Why We Homestead

Knowing why you’re doing something will determine how long you stick with it. This is especially important when you’re committing to a completely different lifestyle than the one nearly everyone else is pursuing.

For that reason, we keep the reason why we’re homesteading at the fronts of our minds at all times.

I don’t love waking up early to scrub dirty diapers or taking our food scraps outside to bury them when it’s over 100 degrees in the shade.

But, I do these things and more. Why? A few reasons.

Here are some of the reasons why we homestead:

1. For Our Health

Between genetically-modified produce, steroid-pumped meat animals, and highly-processed everything else, it’s easy to see why so many people today are unhealthy and overweight.

We both have diabetes running in our families as well as a myriad of other issues. To do what we can to improve our health, we’re starting by cooking with locally-grown whole foods and working on growing our own food.

By knowing exactly what goes into our bodies, we can improve our health and help avoid some or all of the conditions that run in our families.

2. For the Environment

While we don’t subscribe to the idea that global warming is a legitimate concern, there are other things that are major issues the earth is facing. The most pressing is the amount of plastic waste that’s ending up everywhere, particularly in our oceans.

As Christians, we believe God charged us to take care of the earth when He first made it. We also don’t feel most people have done a good job of this. And now, everybody is suffering.

By homesteading right where you are and defining it in part by limiting your environmental impact, we can make a difference. At first, it may be small, but if each of us only encourages one other person to change, the producer mindset can spread around the world.

3. For Self-Sufficiency

I (Melody) have always been independent. Trust me. My parents have plenty of stories. Sometimes, it even bothers me that I have to buy bread from the grocery store. I also wonder how we would survive in a short or long-term emergency situation.

That makes self-sufficiency one of the other reasons why we homestead. We want to make sure our family will be safe and well-cared-for no matter what happens. If the world goes crazy, we want to know that we’ll be ok.

There’s so much that goes into being self-sufficient that I’ll have to make another post about it, but this is a huge motivator for us to be homesteaders.

4. For Financial Freedom

With self-sufficiency and producing more than we consume comes financial freedom. Financial freedom means we get to spend more time doing the things we want and less time working for money.

To reach financial freedom, we first got control of our spending by creating a budgeting system that worked for us. Now we’re working extra hard to pay off our bank loan and create some passive streams of income.

The possibility of working less than an hour a day while still earning a full-time income helps us keep our focus now while we’re still stuck exchanging our time for money.

5. For Fun

Nothing quite beats the feeling of having put in a hard day’s work to better your family. Some of the best times of my life were when I was working in farm environments. First at a summer camp and later with a ministry.

I love working with animals and being outside. While Roberto has less experience with these things, he also longs for this lifestyle.

The enjoyment we’ll get out of being able to work the land side by side and raise our kids to see exactly where their food comes from is one of the biggest things that keeps us going in this homesteading journey.

Why do You Homestead?

Our individual stories of how we came to decide to become homesteaders can be found on our about us page.

Everybody has a different journey to homesteading. We would love to hear about yours, and learn more about your motivations behind why you’re doing what you do.

Let us know by filling out this form and you may be featured in an upcoming post!