Living Life in Rural Iowa

If you have been shopping lately, you have probably noticed an uptick in the prices. Grocery stores have been no exception to this. Even though it seems like prices have gone up more lately, I would argue that they have been gradually increasing over the last two years. The pandemic-created shortages have made things worse at all stores, but grocery stores in particular. You might be asking what inflation means and why it is happening now. Inflation is simply the decline of purchasing power of a given currency over time (Investopedia) . Basically, your money is less valuable and you need more of it to purchase things. What is this happening now? In the spring of 2020, the Feds decided to print more money to boost the economy to the tune of $5 trillion more dollars . Eesh! In addition to that, the pandemic shut down supplies, industries, and employment which meant less spending and fewer goods. Less spending with more money being printed means that the dollar has less purchasing power.

From 2014 - 2017, I had my chicken coop in a room in my barn. This worked out great for several reasons: proximity to the house, a ready-made room that was closed off from the rest of the barn, and low cost. I used free and reclaimed materials to build nesting boxes, roosting bars, and an outdoor area.  You can check out that build here: Introducing The Chickens! and Homemade Nesting Boxes .  In 2016-2017, we became aware of another problem that was afflicting our barn and garage when we were trying to make another room in the barn into a shop. We had a major rat infestation which is common on farms and homesteads. This was a major problem and we went on a full-scale attack to get rid of the rats. They had made a way into the barn chicken coop, giving the rats free access to fresh water and food.  Fortunately, we did not have cats at the time so we could use poison and killing traps to get rid of the rats. However, that meant we needed to find a new home for the chickens. I had fiftee

The next collapse is potentially coming. A government cannot keep printing money while keeping the interest rates low and still expect to fight off inflation. What is happening now is called Modern Monetary Theory and I encourage you to read the linked article. As long as we continue to support the government with our taxes and other means of extortion, they will continue to be able to pump out aid to whomever they want. If they need more money, they just print more. If they think they are going to run short of money, they will just increase taxes. The workers are the lifeblood of this system and merely tools.  In short, the government does not care about you in particular. Just your contribution to their machine. They will spend the money how they see fit and give you crumbs. Oh wait, this sounds familiar. I think we have seen this happen in other countries that have eventually collapsed... No matter what ends up happening due to this theory, your finances will be severely impacted.

Laundry is one of those tasks that are inevitable. At some point, you will need to wash your clothes. No matter the situation, life is a bit more bearable with clean underwear and socks.  While there are some arguments over how often you need to wash clothes, at some point, you will need to wash clothes. There are some considerations you should think about to make this task easier in your prepping.  For a long time, one of the most important items to stockpile for me would have been laundry detergent. Of course, food and water are always the most important, but a close third place would be laundry detergent. With four kids at home at one time, we used a lot of laundry detergent and I couldn't imagine being out of it at any time.  I have done the whole gambit on laundry detergent. I have made my own detergent. I have used powdered laundry detergent. I have tried the laundry detergent packets and pods. I use liquid detergent most of the time now because we have people with skin issue

You make choices every day. It has been guessed that an average person will make 2500-3200 choices in a single day. That seems like a lot. However, it makes sense. You are consciously and unconsciously making choices every minute of your day. Even if you don't believe so, you are still making choices.   Even though you may be on autopilot right now, you are still making choices. You may have routines in place to don't need to think, but those are still choices. You could upset your entire routine by making a decision to change your alarm, change your route to work, or even stopping to help someone. You make choices even if you are on a routine. What choices do you make every day?  You choose how you spend your day and where your time goes. You make think you don't decide to go to work because you think it has to be done, but you choose every day to go to work. You could choose differently. You choose to stay stuck. You choose who you surround yourself with. You choose who y