Being Self Sufficient! Part 7

#7 Work a little every day at your goals
I am trying to do this.. I try to take 15 minutes per day to at least make a list of what I want to get done.. and then also take another 15 minutes to organize what I want to accomplish.. I have piles of stuff to put up for sale in my craft room.. lol. as well as pictures of items on my computer.. every Sunday I start another list of what I want to get accomplished each week. as well as lists of what I would like to get done every day.. 
I keep a notebook with me almost every day just to jot down ideas.. for the house, my stores, etc.. I may not finish the whole list each week.. but at least I see some things get accomplished.. Do you also make lists?

Being Self Sufficient! Part 9

#9 Learn To Enjoy What You Have Now
Alot of people cant do this.. seems everyone wants to keep up with the Jones.. I personally have few wants.. a decent computer.. some books to read.. my crocheting.. food in the frig... and a roof over my home.. I got those.. smile. 

Most of the time I dont feel jealous of people.. of people getting things.. I do want one thing in life that sometimes seems hard to find.. peace and quiet.. I am probably one of the few people who would love to be in a rut.. LOL.. I truthfully never feel bored.. I always have something to do.. smile.. 

How do you all feel about this step.. is this something you can relate to?

Being Self Sufficient! Part 6

#6 Learn To Work with Basic Tools
Did you know that most high schools and some technical schools have courses to teach you the basics.. you can look online by typing the name of your city and adult education.


I live in Buffalo.. and some of the courses they have here are:

Hand-on Home Improvement

Basic auto mechanics

Being Self Sufficient! Part 5

#5 Learn To Fail 

This is probably one of the harder steps.. smile.. Nobody likes making mistakes, but the only way to learn is to make mistakes.. and keep doing it until you got it right.. I probably should have put the gardening one under here.. lol.. 

Not everything can come easy.. sometimes you just need to keep plowing thru things until you reach the other side.. and just consider it a learning experience.. and dont kick yourself for making a mistake.. sometimes we can be our own worse enemies.. 

I learned that years ago.. if things dont work out one way, try a different way, but if they dont work out trying a couple of different ways, the best thing to do is to just drop it.. and move on to something else.

Anyways.. that is all I wanted to say on this.. 

Chickens at the Fair..

One of my favorite spots is the Chicken, Duck, and Rabbit barn.. Of course this year my main focus was getting pictures of chickens for my blog series.. lol.. Here are some of the breeds I saw..

Rhode Island Reds are a utility bird, raised for meat and eggs, and also as show birds. They are a popular choice for backyard flocks because of their egg laying abilities and hardiness.  They generally lay 5 - 7 brown eggs per week.

The Belgian Bearded D'Uccle is renowned for being a calm bird. Bearded D'Uccle eggs are notably small and are coated with creamy or tinted coloring. The breed is known for being very broody, and a typical hen can lay her eggs over a two-week period, though others have taken as long as three weeks.

Plymouth Rock is a dual-purpose, cold-hardy bird and therefore makes a great breed for the small farm or backyard flock owner.  There are many different strains of this breed.  They lay a large egg that varies in color from light to medium brown with a touch of pink. The birds continue laying throughout the winter but with decreased production. The amount of eggs laid is dependent upon the strains of the birds.

These are Silkies.  They are mostly used as pets and to hatch other birds' eggs as they are quite broody.  They generally lay about 100 white to beige colored eggs per year.

Polish Chicken - These are considered ornamental birds.. not very winter hardy.. Generally lay about 2 small, white eggs per week..  

#myeriecountyfair

More On My Garden

Well.. I talked to the Cooperative Extension about my mildew problem.. they said I could try a fungicide on my plants.. but probably the best thing to do is pull them up and destroy the plants (dont compost them).. luckily for me I plant them in pots, so I just got to bag up the plants.. dump the soil (probably not the yard), and then bleach the pots for next year.. sigh.. guess that was a learning lesson.. no zucchini and yellow squash for me this year.. Then I think I also will bleach the whole area and tables where the pots are..

Tomorrow, I will have about the chickens.. just wanted to tell you what I found out.

Being Self Sufficient! Part 3

#3 Learn to Can and Preserve

Picture used from Scrapgirls.com

I used to can years ago.. both with my grandmother, my mother.. and myself.. only thing we really canned were tomatoes.. and I also remember doing peaches with my grandmother.. now.. I just freeze.. I specifically got a small chest freezer to store my produce in.. it iis so nice to not have to pay high prices for my veggies in mid winter!
One of these days I do want to try canning and making jelly again.. but usually I dont have the time.. with my orders and stuff.. 

Being Self Sufficient! Part 2

#2 Grow Some of Your Own Food – Plant a Garden

One of steps I like and have been doing now for 4 - 5 years is gardening.. the prices for food seems to go up every year.. especially for healthy, fresh veggies! I started just with tomatoes and peppers (yes, I am Italian.. so use those alot).. then every year I tried one or two new items.. This year I didnt try anything new.. the planting season started late.. plus it has been a cool, rainy season.. 

First having a backyard that is tree covered and with a bad clay soil with tons of weeds.. I didnt want to spend the energy gardening in it.. so I decided to do patio gardening.. my first attempt was to check out pots. um... large pots were way too expensive.. so thought about it and said.. why not recycle those plastic cat litter containers.. we get our cat litter in 40 lbs or larger and at the time was using Tidy Cat (yep.. those plastic containers).. so just took those. and punched holes in bottom for drainage.. I first tried using gardening soil.. discovered it was too heavy.. now I use potting soil.. If you look closely, you often can see the cat litter containers.. lol.. 

What I do is every year I take out half the old soil.. (saving it).. and mixing the old soil with new potting soil, coffee grinds, eggshells crushed really fine, and compost.  Then I transplant my seedlings (I dont often grow my seedings from seeds.. get them ready grown) in the pots with some fertilizer and more coffee grinds and egg shells.. You need to use eggshells in things like tomatoes to prevent with Blossom End Rot.. One of the things I discovered this year is you need to soak your crushed egg shells in vinegar before putting it in the soil and it really helped my tomatoes this year.. 

Anyways.. I discovered that these items seems to grow really well in pots: all kinds of tomatoes, peppers (both green peppers and Italian sweet peppers), eggplant, lettuces of all types, cucumbers, green beans, carrots, and the summer squashes.. I tried regular squash and broccoli.. no luck with those.. They just didnt produce enough for it to make it worth my while..The pictures here are recent.  took them a couple of days ago.. 

Being Self Sufficient! Part 1

I was reading this really interesting article on 9 Keys to Living a More Self-Sufficient Life!  It was quite informative.. and boy, I find that I am slowly doing what they are doing.. Just gardening to supply a part of our food supply, and selling my stuff online makes me feel both useful and in control of my life.. 

http://oldworldgardenfarms.com/2014/07/23/9-keys-to-living-a-more-self-sufficient-life

I decided to take one step every other day and discuss this.. for today I am discussing Step One..

#1 Simplify and Remove the Clutter

Are you a pack rat? A minimalist? I find that clutter stresses me out.. I hate not being able to find things.. and seeing a mess.. you would never think that if you saw my craft room.. but even in that disorder.. I have some structure to it.. cos I know where everything is!!

This is probably one of the hardest steps for me to do.. first, I am a collectors of yarn and crochet patterns.. tons and tons of them.. lol. I probably have patterns that go back to the 1940's (way before I was born too.. grin).. and my boyfriend is a bit of a pack rat.. sigh.. My latest attempt to do this is I am bagging up stuff in the back room again.. either to give away or throw away.. hopefully he wont figure it out.. lol..

I also am currently getting rid of items on Ebay.. selling books, tapes, and other small items to clear them out and make a little money too.. What doesnt sell after a matter of time ends up on Listia.. I am doing the same for my patterns.. slowly scanning them and putting them up for sale on Ebay or Listia.. it is a work in progress.. I figure I might be gone before they are all gone.. lol..

So I am taking 15 minutes a day to either pack up stuff from the back room.. or organizing items in my craft room to scan and sell.. little time.. hopefully will make some changes.. lol.. we will see.. I will update this probably in 2 weeks or so..