Momma Dragon's Homestead

Today I'm talking with Susan at Momma Dragon's Homestead. www.patreon.com/atinyhomestead Muck Boots Calendars.Com If you'd like to support me in growing this podcast, like, share, subscribe or leave a comment. Or just buy me a coffee https://buymeacoffee.com/lewismaryes 00:00 You're listening to A Tiny Homestead, the podcast comprised entirely of conversations with homesteaders, cottage food producers, and crafters. I'm your host, Mary Lewis. Today I'm talking with Susan at Mama Dragon's Homestead in Maryland, of all places. Good morning, Susan, how are you? Good morning, I'm doing well. How are you? Well, let's be honest, you and I are both coming off of a two-week sickness. And if I sound rough, it's because I have had the most 00:26 ridiculously miserable head cold upper respiratory thing since two Tuesdays ago. And how long have you had it? It's been about the same. I'm on week three and doing so much better than I was before. My tonsils decided that they were going to get huge on me. So but it's something that my kids brought home for sure. Yeah, my kid went to see his girlfriend and she had been sick and I didn't know she'd been sick. 00:54 And I think he brought it home from her place. So I'm kind of mildly displeased with him, but I love him. And so I'm just like, eh, it could have been my husband bringing it home from work. can't find anybody to blame. I just have to be miserable. So if Susan sounds snorky or I sound snorky, that's why. And listener, if you are smart, 01:19 try to make sure you wash your hands and if you feel okay about it wear a mask when you go out in public because it is going around. Yeah it is. It's gross you do not want this. It has been so bad. Okay so first off I'm so happy that you're you're well enough to chat with me and second off why is it mama dragons homestead? um I really really love dragons. um 01:47 I was definitely uh kind of a horse girl growing up. But then like in middle school, was like, you know what? I'm going to just make these look like dragons now. dragons have just been something that I've loved for most of my life. And I'm an artist as well. So I draw a lot of dragons. uh I didn't want uh my homestead to be uh 02:17 a name that I already have online elsewhere or anything. I tried to make it kind of, well, I love dragons. So I'm a mama. Here's dragons. Mama dragon. Well, it's attention getting because I saw it on Facebook and I was like, hmm, what is this? Does she raise dragons? Do they exist? My kids, my kids are all grown. But if you had figured out a way to find dragon eggs, hatch them and raise dragons, they would have been all over that. Oh, if I 02:46 you'll be the first to know because I'm all about that. Yeah, the book that got my youngest hooked on reading was Aragon and he talked about dragon eggs incessantly for months after he read that book. I actually have read that one too. think I was um in middle school as well when I read that one. ah But my first uh big dragon series book was Anna Caffrey's Dragon Riders of Fern. Mine too. 03:14 love that series. Absolutely love it. Me too. And what I didn't know when I started, the first one I read, we're going to get into books for a minute, was The White Dragon because I didn't know there were other books before that one. And that's the one that got me sucked in. And then as a young adult, I learned that there were so many more. And then I think she's died now. think Emma Caffrey has passed. So there will be no more Pern books. And I'm kind of sad about it. 03:44 She did collaborate with her son. So her son has, they've got books that they've done together and some that he's done. So there's still some Anne McCaffrey magic out there. I may have to dig into it. I haven't read one in a long time. Okay. Well, anyone who's a reader and loves dragons and loves words, go find the Pern series because it is fabulous. So I don't want to get into books too much because I am a word nerd and a 04:12 book geek and we could spend two hours and that's not what this podcast is about. keep joking that I need to start a book podcast and I just don't have the time right now to invest in a second podcast. So maybe if I do do one in a year or so, I'll have to have you come back and we'll talk books. But what do you do at Mama Dragon's Homestead? What are you guys going on there? um So we just started out. This is 04:40 This is my first year homesteading and I literally took a nose dive into it. um And in February, me and my kids started planting our little garden. had pumpkins, corn, uh tomato, every tomato. planted way too many tomatoes. um Zucchini, we got that all going and I felt like really hopeful for it. I'm actually terrible at keeping any kind of plant thing alive. So the fact that uh 05:09 it was working was really exciting and encouraging for me. And then I was going to be getting into canning. um But on ...