Modern Homesteading in the City

My apartment size kitchen (photo: Alvin D. Barrett)

I have been watching the Living Big In A Tiny House series on YouTube every night. Since I live in a very small apartment, I find some of the ways they organize these homes useful. Another aspect of it is what the people do in designing a home that eliminates all the useless clutter and objects that they do not or will not use. If they cook meals, maybe their kitchen has full sized appliances, sinks and food preparation areas. Some do most of their cooking outside on a grill or fire pit, depending on where they live. So they do not have a full sized stove or maybe just a microwave. Instead of buying a house that has rooms or items that do not pertain to them, the house is built based on their own needs or wants. Some of the older couples did not do this until their children left home. It was a dream they couldn’t wait for. One couple still had their 19 year old son living with them and he had one of the lofts and loved it. In fact, he was planning on building his own someday. One that I really liked was a single mom who actually built the house herself and lived with her fifteen year old daughter. Her daughter was interviewed and she told about her friends envying her because she lived in a tiny house. Now as I watch these videos I wonder why I did not know about this way of life before? Instead of buying a house to homestead with, building a tiny house on wheels would have been a better alternative. But alas, that time is gone. Now on to new ideas.

Living downtown, I am just around the corner!

My first idea is that you can really homestead wherever you live. Country, small towns or the biggest urban centers. It is totally up to you. You only have to do what you want to do or can do. Gardening is not something I can do living where I live. So except for a few small pots of plants here, I will be purchasing my fresh produce. I have said for years that there are no rules. It is your homestead and you develop it however you choose. No rules! Due to my circumstances, I am living in a very small apartment and I thought I was done with the homesteading life. That does not have to be. I remembered how I encouraged people who wrote to me about wanting to homestead but not being able to move to the country. I would tell them they can do it right where they are. Time to listen to my own advice!

katlupe's kitchen has much more workable space than my last one!

As I write this post and others, I want you to understand, this is how I do it or how I plan on doing it. Not that you have to do it my way. Choose what works for you! Even though this is not the same type of homesteading I did in my past, gardening, cooking on a wood cook stove (which I loved!), heating with a wood stove, foraging for wild medicinal and edible plants in the forest and living off-the grid, etc. I can do it, but differently. Apartment homesteading for one? Homesteading for an over sixty woman......living alone? However you phrase it, you describe what you are or want to be doing. Have fun with it! If you have a disability, do not overwhelm yourself by making it too hard or too time consuming. Make it yours!

kat in 2018 Photo Credit: Alvin D. Barrett

Being a homesteader basically means that you are preparing for life. You are making sure you have food to eat. The best quality food you can procure. Instead of growing it now, I have to exchange my time in the garden to money being used to buy that food. I buy as much organic NON-GMO food as I can. There have always been people who want to live this way or do live this way but don’t put a name on it. Sometimes it just hits them that they are already doing what others call homesteading. I see it all the time on my Tightwad Gazette Fan Club group I belong to on Facebook. Instead of doing my laundry by hand outside (which I hated as I got older and could barely walk) I do it downstairs in the laundry room of my apartment building. I love it! It does not take up my whole day so I can do other things. I do not make my own laundry detergent now either. To be honest, I had stopped doing that long before I moved here. I have always been very frugal with the detergent anyway, so a bottle lasts me a long time. To make your own, you still had to buy the ingredients. It wasn’t something you could grow in your garden, though there are some plants you can use for soap.

I use an induction cook top almost daily for cooking!

I like to cook but not large meals. Instead of wood stove cooking, I have gotten into cooking with various small appliances. An Instant Pot is sitting right on my counter so I can use it whenever I decide to make a meal in it. I find that putting the appliances in a cupboard means I don’t use it as much as I would. The same with the Nuwave convection oven. I use the electric range as a cupboard for all my pots and pans. I did not like using the electric stove the first few times I used it when I first moved here. I used to cook on electric stoves before I got my first gas one and I can’t remember not liking it. Now though, I do not use it. It is useful as a cupboard and I took out the burner coils and have an induction cook top burner on top of it along with the toaster oven. Works great for that and I have the clock and timer that is convenient when I need it. I have a small Dash hot pot for heating water fast (and I mean fast!). It can be used for cooking food too. I think it was marketed for college kids cooking in their dorms. I do not cook in it because I do not want it to take on any smell that would transfer to my hot water. I suppose if I wanted to do that, I would purchase a second one. It would be good for cooking rice or pasta but I don’t need that.

My father taught me to can and I love doing it!

My favorite homesteading activity, as all of my regular readers probably remember, was always canning. Preserving your food does not mean you have to grow it. I loved to garden, but it is not possible for me to do it here. I can still do canning. I can dehydrate with my Nuwave oven too. I can buy local produce and bring it home to can. I can buy meat on sale or at local farms or butcher shops and can that also. Since I live alone, I do not need large amounts and the work will be much less than I was used to. I can also cook from scratch, which is what I do most of the time anyway. I can make a variety of dairy products just by purchasing organic (or raw if available, but I’d have to drive somewhere for that) milk. I know how to make a number of those. For now, I find I need such small amounts that I don’t want to do the work. Life here in my studio apartment with Rabbit is pretty good! 

Copyright © 2019 Kathleen G. Lupole

All Photographs Copyright © 2019  Kathleen G. Lupole

Unless otherwise stated on photo