Starting a Homestead from scratch, wow, what a dream!
I had never even considered the fact I was actually “homesteading”; I have just been living life the best way I know how with what we have at hand, that's all. But then I discovered the word and the life and realized I have been living part of my dream all along for the last twenty years…
I have been living a homesteader life!
But what if I could start it all over again, start from scratch, start with $100K USD? I’ve been given the ground rules of climate, seasons and rainfall and I am required to consider priorities and power.
Coming from the type of homesteading where winters run for about 7-8 months long with temperatures regularly dropping to -36o degrees Celsius(-32.8o F); where it practically shifts from winter to summer overnight with little to no spring evident, and where fall can linger for a short time or be non-existent depending on Mother Nature’s mood at the moment, my wants, needs or ideas may not necessarily offer up any specific solutions, but rather, offer up general considerations were I to do it all over again.
This post does give me food for thought though, because I am hoping in the near future to find myself in a somewhat similar position of “starting over” as we near our retirement age and are considering the move to a more advantageous climate to spend our retirement years.
Which brings me to the point of age… what I would do now versus what I did twenty years ago? The two are completely different spectrum points on the rainbow of happiness!
First priorities at my age would be to consider:
Water. Man is 50-60% water, we cannot live without water. So first priority would be to seek out an area with excellent water availability along with quality. Then it would be to choose the best, most convenient, most economical access and storage system available.
Choice of land. Trees, it must have trees, both for privacy and for self-sufficiency of heating and cooking… and large enough to suit my introverted nature because nothing pleases me more than to be by myself. Happiness and stress free are the only way to live in harmony with the earth and be successful in a self-sustainable lifestyle. I would however choose to be within close proximity to available amenities such as health care since our closest cities are a minimum of four, six and ten hours away for specialized medical/dental services should a person find oneself in need of them.
Ease of work. The energy and dreams we have when we are young are completely different than our aged bodies can handle. While I would love to be totally off grid, using only solar power and wood heat for everything, finding, cutting, and splitting wood is a big job! We do it every year, burn about six cords on average. Guaranteed a warmer climate may not require as much for heating or cooking purposes, but I’m just sayin’.
Tools. Living without “tools” and foraging off the land is a wonderful existence, but after twenty years it becomes old… so a few tools to ensure a long healthy life and homestead such as log splitter, Bobcat and tiny rototiller would not be unattractive. The log splitter for obvious reasons, the Bobcat serves a multitude of purposes from snow plough to land levelling to garden aide. And the rototiller because, well because gardening is just a lot of work… I own a fantastic little Honda 4-stroke weighing only 20 pounds and it is marvellous!
The home. My choice would be a very well insulated, as small a home as one can live with. Smaller homes mean less to heat and less power consumption, not to mention, less to clean. Well insulated will keep it warmer in the winter and cooler in the summer. For twenty years our home was a mere 950 square foot until this year when we decided to convert our deck into a three season sunroom adding 250 square feet to the structure…. a place to add a hot tub to soak in memories of our youth!
Power. I would love to live solely off solar power…. but… when said system fails for one reason or another it is valuable to have a backup system. We don’t have one, other than wood heat (and a gas generator which we have not used for survival purposes....yet), which allows for both heat and cooking and I consider myself fortunate, but I am not sure whether or not I would install a propane backup, Genset (propane, gas, diesel, etc.), or rely on electricity and pay the prices and hope it doesn’t fail me through a power outage of which we have experienced many times. Either way, when you’re “old”, you don’t want to be out fussing with necessities in the middle of winter, the old bones just can’t handle it!
Self-sustainability. In order to be self-sustainable, you need to be able to produce food all year long, otherwise it is to the grocery stores we go to purchase much needed nutrition for our bodies, and where we live, the produce is already old by the time it gets here. For this, besides the obvious garden, canning, preserving, etc., I would, preferably build, an indoor hydroponic garden system and/or lighting system so I can have fresh greens all year long, close at hand and to save money.
As I come to a close in my response to the question posed by @thetreeoflife, I guess what I am trying to say is that when we are young and eager with our whole lives ahead of us, full of excitement and eagerness, ability and imagination, plans and dreams... take a step back and look at the long-term picture.... live for today but plan for tomorrow and your ever after home will be the fairytale you dreamt of and the story you get to live.
All in all, there is always room for improvement in any homesteading environment and if I listed them all here I could go on for ever and a day; if money were no object, well let’s just say, if money were no object we wouldn’t be having this conversation, would we?
@thetreeoflife, I guess what I am trying to say is that when we are young and eager with our whole lives ahead of us, full of excitement and eagerness, ability and imagination, plans and dreams... take a step back and look at the long-term picture.... live for today but plan for tomorrow and your ever after home will be the fairytale you dreamt of and the story you get to live.
