Homesteading is a wonderful way to become self reliant. If you have a little bit of land, you can use it to grow the food that your family eats. It’s healthier, sustainable, and important for preparedness.
We started this journey in the hopes of getting away from all the chemicals that are in the food that we eat. My mom died of cancer, and she swore to her last day that it was from the preservatives and chemicals that are in modern-day food. I wanted better for my family!
We moved to a small farm (3.8 acres) and immediately started raising meat animals and gardening. Everything that we’ve done has been to reduce those nasty chemicals and preservatives. And to raise our own, healthy food.
Although we’ve had some failures, overall it’s been a great success! We raise a lot of our own meat, and lots of veggies throughout the summer. But there’s always room for improvement!
I’m not going to tell you that you can be truly self reliant and grow and raise everything that your family eats on a very small lot. But I will tell you that it’s possible to do a lot in a relatively small space!
You just have to get creative, and do your research. I hope to be a big part of your research! In my menu at the top, there are more categories of what to read about. Make sure you check those out.
Homesteading is a journey, let’s take it together!
If you’ve ever made soap, you may be wondering, “Can I make soap more sustainably?”. Well, I have exactly the solution for you! You can make lye from wood ashes to make your own sustainable soap. At its very basic form, soap is made from lye and fat. For the fat, you can use oil, …
Have you ever ground your own flour? If you have a simple grinder, you can easily grind wheat into flour. For this edition of the Self Reliant Skill of the Week, that’s exactly what I’m doing! Last year, when the pandemic hit, there was NO flour on the store shelves. None! So what did I …
Now that spring is here, our chickens are laying eggs like crazy again. We get about 6 dozen a week right now, and that’s more than we will eat before they go bad. So what do we do with all those “extra” eggs? Well, in the past, we’ve sold some, to help offset the cost …
How to Waterglass Eggs for Easy Egg Preservation Read More »
Did you make tallow with me the week before last? Why not try making tallow candles with me? This is an easy project for anyone interested in making their own candles. Let’s learn how to make tallow candles together! For this episode of the Self Reliant Skill of the Week, I am making candles for …
Here on our farm, we have raised meat rabbits for about 3 years. But so far, I hadn’t done anything with the hides. I’ve always wanted to learn how to tan rabbit hides, but just hadn’t done it…until now! For this episode of the Self Reliant Skill of the Week, I am tanning rabbit hides …
We had company from the city last weekend, and we had an interesting conversation. I told them that I was going to render tallow from a sheep that we had butchered ourselves. I tell you what, I’ve never seen so many blank stares and scrunched up noses, asking me “What’s tallow?”. So for this episode …
In the last episode of the Self Reliant Skill of the Week, I made flour tortillas. They were a lot harder to make than I though they would be! So for this week, I am making homemade corn tortillas. These corn tortillas are versatile, easy, and only take 3 ingredients. In the spring of 2020, …
My family eats tortillas all.the.time. In fact, we almost use tortillas more often than we use bread! We sometimes use tortillas to make a sandwich wrap. A favorite “dessert” here is fried tortillas with cinnamon and sugar. And don’t judge, but some members of my family (definitely NOT me) will even eat leftover spaghetti wrapped …
If you haven’t noticed, I’m on a bit of a fermenting kick right now, which is a really new thing for me. It all started with my super easy Homemade Yogurt in the Crockpot. I still had some whey left over from making this, and I had a big bag of carrots that needed to …
Lacto Fermented Carrots in a Ginger-Citrus Brine Read More »
I’ll admit it. I’m a bit of a soda addict. So when I found out you can make healthy lacto-fermented soda with whey, I just had to try it myself! This episode of Self Reliant Skill of the Week covers exactly that. Remember last week when I made homemade yogurt in the crockpot? I decided …
