My Custom Homestead: Steps 17, 18, & 20

I'm almost done with Jill Winger's 21 Days (Steps) to Your Custom Homestead (ebook available at www.theprairiehomestead.com).  These next three steps are food related:  17. Learn How to Cook; 18. Plant Something Edible; and 20. Practice Preservation.  (Yes, yes, I skipped over step 19 for now.  I'll talk about that one in my next post.)
I agree with Jill when she says, "Learning how to prepare a meal from scratch could be the single most important skill you learn as a modern-day homesteader."  When you homestead, it's almost like your job title becomes "Professional Nurturer".  You grow food to nurture yourself, your family, your animals.  You nurture the earth.   So it makes sense that living off the land and learning to prepare what comes off the land become part of your daily life.

Creamed Chicken and Corn Soup from 

www.bhg.com Slow cooker recipes

I love to create meals that require as few ingredients and as little time as possible.  That's great, because this adds to the quality of the simple life I long for.  Olive oil, butter, garlic, salt and pepper grace just about every meal, whether in the crock pot or the cast iron skillet.  In fact, my crock pot is my favorite and most used kitchen appliance.  Just throw everything in, turn it on, and come back hours later to tender, tasty food.  My now second favorite kitchen appliance is a vacuum sealer I picked up for $15 at a Goodwill store in Indiana on a family trip this past summer.  I can prepare a few days' worth of meals in one crock pot and freeze half of it for later.  And of course, my other favorite kitchen appliance is my thrift store bread machine, given to me by a friend.  Again, load the ingredients, push a button, and 3 hours later I have fresh bread to dunk into my crock pot stew.

If you don't know where to begin with cooking, I would suggest skipping the fancy cookbooks with complicated multi-step recipes with ingredients that you cannot find in your backyard or local grocery store.  Instead, opt for resources like Pinterest and search keywords like "clean food" or "whole food".  You can check out some of my saved recipes on my Farm Table board here:  http://www.pinterest.com/bohemianfarmgir/farm-table/
Jill also has plenty of recipes on her blog at www.theprairiehomestead.com.

Step 18, Plant Something Edible, just makes sense, even if you don't have your 1/4 acre veggie garden up and running yet.  This summer I bought herb plants from local farms at my farmer's market and grew them on my windowsill.  Easy peasy!  Step 20, Practice Preservation, makes me sweat just a little.  My how water bath canner lives at the back of the bottom shelf in a hard to reach cabinet in my kitchen.  But I promised myself that this harvest season I would practice storing up goods for the winter months.  I admit, my vacuum sealer is a lot more appealing than the anxiety-producing (for me) process of canning. I have procrastinated with practicing this skill since I don't have that veggie patch yet.  But I also know that when I am up to my eyeballs in tomatoes, it will be more stressful for me to learn to can then than now.  And besides, what if the power goes out and I don't yet have a back up generator?  My frozen harvest will not last long. . .

As with any and all of my blog posts, I would love to hear about what you've learned from your own experiences. Send me an email or post a comment!

Free Mini-classes with Craftsy

I just discovered a website called Craftsy.com which offers 36 free mini-classes on some essential Bohemian Farmgirl skills.  I just registered for lessons on woodworking, quilting, and spinning. Yay!  They have more in-depth online classes as well (for a fee), on topics such as gardening, sewing, knitting, cabinetry, and more.

www.craftsy.com

Farm Table: Homemade Ice Cream!

Country Living Magazine, June 2014, page 114

I had been keeping my eyes open for an ice cream maker at flea markets, but didn't really want to squeeze another gadget into my already over-stuffed kitchen cabinets.  Luckily, I found a recipe for homemade ice cream in a recent edition of Country Living magazine that did not require electricity. We are ice cream snobs in this household, so I was a bit skeptical that we could compete with the likes of Ronnybrook Farms (Best. Ice-cream. EVER.) My little helper and I made some yesterday and the snobs gave it a unanimous thumbs up. Future versions will include the addition of chocolaty goodness, peanut butter, fruit, or anything else our enthusiastic little bellies desire.

Road Trip: Family Visit in Indiana

Big family meals
Maddie & Kendra
Crickets
Hummingbird chatter
Abby in her country-dog glory
Lakehouse
Seas of corn and soy
Hobbit garden
Butterflies
Treasure hunts
Piano playing
Farmers market
Porch swing
Aunt Karen's raspberry bushes
Anne's bees and flock
Bug bites
Sleeping soundly
Biscuits n'gravy
Celebrations
Love, Joy, and more Love

Domestic Arts: Candlemaking

Note: This post contains affiliate links.

On my list of things to try in my little urban homestead, was candlemaking.  It was easy as 1,2,3.

1.  Melt wax in a double boiler to about 170 degrees

2. Place wick in mold (I used a pencil to prop it up in the melted wax)

3. Pour wax into mold or container and let cool

That's it! Instead of waiting until I have my own beehive and learning how to harvest the wax, I bought some beeswax online at www.bulkapothocary.com (1 lb for about $9).  They also sell wicks (100 for $6) and tons of other homesteading supplies for soapmaking and natural body care.  I picked up some cute little tart tins at a yard sale for $2 to use as molds/candleholders.  To melt the wax, you need to do so in a double boiler.  I opted to purchase a candlemaking pitcher and a wax thermometer but you really don't need anything special.  You just need a pot of some kind that has a pour spout and one that you can devote to only candlemaking. (The wax will stick to the pot.) I do recommend a candlemaking thermometer to monitor the temperature of the wax.

Making homemade candles was so easy and fun, that my daughter and I will make lots more to give away at Christmas time. (Oops!  There goes the surprise!) 

My Custom Homestead: Steps 15 & 16

Continuing my work with Jill Winger's Your Custom Homestead e-book, it is time to start taking action.  Step 15 is to plan out your year with important dates of things to do so that they don't sneak up on you.  Things that will go on my annual planning calendar may not be completely relevant now.  But when the time comes to call a patch of grass my own, I know I will be overwhelmed with the amount of work to be done.  Having my plan ready to put into action will keep things fun and enjoyable.  Let's say we move into our farmhouse on October 1st.  I can open up my plan book to that date and see what needs to be done so that the spring gardening season will be ready when the last frost chills the ground.  There are tons of free gardening planning tools online that make the growing season a breeze.  Plug in your gardening zone and the plants you want to grow and viola!  The planner will even send you a reminder so that when you are up to your elbows in water bath canning, you don't forget to put in the next round of plants in the empty space where your tomatoes were yesterday, ensuring that you have more veggies in the weeks to come.  My favorite garden planner and journal is on the site www.smartgardener.com.

www.smartgardener.com

Other things I will put on my planning list include giving vaccines to my farm animals (when I have them), checking all the fences to see what might need repair, ordering and storing hay, chopping firewood (which will pretty much be daily...), and ordering chicks.  In addition to planning the farm work, I will be planning and facilitating art workshops and retreats.  As exciting as all of this work feels, I also feel a little twirl of anxiety in my gut just from writing this.  Better get started on that plan!

Step 16, is to start doing what I can.  Jill explains this perfectly.  "If you are waiting for the stars to align perfectly before you start canning or putting in that garden or building those cold frames," (that's me!), "then you are going to be waiting a long time....I want to encourage you NOT to sit around and wait for the 'big day' to come.  You might not be able to do everything, but remember that every little bit helps." Jill goes on to provide a perfect example for me.  Even though I don't have my own veggie patch yet, I can buy veggies at the farmers' market and practice canning them.  Looking back at my list that I wrote when I first started Your Custom Homestead, I see several things I can do right now.  I can email the guy in the woodworking studio to schedule the safety class so I can learn how to build things.  I can make a list of questions to ask when I go to the sheep and wool festival in October.  I can get out the candle making supplies I bought and make candles.  SARK taught me all about "micromovements", and I will create a micromovement right now:  Get out my weekly planner and put it on the table with a pencil.  :)

My Custom Homestead: Step 14

As I travel along in Jill Winger's Your Custom Homestead (www.theprairiehomestead.com), I am finding myself a little discouraged.  It happens I suppose, but I want a farm now.  While making the best of my current city life is challenging and rewarding, it still falls short of the peace and serenity of the country life I long for.

Perhaps if I work on Step 14, "Know your local resources," I will find support during these times of feeling the longing of a Barnheart (Jenna Woganrich).  Jill suggests a few starting points for connecting to local resources:  becoming a regular at your local farmers' market, checking Craigslist for homesteading ads, or starting/joining a club.  These are all great ideas, and if I did them myself I would probably find come good company on this trail I am blazing towards my destiny.