My Homesteading Journey: Year One

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Homesteading Journey

This is the story of my transformation. In just one year, I became a homesteading junkie. Learn from my homesteading journey of mastering cooking, gardening, food preservation, herbalism, raising livestock, composting, recycling, and permaculture.

Check out these other articles to help you in your homesteading journey . . .

Year One

I am a dreamer, a creative mind, and a very independent person. Being a stay-at-home mom was never in my plan. But when my firstborn came along, it changed everything. I decided to quit my job and become a full-time mother. But I needed another outlet for my creativity.

Cooking

It started with cooking. I was bored in the house all day with a sleeping infant. So I started challenging myself with more intricate recipes. These needed more prep than the 30-minute meals I used to make after work every day. I used the baby’s nap time to prep the meal. Then, I popped it in the oven when the time was right.

I started meal planning, which made grocery shopping much more efficient. That eventually led to buying a wider variety of produce. I began experimenting with herbs. I also started searching for ways to make my family healthier. All these changes marked the start of my homesteading journey. I had never even heard of the term homesteading before. The next step was gardening.

Audrey and Liam standing a field of corn

Gardening

For years, my husband had suggested I plant a raised bed vegetable garden. I thought he was crazy. We couldn’t even keep up with weeding the flowerbeds around our house. Let alone adding more! Plus, gardening was something my mother liked, and like any daughter, I couldn’t possibly be like my mother.

Finally, I decided to give it a try. I wanted to save some money on groceries. And it was convenient to have fresh ingredients on hand. This way, I didn’t need to go shopping as often. Plus, finding fresh specialty ingredients at the store can be nearly impossible. So, we bought 2 raised bed kits, some dirt, seed packets, and garden supplies. A new passion was born.

I enjoyed learning about how to start seeds indoors, care for each type of plant, and how/when to harvest. Before the end of the first season, I had already begun planning. My next garden would be much larger for the following year. I had to plan for my excess yields at harvest time. I needed to learn how to cure, store, and preserve all my goodies.

Food Preservation

Before the end of my first gardening season, I invested in a combination pressure/water bath canner. I also bought supplies and a canning recipe book. My first endeavor was canning the 30lbs of carrots I grew in just a 1ft by 3ft area! We also had a mulberry tree out back with more than we could ever eat. So, we got a wine-making kit and started brewing a batch of mulberry wine.

I also learned how to cure potatoes and onions. I started drying herbs. I dehydrated, froze, and baked veggies. (We love zucchini bread, which can also go in the freezer!). I processed venison with my vacuum sealer and a meat grinder. I found every way possible to supply my family’s nutrition sustainably.

Herbalism

When I mastered drying herbs, I decided to start making DIY loose-leaf tea? I started researching different tea recipes and learning how they benefited the body. I researched companion planting herbs to help my garden. They can repel or attract certain insects. They can also change the nutrient composition of the soil.

I had mint growing in my flower beds, red clover in the meadow, and raspberries by the woods. But I longed to identify more species of herbs. So I ordered “The Complete Medicinal Herbal” as a reference. Diving into that book opened up my mind to a whole new chapter in homesteading and survivalism. (And even more gardening inspiration!)

Livestock

I had considered raising chickens. But it seemed like a huge commitment with daily chores. On a Thursday I said to my husband, “I would get pigs over chickens.” They’re supposed to be great for fertilizing and tilling gardens. And on Monday, we had pigs. Maybe a bit hasty, but it was a blast.

We spent the weekend building an enclosure where we planned on having our veggie garden the following summer. We built a shelter out of hay bales, purchased pig feed, and picked up the two little piglets in just a weekend.

We loved watching their rooting activities. We sprayed them with the hose while they frolicked like children in a sprinkler. We enjoyed feeding them all our scraps and leftovers from the kitchen. It felt good to transform our food waste into usable calories for our pigs. The waste would fuel our future food. That led us to want to reduce our waste even further and we started looking into composting and recycling.

Composting and Recycling

Before delving into the world of homesteading, I had never heard of composting. I started reading blogs, Pinterest, and bought some beginner books. We built a 3 compartment compost bin and started using a kitchen bin to collect veggie scraps.

Slowly – and I mean VERY SLOWLY- we started to form compost. We did not do the regular maintenance of turning the compost so it took a very long time to decompose. Through trial and error, we started to get the hang of things. This allowed us to speed up the process. Regardless, it felt great to be doing something that benefited the environment as well as our garden fertility.

Permaculture

This isn’t an event that took place for us. Rather, it’s a philosophy I strive to achieve in our homestead. Check out this article to learn more “My Passion for Permaculture (and how to apply it to your homestead)”. I love learning about this vast topic through articles and books, then applying them to our homestead.

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