[northfifeduckling]

Honestly, I do despair a bit at the moment...I start the day with sorting the birds, then into the garden, still mainly sifting topsoil for hours, weeding, planting the odd vegetable, picking caterpillars of the fruit bushes, cutting grass. Once everybody else is home I am in pain and it's cooking time. How do people work around all this (as in making money)?? My money is running out soon and panic is creeping in! Apart from being unemployable at 46 - I simply don't have the time to do anything else...How do you all do it with the perfect gardens and all the animals, families and jobs???

[rustyme]

51... no family ...no perfect garden ... no job... no money... too many horses ... too many dogs ... but it all gets done at some time... I am on my own, so I decide what gets done, and when ....so, much easier that way ...lol.  The simple life eh ? oh yeah !!!!!!! 

cheers

Russ

[doganjo]

65 - retired, widowed, so my time is my own, only just started growing veg so only one raised bed and a few pots to keep tidy, 4 dogs to walk each day, takes about 2 hours, plus another half hour training my young lad for gundog work, 14 birds - easy to look after, feed and water, tidy sand run, let out onto grass for a couple of hours while I do my chores, clean shed once a week.  Like Russ I can decide when I do things and what I need to do or what can be left for another day.  Apart from that I'm Treasurer of two organisations, and members of  a few clubs with meetings to go to, and other than that some of my time is shared with my children and grandchildren.

[ballingall]

I'm a bit more like northfifeduckling. This time of year really stresses me out, because I just want to be at home sorting out the animals and the garden etc etc.

28- work 35 hours a week which really equals 40 hours, plus a 80 minute a day commute. My mother fortunately sees to the goats in the morning, plus she feeds the chickens and ducks, but after work is spent seeing to the goats, dogs, guinea pigs and rabbit. After that, if theres any time left before it gets dark and I don't have to get the goats ready for a show, I'll try and do some weeding, planting, fence painting etc etc. But in reality I just have a lot of stuff that never gets as much attention as I'd like to give it.

On that note- I'm just off out to look at my plants and maybe plant some sweet peas and bedding plants.

Beth

[ukag0972]

This thread is beginning to sound like online dating!!! LOL

34, 2 kids, 2 dogs, 1 husband with his 2 dogs, 500 sheep, 15 show jacobs, atleast 4 pet sheep, 4 nanny goats, 3 goat kids, 2 pet lambs, 2 orphaned lambs being fed by a goat, 35 hens and.........1 highland cow and calf, who is away on her "holidays" to see a boyfriend!!!
Not forgetting 2 Tamworth sows, 1 Tamworth boar and 3 Kune Kunes plus 5 weaners/fatteners.

Just finished clipping the hoggs (last years lambs) and tups, and have clipped my show jacobs too. As well as being mums taxi, and attempting to keep on top of the usual housey stuff............

I'm knackered!!!!!

[sellickbhoy]

i'm a total blagger

no animals, i work from home - so my employer gets his 37 hours, but i get to pick when he gets them - which makes life so much easier

also, large parts of the garden are a bomb site and need some attention

and i really don't believe i need to weed large parts of my garden, so i'm happy for it to just grow.

no bother at all really

I also have a devoted OH who reminds me i have to eat several times a day and she ensures the food is there for me - she also runs a bath at the end of each day for me and points me in it's direction before bed time

[doganjo]

Jammy s*d

[HappyHippy]

I'm 31 with a hubby and 3 kids.
My garden consists of a lawn, large areas of paving, a rockery and lots of big planters (old cow troughs) for growing veg in (because we DIDN'T have time to do the raised beds out of scaffolding planks yet!)
All I have by way of livestock at the moment is a shetland pony sized alsatian and a cockateil, we gave the weaners a miss this year because of new baby's arrival.
I'm super proud of myself because somehow I am finding time to do school & nursery runs, housework, deal with the garden, produce meals for the family and look after a 4 week old while hubby's out driving taxi's. BUT, and it's a biggie, I'm on maternity leave until September, after I'm back at work 2 or 3 days a week it'll all go to pot I'm fairly certain. 

[Fluffywelshsheep]

Hiya step mum to 4 kids but only one lives with us (he is disable but deals with himself most of the time). no livestock unless you call hubby livestock and a 5 month bump, lol.

I work from home on odd jobs (mainly website work while hubby does more manual odd jobs like gardenning/removals/deliveries/charity work/helpping in local school , i did do this before becoming pregnant.

Don't really have that much ground to look after have got a front bit of lawn occasional get cut  and a front flower/herb garden that i very much leave to itself due to the fact that i don't realy go in the front as have to make contact with neighbour (little or no contact is best with them) the back garden is slab so plenty of rubbish (lol)  Pots and sack for vegs also have the side garden that meet up with the front via a way of a fence (yet another good thing as neighbours can't really see me unless they stop and look though gaps that are getting filled up with fruit bushes/trees. In this area i have 2 raised bed which aren't to badly doing plenty of young fruit tree and Bushes to be planted along fence line. We after 3 1/2 year of being here are slowly getting the house in order. Replacing our old outdated second hand furniture with newer looking second hand furniture.

We have plenty of jobs to do in the house/garden. i make a list and then occasionaly remove things we have done and add plenty of things to the bottom, lol

[Castle Farm]

64...male
300 chickens in 15 breeds all in breeding runs that need tending twice daily and cleaning out once a week..Thats 58 seperate drinkers and feeders.
30+ LLeyn ewes and lambs.
15 acres of pasture growing on for hay.
1 acre garden and large veg garden.
Full time gardening jobs in 5 different gardens.
OH who just looks after her horse and hates poultry.

but you cope don't you.
I look forwards to winter and darker evenings at least you can come indoors at a realistic hour.
I.m out by 6am and come in around 9pmish.

[Hilarysmum]

Age (too old) have learned that a weed is a flower in the wrong place, and can live with that, even if the veggies cant.  OH works so just me and the pigs, plus the dogs and cats.  Vacuum and I have a love hate relationship, dont do dusting, at 5 ft 0 dont see the dust above 4ft. 10, bad back means I cant look under the beds.  The chickens tend to weed everything, and what they dont weed out the ducks flatten  - it all looks after itself really.

[dixie]

Hubby, 3 kids, 3 dogs, 2 cats, 3 ferals, 4 ewes, 8 lambs, 1 boar, 1 sow, 4 weaners, 5 ducks, 15 chickens. work 20ish hrs week, largish tidyish house , have just planted my first vegetables!!!! and yes always knackered but lovin it!!!

[gallovidian]

I know, I often wonder how I ever found time for a f/t job....  but then in those days I only had a small garden, no partner and no dogs.
Now 51 with partner, 2 dogs, 2 (soon to be 3) houses -1 run as b&b, the other(s) rented for holidays, therefore endless washing and ironing! - 4 chickens due to arrive any day now, a 1/4 acre garden and veg plot - still sprouting endless weeds from being neglected for the year prior to our arriving -to tend....
But as for unemployable at 46, don't be so sure! My OH (43) has just started a new p/t jobs selling houses at a local development (no previous experience) just thro' talking to the MD in the pub, and a couple of months back I was 'head-hunted' by a local social care agency (but told them I didn't need the stress!).

[Rosemary]

46, married, one child, two dogs, one cat and two kittens on the way, 20 (?) hens and two cockerels; three ewes, three lambs, three Tamworth weaners and a Highland pony. Garden that looks like a bomb site - actually the veggies are pretty tidy - the "flower" garden is a bomb site. Tidy house, pretty much since I'm a control freak. Working full time for five more weeks then I'll be redundant!! so no excuse for the state of the garden OR the kitchen floor, which is my nemesis. I'm going to be Dan's very part-time administrator and "homemaker" - and I'm really looking forward to it.

[garden cottage]

43 groans,married groans, 12 black rocks, 3 loony dogs,3 cats 1 is completely wild, 1 rabbit that thinks its a cat escapes all the time. 12 ryeland sheep, 5 dexter cattle, 1 horse on load from rda which refuses to be caught this week,just took blank firing ram down to you know where. decided on sheep burgers. 3 girls who think dad only exists for taxi service solving problems and fixing broken things. oh and 2 geese who were still not sure the sex of.......................neil