Living Life in Rural Iowa

Sometimes we feel like we are invincible. We have an attitude that nothing will happen to us. We don't think about getting into an accident, becoming ill, becoming injured, and worse. We don't think anyone would want to harm us in any way. Sometimes, we just don't think at all.

On top of that, in this day and age, we have become less connected with our family, friends, co-workers, and neighbors. We think that social media has become the new normal. Why should we check on our loved ones and friends when social media lets us know when they post and we spill everything on social media.

We have lost that connection and, in turn, we have lost touch with those people we interact with on a regular basis. Now you hear stories about people dying in their homes due to illness or injury because no one checked on them for over a week. Someone has a car accident and no one knows why they were where they were.

Worse yet, we assume everyone has a cell phone glued to their hand now. We have …

We all know that skills are critical to survival and more. As preppers, we know that skills will make or break us. As homesteaders, without skills, you will fail on your homestead. Many preppers dream of being self-reliant and becoming homesteaders in order to survive and thrive whatever life may throw at them.

Knowing what skills to learn to be self-reliant is another matter. You need to make a plan for your homestead and discuss what you can reasonably handle. Do you just want to garden and make your own products? Do you want to raise some livestock? What do you want to do? This is your homestead and your vision. You can make it however you like.

No matter what, you need to learn skills. Skills are what keep us alive. They help us save money. They help us to reuse items and recycle other things into useful objects. They keep animals alive and productive. They keep us being productive.

How do you learn skills? You learn skills by reading about what you want to learn and then putting tha…

Christmas is coming around the corner. To say that I find Christmas shopping painful would be an understatement. However, I have a few tips and tricks to buy presents that fit into my values and beliefs without sacrificing my pocketbook. I have a budget for everyone on my list and they are well aware of it.

I almost never buy toys that are electric, take batteries, or need electricity to operate them. My kids figured this out years ago and started asking their grandparents for those items. I am just not a fan of those toys and find them quite disposable. I honestly wanted to buy presents that would keep them busy whether or not we had power or the internet.

I have a tendency to do the same thing for adults. I would rather give an edible or useful gift instead of something that relies on electricity or a computer to operate. Otherwise, I like to give something that would give them something to do like go to a movie or a restaurant versus something they might just discard in a few months.

…

Social media can be seen as boon or bane for most people. For the most part, social media, as well as the internet as a whole, can be seen as beneficial. It allows you to gather a large amount of information that is good for your prepping. It also gives you a sounding board for any questions you may have as well as a large group of people supporting you in your efforts.

You can talk to a lot of people about what prepping problems you have or how you should do something. You can get a lot of great ideas for prepping and projects. You can follow a lot of bloggers, vloggers, and writers for more information and ideas.

All-in-all, social media is not a bad thing. That is if you use it well and wisely. The problem with social media can be a problem for anything in your life that distracts you from getting your work done or away from your loved ones. Social media can be very addicting. You can spend hours online mindlessly scrolling through social media sites hoping to find something to pique…

When you first start prepping, one of the first things that most new preppers tackle is their food storage. Whether you start out buying a lot of food at once, add a little bit at a time, and/or preserve everything you can, you stockpile food. While that is a good thing to do, after a while you have a lot of food in storage. You now have a new problem. You may be a little lost as to what you are going to do with all that food.

Like with all other areas of prepping, you need to have a plan and the same goes for your food storage. You need to have a plan on how you plan to use your food storage. The first thing you should do is create a flexible meal plan.

When you have a meal plan, you have a better idea of what you should be purchasing and stockpiling. Meal planning isn't hard to do. However, you want to keep it flexible so you can be ready to roll with whatever situation you are facing. You want to have options depending on what you have in storage, if you have power, and what your…

Recently, we had an incredibly tough week with a lot of ups and downs. We had not one, but two trips to the emergency room in a week. The first one was pretty understandable and all turned out well. We know why my son is passing out now while he running a race and it is fairly treatable. However, we also had to take a trip to Des Moines to the pediatric cardiologist to make sure his heart was looking good and, according to Dr. Becker, his heart looks beautiful and strong. That was the balm to my worried soul.

The second trip to the emergency room was for my daughter and while I understand the precaution that was being taken, I am still angry over that trip. Mostly, I think I am angry because I don't take my kids to the emergency room when they are sick. I knew she wasn't sick enough to go. However, the college she is attending forced the issue and made her get a meningitis test. I did not realize until that day that you could not go anyway but the emergency room to get this tes…