Our Homesteading Journal: Our first year off grid homesteading in Northern Canada

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Our Homesteading Journal Day Zero

There are so many of you that I have missed and am excited to find still here and still going strong.

I’m back after an entire spring, summer, and fall season away. We now find ourselves back in the deep chill of winter and it’s time to start sharing again. Before I took a hiatus from blogging, I was counting down to our family’s big move off grid here in Northern Alberta. We had a winter that just wouldn’t go away...and we were trying to get ready as best we could to move a farm, our family, and our businesses off grid. I say “our” as back then there were two adults running this show. However, much of the first year ended up being a solo journey (filled with amazing friends and community).

I have documented much of this past year in video and pictures, which I will share along with the incredible, heartbreaking, and joy filled stories that came with each season.

I’ve been debating whether to take a chronological approach to this journal or to jump around based on what strikes me as important to share. I can’t decide so I’ll do both :)

Some of what’s in store includes;

The day my house tipped over.
The day I had to chase a Jersey bull through the forest with a gun...his day had come.
Stuck in the mud...for weeks.
Our first year’s harvest on new soil.
Teaching over 100 people to Brain Tan Hides.
Learning to cook on a wood stove.
Canning a year’s worth of food without a kitchen.
Finishing the hempcrete haywagon house.
Building a hempcrete rocket mass heater.
Tearing out a hempcrete rocket mass heater (when it threatened to burn the house down).
A full year of foraging and wildcrafting.
Learning to install wood stoves.
The heavy duty of taking a life; harvesting our own meat on the homestead.
Taming a wild cow...meeting Violet our new family milk cow
Oh...and...jumping down from the tailgate and destroying my ankle...mid move.

Soooooo much more...sooooo many lessons.

I hope sharing these stories will help others see what it’s like to take full responsibility for your family’s food, shelter, and lifestyle, and what it’s life to start a homestead from scratch on bare land in a forest with little by the way of financial reserves.

I will be using the tag #HomesteadingJournal with these posts and they will be interspersed with other musings, things we are up to these days, and as always...homesteading tutorials.

Follow along and share this journey with us!

Until then, and from my home fire to yours, hai hai.

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I for one will be looking forward to reading all these enticing stories!

Hey, what an exciting post! I can't wait to see the upcoming stories. I liked it so much that I included it in my curation-style post: https://steemit.com/payitforward/@stortebeker/look-what-i-found-on-the-sustainability-front which at the same time is an entry to this contest by @pifc: https://steemit.com/payitforward/@pifc/week-37-pay-it-forward-curation-contest


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Your post was featured in an entry into @pifc's Curation Contest:Week 37. Posts are selected because the entrant felt you are producing great content and deserve more attention (& rewards) on your post. As such your post has been upvoted and will be visited by other members of the PIFC Community.

We are always looking for new people to join our curation efforts. This is a great way to meet new people and become part of a community that focuses on helping one another.

Want to promote a post for free and have a chance to find some other great content? Check out this week's Pimp Your Post.

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What an interesting lifestyle. I don't think I could do something like that... I don't enjoy crowded places but without anyone at all but me? I don't think I could do that.

PS: I have found your post because @stortebeker featured you in his entry for the Pay It Forward Contest

And I'm following you because I want to tead all those amazing experience of yours all this time. You know sharing it on this platform would be a great choice and helps for those who wants to start or just enjoy the unbelievable truth of a homesteader's life.. (I always love to read about homesteaders because I've never be one😊)

Found your post through @stortebeker entry post in the pay it forward contest this week and wish you all the best. Greeting from Indonesia

I spent most of 2016 off grid. I loved it. I learned so much, even though it wasn't the best situation (and I had to leave it, sadly.) The only thing I missed was the internet/computer - we weren't set up for that. My worst annoyance (besides the person that made the situation impossible) was the juvenile black bear who caused lots of problems.

I found you (today) thanks to @stortebeker's entry into the Pay it Forward Curation contest this week. Keep up the great work!

Wow! Northern Alberta! I spent most of my adult life in Vancouver, grew up in Ontario, and spent ONE winter in Edmonton haha Kudos to you for breaking away and doing your own thing!

I found your post because @stortebeker featured you in a Pay it Forward Curation Contest entry; feel free to join us anytime with an entry of your own ... if you can find the time :)