Why Being Self-Sufficient Includes Community

We all want that homestead. We are able to produce all our own food, and only need to go to the store once a year for something we can't produce; like oh say- toys for Christmas. It would be so ideal to live off your land and not depend on anyone else at all. Except, there is one flaw in this dream; God made us so that we would Have to depend on other people.

 I have figured out one thing in my ten years or so that we have homesteaded, and that is definitely that we cannot do it alone. We have depended on our friends, family, neighbors and the Amish community for so so many things. This doesn't mean that we don't want to be self-sufficient. However, unless you are going to have a lot of children to help, you just can't do everything alone. If your reading this, you are probably still somewhat new to homesteading. I know that when I first started, I looked for a variety of different informational sites and blogs to see if it was even something I could do. Step-by-step I started learning one thing after another. Jack of all trades, master of none is how the saying goes. That describes my life! We have yet to do anything masterfully, but we can get what we need done. We look to those who have already done what we want to do for guidance and ideas. We look to our neighbors and friends to help when we are overwhelmed. And that's O.K. It will happen more often than you think. There will be a number of things that you may learn how to do or make, but it won't be worth the time or energy in your daily chores to make because someone else makes it for you for the same price as what it would cost you and your time.

We are blessed to be right in the middle of an Amish community that has already done most of what we look to accomplish, yet they depend on their community for all the help they need. However, despite all the self-sufficient things they do on a daily basis, they still go to Walmart just like we do! They buy flour, sugar, and some other staples that it isn't worth the time to make. That really surprised me, but as I get into more and more activities with raising our own meat, hunting, gardening, building our house, canning, harvesting and processing all the animals, taking care of the family pets... there is no time in the day to do much else. I still work a full time job, so I hope to someday go to part-time so I can spend more time on the homestead.

I really wish that we could have a community that is as close knit as the Amish do. Although they are happy to help at times, we are not actually Amish. Therefore, having them come over for a barn-raising is not feasible. For this reason, it is super important for us to create a give-and-take- system with our friends and neighbors. We try to volunteer to help others as much as we can. Someday we will need that favor back! I have internet and watch some of the television shows about homesteaders (Live Free or Die with National Geographic is my FAVORITE) but have noticed lately that they all depend on others for help of some sort. Maybe its bartering for tools, or trading work for something they need. You will always need others though.

Please feel free to comment, make suggestions, ask questions, and offer ideas for future posts. I am not as gifted as some of the bloggers out there and am constantly working towards improving my blog. Thank you for reading my posts!

Blessings,  The Virtually Amish Homestead

Closed For the Winter

We are closed up for the winter now. We have only managed to finish this one room, but as we progressed we noticed that we were much faster at each tire. We closed it in with a nice sturdy roof that we plan on building a second floor on. We had some family help near the end of the season so that was a big help.

The construction sped up after this point and we started on the roof 

After this we covered the outside in a plastic that will protect the roof from getting wet during the winter and wrapped the plastic around any areas that may be exposed. We hope to get started again sometime of May 2016 again. Thank you for visiting my blog and I'll be back with other homesteading adventures!

End of the year updates

so we have completed the first room. Doesn't seem like much, but that one room was a lot of work for just us. We are not hiring out, contracting anyone, or have had any magic volunteers show up to help. It's been slow going, and we had to get a couple permits along the way in order to keep moving. We also kept up our small farm, preserved all the garden harvest, and I kept a full time job. So, hopefully next year as we get faster and a little more efficient, we will get a bit more done.

The room seems small, but it's a 14X16 with an 8,4" ceiling. It will have a small open area in front of it with a greenhouse type area with garden beds that will have herbs, citrus trees, and other plants that
cannot grow outside in our Maine winters.

This is not our picture but this gives you an idea of what it will look like.

We had some help from our son, who is 21, and my husband's sister and brother in law that moved here over the summer. That was a big help.

We have the roof on and have decided to build a normal second floor. This will allow us to have more of the house built in less time and hopefully move in a year earlier.

These are some completed inside earthships 

Open invitation

we would be happy to invite any students willing to learn rammed earth tire building, as well as other skills that may be involved on our homestead. We have had requests for interview through magazines, etc and please feel free to email me at pamelaconklin@bellsouth.net and I will get back to you quickly. Thank you!!

Earthship Updates for August

We haven't made a huge change this month in progress. It's hot and has been a really rainy summer. But I have faith in God that we will be able to enclose this before winter to prevent any frost damage. I have to. We don't have anyone but us to build. But I know we can do it.

 Here you can see that he's filling in the backside some. We are adding some mud to the back in order to add the vapor barrier so we can backfill it. This will give us solid footing to continue to build upwards.

 
This was a little bit of a trial and error area. We wanted to make the area flat enough to add some insulation and then some of the backfilled dirt. However, we are going to just use vapor barrier here and insulate the inside a little more.

 Here's me. I lost 40 lbs and don't mind my hubby taking pictures of me now, LOL! See that little space above my shorts? Now I know why I burn there all the time!

 We are 6 rows high now. Not too too bad. We will be building to 10 rows for a 8'4" ceiling.

 So we continue on and on. More to come folks!

What Does It Mean to Be a Homesteader?

We have been contacted by a local magazine and will be interviewed this week about homesteading. I guess I never really thought of us as true homesteaders- but then again, I don't see how we couldn't be. It is a little strange to hear though. We started as suburban homesteaders just trying to learn how to do anything we could for ourselves just to save some money. It became a sort of addiction from there.

 It started with a few berry bushes, a few chickens, and a dream of being able to do everything ourselves. We wouldn't have to depend on anyone. We could grow our own food, make our own cleaners, soaps, and buy the very few things that wouldn't make sense for us to make/grow. We started on 2/10 of an acre. We transformed our lawn to edibles, planted some fruit trees, and looked for any ways we could do more. It hasn't stopped since.

Now we are upgrading to 10 acres. Not much, but definitely enough for us. We have 17 wooded acres about an hour south of here, so we can travel to the site for wood and for some berries and other foraged foods. It didn't make sense to build there because it is very secluded and the town we are renting in is where the kids and I have come to love. So the neighbor across the street offered to sell 10 acres of his land. He has become like a 2nd father to hubby and I, offering advise regardless of whether we really want it. But we love it. And I think I could pretty much set up shop anywhere. The people of this town make it our home though.

We have since learned allot more skills and made even more mistakes. As I contemplated what someone would think when they pulled up, I thought about cleaning up a bit because our yard is a bit messy. I think that's part of who we are now though. To me, being a homesteader is using what you have. Maybe that wood is used for one project this year and next year we may disassemble it and make something else. We save feed bags, pallets, and boxes "just in case." Never know when you're going to want to build something like a chicken tractor. We built one last year with a lot (and I mean A LOT) of flaws, but we have managed to fix and replace some of the parts that weren't designed well. But that's ok. Being a homesteader means making a lot of mistakes. And learning from them. And then making some more. We have become accustomed to them and know that we wouldn't get better unless we did.

Homesteading has become our new normal. I used to have a clean house and a manicured lawn. Now we are borderline hoarders and have a cluttered, kinda dirty house. I think "The Clampits" when I walk through our garage and back yard. I homeschool. I have 5 or more bushels of apples in my kitchen that need to be canned. I have fruit flies everywhere and they are making me crazy. I have canning jars all over the place. I know now that this is my home. When we move into our new home it will hold the same cluttery mess. I will have school books all over. Blankets thrown across the couch. A few dog hairballs floating across the floor. I can only do SO much while keeping a full time job. Id love to stay home with my husband and farm for the rest of our lives. It is very possible that that day may come too. I dream about selling my garden extras, eggs, soaps, lotions and whatever other crafts we may learn, and making just enough to quit my job or even just go part time. Even if that day never comes, I know that we are doing all we can for ourselves and will continue to learn new things on a daily basis.

What are some things you have learned for yourself? How do you homestead? I think homesteading can happen in a small apartment or a small urban homestead. There is a family in California that have 0.10 of an acre and make all their own food and even sell some to the local restaurants. How awesome is that!  If they can do it, so can we. So think about all the wonderful things you have learned to do for yourself and brag about it! Tell me 1, 2 or 10 skills you have learned and maybe we can trade some secrets! Thanks for reading and blessings to you all!

Building Our Earthship; July Updates

July has brought us less rain and more work, which is exactly what we needed. The earthship is coming along fairly well now, although we will be lucky to get this one room enclosed before winter. This is the kitchen; we started here because we feel like it is the most important room in the house. It is the epicenter of all that happens on our home. It is super important to get this right.

We were delayed with permits in June, but the department of transportation permit finally came. We are a few rows up in the tire pounding process and are close to starting the backfill process. There is a ditch dug around the back of the tire wall that will have drainage tile, gravel, and then a vapor barrier that will be back filled into the wall. The dirt will continue to be backfilled as the wall goes up. This will also help give us something to stand on when we are pounding tires.

We have found that at a brisk pace, with Dan pounding while I shovel the dirt, that we can fill a tire in about 20 minutes. One would think, therefore, that we could fill many in one day. Wrong!! It is so labor intensive that we can only fill 3-6 per day. We are also trying to keep up a large garden, as well as the house we are currently renting. There is always so much work to do that even when we are up early, we still end up finishing our day around 10 pm. This makes for a long day but no one has complained of insomnia lately.

As you can see from the above pictures, we have the rounded "U" taking shape. Where the tires stop closest to where I was taking the pictures will be a entryway into the living room. The two filled tires that stand alone will be built up into a small partial wall in the kitchen where we will put the wood cook stove. We had some issues while filling the 3rd row because the tires didn't seem to want to level correctly. Dan was becoming very frustrated and I don't know if he was over filling the tires and maybe that was causing the issues. He has been trying to find that balance as he continues that row. 

This is the view from above. The kids have been doing very well to help with all the various jobs that have to be done, but we have had some really warm days that has made the job a bit harder for them. This week has actually been very mild, with the highs being in the 60s and 70s. We are enjoying some rain, as well, as it gives us a break from the tire pounding. Pounding tires has got to be the hardest work I have ever done. Not that I'm old, or have ever had a job involving laborous work. But we are only able to do a few tires per day on most days. There was one day last week that we managed 8 tires in one day, which made us extremely tired and cranky the following day. We figured out that we need to pound 3 tires per day in order to be finished by frost. I'm hoping that when Dan figured that out that he included the time for roofing and enclosing in the room. 

I like this picture but I can't help but laugh at my shadow taking the picture.