I don't like making New Years Resolutions. They are by their very nature made to be broken. I want to set goals. Goals can be achieved! I have many goals this year and I make mini goals to achieve those larger goals.
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So the steps:
1. Become healthy and strong;
2. Garden;
3. Use less electricity;
a. grow accustom to cooler temps in winter and warmer temps in summer;
b. line dry clothes
c. weatherize and use various strategies to help keep home warm in winter and cooler in summer
4. Use less. Period.
5. Make my own
a. Pizza dough, foods, detergent, furniture, clothes, quilts, soap, cream of chicken soup, soup base, butter, etc.
6. Perfect a bartering system locally.
7. Soooooo much more!
Are all these goals attainable right now? No, but some of them are. I can’t make butter, I don’t have a cow or goats. But I might be able to trade for some. I am sure there are many things I can learn to do. But I need someone to teach me.
So, our path to self-sufficiency has been a struggle and we have been on this journey for nearly three years now. We have had some successes and some miserable fails! But we have learned lessons. I know that there are those out there that have learned lessons too and we can learn from each other.
So whether your goal is total self-sufficiency, a homestead or just getting prepared for life’s storms this is the place to be. I believe that being prepared involves self sufficiency. For years, our fore fathers were self-sufficient and supplied their own needs. Granted, I can’t grow a pineapple here, but there will be sacrifices and we all know it. I believe we are headed toward disaster and we better prepare ourselves for it now.
Since we are all on different levels of preparedness and we are all in different financial situations, I hope to cover things that are affordable to everyone. I love to learn how to do things for myself, but I am often discouraged when people talk about things that above my means. I want to include everyone I can.
Share your tricks:
1. How you save money to buy preps or other things you need?
2. What are your short cuts?
3. Where do you get items cheap?
Don’t be shy! Share! If you want to share something, but don’t want to post it yourself, let me know and I will post it without your information attached. This is how we learn, from each other.
Happy Prepping!
I agree about the resolutions. I don't do resolutions either. I did commit to more regular scripture reading. I am reading 2 chapters every morning. We too are trying to do prepping.
ReplyDeleteWe make an effort to add to our pantry each month. We look at the sale ads and then go where we get the best deals. There always seems to be some things we want and need on sale at Kroger. We benefit not only from the sale on a particular item, we get points for gas discount. This is a plus especially with the rise in gas prices. We make most of our meals from scratch. Although we do keep things like canned soup and ramen style noodles on hand for lunches when there are no leftovers. I have found that for us it doesn't pay to make more than one full meal a day. I am always happy to teach others how to do some of the things I do. We live on a very small budget so we don't really do things that are super expensive.
Soon, I plan to make homemade egg noodles. I would be glad to help others learn to make these. I season mine with herbs and spices like onion and garlic powder/salt for onion/garlic noodles. These noodles can be dried and stored in an airtight container to await use or they can be frozen.
We also plan to can (preserve) more this year. We would not only like to can fruits and vegetables, but meat and stocks. Home canned foods do not have all the additives and preservatives that commercial canned foods have and are better for us.
We are looking forward to increasing our meat goat herd this year. So far we have a buck. We are working on getting together what we need to build a goat pen and shed. We are also looking to build a chicken house and some rabbit cages this year to begin raising hens for eggs and meat rabbits. Come Spring we hope to have our pig pen completed and be ready to add a couple of piglets to our mix for late fall or early winter butcher.
Wishing all a good new year and lots of luck in reaching your goals.
Thanks for sharing. Those are some great ideas! I love how we cook things at home more now and don't eat out very much at all. We hope to be able to make all our own mixes and things at some point. Doing away with all those preservatives that our bodies don't need will make us healthier! Thanks again!
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