Setting The Scene

Setting the Scene

With a change in the direction of the blog I think it’s time to get a little more personal. Wait! Who dimmed the lights? Is that Marvin Gaye? No not THAT kind of personal.  I meant that I should tell you a little more about the specifics of life on Good Luck Green. 

First of all, where did the name come from?

Why thank you for asking imaginary, interview person. Good Luck Green is just the name that Becky and I made up when we first moved into our new house here in New Hampshire. The “Good” and the “Luck” each come from parts of each of our last names. Plus we thought it sounded nice. At the time there really was no concrete concept of what this place would turn into. We thought that we might put in a garden, but nothing like the size of the one I just finished making.  Good Luck Green went from being an idea, maybe even a fantasy, into a real place, place that is alive with the work and joys of trying to provide a new kind of life for myself and my family.

So what does the “farm” look like?

I’ll start by talking about the garden and the animals and go from there.

The garden -There are the two large beds, there is another one that is a little bit smaller that you can’t see in this picture as well.

We are part of a garden co-op. On top of growing vegetables for our own household we grow 2 different vegetables per year and contribute these to the co-op. We then get to take home a bunch of vegetables that other people have grown in their garden. In this way you don’t have to be an expert in everything and are still able to get great fresh local vegetables throughout the summer. It’s really a win-win for everybody. It also is an affordable option for people who can’t swing the cost of a CSA (community shared agriculture) share or whose local CSA’s have extensive waiting lists (which many in our area do).

Animals -We also never had any plans to own anything other than our dog. Oh but how that has changed. We currently have 8 ducks – 4 Pekin and 4 Magpies.  We get between 3-5 eggs per day from our flock.

We also have 3 goats. Two wethers (for the initiated this just means neutered boy goats in goat farming language). The boys are named Frodo and Bilbo – We are huge Lord of the Rings fans.

Just recently we acquired our first girl goat named Lady Mary. She is currently helping to provide milk for our family.  There will be more to come on this. Let’s just say that it has been an experience learning how to milk and take care of Lady. That being said, look at this photo of her with our son, Tommy.  

 

Ain’t that sweet?  So really that’s the farm for now.

Okay, so that’s it then? You are going to take this from a rural project blog to a farm blog? That’s cool I guess, but aren’t there a bunch of farm/hippie/homestead blogs out there already?

Well yes and no.

I’m not changing the blog. I’m just adding to it. I’ll continue to update and upload my woodsy rustic projects, but I wanted to give more perspective than just “Hey! Look at this! I made something!”

I wanted to give context. And I’m sure that there are other blogs out there similar but not truly like this. Because this is the story of the life of my family and it’s more than just a little hobby farm. It’s a life.

I’ve built mountain bike course in our backyard out of logs and trees from my own land. I’ve built a knife throwing target from the trunk of a pine I took down. I’ve used other wood from this same pine to help fence my goats, build a goat milking stand and am currently building a shaving horse for using my draw knife on. 

I’m going to tell the story of how we live and what we love, and hopefully others will take inspiration from this and be able to live the life that they dream of – even it is something completely different. It’s not about doing what I do, but finding out what it is that you want to do and then simply doing it. For Good Luck Green, it means living a rural life while still staying connected to the modern world.

- Chuck