, and the chicks that hatched out have been the foundation of regrowing our flock. Half grew into roosters who are unfortunately still around (I’ve wanted them to be processed for the past two months but there have been repeated delays and I’m somewhat exasperated about it). From the female half we still have hardly had any eggs, since it takes about five months until a chicken begins to lay eggs. Our hens came of age during the shortest days of the year, which further delayed their laying.

Finally about three weeks ago, some of them began laying. We’re now getting seven eggs a day, which isn’t nearly enough for our needs but it’s very nice to have them after so long with nothing! Some of the hens aren’t yet ready to lay but will soon, and that will also increase the number of eggs we get.

Below you can spot an a first time egg from a new layer – isn’t it adorable?

Even with all of the hens laying, we won’t have enough eggs to provide for our needs. While it’s nice to have supplemental eggs, I’d actually really appreciate having enough eggs to eat to make a difference to our diets.

I’ve collected eggs to incubate.

Although all chicken care transferred from my son to me at the beginning of last year, my seventeen year old son remains the expert on incubation. I asked him to check the heat calibration of the incubator to be sure it was accurate – last year it wasn’t and the excess heat killed the viability of all seventy eggs in that batch. I don’t want to do multiple incubator batches this year, just one big batch.

Last night he put in over sixty eggs.

All of those eggs won’t hatch; of those that hatch all the chicks won’t survive, and a percentage of those that survive the initial few weeks won’t make it to adulthood. In adulthood, there are still mishaps that can occur.

The saying, “Don’t count your eggs before they hatch” comes to mind.

I am hopeful, though, that by the summer we could have a nice amount of laying hens. That’s the goal – we’ll see how it works out!

By the way, I’ve seen suggestions for those concerned about high egg prices to get chickens. It’s really not that simple and definitely not inexpensive. You need to buy chickens (expensive), build a coop (expensive) and then raise them (ongoing feed costs and care). I don’t consider raising chickens for eggs to be a frugal strategy. It would take a long time to recoup the costs invested in raising chickens – I’m sure we’re nowhere near it. Of course, if we had done things in a more business-like way with the intention to make money, it could be we’d have done better in that regard, but that wasn’t our focus.

Having said that, it enhances our quality of life to have chickens so we have them even if they aren’t frugal.

Avivah

The wild plants are shooting up all around us and this morning as soon as I put our children on their school vans, I took the goats out to graze to enjoy the abundance!

It’s so peaceful to be with them in the quiet of the morning, watching them jump and happily pounce on their fresh salad spread. I love seeing how happy they are.

Enjoy a slice of my morning!

Avivah

After sharing my morning schedule and seeing the comments, I was concerned that it gave the inaccurate impression that all of my time was equally structured. I’ll share a little more so you have a fuller picture.

>> Oh dear. You wake up really early. Really, really, early. No wonder you’re tired at night. If it works for you – so great. For myself it would never work. I can’t function well when I’m tired.<<

I don’t think any of us function well when we’re tired!

For years I used to stay up very late, then wake up between 8:30 – 9 am – as a homeschooling mom I had that flexibility – and every morning before my eyes were open I felt behind schedule and undisciplined. I stayed up late because that’s when I had time to myself after my teens went to sleep, but it made waking up early impossible. Nine years ago I very consciously changed my sleep habits to get up earlier and go to sleep earlier. It took a lot of consistent effort but I felt good about how I was using my time when I woke up.

I gradually evolved to a wakeup time of between 5:30 – 6:30 throughout the year. I don’t set a timer; whenever my body wakes up, I get up. This summer I chose to get up at 4:45 and that was a gift to myself, a way that I prioritized my needs at a time that my schedule was so packed that I wouldn’t have had any possibility of quality time for myself otherwise. I deeply cherish my morning time. This is the foundation that give me the inner quiet that I draw on for the rest of my day.

I usually take a nap daily from 1 – 2 pm, though that didn’t happen regularly during my hectic summer period. So my energy is fairly stable throughout the day. But by the time the kids go to sleep, I want to be by myself. There’s a lot of togetherness when all of the kids are home and I need some space to regroup. Even if I can do more at that time, I don’t want to fill my schedule that full. That means leaving dinner dishes in the sink almost every night to be tackled in the morning when I’m fresh. I don’t like waking up to them, but I like even less the idea of working from dawn to dark. 🙂

>>Also, when your time is budgeted so closely, what do you do when the unexpected happens, or, worse, when you’re not feeling well? It doesn’t look like there’s much slack in this system.<<

I have to differentiate between unusual times like this summer’s intensity and my normal schedule – during the summer there were about six weeks when I needed to push myself to use all of my time well, to get things done and to feel calm and relaxed about it all, from the moment I woke up until I went to sleep. That was the Superwoman period, and that was a much better way to handle it than to collapse or be resentful of all the demands on me. But that’s not my regular schedule, it’s definitely not my ideal, and with summer vacation, the wedding/sheva brachos behind me and my course in it’s final week, I’m now easing into a more typical daily schedule.

I very much value margin and consciously build it into my schedule. I’m the one who creates my schedule and I’m the one who can make changes; I’m not tied to anything that doesn’t work for me. If one day I’m tired and want to sleep in, I can do that.

It’s true that my morning routine is very structured, but it’s full of activities that energize me and give me the ability to go through the rest of my day in a positive way – they don’t stress or deplete me. I feel relaxed as I go into actively getting the kids ready for school, knowing I’ve already done the most important things for myself.

The later morning has less structure, because it needs less structure – that’s when I do the things that need to be done, and they’ll get done without careful scheduling. My self-care activities won’t.

>>You are doing an incredible amount, and getting it done through a combination of efficiency/good planning, dedication to the cause, mental conditioning, and sheer physical grit. If it was me, I would have burnt out long ago. I hope that you find a way to get done what needs to be done in a way that’s healthy and nurturing and forgiving for YOU, not just for all those around you. <<

Yes, I do a lot. Some of what I do I don’t have a lot of say about, but there are other activities that are my choice, and I’m careful about what I take on. I think about each activity before committing to it, to be sure it justifies the time invested.

I’ve begun taking the four youngest kids to horseback riding two afternoons a week, and the time needed to get the paperwork set up was significant, in addition to the actual time spent at the riding lessons. I paused for a while before moving forward with this to reflect on if it was going to stretch me too far in combination with other things I have going on. But I value that so it’s worth it for me.

The same thing with taking ds12 and ds7 to private speech therapy every week – it’s important to me so I make time for it. Last year they stayed home one day a week to make this possible. This year I thought about how they could get the benefit of the therapy and I could still have some time on that day for myself.

I decided to send them to school on their van; I pick them up from school an hour after they get there, take them to therapy, bring them back to school an hour before they need to go home, and they go home on the van. Though this adds an additional forty minutes of driving to my day, it gives me two hours – an hour after they leave and an hour before they come home. I also use the two hours when I’m driving by myself to listen to my course lectures or something else of interest to me that I wouldn’t be able to listen to with kids in the car.

Doing a lot for others doesn’t mean that I don’t have time for myself. I must have me-time. It’s not possible to give to others without filling ourselves up constantly and consistently, or we absolutely will feel burned out.

Last week I requested a change of the speech therapy day, because it coincides with a women’s monthly activity that I really enjoy. Last year I jumped at the opportunity for the boys to have sessions at this clinic when a spot for them opened up, though it meant giving up this women’s activity. This year I’m putting the women’s activity it into my schedule at the beginning of the year and building other commitments around it.

School in the north has been cancelled because of security issues due to the war, so the kids have been home this week. None of us know how much longer the schools will be closed due to the war, and I find it slightly ironic that I’m writing all about how my schedule is working so well for me….and now I need to create a new routine for having the kids home all day, with the limitations the war places on activities outside the home.

Now that my husband and I can’t have our daily walk together, I’m especially glad that I prioritized scheduling that time from the very first day that school began, and we had three weeks to enjoy spending that time together before it was cut short.

I eat really well, I think good thoughts, I take time for myself regularly, in addition to being available for others – life is full but I’m not stressed or deprived. If someone looks just at what and how much I do instead of how I do it, they could come to the conclusion that I’m depleted or on the edge of burnout, but I’m not at all. I love my life!

Avivah

Our first goat babies have been born!

Despite being outside in our yard when the birth was happening, I managed to miss the entire thing since I was focused on listening to my teens share about the trip one of them organized for kids in the community that they had just returned from. One son ran downstairs to tell my that Mocha had her babies – he heard her and could see into the pen from where he was – and we all ran to see what was happening.

Last year Mocha had one large singleton, a male, and from the looks of her I thought she was having twins this time around. Last year I looked forward to triplets but then learned that triplets are much less common and when it happens usually one doesn’t survive. In the end, none of our goats had more than two. So this year I didn’t even consider any of them having more than twins.

Imagine my surprise to see three babies covered with birth fluids laying on the hay. One was still in the amniotic ac and wasn’t moving. Two of the boys immediately went in to the pen to massage it, but after they opened the sac and started it became clear it was stillborn and nothing could be done.

We were able to watch Mocha from the very first moments care for her kids. Last year I had learned about goat care during birth and as soon as our first goat was giving birth, went in to be next to her and towel off the babies immediately so they wouldn’t be chilled. I learned that I should have stayed more hands-off because my actions interfered with the bonding and subsequent nursing between that mother and her babies. That undoubtedly was a factor in the placenta being retained for many hours and we had to have someone come to help out with getting it out since it could lead to infection and death if it weren’t deal with

This time I just watched as she cleaned off one and then the other. We didn’t know if they were males or females for the first hour and a half, because we didn’t want to get close enough to look. I wanted her to have her privacy so we watched from outside the pen.

My fourteen year old did step in to help the one of the babies get latched on for nursing for the first time because it’s important they get colostrum as soon as possible. The other one wasn’t yet standing but this morning they were both standing and nursing, which is great. The placenta still hasn’t detached and I hope that as the babies nurse, it will stimulate the contractions to cause it to come out completely.

Ds6 was mesmerized and sat there for a long time just watching her clean her babies.

We watched as they began to make their first tentative movements to stand, falling over repeatedly. We had guests who arrived about an hour and a half after the kids were born, and commented that one of the kids didn’t look so strong because it was lying down. I explained that they were still newly born and it takes them time to learn to stand up. The one who was cleaned off first was the one to take the first steps and stand independently while the other was still laying down.

Last year our three goats gave birth to a total of five kids – we had four males and one androgynous, which I didn’t know was even possible. That led me to research goat genetics to figure out what had happened. I learned that the high male rate and the androgynous issue were a result of breeding a male with no horns to a female with no horns. Since I wanted baby goats without horns, that had seemed like a logical and good thing to do but I learned that males without horns shouldn’t be used for breeding because it negatively impacts the genetics.

Our new babies are……….two females! Yay! Mocha is a purebred Alpine so these babies are purebred Alpines as well. The other two goat mothers were bred with a purebred Alpine buck but aren’t purebred themselves, so their babies will be a mix as well. I’m hoping they won’t have horns but won’t know for a little bit until they start showing signs on their heads.

What will we do with these little babies in the long run? I don’t know. We sold all of the male babies last year when they were about ten weeks old, but we’ll have to see how many babies we end up with, how many are female, and how many have horns and all of that will factor into our decision.

The goats were all bred at the same time, so within the few days the next two goats should give birth. I’ll breathe a sigh of relief when it’s all over; hopefully everything will go smoothly without any need for intervention on our part. Last year we had to intervene with the placenta for one, and to pull out interlocked kids to help another give birth, and I very much hope we can be hands off this time around.

Avivah

Though there are a number of things on the list of projects I would like to have done, we’re prioritizing our goats right now.

We bought a new pen for them and were scheduled to pick it up from the seller the night of October 7. In light of the horrific attack on Israelis early that morning, the seller left for reserve duty that day, as did hundreds of thousands of others, and obviously our pen wasn’t a priority.

After several months he came home from the army long enough for us to arrange to pick it up. When we bought it, it was because I wanted to have a pen with a strong waterproof roof before the rainy weather began, but it was apparent we weren’t going to get the new pen before that happened. So my son built them a very solid roof over their old pen. Impressively solid, so much so that when my husband asked if we still wanted the pen when the seller finally returned, I hesitated since we no longer needed something with a good roof.

We decided to get the new pen anyway. Once it was home, it was time to dissemble the old pen.

The new pen would have been extremely quick and easy to put together if Iwe had assembled as it was intended; the four metal walls all linked into one another and it would have been a thirty minute project. However, thinking about it creatively, I realized we could double the space the goats had available if we configured the wall panels differently. It was a really good idea though it also was a lot more work, and now requires a new roof since the old one doesn’t fit anymore.

I’m very happy with the new pen. The walls are less visually obstructive than the old pen and though the pen is much larger, it feels like it takes up less space. Because it’s larger, we put in two benches that allow us to sit and interact with the goats much more than before. Goats are friendly and enjoy when we spend time with them.

We were talking a couple of days ago about some potential renovation projects (a roof for the goat pen is at the top of the list) and one of my teens told me he doesn’t want to build anything else until we have a new impact driver/ power screwdriver. I didn’t realize the one we had was lost until he told me that, and agreed it’s a critical tool to have on hand. The right tool makes every job much easier.

As a frugal person, I try to stay away from low quality items. When I buy tools or anything else (furniture, appliances, cars), I look for good quality that will last, and though I try to find it at a good price, am willing to pay for quality. I bought a Bosch rechargeable drill and screwdriver set; my husband made a face when he heard I spent 1400 shekels on it (that was after the discount) but assuming it’s taken better care of than the last set I bought, it will last a long time and serve us well for a lot of projects to come.

When I got back from the hardware store I decided to be the first to use our new drill set. My children of all ages think I don’t know how to build or fix very much, but it’s not exactly true. I’m knowledgeable and I know how to do the tasks and instruct my family members, but other than a few exceptions, I don’t usually do the renovation work myself.

(If you’re thinking that doesn’t make sense, let me clarify how that’s possible. Before we do any renovation project, I research what is involved, watch videos on how to do it, make a list of supplies we need along with what the items are called in Hebrew. I buy all the supplies so everything is ready when it’s time to start working. I sum up all of the instructions for my husband and sons, then they do the work. But despite generally serving as the general contractor and delegating instead of getting my hands ‘dirty’, I also enjoy these activities.)

Back to the goats and upgrading their living arrangements. Our three goats are pregnant and a goat’s milk supply drops as their due date approaches. Though I forgot to note the date they were bred, last week my son showed me the small quantity of milk he got after milking and said it looked like colostrum so we’re not going to milk again until the babies are a month old. It would be very fun if they gave birth during Pesach when our married kids and grandchildren will be here, but I think it’s more likely to be four to five weeks from now (by mid May) when we have new baby goats!

It’s recommended that each goat has her own stall for when she gives birth. That’s what I decided to build.

I picket the goats in a grassy area four or five days of the week now that there are so many luscious weeds for them to enjoy. They love it and I enjoy sitting with them outside and watching how happy they are. While I’m there, I let them graze freely because they all stay close to me. When I have to go into the house, I picket two of the three; the third one is the lead goat and stays with the others without needing a leash. While they were grazing I worked on their stalls.

Building with pallets is harder than with new lumber because there are so many variations in size but I had pallets stacked in the yard from when the boys took down the old pen so that’s what I used. What I made isn’t fancy but it will do the trick!

Within a short time, all of our chickens were making themselves comfortable in the new stalls.

Whenever I see the chickens scratching around in the goat pen, I marvel at how the animals work together to improve the environment for everyone – when flies lay their eggs in the goat pen, the chickens come along and eat the larvae, which is high protein food for them and turns into high quality eggs for us. As the chickens clean the pen, they turn over the soil and create beautiful compost; I periodically heap this compost onto our garden beds. Underneath the ground where we can’t see what’s happening, the microbiome is teeming with beneficial bacteria that strengthen the overall environment. It’s a beautiful synergistic cycle that benefits the goats, chickens, people and world at large.

Speaking of chickens, we have eggs in the incubator and are expecting a huge batch to hatch before Shabbos. We have friends who agreed to sell us some turkey eggs, and we’re going to incubate some of them next.

The spring is a busy time!

Avivah