Happy Birthday to ME!

Happy Birthday to ME!

March 6th I woke up to a breakfast of birthday cake and a few gifts to open...Luke bought me a new laptop as well as a pizza pan, a stainless steel over the sink colander, and last but not least, a 13x9 casserole dish. I've been baking things in the small 8x8 sized dishes...definitely not big enough for our family of 6!

 We spent the day running some errands and working on our property.....so Luke took us out for dinner at Pizza Hut so that I didn't have to make anything or worry about dishes! What a guy! <3

We Have Nigerian Dwarf Goats!

We Have Nigerian Dwarf Goats!

One day at the end of February, Luke and I were texting back and forth (while he was at work...it was a slow day for RV sales) about a milk cow vs milk goats. Luke didn't think we were going to be able to have enough land to feed a cow on top of the other animals we were hoping to raise for our own meat consumption. I was scrolling Craigslist and found a post regarding a couple of Nigerian Dwarf goats that just had a baby each and they were selling all 4 for a deal.....i sent the posting to Luke right then and there and simply said, "fine, then lets just get these". I was joking, but apparently, he didn't think it was funny and said, "ok, lets go get them!" And THAT was how we ended up with Sparkles and her doeling Diamond, and Cookie and her buckling Fuzzy.

We had no real fencing yet, so Luke stopped by Lowes on his way home from work to pick up a roll of wire fencing. The next day (it happened to be his day off) we picked up the goats, stuck them in the room off the back of the barn, put up a partial fence around that one room, and went and got some straw, and....that was going to have to do for now!

Our new goats: Cookie (left) Sparkles (right)

Our babies: Fuzzy (left/bottom) Diamond (right/top)

 Here's the back of the barn and the area we put the goats...yes, its in rough shape!

 Luke working on getting a gate put up.

 Pounding in T-posts...its harder than it looks! Poor Luke was so sore the next day!

 We all went to go pick up 4 bales of straw for their bedding.....and then swung over to the farm supply store to get a water bucket and a couple other essentials.

 They are in their new home and although scared at first they quickly warmed up to the idea that this is what they would call home....

 We had to make a feeder for them for their hay.....they won't have the ability to graze for a little while...until we can get the rest of the fencing done, so alfalfa hay will have to do for now! The plan is to dedicate a 1/4 acre to our own hay production so we won't have to rely on ANY outside feeding...only their supplements (goats need certain extra minerals, baking soda, and while in milk a little bit of a grain mix).

 We didn't want to overwhelm them completely their first day here so Ephraim, Jireh and Havilah had to wait to get some goat loving (it was too small of a space for ALL us and ALL the goats and outside wasn't finished getting fenced in yet)...lucky little Charis however did get to come in with me while I was setting things up.

Its still a Pilgrimage......

Today marks the one year date from when our offer on our house was accepted. I've thought long and hard about whether we should continue this blog or maybe start a new one....or whether we should just do nothing. I came to the conclusion that even if no one reads what I write....i will always have this "web journal" of sorts to look back on! So, I am continuing to write and dare I say, will do a better job this time around!
The Gerrick Pilgrimage started out initially because we sold everything and bought a trailer to live in full-time and travel to find our new permanent dwelling. We left Minnesota and then later Ohio with nothing but what fit in our Nissan NV 12-passenger van and our 31ft travel trailer....it was very much a "pilgrimage". But, here we are now, in a house, settling down, starting our own little homestead, so I thought about changing the name....our journey was after all over, right?!? Not in the least!!!
The journey of our life is still going strong and long...just in a completely different "direction" now! So, the name stays.

So what has this past year looked like for the Gerricks?

Well, for starters, we are the very proud and ecstatic owners of 3.69 acres in Melba, Idaho!

Luke and I decided the best thing to do was pretty much relax the first year...after spending a lot on a down payment and then having to turn around and spend a lot on fixing our well pump and un-for-seen dental problems we just didn't have any funds to pour into doing ANYTHING else!

Luke got what was supposed to be a promotion at work shortly after we moved into the house...and it had "potential" (Finance Manager) to be a great next step in his career but ended up really screwing us over...so back to sales he went by the end of the sales season. Sadly, we lost the opportunity during the busiest part of the season to put money back into our savings which caused for a very financially tight winter for us. But, we've been there before (you know, that place with no money) and we STILL managed to pay OFF our van an entire year EARLY, so that was a HUGE BLESSING for us!

We took advantage of the time we had to watch and learn about our property and to plan what and where we wanted everything. We got to see how the irrigation works and how much it cost us at the end of the year and how much water we got from it. We got to see what the weather does in every season (even though we had spent the previous year in the area it was actually about 30 miles North and in an entirely different growing zone!) and figure out sun patterns. We tested our soil to know what kind of remedies, if any, were needed and which specific plants would need what specific remedy. We tried our best to figure everything out FIRST so that when we're finally able to start doing anything we don't have to scramble to try to figure it all out!

So, here we are now....in the Spring of 2018. Ready to start (slowly) turning our home into a homestead of sorts. We have a plan and are starting to have the business (at work - for Luke -with RV sales) which means we will soon have a little extra money to start the transformation!!!

-Lamentations 3:21-23-
"But this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; His mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness."

Last Winter in the RV!

This will be an awesome winter! We have two other full time families to enjoy the remainder of our time here with. Ten children...6 adults....lots of conversation....lots of laughter....lots of noise! LOL!
We played in the snow (which happened to be the most snow this area of Idaho has seen in the last 30yrs!); we explored together; we ate meals together (between Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years and a few birthdays thrown in their was lots of shared food!); we celebrated together (we had our own family Christmases but then also celebrated together at a later time...and also Charis had her 1yr birthday on Dec 22nd that needed cake!); we had bon fires together after kids went down for bed. In the times where it was just "the Gerricks" we enjoyed each other in a way that we probably never will again....just knowing that this chapter (specifically, living in very close proximity to one another - you literally can't roll over in bed without every single person in the trailer knowing exactly what you just did.) is over soon and another one will soon begin is exciting and almost a little overwhelming and even maybe a little sad....but the excited anticipation of what lies ahead outweighs ALL negative inklings of thoughts!