Photo Montage Frugal Farm Tips

Our farm is a daily place to garner tips to share on line and in person, as we live outside the box. We think long and hard about how to build things with little or no money. We share our humble lives to allow others to know that one does not need to spend a fortune to live an amazing life.

We share that it only cost about $60.00 to heat our home winter long as we heat exclusively with heat.

Because of fire risks, we have to haul the wood down to the farm to cut it up for firewood. Notice one of my sons resting after a good day gathering wood. If you peek to the left of my son, you will see my daughter too! We take up a picnic to the mountain when we gather wood and make it a family outing.

Here are the recycled pens that we have built. They are made out of pallets and logs. We are in the process of cutting the poles all even. The front has the trough and a cooler for water. Because the ram in this pen has four horns he cannot fit his head in a bucket to drink, so we came up with using a cooler! It works well. We are working on a new line of sheep, so we have the ram in with this ewe. By late February we will begin lambing season again!

Notice how clever the gate handle lock is? I write about how one can rethink how they see things. As the gate was a pallet and the lock handle is a rebar with a piece of baling wire holding it securely.

Here is a picture that shares several frugal things at once. I never took home ec in high school, but we have had to learn how to preserve work clothes, so I taught myself how to patch the knees on my sons pants. We also made scythes out of pool post attached to broken blades(from thrift store). We harvested many bales of the native grasses for the goats and sheep.

Here are some of the bales. I used the orange rope that sometimes comes on the hay that we buy to wrap these bales. Nothing goes to waste on our farm.

My daughter came up with the handle for the greenhouse, then my husband attached it!

Here is one of our chicken coops. It cost only nine dollars to build as we salvaged most of the materials.

A friend no longer is running for judge so he gave us all his campaign signs. We used them in all of our pens and shelters as they are double insulated(the perforated plastic signs on plywood).

The coop door is made from two pallets reconverted. The rooster is Colonel Sanders! The coop rest on six pallets.

The windows are made from old refrigerator shelves- neat isn't it?

The perches are made from branches! Once one begins to think frugally there is no limit to what one will create! As our economy slows down many people are rethinking their lifestyles-either from necessity or a desire to preserve the money that they have. I write about what we have done to allow others to realize that it is possible.

My Background That Led Me Down This Path

This was my introduction to the blogging community service aspect:

Hello From Southern New Mexico!

Well I am glad that this is not a public speaking engagement because I can barely think of how to introduce myself! Let's see, my name is Jennifer and I have been married nearly 21 years. I have been blessed with four incredible children(well now young adults). My oldest is in the US Army and most likely will be heading to Afghanistan by mid January. The younger three are still at home.

I am the daughter of a soldier killed in Vietnam two months before I was born, wife to first generation American, and I deeply love this land. My path of preparedness began with my mother's frugal ways, which on 1 January 2005 all came to a head, when I had to step up the plate and walk the walk. Why? Because my husband had an accident that permanently disabled him. We went from 14 years in law enforcement(moving up the ladder) to a job change and a huge salary cut. I then had to decide did I marry the man or the money?(I will inject here that I am deeply, madly in love with my sweetie!)

So we adjusted our lives, decided that we could afford to move to a fixer upper and provide for many of our needs from a farm life. We haven't reinvented the wheel, by any means.I think my writing here will let you the reader know that if we can transition to a very slow paced simple life, all the while weaning oneself from the world, anyone can. I am not suggesting that the world is bad, but Big Brother is working hard to not allow you to sever the tie, and that unless you learn now, the time may pass.

I also believe that preparedness is not because one sees the evil in government or that one is paranoid. Instead I see the prepping lifestyle as an incredible way to live. The box has always been too small to fit everyone, so with the option to think otherwise is great.

I will write about simple living, frugal tips and preparedness...I also plan on posting links, tips on cutting away things one things that they may need, food storage goals, gardening food and medicinal herbs, making your own toiletries, cleaning and well a lot more.