August 101 in 1001 Update

So, I need to complete about 5 or 6 of these tasks per month in order to finish, but I was not sure I actually did that this month.  So many plans, but I just could not get to things.  I was actually suprised to see that I DID in fact hit my 6 for the month!  WOO!

21. Create bike/walking trails on the farm  (DONE Aug 2025)

My husband mowed down a path with the tractor around the new fence, taking down some of the old fence to make that work.  I like it!  It's about an 8 minute walk total at my husband's pace.  I mowed it down even further using our regular mower.  It isn't ready for bikes.  That will take years of tramping it down and packing, and then hopefully some a-base can go on it.  I think if we keep using it this fall, and then even make paths with the snow blower in the same area (that should be easy enough considering it is right along the fence line), it should be packed much better next year.

24. Work out a budget/farm plan for the year (Done August 2025)

So I have a program that allows me to use info from previous years to create a budget.  I went through the entire year of 2025 and managed to input actual values, budgeted values, and some other things.  I was super happy to make it work so that the expenses were lower than the income!  SO happy!  I'm not sure how to work the cash flow section of this program yet, but it doesn't make sense to do for 2025 year.  I hope I can figure these things out for the 2026 year in advance.  I'm happy to finally have this done.  Now to try to continue doing this each year... and earlier, too.

31. Make Disney trip albums 1/3

I finally finished our 2011 Disney album!  It's 99 pages, and could be longer, but I'm calling it done right now, even though it isn't printed yet.  I'm going to just print them all around the same time.  It was such a lovely trip down memory lane.  I'm already 3 pages into my 2013 album.  I am not sure I'll finish this one in time, though.  I've devoted an awful lot of time to this project already and we will be starting school soon, so I'll have a lot less time for scrapbooking.  Plus, I'm staying up after putting the kids to bed to scrapbook right now, and it is honestly not something I can keep doing.  Midnight is too late to go to bed at my age... but I keep doing it.

39. Do a ‘drop and dash’ gift give for fun DONE August 2025

I saw this sign at Princess Auto that was PERFECT for someone, so we bought it and my husband brought it down there as a gift while in town running errands.  

44. Go on a weekend retreat  DONE Aug 2025

I kinda put the family weekend down as this.  That wasn't what my intent behind this was, but honestly, there hasn't been anything in the area that would qualify as what I intended to have, and the retreat I was going to do years ago was cancelled last minute, and I haven't been invited to anything since. 

47. Do ‘on farm’ work that saves us at least $20 000 from if we would have hired out.  (20000/20000)  DONE August 2025

I can honestly hardly believe how much we did this summer!  This is amazing!  I am so proud of my family!  Anyway, going from $12500 to over $20000 in one month is huge, so I'll break it down, especially considering a lot of things were small time numbers on their own, but added together became so much more!

Bull Barn:  We saved a lot of money doing the work ourselves in the old bull barn to turn it into a useable area... which isn't finished yet.  We still want to get a nanny cam, projector, work on the doors a bit, and get some fans and heaters.  We have some long term projects in the idea tank as well, like a sauna/hot tub area, toilet area, and zone for prepping for skating if we can make a skating rink nearby.  I also would love to paint the exterior for fun, but these are 'future' projects.  From what we have done so far, this is my breakdown:

- Hire someone to clear out the space and fixing a wall ~ $150 saved doing it ourselves
- Pressure washing prices vary from $0.10 to $1 per square foot, and we did 1500+ square feet.  Saved ~$200
- Paint - Bought a 5 gallon mis-tint with primer for $150.  Regularly would have been about $250.  Saved $100
- Painting - Looked it up and it is amazing how much people charge to just paint your walls!  Apparently the average price is from $2-6 per square foot, and we had about 1500 square feet when you include the ceiling!  I just can't see it being $3000!  I've been painting rooms for years and that is insane (especially since the time it took my daughter and I to do it would have been about 8-10 hours, not including drying time).  I think I'll just put it at $1000 saved.  Seems reasonable, right?
- Rubber floor matts (used what we had, washed them) saved about $1000 from buying rubber workout matts (granted, ours are cut poorly, probably need a carpet or something on them.  I'll say $750 saved)

- Concrete grinding.  Our brother on the farm did this, grinding down a number of concrete spots with a tool we have, as well as removing pipe that was sticking up out of the floor.  Google was giving me a cost of $5-12 per square foot, which I'm guessing is for a nice finished garage floor.  Meanwhile, this is a barn floor with some higher sections and pipe.  He spent a few hours on it.  So... $200?
- Lights - Got on sale from Costco for $50 total for 4.  They are regularly $40 each at home depot.  Saved $110
- Magazine shelves x6.  Purchase price about $17 each, cost to make $0.  Saved $100
- 12 foot countertop and brackets.  Purchase price approx. $200.  Cost to us $0.  Saved $200
- Slide was gifted.  Saved $150
- Play floor matt - Cost new is $30 plus tax.  Purchased for $1.  Saved $30
- Bed into play structure - Cost about $0.  Saved about $200

- Used a lot of furniture we already had in storage.  2 filing cabinets (~$1000 new), door countertop (~$100 new), desk (~$1000), sliding glass cabinet (old, missing legs, used purchase estimating at $50), doored cabinet (old, used purchase ~$30), bench press (missing a bar, but a new one is ~$200, so savings of $50?).  Approximately $2200 saved?

- Bulletin Board.  Gifted.  New is about $70

- Free used Wii, workout games, etc.  Savings of about $40.
TOTAL (so far) Saved $5500 in bull barn.

Coffee Station:  The coffee station area would have cost us to hire someone to do as well.  Not sure what.  I'm not even sure how to get an estimate for that!  However, we used an old countertop that I cut to size that I found laying around in the bull barn.  That was a cut end someone picked up for $40 it looks like (from a sale).  I also changed and fixed up the table that was in there (~$250), and we added some mail sorters and drawer units that we found (~$30), as well as the coffee maker that was upstairs (~$25) and a cookie jar (that looks like a cow... I found a similar one on amazon for $55).  If they wouldn't have been found, we likely wouldn't have done it.  Either way, doing it all ourselves saved about $400.

Other Labor:  My oldest two kids have been doing extra things on farm that were not being done before, especially this month, in between their normal tasks (lots of extra cleaning chores).  We pay them weekly (I aim to ramp this up yet again as they do so much), but I could easily see that the jobs they've done saving us $300+.  

My husband has done a number of modifications on the barn.  As an example, this week he put a bar across the feed trough to fix a situation with smaller animals jumping through.  Savings of about $300.  Also, I did not remember to put in the cost savings of building the fence for the cows last month!  We figure we probably saved over $1000 doing it ourselves with our wonderful hired hand who did SO much amazing work on it, too!  We are so grateful for her! 

48. Put $10 000 into TFSAs  (DONE Aug 2025)
Did it.  Done deal!  Yay!

49. Find a way to pay for a garage/expansion without a loan

If I change this to kitchen, I have saved up what I need to do this through Ikea (if I do the work myself).  I'm a little overwhelmed by this idea, to be honest.  I need to finalize my online kitchen plans, then buy the stuff!

55. Get back to pre-pregnancy weight

I'm back to what I weighed prior to my latest pregnancy.  My thoughts were more on the lines of when I got married, but I'm 12lbs away from that goal, and have not been there since having my 5th baby.  I do want to get to what I was prior to my 7th baby at least, as that was when I made this goal, so 4 lbs to go.  I don't think I'll ever get my waist back down, though.

That said, I've started working on this again.  I'll be doing a walk around the farmyard most days with my belly band on to try to heal my diastasis a bit better.  The chiropractor said that I need to work to heal that separation as most of my hip and back pain is coming from that.  In the process, I'm hoping to help meet this goal.  I need to work on limiting my snacks, though.  I really love my food.  I am still nursing 2x a day, too (morning and before bed).  I really need to up my water intake and actually take care of my health again.  I've been terrible at this.  Honestly, we are going through a family crisis right now (have been for a few months) that I'm not really willing to talk about here, and so I've not been caring about myself so much.  Is that just an excuse?  Kinda.  

90. Learn how to butcher chickens

I NEED to do this... asap!  I want to figure it out on our old birds and use them as soup chickens.  Just the males, though.  We have way too many roosters from our last batch purchased (got them unsexed).  SO many roos.  They keep fighting.  If I can get rid of our old roos, I can move a bunch of my big boys into that coop where they have more room and maybe when they are finally big enough to butcher, I can finally do that.

96. Build a greenhouse OR a summer kitchen

I have the sink and the pallets over by the area I want to build it.  But I haven't done it yet.

6 more done!  Yay!  75 total finished, 26 to go.  I'm already doing better than I did on my last 101 list!  WOO!

101 in 1001 July Update

July was a busy month here on the farm.  My oldest was so excited about finishing the workshop in June that she has made a new pet project or two, both of which were on my new upcoming 101 list which I started in June, and got over 101 items on this month.  Every time I get an idea, I add to it on my phone.  The hardest part with these lists is coming up with reasonable ideas, so I'm excited to have such a list made already!  Also, I figured out I'd need to complete 6 items a month (one every 5 days)  to be able to finish this list by the due date.  Not sure I can do that every month, but I did this time!  Anyway, on to the update!  (NOTE:  I'm publishing this now, but hoping to add some pictures once I get them on the computer from my phone).  Link to my 101 list.

12. Visit the dam, and the falls, DONE July 26 2025

We figured out when Chuck had his next weekend off, and so we decided to head over to the falls and the dam again this year as last time we went was 3 years ago, and we really enjoyed it.  The kids brought swimsuits this time so they could enjoy the water.  It was a really hot day!  We also managed to follow the path the correct way this time, following the information boards in order!

19. Clean out old bull barn DONE July 2025

The very beginning of the month we headed out there and pulled everything out.  I mean everything!  There are two sections to this barn.  One was made into a woodshop of sorts and we had rented it out to someone for a few years.  They left a huge bunch of wood laying around when they were done, and it took a few years of me slowly working at it to mostly clean it up.  We finished with that, cleaned up the floor, and then moved the keepable things into that section from the larger part of the barn, the part that became the laundry appliance cemetary.  We dragged 5 or 6 washers out of that thing, plus two broken toilets and an old fridge (the guys used the skidsteer for those).  She pulled out the pressure washer and got the walls cleaned of 30 year old manure, and then on Thursday we completed painting of the walls and ceiling (bought a 5 gallon pail of mistint and had barely enough... I calculated over 1500 square feet of space that we painted, the ceiling being half that).  There were sections of floor that needed grinding down due to poles that were in the concrete at some point that were removed, so her uncle did that, and M wants to wash some old cow matts that have been sitting in storage for years that are rubber and would be perfect to put in as flooring in places.  

23. Build cow fence DONE July 2025

It's done!  We let all the cows out of the barn!  They love being out in the evening, and the one section can often be found outside in the early morning, sleeping on the grass.  It was so fun watching them come out for the first time in years!  The giant cows bounding about like little calves is so cute!

26. Work on a plan to keep cats out of robot room  CHANGED to Make a coffee station in the entrance of the barn  DONE  July 2025

So, on my new 101 list we had the idea to make a coffee station.  My daughter really ramped that up this month, and so we finished the entrance to the barn by washing the old coffee maker, removing boards, adding some linoleum to the counter to make it easier to wash, adding a countertop, honestly we did a lot.  It looks so pretty, too.  We just used what we had, zero dollars spent on this little project.  So, I figured that since the cats were not interested in the robot room at all right now, I decided to swap this one out with that one from my new list.  

31. Make Disney trip albums 0/3

I'm not even done one of these, and I kind of wish I'd have just said to do one because I don't know if it is physically possible to complete all three by January!  I started working on my 2011 trip (the one with the least photos) two weeks ago, have 35 pages, but am only about 2 1/3 days into the 7 days we visited the parks (10 day trip with two travel days and a rest day).  I'm not sure how I'm going to fit this all in!  Even doing 1 page a day I likely won't have all three finished in time.  Maybe I'll get two done, and try getting the third done next list?  I'm loving the album so far, though.  I even bought some Disney kits to do this!

41. Volunteer some time to clean/mow/fix up the old Heritage Cemetery DONE July 2025

My oldest two and I spent a couple of hours pulling weeds and using the weed trimmer (took 3 batteries and drained them all) over at the cemetery where my husband's 3 greats grandparents are buried.  I think we need to get them a new headstone.  Their 'post' is broken so badly, the metal is still there but the wood is rotten and has become an anthill.  We really couldn't do anymore there, so we called it a day.  One of the letters (the 'F') on the sign was missing, and try as I might, I couldn't find it.  

101. Create another 101 in 1001 list DONE July 2025

So, I had a running list of things I would like to put on my next list, and it went over 101 (I think it's at 113 or something now).  It's on my phone, so I could pop new list items on it whenever I thought of them (I usually forget by the time I would get home to my computer otherwise).  I'm liking this new list, although I think the categories are going to be less balanced and changed up somewhat.  I haven't gone that far with it, which is fine.  I'll do that when I officially type it up for the blog.

So, that officially puts me at 69 done, 32 remaining!  Woo!  Oh, and to make things easier for me, I also have this 101 list on my phone that I regularly look at instead of once a week.  It definitely helps motivate me.

June 101 in 1001 Update

Another month, another update.  I did barely manage to get three complete this month.  I am working on others as well, but I'm really beginning to wonder if I'm going to actually complete this entire list in time!  (see my 101 in 1001 list here)  Right now, I have 198 days left, and 38 items to complete.  I need to complete 1 every 5 days.

20. Thoroughly clean/reorganize farm workshop (here)

DONE!!  My daughter had this as her June project, and roped all of us on the farm to work on it with her!  It looks so much better!  All the hardware is in one place, you don't have to search through multiple toolboxes for one thing anymore because it is all located in one zone.  We made zones for the oils/lube, the woodworking/electrical, the hardware and parts, and all the power tools, and then there are the main project counters!  They went from loaded full of stuff to clear and free!  Even mounted battery chargers to the walls, and put up a pegboard.  I still want to make a few things (like a shelf for charged vs need to be charged batteries next to the wall mounted chargers, and labelling the 2 remaining large tool boxes) but it is so much better!

23. Build cow fence (here)

Work has been slow, but it is continuing.  We have some of the wires up, but are waiting on more insulators to come in the mail, and my husband is picking up more wire today.

24. Work out a budget/farm plan for the year

Slow going on this.

27. Fix floor properly in bulk tank room  DONE

It needs to be done shortly after milk pickup to give the cement a little cure time before it is hit with all the water from the tank wash that occurs after the tank is emptied each and every time.  There is not a large window of time to do it.  So... I did it today.  It does look a lot better, but it is also still wet.  Hopefully it will cure ok (even though every time the robot washes, we get water running everywhere).  Happy to be done this, but likely will need to revisit this one on an almost yearly basis.  Anyone know how to protect the rest of the bag of concrete from hardening on me?  We have 3 different half opened bags of hardened concrete I've found on this farm now.

47. Do ‘on farm’ work that saves us at least $20 000 from if we would have hired out.  (12500/20000)

So, I filed the farm taxes again this year, and oh boy am I happy I finished!  This was the first year I had some initial problems where it wanted us to pay taxes, but I was able to see where I made a mistake and fixed it.  So thankful for that.  Anyway, that is another $3000 saved (might actually be more, since the price of everything has increased so much and $3k was the approximate charge in 2020).

Also, after reorganizing and cleaning the workshop, I went online to search for what it would have cost us to hire that out.  It was such an overwhelming job that there was actual talk of doing so.  With a bunch of research, it looks like it might have been about $3000 (looking at half day charges, full day charges and estimations of how many days it would take a huge team vs the whole month it took us, also there were estimations for things like workshops, garages, etc).

Also, fixing the floor would have cost about $300 to hire out.  At least, that's the number I found.  So that's what I'm putting up there.

49. Find a way to pay for a garage/expansion without a loan

I think I may change this one as it is not looking to be something we will do.  I do need a new kitchen.  Perhaps that is what I'll pop in here instead.  And that will be simple enough to pay for as I have managed to save enough to do so if I keep on budget!  Hopefully we can get the kitchen built by fall.

78. Visit Mennonite Museum and dress the part  DONE

Canada day was the perfect opportunity.  We donned our most Mennonite like clothes (long skirts for some of us, and high necked shirts, bonnets/hats or little head scarves) and went to the museum.  We used the old stroller that I refinished 7 years ago that is from the 1930s and wheeled that thing around all day.  I will say, the newer strollers are much easier to fold, have better storage, and nicer turning radius.  But that's all fine.  It was fun to go out, enjoy the festivities, and 'dress up' a little.

63 down, 38 to go.

May 101 Update

I honestly thought I was going to get so much more done this month, as I was cruising in the first week!  But alas.  I was strong on the first week, and then did nothing.  Sigh.

20. Thoroughly clean/reorganize farm workshop

My oldest is really gung ho on this one.  So, this week we've spent 10 hours on this already... and have hardly made a dent in it tbh.  It's kind of difficult when you aren't the ones using the space.  And everything is so coated in dust that 'cleaning' is really just sweeping everything off because using water in any form turns it all to mud.  I think this will have to happen in segments.  Organize and sweep off everything, make a system that provides a day to spend each month to bring things 'back' to order so as to prevent the chaos that is there currently from happening again, and then slowly wash everything as we have time for it.  I don't know, right now, 10 hours in, it looks like this may take another 50+ hours with just the two of us.

23. Build cow fence

All the posts are in place in the main areas.  This is coming along nicely.  I wish it was done, though.  I really feel like we should be closer to done on this.

35. Use Cricut to make van decals (DONE May 3 2025)

I finally finished these and put them up on the van.  Looks so NICE.

36. Take part in pick up and walk (DONE May 3 2025)

First weekend of May is when this happens, and my oldest noticed that it was coming up and brought it to my attention, so we joined on in and helped with some other families to clean up in our town.  It felt so good knowing we did something to help our community, and I think it is a great opportunity to teach the kids the importance of cleaning up after yourself, and not throwing trash on the ground.

83. Learn Macramé (DONE May 2025)

I found another kit at the dollar store.  My first macramé keychain didn't turn out great until I really got the hang of how to do those knots well so that they form correctly each time.  Second one looks much better.  I quite like it!

April 101 in 1001 Update

 This month I became very focused on the heritage stuff online.  Been really just trying to get more than 3 things done this month as I need to attempt one per 5-6 days now instead of one every 10 days.  I'm pretty proud of myself for getting 7 completed!

33. Create a tangible family tree. More than having it in the family Bible.  DONE April 2025

I did this!  I printed our family trees in a fan shape, one page each for me and for my husband.  They are color coded according to where each ancestor was born.  Lots in Russia, Ukraine, Canada of course after they all came over here, and I even have one great great grandparent that was born at sea!

35. Use Cricut to make van decals

I have them cut and ready to apply, I just need to send the van through the car wash, then wash the window well and apply them.  The temperature is a little cold for application today...

36. Take part in pick up and walk

This one is happening this weekend.  It's my last chance to do it in this particular time period.  I'm trying to get my family on board, but I'll be honest that it's harder to get into when we aren't in a church that takes part.

49. Find a way to pay for a garage/expansion without a loan

Been saving up, but we are not doing the garage expansion as the expense is WAY too high, sadly (I cannot believe how much money it is supposed to cost!).  But, we are currently looking at redoing our kitchen.  Which is also very expensive.  Much more than I anticipated.

81. Learn about tanning hides. Perhaps try it when we have a cow butchered?

Been watching some videos on this.  I am actually not sure how much I want to try it.  I'm not marking this as done, because perhaps I will actually do this during summer as it is very interesting to me, but it does look to be quite a bit of work.  I could possibly do fine with it if I can use our power washer.  I'd have to ask the butcher if they can keep the hide aside on the farm, though.  

82. Learn to knit/crochet DONE April 2025

I found a cute little kit in the Dollar Tree for under $2.  It was for a cute lil bee.

So, I picked it up, watched some videos to figure out what on earth each of those stitches in the pattern meant (the diagrams were not so easy to follow), and after restarting 4 times, I figure I did pretty good!  I know I made a number of mistakes on this little guy, but I'm ok with that.  It was a learning experience, and now I want to try my hand at making a little chicken!

83. Learn Macramé

They have little macramé kits at the Dollar tree as well, but I think I want to try just using some of the string I already have.  The kits might be the next thing I try if I can't get into it on my own, though.  Even though it looks as though I have everything already.

85. Find/add more info onto the Family Search website (photos, certificates, sources). (15/15) DONE April 2025

I was able to put in a number of obituary sources, some photos from my grandmother's information, as well as a few more pieces of information from "find a grave".

86. Enter at least 5 stories/memories into the Family Search website (5/5) DONE April 2025

I entered a number of stories I found in Preservings magazines from the 90s, and entered 2 more of my own as well.  

87. Find family war stories DONE April 2025 (but as always, to be continued)

Last week I was super focused on finding information for Family Search for some reason.  I think it might have to do with finding out that my great great uncle Corny served in the war on my mother's side.  I didn't get to see the story itself, however.  Grandma said that her uncle had a book about it but refused to talk about it, and they had found the book and were able to give it back to his family.  Apparently, another family member of hers told some stories about the depression and the war to my aunt who was a hairdresser.  Little tidbits here and there.  So interesting!  I find it sad that so much of that history in those stories that would have been told is being lost.  I didn't get to enter anything into my direct family line, but I saw a number of stories in Preservings magazine and entered many of those into the proper places.  The most interesting was of a Janzen (nicknamed Hans) that lived in Germany at the time of the world wars, and he apparently was an ace pilot under the Red Baron!  Came from a Mennonite background, but that definetly isn't common for the Mennonites of the time, as they were supposed to be Anabaptists and took a very peaceful stance.  I did find out that my husband's grandparent was a CO like my grandfather, and it looks like they served in the same area (well, the second area my grandfather was relocated to after having some very serious issues with his lungs in Jasper) according to the registration of CO's in our province!

97. Make homemade crackers  DONE April 2025

Today I decided to attempt some cheese crackers that I found on this blog (click here for the recipe).  

They tasted pretty good (the few I did get before the kids ate the rest.  One batch was not enough, that's certain!).

100. Take a tour of my local area… bring camera (here) DONE April 2025

My husband and I walked along the old town site area in our city and took pictures of the many plaques along the way, including some of the older churches and an old well/pump.  Maybe I'll post some of the pictures eventually, but only if there's some interest.

56 done, 45 left to go.  I'm pretty pleased with myself this month!  Caught up a little on the '1 every 10 days' aspect of things, although I am about 740 days in, and should be done 74 at that rate.