As a mom who spends most of her time on the farm, I know how important it is to start my day with a warm cup of coffee. However, after realizing that coffee was causing inflammation in my body, I had to give it up. It was a difficult time for me, as I missed the comfort of my morning cup. While searching for a coffee alternative, I came across Roots Apothecary adaptive cacao. Not only did it satisfy my coffee cravings, but it also had the added bonus of adaptive mushrooms to manage the everyday stress of life on the farm. In this blog post, I will share my experience with Roots Apothecary adaptive cacao.
To start with, Roots Apothecary adaptive cacao is more like a hot chocolate than coffee. It has a smooth, creamy texture that feels indulgent without the added guilt. It is made from high-quality cacao beans, which give the drink its rich, chocolatey flavor. Once you add hot water or your preferred milk, you get a warm and comforting drink that is perfect for chilly mornings.
What sets Roots Apothecary adaptive cacao apart from other hot chocolate blends is the addition of adaptive mushrooms. These mushrooms are known for their ability to adapt to stress and support the body's immune system. The blend includes reishi, chaga, and lion's mane mushrooms, which are widely recognized for their health benefits. The mushrooms also make the drink more filling, so you don't feel the need to snack as often.
Another advantage of Roots Apothecary adaptive cacao is that it is caffeine-free. If you are sensitive to caffeine or are trying to limit your intake, this beverage is the perfect alternative to coffee. I found that it gave me the same energy boost without the jitters or crash that often come with coffee. It also means that I can enjoy it any time of the day without worrying about disrupting my sleep cycle.
If you are looking for a sweet treat that won't sabotage your diet, Roots Apothecary adaptive cacao is a great option. It is made with natural sweeteners like coconut sugar and monk fruit, which have a lower glycemic index than regular sugar. This means that they won't cause your blood sugar to spike and then crash, leaving you feeling lethargic and hungry. The sweeteners also give the drink a pleasant sweetness without being overpowering.
In conclusion, Roots Apothecary adaptive cacao has become a staple in my kitchen. Not only is it a great alternative to coffee, but it also has the added benefits of adaptive mushrooms and natural sweeteners. It is a delicious and comforting drink that leaves me feeling energized and satisfied. If you are looking for a new hot beverage to try, I highly recommend giving Roots Apothecary adaptive cacao a chance.
Use this link with code CASSANDRAROW for 40% off your first order!
As I've grown in my journey as an entrepreneur, mom, gardener, and livestock owner, I struggled to find a planner that met my needs and kept me organized. So, I MADE MY OWN. You can look at it on the link below and buy it on amazon below.
Don't want the whole calendar part? I got you! I pulled the gardening and animal care pages out and put them in a book all their own.
Wanting a community to lean into? Join the FREE Helping Your Family Homestead for Food group! This community is for the Mommas, looking to stay home and raise their kids, but unsure how to keep everyone fed and make ends meet. I share tips from my journey from the office to half the income and feeding my family from home, while maintaining good nourishing food. Tips include gardening, bulk buying, caning/preserving, livestock, homesteading, and home remedies. Your family is precious, and this group is to help you gain the knowledge and tools to keep your family well and not reliant on outside professionals. Remedies and tips are easy and simple for the busy momma, time is precious after all, including pregnancy, birth, young kids, and illness. Trust your Momma gut again! This community offers the resources + community you need to help get started on your journey and prepare for whatever future you envision.
Starting to garden doesn't have to be hard! I gathered all the tips I've learned over my gardening learning curve and made them into a simple course to jump start your gardening your life.
Supporting Your Family Naturally from the Inside Out community!! This community is for Mommas, looking to Support Your Family from Nature for Wellness. Tips range from nutrition, herbals, detoxing, natural cleaning, and essential oils. Basically, all the things I’ve learned slowly over the past 5+ years of my journey. We have moved off Facebook, to better serve our community and be able to discuss openly options for providing for your family in the best way possible.
Join the FREE Community
Join the FREE Community
I've had 3 very different pregnancies. After the first traumatic birth, I learned better and how to care for my body naturally and prevent common pregnancy and birth problems before they arise. This quick course will get you the tools you need to have a naturally healthy pregnancy, labor, and delivery. My first pregnancy I had a normal western medicine all the things pregnancy. My second? I flipped to completely natural, no medicine. Bonus: Preventing Preeclampsia Without the Aspirin & Healing from Birth Trauma
For more on wellness tips click here:
For more on homesteading on your budget click here:
In 2022 when I found out, I could no longer have cinnamon. I had to find a different toothpaste. The nontoxic toothpaste I had been using, and my family loved, was no longer an option. I had tried some homemade toothpaste, and while they worked, they had a very strange texture that I did not like at all.
Someone had mentioned Using primal life. So, I looked into it. It is a tooth powder instead of paste, which was different but easier to keep the kids from squeezing an entire tube of toothpaste out. The ingredients are all clean and natural. And it has the minerals to help build the tooth enamel.
At first, I tried just a little jar to see if I liked it. The texture was different than traditional toothpaste texture. However, it was definitely better than the homemade. I began to phase the rest of the toothpaste out and switch the rest of the family over, so I was only buying one thing.
The older two, six and four, caught on quite quickly to let the toothbrush tap it off then dip it in the powder tap the toothbrush again. The youngest, 2 years old, thought it was fun to just brush her teeth whenever and dump the tooth powder.
I ended up keeping a partial jar of tooth powder on top of the medicine cabinet where it was not reachable. Then it out at toothbrushing time for everyone to use before putting it back.
We use the charcoal whitening tooth powder. While it startled the kids, the first time they brushed their teeth and their teeth were black, they quickly got over it when they realized it rinsed off. I wouldn’t say it has the whitening ability of the chemical whitening strips, but it does work as good or better as any whitening toothpaste I have tried.
Overall, what I recommend it? Yes, without a doubt. You can grab yours for $5 off with the link below.
As I've grown in my journey as an entrepreneur, mom, gardener, and livestock owner, I struggled to find a planner that met my needs and kept me organized. So, I MADE MY OWN. You can look at it on the link below and buy it on amazon below.
Don't want the whole calendar part? I got you! I pulled the gardening and animal care pages out and put them in a book all their own.
Wanting a community to lean into? Join the FREE Helping Your Family Homestead for Food group! This community is for the Mommas, looking to stay home and raise their kids, but unsure how to keep everyone fed and make ends meet. I share tips from my journey from the office to half the income and feeding my family from home, while maintaining good nourishing food. Tips include gardening, bulk buying, caning/preserving, livestock, homesteading, and home remedies. Your family is precious, and this group is to help you gain the knowledge and tools to keep your family well and not reliant on outside professionals. Remedies and tips are easy and simple for the busy momma, time is precious after all, including pregnancy, birth, young kids, and illness. Trust your Momma gut again! This community offers the resources + community you need to help get started on your journey and prepare for whatever future you envision.
Starting to garden doesn't have to be hard! I gathered all the tips I've learned over my gardening learning curve and made them into a simple course to jump start your gardening your life.
Supporting Your Family Naturally from the Inside Out community!! This community is for Mommas, looking to Support Your Family from Nature for Wellness. Tips range from nutrition, herbals, detoxing, natural cleaning, and essential oils. Basically, all the things I’ve learned slowly over the past 5+ years of my journey. We have moved off Facebook, to better serve our community and be able to discuss openly options for providing for your family in the best way possible.
Join the FREE Community
Join the FREE Community
I've had 3 very different pregnancies. After the first traumatic birth, I learned better and how to care for my body naturally and prevent common pregnancy and birth problems before they arise. This quick course will get you the tools you need to have a naturally healthy pregnancy, labor, and delivery. My first pregnancy I had a normal western medicine all the things pregnancy. My second? I flipped to completely natural, no medicine. Bonus: Preventing Preeclampsia Without the Aspirin & Healing from Birth Trauma
For more on wellness tips click here:
For more on homesteading on your budget click here:
A few years back, I got introduced to this thing called tapping. While I wasn’t keen on the idea of tapping all over my face in public, I was curious about what it could do.
The basics of tapping is like acupressure where it is targeting specific points in tapping meridians to help release stress emotions, etc. I was a bit skeptical but had heard about it from a couple of different people. I trusted, so I decided to try it for myself.
After I got the hang of it, I learned there were points in your hand that were the same as the ones on your face. This made it much easier for me to do in public as it was less noticeable.
The first time I tried it was before I started a lot of my gut healing. we were black Friday shopping in Boomgars with three kids and cart to people. Not the best idea ever. I began to feel the anxiety coming on. So, I decided to try this tapping thing.
Hi, my cart with my husband, but kind of zoned out for a little bit as I started tapping on the points in the hand after a couple rounds What was going on instead of panicking this was a cool, I should keep.
Fast-forward to this past year. I’d healed my gut and anxiety was no longer a problem. But I was still having problems managing my stress and bringing my hormones into balance.
Well, running through all the tools and my toolbox one night trying to come up with something that would help me sleep better and decrease the stress in my body, tapping, came to mind again. So, I tried it. I fell asleep before I got through the entire and when I woke up the next morning it was to the gentle music that was playing in the background tapping meditation. But I slept really well that night.
Over the next few months, I continued to use the tapping every night to help with the stress of daily farm and mom life. I began to see a much bigger difference in my body’s response to balancing.
My adrenals began to come back online, even more than with the supplements alone. And my hormones were starting to balance in optimum ranges, where, before they were bottomed out even with supplements.
So, is tapping worth it? And is paying for the subscription to the tapping app worth it? Would say 100% yes Would say 100% yes.
A week for free using the link below.
As I've grown in my journey as an entrepreneur, mom, gardener, and livestock owner, I struggled to find a planner that met my needs and kept me organized. So, I MADE MY OWN. You can look at it on the link below and buy it on amazon below.
Don't want the whole calendar part? I got you! I pulled the gardening and animal care pages out and put them in a book all their own.
Wanting a community to lean into? Join the FREE Helping Your Family Homestead for Food group! This community is for the Mommas, looking to stay home and raise their kids, but unsure how to keep everyone fed and make ends meet. I share tips from my journey from the office to half the income and feeding my family from home, while maintaining good nourishing food. Tips include gardening, bulk buying, caning/preserving, livestock, homesteading, and home remedies. Your family is precious, and this group is to help you gain the knowledge and tools to keep your family well and not reliant on outside professionals. Remedies and tips are easy and simple for the busy momma, time is precious after all, including pregnancy, birth, young kids, and illness. Trust your Momma gut again! This community offers the resources + community you need to help get started on your journey and prepare for whatever future you envision.
Starting to garden doesn't have to be hard! I gathered all the tips I've learned over my gardening learning curve and made them into a simple course to jump start your gardening your life.
Supporting Your Family Naturally from the Inside Out community!! This community is for Mommas, looking to Support Your Family from Nature for Wellness. Tips range from nutrition, herbals, detoxing, natural cleaning, and essential oils. Basically, all the things I’ve learned slowly over the past 5+ years of my journey. We have moved off Facebook, to better serve our community and be able to discuss openly options for providing for your family in the best way possible.
Join the FREE Community
Join the FREE Community
I've had 3 very different pregnancies. After the first traumatic birth, I learned better and how to care for my body naturally and prevent common pregnancy and birth problems before they arise. This quick course will get you the tools you need to have a naturally healthy pregnancy, labor, and delivery. My first pregnancy I had a normal western medicine all the things pregnancy. My second? I flipped to completely natural, no medicine. Bonus: Preventing Preeclampsia Without the Aspirin & Healing from Birth Trauma
For more on wellness tips click here:
For more on homesteading on your budget click here:
This post may contain affiliate links, which means that I may receive a commission if you make a purchase using these links, with NO additional cost to you.
You’ve got to take care of the kids, house, animals, and business. The list is over a mile long and growing. You feel like you’re just spinning your wheels and not gaining any ground.
STOP
Breath. Then read the #1 tip I’ve learned to keep my mind sane, get everything done, and still give myself time to breath.
First a disclaimer. I didn’t develop this method. I’ve tried many different methods but the one taught by Charlotte Smith has worked the best by far. It’s a habit that you will build and will continue to make your life easier every week.
You will need a planner. Any planner works, but one with half hour break downs works best. A piece of paper and pen/pencil.
You will do this every week, so pick 1 day that will work best for you. One day that you can dedicate about an hour to plan for the week ahead. For me it’s Saturday morning.
First sit down and write out everything that needs to be done in the coming week. Laundry, special meals, bills to pay, content to create, cleaning, etc. Look at your list and ask yourself if that is all. Repeat until there is nothing left in your brain.
During the week I keep a list on my phone with things that need to be done. I can quickly put them in my phone when I see them during the week and then easily remember them to put on my list for the following week.
Then open your planner and write in your appointments. I keep these in my google calendar and write them down in the planner the week prior. Make sure to also add in mealtimes and the meal prep time, any scheduled animal feeding times.
Find one spot where you can make time for you. I like to do this at a consistent time for routine sake. 1 hour is all you need. This is the time when you relax, read, etc. And yes, it is a must. It allows your body to relax and repair and get ready for the rest of the day.
Once those are written in, look at your list and start scheduling them into your week. Yes, even the laundry. Add in buffer time throughout the week or one big chunk at the end of the week. This is the time for you to catch up when those little things come up and derail your schedule.
Some tips as you get started. If you are unsure how long something will take, guess long. If you are with kids and have never done the task with them, double your time. If something takes longer. It’s ok, you learned you need more time. Stop when your time is up and put it on next weeks list.
You don't have a planner? My 2024 planner is out and ready to purchase on amazon. Grab it with the link below.
As I've grown in my journey as an entrepreneur, mom, gardener, and livestock owner, I struggled to find a planner that met my needs and kept me organized. So, I MADE MY OWN. You can look at it on the link below and buy it on amazon below.
Don't want the whole calendar part? I got you! I pulled the gardening and animal care pages out and put them in a book all their own.
Wanting a community to lean into? Join the FREE Helping Your Family Homestead for Food group! This community is for the Mommas, looking to stay home and raise their kids, but unsure how to keep everyone fed and make ends meet. I share tips from my journey from the office to half the income and feeding my family from home, while maintaining good nourishing food. Tips include gardening, bulk buying, caning/preserving, livestock, homesteading, and home remedies. Your family is precious, and this group is to help you gain the knowledge and tools to keep your family well and not reliant on outside professionals. Remedies and tips are easy and simple for the busy momma, time is precious after all, including pregnancy, birth, young kids, and illness. Trust your Momma gut again! This community offers the resources + community you need to help get started on your journey and prepare for whatever future you envision.
Starting to garden doesn't have to be hard! I gathered all the tips I've learned over my gardening learning curve and made them into a simple course to jump start your gardening your life.
Supporting Your Family Naturally from the Inside Out community!! This community is for Mommas, looking to Support Your Family from Nature for Wellness. Tips range from nutrition, herbals, detoxing, natural cleaning, and essential oils. Basically, all the things I’ve learned slowly over the past 5+ years of my journey. We have moved off Facebook, to better serve our community and be able to discuss openly options for providing for your family in the best way possible.
Join the FREE Community
Join the FREE Community
I've had 3 very different pregnancies. After the first traumatic birth, I learned better and how to care for my body naturally and prevent common pregnancy and birth problems before they arise. This quick course will get you the tools you need to have a naturally healthy pregnancy, labor, and delivery. My first pregnancy I had a normal western medicine all the things pregnancy. My second? I flipped to completely natural, no medicine. Bonus: Preventing Preeclampsia Without the Aspirin & Healing from Birth Trauma
For more on wellness tips click here:
For more on homesteading on your budget click here:
This post may contain affiliate links, which means that I may receive a commission if you make a purchase using these links, with NO additional cost to you.
You have the vision, you have the dream and now you’re taking the first steps into homesteading. Pull out all the stops and get everything now! No. Take a step back and plan a bit.
Take the time to envision how you want your homestead to look. What animals do you want? How big of a garden do you want? What do you want to grow? Are you going to be managing it on your own or will you have help?
Now how much do you know how to do? Do you know how to grow the food you want? How to care for the animals you want? How to preserve the food?
Once you have your big goal envisioned, what you know and what you still must learn, start to map out your journey. Not necessarily a timeline, but more once comfortable with a, start b, and so on.
Start with your big picture at the end. Then go to the beginning and put down what you know how to do. Then start filling in the space between. Leaving enough time for you to research what you still need to learn.
Do NOT try and add a bunch of things at once. You will overwhelm yourself and not do anything well. If you want chickens, pigs, and a milk cow but don’t know how to raise any of them, pick one. Start with one and get comfortable with it. Then add the next.
Do NOT try and add a huge garden and an orchard at the same time. You will overwhelm yourself trying to keep everything alive. If you’re more comfortable with an annual garden, start there. Get the systems in place to make that easy to care for, then start the orchard. Set up systems so that are easy to care for. Then expand.
When you expand too much at one time, with no systems in place to make the work easier, you set yourself up for a garden of failed crops. Trust me, I’ve been there and done that.
The biggest DO of homesteading is to keep your big vision in sight and visit it often to make sure you’re still on track. The biggest DON’T, starting everything at once.
As I've grown in my journey as an entrepreneur, mom, gardener, and livestock owner, I struggled to find a planner that met my needs and kept me organized. So, I MADE MY OWN. You can look at it on the link below and buy it on amazon below.
Don't want the whole calendar part? I got you! I pulled the gardening and animal care pages out and put them in a book all their own.
Wanting a community to lean into? Join the FREE Helping Your Family Homestead for Food group! This community is for the Mommas, looking to stay home and raise their kids, but unsure how to keep everyone fed and make ends meet. I share tips from my journey from the office to half the income and feeding my family from home, while maintaining good nourishing food. Tips include gardening, bulk buying, caning/preserving, livestock, homesteading, and home remedies. Your family is precious, and this group is to help you gain the knowledge and tools to keep your family well and not reliant on outside professionals. Remedies and tips are easy and simple for the busy momma, time is precious after all, including pregnancy, birth, young kids, and illness. Trust your Momma gut again! This community offers the resources + community you need to help get started on your journey and prepare for whatever future you envision.
Starting to garden doesn't have to be hard! I gathered all the tips I've learned over my gardening learning curve and made them into a simple course to jump start your gardening your life.
Supporting Your Family Naturally from the Inside Out community!! This community is for Mommas, looking to Support Your Family from Nature for Wellness. Tips range from nutrition, herbals, detoxing, natural cleaning, and essential oils. Basically, all the things I’ve learned slowly over the past 5+ years of my journey. We have moved off Facebook, to better serve our community and be able to discuss openly options for providing for your family in the best way possible.
Join the FREE Community
Join the FREE Community
I've had 3 very different pregnancies. After the first traumatic birth, I learned better and how to care for my body naturally and prevent common pregnancy and birth problems before they arise. This quick course will get you the tools you need to have a naturally healthy pregnancy, labor, and delivery. My first pregnancy I had a normal western medicine all the things pregnancy. My second? I flipped to completely natural, no medicine. Bonus: Preventing Preeclampsia Without the Aspirin & Healing from Birth Trauma
For more on wellness tips click here:
For more on homesteading on your budget click here:
This post may contain affiliate links, which means that I may receive a commission if you make a purchase using these links, with NO additional cost to you.
Homesteading is an adventure in itself. Motherhood is another adventure. Put both together and you will have a grand adventure. That grand adventure, however, can easily turn into overwhelm if you’re not careful.
So how do you keep your homestead going, as you prepare to welcome your newest bundle of joy? With my last child I finally figured it out and I started in my second trimester getting ready.
First plan ahead. There is no such thing as planning too far ahead. After you give birth plan to give yourself 6 weeks of rest. Not joking. It seems excessive, but it will take that long for your body to fully heal from pregnancy and birth.
In that time, you, your family, and your critters will have to eat. Preparing ahead looks a lot like making freezer meals for you and your family. Make sure you have 2 months of feed stored for the animals. Make a list of quick meals you can make that everyone likes, so you don’t have to think. These are both steps you can be working on in your second trimester when you have the energy.
Start implementing systems to make your chores easier. Do you know how much feed is gone through in a day or week? Can you switch to self-feeders? Do you have enough water space to last 24 hours? Are you feeding twice a day? Can you switch to once a day? Do you have to water every day or is there a way to implement timers? Make the changes early so you can adapt if needed and your animals are ready.
In the third trimester, start thinking and asking who you can have to help you postpartum. Write down in detail what you do for chores. For me my daily chores were split between 3 people. My husband let the birds out and locked them in at night. Another friend did all the animal chores. Another friend took care of what was left of the garden.
Do you have other kids to take care of? Find someone to help you for the first week for sure. I was blessed to have my mom come stay with us for a week to help after each kid was born. After that, she still came back (we live 20 minutes apart) once a week to play with the other kids. My mother-in-law watched the kids for a day. When the last baby was born, it was harvest time, so there was lots of tractor and combine rides for the older two as well so I could rest and heal.
Did it seem excessive? Yes, but I will tell you it was my best postpartum yet for healing. And by that time, I had a large garden, chickens, ducks, turkeys, geese, horses, dogs, cats, and maybe a bottle calf. I was also running multiple business at the time. I scheduled things out so there was minimal I had to do for a good month.
Adding a baby to the homestead doesn’t have to make everything crazy. With the right planning your homestead can keep going, while you take your time to rest as well.
As I've grown in my journey as an entrepreneur, mom, gardener, and livestock owner, I struggled to find a planner that met my needs and kept me organized. So, I MADE MY OWN. You can look at it on the link below and buy it on amazon below.
Don't want the whole calendar part? I got you! I pulled the gardening and animal care pages out and put them in a book all their own.
Wanting a community to lean into? Join the FREE Helping Your Family Homestead for Food group! This community is for the Mommas, looking to stay home and raise their kids, but unsure how to keep everyone fed and make ends meet. I share tips from my journey from the office to half the income and feeding my family from home, while maintaining good nourishing food. Tips include gardening, bulk buying, caning/preserving, livestock, homesteading, and home remedies. Your family is precious, and this group is to help you gain the knowledge and tools to keep your family well and not reliant on outside professionals. Remedies and tips are easy and simple for the busy momma, time is precious after all, including pregnancy, birth, young kids, and illness. Trust your Momma gut again! This community offers the resources + community you need to help get started on your journey and prepare for whatever future you envision.
Starting to garden doesn't have to be hard! I gathered all the tips I've learned over my gardening learning curve and made them into a simple course to jump start your gardening your life.
Supporting Your Family Naturally from the Inside Out community!! This community is for Mommas, looking to Support Your Family from Nature for Wellness. Tips range from nutrition, herbals, detoxing, natural cleaning, and essential oils. Basically, all the things I’ve learned slowly over the past 5+ years of my journey. We have moved off Facebook, to better serve our community and be able to discuss openly options for providing for your family in the best way possible.
Join the FREE Community
Join the FREE Community
I've had 3 very different pregnancies. After the first traumatic birth, I learned better and how to care for my body naturally and prevent common pregnancy and birth problems before they arise. This quick course will get you the tools you need to have a naturally healthy pregnancy, labor, and delivery. My first pregnancy I had a normal western medicine all the things pregnancy. My second? I flipped to completely natural, no medicine. Bonus: Preventing Preeclampsia Without the Aspirin & Healing from Birth Trauma
For more on wellness tips click here:
For more on homesteading on your budget click here:
This post may contain affiliate links, which means that I may receive a commission if you make a purchase using these links, with NO additional cost to you.
I did not start my journey intending to dive into the homesteading lifestyle. I thought that was 40+ acres of grass to run my animals on. I had 3.4 acres to work with in the middle of crop country. I just wanted to be able to feed my family.
I grew up on the farm and remember my grandma growing a beautiful garden and my mom canning every summer. My mom, try as she may, has never had a green thumb. When I was first married, I didn’t even grow a garden for the first couple years. We were both still in college and traveling back and forth between school and his family farm. We had my 2 horses, 1 dog, and jobs. I was working 45 minutes away from home, while he worked on the family farm.
When we moved home in 2015, he grew the first garden. A very rough looking sweetcorn patch. I had some herbs in pots up by the house. The following year, we got a fence up, because of rabbits, and I had a small garden, of tomatoes, cucumbers, and peppers. The things I remember my mom trying to grow.
We actually debated the size of the garden. I wanted it smaller and a bigger fire pit area, he thought it should be bigger. Fun fact, he was right. 2-3 years later, my oldest daughter and I were moving the fire pit brick by brick and making the garden bigger.
In 2019 I was pregnant with my son and looking at the cost of what daycare for 2 would cost. I was also moving into a season where I no longer liked being away from my family so much. I loved my job but seeing my child for 3-4 hours every weekday wasn’t cutting it. The only problem was, my job was providing insurance, and groceries. We were using my husband’s income for savings and home improvements.
No matter how I ran the numbers, I couldn’t continue to work and still buy gas to get there and groceries to feed my family. I ran the numbers with just my husband’s income, what insurance options we found, and no daycare, it was going to be tight, but do able. I told my boss I wouldn’t be back after I had my son.
Now how to make the grocery bill smaller. Then I remembered my grandma’s garden and stories of great grandma’s garden. They grew everything! So, I dug in over winter. Looked at what my family was eating vegetable wise and figured out how to grow it. Every year my garden has expanded in space and variety.
I learned how to preserve what I grew and how to cook with whole food ingredients, eliminating all the boxed dinners. 2019 also brought a new frontiers of food allergies and learning to cook without gluten and dairy.
We were fortunate to be able to get ½ a beef every year with my husband’s job. 2020 I bought my first chickens. 2021 brought guineas, ducks, and turkeys. 2022 came the geese and honeybees. In 2022 I also learned how to butcher chickens.
I started a poly culture orchard in 2021 as well, to raise some of our own fruit as well. The advantage of the poly culture orchard is once it is established, it takes care of itself with very little maintenance and care.
This year, 2023, we added our milk cow and a small greenhouse to learn in.
Next year, 2024, were planning on adding pigs.
Today, we raise 95% of our own protein and 70% of our own vegetables. The orchard is still maturing but will one day produce 50% of our fruits.
Our family is now 5 strong. I spend maybe $300/month on groceries. Some months we trade for groceries. Yes, it would be nice to spend more on groceries, but we’re not able to yet. However, we eat well and won’t starve either.
I started with a simple garden but grew as I had the capacity and the need for another food category. I started small and added as I got comfortable with what was already here.
As I've grown in my journey as an entrepreneur, mom, gardener, and livestock owner, I struggled to find a planner that met my needs and kept me organized. So, I MADE MY OWN. You can look at it on the link below and buy it on amazon below.
Don't want the whole calendar part? I got you! I pulled the gardening and animal care pages out and put them in a book all their own.
Wanting a community to lean into? Join the FREE Helping Your Family Homestead for Food group! This community is for the Mommas, looking to stay home and raise their kids, but unsure how to keep everyone fed and make ends meet. I share tips from my journey from the office to half the income and feeding my family from home, while maintaining good nourishing food. Tips include gardening, bulk buying, caning/preserving, livestock, homesteading, and home remedies. Your family is precious, and this group is to help you gain the knowledge and tools to keep your family well and not reliant on outside professionals. Remedies and tips are easy and simple for the busy momma, time is precious after all, including pregnancy, birth, young kids, and illness. Trust your Momma gut again! This community offers the resources + community you need to help get started on your journey and prepare for whatever future you envision.
Starting to garden doesn't have to be hard! I gathered all the tips I've learned over my gardening learning curve and made them into a simple course to jump start your gardening your life.
Supporting Your Family Naturally from the Inside Out community!! This community is for Mommas, looking to Support Your Family from Nature for Wellness. Tips range from nutrition, herbals, detoxing, natural cleaning, and essential oils. Basically, all the things I’ve learned slowly over the past 5+ years of my journey. We have moved off Facebook, to better serve our community and be able to discuss openly options for providing for your family in the best way possible.
Join the FREE Community
Join the FREE Community
I've had 3 very different pregnancies. After the first traumatic birth, I learned better and how to care for my body naturally and prevent common pregnancy and birth problems before they arise. This quick course will get you the tools you need to have a naturally healthy pregnancy, labor, and delivery. My first pregnancy I had a normal western medicine all the things pregnancy. My second? I flipped to completely natural, no medicine. Bonus: Preventing Preeclampsia Without the Aspirin & Healing from Birth Trauma
For more on wellness tips click here:
For more on homesteading on your budget click here:
This post may contain affiliate links, which means that I may receive a commission if you make a purchase using these links, with NO additional cost to you.
Like any animal, milk cows have a cost to them as well. Most livestock will have about the same cost, in differing amounts. A cow will eat more than a sheep for example, but they both require feed. The main difference lies in the potential income they produce.
Basic one-time costs (unless you break it or have a disaster), include shelter, waters, feed bunks or hay feeders, and fence. Now if you are blessed with abundant, year-round pasture, you may not need feed bunks or hay feeders.
With a milk cow you will need some way to milk her. Especially if she is new to milking, you will want a stanchion. Yes, the idyllic walking out and milking in the pasture is nice, but not guaranteed to happen every time.
Keep in mind barns and fences will require maintenance to keep them in functioning order. The older the structures, the more maintenance cost is typically involved. For ease of figures, just plan on a basic number per year. There will also be a cost involved in moving manure around if your animals are in smaller pen areas instead of pasture at any point. For more on fence design tips, check out the blog here.
What your hay or grain feeder is made from will determine how long it will last. Wooden feed bunks outside may only last 5-10 years before they completely fall apart. Kept inside, they will last longer. Metal will last longer 15-20 years even outside.
The nice part about a milk cow is they are used to you being around them, so if they do get sick, you can usually easily treat them, even if it is simply using the milking stanchion as a head catch to help you.
One important thing to consider unique to dairy cows is breeding. It is NOT recommended to keep a dairy bull around for safety reasons. They are big, hard on fences, and often don’t respect your space. You will have to factor in what it will cost to get your cow bred. This is typically done through artificial insemination. You can pay your beef cow neighbor a breeding fee and use his bull.
Now the fun part is the income! The obvious is milk! Even if you aren’t selling the milk to your neighbors, you aren’t buying it either, so be sure to factor that in. Even your cheese, butter and other diary products you are no longer buying.
You will have extra calves at some point. The quickest dollar to figure is selling the calf after weaning. The different times when you sell and what weight the calf is will determine the price.
If you’re up for some marketing, you can sell sides of beef or directly to the consumer. Keep in mind, this is going to cost more to raise, and you will have processing and marketing costs involved. Even if this is raising one to put in your own freezer, factor in those extra feed costs and the income from the beef you could have sold in. You don’t have to buy it at the store now.
At some point your cows will age out and no longer produce calves. They still have value though as a cull animal, though it is much less than a calf. Be sure to factor this in as well.
The easiest way to see all the expenses and income together is to lay out all the expenses on one side of a chart and the income on the other. Then total the numbers. Keep in mind one time cost should be spread out over the lifetime of the structure/equipment for accurate analysis.
Now get figuring and go buy your milk cow!
As I've grown in my journey as an entrepreneur, mom, gardener, and livestock owner, I struggled to find a planner that met my needs and kept me organized. So, I MADE MY OWN. You can look at it on the link below and buy it on amazon below.
Don't want the whole calendar part? I got you! I pulled the gardening and animal care pages out and put them in a book all their own.
Wanting a community to lean into? Join the FREE Helping Your Family Homestead for Food group! This community is for the Mommas, looking to stay home and raise their kids, but unsure how to keep everyone fed and make ends meet. I share tips from my journey from the office to half the income and feeding my family from home, while maintaining good nourishing food. Tips include gardening, bulk buying, caning/preserving, livestock, homesteading, and home remedies. Your family is precious, and this group is to help you gain the knowledge and tools to keep your family well and not reliant on outside professionals. Remedies and tips are easy and simple for the busy momma, time is precious after all, including pregnancy, birth, young kids, and illness. Trust your Momma gut again! This community offers the resources + community you need to help get started on your journey and prepare for whatever future you envision.
Starting to garden doesn't have to be hard! I gathered all the tips I've learned over my gardening learning curve and made them into a simple course to jump start your gardening your life.
Supporting Your Family Naturally from the Inside Out community!! This community is for Mommas, looking to Support Your Family from Nature for Wellness. Tips range from nutrition, herbals, detoxing, natural cleaning, and essential oils. Basically, all the things I’ve learned slowly over the past 5+ years of my journey. We have moved off Facebook, to better serve our community and be able to discuss openly options for providing for your family in the best way possible.
Join the FREE Community
Join the FREE Community
I've had 3 very different pregnancies. After the first traumatic birth, I learned better and how to care for my body naturally and prevent common pregnancy and birth problems before they arise. This quick course will get you the tools you need to have a naturally healthy pregnancy, labor, and delivery. My first pregnancy I had a normal western medicine all the things pregnancy. My second? I flipped to completely natural, no medicine. Bonus: Preventing Preeclampsia Without the Aspirin & Healing from Birth Trauma
For more on wellness tips click here:
For more on homesteading on your budget click here:
This post may contain affiliate links, which means that I may receive a commission if you make a purchase using these links, with NO additional cost to you.
Like any animal, cows have a cost to them as well. Most livestock will have about the same cost, in differing amounts. A cow will eat more than a sheep for example, but they both require feed. The main difference lies in the potential income they produce.
Basic one-time costs (unless you break it or have a disaster), include shelter, waters, feed bunks or hay feeders, and fence. Now if you are blessed with abundant, year-round pasture, you may not need feed bunks or hay feeders.
The good news is for the most part beef cows are hardy and don’t need access to a barn all the time. Be sure to match the breed of cow to your needs and environment and you can save more money. You can read more on that here.
Keep in mind barns and fences will require maintenance to keep them in functioning order. The older the structures, the more maintenance cost is typically involved. For ease of figures, just plan on a basic number per year. There will also be a cost involved in moving manure around if your animals are in smaller pen areas instead of pasture at any point. For more on fence design tips, check out the blog here.
What your hay or grain feeder is made from will determine how long it will last. Wooden feed bunks outside may only last 5-10 years before they completely fall apart. Kept inside, they will last longer. Metal will last longer 15-20 years even outside.
At some point you will probably have a sick or injured cow or calf. You can’t just physically manhandle a cow to the ground and treat it like a sheep or goat. You will need some way to gently move the cow/calf to an area where you can physically restrain it for treatment. This is going to typically be some kind of working chute.
Of course, if you have a good horse and are a good roper, you can always rope and treat in the pasture. For a cow though you’re going to need at least one other person.
Now the fun part is the income! You will have extra calves at some point. The quickest dollar to figure is selling the calf after weaning. The different times when you sell and what weight the calf is will determine the price.
If you’re up for some marketing, you can sell sides of beef or directly to the consumer. Keep in mind, this is going to cost more to raise, and you will have processing and marketing costs involved.
At some point your cows will age out and no longer produce calves and your bull will no longer be able to breed. They still have value though as a cull animal, though it is much less than a calf. Be sure to factor this in as well.
The easiest way to see all the expenses and income together is to lay out all the expenses on one side of a chart and the income on the other. Then total the numbers. Keep in mind one time cost should be spread out over the lifetime of the structure/equipment for accurate analysis.
Now get figuring and go buy some cows!
As I've grown in my journey as an entrepreneur, mom, gardener, and livestock owner, I struggled to find a planner that met my needs and kept me organized. So, I MADE MY OWN. You can look at it on the link below and buy it on amazon below.
Don't want the whole calendar part? I got you! I pulled the gardening and animal care pages out and put them in a book all their own.
Wanting a community to lean into? Join the FREE Helping Your Family Homestead for Food group! This community is for the Mommas, looking to stay home and raise their kids, but unsure how to keep everyone fed and make ends meet. I share tips from my journey from the office to half the income and feeding my family from home, while maintaining good nourishing food. Tips include gardening, bulk buying, caning/preserving, livestock, homesteading, and home remedies. Your family is precious, and this group is to help you gain the knowledge and tools to keep your family well and not reliant on outside professionals. Remedies and tips are easy and simple for the busy momma, time is precious after all, including pregnancy, birth, young kids, and illness. Trust your Momma gut again! This community offers the resources + community you need to help get started on your journey and prepare for whatever future you envision.
Starting to garden doesn't have to be hard! I gathered all the tips I've learned over my gardening learning curve and made them into a simple course to jump start your gardening your life.
Supporting Your Family Naturally from the Inside Out community!! This community is for Mommas, looking to Support Your Family from Nature for Wellness. Tips range from nutrition, herbals, detoxing, natural cleaning, and essential oils. Basically, all the things I’ve learned slowly over the past 5+ years of my journey. We have moved off Facebook, to better serve our community and be able to discuss openly options for providing for your family in the best way possible.
Join the FREE Community
Join the FREE Community
I've had 3 very different pregnancies. After the first traumatic birth, I learned better and how to care for my body naturally and prevent common pregnancy and birth problems before they arise. This quick course will get you the tools you need to have a naturally healthy pregnancy, labor, and delivery. My first pregnancy I had a normal western medicine all the things pregnancy. My second? I flipped to completely natural, no medicine. Bonus: Preventing Preeclampsia Without the Aspirin & Healing from Birth Trauma
For more on wellness tips click here:
For more on homesteading on your budget click here:
This post may contain affiliate links, which means that I may receive a commission if you make a purchase using these links, with NO additional cost to you.
Like any animal, sheep have a cost to them as well. Most livestock will have about the same cost, in differing amounts. A cow will eat more than a sheep for example, but they both require feed. The main difference lies in the potential income they produce.
Basic one-time costs (unless you break it or have a disaster), include shelter, waters, feed bunks or hay feeders, and fence. Now if you are blessed with abundant, year-round pasture, you may not need feed bunks or hay feeders.
Keep in mind barns and fences will require maintenance to keep them in functioning order. The older the structures, the more maintenance cost is typically involved. For ease of figures, just plan on a basic number per year. There will also be a cost involved in moving manure around if your animals are in smaller pen areas instead of pasture at any point. For more on fence design tips, check out the blog here.
What your hay or grain feeder is made from will determine how long it will last. Wooden feed bunks outside may only last 5-10 years before they completely fall apart. Kept inside, they will last longer. Metal will last longer 15-20 years even outside.
One unique cost to sheep that is NOT required is a working facility. For the most part, especially in a small flock, a simple panel in the barn or corner of the pen is all that is needed to treat the flock when needed. The fancy working facility is quite nice when you no longer have young backs to help you catch the ewes. That’s when my dad got his facility, when 3 of the 4 kids had left for college, 10 years after the first breeding ewes arrived on the farm.
Reoccurring expenses are ones that are happening every month or year. This includes maintenance costs, vaccinations/deworming/testing, rent (or mortgage payment), and feed.
Now for the income potential. Sheep are unique in their grazing as they will eat the broad leaf weeds first, before the grass. If you have portable fencing, you could use them as weeders for neighbors. Most pasture areas are not set up for sheep but cattle, which will not hold sheep.
If you are breeding sheep, you will have extra sheep at some point. There are only so many breeding animals you can have, so meat is a potential income. How much demand locally for this you have will depend greatly on your location. Be sure to factor in the ‘income’ even if you simply put them in your freezer. You no longer need to buy some other meat.
A more common market for extra lamb is to sell them to a local sale barn. The income from lamb sales will vairy depending on the time of year and the weight of the lambs. There is also the value of the ewe or ram when they are done with their useful breeding life.
Depending on the breed you have the potential for wool sales as well. Again, this will be more area dependent. But could be a good market if you are willing to do the work and connect with the hobby spinners.
The easiest way to see all the expenses and income together, is to lay out all the expenses on one side of a chart and the income on the other. Then total the numbers. Keep in mind one time cost should be spread out over the lifetime of the structure/equipment for accurate analysis.
Now get figuring and go buy some sheep!
As I've grown in my journey as an entrepreneur, mom, gardener, and livestock owner, I struggled to find a planner that met my needs and kept me organized. So, I MADE MY OWN. You can look at it on the link below and buy it on amazon below.
Don't want the whole calendar part? I got you! I pulled the gardening and animal care pages out and put them in a book all their own.
Wanting a community to lean into? Join the FREE Helping Your Family Homestead for Food group! This community is for the Mommas, looking to stay home and raise their kids, but unsure how to keep everyone fed and make ends meet. I share tips from my journey from the office to half the income and feeding my family from home, while maintaining good nourishing food. Tips include gardening, bulk buying, caning/preserving, livestock, homesteading, and home remedies. Your family is precious, and this group is to help you gain the knowledge and tools to keep your family well and not reliant on outside professionals. Remedies and tips are easy and simple for the busy momma, time is precious after all, including pregnancy, birth, young kids, and illness. Trust your Momma gut again! This community offers the resources + community you need to help get started on your journey and prepare for whatever future you envision.
Starting to garden doesn't have to be hard! I gathered all the tips I've learned over my gardening learning curve and made them into a simple course to jump start your gardening your life.
Supporting Your Family Naturally from the Inside Out community!! This community is for Mommas, looking to Support Your Family from Nature for Wellness. Tips range from nutrition, herbals, detoxing, natural cleaning, and essential oils. Basically, all the things I’ve learned slowly over the past 5+ years of my journey. We have moved off Facebook, to better serve our community and be able to discuss openly options for providing for your family in the best way possible.
Join the FREE Community
Join the FREE Community
I've had 3 very different pregnancies. After the first traumatic birth, I learned better and how to care for my body naturally and prevent common pregnancy and birth problems before they arise. This quick course will get you the tools you need to have a naturally healthy pregnancy, labor, and delivery. My first pregnancy I had a normal western medicine all the things pregnancy. My second? I flipped to completely natural, no medicine. Bonus: Preventing Preeclampsia Without the Aspirin & Healing from Birth Trauma
For more on wellness tips click here:
For more on homesteading on your budget click here:
