Once there was a time that our family romanticized the idea of homesteading. After all, wouldn’t it be great to live debt-free off of your own land while having the time to pursue the things that are most important to you? Well, this post is the start of me sharing small glimpses of what our family experienced as we began our homesteading journey. 

I like to think of our family as being an intelligent group of people. After all, most of us have scored above average and even at a genius level on IQ tests. Now I’m not saying this to brag or boast, but instead to lay a foundation for others to understand that intelligence if not developed in the areas of need is useless. Before homesteading, my husband and I both had very important and demanding careers. Our careers placed us in charge of development, training, supervision, and company growth among other things. We had almost 40 years involved in the guidance of hundreds of people who trusted in our knowledge and wisdom in the areas of our expertise. Being at the top of our game, we thought, “How hard could it be to get some land, plant some seeds, raise some animals, and produce ways like solar energy to live life as free as possible”?  With this lifestyle change, we could enjoy God in nature and grow healthy organic food for the betterment of family and friends. You must realize that this homesteading idea was over 15 years in a dream state when the unexpected happened forcing our hand to make a decision. There was no planning involved, it was just a cluster of cool thoughts of how we thought life might be. Let me tell you when you don’t expect something to happen you fail to plan for it. This should be your theme phrase when wanting to homestead. Before the unexpected happened, our thoughts were, “We are still kinda young, we have plenty of time and we are not as old as our parents”. Surely we have many more productive years left in us to live our dreams. We both have to admit that we loved the rat race in the city. Neither of us wanted to change what we were doing. We also realized that our children grew up in a world that had little knowledge of growing food. The picture that was being painted for us in the media leads us to believe we failed to educate our children to be able to survive in a world with so many pitfalls. Then my husband’s health started to decline. After many years of him being the-tough “I can do it” guy and numerous doctor visits, we were faced with the fact that he could no longer perform his job anymore. For over 5 years I worked 3 jobs trying to maintain a lifestyle that we created living in the city, while our retirement income dwindled along with my husband’s health. Giving up most everything that we have worked our whole lives for, now we needed to move. Homesteading during this period of time was not even on the plate until we were forced to look at the numbers and realized we had 2 options. Option 1 is to find a place near our children who live in the city. For us, this would mean living in a crime stricken gang-run area or option 2 we could try to live our golden years in a county setting at the cost of being away from family. The following video is 3 of our children using homesteading humor to keep a romanized dream alive. Needless to say but I will say it, “Green Acres Here We Come”!