The Green Shack

A Tiny Homestead

Today I'm talking with Brittany at The Green Shack. You can also follow them on Facebook.

00:00
This is Mary Lewis at a tiny homestead. The podcast comprised entirely of conversations with homesteaders, cottage food producers, and crafters. Today I'm talking with Brittany at the Green Shack. Good morning, Brittany. How are you? Good morning. I'm good. How are you? I'm great. Um, tell me about yourself and the Green Shack. So I am, um, a horticulturist and we started the Green Shack to do, um, landscaping and things.

00:29
Um, and then I found out that I had rheumatoid arthritis and decided that landscaping was probably not a good idea. Yep. We pivoted and are doing more of a hobby arts farm. Um, but we do lots of crafts and birthday parties and, uh, we've got some animals. We've got goats and chickens and ducks and the rabbit.

00:58
and bees and I host Girl Scouts and 4-H and more of a community event kind of thing than landscaping, yes. So you're doing everything. Yeah, a little bit of all of it. Very nice. So I have a question about you being a horticulturalist. Yeah. My former neighbor was too credit shy of being a horticulturalist, like she went to school for it.

01:27
She's my age, she's 54, I think she might be 55 now. And she was saying that she got a lot of pushback from the males in the industry telling her that women didn't do well as horticulturalists. And granted my neighbor was a little tiny lady, she's like 5'5 and maybe 100 pounds spoken with. Did you get any pushback? Because I'm assuming you're not 55.

01:58
So it was a different time. Not 55. I went to school when I was about 30. I did not have any pushback because my teacher was a woman. Nice. And she had been in the industry for 25, 30 years.

02:17
but I didn't feel any kickback from her, I guess. There are...

02:26
There's always men out there that feel that women can't do the things men can or surprised when a woman can do the things men can do. Um, so there have been a couple of boomers that have stated like, wow, you can drive a Bobcat and, oh, you hooked that trailer on yourself. Or like careful that's heavy and it's a 50 pound bag of feed and I throw it over my shoulder and walk away. Um, yeah. Yeah.

02:55
So there's just, there's comments like that, that I think as a woman, we're always going to get. As far as like the science wise, I haven't had any, I haven't had any pushback or weird comments about that. I think, I'm not sure when your friend went to school. I'm assuming it was like right after high school and to college. And I mean, 30, 40 years between that and now.

03:25
there's been a lot more acceptance of women in the science fields. Yeah, I think it was probably a generational thing. Absolutely.

03:37
And I hate to put boomers down, but that's kind of their mentality is more of women are supposed to be in the home and doing cooking and cleaning and stuff. Right. That's just how they grew up and I get it, but we're not there anymore. So no, thank goodness. We're not there anymore. In defense of boomers, my, my parents are boomers and my, my dad, because obviously he's male, um, was very, very pro.

04:06
Go do the thing you want to do with me. Yeah. So, so it's not all of them, but just like the generation before my parents generation, the men tended to be very quiet. They didn't, they weren't very social and they weren't real good about expressing feelings. So we've come a long way, baby. We have. Yes. Okay. So I was reading your story on your website and

04:34
I love how this came about. Can you share about the beginning to now? I guess which part of the beginning do you want me to talk about? Whatever the beginning was on the website. I could look, but I don't remember. Let me look and I'll double check here. Just so I don't move forward or I don't hear them. Yeah, that's fine. While you're looking it up, the way I found you is my mother-in-law actually texted me and she had been doing some...

05:03
some researching for classes and found you guys' website. Well, that's awesome. She said, can you, do you want to see if they want to talk with you? I was like, yes, yes, I do. Thank you. Yeah, I was surprised that you had reached out. It's really, we still haven't gotten a lot of.

05:22
I guess I can't think of the words right now, but for us publicity, publicity marketing. Um, I've gotten some like outstanding things, like things, weird things that are like, I never would have thought that it would be something that we would be a part of. Um, and then other weird things like, or just like local small publication kind of stuff. So, yeah. Let's see here.

05:53
I'm looking to while you're looking, so we're both typing. Just as far as like opening a business, we've always, my husband and I have always kind of wanted to do our own thing. Um, he's a military vet served in Iraq for a little while. And I just, I, we got married pretty much right out of high school and he joined the military and I went to.

06:22
Cosmetology school and I wasn't, I wasn't super happy with doing people's hair all the time. It was more of a, this is where I'm going to start and I'll figure things out later.

06:41
He, he has struggled with some PTSD in the past and was getting better. And I was like, well, I don't have to focus a lot of my time, like making sure he's okay. Um, so then I went to horticulture school and got my horticulture degree. And while we, while I was in, while I was in school, sorry, the birds are being loud. Um, we, we were looking around at areas that we could.

07:11
maybe open a business in this beautiful 7.25 acre piece of land with some large buildings came up for sale. And we.

07:28
We decided to go for it. It's, it wasn't the prettiest inside of the buildings when we bought it. Um, it was kind of a hoarders, mechanical hoarders paradise. It was, yeah, it was very clustered, claustrophobic-y kind of, there's just stuff everywhere. Um, it took about a year to clean it. At least we could get into one part of the building.

07:57
And then I was going to start doing classes for like, like, you succulents and learning how to propagate and kind of, depending on how they wanted to do it more of like pollinator gardens and edible perennial kind of things and how to incorporate them into your gardens. And those kinds of things.

08:28
And then COVID hit, so then it was another year, at least of cleaning and organizing and prepping and a lot of taking care of animals and figuring out what we were going to do with all that. And that it was 2021 and I was finally able to start kind of. Opening up and letting people in and we started doing.

08:54
We did.

08:58
In 2022, we decided to start doing some more community events. So we did. And community Easter egg hunt. So the Easter egg hunt was free and we had. I don't know, like 200 kids in here hunting for eggs and we went through 1000 eggs in like 10 minutes and. We had to we had the reassess our plan for that and.

09:26
And then we did a Halloween event that year and started doing more classes and more. Marketing and I've just kind of expanded from there. I do a lot of classes through community and I've hosted multiple birthday parties and.

09:49
business events. It's just kind of a fun place to hang out. There's lots of little kid events, little kid things to do, but everybody loves to snuggle bunnies and baby goats. Yes. Animals here are button quail, so everybody's fascinated with them. I thought it was kittens in the background at first when I first heard it. I was like, does she have a kitten? And then I was like, no, I think it's a bird. It sounds like a really fun business. Like

10:17
Like you must wake up in the morning and be like, what do I get to do today? Yep. Pretty much. Yeah. I'm not, I'm not the greatest at being able to market myself. Um, I'm not good at with words, but I'm getting there and we're getting more and more like every, I feel like every day people are like, Oh, I haven't heard of the green shack or I've heard of you, but I don't know what's going on out there. And then I try to explain it and I feel like I just stumble over my words.

10:46
And I really am just pushing people to come out here and see what it is and what we do and they get kind of a better feel of the space and what we can offer. Yeah. So is Oetana right near you? It's about 30 minutes west of us. Okay. So what's the biggest town near you? Is that it or city? It's 30 minutes the other way to the east. So you're right in between. Okay.

11:15
All right, well, I am I have a marketing background and I'm pretty good at publicity. So maybe I can think of some things to help you with your with telling people about what you do in an elevator speech. I would be happy to do that. Well, we have to make elevator speeches, but we just do so much that it's hard to come up with. And that short way of explaining, you could call it the fun zone, but that's already taken.

11:43
I had a question from what you were saying five minutes ago. I'm trying to catch it get it back. Um, um, um, um Mmm now I can't remember That is I have got I've got to get a notebook and put it beside me when I'm talking with people because I think Things and I get listening and I forget what I was gonna ask you. Uh so

12:09
Yeah, stuck. Can't remember what it was. Um, um um um, I shouldn't say um, I'm gonna have to edit it out.

12:16
Oh, I know what it was. In this day and age of people being able to go out to YouTube and learn how to do something just by watching someone else do it. It's amazing to me that people still sign up for actual in-person classes and I'm glad that they do because I think there's a real community that gets built when people go to a class instead of just sitting in their living room watching a video of how something is done. Absolutely.

12:44
So do you have a lot of people take your classes? Not a lot yet. Like I said, I'm not great at marketing. Community Ed has been helping a lot, just getting the name out there, offering specific classes for people and times and dates and stuff that seems to help. I have found that a lot of people that come in are like, oh yeah, I've seen this on YouTube and I've always wanted to do it, but I've never made the time.

13:13
Or I've never like, cause you have to make the time to go shopping for all the supplies, right? And then you have to get them all out and then you have to make the thing. And then you have to clean up afterwards where I have a two hour, let's say a schedule where you come, I have everything set out for you. You start making your thing, have a lot of fun. You can bring your own beverages and food and whatever, and have a good time. And then.

13:39
You don't even have to clean up. You can just bring your fun project home and I'll clean up afterwards. So. So it's like going to a birthday party and walking away with the hostess gift. Yeah. Fun. That's awesome. So you said you have goats. Everyone knows who listens to my podcast. They know that I love goats. I love baby goats. We do not have any because I'm not keeping goats. Do you do anything with the milk from the goats? We do.

14:08
As far as right now, we do a lot of goat milk soap. Um, and I even do like a class, so it's $50 and you come in and you get. The one it's like ends up being like 10, 10 or 11 squares of soap that you get at the end of it, but you get to put in your own sense and your own colors. And, um, it only ends up being about a half an hour of work and then you come pick it up the next day after I cut it.

14:37
Oh, that's really fun. Yeah, that's brilliant. I love that. We, we make, we make cold process, processed lye soap here. And I say we, but actually my husband makes it cause I do not like playing with lime water. It makes me nervous. We use the lye in, with the goat milk instead of water. And then we actually use it with goat milk, ice cubes, frozen goat milk. And it.

15:06
keeps the temperature down and the fumes down and it's not quite as a toxic substance as it would be if you just put it in regular water. Not quite as scary. Yeah. We have friends who have goats and her goats are due anytime now. I'm hoping to get some goat's milk from her and I'm going to tell my husband about what she said and be like, you want to try making goat's milk instead of water? Because I hear it's safer.

15:35
Yeah, so I put it in the freezer in ice cube form and it makes it a little easier to measure it out properly. I mean, you could do it by weight and then put it in the freezer. Yeah, but then you don't have to wait for it quite as long melt with the lie. And then.

15:55
Oh, and then it doesn't burn the milk. So because the lye, you know, the reaction of the lye and the water, the chemical reaction between the two actually heats up. Really hot, yeah. Really, really hot. Yep. So, and it can burn that milk pretty quickly. So we use ice milk instead of milk. Okay. Do you dry your soaps in your house or do you have a place on your property where you dry them?

16:23
Um, I have, I have created a couple of small cupboards that I drew it in. Um, I've got one, I just let it, I do let it do the original setting for just on our shelves, we've got some shelving in here, but just let it sit on the shelf and the opening or to draw and then we cut it and then it will either stick it in tote that's got some.

16:53
racks that I've made to put in it and then a dehumidifier, one of those containers that dehumidify. I told that does that and then I've got a little cabinet that I can put it in. So that's great. When we dry ours, we have we have racks in our bedroom actually that we set our soaps on. And our whole house smells so good every time we make a new batch that's sent in.

17:22
And it lasts for about a week. Like it's really permeating the house. Yeah. My favorite is lemon. And I also, we also do an orange clove cinnamon. And the whole house smells like autumn for that week that they're, that they're fresh, they're brand new. So I had been using just, um, bottles of essential oils that I had.

17:51
accumulated over the years. Um, and I haven't really found. Well, they don't, the sense from them don't last very long. So people are like, what does it smell like? And I'm like, it smells like soap. It's the sense that I put in there just don't last. That's one of the things that I've had to, it's on my long list of things to do is to find sense that actually works. Well, the only ones that really, really, really last are the fragrance oils. And.

18:21
They're not all natural, which is a bummer. The strongest scent that we've used is lemongrass for essential oil. And it lasts for a month, maybe, if you don't actually use the soap. But once the thing that people don't realize is that once you use the soap in the shower or the bathtub, within a day or two, that kick you in the face scent, it's real quick. And it's really sad.

18:51
I don't know if you know about Blue Heron Soap Company and I think they're Blue Heron Home now, they changed their name. They're in Minnesota. And the lady that owns it now, she does an oatmeal almond that I fell in love with back years ago at the Renaissance Festival. That's where I got the first bar of soap. And the company was owned by a different lady at the time. And that is the only soap that has kept its scent.

19:19
And it's a cold press process. Lysol, I can't say process for some reason this morning. And it, it's beautiful. I love it. And I have been trying to replicate this for, well, my husband and I have been trying to replicate this scent for the last two years, and I very politely asked the, the one that owns the company now. I said, is there any chance you would tell me what you use for scents? And she's like, I want to, but I can't.

19:46
Cause like I understand, I just thought it was worth a shot because you don't want to give away your trade secrets. It's always worth a shot to ask and the worst they say is no. Right? Yeah. So we got close, but the scent doesn't stay past like three showers, which is a big bummer because hers do. Hers smells like that pretty much until the bar is gone. And I really want to know what it is. I'm never going to know. It's never going to happen. But

20:13
Um, for anyone who's never made soap, it's really easy. It's just that you really have to learn how to do it and you have to be really careful using lye and even if you use goat milk, goat's milk for in place of the water, you still need to be careful with the lye. Yeah. I found well from going from here to doing all of this, I mean, we deal with chemicals doing here all the time and the bleach peroxide mix is about the same.

20:43
I don't want to say toxicity because that's not the right word but if I... Is that what you mean, maybe? Maybe. So if I get the bleach peroxide mix on my fingers, it kind of turns white and like it kind of burns but it doesn't really burn and that's the same kind of reaction that will happen with the lye. Except for the lye also has lots of fumes and stuff that go with it if you're using just regular water. So you want to make that word?

21:12
wearing gloves and a mask if you need it and safety glasses. So yeah and if you're going to do it in an enclosed space you need to have ventilation because it will make you pass out or it will kill you if you're not careful. Okay so you were talking about your quail. Are your quail suicide addicts? Because I keep reading about the fact that quail will find any way to unalive themselves.

21:39
So these are button quail. So I'm not sure if you're talking about like, white quail, um, button quail are smaller. They're about the size of a newborn chick at their adult size. And they get to that about eight to 10 weeks, they start laying eggs. So from hatch to eight to 10 weeks. Um, and their eggs are about the size of a

22:04
Bumblebee, so they're pretty small. Yeah. I haven't had any that just like up and unalive themselves. I've had a few that like, they're fine one day and then I'll come in the next day and they're just dead. And I don't know why they had food and water and clean bedding and they're just gone.

22:31
But out of the like 200 I've had in the last year, I think it only happened maybe five or six times. So it's not like it's a super common occurrence. It's just because of the amount of birds that I've had go through here. Yeah. Okay. So if you have that many quail, are you selling the eggs? Because I can't imagine you using that many eggs for your... No. The eggs, because I said they're like the size of a bumblebee, right? They're pretty small.

23:00
We do a lot of hard boiling and pickling them. They're just like a nice easy snack or you can throw a couple on a salad.

23:12
They last a little longer that way. Okay. And, and do you sell quail meat or you just don't sell anything from the quail? So I don't, I don't sell anything from the quail. I, and this may sound, um, worthless, but I have a snake at home that only, I got it as a secondhand snake and she's 14 or 15 years old now and she will only eat live. Yeah.

23:42
And I do all of my incubating and hatching and grow them up to the eight weeks. If I've got a lot more males than females, then a lot of the males will go home. Oh, that's fine. That makes sense. Any, I kind of a realist on things. So like I do the hatching, any eggs that don't hatch or any chicks that like don't survive, they just go out to the big birds, the chickens will eat them.

24:12
I try not to waste things. We have enough waste in life, in the state. Especially food waste. All my food waste goes out to the chickens and ducks and goats and they eat pretty much everything they can. So you were saying that you do birthday parties and things. When you do birthday parties, do you let the kids hang out with the goats?

24:40
Yep. So we do, um, well, I guess I shouldn't just say, yep, it depends on what the parents want to do. So I have children, they are now 14 and almost 11. And I had found that birthday parties, you'd go to a place or they'd want to do, let's say bounce housing, right? So you go to the bounce house place and it's like $200 and the minimum amount of kids.

25:10
or the minimum amount is like $200 and you have 10 kids there and you have to order food through them and you have to do this and you have to do that. And then your bill at the end of the day ends up being like five, $600. Um, I didn't like that. I like things to be cheaper if the family needs it cheaper or easier and more expensive depending, you know, depending on what the family can do and what they need. So I offer multiple different things.

25:38
So it's only $25 an hour and birthdays parties that we typically do two hours. So it's $50 rental fee for the space. And then we do like the petting zoo. If it's, depending on if it's summer or winter, we can go outside and they each get like a cup of feed and then they can kind of spread the feed out or like hand feed, whatever animals come up to them. Or we can do

26:08
indoor stuff and we just set up this little pen area with, and bring in a goat or two. And then we've got bunnies that they can snuggle and it all kind of depends on the time of year and what the families want. Um, we have a mining sluice. So that's one of the water things that you put the sand and gems into like a strainer. Kind of like running for gold, right? So we've got a big one of those that they can choose to do if they want to. We've got.

26:38
All the different crafts that we offer, a big one has been fairy gardens. The kiddos love fairy gardens. So they get a little dish with some soil and then they get to pick out their plants. And then they get to just go crazy on decorating it. And some of them go crazy on decorating it. And some of them just pick out a couple of decorations and throw them in there and call it good. Yeah. I love fairy gardens. I think there's one. It's been a big hit for all the kiddos. They really like it.

27:08
But yeah, so it's a pick and choose and you can decide, you can bring your own food, have it catered or just bring in food that you made. It doesn't matter to me. I'm sure there are health laws somewhere that you're not supposed to do that. But if you're having it at your house, you can do whatever you want. And I'm sure like a birthday party. Not all of us to have the kind of money that can support a...

27:35
$200 bill from Casey's for just pizza. So yes, it's all kind of I just I try to be more flexible that way about things Okay, I have two other questions one is about Photoshoots and one is about weddings. Have you guys ever hosted a wedding? I've not hosted weddings. I'm not super interested in it Having done hair before I know how

28:02
crazy people get with weddings and how specific and I get it. It's a big day. I don't want to be a part of it. Okay. That's reasonable. I love that. You know what you want to do. Um, and then photo shoots, photo shoots. Do you let people come out and do photo shoots on your property? You want to say? Absolutely. What I haven't had. I had one friend, a friend that's, um, kind of like an aspiring photographer. She came out and a bunch of girlfriends came out and got dressed up and she did a photo shoot out here.

28:32
Um, so that was a couple of years ago now and I haven't had anybody come out and do anything since. Okay. I'm absolutely open to it. We've got some great areas. I've got a little, um, prairie area that I throw a bunch of wild flower seeds into every spring and it turns into a really pretty flowery field. Yeah. Um, and then there's the goats and stuff that we can always bring out and do pictures. And we have.

29:00
I've had some really bad wind storms the last couple of years and I've taken down a couple of trees. So we've got some fun trees that are just laying down that you can stand on or sit near or whatever is a fun. Yeah, I was just thinking your place would be a great place for high school graduation photos or like Easter pictures even because you have bunnies and you have a goat. Yeah, you have ducks too. Yep, we've got ducks and we got all that stuff. We do.

29:30
We do a big Easter egg hunt, like I said. We do, last year we had, I want to say over 100 kids because they had over a thousand eggs and we only had like 21 at the end of the day.

29:50
And I do like the big wooden cutouts where it's like got the big picture and then it's got the face cut out. I've painted a few of those for Easter so you can be the Easter bunny or Easter egg or just some flowers. Cute. Yeah. So I do, I try to, I try to create a space where families can come together and be a part of the community and like want to get out of the house and away from screens and.

30:20
I love what you're doing. It sounds so much fun. If you had been around when my kids were young I definitely would have brought the kids out. My kids are not young anymore. They're grown. And then I have one more question because I was thinking about it and I'm going to ask. When you are getting ready for an event like a birthday party or the Easter egg hunt or any of it.

30:45
Do you get anxiety about it? Do you get butterflies in your stomach? Are you like, oh, I hope it goes well? Um.

30:55
I feel like that's a multi-part question, but only because like, I don't, and that might seem strange to people. But I have had, my husband and I have been together for 18 years and 17 years of that. He's had PTSD for being overseas. So I have had to learn.

31:19
to not necessarily control my emotions, but to not be so anxious about everything because he is so anxious about everything. So one of us has to keep a level head. Yeah. So I've had to do a lot of like meditating and breathing and making sure I center myself before things get out of hand. And I just, I don't feel the panic anymore.

31:48
I just, I know I need to get things done and I get them done and I make sure things are ready before people get here. If things aren't perfect, they're not perfect in my eyes, no one's going to know the difference. Yeah. That's just kind of how I, how I take things anymore. Okay. The reason I ask is I was, I was getting myself ready to chat with you this morning because about an hour before I do the interviews, I start thinking about what I want to ask and how it's going to go and that stuff.

32:17
And it it will not stop an hour before I'm supposed to interview somebody. It doesn't matter who it is My my stomach gets kind of fluttery and I get kind of kind of anxious about it And I have to take a big deep breath and go I'm just having a conversation with someone And if it sucks, I don't put it out and if it's great It's gonna be great and I have to remind myself every time I've been doing this since August you would think I would be past this But I'm not

32:47
Sometimes it takes longer. Like I said, I've been doing it for years. So like, I just

32:54
I try to stay at a constant, it is what it is, and it's gonna be what it's gonna be, and there's not a whole lot of.

33:08
You can only prep so much for things, right? So like there's only, the only so much you can do. And if you've gotten to that point before it starts, then there'll be it. And that's, it's just, it's just going to be, it's going to be, and there's really no reason to stress so much about it. Yes. And the minute I sit down and the people come in, whoever it is I'm talking to, who shows up in the room to be recorded. I'm like, Hey, how are you? And everything's fine. But.

33:34
that hour before I'm like, I'm doing this again. This is great. But at least it's only the hour before and not like, you know, you message me, what was it just yesterday or the day before yesterday? Yeah. Like, at least it wasn't like, Oh, I found this person. I'm going to message them about it. And then you're like, that's when it starts and you start panicking from. No, that's how it was with the first couple though. Like I've, I've never done something like this before. And.

34:04
When I had two people say yes, the first two people I asked, they said yes. And I was like, Oh, Oh, Oh, I'm going to actually do this. Okay. This is new and it's fine. I love it. I love talking to you guys about what you're doing because I always learn something and I feel like I'm promoting you and I'm promoting your ideas and I'm promoting things that are good for the planet. Like everything that I'm doing is, is good. And I want to do good. Yeah.

34:33
And you're better at this part of it than I am. I'm terrible at, like I've always wanted to do a YouTube channel or just a podcast and talk to random people about all the crazy things. And like, I just, I can't get to that point, but. You're also super busy. My goodness. So many things going on all the time. It takes time to put on a, on a podcast to produce a podcast. It does. Yep. I, yep. I spent.

35:03
And I'm glad that there are people like you that do it. It was the information needs to get out there, but I can't do it myself. Yeah. I spend like, at this point, probably 25 to 35 hours a week producing this little tiny, nobody really knows about it show. And I mentioned that to my husband the other day and he said, what are you going to do if it actually becomes popular? And I said, work 45 hours a week. Probably.

35:32
But it'll be the same and putting it out and people are loving what you're doing already. So yeah, it's so much. And it doesn't feel like work, which helps. Yes. So, but anyway, I told you last night was about 30 minutes, give or take for this. And, uh, it's at 35 minutes and 45 seconds right now. So I'm going to let you go. Thank you, Brittany, for taking the time to talk to me. I really appreciate it. It's been a good conversation. If you ever want to talk again, let me know.

36:02
Absolutely and good luck with everything you're doing. Keep doing the good things. Thank you so much. All right have a great day. Yep you too. Bye.