5 Goals for 2017

Did you fill out the 'Goals for 2016' thread last year? https://permies.com/t/52527/Goals
Did you achieve your goals? More goals for 2017?

I certainly attempted my 5 goals of 2016, but some of them I'll have to reiterate as not quite yet completed!

1. Finish reading all my permaculture books (I said this last year, and I did so! But I've got more books since then)
2. Finish the 'ultimate greenhouse'! Foundations built last year, need to do the above ground half now.
3. Do some proper growing at the allotment, creating beds and planting things would be useful
4. Pay particular attention to trying to be self sufficient in onions and garlic.
5. Implement some strategy for growing greens throughout the whole year including winter, so we don't have to buy any.

Thank you for starting this thread, and congratulations on working toward your goals!

Most of my goals for 2016 are ongoing, so they return for 2017, plus more

1. Brush dams in the creek
2. Exclusion fencing around as many trees as I can manage
3. Set up composting system with chickens
4. Work on future food forest
5. Grow more staple foods and learn to eat them
6.  Set up paddock shift system for chickens
7. Zai Holes experiment
8. 30 Vegetables experiment
9. Set up Spiral Breeding scheme for chickens

This is a great thread, and really made me think about where my sweat equity is going this coming year. Here it goes:
1. Implement earthworks design
2. Begin establishing alley crop and silvopasture fields.
3. Acquire dairy cow
4. Expand chicken flock
5. Produce food year round from existing production space.

My wife and I try and just do one big farm related thing per year. That is enough. A few smaller goals inevitably get done, but I have learned over the years to devote myself to a big project and try to carry it out to fruition. Over the years it really has paid off.

Our ultimate goal is 200 more sheep, but for this year, it simply will be to put up 100% of our own feed. Having it done for us has just been a hassle these last few years. So While it is not the ultimate goal, it is a major step to getting a few more sheep probably the year after in 2018.

Well, I'm not usually one for doing the whole 'New Year's resolutions' thing, but I do have some goals:

5 Garden Goals

• Finish beds in fenced area, and fence another 1/2 acre or so to expand market garden
• Get the small food forest going in the garden
• Landscape front yard/Zone 1 - includes small kitchen garden, plantings around pond, incorporating edibles and more flowers, and getting TM to get his potted trees, shrubs, palms, and bamboos in the ground.
• Preserve more food - drying, freezing, canning, cold room storage
• Greenhouse - I hope, I hope, I hope

• And a bonus goal - make more money so I can do all of the above.  

5 Personal Goals

• Patience - get some
• Tolerance - practice more
• Relationship - sigh, needs work, and I’m not good at it.
• Exercise - yeah, well . . .
• Art - not doing enough, because I feel guilty doing it when there are so many other things to do that I’m already not doing.

I think that's enough for one year . . .

Goals:

(1) Up my veggie production. Finish three garden beds, build a new one, and continue to maintain my 3 other hugel/garden beds. Focusing on growing beets, squash, radishes, beans/peas, carrots, broccoli, tomatilloes and maybe potatoes.
(2) Plant at least two more fruit trees (one of which will be my baby's 1 Year fruit tree).
(3) Expand my berry production further, transplanting golden raspberries into my salmonberry hedges and thimbleberries into the woods.
(4) Get the himalayan blackberry and bindweed under control.
(5) Get my property back in shape since I couldn't do much last year (trim the paths, weed/replant my fruit tree guilds)

I've got more than 5.  I'll list 10 for now.  I might be able to accomplish more... or less.  Well see.

1.)Take part in my first PDC, finally. Just signed up for Geoff Lawton's online course this week.
2.)Learn how to weld (I'm beginning my training in February for work).
3.)Build my first RMH
4.)Build a stone/steel and cordwood sauna with the RMH barrel in the sauna.
5.)Build a insulated solarium/greenhouse with the RMH bell benches in the greenhouse.
6.)Build a massive sunken wood bed under most of the greenhouse area and build raised hugulkulturs where the beds will be.
7.)Expand my orchard with more trees and more sheet mulching for potato beds.
8.)Fence my main veggie garden.
9.)Document/film/photos
10)Share the projects more on permies.

Tracy Wandling wrote:
• Exercise - yeah, well . . .

Hey, if you meet all your garden goals, that's a lot a lot of exercise!

Good point, Nicole! There now, I've already reached one goal. Success!!

If my life continues along the same path in 2017 as it did in 2016, I'll feel like it's been a successful year. So for me, I'm hoping for more of the same. Good food, good wine, good friends, good lovers, good health, good growing.

Edited to add: And get some chikens.

Realistic goals.

Tracy Wandling wrote:Well, I'm not usually one for doing the whole 'New Year's resolutions' thing, but I do have some goals:

5 Personal Goals

• Patience - get some
• Tolerance - practice more
• Relationship - sigh, needs work, and I’m not good at it.
• Exercise - yeah, well . . .
• Art - not doing enough, because I feel guilty doing it when there are so many other things to do that I’m already not doing.

Great personal goals!

Mine have always been about improving myself in some way.  One year it was about learning about the different Wine Regions.

2017 Goals

1. Carryover from last years is to learn to successfully plant from seed. [Both success and failure last year]
2. Add herbs to the perennial plant bed aka Monarch Garden.
3. Carryover from last year is to grow lavender  [total failure after trying three different ways, probably was the seed.]
4.  Carry over from last year is to improve food plots for deer [every year goal]
5. Plant Medicinal Garden

I seem to have been in near-constant state of burnout over the last year, and I think I need to set a completely different type of goal to usual to try to get me back to a more productive state.

1. Improve my time management skills so that I can achieve more while not feeling so overwhelmed by it all.
2. Take a day or two 'off' every week to concentrate on myself instead of all the things that need doing here on permies.
3. Concentrate my gardening efforts on one relatively small area that I can care for without spreading myself too thinly.
4. Pay attention to my post-menopausal (hopefully...) status and learn what changes I need to make to care for myself physically as well as I can. This will definitely involve going for more walks!
5. Start to write again.  My concentration span hasn't been good enough lately and I seem to promise reviews and never complete them, let alone write anything original.  

here are a few things on my list

1. stay healthy so I make it through the year (eat good, walk, etc)

2. continue to work with some young people to get them interested in permaculture related things

3. encourage them to work work on long term projects I won't see the results of
 http://quotevadis.com/post/33434415979/greek-proverb-society-grows-great-when
“A society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade they know they will never sit in.”
I paraphrased this to:
"a society grows great when old men plant trees whose fruit they know they will never eat"

it's a sign I put besides my seedlings that I sell

4. putz around my property and continue to build garden beds to eliminate the need to mow grass

5. play nice with everyone

1) Finish the foundation, walls, and roof of my  new cob/bale house

2) get some clover, vetch, and turnips working to improve my clay soils

3) Plant a dozen new fruit/nut trees

4) Wim Hof breathing/cold condition everyday

5) Go Pooless

6) Save some money to do a PDC!  Come on 2017!!!

1. dig kratergarden or sunken greenhouse
2.  transform inground pool hole into kratergarden, filling it only as much as needed for stability with earth dug out of kratergarden in 1.
3. build better herb drying setup and better quarters for wwoofers in attic of barn
4. get good at grafting, practice a lot, especially grafting the most yummy of apple trees which happens to be the farthest away from the house onto the numerous crab apple trees that are close to the house
5. when the twins turn seven in July give them knives and teach them knife safety, sharpening and technique

1. Finish "zone zero" so we can move out of our site shed...
2. Finish zone 1 - predominately terracing work and more hugel beds
3. Start zone two planning and earthworks
4. Get our first livestock and therefore cash flow (600 chickens coming in March for paddock shift/pasture raised - eggs)

Other things I'd like:
- Build first dam/pond, hopefully one of many (Sepp Style )
- Prepare site and cover crops for future food forest planning
- Build a machinery shed and some other infrastructure i.e. roads etc

1. Complete privacy screen along two main sections - privacy screens will double as wildlife habitat with native edibles included.
2. Complete re-purposed concrete patio with fire pit.
3. Finish design for early succession native seed mix for my property - to replace old hay field grasses and prepare soil for future food forest.
4. Complete prep work for main herb garden - wood chips, installing re-purposed concrete stepping stones.
5. Install main paths leading out from zone 1 into zone 2 and 3 areas for future work in those zones.

My five goals!

I won't call these resolutions nor goals, but they are high on my priority list.....

...increase my trading network. I'd like to add a ready source of fresh fish and fresh milk. And I'd enjoy adding more baked goods to my trading network too.
...develop a farm income. While the farm already produces food and resources, I would like to see an income of around $5000 this year. That's a start.
...complete the house. I still have the bathroom to complete, plus a few littler things to finish up.
...improve the pastures. Not a job that will be completed this year, but I'd like to see some significant headway made into improving my pastures.
...create slug-free gardens for fresh greens. I'm actually working on this project right now. My first experiment will be completed and in use within the month.  I hope it works.

I have lots more on my list, but these are the top five I'd really like to see happen.

1) Finish harvesting the wood where my new field is going
2) Move a barn to serve as additional sheep housing
3) Buy a flail chopper so I can put up my own sheep feed
4) Install silage pad for winter feed

While I really do not have a 5th goal this year, honestly I will rarely LOVE to have another baby with my wife (obviously). She is all set with 4 daughters, but I would love to have a son and I just love kids. I grew up in a foster hoe where my parents took in hundreds of foster kids, and I was a foster parent myself; one of the greatest accomplishments of my life. I JUST LOVE KIDS. It probably won't happen, she is now 37 and that ship is sailing, but...

My 2016 goals were:
1) fix our backyard drainage issue by regrading - not achieved yet
2) sheet mulch the prime garden area and put in keyhole beds - mulched with wood chips instead and put in raised beds instead of keyholes
3) rip out unwanted decorative hedges and replace them with food-bearing bushes (probably berries) - done, 8 blueberry bushes went in
4) set up a real hot compost pile - not achieved
5) build raised beds in the front yard - I put them in the back instead

For 2017, 6 goals
1) Many Zone 0 improvements: structural fix, chimney fix, add a wood stove; possibly upgrade our front awning to a wood mini-roof and/or add a back deck
2) Fix the drainage!
3) Put in more slow-growing perennials (possibly: pawpaws, groundnut, asparagus, sea kale, rhubarb, wintergreen)
4) Make more efficient use of my planting space for annuals
5) Put in 2-4 cold frames and plant them early enough to harvest greens during the winter
6) Put in giant sunflowers to screen the summer sun on the southern windows

Last year was the first year I've had land to work with, so it was a year of observing, learning, repairs, and equipment. It's an old high-country cow camp with a bunch of old buildings built from the '20s onward. But the family that owned it hadn't been there in about 15 years when we bought it. I had a lot of vague goals, and to my surprise we accomplished most of them!

Cleaned out all the cabins and got a heat source in the living spaces.

Fixed all the broken pipes and got running water back (+ hot showers in the bath house!)

Took down half a dozen dead trees around the cabin (~100-150ft each) and turned them into firewood, hugel beds, and mulch.

Acquired a Backhoe, UTV, and Snowcat (!)

Built up one hugel bed and dug out a small pond in front of the barn with the backhoe.

During the winter, the land turns into a ski-in snow park, so any serious work is on hold. It's a good time to focus on workshop work, reading, computer time, and planning for the upcoming summer. I'm feeling a lot more confident about clear goals this year so I'm going to try and keep myself accountable in 2017:

Finish the composting toilet. Materials acquired and foundation/platform is built.

Build a skiddable solar shed and get weather stations / security cameras running.

Finish major earthworks for barn garden and (hopefully) build a deer fence.

Build an underground greenhouse.

Get at least one more person seriously involved in the land.

My goals for the year:
1.  Finish sugar shack (maple syrup building)
2.  Design/build passive solar compost heated tropical/citrus greenhouse
3.  Plant at least 15 trees/berries in the food forest area
4.  Learn how to and then make hard apple cider
5.  Bike to town instead of drive a few times (hopefully a lot of times)

I have so many goals. Probably too many. Here are a few for this year:

1. Read everything I can, but particularly, Gaia's Garden and Carol Deppe's books.
2. Work on the forest garden and more traditional garden areas to get food production for us and the animals up and going.
3. Establish our chicken flock, get their coop safe and secure, let them free range in the day and have compost piles nearby. Minimize feed costs by growing what we can, sprouting seeds, and allowing them to range in the barnyard and forest.
4. Improve fencing, gates and paths to protect plants and animals, and provide structure and access to areas we use. Make what I can from scratch or free/inexpensive materials but pay attention to aesthetics too. Use natural materials (wood, stone, living fences) wherever possible.
5. Work on the "pond" to be more of an actual pond.
6. Plant some trees and perennials.
7. Save all the seeds!