However first, introductions are in order. My name is Dody Mitchell.
That's me!
I am a wife, mother, writer, farmer, teacher, and so much more. I wear more hats than I care to say. I started homesteading way back in 2005. My first start was making a small garden for my then 5 year old and 4 year old girls. Woo hoo how the time flies. Since then these beautiful ladies have helped me and their dad take care of goats, pigs, chickens, geese, and more. Without further ado though, let me introduce you to these fine young ladies.
This is Danilla Mitchell.
This was her 17th birthday. She's in front of our behemoth wood stove that we use for cooking and heat in the winter. The little bit of mess you see is some construction materials, a backer board for the stove, and her backpack. She works very hard all the time on her school work and chores. We are very proud of her.
She is a lot of the muscle in the field. Before we had a tiller and on those times it was malfunctioning, I could count on Danilla to be right by my side shoveling the garden up. She hauls feed sacks and plays with baby piggies too.
This is Aluciana Mitchell.
She's a brilliant artist that loves baby animals and will entertain you for hours. She isn't much of a farm girl, preferring to follow national trends, instead of local, but she does have emotionally insightful thoughts on all things.
She is more the visionary. I hear, "mom could we do this..." more than chores get done, but that's ok. She is trying out her wings in this big old world by trying new things.
However, even though my girls have helped me for years on the little homestead, all this would not be possible without the man that keeps all the machines running, builds all the structures, and keeps the big animals from getting out of hand. That man would be my husband. His name is different than ours, because he wasn't the man that made my girls, but he is the one that raised them.
This is Paul Clark.
You may notice his right eye is a bit "squinty" and that's because he suffered Bell's Palsy a few years back. He never completely recovered. He has a completely blown shoulder, but he still does everything in his power to help around the homestead.
After I married Paul, our homestead grew in more ways than one. We started adding chickens to the old place. Then before long I got ducks. Then I had a baby, the first of his children a daughter.
She's the one on the right of her sister Danilla. Her name is Aukxsona Mitchell-Clark.
After Aukxsona was born the building on the homestead took a pause. A long pause. First we found out she contracted Transverse Myelitis from a common childhood vaccine. So, she didn't walk until almost 5 years old. Before I knew just how extensive her disabilities were I had another child.
His name is Alestria Mitchell-Clark.
He was the only boy in a house full of females. He loved hanging out with mamma, watching Popeye, drawing pictures, playing with his big truck, and helping collect eggs. He was always outside when we were planting. We are blessed he is so healthy. In fact, when he was born we still didn't know what caused his sister to be paralyzed, so we were very thankful.
Nowadays he prefers comics, shooting games, and helping with the animals. He is solely responsible for many farm chores and has not failed me yet.
Nothing still happened on the old homestead besides the chickens and ducks because I was so busy. We planted annuals. Then I planted a few pear trees. Then just like that, we found out I was pregnant with the last of our kiddos. The baby of the family if you will...
This is Illyan Mitchell-Clark.
He is my shadow. He is my wake up in the morning, my helper all day, and my last goodnight. He sticks to me like white on rice. He is never out of eyesight or earshot. I feel honored that he adores me so much. The feeling is mutual. I love this little bundle of energy. He was born two months early and never went to NICU. He is now 8 years old, small for his age, but so lovely when you meet him. He has never met a stranger.
I was very busy with a disabled kindergartner, a preschooler and a new baby...not to mention a 9 year old and 8 year old. Oh, I was home schooling them all too...so yes, homesteading took a huge back seat. My days consisted of art projects, science experiments, reading and math practice, and music. We still found time to homestead, making our garden a little bigger every year. We added a few perennials, mostly jerusalem artichokes and a few more trees. However, I didn't feel I had the time to do anything more at that time.
Then a few years later, in 2013, I felt I had enough time to start expanding the homestead. We bought two goats. We had one of those goats until about just last week when we sold her. She in turn gave us three goats, who gave us two more. We now have 4 goats and would have 5 if we didn't sell the original. We have 4 goats that are all female and we plan to breed them this fall.
Then in 2015 we added pigs. At first, we were just going to raise one to butcher every fall. However in the spring of 2016 Danilla convinced me that perhaps breeding pigs from babyhood would be a good idea. She has been the mover and driver behind this endeavor and really deserves all the credit. I only risked 60 dollars. We bought and raised two pigs, which mated and produced a litter of piglets just a week ago.
This is our pig immediately after birth.
As you can see life on the farm is messy. We were concerned she would be aggressive towards the children so we had to separate her. It turns out we were worried for no reason at all! She is so gentle. Those piglets, should they all make it to adulthood, I plan to sell them off after being processed at the Farmer's Market.
Then this spring we decided to bulldoze about 5 acres and plant it with 50 different fruit trees. In between the rows of trees are where we decided to put our animals in fencing. In addition to that we purchased additional chickens, geese, and ducks this spring. Next year for the Farmer's Market we hope to offer eggs, USDA inspected pork, vegetables, and eventually when the fruit trees produce, some fruit.
So now that introductions have been made, let me introduce you to the season. It is May 4th and nothing except our perennials has been planted. I sound like an AWFUL homesteader. However, it has been raining non-stop since the end of March. In fact, as I type this, it's the 4th straight day of rain. We have had historic floods here in Arkansas this year. I am hoping the rain will stop long enough that we can plant something before mid-May.
Until then, it's homeschooling and playing with baby piggies, chicks, ducklings, kittens and goslings.
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