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Making Your Own Shampoo

Are you sick and tired of the high-priced shampoos that are on the market today? You want to be self-sufficient, but you still keep on buying those shampoos because you need to keep your hair clean. What if you could make your own shampoo? Think about the benefits that can provide. Benefits of Homemade Shampoo First, when you have homemade shampoo, you’re not going to be spending as much money on those expensive brands in the store or at the salon. Consider how much money you spend on shampoo each year for your entire family. A bottle of high-quality shampoo […]

Things to Consider Before Building an Outhouse

When living off-grid long-term, one factor that everyone must face is waste management. Going about it improperly will have a serious effect on your comfort, and could have a serious effect on your health. The most traditional way to handle the issue is the age-old outhouse. If placed and maintained properly, an outhouse will not present a health hazard and will not even stink (at least not more than an active compost pile). Here are the factors you need to consider before building an outhouse: Placement First, when planning your outhouse make sure that you consider the fact that improper […]

Coffee Grounds For Your Garden

Coffee grounds are a common cheap and easy form of organic material to add to your compost pile or garden. Here are a few tips for how, and why, to use them in your garden. Coffee and pH Despite what you might have heard, coffee grounds in your garden will have little to no effect of your soil pH and will not harm plants even when applied directly as a top dressing in generous amounts. The acid that is in the coffee you drink is there because it is water-soluble, meaning that is has been removed from the coffee grounds […]

Chickens vs. Rabbits

When most people think of small scale backyard animal husbandry, they tend to think exclusively of chickens. And while chickens are not without their own advantages, they are certainly not the only small animal that even a new backyard farmer can raise, one such animal is the rabbit. There are many benefits to having either chicken or rabbit. Both animals produce sustenance, and can provide the backyard farmer with plenty of nutrient rich manure for the garden, as well as have their feeding needs reduced by keeping them in a mobile pen. Not every backyard farmer has the same resources available to them and what might work […]

Making Your Own Sprouted Flour

You may have heard that sprouted flour is healthier than regular flour, and this is definitely true. When wheat is allowed to sprout before it is ground into flour, it breaks down the antinutrients that are the plant’s natural defense system, which can be difficult for us to digest. This is one possible reason for so many people having gluten and wheat allergies in recent years. Before modern industrial harvesters and mills, wheat used to be cut and lay to dry in the field, allowing the wheat berries as they’re called to naturally sprout before grinding. Sprouted wheat flour can be quite pricey-but, with […]

Health Benefits of Turmeric

Turmeric is totally incredible. If you don’t already have it in your natural healing arsenal, you totally need it. It’s a staple in Indian cooking, and its bright yellow pigment is even used as a natural dye, and has been for centuries. You can buy it in different forms, if you’re lucky you can find it fresh in the produce section, usually at a health food store. Health food stores will often have turmeric supplements too or even fancy mixtures, but those can be pricey. If you have no idea how to use turmeric or need a quick remedy these […]

2 Common Water Sources for Homesteads

You simply cannot survive without water. And while you might very well be able to purchase land for a homestead that has county or agricultural water, you might also want to consider self-reliant options for water. You also might not be able to buy land that is already irrigated and on the water grid, and either way, considering grids can always fail and if you’re homesteading, you are most likely intending to be as off-grid and self-reliant as possible, so alternative sources of water are always ideal. Here are a few of the most common methods for getting and keeping water on […]

How to Make A Sourdough Starter

Sourdough starters can be purchased online or you might even have a friend or relative who’s already making them who’d be willing to share. They’re easy to pass around, and you can use just a small amount to grow as much as you want! That’s the beauty of sourdough. To grow your own, you don’t need anything more than flour, water, and time. Let’s begin! What you need: a mason jar or similar sized glass or plastic container, no metal measuring cups and spoons plastic wrap flour (at least a pound to be safe) What you do: Combine 3/4 cup of […]

5 Tips for Storing Food in Harsh Conditions

Storing dry foods can be tricky. Ideally, you want to store your food at about 50-55 degrees Fahrenheit, with low humidity (less than 15%). Of course, that just isn’t possible for a lot of people, especially those who live in exceedingly warm or cold climates, floodplains, etc. So how can you improve your food’s longevity, even if you’re storing it in harsh conditions? Follow these tips. Be selective with expiration dates – Canned goods can usually last years past their expiration dates, but it’s a good idea to choose the ones with the longest dates to be sure that […]

Is it too late to start my garden?

Summer isn’t going to last forever, so should you just wait until next year to start your garden? No. While your potential for late planting will depending on the zone you are living in, there is still time to get plants in the ground for almost everyone even without season extension tools like a green house or low tunnel. Leafy greens and root crops like carrots and radishes easily tolerate the declining amount of sunlight and cooling temperatures this time of year in most places. Late-Season Start Find out what the first frost date is for your zone, and check out the packages of what seeds you have […]

Mistakes to Avoid When Starting a Garden

Most gardeners don’t live in the tropics or have acres of land to spare, so choosing the right crops and materials to start a garden with is something you aren’t going to want to take lightly. It could be a third of the way through your growing season before you realize that you wasted all of that time, energy, money, and space in your garden just to grow crops that you aren’t going to benefit from. Over-enthusiastic seed purchases One thing to avoid is getting your ideas of what crops you are going to grow from a seed catalog. Seed sellers don’t make most of their money […]

2 Ways to Preserve Spinach

Spinach is a very easy vegetable to grow, and it offers a ton of nutrients. Plus, it’s tasty, and you can use it for numerous recipes. Of course, if you want to use your spinach after the growing season is done, you’re going to have to know how to properly preserve it. Here are a couple of simple preservation techniques that will keep your family eating spinach all year long. Dehydrated Spinach Rinse your spinach, remove any brown or unappetizing spots, and cut off or tear out thick stems. Once your leaves are prepared, lay them out evenly on a […]

How to Make Yogurt

Yogurt has increased in popularity in recent years, and for good reason. It’s a wonderful source of healthy fat and protein as well as millions of beneficial probiotic bacteria. It’s also delicious! Did you know you can make your own easily at home? Yogurt is nothing more than cultured milk, and, like sourdough, all you need is a starter to get going-which is actually just about 1/4 of a cup of yogurt! There are many different methods for making yogurt, and this is simply one of them. You can make it in a specially-designed yogurt maker, in a crock pot, […]

Tips for Keeping Chickens Warm This Winter

We recently covered how to care for chickens in hot weather, but as fall seems to be whizzing around the corner, we thought it would be a good idea to cover how to care for them in cold weather, because it’s important to plan ahead. It’s simpler than you think really-chickens can, with the right conditions, keep themselves warm surprisingly well. 1. Let them breathe It seems like you’d want to make their coop completely insulated and airtight to protect them from harsh winter weather right? Wrong. While insulation is very important, and you should start fixing leaks in the roof and […]

A Simple Guide to Alternative Flours

There are many reasons people are flocking to alternative flours today. Gluten intolerance is becoming very common, but there are also many diets that eliminate wheat or grains, such as the whole 30, primal or paleo diets. There are a few reasons gluten-free and grain-free diets can be beneficial for your health, but that’s another post for another today. Today we’d just like to discuss a few of the basic non-wheat flours. This is useful to know for homesteaders, in case you’re interested in growing and milling some of your own flours. A note: all grain-free flours are also gluten-free, […]

How (and Why) to Render Tallow

Tallow used to be commonplace a few hundred years ago, before it was replaced with mass-produced cooking oils like canola, corn and soy. What it is is rendered animal fat, (it’s normally called tallow for beef fat and lard for pig fat, but the same principles apply for each) and it can be used in many ways. Why Render Tallow The reason this is ideal for a homesteader is it’s always ideal to use every part of a butchered animal, and tallow gives you a great way to use up all the fat. But it’s not just useful-its super healthy and […]

Dairy Cow Basics

Dairy cows are a wonderful addition to any homestead. The nourishment their fresh milk provides is liquid gold-raw milk is highly nutritious and can produce delicious, top-notch butter, cream, buttermilk, cheese and yogurt. I think when anyone thinks of farming or homesteading, they think of owning a dairy cow. If you’re interested in getting a dairy cow, here are a few basic considerations: Your Homestead’s Capacity What breed of cow, how many to get, how often to breed and what to feed the cow(s) will depend on your homestead, what facilities you have, how much acreage you have, how much […]

4 Crafty Ways to Reuse Mason Jars

Mason jars. Are they not one of the best inventions of all time? Originally designed for canning, mason jars (or Bell, or Kerr, or other canning jars…wide-mouth canning jars are just all-around awesome) have so many uses. They’re sturdy, difficult to break, have a big capacity-well, a quart! Lately, the annals of Pinterest have shown us that there are dozens of ways to use mason jars, so we picked a few particularly clever uses. Mason Jar Herb Garden Probably the most homestead-applicable, a simple mason jar herb garden is pretty much exactly what it sounds like! In lieu of drainage, […]

Benefits of Compost Tea

When it comes to a thriving, healthy garden, one of the quintessential components is a good fertilizer, and homemade compost is one the best things you can make. Using kitchen scraps, garden cuttings and locally sourced organic waste like grass clippings, manure, coffee grounds, egg shells, etc., you can-and should-make your own compost pile for a consistent supply of amazing plant superfood. There are many different options for how to build a compost pile and what to build it with, so if you’re not already composting, you’ll want to start there. But if you do already have a successful compost […]

How to Get Started Knitting

It’s only the middle of August, but apparently snow is already accumulating above some US states-can you believe it? It’s already time to start thinking about getting out that winter gear. Or, if you want to learn a new skill-making it! Knitting is a wonderful skill to have, and it’s never too late to learn. It’s actually has some surprisingly health benefits, like improving cognitive function, memory, coordination and relieving stress. Not to mention you get scarves, hats, and or any of the many other things you can knit right at home! It’s a great way to give an original […]