At Ease Homestead

At Ease Homestead At Ease Homestead, a small veteran managed homestead. Two old Marines At Ease living our best lives! Leonard has been our home for just over ten years.

Hello and welcome to the At Ease Homestead (previously known as Clucks and Quacks)

Iā€™m Toni and along with my husband Bob we have a small homestead in Leonard, Michigan. Prior to that we lived in Oxford for thirteen years. We're both from the east coast. I'm from NJ and he's from PA. The Marine Corps brough us to Michigan in 1995 where I completed my last tour of duty. We have two grown children

and two beautiful granddaughters. The eldest makes occasional appearances in my posts. I love gardening, food preservation, cooking and raising poultry- chickens, ducks, guinea fowl, turkeys and a sole goose. I have a running joke that after becoming an empty nester I had to find a different kind of nest. I started raising poultry in 2017. A dozen birds has grown, and I have loved every minute of it. In 2022 we added forest raised pork to the homestead as well. We thoroughly enjoyed having pigs and plan to continue raising them seasonally. Eventually we plan to add dairy goats and other small livestock. Here you will find posts and updates sharing critter shenanigans, a bit of gardening, home food preservation and pantry stocking information along with general small scale homesteading that prioritizes stewardship. The At Ease Homestead is our little holding that sustains our family, provides us an opportunity to learn as we grow and connect with simple things that bring us joy and a bit of good healthy dirt under our nails.

Obligatory loaf bc my DIL is visiting. šŸ™ƒ
06/06/2026

Obligatory loaf bc my DIL is visiting. šŸ™ƒ

The new steel roof was completed on Monday. IMO it makes the house a bit more contemporary looking but there isn't a buc...
06/05/2026

The new steel roof was completed on Monday. IMO it makes the house a bit more contemporary looking but there isn't a bucket in my office anymore! Now we begin on replacing all of the windows and doors.

I need help deciding on window & door trim. Unfortunately we can't afford to do the siding as originally planned so the yellow stays. I need to decide if I still want my windows trimmed in white or if we move to a gray or black? The front door will be a solid plain gray door with no windows but it will have sidelights similar to the current door.

Help me decide what are your thoughts?

06/05/2026
Fresh cut dianthus to dress the table for the weekend. šŸŒø
06/05/2026

Fresh cut dianthus to dress the table for the weekend. šŸŒø

Red Romaine and Bronze Mignonette. These will make a beautiful antipasto salad tonight!
06/05/2026

Red Romaine and Bronze Mignonette. These will make a beautiful antipasto salad tonight!

If you purchased seed garlic from me last fall, its time to harvest your scapes. Scapes are the emerging flower stalk. I...
06/04/2026

If you purchased seed garlic from me last fall, its time to harvest your scapes.

Scapes are the emerging flower stalk. If left unharvested, the plants energy will be focused towards producing a flower for reproduction versus producing a large garlic bulb.

When your scape begins to curl, hold it from the base as far down as you can to the plant and give it a gentle steady pull. If you can apply a slow patient force you'll be rewarded with a long scape including the tender, yellow inside. Sometimes they prematurely break and that's okay too.

Scapes are wonderful stir fried, grilled, diced into salads, pasta dishes or quiche, fermented, made into pesto, dehydrated to make green garlic powder, frozen for a taste of spring in the winter months and my favorite way to enjoy them is to munch on them raw mid harvest!

They have a delightful mellow garlic flavor. I trim and save the tips in freezer bags and add them to bone broth.

I will be harvesting scapes regularly for the next few days until the entire garlic patch is completed. If you'd like to purchase scapes I'll have them available while they last. A bunch of 12 scapes for $5.

I wish it was socially acceptable for me to fill my belly and roll over for a nap right beside my plate. Life is hard wh...
06/04/2026

I wish it was socially acceptable for me to fill my belly and roll over for a nap right beside my plate.

Life is hard when you're a well loved porcine. Someone always feeds you well, gives you ear and back scratches, regularly moves you to fresh paddoks and hauls your shelter, water and feeders for you while you nap in the grass with your litter mates until bacon day.

The piggy good life!

It's that time of year, time to fire up the freeze dryer! She's had a fresh oil change and is ready to help preserve thi...
06/03/2026

It's that time of year, time to fire up the freeze dryer! She's had a fresh oil change and is ready to help preserve this year's harvest.

Today she's loaded with trays of parsley and sage. Freeze dried herbs are so much more vibrant and fragrant than dehydrated. The freeze dryer uses sublimation, a low-temperature process that removes about 95% of the moisture while preserving the herbs' cellular structure, volatile oils, and garden-freshness. Bonus, herbs are done in about 15 hours vs longer processing for other produce.

The cabbages are looking lovely and starting to develop heads. Perfect timing, I'm starting to get low on sauerkraut.
06/03/2026

The cabbages are looking lovely and starting to develop heads. Perfect timing, I'm starting to get low on sauerkraut.

Goose eggs were so incredibly popular this year that I didn't even get to enjoy a single one. It's been several days sin...
06/03/2026

Goose eggs were so incredibly popular this year that I didn't even get to enjoy a single one. It's been several days since Gunny has laid and she usually peeters out for the season at the end of May/first week of June. I was thrilled to find this beauty! Now I need to decide between a giant omelet, fresh custard or a batch of egg pasta.

Address

5395 Rochester Road
Leonard, MI
48367

Opening Hours

Monday 9am - 5pm
Tuesday 9am - 5pm
Wednesday 9am - 5pm
Thursday 9am - 5pm
Friday 9am - 5pm
Saturday 9am - 5pm
Sunday 9am - 5pm

Website

Alerts

Be the first to know and let us send you an email when At Ease Homestead posts news and promotions. Your email address will not be used for any other purpose, and you can unsubscribe at any time.

Shortcuts

Share