The Modern Homesteader

 The question... 

A few weeks ago a fellow blogger left a comment asking me what information I could pass on to them about homesteading in Missouri.  Little did they know they got my wheels turning! Quite honestly I felt very unqualified to answer her question. Before I answered her question I found her blog to "get to know" her a bit.  You can find Tessa at www.homesteadlady.com.  My first though was WOW...  Her blog is beautiful and after reading a bit I realized she is much farther on this homesteading journey than I am.  I felt even more unqualified to answer.  In fact she got me thinking what makes me think I am a homesteader at all?  What is a homesteader today? Who can be a homesteader?

The journey...

I began by thinking where we get the word homestead.  What does that mean?  Basically it was a way for people to get land and create a home.  The government said that if you move to this area and make a home you can keep the land.  It became theirs.  People moved to places previously uninhabited by people to live.  Ok, to that is the grade school version but stay with me :)   That version of homesteading is very rare today.  So what does homesteading mean today.  Modern homesteading can be simply defined as being self sufficient.  (see Wikipedia)  I found the The homestead bloggers network and looked through their list of bloggers.  The one basic idea I found was that they all were striving to be self sufficient in some way.  Common threads were gardening, building, raising animals for food, living off grid, and anything to provide for oneself.  Members were at different spots in the journey and the members themselves were varied and from all different backgrounds.  So...

The answer...

Are we homesteaders? I say yes.  When I started the blog I picked the name because I felt like a homesteader as we moved onto land that was empty of any modern touches.  I felt like we were blazing a new path.  Since then, I've learned we are far from alone in our way of living and I find comfort in that.  That means I can learn from others and yet even then I've learned that reading about how to milk a cow, raise chickens, make cheese, can food, garden, and all the other things that come with this life are far different than the real experience.  Nothing really compares to actually doing these things than when you get your hands dirty and feel the sweat, tears, fear, and triumphant of succeeding over a hurdle.  The  feeling of satisfaction of carrying a full milk bucket, building a chicken coop, toting a basket of eggs, stocking a pantry of home canned goods, piling a stack of firewood, or eating a meal of food all from your backyard.   

Homesteading in Missouri? I believe it is a bit more popular here because we have more rural land available.  The growing season is longer which means gardens can do well and food grows abundantly wild also.  I have found many homesteaders here even if they don't think of themselves that way because it is simply a way of life they've had for years.
I hope you can join me on this journey and learn with me as we do our best to take care of our little corner of the world. 
What do you think??

Breakfast Burritos

OK I know I haven't done a food post for a while so I thought I'd throw this out there.  Super D was really happy to have this Breakfast Burrito..

Now I usually am not a big fan of breakfast burritos but these were great and super simple!

Tortilla
Scrambled eggs
Hash brown
Chili
Toppings of choice: Cheese, black Olives, Jalapenos, Sour Cream

I stuffed the Tortilla with Eggs and hash bowns, then topped with left over chili and toppings.  These were wonderful. 

Enjoy!

A Cold, Cold Winter!

I know we are not the only ones fighting extreme cold this winter.  I hope this finds you staying warm! We have been working hard to stay warm with temperatures dropping to -15 degrees our little wood stove is working overtime to keep us warm. 

 

Here's the girls and I cuddled up under seven blankets (we counted!) on the day we couldn't get the house above 50 degrees.  That night it dropped to 37 degrees!  We stocked our little fire religiously and Super D and I slept in the living room by it to keep it going all night.  The next day we got a much better supply of wood that is burning better!  The last stuff just didn't want to burn very hot and if you've never had to use a fire to keep a house warm I know that sounds odd. 
 I never realized all that goes into using a wood stove.  We sure didn't get much done for a couple days but had a pretty good time cuddling and watching TV. 

Even the dogs had to get in on the blanket action!  Thankfully the weather has gotten warmer since then and our stove is keep up much better.  I've been glad for some sunshine and hope the below 0 temps are behind us for the year.  I am looking forward to spring! 

A Quiet Christmas

For the first time ever I think, we had a quiet Christmas at home.  We didn’t go anywhere or even have company.  Just got to lounge around in our PJ’s all day!  We started out the day at about 7:20 with kids waking us up.  We slowly got out of bed to get the fire going…

Super D is standing in front of the real fire while we get the effect with music from the TV.    Of course next is presents…
 
Sassafras got a new hat from her sister. Can you tell she likes Pandas??  It’s an inherited trait, I collected Panda things as a kid too.
We then had a yummy Christmas breakfast of Eggs, bacon, and Cinnamon Rolls.  Bacon was a treat too as we haven’t had Bacon around lately as it is a bit more expensive.  Then we just hung out.  Watched a Christmas movie and played. 
Sugar Bug had all her clothed tried on and toys all played with before the day was over. 

Here she is coloring after working a couple pot holders on the loom, by the end of the day we all had our own pot holder.    And we played her new game together.  It was very funny…

The game is called Hedbanz Act up.. The game like charades, you act out what is on another players card and have them guess. Super D is acting out an earthquake here.


Sassafras pausing to take a picture of us.  With our game headwear .  It is a fun game that gets us all laughing!
We didn’t have a big dinner just a simple every day one and that was fine.  We had a family dinner with everyone a couple days after Christmas.  It was nice to just stay home and enjoy the family.

I hope you had a wonderful Christmas and Wish you all a Happy New Year!!

Merry Christmas From the Ozarks

I thought I’d share our Christmas Letter with you all with extra pictures…

It’s been another tough year for the S Family.  In July we lost Super D’s  Dad  to cancer.  Super D was able to take time off and spent 3 months in Colorado caring for his dad in his last days and taking care of the estate after he passed.   The girls and I made a quick week long trip up with my sister-in-law and her kids at the end of June.  We were all able to see Grandpa G and say our goodbyes.  It was a very trying trip but we made it, making a quick over night in Tulsa on the way.     

   
    In April I started working at the local store here.  It is about 10 minutes from home and is going pretty well.  I now know about half the town by name.   We are the only store/gas station/ restaurant for about 30 miles. 
       
    In June we celebrated Sugar Bug’s 10th birthday at blue springs, her favorite place on the river.  We had a lot of fun jumping into the icy water on the warm day.   In October my mom , sister , grandma E, and grandma B along with a couple family friends all made the trip to visit us and help celebrate Sassafras turning 15!  It was the first trip for any of them out here.  We rented a cabin on the river with a gorgeous view for everyone. 

    October was a crazy month as along with everyone visiting we moved again.  We didn’t move far.  We still love the Ozarks and have expanded a bit.  We bought another 4 acres practically next door with a mobile home on it.   We are all thankful to have running water with working toilets and showers for the winter!   We still have our other 6 acres with 10 acres separating the two properties.   Originally, when Super D was growing up the all 20 acres were combined.  His step dad had split it up to sell.  Maybe one day we will have it all back together.  For now we have put building on hold while we decide where we want to build and our next step. 

   Super D has been working installing solar systems with another guy who has decided to sell his business.  As a result, Super D is no longer working with him and planning to starting his own business in the new year. 

    Despite our crazy year our little farm has managed to grow.  We got a little milk cow named Sweet Pea who gave birth to a bull calf in August.  The girls named him Thor.  Thankfully she delivered with no help as Super D was still in Colorado when she had him.  So I got plunged into learning to milk our cow!  I am so glad she is a sweet thing and has been a great cow and we learned to milk together with no problems.  This was her first calf so we were both new it all!   We have loved the fresh milk and Super D has taken up cheese making.  Our chickens didn’t fare so well while we were in Colorado so we got a new set of chicks that should start giving us eggs again in the spring.
   

Here is one of the Christmas pictures of the girls.  I take pictures every year at Christmas our version of school pictures.  This one captures my girls personalities wonderfully!

 
  

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!!

A New Tradition

“It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas, everywhere you look”   To quote the song.   We had a blast getting our Christmas tree this year.  I haven’t had a real live Christmas tree since I was a kid.  When Super D and I got married we didn’t have any extra money for a tree.   We were lucky to have a fake tree given to us and for about 10 years that was what we set us every year.  We’ll when we moved and downsized that was an item that got left behind.  Last year if you remember we didn’t have room for a tree.  So I was excited this year!

And the search begins.  It was a beautiful sunny day with just enough snow on the ground to make it fun.  This was contestant #1,  first tree we looked at and really looked good but we wanted to search a little more.  It was slightly on the short side. 

Contestant #2  nice and full and right height but too wide.  So we keep looking.  By the way we are looking on our 6 acres where we have several smaller cedars growing. 

Gotta play in the snow a bit while looking!  The snowball ended up showering Sassafras as soon as we got the picture.  Trust me she had it coming. 

And the winner is Contestant #3 Good height, a bit narrower, and full branches.  Down she comes.
We got her loaded up and home.  Sugarbug helped me decorate after Super D got it set up and adjusted just right.  Sassafras make cookies for us while we worked.

Ta Da...  Okay so we learned some lessons.  Cedar trees are a bit more pokey than the fake ones and they tend to grow once you get them inside.  We ended up tying some branches up a bit to narrow it up even more so it fit better and we ended up cutting a bit off as it was slightly too tall for our roof.  The tree wants to lean to one side but I love it’s imperfections and love having a real one that smells great too. Goliath our dog wanted in on the actions and posed for this picture too. 
Hope your having a Great Holiday Season!

Winter Wonderland

Here I was concerned I’d miss snow when we moved.  Well, I was wrong.  Missouri has not disappointed in giving me some snow.  Now it usually doesn’t stick around too long and I like that.  I think I got the better deal.  Ok on to the pictures.  As most of the US is in deep freeze right now we got this yesterday…

                                              Defiantly a blanket of white.  And it was still snowing. 

 

             This is about 6” and only the half way mark.  It snowed the rest of the day and we have at least a foot! I even got the day off work as the store                                       closed early.

                     Prince was cold too trying to stay out of the wind on the porch.  For some silly reason only  he knows he didn’t want in the coop with the rest of the hens.

So… If it doesn’t look too familiar these are all at the new place.  Which I promised.  ;)  Here are some not covered in snow so you can see the land…

 

 

Well, I’m not talented enough to merge these two so you’ll have to use your brain.  But bottom one is by the Hwy which borders our property and then continues in.  You can see the pond in both pictures.  (that’s the dark spot surrounded by trees)  These are taken from our porch.  Here’s one taken from the other side of the pond looking back…

I love the reflection of the trees in this picture! You’ll have to use your imagination for how pretty everything will be in the spring when it greens up.  On this land we have quite a bit more woods.  The border of our land is a couple hundred feet from the tree line in some areas and it borders a property that is just a 2 acre slice of trees it has a rich history that we are trying to learn about.   But that’s for another day. 

Just so pretty!  Hope you stay warm where ever you are!