Homesteader Life

We have been reading a delightful book at lunch time as a family. Scratching the Woodchuck: Nature on an Amish Farm is a collection of short essays about a life lived closely with creation. David Kline has the ability to take you right to the very place he is writing about. We […]

God tells us in His Word that he gave us wine to “make light the heart of man”. The brewing of wine is time honored tradition for homesteaders, and one that is pretty easy to do. I found this recipie in Charles Sander’s book The Self-Reliant Homestead. Though its called a “whiskey” […]

We recently gained access to a beaver pond for trapping. Yesterday the boys and I went down to check it out. Beavers are such amazing creatures, we had a ball looking around. I showed the boys the dam and the house and all the little canals they make to haul in food […]

Today the boys and I dropped Leah off at the Above Rubies Reatreat for the weekend. Its chilly out tonight, we sit here by the warmth of nice hickory fire listening to some Johnny Cash. We read a few chapters in On The Shores of Silver Lake after we got some wood carried […]

“That’s such a small community that there’s nothing to do but visit friends and eat and sing and talk all night. It was a wonderful time….”
These comments by Kelly about life in the Bush are very true.
I’ve lived in farm country my whole life, but my first experience with true community was […]

Yup, I hear them. Not all the time, thankfully, but when I do… I hear them loud and clear. They come from the North, calling, begging and pleading with me to come back home. Never know what might set them off. Sometimes it happens after reading some Robert Service. Sometimes […]

The natural thing for people to do when they “become agrarians”, is to want the whole shebang…..last week. As the country didn’t fall apart in a week, a christian agrarian homestead will not built in week. The homestead might well take many generations before it is a real income generator that can sustain […]

This morning at 4 o’clock, Little John and I headed off to start the morning chores. I tapped John on the shoulder a few times and told him we needed to get going. He got up right away and wiped the sleep from his eyes, got dressed, put on his rubber boots and […]

This past year has been a rough one. Many times I’ve wondered to myself, “why one earth I’m I doing this”. Trying to live a biblical agrarian life in a pagan economic system is trying, to say the least. Sometimes it seems that no matter how hard you work, no matter how […]

Today was John’s “Big Day”. As most of you know, the boys spend a lot of time doing chores with me. Up until now the early morning chores have been done without the boys. For those who don’t know, John will be 4 in July and Noah turned 2 in Febuary. […]