Homesteading
Homestead survival shtf
Victory Garden and How to Make One
A Victory Garden is not a new phenomenon. These Gardens first became popular in WWII. They were simple gardens with vegetables fruit and herbs. The Victory garden was generally a private residential garden but some also sprang up ion public parks. They were mostly to ease the pressure on the public food supply during the time of war.
These Victory garden are becoming increasingly popular with the Preppers and Survival groups. One big difference in Victory Garden now is that the main reason behind them is not to ease the pressure of the food supply but to ensure your own food supply.
With everything going on now it’s easy to see what might be just up the road. So how do you plan for your family’s needs when it comes to food? You plan on not relying on grocery stores or FEMA handouts! I’m not talking about going out and investing in acres of land to plant but a simple Victory Garden.
Your Victory Garden can be a large or small depending on your needs. There are a lot of people Urban Gardening now which is great!
Victory Garden 
A Victory Garden can provide fresh food when you can’t go and buy it. It can become a great asset if you look to barter for items. Having the skills and the seeds on hand to have a Victory Garden is like having Home insurance, you hope to never need it but if the need arises you sure are glad you had it.
Now if you are looking just to store seeds the most important thing to do like I mentioned in my Survival Seeds post is to make sure you have heirloom seeds. GMO plants and seeds are not reusable!
There are several great methods to use in your Victory Garden.
The no-till Garden Method
This method means you don’t take hours of prepping the soil and tilling it. Most green leafy vegetation can be grown in very little dirt. Get creative with this method! You can use containers. Victory Garden in containers are great, think about if you need to bug out you can simply gather up your plants that are in container and load them into the car and take your Victory Garden with you!
Now the first thing when setting up your Victory garden is to think about how much you want or need to grow. Now you can choose to grow just enough for your family or you can grow more and possibly have food you can trade and barter with.
Victory Garden
Now you need to evaluate your location. This means decide if you have enough room to make your garden worth the effort. Make sure the land you choose gets enough sun and take into consideration of whether you need to build a fence to keep critters out.
The next step for your Victory Garden is prepping the area you choose. This means clearing any rocks or plants from the area. This step if done right will save you a lot of headache later. Make sure to get all the weeds while you have the area cleared!
The next step is to amend your soil. I can almost guarantee that your soil needs a boost. This can be as easy as getting some organic soil and mixing it in or gather grass clipping or compost material and layer it into the soil.
Now that the ground is ready to plant in you need to choose your seeds. This is a very important part. Make sure to choose heirloom seeds as you will be able to let a few of the plant go to seed and collect them to replant.
Check out my post on Survival Seeds for more information on seeds. Now you need to take into consideration of what you want to plant.
Each plant has different needs and different seasons. You will need to read up on your specific location and seasons and pick the best plants to grow. Remember with Heirloom Seeds in your Victory Garden you will be able to grow a much larger variety and not have to buy seeds next year to replant.
Now just plant your seeds, follow the directions on the seed packs and ta da you have a Victory Garden. Just employ he basic gardening techniques you would use for a traditional garden and use Heirloom seeds for your Survival Victory garden!
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Growing Herbs The Top Herbs Everyone Should Have
Growing herbs is a very simple thing to do. They are very easy to grown and they take up virtually no space compared to vegetables and other nutritious things. Growing Herbs will keep you supplied with great herbs to flavor your food and also most herbs have a medicinal value as well.
If you have checked out the price of dried herbs lately at the store you will know they are not cheap. If you plan on growing herbs yourself you will be able to dried the herbs and save a ton. From my experience growing hers most of them grow like a weed. They are very sturdy and hard to kill, which is good if you forget them for a day or two. Not only will growing herbs save you money but they will provide you will a great way to flavor your survival food and make eating rice and beans much more bearable.
Here are a list of the most essential herbs to grow and their uses.
Growing Herbs
- Aloe Vera- Aloe Vera is great for growing herbs, this plant produces a thick sap in the leaves that is a great cooling and healing substance. It can be used in a multitude of ways from sunburns, regular burns and most other skin related issues. If you drink the plant it is very good for ulcerative colitis, digestive diseases and constipation.
- Peppermint- Peppermint is great for flavoring food as well as a medicinal plant. It is great for upset stomachs, IBS, spastic colon and it will also help reduce fevers.
- Sage-Sage is also a great cooking herb. It is great for treating indigestion, depression, menopausal symptoms and flatulence.
- Ginseng- This is a plant that is highly regarded for its medicinal uses. It helps relax the nervous system, treats insomnia, lowers blood sugar levels, stimulates hormones, lowers cholesterol and even improves general stamina.
- Tea Tree- Tea tree oil is another great herb to grow. This herb is actually found in a multitude of over the counter products today. It treats acne, burns, athletes foot, insect bites and cold sores.
- Feverfew- This herb is a very old plant used medicinally. It has been used for hundreds of years. It helps treat colds, arthritis, fever, bruises, migraine headaches and even swollen feet.
- Evening Primrose- This is primarily a root herb, although the shoots can be eaten. This herb is usually administered in a tea to treat bowel pain and obesity. You can use the leaves and bark to make an oil which treats rheumatoid arthritis, acne, pms symptoms and eczema.
- Fenugreek- The seed of this herb are extremely nutritious and may be uses to treat inflammation of the stomach and intestines. It is also good for treating late onset diabetes, cancer prevention for the liver, lowering cholesterol levels and even labor pains.
- Chamomile- This herb is most known for its soothing effects in tea and aromatherapy but it is also a great medicinal plant. It treats colds, earaches, digestive disorders, diarrhea, toothaches and common wounds.
- Echinacea- this wonderful plant is the king of any medicinal garden. It treats many things like wounds, insect bites, burns and snakebites. It is also great at strengthen immune systems and helping with allergies.
Growing Herbs
That being said whenever you are planning to use plants as medicine you must research exactly how to administer the herbs which can be a number of ways, tinctures or oils, but each herb is different. You will need to know the does and use caution. Growing herbs can be a very rewarding experience. You will find that growing herbs will provide you will a huge amount of ways to have fun with what you have grown. Growing herbs can also be a great way to “stock up” on medicine if you need to for survival. Growing herbs will help you create a pharmacy in your backyard in case the shtf as well as a rewarding way to flavor your food!
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Homesteading And How Making Soap Is Easy!
Homesteading is as easy as making soap. Making soap is one of the basic essentials to begin self-sufficient and starting to Homestead. Think about this scenario.
Grocery stores are closed, infrastructure as we know it is gone. There is no way to “buy” soap or cleaning products.
How long before you start stinking worse than the compost pile? Not long without a shower and you start building up some grimy bacteria on yourself and your clothes.
So what the solution to this cleanliness and sanitary situation? Making soap, your own homestead soap!
I know a lot of people are discouraged from making soap and Homestead soap because of the lye and the fact that its work to make something that you can just go to Walgreens and pick up for a few bucks.
Trust me this is a skill that could really come in handy in the future while you Homesteading. Also check out some great Homesteading ideas in the LDS Preparedness Manual.
Making soap is a very easy process. There are three ways to make soap.
- The Cold Process
- The Semi-Boiled Process
- The Fully Boiled Process
For Homesteading the cold process is most common with artisan soap makers and is one the easiest methods but it does take weeks for the soap to be ready. Whereas the semi boiled process is almost instant soap making.
Homesteading with Making Soap
As for Lye. It is quite easy to make your own lye water. First you need to burn some hard wood for making soap. Save the ashes.
This is what most families did when making soap, they would save the ashes from the fires and when soap time came around they would bring the ashes out and use them. So once you have the ashes you need to soak them in distilled water and collect the run off.
There are a few different creative ideas for this procedure if you look on YouTube and such you will find some great inventive ideas for homesteading soap making.
In the olden days of Homesteading making soap the easiest way to tell if the lye water was concentrated enough was with an egg. You would put an egg in the water and if it sank down then you would need to run the water through the ashes again but if it floated you were ready to make soap with you lye water.
CAUTION: Lye is extremely caustic it will burn eyes and skin so be very careful when making or handling lye!
Homesteading Soap Making
So now what do you do after you have the lye? Well at this point you would add your actual liquefied fats. The lye water is carefully added to the liquidized fat. You will need to stir this mixture continuously until little until it thickens up and you start to see droplets “trace” the top of the mixture.
This is when most people add their colorings and pretty smells to the soap. This is the really fun part, you can get really creative here and add oatmeal to your soap for a bit of abrasive cleaning power or add other tropical scents like mango or romantic smells like rose soap.
After adding what extras you want you then pour the soap mixture into soap molds.
You need to let the molds sit and after a week or more when it dries out you have soap your very own handmade Homestead soap!
Making Soap
This being said I have not been able to find any tried and true soap recipes using this homemade lye water.
This is probably due to the fact that it’s really hard to determine the actual concentration of the lye in the water.
Most recipes I have found for making soap call for store bought lye crystals which is also great for Homestead Soap making!
Here are some videos that show you what other people are doing and how they make their soap.
Also check out my other post on how to save money by making your own Laundry Detergent! Enjoy these great Homesteading Making Soap Videos!
Download Video with Vixy.net | Convert YouTube to MP3
This is a great “modern” was of making soap!
Download Video with Vixy.net | Convert YouTube to MP3
Heres a great idea for making your own Homestead lye!
Download Video with Vixy.net | Convert YouTube to MP3
Here is the traditional way for making lye for Homestead soap!
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