My Faux Farm
Small property management of horses, gardening, chickens, sustainability, small scale homesteading
Small Property? No problem!
I grew up just outside of the city in the suburbs. Not too long after I married my husband and had our two children, we moved up into the cornfields. Neither one of us grew up in farm life, but I’ve always been drawn to it or to just get back to nature. While camping isn’t my thing, animals and gardening are.
These are our adventures and trials and tribulations in managing horses on small property as well as raising chickens, gardening, renovating, and dabbling in homesteading (beekeeping to come – ssshhh! The family doesn’t know yet). All this, and we only have just over two acres (I love to clean and organize so that’s quite the juggling experience but as a creative, I am always using those skills to do so). If we can manage this successfully (including the horses) in this amount of space, anyone can!
While doing all of this, I strive for the work-life balance that everyone else does. Everything I do is done so that life can be easier (efficiency is the key word) even if it doesn’t seem that way. I share cooking for real life here as well and wow did that Instant Pot change my life.
Did I mention we have a rabbitry? Our every day can definitely be interesting!
Horses on Small Property
Small pasture management, keeping horses on small acreage…
Backyard Gardening
Gardening in small spaces, gardening in raised beds, seed starting…
Backyard Chickens
Backyard chicken keeping, raising chickens for colorful fresh eggs…
Cooking for Real Life
Easy recipes for busy life cooking, Instant Pot Pressure Cooker recipes…
Home Projects & DIY
Home renovation on a budget, do-it-yourself home projects and decor…
Adventures in Rescue & Wildlife
Our rescues, bottle feeding kittens, wildlife tales…
My Faux Farm Recent Blog Posts….
Merlin, the Miracle Cat – Hemivertebra
If you haven't followed along, in May of 2014, my daughter, Erynn, and I welcomed our brand new foal, Pixie. While waiting for the foal, we had spent the night at the barn. The one morning, feeding was taking place when two tiny newborn kittens were found in the...
Homemade tomato sauce and the dreaded tomato fungus
Well, 2018 was not the year for tomatoes in Zone 6a. It started out well. I grew all my plants from seed indoors and then transplanted 17 plants. Remembering I had late blight last year, I scattered the plants in three locations far away from each other. That...
Homemade Seedless Blackberry Jam
Okay, this post is not a recipe. I'm sorry, it's not but it's more of an account of what happened and how it was handled when it failed which is very important to know how to fix jellies or jams if they do not set. My first experience preserving anything was making...
Garlic Dill Pickles – canned
My mother made pickles when I was growing up - all different kinds. I have always liked dill pickles best, so when I was getting an overabundance of cucumbers in the garden, it was time to give it a try. I looked online and compared recipes. I know all about hot...
Orphan Baby Squirrels
If you remember the blond squirrel from a previous post, we found out that it is a rare genetic mutation. We've seen white squirrels with brown eyes (specific gene), white squirrels with pink eyes (albino), black squirrels, blond squirrels with brown eyes, but not...
Basil – Growing, harvesting, drying….
Basil is the easiest herb to grow. If you are ever considering starting an herb garden, start with basil - outdoors. You can't go wrong. Basil loves lots of light and water. It prefers moist soil, so keep it watered. I find that I have very little issue with...
Indoor Seed Starting
Last year, I made a mistake of not starting my seeds early enough for the vegetable garden. I mean, it didn't turn out bad, but the cold weather vegetables could have been started much earlier and my tomatoes took forever to be ready! This year, I decided to start the...
The Blonde Squirrel (not albino)
We have a strange phenomenon. One morning, I saw something out of the corner of my eye and turned to see a strange-looking squirrel on my back deck. I had never seen anything like it. Immediately, I thought it was albino due to the light color. I grabbed my...
Beer Cheese Soup – Instant Pot
This is a super quick recipe. I'm not a beer drinker but I do like the taste of beer in food. Today is the Superbowl and it's nothing but snow and ice outside, so still soup weather 🙂 Beer Cheese / Ale and Cheddar Soup 2 cups of chicken broth 1 onion 2-3 stalks...
