The Blessing of Failing (thus far) at Homesteading
It felt borderline devastating last year when we lost fruit tree after fruit tree and vegetable after vegetable. Chickens, cows, grasshoppers, drought, a new baby… clearly it was not meant to be.
The heat of summer was fully upon us in June when Stewart walked in from his morning chores. He had that pragmatic, stiff-lipped, this-is-me-saddened look on his introverted face. I knew something was wrong. He spoke calmly and quickly:
“The fruit trees are all gone now.”
Every relationship needs balance and so I fulfilled my side of the bargain by weeping like a little girl.
That summer we began trying to keep the chickens on our land through fencing, but still the hens crossed over to lay eggs. Stewart chased one down and the chase combined with the 100 degree temperatures killed her on the spot.
Another morning we woke up and saw pale beige feathers scattered across the dirt road and one hen was missing. Dead.
In the fall we tried again. Row covers weren’t strong enough for the wind and the bugs and the cold and everything died.
Eggs were laid by hens and some 21 odd days later they were living little fuzz balls. When we took our trip up north we left eight of them at home. All but one died.
New cold frames were built – sturdier, warmer. I was watering the greens, left it open to get some air, hung up the laundry, got distracted when a neighbor stopped by. The chickens ate it all.
In those single moments of loss I understood, cognitively, that the Lord gives and the Lord takes away… that these losses were allowed… that He would be glorified through them… that all we could do is pray for guidance and wisdom and insight into what we are supposed to see through these losses.
It is the compounding of all of these events, however, seemingly one after another, that has engraved into my spirit that we will fail at homesteading.
We forget to water. We do not give the soil enough time to heal. We don’t anticipate the need of some small critter who will claim the lettuce as his own. We don’t sow seed deep/thick/thin enough. We wait too long to plant almost everything. We put up a quick chicken coop/fence/cold frame and the inevitable failure happens.
And then I walk out of our cabin, past the kitchen garden, through the dirt walk way studded with the sticks and ropes and other little man building material of the day. And I walk past that makeshift chicken coop that is too small to house our current flock and single-handedly kept from its fall to the west by a 1 x 2.
And I stop. Is that what I think it is?
Our four-year-old is at my side and he peeks through the chicken wire to confirm my suspicions. The two broody hens sit upon eggs that are starting to crack and little chirping fuzzy chicks are making their way into daylight.
I squeal. He squeals… and takes off running at a speed of which I have never seen from him, certainly not when chores are at hand. He hurls himself towards Papa like a freight train with suspenders and screams “Papa, a baby chick hatched!“
And I am grinning from ear to ear as I watch him bursting with unabashed joy at the miracle of life we are witnessing. I am bursting too… with contentment in knowing that we had absolutely nothing to do with those chicks coming to be. That it is despite our forgetfulness and ineptitude and constant daily failure that the Lord grants food and life and… everything.
So I roll around in this for a while, watching Papa stroll over and see what all the commotion is about. Annabelle is screaming now: “Dat! Dat! Dat!” as she points at these new chickens. Three days later there are fifteen of them and I am in awe.
The things we’ve tried the hardest at have often failed. The things we have nothing to do with are the most awe-inspiring, and often the most fruitful. I don’t think that’s a coincidence. We’ve pushed too hard, asked too much, put the cart before the horse.
We needed to fail. We needed to know what it’s like to feel like we did everything physically possible to make it work and then watch it come crumbling down around us. Our “best” wasn’t good enough because it wasn’t even good in the first place.
We needed a big fat F in self-sufficiency… a big fat you’re no good at this… a big fat we’re able to produce nothing apart from Him.
And we might need even more, I just don’t know. But I do know that we’re supposed to keep learning, keep planting, keep nurturing and keep stewarding. As far as the results go… I think I’ll stick with “I just don’t know“.
Because the moment we think we are “self-sufficient” will be the moment we have truly failed.
I am so thankful you shared this. A big amen. Praying that this message truly settles into our souls.
This was such an excellent post. Thanks for your honest sharing. We have lost chicks and then had the joy of seeing some hatch a few weeks ago. A rooster who tore up my raised bed where I had just planted cilantro. Possums pulling all the tail feathers out of our bantam hen. A hen with broken legs because she got herself caught upside down in a chain link fence gate. Two hens who died from parasites…and on and on. When things DO actually grow and we get beautiful eggs, it truly feels like sweet gifts from His hand despite all of our humble attempts.
You definitely chose a challenging place to homestead. Texas in the summer is much like the surface of the sun and I admire your tenacity in attempting to farm there. Perhaps some hardware cloth or similar material around the fruit trees?
Wow. What a post. I am always talking to my husband about being “self-sufficient”, and while I know in my head that everything comes from the Lord, to see our ineptitude come to nothing if not for Him would be a painful, valuable lesson indeed.
Amen! Glad for some success for you all.
Oh Shannon, dear, I do understand. I couldn’t begin to list all the failures we’ve endured over the years, but my the blessings are sweet. The longer we live this life the more I realize that 1)We really don’t know much, and 2)We’re certainly not in control of much of anything. Thank you, again, for your eloquence in expressing the heart of Christian agrarian living. We pray for you all down there regularly.
Thank you Shannon for sharing. I hope you don’t mind but I shared a link to your message on my facebook page. If you want I can take it down but I think everyone needs to hear your story. We serve an awesome Lord who wants us to depend on Him day by day. Thank you for reminding me of that dependence as my husband and I will be getting our first ever chickens as soon as I return from visiting our beautiful grandchildren in St. Louis.
Wow, I wrote a post about our own failures not too long. I think it’s been a bad year for just about everyone I’ve talked to. Tough weather. Drought in the Midwest where I’m from, and tons of rain in Baja where I currently farm. And I like how you pointed out that terrible term self sufficient. We also need community!
Wonderful post. Enjoyed it tremendously.
Oh, Shannon, YES! Thank you again for the beautiful reminder. I have often felt this way when my perceived losses are piling up and then days, weeks, months later I realize that they all had to happen to get me to the place I’m meant to be. Blessings!
Our failures would fill a book, but so would the blessings that the Lord has given us. I am grateful for the many things that God brings into our lives to pick us back up and set us onto His path again. Good article. Snow here in Nova Scotia this morning, but maybe this afternoon it will be warm enough to plant peas!
That was beautiful and so very nourishing. Thank you Shannon. Bless you and your family.
I can share my fruit tree saga. I started planting 5 per year here. The result was always the same – good growth the first year, stagnant the second, and dead by the third. I finally found the secret to growing fruit trees – a REAL big hole. I was following the directions earlier and digging a hole 20″ deep and a little bigger than the root ball. NO! You need a hole about 30-36″ across and about 2-3 feet deep. Fill the really big hole with mixed dirt and peatmoss, then set the root ball in when you get the fill right for the base of the tree. Top dress with a little mulch and manure. That’s it! This apparently gives a nice area for the roots to set and begin to spread. So far, no more losses and I’ve set 8 more out this year.
@sally mae, Also a good help in dry conditions is to plant a vertical length of pipe along side the tree. Pour into the pipe when you water and it will get straight to the roots and won’t evaporate off the surface.
This is a beautiful, truthful post. I am not a great gardener but I had always considered myself adequate. 2012 was a terrible year in the Midwest–early spring, late freeze, 100 degrees and no rain for too long–if this had been my first attempt I would never have tried again! I harvested about 2 pounds more potatoes than I planted, I didn’t even bother to pull the onions as they were barely larger than the sets, even the garlic was puny. The raccoons ate all the peaches the night before I was planning to pick them. (That means I do know when they are ripe, though.) The black-eyed peas and sweet potatoes were the only things that thrived, but it turned cool and wet before I got the dried peas in so I had to discard most of them because of mold, and the voles had highways through each hill of sweet potatoes and invariably had tunneled through the big tubers! We have so many coyotes and raccoons that I refuse to even consider chickens until we have predator-proof housing FINISHED and ready to go.
But the pasture is growing well this spring, the trees survived the drought, I had the offer of some red raspberries free for the digging to replace the wild ones that seem to be succumbing to a rust-colored something (just need to figure out where to put them away from the others.) And our CSA neighbor provided us all the veggies we wanted last summer because we were able to step in and take care of their garden when they had to go across the country for a son’s wedding as the drought began to turn the screw here. God provides in wonderful ways and we need the reminder to continue to rely on him and not on our own understanding. Thank you for this beautiful post and may He bless you bountifully this season.
Thank you for a great post. We are new to homesteading and have had a very difficult winter here in Northern Wisconsin with all the record cold weather. We have had one defeat after another. One day we lost a calf in the morning and had another calf born that very night. I was so scared the birth was going to go badly due to our earlier event. I told God I don’t think I can handle that. He must not have either. The calf was born easily.
Life and death. That’s what we see. We are growing from it. Feeling powerless and inadequate, but still getting back up after you think maybe you will just give up. And yes, then comes something glorious. Praise God now and forever!
You are such an inspiration! I’ve found much of the same, although I’m not full on homesteading like you and your family. The more I fight, the more I fail, and the biggest successes I have are when I wait, let go, watch, and let things happen on their own. We have to take the lessons we learn from these failures and grow. Plus, fruit trees must just be really hard- I’ve lost almost all that I’ve planted too, save one apple tree and two paw paws, and I can almost promise you that this past wicked winter killed the paw paws.