There are many great reasons to raise sheep on your homestead. For starters, sheep wool is wonderful. It's nice and warm and very valuable. Sheep milk is super nutritious with far more calcium and vitamins than cow milk. And if you decide to breed your sheep, you can make a lot of money from the offspring. The downside of sheep is that they … [Read more...]
15 Ways to Homestead While Renting
When people think of homesteading, they usually think of a big piece of land out in the country, a large pasture with grazing cows, a huge garden with row after row of crops, a barn filled with livestock and chickens, or something along those lines. This is a misconception. Although that description could certainly be of a homestead, the term … [Read more...]
Baking Soda Trick To Fix Almost Anything
Do you buy baking soda in those tiny little boxes they sell at the grocery store? Not me. I buy huge 20-pound bags from Sam's Club. Sometimes people look at me weird when they see the big bag of baking soda on my kitchen floor. My friend once asked if I was starting a bakery. The truth is, I don't use baking soda for food very often. Rather, I … [Read more...]
27 Foods That Last For Decades
If you're stockpiling emergency foods, hopefully you have a system for rotating that food. My husband and I have a room with metal shelving units sticking out from the wall, so it's easy to pull old cans and boxes of food from one side while putting foods we just bought on the other side. There are some foods, however, for which our system is a … [Read more...]
15 Pioneer Skills You Must Learn Today
I don't like doom and gloom. Talking about how the economy is going to crash again (as it does every decade or so) and how life is continuing to get more difficult for the average worker (regardless of which party is in power) is depressing. Still, we need to talk about it occasionally. Why? Well for one, it can be very motivating. When my … [Read more...]
3 Things To Know Before Going Off The Grid
When people hear the words "off the grid", they usually think about a nice little cabin in the woods or a homestead out in the open country. What they often don't think about is no power, no cable, no water, no sewer, no garbage pickup, and all the other things we take for granted every day. It's not so bad once you get used to it, but if … [Read more...]
11 Natural Ways to Get Rid of Garden Weeds
Weeds are a constant thorn in the side of gardeners everywhere, sometimes literally as well as figuratively. Unfortunately, the most common ways for gardeners to deal with these weeds are not the most healthy or beneficial. Weed killers that are powerful enough to kill weeds on contact are also toxic enough to harm the people using them. This is … [Read more...]
Companion Planting With Herbs to Improve Yields
When people plant their gardens, usually each vegetable gets a plot of land all to itself--potatoes over here, cucumbers over there, and so forth. But many gardeners also plant herbs alongside their vegetables. This is called "companion planting" and it has many benefits. For example, companion planting can enrich your garden soil and make soil … [Read more...]
3 Animals Every New Homestead Needs
When people talk about homestead animals, they're usually referring to cows, goats, chickens, and other livestock. But in this video from Becky's Homestead, she talks about other types of animals that every homestead should have. For example, cats are great to have around because they keep mice and rats away. Also, livestock feed tends to … [Read more...]
10 Trees Every Homesteader Should Plant (And Why)
Most homesteads are surrounded by an abundance of trees growing in the wild. This is great for firewood and shade, but selectively planting certain trees can offer other benefits. These include fruit trees and certain trees that provide natural, medicinal benefits. The win/win is when a tree can satisfy all needs: firewood, shade, nutrition, and … [Read more...]
5 Ways Our Life is Better Living Off The Grid
Here's an inspiring video for your weekend. Anyone who's ever attempted to live off the grid as much as possible has had those moments where they thought, "Why am I doing this?" Living a self-sufficient lifestyle is not easy, but it can still be very rewarding, as Jamie from Guildbrook Farm reminds us in this video. She made a list of 5 ways … [Read more...]
5 Off Grid Kitchen Gadgets You Need
Setting up an off-grid kitchen is easier said than done. Most rely on electricity and electronics more than they realize (ovens, blenders, mixers, timers, and so forth). But with the right tools, you can do you everything you would do with an "on-grid" kitchen. In this video, Stacy from Off Grid with Doug & Stacy shares five of her favorite … [Read more...]
20 Creative Ways to Cut the Cost of Chicken Feed
If you have a dozen chickens and you're feeding them organic, non-GMO commercial grains, you're going to spend well over $100 a month just on chicken feed. But as Justin Rhodes says in this video, we've only had grain for chickens for about a century, and chickens have been around for thousands of years. This is very good news because it means … [Read more...]
20 Things We Wish We’d Known Before We Went Off Grid
For the past several years, Nick and Esther of Fouch Family Off Grid have been living off the grid in a yurt while building their off grid timber frame dream home. In that time, they've learned some valuable lessons about living off the grid. In this video, they share those lessons. I typed them up for you, but it's worth watching the video as … [Read more...]
Top 10 Homesteading Tools You Must Have
There are so many lists of homestead tools floating around out there. In fact, one of our own writers made a list. But this list by Big Family Homestead is especially interesting because it has several ideas that wouldn't occur to most people. For example, fence post drivers. These are a must-have for people putting up chicken wire, electric … [Read more...]
6 Proven Strategies to Boost Garden Harvests
Some people grow food year after year and, no matter how hard they work in their gardens, never have as big of a harvest as they hoped for. If you've ever been in that situation, maybe it's time to change your strategy. In this video, GrowVeg shares six strategies that are guaranteed to give you a huge harvest. Here they are: 1. Choose … [Read more...]
60 Things You Should Stop Buying and Start Making
Do you really feel like driving to the store every time you run out of dish soap? And do you really feel like spending $10 on name brand deodorant that you could make at home for $3? Wake up, people! A self-sufficient lifestyle is so much more rewarding (and inexpensive)! Once you know how to make everyday cleaning products and your favorite … [Read more...]
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