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January– This month is usually a pretty quiet month on the homestead. We try to make sure we have a couple months out of the year that are calm and quiet. It helps us catch up on some house stuff and get some rest. But, it is not without its planning.
I take a look at our maple syrup supplies and make sure we have all the equipment we need for the next syrup season. I am also planning the garden and making sure I have all the seeds I need and I have my seed potatoes pre-ordered if I am not using the last years harvest. I often plan my garden setup as well.
I try to take some time for hobbies throughout the year, but I often find that this is the month I actually get some done. My hobbies include basket making, candle making, painting, and drawing. I usually only get basket making and candles done, but that’s ok. I can even involve the children with the candles.
The animals are pretty quiet. The birds are no longer laying. The animals have, ideally, gone to butcher, last fall caught us a bit off guard so we still have pigs yet to go to the locker. We hopefully don’t have calves due, although our milk cow is due in February this year……. BUT there is some excitement, this is the time when we bring our male pig in with our girls to hopefully have late March to early April piglets!! This is our first year farrowing hogs so this is an extremely exciting year for us!
February– This month is usually a tossup month. It may be quiet or it could be busy, we really don’t know. We are on maple season watch! Some years, we did not begin tapping trees in February and other years where the entire syrup season was in February.
Certain seeds get started this month such as peppers and possibly some herbs, depending on how ambitious I get. At the end of this month, is the time we strive to prune the fruit trees, bushes, and vines.
As far as animals go, we try to keep it quiet in February like January but again, animals will be animals and sometimes our best plans don’t work. For instance, this year, our milk cow is due to calve in February, not an ideal time to have a calf in zone 5 as it may be in the negatives for temps or in the 40s but here we are!
March– This is a bigger month for us. This is when I start planting most of the indoor seeds, such as, tomatoes, cauliflower, broccoli, nasturtiums, marigolds, cabbage, etc. We are also, usually tapping all of our trees for syrup season or in the full throws of boiling sap down.
The birds are starting to lay again, and we are preparing for farrowing and calving which should be happening soon! Hopefully….
Candle making supplies!