"I would think you would be really depressed if you went from this way of life back to the way we used to live," The Papa said the other day while we had lunch with friends.

Looking back at our life just over three months ago the contrasts are huge. Where once there was electricity there is now minimal solar power. Where once there was running water there is now a hose connected to a solar-powered pump (a luxury by many standards).

Our solar-powered refrigerator is the size of a very small freezer, a freezer is something we are currently living without, we go to the bathroom in a homemade composting toilet that consists of a bucket and a toilet seat, and I have not taken what y’all might consider to be a "real shower" in over three months.

But these, frankly, are things that shouldn’t matter when pondering the "how then shall we live" question. Every now and then I daydream of showers and washing machines and flushing toilets, but then I remember one of the many reasons that we are here.

Freedom.

I see it in my husband’s face when he spends his day working with his hands, building things, digging holes, preparing soil for a garden. He no longer has to pretend that what he does every day is okay even though it disconnects him from his family, his faith, and his reliance on God.

I see it in my precious children’s perspectives when they tell me they didn’t like it when Papa used to have to leave for work every day. Giving them our time, and struggling daily not to be hypocrites, is all I know of to give to them.

The Price Thereof

About 95% of the time I don’t miss the old, easier way of doing things. We were fortunate enough to start with nothing more on our land than a camper and a catch water system. The process of building up the very basic infrastructures of life is incredibly important, I think, in the process of realizing what you truly need and what, frankly, you can live without.

But that doesn’t mean that things aren’t hard sometimes, even if you can see the bigger picture.

The only food we are producing is one egg per day and a baby winter garden that won’t be ready for harvesting for quite some time. Neither of us has a job working away from the homestead. Until we are truly producing, we feed our family with the not-very-consistent proceeds from this blog, the free-lance writing and editing jobs I have done, and a very exciting new project The Papa has been working on.

There is savings, used for bigger projects or midwife payments, but we are hoping to save that for infrastructure.

When the Rubber Meets the Road

We are trying to trust the Lord to provide in every instance. But you realize really fast that saying "I trust the Lord for our provisions" is much easier when you are selling your soul to a corporation for a paycheck than it is when you actually step out of that cocoon and start making an attempt at an obedient life.

But isn’t that the point? Nothing worth anything is easy and nothing worth anything comes from staying where you are simply because it is comfortable.

And what is the point of comfort and money if it comes at the cost of true freedom in being able to live one’s life according to one’s conscience?

I have been wanting to share our very basic, very unprofessional off-grid infrastructure with y’all for quite some time now. I am always fascinated when reading about how people do the basics of domestic life without modern conveniences. Problem is we’ve passed the three week mark on one or all being sick and, well, priorities have to be made.

Until then I’d like to share with you the top five items I have found to be necessities in our off-grid kitchen. They aren’t fancy gadgets, they aren’t anything extravagent or particularly "foodie", but their simplicity has gotten us through these past three months.

So, if you’re interested, go check out the article Five Things I Couldn’t Live Without In Our Off-Grid Kitchen. And I would love to hear your ideas for what could streamline those daily tasks in the kitchen.

Cold nights have necessitated some hoophouses. These were built of PVC and plastic sheeting – a short term solution we are hoping. The middle bed is the garlic bed. Lettuce, kale, and pea shoots can all be found hidden under cover.

The little man’s own hoophouse.

Also sprouting up is the garlic we planted shortly after we arrived.

Speaking of arrivals… just a few chickens have made their way to the land, courtesy of a generous neighbor.

And this treasure is their new home – an almost-free chicken coop built from mostly salvaged materials. Final cost: ~$20, coming from the chicken wire, a $5 window, screws & nails, and the fuel used to pick up free pallets.

And the most exciting news of all is this beauty, found in the egg drawers just this afternoon. The first animal product ever to be harvested by our family.

We continue to be amazed at this process and all of the lessons and treasures it brings.

This guest post comes from Wardeh of the awesome blog GNOWFGLINS. This article has been beneficial for us as we plan our homestead and I hope it is for you as well!

I‘ll begin this post with a confession: I’m not an animal person. Never have been. But here I am, the chief milk maid in my family. I started out by milking goats and now I’m milking a cow. I figure, who better to tell you all about it (both the wonderful and the icky) than someone who was won over to it in spite of herself?

Here is one of the most often-asked questions I get: what are the differences between milking goats and milking cows? And probably the second-most-asked question is: which do you prefer? I don’t claim to know it all, but I’ll do my best to answer. First, let me tell you the story of how we got into dairy animals. I hope you realize this is my story and my experience. Your mileage may vary.

Inspiration

I think we’re not the only family who read Nourishing Traditions and decided on the spot to raise dairy animals to produce our own raw milk.

"…the milk sold in your supermarket is bad for everybody, partly because the modern cow is a freak of nature. A century ago cows produced two or three gallons per day; today’s Holsteins routinely give three or four times as much. … All the healthy milk-drinking populations studied by Dr. [Weston A.] Price consumed raw milk, raw cultured milk or raw cheese from normal healthy animals eating fresh grass or fodder. It is very difficult to find this kind of milk in America." –Nourishing Traditions, pages 34 to 35

Goats or Cow?

My husband wanted to start with a cow. I wasn’t ready for that. I’d heard stories of how cows are bigger and capable of dealing a fatal blow to the head with one kick, how they’re harder to control because of their size, and how they always go to the bathroom during milking (ick, ick, ick).

On the other hand, I heard how goats are easier to control, being smaller and friendly, and how they’d never do that other icky going-to-the-bathroom thing. Whether or not any of these things were true remained to be seen. This is what I heard.

Our Step 1: Goats

We started with goats. For someone new to milking — or new to animal care altogether — starting with a smaller animal seems to be a good plan and one I don’t regret. We chose to raise Nubians because they make the creamiest milk. We got our first herd by buying a handful of goats already "in milk" (meaning they’d just given birth and were lactating). I learned to milk them through trial and error. So did my daughters.

Of the four milkers we brought home: two were easy milkers but their production went down when they moved to our place, one was a real trial (spooked easily), and one goat got sick the day she arrived at our place, never to recover. There were other ups and downs. Yet we learned to milk and that experience was good. But in terms of volume of milk, we never got quite enough.

Enough to drink, for the most part. Enough for daily batches of kefir. Enough for occasional batches of cheese. But even if we could have gotten the yields up — through more goats and better health — I couldn’t easily get the one thing we lacked. Cream. For butter and ice cream, of course!

You might be wondering: if the milk is so creamy, why couldn’t I get any cream? Well, goat milk is naturally homogenized; the butterfat doesn’t rise to the surface. Over four or five days of refrigeration in a shallow pan, some will rise. But who can wait that long — and who has that much refrigerator space? Or, there’s the $400 cream separator option. (Which I did buy with a craft haul one year, but we never installed it because we didn’t have a countertop to give up to it permanently.)

Our Step 2: A Cow

About two years after the goat-milking journey, we decided to try a milk cow instead. We wanted a Jersey cow because of the cream. And also because she’s a heritage breed that offers more nutritious milk on other counts. (If you want to read more about that, click here.)

At that point, I felt ready to take on a bigger animal, though truth be told, quite scared. You can read about my journey learning to milk Gracie, our milk cow, here and here. The first link is my cry for help and the second, my lessons learned about patience.

Adjusting to milking Gracie was harder than adjusting to milking goats. I guess it would have been even harder had I not learned the actual skill of milking first, given Gracie’s irritable temperament. There are slight differences in how you milk each species, but I think when you know how to milk one, you can easily milk the other. At least, that’s been my experience.

Gracie’s milk — both the volume of it and the lovely, luscious, sweet, thick cream it contains — has been a dream come true. Or rather, an answer to prayer! I couldn’t imagine what having that much milk would be like until I was swimming in it. We have plenty for everything I want to do with it. Drinking, kefir, cheese, butter, ice cream. Plus enough to share. All from one animal.

We share milk with some friends. Their son has a short gut and he needs nutrient-dense foods to keep his weight up and to get enough nutrition. From their weekly gallons, they give most of the cream to him. He drinks it straight. He is gaining weight. Of all the reasons to be happy about raising a family milk cow, I’m most thankful for that.

Truth and Fiction

Remember the things I heard about cows and goats? Some of them turned out to be true. Cows do go to the bathroom during milking. (The goats never did that.) One reason is when they’re unhappy or irritated. Gracie, brand-new to being milked, was understandably unhappy and irritated alot those first months. We kept a 5-gallon bucket handy for #1 and a shovel handy for #2. She learned to hold back because she didn’t like a bucket or shovel held up to her backside.

Another reason cows do that is because… they just do. When they have to go, they have to go. So we give her time to take care of that before the milking, and most often she does. She’s learned. Smart cow.

Here’s another thing that turned out to be true. Cows are dirtier than goats. On colder nights Gracie prefers to sleep in her you-know-what because it’s warm. Yep. Our goats were never dirtier than dusty.

What turned out to be fiction? Cows are not usually vicious. Our Gracie is guilty of being irritable, but not deadly. In fact, I believe she goes out of her way to not hurt me during milking. Harder to handle? Sometimes — but not impossible.

Goats, on the other hand, are at least as stubborn and much more mischievous. I mentioned our easily-spooked goat. I couldn’t even get a hobble on her without her totally freaking out. Her kicks hurt. And just try getting a goat to stay in one place when there’s food involved. If there’s a hole in the fence (or even the beginning of one), they’ll find a way through.

What I’ve Learned

There’s not one bright and shining better way. It comes down to what you prefer and the limits of care you can provide.

For me… I prefer handling a smaller animal like a goat. I prefer the cleanliness of goats. But I also prefer more milk. And of course, cream. So I’m on the cow side of the fence. For now.

Want to learn more? I highly recommend the book Keeping a Family Cow by Joanna S. Grohman, plus the forum she started to support family cow journeys.

Thanks so much for your perspective, Wardeh. We’ve got a lot to think about!

It is one thing to say we’re going to move off-grid and start a homestead and it is an entirely different thing to do it. What you think might happen really doesn’t and what you envision your days looking like isn’t really a reality.

We’ve spent the past seven weeks learning that lesson, amongst others. You’ve got to get your basic needs met first before you can even consider work on food production projects. You know water, food, shelter, and waste management.

The last couple of weeks, however, we have started to see a glimmer of what could be. One day the Papa mentioned the winter garden and I said "Where? and hand me a shovel." I guess all of this don’t lift heavy objects stuff had me itching to do some manual labor.

So we dug out three beds right next to our cabin and started the garden. One of them we turned into an hugelkultur bed after learning about them from Mr. Bunker.

Little hands collected many, many rocks and sticks and planted big bulbs of garlic. Papa hands did pretty much all of the heavy lifting, planting, and planning. Mama hands took to the shovel and the rake and were actually caught on camera.

We also piped grey water out of the house and into a small hole containing lots of rocks to increase surface area and bacterial break down. This now helps to keep the hugelkultur bed moist.

We are thankful for this start to our little homestead and for the lesson that you have to start small and you have to start somewhere.

For years I have read that it is all too easy to romanticize the simple life. You know, the life where you haul water, live without electricity, and have to drive at least fifteen minutes to town. Kind of like our life right now.

The thing about homesteading, from what I can tell, is that there are phases and seasons. I’d love to tell you that we’re chasing chickens, growing big gardens, milking a cow, and making my own herbal medicine. But the truth is that phase is a little down the road for us. Right now we are still in survival phase.

Survival phase looks like needing a place to hold your five-year-old over so that he can poop because Papa is digging the outhouse as we speak. Survival phase looks like building a cabin (that I love!) seemingly fast and then mopping up the constant streams of water when it rains and continuously patching cracks that you can see the light of day through.

Survival phase looks like buying 90% of your food from a grocery store, only because you have neighbors who are actually producing some decent meat and lard. Survival phase looks like eating plain old corn tortillas and canned beans for at least three meals per week. Survival phase looks like wanting chickens but having to have, you know, water and shelter for them first.

Survival phase looks like hauling water for every sip you take, every dish you wash, and every sock you wash by hand. Survival phase looks like spending more time and resources than you thought on various projects and learning to deal with it because it is all part of survival phase.

So when I talk about how thankful I am for a cabin, a sink that drains, and a toilet with a seat know that it is because we are not super-homesteaders, but homesteading-hack-it-as-you-goers. We have no idea what we’re doing out here, truly. We are thankful to have spent the last five years reading and soaking up all sorts of information on this life we now live, but we are literally guessing from one project or moment to the next.

Don’t get me wrong, I love it. I love the freedom from debt and the 9-5 that we now know. I love the fact that almost every day we are all working in the save vicinity. I love watching this man I married do things I never dreamed he knew how to do and seeing my children learn from him daily.

But it is a lot of work. There are hard days. We don’t have a clue what we’re doing. We fail and get frustrated and daily learn from our mistakes. But there is something about this somewhat desperate phase of homesteading that makes you hopeful… like knowing that holding your five-year-old over a bucket to poop is exactly where you are supposed to be.

Two things we’ve learned since we moved off-grid are that everything happens at a slower pace and sometimes the smallest completion of a task can mean more than you realize.

Take, for instance, the day we moved our bed from the camper to the cabin. My husband built a bed frame into the cabin and when the mattress was moved it was like he handed me a dozen roses and a huge box of chocolates… and a convertible. That night I stretched my arm straight up from the bed and said “Look, I can’t touch the ceiling!”

There was the day the door got hung in the cabin, making it feel like a real home. Everyone had to try it out, even the smallest of us.

Or the night I saw my dreams come true as I watched the Papa build the first fire in our wood stove. The next morning we cooked breakfast on it which was indescribably satisfying.

There was the day the Papa made the camper’s indoor toilet usable. Somehow not having that night time bucket in the bathroom made everything brighter and cheerier.

And then there is the day I came home to find counter tops in our previously bare kitchen. In an afternoon he transformed that room from a box to a kitchen.

But the latest and greatest addition to our little homestead has got to be the sink. That drains. Outside. You never know the power of drainage until it is gone.

All of these little things are making our days workable and livable and far easier than those first few weeks. But I am glad for a time before draining sinks and wood stoves.

That time taught me that sometimes it is good to be uncomfortable. Those times allow us to see ourselves for who we really are and realize that comfort in this world should not be our goal. And if I happen to be able to wash dishes inside without dish pans you can see what a convenience really looks like.

The other day I drove home from town and when I saw our property, strewn with pallets and lumber, I smiled. For the first time since we moved here I had the feeling that I was home.

Once the basic necessities were taken care of we thought it was a matter of maintenance and larger projects. But every day brings new and different and spuratic challenges.

There is the sink that was draining (more important than running water, btw) that is now flooding half the camper. There is the temporary outhouse that is approaching the end of its life. There is the 6-day cooler that began leaking all over our (carpeted) camper floor. And then there is this this chest cold I’ve had for a week that I just can’t seem to shake.

These aren’t complaints, they are just the facts of life here. There is always something that needs improving, fixing, updating, or attention. There is always laundry to wash and dishes to do and three meals a day to cook. Everything happens slower, and somehow that makes it feel like life, not work.

Last Saturday morning when I was hacking up a lung and nursing a head that felt like a helicopter lived inside I had a mini break down. I say mini because whenever I have had a real break down it involves me laughing hysterically and uncontrollably on the floor for a good 15 minutes. I know, I’m weird.

But Saturday there were only a few tears, possibly of exhaustion or possibly of frustration, and then I finished my oatmeal and went back to bed.

And yet I have been thinking for days now of how much harder this could be. Like if the Papa had to work a full-time job away from the land every day. Or if we had a newborn at these beginning stages of homesteading. Or if our boys were younger or if I hadn’t had the unconventional childhood I did or if I was single or if the Papa wasn’t working his tail off with an incredibly enthusiastic attitude or if we weren’t surrounded by supportive and loving people who share our burdens and our joys.

Every day, as new challenges and new projects arise, we are reminded of God’s hand in every thing… that getting sick is just as much of a blessing as watching my husband crank out a cabin in what seems like no time. These challenges remind us that perhaps we need humbling or encouragement or eyes to truly see.

All of that seems clearer here, in this space with fewer distractions.

The first half of our week was a bit more of a challenge than the second half, but we are learning daily what it means to throw off all previous expectations and learn from the process.

Day Five:

We get up early and I crank up the propane stove for what will be our first home-cooked breakfast (or meal, for that matter) since we arrive. After breakfast I wash up the dishes using dishpans and water heated on the stove. Then my six hour rendezvous with the laundry commences, with help from some cutie pies of course.

There are, of course, breaks for helping little ones, making lunch, and other things but by the afternoon I realize that something’s going to have to change for this to be sustainable.

While we plunge away on the laundry, the papa sets up the clothesline, secures the solar panel, and gets the water filtration started.

Day Six:

We sleep in past sun up, which is 7:30 right now, and thank God for the sabbath. We spend the day resting, reading, and staying out of the (October?) heat. You really appreciate this day so much more when you truly need it by the end of the week.

Day Seven:

It looks like the basics – outhouse, water, and cooking ability – are all set up so we move on to other projects. I sort through all of our clothes, pare way down, and vow to keep working clothes and nice clothes separate in an attempt to cut back on wash time. Then I wash some more laundry.

The Papa is making deck preparations, securing the outhouse, and is constantly helping me by carrying water buckets for laundry, lifting all those heavy things I’m not supposed to and generally fixing all of the things that need fixin’.

It has been a busy first week on the land and we breathe a sigh of relief as the absolute bare necessities are in place. There is always work to be done or a project to start, but it feels more like life than work. And we are so thankful to be doing this together.

I may continue to share updates of our progress here on the land so if y’all are interested let me know in the comments.

Last week, on a hot October day by our northern standards, we arrived on our land in the south. Yesterday marked our first week here and it has seen some ups, some downs, and a lot of grace.

We are residing on two acres of bare land filled with mesquite trees, cacti, and the occasional free-ranging long horn cow. We are building our off-grid homestead from scratch which means we are living in a small camper while we prepare to build our home. It also means the basics of life that we normally take for granted become hugely significant and your perspective on what you really need is constantly changing.

This is what life looks like for a family of four just starting out.

Day One:

We arrive at approximately 6 p.m. with only an hour or two of daylight left. We meet with the neighbors who show us around. By 7:30 it is starting to get dark. We prepare to stay on a neighboring off-grid homestead for the night. By 8:00 it is very dark and our lack of preparations for an off-grid evening are showing. Oh, and we forgot to eat dinner. So we fold it up for the night and head for the local motel.

The idea of using an outhouse every day hits me like a ton of bricks and I try to get past my coddled squeamishness.

Day Two:

We get to the land early to meet with the neighbors to discuss the community, the land, etc. At lunch Papa heads out with some men to check out the area and get supplies while the boys and I are graciously fed lunch. We then promptly head to our camper for much-needed naps. By late afternoon I realize that one of our boys has had a nap-time accident and all of the clean clothes are in the van, which I do not have a key for, is locked. Our kind neighbor stops by just in time to offer to go get keys from the Papa. Once that crisis is solved and a bucket has been located as a temporary outhouse we call it a night early in the hopes that we can get to some bare necessities in the morning. Once again we stay at a motel for the night.

I have moved past squeamish on the outhouse front and into the I’ve-got-to-go-right-now-so-just-give-me-a-bucket-cuz-the-baby-is-kicking-my-bladder phase.

Day Three:

We try to get up early enough to make the rounds for supplies. We arrive to the land mid-morning ready to get started. Our first priority is an outhouse so the digging commences. I mostly observe while trying to get things set up in our new home. In the mean time we realize the urgency that a lack of a bathroom causes and try to work faster, thankful that our neighbors graciously allow us to use theirs. By the end of the day we have a temporary outhouse, we have lights and beds for the night, and we continue to drink store-bought water. Filtration of the water from our 1500 gallon catch-water system will have to wait until tomorrow.

That afternoon we meet the (very large) longhorn cows in our backyard. We spend our first night in the camper cozy as bed bugs, tired as can be, and happy as clams.

The outhouse, A-framed with a draping tarp, makes me want to weep it is so beautiful.

Day Four:

We head out early for supplies at the nearest large town, 30 miles away. Six hours later we arrive home with a van full of groceries, deep cycle batteries, and lumber. The afternoon is spent hooking up our first solar panel, setting up the solar freezer/refrigerator, hooking up the propane stove and putting together our Berkey water filter. 

The rest of the week brings its own set of challenges, which I will share next time.