Reflections of katlupe: learning to homestead

Showing posts with label learning to homestead. Show all posts

Tuesday, June 12, 2012

Learning And Trying New Things

Robin Redbreast keeping an eye on the strawberry plants!

Learning to be self-sufficient does not have to be hard. I know many people write to me saying that their spouse or children refuse to do it, otherwise they would do it. You can learn to be self-sufficient even without their help. Did you know that? Yes, it is a fact that if one person starts doing something and it becomes a habit or routine, then the other family members will follow along. In the same way that your parents did things raising you. Do you ever do things exactly as your parents did? That is because they taught you to do it that way!

Chives! Easy to grow!

If you are new to self-sufficiency getting started can be easy as planting a garden. Or planting some containers of vegetables. Or purchasing produce from your local farmer's market and learning to can it. Or freeze it. Whether you live in a city or suburban area and are not in a rural area makes no difference. Even if all you do is buy a book about gardening and start learning this year. Plan to have a garden next year for sure. If you can possibly start one now though, would be best.

Green bean seedlings much bigger than this now.

Take little steps, spending small amounts of money or finding useful tools at auctions and thrift stores. Taking the steps to be self-sufficient now, before you really need it. The reason to do this is not because civilization is going to crumble necessarily, but because it will provide you with peace of mind. In my opinion that is the best reason to do it!

Monday, February 06, 2012

Homesteading Skills You Want To Learn

Fall 2011

I am working on a new eBook that will consist of needed homesteading skills. So I wanted to ask my homesteading readers a few questions. One is, if you are new to it, what would you like to learn? Or if you are not new, what was the first skill you learned, or wished you had learned in the beginning? When you think of homesteading and being self-sufficient, what comes to mind? Often someone moves to their future homestead, and then finds all the jobs that need to be done, but all at the same time! That is not good. You need to learn them before you get there.

Preparing raised beds with the wheel hoe

If you had to learn one skill first, what would it be? My own thought is, that it would be gardening. Nothing can beat growing food. Since the garden takes time to get started. Usually your garden gets better after you have acquired the experience. There is a lot to it. Starting seeds, the soil, planting, pest control, weed control, harvesting, etc. Lots to learn, but it is so worth it!

Canning with two pressure canners

For me, I learned how to can first. When we were living in an apartment, a country apartment, but still not exactly a homestead, I started out canning. My husband was baking bread and washing laundry by hand. We were fortunate in that apartment, that we were on the second floor, and was able to string a clothesline from the landing at the top of the stairs. It was an old farm that had been made into apartments and there was lots of land, a creek and old apple and pear trees. I canned crab apple jelly for the first time there.

Our home in 1996-97!

After that we went out on the road while my husband had a job driving an over-the-road truck. We traveled all over the country and I was busy reading our homesteading magazines aloud to him while he drove. I made lists of all the things I wanted to learn how to do. Eventually, all that came to be.

Monday, August 22, 2011

Learn Your Homesteading Skills Slowly

We learned about alternative energy!

One of the things I have learned about modern homesteading or living a self-sufficient lifestyle is that you don't have to do it all. Do little bits at a time. Learn to do one thing before you move onto to another. Finish learning before tackling something else. I know I haven't always done that. That is why I know not to do it anymore. If you try to take on too much at once, it will seem overwhelming. You might want to give up. There are no rules, do as much as you can. Little by little. You can do it! I did.

I learned to can!

That is another reason it is good to learn much of your homesteading skills before you move to your homestead. We learned how to can, how to wash laundry by hand, how to garden and how to make homemade bread while living in an apartment. Our apartment was in the country, but in a very busy area and there were many other renters. We were fortunate in the fact, that nobody else was into this. So nobody else wanted to harvest the fruits from the crab apple or pear trees that grew there. It was an old farm that had been turned into apartments.

Our clothesline!

Living there was where I had my first clothesline as a grown up. When I was a child, my family had one at several places. But this clothesline in our apartment ran from our upstairs tiny porch out to a pole in the yard. I loved it! My husband and I did all our chores together. Some of the time I was working a full time job and he was not. So he did more of the chores than I did. Sometimes it was the other way around, him working and me at home. It was a partnership and still is to this day. Working together gets us further down our path.

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