Planning, Planning, and More Planning

Almost everything that happens around the homestead takes a lot of careful organizing and planning. Whether that includes updating the inside of the house, cleaning, decorating, gardening, caring for animals, creating the blogs and videos, or anything in between, time management and meticulous planning are required for everything to run smoothly.

Using Planners

My very best friend when it comes to organizing and planning are planners, which sounds obvious - duh! But never underestimate the benefit a couple planners can provide.

I have three planners (yes, I'm excessive, and yes, I keep up with them and LOVE them). One is specifically for monitoring my health. I track my measurements and water intake, plan meals, practice gratitude and self-affirmation, and record important doctor appointments. Although I do use this one, it is not the most well-loved out of all of the planners.

My second planner is all about the boys' growth and learning. In it I record doctor appointments for them and create lessons ranging from letter work to science to math and everything in between. It's very obvious I was a teacher. Here I record how I think they're doing with letter recognition, social skills, and life skills. The goal with this planner is to formally teach them a little bit while primarily allowing them to learn through play!

My third planner is probably my most significant planner. This one is the "Everything Homestead Planner" if you will. The most important feature of this planner is that it includes my 6 most important things for the day to accomplish. I've used it to plan when I will plant which seeds in which conditions. I've used it to determine when to purchase what homestead necessities (seeds, gravel, tiller, chick and chicken requirements). I've used it to plan videos and blogs. Yes, I do know what I will be posting in the middle of November. I've used it to keep on top of cleaning with daily, weekly, monthly, and quarterly chores already planned out for the entire year. I've used this planner to write down when which individuals were going to visit or when we were going to go visit elsewhere. And I've used it to keep track of any other important dates and times necessary for my family. At the end of this planner I have a morning and nightly routine listed out to make sure I don't forget anything (at least for the first month or so until the routines become habitual) and a daily schedule to follow for my sake and the boys' sakes. It's safe to say if I lost this planner, I'd be a bit of a chain wreck for a day or two until I find another way to record it all.

Journaling

Separate from my planners, I also journal nightly. This allows me to decompress from the day's activities and focus myself for the upcoming day. I also will randomly jot down financial notes in the journal that I am keeping as well. My journal is less a to do list and more a word throw up almost, so while it doesn't help with planning and organizing things, it does help with compartmentalizing thoughts and feelings.

Organizing the Homestead

Every home has a specific spot for things like towels, extra toilet paper, pots and pans, paper, clothes, and food. While the concept of organizing everything and keeping it in its home isn't new, I do try my best to apply the same principles to everything around the farm. The chicken coops hold all things bird. The tool shed has tools, woodshed has cut wood, and garden shed has everything for the garden. The machine shop holds - you guessed it - machines! One lean-to is used for when inclement weather is on the horizon. The other is for fencing we are not currently using and extra buckets and barrels. The main shop houses the tractor, implements, and other machines we use on the farm.

The most significant and creative organization on the farm is our seed storage. We are currently using picture holders like from the craft store to hold various packets of seeds. However, they are already full, and I've bought more seeds already this year that now need a new home. We will need a new storage system for the seeds, so stay tuned for that!

Planning the Garden

While planning everyday activities is nice in the planners, some things on the homestead require some additional planning and preparing, like the garden. I am starting with a blank slate. Last year, while mowing the yard, we cut down and mowed the field just beyond the garden shed. It takes a long time to mow all of this area, but we did it intentionally. We planned on using the entire field for gardening. Because we have such a huge space to garden and we also want to get berries and grapes of multiple different kinds, I needed to plan out the garden.

The first thing we did was determine what we wanted to use the garden for:

1. Food for the year. We wanted to make sure we had food throughout the entire year for our family to eat and enjoy. While we know not everything we grow will save well, at least some of it will, and we are excited to enjoy the fruits of our labor year-round.

2. Chicken supplementing. Anything we can't or won't use in the kitchen, we can throw out to the chickens. They'll love kitchen scraps including things like carrot and potato tops, over ripe fruit, and rotten pumpkins at the end of the fall season. And anything the chickens won't be able to consume can go right into the compost pile!

3. Canning recipes. We want to try new and exciting recipes. One that we will be doing brand new this year is candied jalapenos, and while I don't particularly like spicy foods, Trevor and the boys all love it!

4. Cutting down on the grocery bill. Produce is expensive, and the boys would eat fruit and veggies full-time if I let them. They love all things grapes, berries, peppers, and pickles. By growing our own food, the grocery bill should be cut back considerably.

5. Helping the pollinators. When we finally get the berries that we want planted and producing, they will be helpful in attracting all sorts of pollinators out to our garden for a more plentiful harvest.

6. Saving seeds? Honestly, we have spent a lot of money on seeds over the years, and we're fine with that, but if we can learn how to save seeds easily and efficiently, we'd both be much happier.

While we may not (will not) meet all the goals that we have for our garden this year, we do want to start in that direction. Because we have so many big plans with the garden, we knew we were going to need a lot of space for everything.

Doing the Math

The next step was determining how many people we were going to feed for a year. This sounds obvious, and for most people it is. Simply ask yourself, how many people are in my family that I'm responsible for feeding? Then, go from there. For us, it's a little more complicated. Since we are a foster family, we have different kiddos in and out of the house throughout the year. We want and need to be prepared to house, care for, and feed each child that comes into our home. So, we decided to provide enough food for 7 people to eat - the four of us, plus three additional just in case. It's also important to note that any extra or excessive amounts of food will be given to my parents. My mom will be helping with the garden throughout the entire summer and with canning.

Then, we needed to figure out how many of each kind of plant we need to plant for a full year's supply of food. This was easy to do. A simple Google search did the trick. Then, I looked up how much space each plant requires for best growth. I did this through a combination of Google searches and looking on the back of the seed packets we already had.

By using the total number of plants divided by the space required for the plant I determined how many rows of that plant I needed.

For example, to feed one person green beans for a full year, you should have somewhere between 10-20 plants. I know that we eat a TON of green beans in our household, so I opted for 20 plants per person. Because we are feeding 7 people, I multiplied 20 plants times 7 people, which resulted in 140 plants. (A word to the wise: this number is recommended for fresh food and not necessarily canning.) A quick search on Google showed that each bush bean plant requires 2-4 inches in between within the same row, and between rows 18-24 inches apart. 140 plants times 2 inches is equivalent to 280 inches of space. 280 inches divided by 12 inches (because that's how many inches are in one foot) shows that we need 24 feet of green beans. Now, we know that won't be enough green beans based on previous experience and because with green beans in particular we are planning on canning enough for both our family and my parents. Therefore, I opted for 120 feet of green beans (three rows of 40 feet), or approximately 500 plants. Anything we can't eat or can, we will be able to give the chickens (but those won't be going to the chickens any time soon).

Companion Planting

In the gardening world, there is something called companion planting. The purpose of companion planting is to keep beneficial plants together. Some plants attract the pests that hurt vegetables or help prevent mold growth. My favorite companion plant is the marigold. They're pretty. They attract all the bugs that kill tomatoes or eat through the fruits and prevent bug spots on them. They are helpful for most vegetables in that sense. I searched companion plants prior to planning the garden.

Finalizing the Garden

Equipped with all that information in our hands, we set out to plan the garden. I decided that the spring and fall vegetables could be planted in the same part of the garden through succession planting (planting one round of crops, harvesting it, and then planting a second round of crops). So one part of the garden (approximately a third of it) would be spring/fall planting. The other two thirds would be summer plants. After arranging the plants in a way that is beneficial for the most part, we finally had a layout of the garden!

And thus we have our HUGE garden!

Next Steps

Following planning the garden, I went to work determining which seeds I had yet to get before they were necessary to plant. I inventoried what seeds we already had and went shopping at several different seed retailers. Walmart, Amazon, Gurney's, True Leaf, and Johnny's Selected Seeds were all reasonably priced for the seeds I needed, so I bought them and just opened the packages!

Now that we have planned and organized all things gardening, the only things left to do is... almost everything! We're excited to bring you with us on the rest of this journey! Thanks for tuning in! Until next time!