Christmas Savings

Christmas Savings

Hey all,

With Christmas literally just days away, I got to thinking about how we go about saving money for Christmas and other times of the year. Here’s one thing we do.

As homesteaders, my family is always looking for ways to be frugal. One of the things we have started doing a few years back, is making the liquid laundry soap that the Duggar family makes. We’v.e found that it enables us to make large batches of soap fairly cheaply and we get more soap this way.

Here’s the recipe:

Ingredients

• 4 cups hot tap water

• 1 Fels-Naptha soap bar

• 1 cup Arm & Hammer super washing soda (not baking soda or detergent!)

• 1/2 cup borax

Preparation Instructions

1 Grate the bar of Fels-Naptha soap; place in saucepan with water over medium-high heat. Stir soap constantly until dissolved.

2 Fill half of a 5 gallon bucket (2.5 gallons) with hot tap water.

3 Add melted soap from saucepan, washing soda and borax to bucket. Stir until completely dissolved.

4 Fill remainder of bucket with hot tap water; let sit overnight.

5 (Optional: add 10-15 drops of essential oil to two gallons of concentrated soap after it has cooled.)

6 When ready to use, fill half of a clean laundry soap dispenser with the soap concentration and the other half with water. The two will form a gel.

We use 3/4ths of a cup of this to wash our clothes. It saves a lot on money. This is especially helpful in terms of all the extra things you can buy when you aren’t paying as much for laundry soap. Christmas just got easier.

Until next time,

Homestead in health ya’ll,

Emily

Making Your Homestead Pay Part 1

 

Making Your Homestead Pay Part 1

Homesteading can be more than just a way to feed yourself. You can both save and make money by homesteading. We’ve helped ourselves out by raising as much as we need and more. Some we barter, some we keep, and some we sell. So, what do we raise or grow extras off, and where do we sell them?

Well, for starters, we raise extra chicks, turkey poults and ducklings. We hatch twice a year and we bought the absolute best stock we could get. These, we sell on Craigslist, by word of mouth, myneighbor.com, and every once and again, the auction barn. We rarely sell through auction though because we get a lower price at the auction than we do through private sale. We see our livestock as cash on the hoof.

We also got licensed to sell seeds, so we raise extra plants to be able to sell. In our state, it’s only $35 to get that license. Aside from selling sprouts, cuttings, and seeds, we also raise rabbits, goats, and occasionally with the goats’ milk, we bring up a calf to sell.

Because we raise dairy goats and chickens, we have milk and eggs frequently available from the farm gate. We also sometimes have yogurt and cheese, and maybe soap for sale. We also have it known in our community that we sometimes have fresh vegetables available at the farm. They just have to ask. Another thing that Jerreth said to tell you all to look into, is a stand at a local farmers market. If you don’t have enough extra to need a stand, you might see if a friend who has a stand might be willing to let you sell yours from their stand. Another thing that we do that is an excellent way to raise a little extra cash, is raise red worms. Fishermen love them. Gardeners that know enough to know, love them too.

I’ll post again next time with a few more things you can do to either save money or raise money with your homestead.
Until next time,
Emily

Balancing The Homesteading Life Part 2

Balancing The Homesteading Life Part 2

Hey all,
I’m sharing part 2 of my multiple part series on simplifying your life and making your homestead not turn stressful for you. You need to keep a balance. So, with that said, here are some more things that we’ve found have helped us on our homestead.

As I mentioned in the last post, it’s easy to get so wrapped up in your garden or livestock that it becomes overwhelming. We do need to take a break for our loved ones. Stuff is just stuff. Sometimes the garden will need to wait. Be present for your family. Take time for friends. When they remember you, you want them to remember you not for the way your homestead was always immaculate, but for being a warming, loving and caring person who took time out to really love them.

Also, while you are working on your homestead, look for deals. Lack of money can be a big burden. You don’t always have to go pricey on everything. Sometimes, you can find a great deal on just one component of something you would like to have, and you can get the pieces over time to make something, or you might be able to barter with someone to get an animal that you would want. For example, we’ve bartered meat before in exchange for a doe on the hoof that we really wanted. Craigslist can really be your friend. Keep your impulses in check and don’t buy something before you are sure that it is exactly what you need.

Also, be a learner. Being a learner means that when you have something horrible happen on the homestead, because bad things can and do happen to good people, you take it as a learning opportunity. A learner maintains a positive attitude, and asks questions about how to solve their problems. Learners try to make sure they are linked in with community because everyone can still learn something, and sometimes someone else in your community will have the answer to your difficulty. A learner is a person with perseverance.

Until next time,
Emily

 

 

Out With The Ants!!!

Every year around April or May, our homestead gets invaders. They are small invaders but can be very damaging to the house, and our wallets. 

After years of trying different things to get rid of our yearly ant invasion that seems to show up no matter how neat one is with the home, dad came up with a solution.

It only uses items we normally have in our home anyway, and ants seem to be incapable of resisting it. The downside is that until the ants are gone, it is an eyesore.

Here is the recipe that dad found that kills whole nests of ants:

Roughly:

1 cup water

3/4 cup sugar

1 teaspoon borax

Bring water to a boil and add the sugar. 

Stir until the sugar is dissolved. 

Let cool until just warm. Add borax and stir.

We then set it out in cups or jars for the ants to find. They die in the cup or jar and the whole nest ends up dead in the containers. After a few weeks of this, we don’t find a single ant in the house.