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  • DIY Lamp Oil

    DIY Lamp Oil

    Ok, this is really cool. I had no idea it was so easy to make your own lamp oil, but as it’s basically comprised of rubbing, or isopropyl, alcohol, and distilled water, apparently it’s quite simple to mix up your own batch that’s guaranteed to be a lot cheaper than the kind you’ll buy pre-made at Walmart for tiki torches or old-fashioned oil lamps.

    Lamp for oils is a really important item to keep on a homestead. If you live off-grid or with limited electricity, it can easily light up a room in the evening and save on electricity. I used a simple oil lamp at night for years and loved it. You can hang them to disperse the light and cook, clean up, even read, depending on how close you are to the lamp or how many you have. They’re great! So this is why I was so thrilled to discover how stupid simple it is to make your own fuel for them.

    Since the base is rubbing alcohol, you can easily just stock up on this and make it when you need it. Rubbing alcohol is already a great item to have in your stockpile for first aid.

    So, here’s what you need: 

    • 16 oz bottle of isopropyl alcohol
    • Distilled water
    • Mixing container
    • Storage container (plastic bottles with caps will do for both of these)
    • Essential oil (optional)

    Instructions: 

    1. Put your alcohol in the container you intend to mix in.
    2. Measure 1 tsp of distilled water and 1/2 tsp essential oils if you intend to use them, and add to the bottle.
    3. Shake your mixture vigorously.
    4. Pour into the container you intend to use, then close the lid tightly and label. This is an important step so you don’t get it mixed up with regular rubbing alcohol or other solutions.

    That’s it! So simple and easy, right?

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  • Realistic First-Year Homesteading Goals

    Realistic First-Year Homesteading Goals

    If you are just starting out homesteading, planning for someday homestead, or trying your hand at urban homesteading, it’s it important to understand what is realistic to accomplish in your first year.

    Setting goals is a great way to plan for the long-term and motivate yourself towards completing a task, and knowing what’s possible in the first year of homesteading can help you set these goals. This isn’t by any means a list of everything you should do in a year, but rather, everything on this list is something you can feasibly get done in one year. Let’s begin!

    Grow herbs

    This will be particularly appealing to urban homesteaders, but anyone can do it. Growing herbs is very simple, can usually be done indoors or in limited space, or, if you’ve got lots of space and want a relatively quick and easy crop to sell at a farmer’s market or put into homemade soaps and lotions, this would be a great focus.

    Grow vegetables

    Starting a simple vegetable bed or pot garden is an excellent place to start producing your own food. In one year, you can plant a few different crops at least and watch them come to fruition, and during this time, you’ll learn about your capacity as a gardener and things like your soil content, water quality, ability to irrigate, gardening zone, where to get the best seeds, etc.

    Stockpile

    Wherever you live, you can start stocking up on food, provisions, and anything that would make you more self-reliant in your day-to-day life and if a disaster were to strike. Grocery shopping in bulk and stockpiling can be a great way to save money, too, and will get you more in the groove of a homestead mentality.

    Preserve Your Harvest

    This one goes hand-in-hand with the first three. Real homesteading often involves preserving and stockpiling the food and sustenance you are able to produce on your homestead, so within a year, you should be able to start this stockpile. Think about what you want to grow and the best way to preserve those crops, and consider investing in preserving equipment like a pressure canner or dehydrator.

     

    These are a few of the most realistic starter goals for your first year of homesteading. Other possible goals can include raising chickens, a pig, clearing more land for planting, or finding a cash crop you can invest your time in. Whatever you choose, remember that you will always learn by doing, so don’t worry about getting it all right right away!

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  • How to Conquer Winter on the Homestead

    How to Conquer Winter on the Homestead

    When the winter comes, it can start to feel lonely and overwhelming on the homestead. You have plenty of extra things to think about, worry about, and do to keep the house running properly and to make sure that you and the family stay warm, healthy, and happy through those long winter months. Whether this is your first winter in the home or you have been doing this for years, it can feel oppressive at times, especially when things seem to go wrong. You are a homesteader though, and you can handle anything. Let’s look at some tips that can make winter easier to handle.

    What if you have a lock that froze? This is a common problem, and people have tried to figure out ways to deal with the issue for a long time. Some have resorted to plugging in a hair dryer with an extension cord and trying to warm up the lock that way. Fortunately, there is an easier and faster way. You can use a lighter to heat the key and then insert the key into the lock. This will melt the ice. It might take some time, but it will work.

    You do not want to get your vehicle snowed in and unable to move. You can keep some sand or kitty litter handy to sprinkle under the tires to help provide some additional traction. Another good option is to have some extra car mats. You can place these under the tires to get that extra tractions, too.

    The winter feels a lot nicer when you are able to keep warm. Wear warm clothing. Put some plastic sandwich bags over your socks before putting them into boots. This will help to waterproof them. Also, have plenty of hot chocolate on hand for those days when it just feels too cold out to do much of anything. You can get through the winter no matter how cold it gets.

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  • Are Fish Antibiotics Safe for Humans? (Video)

    Are Fish Antibiotics Safe for Humans? (Video)

    Fish antibiotics are a really popular item for preppers who want to stock up on crucial, life-saving medical supplies. Antibiotics can be incredibly crucial when disaster strikes, and might be particularly appealing for homesteaders, especially those that live in rural areas who might get caught with an infection, miles away from the nearest hospital.

    For this reason, it’s worth looking into whether or not fish antibiotics are a viable option for you. Being concerned as to whether or not fish antibiotics are safe for human consumption is a reasonable concern, so this video from one of my favorite YouTubers, Patriot Nurse, explains it quite well.

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  • Tips for Gardening on a Slope  

    Tips for Gardening on a Slope  

     

    For most gardeners, space is a major limiting factor, these means that you have to make the most out of every square foot you have, whether it’s ideal or not.  One less than ideal situation you might have is a slope, which many would leave unplanted and unproductive.  While slopes do pose some real difficulties, there are steps that can be taken to mitigate the natural difficulties and take advantage of potential benefits from growing on a slope.

     

    • If the slope is orientated so that it faces the sun you are in luck, your slope will maximize the amount of light available to your crops. If your slope produces shade you will need to grow crops that reach heights that allow them to access the light, trellising may work, or you may want to grow trees.
    • Always use heavy mulch on slopes and never leave soil exposed, exposed soil on a slope will be easily eroded by rain or irrigation.
    • Grow the crops that can tolerate drying out or that require the most sun at the top of the slope and crops that are heavier feeders at the bottom.
    • Planting perrineals will reduce the amount of work you need to do on the slope which can be physically difficult if the slope is steep, and will be a risk of erosion.
    • Using construction stakes and planks of wood, or natural onsite material, you can make terraces that will both decrease the rate of erosion and make it more comfortable to work. Simply drive the stakes in, screw the planks to the stakes, and fill in the empty space with dirt from above.  Then place another set of stakes and planks against the exposed area where you removed the dirt from to support the slope above it.

    Don’t let the terrain available to you limit your garden.  With some innovation you can take advantage of nearly any ground do grow food and in some cases even benefit from what others would see as a disadvantage.

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  • Cheap Bio Ethanol Fuel at Home (Video)

    Cheap Bio Ethanol Fuel at Home (Video)

    This is something I’ve always heard about and wanted to try. It’s pretty amazing how cheap the ingredients are to do it, and any homesteader might find the idea appealing, if you’ve got equipment that could be modified to be fueled with bio-ethanol fuel.

    Check it out! I’m pretty impressed.

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  • Understanding Garden Zones (Infographic)

    Understanding Garden Zones (Infographic)

    Understanding garden zones is so important if you want to have a hearty garden. Some plants will thrive in one area and completely fail in others! Also, when you are buying seeds, they will usually come with indications as to what zone they will work in.

    When you get started gardening, figuring out your first zone is the first step you should take. That will dictate the research you do, the kind of seeds you can buy, when your growing season is, when you should start your seeds, and so on. You can find online forums specifically for your zone and consult with gardeners across the globe facing the same environmental factors, weather patterns, seasonal changes, etc. as you are!

    This infographic from Homesteading.com is perfect for quickly discerning what your growing zone is, along with some handy tips for certain vegetables and zones. Very useful!

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  • Are Grow Lights Worth it?  

    Are Grow Lights Worth it?  

     

    For those that have outdoor gardens, the thought of growing food indoors with artificial lights can seem like a ludicrous concept.  Providing your plants with access to the maximum amount of possible sunlight is a basic strategy for increasing growth, and the sun is free.  Purchasing and the operation of grow lights costs money, and gardening should save you money and provide you with resources, not cost money and use resources.  So, are grow lights worth their cost and the cost of their operation?

     

    Not to try to skirt the question, but it depends.  If you live in an area that has little difference in day length throughout the year and relatively warm winter temperatures that allow you to produce in your outdoor garden year-round, or nearly year-round, then grow lights will not offer you the same benefits they will to someone living in a colder zone, but they will cost the same.

    There are also a variety of products for you to choose from, on the low end you can get a small compact florescent light fixture for around $50.  Compact florescent lights don’t use as much energy as incandescent lights and they provide plenty of light for vegetative plants, that is plants that are growing leaves, but they do not provide the necessary light for plants that are fruiting.  On the higher end of the spectrum you can get LED grow light fixtures that can cost anywhere from $80 to over $600.  Some of these LEDs use less energy than CFL and still are capable of producing all the light necessary to grow plants all the way through their fruiting stages, but at that point you need to start thinking about more than just putting a few pots under a light and the cost begins to rise in proportion to how long you want your plants under the lights.

    If all you want to do is to extend your growing season, that is to start you plants earlier in the year when the sun is not giving enough light and when outdoor temperatures are not high enough yet, and potentially bring in a few perennial greens, then a grow light, even a CFL can be more than worth its cost, especially to those living in cold zones.  Consider that 1 pound of fresh spinach can cost most then $5, and that a $50 light fixture that will last at least a few years can extend your season by more than 8 weeks and cost little to operate and you will begin to see just how worth it a grow light can be for you.

    Even during the warm months, you may want to start seeds indoors to reduce the access pests have to seeds, this will reduce the cost of each crop.

     

    Not everyone is offered the same amount of benefit from a grow light.  If you have a green house or live in a zone with mild winters, then you won’t stand to gain as much as others.  A little math may be necessary to determine if they are right for you, but no gardener should turn their nose up at the idea using supplementary lights.

    Click Here to Shop Grow Lights on Amazon

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