A Farmish Kind of Life

To be a successful homesteader, you also need to be a fixer. But I'm not just referring to hands-on fixing, I'm also talking about the ability to move past just complaining towards taking action on the issues we're dealing with. And believe me—there's a reason this has been on the forefront of my mind lately. (Listen to today’s podcast by clicking on the play button on the black player bar above, or find the Farmish Kind of Life podcast on your favorite podcast player!) A few thoughts from today's episode: — There is a big difference between blowing off steam and pointless complaining—and you will know if you ask yourself is there productive action after the complaint? — People complain for lots of different reasons: It's a way to bond with people. If you don't complain, you fear that people assume your life is easy. Complaining is easier than making the (usually) uncomfortable choice that will bring about the solution to the problem. — When an issue arises on your homestead and you complain and don't fix it, you're just making noise. And you can't run an effective homestead by just making noise. — How many times have you heard someone complain about their aggressive rooster, or that their free range chickens are tearing up their yard—but they don't take steps to remedy the situation? They just post again in another forum, asking the same exact question. — It is most effective to focus your efforts dealing with things within your circle of influence/things you can control (health, children, issues at work or on homestead), and give less effort to worrying about the things in your circle of concern (the weather, the national debt, terrorism). — Don't get caught up in complaining about the stuff you can't do anything about. It only takes you away from the stuff that you actually have to do on the homestead—and I know you have enough to keep you busy. — When you complain, be willing to take action on the things you're complaining about. What are you going to do about it? — Complaining is sometimes the way to identify what we need to learn more about. — Pay close attention to what's going on around you and figure out solutions to what you may be dealing with in the future—but don't get stuck in the complaining part. Move into action to make things better for yourself, your family, and your homestead. — There are a lot of people out there who do nothing but complain. They are hard to be around. Don't be like them. — There are also people who are dealing with a lot of stuff and they complain very little. As in, yep, there's a struggle, now let's figure out what to do. Be like them. Links referenced in today’s show: Cook With What You Have by Nicole Sauce Join the A Farmish Kind of Life group on MeWe Should You Keep a Rooster? (episode 15) Five Truths About Free Range Chickens (episode 7) Habit 1: Be Proactive (FranklinCovey.com) Smart Homesteaders Keep Learning (episode 54) Check out all the episodes of the Farmish Kind of Life podcast Subscribe to my Farmish Kind of Life podcast at iTunes, Stitcher, Google Play, PlayerFM, or other popular podcast players. All episodes of the podcast will also be linked under the podcast tab that you can find way at the top of this post in my menu bar.

There's something that smart homesteaders continue to do, and that's learn. This revelation came about the other day when I made sun tea—for the very first time. I can hear you now, asking Amy, you've seriously never made sun tea before? True story. And the simple act of sticking some tea bags in water and setting it out in the sun sent me on a path of deep thoughts about the importance of continuing to learn new things around the homestead. (Listen to today’s podcast by clicking on the play button on the black player bar above, or find the Farmish Kind of Life podcast on your favorite podcast player!) In order to continue being successful at homesteading, you have to keep learning. How else are you going to take your homesteading journey to the next level? Join today me as I talk about: -- The reality that you really don't know what you don't know -- How continuing to learn increases your self-sufficiency -- Why it's important to teach people about the homesteading things you know -- The importance of being part of a community when it comes to learning -- Project: list out the things you do know and what you don't know—and why it's really hard to make that list -- Examples of things I do know how to do—and the many things I don't -- Why we tend to get stuck in the information we currently have -- Why you shouldn't feel dumb or overwhelmed if you don't know something -- How modern homesteading gives us the option to be afraid to screw up—and why that doesn't help Links referenced in today's show: Cook With What You Have by Nicole Sauce Living Free in Tennessee - Nicole Sauce's podcast How to make sun tea in a mason jar The how-to of fermenting chicken feed The Backyard Herbal Apothecary by Devon Young Why YOU are a Homesteading Expert Homesteading Questions: There are No Dumb Ones The Gift of Community Subscribe to my Farmish Kind of Life podcast at iTunes, Stitcher, Google Play, PlayerFM, or other popular podcast players. All episodes of the podcast will also be linked under the podcast tab that you can find way at the top of this post in my menu bar.

A new friend asked the other day, "do you have an blog post or a podcast episode on why you decided to be a homesteader?" As it turns out, while there are a lot of things I've talked about in this blog and on my podcast, I've never really talked about why we started homesteading. (Listen to today's podcast by clicking on the play button on the black player bar above, or find the Farmish Kind of Life podcast on your favorite podcast player!) So, what exactly prompted our head first dive into this crazy life? (Or wait. Was it head first? Or was it more gradual?) Join today me as I talk about some stuff and things like: -- Where we were before the farm -- How we ended up at the farm -- Our original plans for the farm, what worked...and what didn't -- What happened when life happened -- How I got lost in our plans and "got away" from homesteading -- What I needed to do to get back to it -- The importance of knowing your reason for homesteading and what your goals are -- How to determine what's extra and if it needs to go Links I may have referenced in today's show: Find me on MeWe at my personal account, the Farmish Kind of Life discussion group, and the Farmish page Episode 52: The Importance of a Handwritten Letter (and I swear I'm not a hypocrite) That time I asked other people why they homestead That time I explained why I call my life farmish Backwoods Home magazine (it's back in print!) Self Reliance magazine (by the same people that publish Backwoods Home) It's super awesome to open your freezer and see that its full—here are 5 ways to make sure that happens The really sweet chicken butchering set up we've figured out Why homesteading veterans actually need homesteading newbies Use our homeschool mission statement project as a sorta kinda guide to write a homesteading mission statement Subscribe to my Farmish Kind of Life podcast at iTunes, Stitcher, Google Play, PlayerFM, or other popular podcast players. All episodes of the podcast will also be linked under the podcast tab that you can find way at the top of this post in my menu bar.

Someone give me a pen and a paper. I'm gonna sit down and write a handwritten letter. (Well, I mean, after I finish this blog post.) (Don't want to read all the words? This blog post is also a podcast—just press the triangle play button on the little black bar at the top of this post!) When I was younger, I had many pen pals. Even as an adult—before Facebook’s popularity—I found a pen pal through an old fashioned living/homesteader forum. And though she and I are now friends on Facebook, we do the vast majority of our communication by way of a handwritten note, letter, or card. The majority of people I’ve asked say they love to receive handwritten letters or cards in the mail. It lets them know someone is thinking about them because they put the effort in to sending them something special. However, most of those people I asked admitted they don’t send handwritten mail. While a few people said they don’t send cards or letters anymore because the cost is prohibitive, the majority of people I asked said they don’t send handwritten mail because it simply takes too much time. Time. You know, that thing we were supposed to be saving with all the technology and advancements we add to our lives? (That’s a whole different blog post, though, so…) Our communication now may be faster and more efficient, but is it actually better? Is it to be considered an improvement that we can blast off a paragraph's worth of response in less than 15 seconds? In some ways, maybe. But I’d argue that it’s not better in all ways or every situation. See, the thing I’ve realized is this: regardless of the reason for the death of the handwritten letter, the quality of our communication has changed because of it. And this is much deeper than what it first seems at face value. A handwritten letter requires time to write each word. I sat down to write a letter to a friend last week and was amazed at how much longer it takes to w-r-i-t-e out the very same words than if I were to type them out on Facebook. Do I want to write that paragraph about what the chickens/my kids/the neighbor did yesterday? Do I want to write out what I think of my friend’s sister’s boyfriend? Or should I leave it out? What’s really important or pertinent to this note? And how long will my 40-year-old hands and fingers hold out to continue this pen-and-paper letter? Which got me to thinking—if people had to hand write all their emotional, dramatic, political explosions, would there be as many of them? Or would we get better at sighing and scrolling past because it wouldn’t be worth our effort to drag out a pen and paper? Communication happens much faster now—and it's changed what we allow to be said. A handwritten letter devotes complete attention to the person you’re writing to. On social media, it is not uncommon for me to have several chats open at once. And while I can get a lot done in a short amount of time, I also haven’t fully given myself to any of the conversations I’m having. You can’t be scatterbrained about who you’re writing to when you’re using a pen and paper. There’s not enough room on the kitchen table to be working on 12 letters at once. You have to focus on one person at a time—which brings with it a sort of importance and reverence for the individual that’s being written to. A handwritten letter means a break in the day. It might have something to do with the fact that to write a letter, it requires that you take a break from what you were doing, but I tend to think that sitting down to work on a handwritten letter is just as enjoyable for the writer as it is for the receiver. I would argue that in the days when the handwritten letter was more common, people knew how to take a break every once in awhile. We could learn a lot from taking time for the handwritten letter. It’s more than just words on paper. It’s a break within a way to connect. But one of the biggest changes I see that’s come along with the ...