Moving state!

[Mira O'Halloran]

Well, It's happening again. And this time, i'm not just moving house, or city, but over two states!

It all started a month or two back talking with Matt (housemate and boyfriend) about how disgustingly hot the Adelaide weather is and how I want to move to Finland, but he doesn't, so how's Tasmania? (the island state) He agreed that it was close enough to his family, so we set about figuring out ways to get there, jobs, housing, ect.

We were asking a friend, Kitty, about getting the animals down there, and she looked interested, and then decided to join us.
So, then there's me, Matt and Kitty looking at how to move to Tasmania, in the process taking her three kids, my mum and our numerous animals (about 21 of them) with us.

The common questions were "What do we take with us?" "How much property do we need?" and the big one: "Where is the money to get there and buy a place come from?"

Kitty nearly floored us with her offer. She owns 2/3 of her $300,000 house. She told us that strawbale houses are amazingly cheap, and save on the heating and cooling, and are practically fireproof, and that she didn't care about buying everything, and that she'd need help with all the animals that she plans on adding. So there's the problem of money dissapeared. However, convincing the owner of the other 1/3 is another story entirely...

So, we talk about what the heck to do for income, and Kitty says "let's open a petting zoo type thing - we can get tonnes of different therapy trained animals!" So, there's one thing for income... And then both Kitty and I decide we're heading up to the Gold Coast for a weekend course run by Scott Alexander King, which gives us qualifications! (that's later, in August)

Next, in about 3 months time some family money is getting doled out, and Kitty is meant to be getting almost enough to entirely buy out the other share of her house!

In the meantime, Matt and I should be able to save up enough to cover the costs of moving, and the plane tickets, and possibly some to go towards the building of our house! (these houses are only about $30,000 to build)

One other thing we have to look into is downsizing - We have waaaay too much stuff. So after a short talk with Kitty and Matt, we know that we're keeping personal effects, and any expensive / irreplaceable items / furniture. The only problem here? My mother. The worlds worst pack rat. Her favourite justification for buying stuff is "Oh, it might useful one day!" However, we busted up the broken 2 seater couch yesterday! So things are moving in the right direction!

We don't know when exactly, but we're looking at May-October next year as a time to move. We can't do it in the warmer weather because of the kids and the animals and having to drive the car down to the ferry - that's going to take us about 2 days And I think that that is just going to be me and Kitty and anything that we're scared of breaking in the car with us instead of getting shipped.

So that's the exciting news from over here! And also why I've been so absent - over thirty boxes, garbage bags and enviro bags of stuff for the op shops. And two desks and a couch for the bin

[Rook]

Petting zoo, petting zoo! That's cool. Her Majesty and I have a potential plan for when we find some land to have a number of heritage breed livestock, like stout furry highland cows and bizarre looking chicken etc. and create a 'what the world used to look like' farm that people can come to. During the week it would be a petting zoo / fresh produce shop. During the weekend groups could come spend the night and see what it's like to live on the farm. The basic theme was 'where does your food come from.'

As I learned how and got proficient at it I was also planning on holding seminars for those interested in proper butchering of livestock and how to deal with the hide and the tallow, the brains for tanning etc. and the list goes on for all the parts of the creature. You can use so much of an animal, the hide, the horns, hooves and guts for tallow, the bones for mortar etc. Especially if I'm in a hunting community I'd love to offer that knowledge and the resources for those who don't have room (IE a public bone grinding mill and tallow vats that can be used first come first serve at the price of fuel) or at least a place for hunters to donate their excess body parts so that they can get put to use by me either practically or during demonstration.

[Mira O'Halloran]

That's the idea! We're going to get miniature goats and highland cattle and what not - takes up less space, which makes room for more! Kitty was showing us all these weird breeds of chickens, that she intends on getting.
We're also thinking of building a lodge to house people for running our courses. We're not too sure on what's going to happen - we're just concentrating on getting there.

Matt plans on dealing with all the slaughtering. I don't think i could stomach it. But you make a good point - trying to use all the animal parts so nothing goes to waste.

[Rook]

When the time and effort is put into it an animal has no waste. Even the bits we can't use or stomach can get ground up or chopped up and a dog will eat it. I've seen a dog swallow the entire contents of a rabbit's abdominal cavity in a single gulp and look at me like 'and that's all there is?"

[Mira O'Halloran]

Okay, Ew... I did not need to hear it put that baldly. I am aware the the "inedible" parts can be used for dog food. We plan on having from 4-10 dogs. I'm intending on getting two Huskies and two Malamutes, and I think Kitty is planning on getting a breeding trio of Bernese Mountain dogs. So, yay! Free dog food!
I might look into to a large slicer for dog feed, and I've found some brilliant sites on raw feeding.