Recently in Self Sufficiency Category
July 15, 2008 5:45 AM
May 11, 2008 8:52 PM
'Inspired Living' Guest Bloggers Niki and Howard
Before we moved, we gathered up a large amount of the local newspapers, the "Nickel" Want ads, and looked at postings on local bulletin boards. Seeing a fairly religious posting nestled next to an excerpt from "The White Book" showed us a possible leaning to balance was in the area. At least we could be among like minded folks! (Still, it helps to keep in mind, "It's an alone journey" after all.)
We developed relationships with others that provide services (and help) in this neck of the woods. We are very grateful for their experience and knowledge and knew we needed their opinions. This approach, treating folks as the 'experts' you deem them to be, has created good working relationships with fair-minded folks. We met members of several 'Pioneer' families who loved to share their history.
There is a once-a-month "Ladies gather" that rotates locations each month. It is a pot-luck, and you bring your choice of beverage to share. I met the 'Egg Lady', the 'Honey lady', and discovered who was good with computers, who was bi-lingual, who could sew, make wine, grow gardens, can food, was herbal-efficient, organic, could sing, babysit and could raise sheep. We circulated a "Contact List" and whoever wanted to be on it - is. They developed a call system where you called the people below you on the list. It works well. Several times it was used in emergencies to good advantage. We share a 'plant exchange' in May. We bring extra plant starts, and exchange flowers, veggies, house plants and often clothing exchanges, or items for a local family in need. For holidays, we each brought a poem or song or 'reading' from our many varied backgrounds, in a spirit of co-operation. And, we each helped in a local "professional" cannery, exchanging part of our work, to help make salsa, or to add our tomatoes to be canned for trade!
Learn to grow your own food. Not just tomatoes, although with a bit of seasoning, you will be in enchilada and spaghetti sauce for a long time. We discovered tomatoes stored better, more reliably, in jars. The new lining in the cans does not have the shelf life it used to have. You must learn to do your own canning! And, that means, you must have the proper supplies, now. We recently heard that there are now some "LED" Grow lights and are considering trying them with hydroponics indoors!!
Get a copy of Carla Emery's "The Encyclopedia of Country Living", it's great! Check and see if there is a food-co-op, such as www.azurestandard.com Or www.mountainpeople.com , delivery in your area. We belong to Azure, out of Dufur
Onward!! ~Niki & Howard
April 2, 2008 8:45 PM
Welcome to our Question and Answer postings, a dynamic forum for people to have their questions answered by a group of "wise ones". Our experts bring a rich and diverse background of skills and knowledge gained from years of experience living and breathing what they talk about. Click here to meet them.
It is my desire that the Weekly Wisdom Forum will reach out to a sea of people of all ages, from different backgrounds and levels of understanding and experience, and be a support and even a comfort to those who are looking for guidance in preparing body and mind for the days that are here.
Send your questions to louise@mastersconnection.com.
QUESTION: MAKING A FIRE
Can you give some suggestions on how to start a fire? More specifically, if I've only got my survival pack, what should I include in there. Will regular matches do the trick?
Always, always have three ways to make fire. This is your most important survival skill and equipment. Start with small roll-type cigarette or pipe lighters. Get the good ones that can be refilled, with an adjustable flame height. Don't count on the cheap throw-aways. I have found this out the hard way. Second, have good waterproof kitchen/camping type matches, kept in an air and watertight container of your choice. Third, have a magnesium bar and striker type fire starter. I always carry recycled vitamin bottles stuffed full of pre-made, very flammable fire starting tinder , stuffing as much as I can in the bottles. This is the secret to fire starting even in difficult situations, which is when you will need it the most.
This is just a brief overview on how to make a fire. If you live in this area, (Yelm & Rainier Washington) take my upcoming survival and preparedness classes. One whole day is on fire making. It's that important!
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
Abigail Haddock responds:
Oh, I hear strains of Kumbaya in my head and see visions of all the Girl Scout camping trips I went on as a youngster!
Simple answer ...get a magnesium fire starter and always have a jackknife handy. Learn to find tinder (dried grass, pine needles, tree fibers etc.), scrape off some magnesium, create a spark with the flint side of the
In an emergency, under stress, or in the pouring rain, you are not going to rub sticks together to make an ember and ultimately create a fire. Only in good conditions are you going to have the fortitude to accomplish that task. I know how to do it. It is impressive but it takes time and energy better spent elsewhere, in my humble opinion. I am glad I have the skill locked away in my neuronet, but give me something simple when I am hungry, wet and tired, to start my fire any day. Yes, I do have a magnesium fire starter and jackknife in my briefcase. Just ask Louise!!
Thank you experts! I would like to comment by saying PRACTICE THESE FIRE MAKING TECHNIQUES BEFORE YOU ACTUALLY NEED TO USE THEM!
NEXT WEEK: Powdered Milk. Rumor has it, it tastes a lot better than it used to.
Be well. Be happy. Be outrageous.
Louise
March 22, 2008 8:43 AM
Welcome to our Question and Answer postings, a dynamic forum for people to have their questions answered by a group of "wise ones". Our experts bring a rich and diverse background of skills and knowledge gained from years of experience living and breathing what they talk about.
It is my desire that the Weekly Wisdom Forum will reach out to a sea of people of all ages, from different backgrounds and levels of understanding and experience, and be a support and even a comfort to those who are looking for guidance in preparing body and mind for the days that are here.
Send your questions to louise@mastersconnection.com.
QUESTION: COMPOSTING
Do any of you have any experience with composting? It's something I've put off because I seem to find more information than I know what to do with, and I don't like the idea of attracting animals to my yard. I'd like to recycle my kitchen wastes and have good stuff to put in my garden. Does it take many months or more than a year to get compost that I can use? Do I need to have a special container for it? Does it take a lot of physical labor? What things can I include in this pile?
Steven Knopp responds:
There are many complete books on this. I have been a devoted composter since my first organic garden at age 9, through the years when I had a large organic /biodynamic farm, to times when it was my job to design and implement large scale composting projects for farms and municipal situations.
It's a wonderful, interesting and valuable science and art. Observe nature. It is continuously growing new life and then recycling its nutrients back into the system to be used again. It is continuously doing this with everything, everything, including man and everything man-made. Approach it anew with the childhood enthusiasm of a school science project.
I take all organic kitchen wastes and or yard and garden material and layer it in a pile, bin or container. Since I heat with wood, I burn all paper and wood and add the ashes to it, throw in some earthworms, and a little human urine (the uric acid is a great nitrogen source], and voila! Soon you will have a wonderful natural fertilizer.
The length of time will depend on several factors- the composition and size of the materials, the amount of nitrogen, aeration, moisture, and the size of the pile. THE MORE NITROGEN, BENEFICIAL MICROBES, AERATION, OR TURNING OR TUMBLING, QUICKER THE PROCESS. I highly suggest the use of beneficial microbes like E M brand {effective microbes, a mixture of bacteria sand yeasts that will compost everything including toxic wastes]
P.S I love nature and welcome all animal friends to my environment, but I keep them out of the compost and from eating the garden. This is not hard. Yes it takes some work but not too much. Unless you're doing it on a very large scale, nature does most of it.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Abigail Haddock responds:
Being the Frugal Fraulein that I am, I simply tied free wooden pallets together with plastic ties. I throw in my free garden refuse, grass clippings, leaves, non-meat food scraps and coffee grounds. From spring till late fall, let it sit over the winter and voila in early spring I have yummy, free compost for my garden beds.
I do keep a garden fork nearby and when it calls to me I turn it to aerate, and in dry times I give it a splash of water occasionally. I cover the pile loosely with a piece of black plastic during the winter to keep it cooking and hot. I have not had a problem with animals, but then I do have dachshunds!
In years past I purchased advertised additives to promote growth of good enzymes. Most years I bless it and let it evolve on its own.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Thank you experts!
NEXT WEEK: How to Start a Fire-There's More Than One Way
Be well. Be happy. Be outrageous.
Louise
March 3, 2008 9:14 PM
Reader Comments:
Wanted to make a comment about those canned goods getting rusty! Click Here for posting on moisture and storing food. I cleaned out my root cellar, and had the same problem. The books I checked never did address this well, other than suggesting to open and eat, or open and re-can into glass jars. I cleaned up ours with steel wool, and dried them well. Where the labels had come off, I used a heavy black marker, wrote the content and date if I had it. There were some cans I had to send to the dump, all the while wondering about the bears that shred the coca cola cans, such as one in an ice chest that we had when we were first building our home. The bears drank our citronella oil for the outside lanterns as well!
I was wondering if a light wax "dip" would help? We stack our cans on those cardboard flats, and I check for too much moisture quite often. The problem is not as bad as it was when we had a dirt floor. We ended up pouring a four inch thick cement floor, and it has taken three years to adjust the moisture in there!! Plan ahead!!
Niki
February 2, 2008 8:21 AM
Inspired Living-Stories From A Mountain Top Home
Guest Bloggers Niki and Howard
The day our land picked us, we thought we were ready for anything! Hindsight has confirmed the truth in the statement, "Attitude is everything!" And we continue to this day, seven years later, to realize that it IS the journey, not the destination.... There is always something that needs our attention, always the next project.... and your attitude will help you make it or break it, meaning your lifestyle in the mountains or any 'independent' lifestyle outside of the 'social consciousness norm'. It is not what happens to you, but how you re-act to it.
So, what is your attitude? Ours would be, "Independent, self-starters, happy, adventurous, willing to learn, ask questions. Not too 'ego' centered, not afraid to be wrong or make mistakes- if there is such a thing! We grow as we learn!
If you tend to "victimhood" and blame others for your situation, you will discover more opportunity to accept your own ability to create your own reality as you continue to create more challenges for yourself, than "lessons learned."
Here is a sample of the 'new' neighbors: #1 moved here from out of state. Has an attitude his land is His land, (not part of Mother Earth evidently...) He is a victim, expects people to take advantage of him. He offended the man whose family farmed this acreage for generations. Yep, he is our 'Neanderthal neighbor'!
#2 Moving here from a high-tech job is a young couple, vegan, whose religion has spread the fear of a downtrodden humanity that will celebrate Armageddon. Their children learn survival skills, and their precious minds are tightly wrapped in a box with very defined edges. Their parents have taken 'advantage' of the property boundaries, road easements, and undermined the trust of their other neighbors in the area. Local contractors are leery to work with them again, and have spread the word. Yep, set themselves up to be very independent.
#3 A retired professional in the legal profession; moved here to his "nature retreat". Everything is a new experience- building, living off the grid until his 'main home' is completed; he is joy-filled, curious, gracious and does things within parameters that leave room for possibility. What a great spirit!
No matter where you go, even out into the world to make a space for your "space", create it with room to grow, in all ways. We each shall be challenged by our realities, and to build a community, a 'safe' space, or an attitude, you will need all we have learned about "creating your own reality". Make it known! ~Onward!
Niki and Howard
December 1, 2007 10:14 AM
Guest Blogger
Niki and Howard went from City to Homesteader, built their own home and are becoming wise in preparedness from their direct experiences. I've asked them to contribute from time to time on what they have learned and are learning, and as they say "what we would do differently, or better, and creating a better set of circumstances in our preparedness".
Thank you Louise, for your blog! It is a wonderful effort!
We are living up on a mountain, in the inland northwest, near the Canadian border, in an "earth sheltered, off the grid -abode." Whew! In fact, synchronicity being what it is, when we were moving here, we stopped to read a public billboard, something from the bible; then posted next to it was something familiar, inviting even- and after checking at home, I discovered it was from Ramtha's White book! Another talisman on our path...While building, we met two other Masters on the same mountain, and heard of two more in this tiny town!
We built our home and continue making known the unknown. We are earth covered and have a thick rebar & cement roof, but the front is open to some degree, with earth-berming completed with cement planters. The learning curve expands exponentially. It is an ongoing effort, as the building and storage has changed where and how we do things. New information also changes some of the previous efforts, such as water storage.
From City to Homesteader! Had we been in a community, we would have spread out the preparedness, with others focusing on things we hadn't yet discovered a talent for, or going together on larger tools. As it is, we are now getting neighbors who have some preparedness skills, but are preparing for their idea of Armageddon. Our lesson here is patience and non-judgment of other people being God too.
While we may not be as experienced as many, we do have a lot of determination and want to share our experiences with others who may benefit on topics such as, water storage, canning, firewood, gardening.........
Love and bright Blessings!
Onward!
Niki & Howard
November 7, 2007 11:11 AM
I wanted to split some wood for my stove a couple of weeks ago. It's something I'd never done, but with great enthusiasm I went outside to the log pile to prove to myself that "I'm strong and can do anything"! With my son's camp axe I began to hack away with all my might, sound effects and all, splitting the logs, feeling quite empowered and absolutely exhausted and in pain after five or six splits!
A neighbor who had been hearing and watching my sincere efforts walked over and gently inquired if she could show me how she had learned to split wood. I welcomed the training session and with gratitude and new information carried on and managed to get a few more logs split (not many), with a little less effort (not that much less). My back was still screaming for mercy.
Later that day I went to a friend's house where my son would be learning some wilderness skills. The next thing I knew, I was in the midst of a fabulous lesson on splitting wood and making fires! I learned three very important things. I needed to use a splitting maul, instead of the camp axe; I needed to use my entire body; and I needed to have a clear focus of mind. What a huge difference this made. There were other details, but these were the standouts for me.
I now know how to split wood in a way that engages full focus, uses minimal energy, and without the physical stress. Just like any art, I am practicing this skill. Most importantly I have added one more thing to my "I can do this" list.
The true gift is that in one day, with my desire to learn how to split wood, opportunities presented themselves one right after the other. Growing in self-sufficiency every day.
Click below for specific tips on splitting wood:
October 8, 2007 9:20 AM
Sauerkraut and Kim Chee
I wrote about my first canning experience with cabbage last week. My sauerkraut is brewing nicely. It takes about six weeks to ferment.
Thanks to my friend Diane who suggested including the simple recipe for sauerkraut in this blog; and a recipe for kim chee, a fermented cabbage dish made with chile peppers that is served at every meal in
September 19, 2007 7:10 PM
From Wilderness Guide and Preparedness Consultant to Medicinal Plant Researcher
LOUISE: The wilderness, nature, self-sufficiency and alternative health, are at the core of your life. When did this begin for you?
STEVEN: It was my way of living from the time of my late teenage years, when I left home, even before I moved out here, and even before I began to participate in RSE. Self-sufficiency, organic gardening, farming. I grew up around sovereign, self-sufficient people who did all these things for themselves. I always did that.
I had a wonderful home way in the mountains in North Carolina. When I decided to leave there and come to the west coast, I wanted something even more wild and beautiful than what I had there. I didn't want to go less. I wanted more. In particular, when I moved back to Washington state I lived way out in the wilderness along the edge of the Olympic National Park and the Olympic wilderness, I lived as extremely self-sufficiently as you could. When I moved here I really pushed the whole thing to the extreme edge. I was a survival instructor and taught survival classes all over the west. I attended many primitive skills and survival type rendezvous events where other people who teach these things, gather together to learn from each other. I would teach at these things. I was a wilderness guide. So when I was not growing all my own food and hunting and fishing to provide for myself, I was taking people into the wilderness and teaching them these skills.
It's been my great love, my passion, my great teacher. I made the choice to live that way very early on and pursued it. Now I am comfortable living in any kind of circumstance, from extremely primitive or eighteenth or nineteenth century style homesteading, to modern high tech. I can really blend all those worlds. I did it for many years. I pushed the edge of the envelope as far as you can possibly do it today.
LOUISE: For you to make known the unknown. You have traveled to so many places on our beautiful planet and carry this love of the natural world wherever you go.
