Frontier House

It all started several years ago with Frontier House, a show featured on PBS. We weren't the only ones. I have actually talked to a lot of people who have been inspired by this show that was its own experiment. Three families were chosen from a group of applications to be on a show that would set them back to the days of the Homestead. It was in fact, a failure of sorts. They lived on their homestead in Montana for a summer. One summer is just barely a vacation, hardly enough time to  One of the families cheated and none of them lived on the actual homestead for very long, but it got to us, a lot of us. We started thinking could I do that? How would I respond to that particular situation? And there were lots more questions with only one way to get the answer, and that way was to start our own Homestead. It was rough on those families and it was apparent that homesteading was definitely not for everyone. However, it was so intriguing for some of us that the ideas just took root and grew for years until the opportunity presented itself to find a way to start our own homestead.

I remember watching one episode and the commentators on the show mentioned that one of the families cheated. They weren't supposed to trade with anyone outside the make believe community. However on a real homestead, you need to trade with anyone and everyone that you can. It is very important to establish your homestead community. This may include other homesteading families or it may be people or businesses outside of the homestead community.  As a homesteader we need to make a life for ourselves utilizing our homestead as best as we can. If I look back to the fictional series Little House on the Prairie we see that although the Ingalls family lived on a homestead where they were able to raise animals and grow food that they harvested, they still were dependent on their community for a lot of their needs. They more they skills they possessed translated directly into an increases ability to survive especially during financially difficult times. Likewise, any time we become more diversified or our homesteads become more diversified it increase our ability to survive with the ups and downs of any economy.

Homesteading can be a difficult life, and the more self-sufficient you want your homestead to be the more difficult it can be because you are working to create an environment where you are the provider. That means that you do the work instead of paying for food or consumer goods that someone else has created or provided. You are the person going out in the cold or the heat and taking care of the animals and the plants.

It can be difficult to understand a homesteader. Many of us are beginners. A rancher or a farmer often has generations behind them that led to their current lifestyle, however most of the modern day homestead are turning back the clock just a little and changing the course and direction of their lives. They are putting their course on a different path then the one they were raised on.

It is more difficult and that makes some people wonder why we homestead. Although there are a lot of similar answers out there, you will also find that each and every story is unique. I have talked in other posts about some of the reason why our family choose a homestead, but its important to understand that this life (this homesteading life) isn't one level. There are multiple reasons why we and other families do this. And despite the difficulties and the struggles there are also multiple levels of rewards.