So here's the hot off the press news from Tangly Woods: we welcomed three new piggies to Tangly Woods this morning! They are adjusting just fine to their new accommodations and seem pleased with the vast amount of food that awaited them. Terah and Alida got right on "piglet training" and some back scratches were accepted within the hour of their arrival.
We are all wrapped up with the 2023 hog butchering other than putting away the things set out to dry last night and slicing and freezing the bacons tomorrow after they have one more day to cure.
So here we are starting the yearly cycle over again! While I'd love if it worked for us to birth piglets here, it simplifies things considerably for us to buy them from a friend who raises pigs on pasture and is better set up for breeding than we are. Now we work to get them settled and comfy here as quickly as possible and give them a great home at Tangly Woods for the next year. 
Backing up to the hog butchering: this year we split up the schedule a bit differently due to the weather forecast of rain on Sunday (which came to fruition). And in the end it's quite possible we will continue with this system going forward as it made for a much calmer day 3! The more I get involved with the whole process, the harder it is to take a bunch of photos. And I still have mixed feelings about photographing some parts of it. It also doesn't look all that different from year to year, other than the size of the kids changing dramatically! I just looked back and this was our 5th year doing the butchering down at our place and the 4th year that Terah has been old enough to help cut up lard.
Here's the brief run down of the 4 main days:
Day 1: set up (thanks to Grant and Jason for doing the bulk of this - I'm in charge of making sure we have corn ground for ponhoss and gathering other supplies, along with having a food plan for feeding everyone throughout the butchering days). This lands on Friday so I actually left early that morning for a day of doula work and errands in town and came home to the outdoor space all set up and ready to go.
Day 2: killing, scalding, scraping, gutting, and halving. It's always very hard to roll out of bed when the 4:30 a.m. alarm goes off but I also savor watching the daylight return as we get the fire going to heat the water in the scalding trough. I always feel so relieved when the killing part goes smoothly (which is mostly did - even with the transition from lead to copper bullets). It was too warm to hang the halves in the garage overnight, so we were grateful for the use of the walk in cooler up the hill for that.
Day 3: cutting up the halves, cubing lard, grinding sausage, freezing various cuts, salting bacons. As predicted it rained off and on this entire day and we were very grateful for the roof over our heads that the garage provided. And that we were standing out in the rain trying to render lard and make ponhoss. It also meant that rather than being up late and working outside with headlamps to finish things up, we were done before dark! Terah alternated between helping and riding her bike between rain showers - that's the reason for her helmet, not that cutting up lard is likely to make you fall on your head!
Day 4: rendering lard, making ponhoss, and clean up! Day 4 is normally JUST clean up but we moved the outdoor fire processes to the non-rainy day, which ended up being a magical and gorgeous snowy morning. Other than keeping melting snow from falling into the lard kettle (Kali was on umbrella duty for a bit), this caused no major issues. We were putting lard in jars and ponhoss in pans by lunchtime and then had the rest of the afternoon for cleaning up and putting things away. When friends dropped by, we didn't have to scurry around in a panic but could visit for a bit. It was a lovely day (and I'll likely share additional photos in a subsequent post because I could not stop taking photos)...Terah and Alida were up with us before daybreak. We all enjoyed potatoes fried in the lard, pig tongue from the ponhoss kettle and taste testing ponhoss for the correct salt/pepper spicing.
All went really smoothly AND Jason and I were both exhausted at the end of yesterday. It feels like every year we learn a little more about how to make the process run smoothly and have a great butchering team! This year, I was somewhat distracted and glued to my phone since I was expecting to be yanked from the process at any point for a birth. In the end I was able to see the process through to the end (unless I'm called before bacon gets in the freezer!). I am feeling both gratitude for the three piggies that will provide us with delicious food over the next year and the fun the three new piggies will be providing us with in the coming weeks and months! Pigs are such enjoyable creatures to have around and are so entertaining to feed. I know they will get big fast on their rich slop, but for now it's fun to see the girls in there playing with them. 
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