I started writing this before you posted your comment above. So, we were writing at the same time.
We picked up our pig (Bacon) yesterday. We decided to not have it smoked & to butcher it ourselves to save money. We did what is called a "Kill & Chill", which means they kill & gut It & skin It. It ended up costing $150 less doing it that way.
It was quite a sight, seeing the butcher's son pull the 2 halves out of the cooler, on the track, hanging up on hooks. He cut it into 6 parts, so it would fit into our two coolers.
We bought a Kindle book on Amazon, that did a good job of telling us how to butcher our pig. Some places were a bit confusing, but we muddled our way through getting two chances too cut each section.
it had photos, that really helped
http://www.amazon.com/Butchering-Po...TF8&qid=1458955764&sr=8-1&keywords=Butchering
Here are the photos I took this afternoon. This is only part of the meat. We still have a rack of ribs, to cut into pork chops, as well as meat in our fridge (with the temp set at 34°F, to allow one batch of meat to freeze, so we don't over tax the freezer all at once. We also have a nice batch of fat, to be rendered at another time.
This is the back leg (the ham) which we boned. It doesn't look like it, but there are two ball joints & was quite a job to do the boning.
Top shelf of our full size upright freezer. The loin roast was done yesterday (3/24/16). DH got the date wrong when he labeled the packages of meat yesterday.
Bottom drawer, of the freezer, full of meat.
Precious Filet cuts. YUM! Looking forward to cooking those!
Shoulder (Butt roast)
Bones to be used for bone broth.
While we were cutting meat today, DH was drooling, so I suggested he take some of the smaller pieces, that we are going to use to make sausage & fry it up. About the same time, I found a beautiful piece of muscle that looked a lot like filet. So, I cut it across the grain, which made it look like medallions. OMG! It was so tender & full of flavor! YUM!
They spent yesterday and today on their pig and have a freezer full of meat. I am so proud of them 
It will be a few weeks before our meat is ready. We are having the bacon and hams smoked. I will post pictures of our first supper! @Devonviolet where are the pictures of all that lovely meat?? 
