Busy Livin’ Homestead

We’ve been pretty absent around these parts, but not because we’ve wanted to.

Three months ago, my husband’s four year battle with cancer came to an end and he went home to be with the Lord. Our hearts are broken, but we are comforted in knowing that he is finally healed and at perfect peace.

Life has looked very different for the boys and I since he passed. As we’ve been navigating how to do life without our fearless Papa who always knew exactly what to do, we’ve had to step up in new ways and do some prioritizing around the homestead, too.

The dream lives on, and we are really excited to continue to build our little homestead and carry on the dream God put on our hearts when we moved to Arkansas. It might look different than we thought it would, and it might take longer than I’d like, but I am confident that Papa would want nothing more than for us to stay busy livin’, working hard and pursuing freedom. And that’s exactly what we intend to do, one day at a time.

So hi, friends. If you’re still here, thanks for sticking around. The boys and I are so excited to learn and network and share our journey with y’all. There are sure to be lots of challenges and mistakes and all that hard stuff, but we’ve learned that there’s always joy to be found amidst the hard stuff, and we intend to find it.

You ready? Let’s get busy livin’!

We (finally) up-potted our seedlings yesterday, and learned a whole lot in the process. Number one lesson being that we planted way too many seeds. 😂 But hey, I wasn’t convinced that I was doing it right, so I needed some seed insurance. 🌱

Check out our “Seed Starting” highlight to see Mama’s process. Let us know if you have any suggestions for us! 💛

Sunday. 💜

Oh yeah, it was a good day. 🐽☀️

🍳

More days like today, please. ☀️🌼

When things just aren’t going your way… 🐽

Excited is an understatement. 🌱

How are your seedlings doing this year, friends?

Cronk, meet Eleanor. 💛

Today I realized that both our kunekunes and our English bulldog will be of breeding age at just around the same time. So, Lord willing, we will have baby English bulldogs in November and baby kunekunes in January.

So we’re gonna be REAL BUSY real soon. 😅🤪 It’s gonna be wild! Yes, we’re crazy. And we wouldn’t have it any other way. All the things, all at once. Living the dream! 🙌

Homestead friends, did you ease into each project, or did you jump in to all the things all at once?

Happy Sunday, friends. 🐽

Today was both of our first time planting seeds, and somehow it struck a strong chord with me.

Maybe it’s the heaviness of our circumstances.
Maybe it’s the chaos of the world, happening all around us.
Maybe it’s the never-ending hope of a better future - for them and for all of us.

Somehow, these seeds represent so much more than they appear to hold within them. But that’s the thing about seeds, isn’t it? Regardless of what’s going on around them, each tiny seed holds the potential to produce an abundance of fruit, each fruit containing an abundance of seed, each seed containing the potential to produce more and more. One tiny seed that could so easily drift away with the slightest breeze, somehow carries the ability to feed my family. And today I just can’t get over how incredible that is.

That’s how good God is.

Today was our first time planting seeds, and somehow it felt like tangible hope. I don’t always get to see and touch and feel hope, sometimes I just have to know that I have it. But today I saw it. Today I felt it. Today I saw a seed for what it really is, and I remembered that God’s plan is so much bigger than me. It was a beautiful reminder of how blessed we are to be right where we are, even amidst the hard stuff.

Today I drew closer to God by planting seeds. I marveled at His majesty and wondered how I could ever forget how good He is.

Today we planted some seeds, and today He planted some hope. 💛

Papa. ♥️

He’s the backbone of this family, and has led our family so beautifully and intentionally. If you know him, you love him, and we can all agree that this world needs more men like him.

When he was diagnosed with cancer back in 2018, we put all of our dreams on hold while we fought for his life. But when the cancer progressed to stage 4 in 2020, we knew we couldn’t wait any longer - we had to get busy livin’! So we sold our home in California and moved across the country to pursue the dream of a different life for our family - living on property, raising animals and growing our own food. We knew it wouldn’t be easy, but all great things are worth working hard for.

Over the past three years, Papa has been on numerous treatments, and so far nothing has seemed to work; the cancer continues to grow. To say that our family has been on a roller coaster is the best way I can describe the ups and downs we’ve gone through. And while it’s been the most trying, exhausting, devastating thing we’ve ever experienced, it has also brought unexpected, incredible blessings.

We know that we will never fully understand God’s plan this side of heaven, and we accept that. But we also know that this IS His plan, and it’s perfect, even if it’s not how we would have it. And because we accept that, we can rest in knowing that He’s in control, and we’re not. And somehow that brings us peace.

Perhaps life would have been easier without the cancer. But without it, would we ever have taken the risk to move across the country? Would we be pursuing our dreams with the intention that we are today? I sometimes wonder if we would be as close as we are today. And certainly we wouldn’t have experienced the incredible pouring out of love and support (God’s grace, tangibly) from our amazing community. Not many people get to experience those things, and while cancer has been so, so hard, it’s also been such a blessing.

Whatever you’re going through today, friends, I encourage you to reconsider your perspective. Maybe your mountain isn’t just an uphill climb. And if you’re willing to stop and look around, you’ll see the beautiful view that comes with it. 💛

We’re dreaming of warmer weather and all of the green that comes with it. 🌱

But in the meantime, we’re over here in our jackets and beanies, planting seeds and prepping the garden space. Lots to do before the last frost date gets here.
I’m so excited to share what we’re up to!

What are you doing to prep for the season?

Happy Tuesday from Yzma!

Can you see the resemblance?! 😂

Let’s talk about ticks. 😩

To some, particularly those who grew up with lots of them around, they are no big deal. But to others, like those of us who grew up in the city and have never even seen one until starting our homestead 😬, they’re tiny little anxiety-inducing nightmares.

Ticks are external parasites, specifically parasitic arachnids, that live by feeding on the blood of mammals, birds, and sometimes reptiles. What makes ticks really dreadful is that they can transmit diseases by burying their head into the skin at the site of the bite, and then they just chill there… growing bigger and bigger as they feed on their host.

Gross, I know. I’m a city girl from CA gone homesteader in AR, and ticks have been a huge source of anxiety for this mama. Many Arkansans have said that they’re no big deal and just a part of life here, but I’m having a hard time accepting that. 😬

I’m no pro, but here is our protocol so far, and keep in mind that we like to keep things as natural as possible:

• Tick checks nightly (check those crevices!)

• If a tick is found, we use needle nose tweezers to grab only the base of the head to slowly pull out, creating tension. We hold it there until the tick releases, and then use a magnifying loop to ensure we got the head out, and nothing is remaining.

• Wash the bite area, then apply manuka honey to help draw out toxins.

• Place a piece of napkin or paper towel over the honey to keep it from rubbing off.

• Place the tick in a ziploc bag and label with date. That way, if symptoms of illness begin, we can have the tick tested. Store in the freezer.

• Monitor the area to make sure no rash is developing.

I’ll admit, I became incredibly overwhelmed by the plethora of suggestions out there on how to respond to ticks. Ultimately, I had to come to terms with the fact that we can’t completely avoid them, and decided that this simple protocol was enough to bring me peace. But also, I still panicked when I found this little sucker on my kid last night. 😩🤪

So tell me, what have you heard and what do you do? I’d love to have more natural responses in my mom-box!

The more we know, the more we grow! 💛

After we finished our chores today, we headed to the lake with some dear friends for some fishin’ fun!

No fish were caught, not even a bite was bit. But man did we have a great day!

Don’t forget to step outside of the day-to-day every once and a while, friends. Your to do list will be waiting when you return. Take care of the essentials, yes, but then go out with your people and enjoy God’s creation together. Talk about important things. Laugh together. Enjoy your children. And then tomorrow, get back to it, just a little more refreshed. 💛

Kunekunes and Cadillacs ♥️

Buckle up Mildred, it’s go time! 🐓🏎

To dream it is one thing.

To dream it, research it, plan it, sacrifice for it, and build it - one day at a time, even when things are hard… and then to see the results of all of that time and energy and resources… that’s another thing.

Maybe this just looks like a small, beautiful bowl full of eggs to you. But to me, this is the long-awaited reward of our family’s determination for a better life. To me, this is a small bowl of our dream come true. A small bowl, yes, but a great reward.

We may not be where we want to be yet, and perhaps we’ll never fully arrive. But today, with this little bowl of eggs, we’re one step closer to it. And man has the journey been so rewarding.

I never thought that I’d be building a homestead, working towards self-sustainability and living the life I live today. But thank God that His plans are better than mine. What an honor it is to be on this journey with my little family, sharing it with you.

One day at a time, friends. With a whole lot of persistence and grace.

Thank you Lord. You’re so, so good.

We welcomed some new critters to the homestead this week, and we’re pretty excited!

You ready for cuteness overload? 🐽

Not quite how we thought March would look, but hey, this is Arkansas! 70 degrees one day, snowing the next. 🤪🤷‍♀️😂

We’ve got some exciting things happening on the homestead this month, and we can’t wait to get started! But first… ❄️⛏

Hey y’all! Welcome to Busy Livin’ Homestead. We are so glad you’re here. I’m Tamara, and this is us - Papa, Mama, and our four amazing boys.

We were both born and raised in the San Francisco Bay Area of California. After our boys were born, we knew that we wanted a different life for them, and we began dreaming of having a small piece of land where we could grow our own food and raise some animals… a little homestead. But in 2018, all of our dreams were thrown off the table when Papa was diagnosed with colon cancer. After two years of chemotherapy and surgeries, the cancer continued to grow, and Papa was declared Stage 4. It was then that we knew we couldn’t let cancer deter us from pursuing the dream that God had placed on our hearts for our family - we needed to get busy livin’!

The week that we found out about the cancer spreading, we listed our house, accepted an offer, and set our sights on a beautiful little property in Arkansas. And now, we are blessed to call it home.

So here we are, on a journey to choose joy over cancer and stay busy livin’ despite our circumstances.

Join us as we dive deep into this new world of growing food, raising animals, facing Arkansas bugs 😬, and all of the other fun things that take us towards self-sustainability. We have no idea what we’re doing 😂, but we’re confident that it will be an adventure worth taking.

Here you’ll find lots of what we’re learning and how we’re doing things. We’ll share the good stuff and the hard stuff - we promise to keep it real. And hopefully we’ll share some hope and give God all of the glory, because that’s what we really want to do. Life may be really hard, but God is still really good. And we fully intend on spending our time together thanking Him, and embracing and sharing the beautiful life that He’s given us.

So, welcome. We hope you’ll stick around and join in on the fun! We appreciate you being here, and we hope to serve you well.

Until next time friends, we’ll be busy livin’!