Women's Wednesday: Jordan Interviews Carolyn & Josh from Homesteading Family AFA

The Pepper Broadcasting Network. We have to hit the reset button to create a true culture preparedness, starting at a very young age and filtering all the way up. Well, Hello ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, it is great to have you again. It's another night of a family affair. I'm your host, Jay Bertie, and it is wonderful. I'm so excited because I have two amazing special guests and I would say they are a dynamic duo, but actually it is a dynamic family. And this family, I think is. Actually the hidding me of what I hope for my show to be. They are literally a family affair of themselves. Everybody in their home runs the show together, so without no fur their ado. I have Carolyn and Josh with Homestead and Family. If you do not watch them, they have a YouTube channel as well as a personal channel which they have set up. I will let them tell a little bit about themselves because I don't feel like I could give enough credit. But Carolyn and Josh, it is so great to have you. It is wonderful. I am excited. I am thrilled. I have actually been a huge fan and followed y'all for several years and I know I've bugged the stink out of y'allfers several several months trying to get y'all to come on here. But if you would, if you could give just a little brief info on yourself so our listeners and our individuals in the chat room can get to know you and who you are and what it is you offer and you do. Yeah, well, thank you for having us. We're so happy to to be here with you guys tonight. And we are all the way up in the far north of Idaho calling in from our homestead up there, and so just great to talk with everybody here across the country. Absolutely great to be here. Yeah, thanks for having us on. Yeah. Yeah. So we have a forty acre homestead way up here in the far north of Idaho, and we have nine children, and boy, we just love getting to homestead up here. We are just now starting to see our ground underneath all of the snow that's finally getting to melt. So I know that's really different for different parts of the country. Not everybody's in that experience, but that is putting us into full on spring mode now that we can see our dirt. Yeah, you don't ease in really up here, it just kind of turns on. Yeah, and you go as soon as you can because the season is so short, you have to back it all in. So we're just you know, you start working whatever it is that melts first, and to that and get that all prepped for plants going in, and then just keep expanding your little area that melts as it goes. Now. I think that's wonderful to see here. I live in the Mississippi and it's so far south that if we get any snow, it's usually around February, and we usually don't get snow. We get ice, but it doesn't last long enough to do anything. Yeah, we spent a little time in Tennessee and the ice was pretty crazy. Yeah, that was different and almost hard to work with in some ways. When you get that ice up here, the snow just comes down and it kind of ends your season. So you have a nice delineation from one year to the next, which it's kind of helpful when you just grow so much of your own food. It makes you take that break that you might not take any other ways. We sure wouldn't. Yeah, no, well, so oh go ahead, sorry. So while we're up here, we do we raise a lot of our own food, we preserve it. Let's see, we're always busy gardening, raising animals, and then of course we have to put it up and preserve it for the winter, and we do that in all different ways. And what's really special about this lifestyle for us is that we get to do it all together with our children, and everybody's gaining skills. The kids are gaining skills, and we just love seeing the characterter qualities that working together on a piece of land really brings about with all of our children. So that's one of the most special aspects I think to us about working together as a family and home thing. Oh yeah, absolutely part of the part of the purpose of what we're doing. No, I think it's wonderful, you know. That's what I try to achieve with my children is trying to give them as much stability of themselves and the confidence to be able to do to do such things and has such life skills to take with them as they get older. So for those who are not familiar with who mister Josh and Ms Carolyn are, they are actually they have a YouTube channel called the Homestead and are called Homestead and Family as well as you have a web web page as well, correct, I can, yeh. Yeh Homesteading Family dot com. Yeah, and we are on YouTube as you said, also Facebook. Page, Instagram yep, yeah, yeah, just uh. Sharing what we do. I mean, our goal is really to inspire people that are interested in this lifestyle and uh and provide education, uh towards building skills. And I mean we focus really on while it's all homesteading, we really focus on growing. Your food preparing it right. Right, Okay, So one of our listeners in the chat is curious, is what are your kids ages? With nine children if you don't mind, Yeah, the oldest is fourteen years old, and wow, he is such a great guy. He is so responsible and so capable, and he's been part of homesteading since just about when he was born. He was bringing in wood on his own two. Years he was absolutely yeah, and that he just really grew into that lifestyle. So we have all singles and they are all biologically our children all the way down to eighteen months old is the baby right now, so we've got him crammed in there. Right fourteen to a year and a half with nine So that's that's why the disclaimers because they all. Believe that, Yeah, a whole new term. Instead of Irish twins or triplets, you have a little bit more. Yeah, we just have the whole Irish family. I think. All right, well, hold on, I'm not sure if I understand this correctly, Melinda, Lee and Chat Will you please clarify? Are you asking that they are going to be at a conference this summer or if they're hosting a conference this summer. One was asking a question for you, but I wasn't certain exactly how how it's being praised. Oh and flying Dutchman and both of them. Yes, I don't think we're doing either. We this year because we're on a brand new homestead of year, we are going to be here working hard. Yeah, we. Bought this place in the fall, and this is kind of our long term permanent. It's a great setup. But we have a lot of infrastructure, so we are and we are dependent on We raise pretty much one hundred percent of our meat. We buy meat. It's just for something extra we want, not because we need it. And fifty to seventy five percent of our veggies, yeah, almost all of our dairy. And so we're this year and we're in a. Race to get fencing up, get the barn in shape, get the soil amended, and gardens planted. And then we have Carolyn Spokes coming up with us and getting them set up. So we're not going anywhere. Yeah, so we'll be right here. So it's kind of an all hand, hands on deck summer and all of us are going to be out there working away on the property getting this place in shape. But would you I believe you've said it once before on one of your videos, but y'all are to a point where you're seventy percent self sufficient? Correct? Or was that has that changed since it's been a few videos back? Several videos back. Actually, you know, that's kind of a moving target because depending on life circumstances, some years you have a year where you really produce a lot, some years you don't. In this case, this year, we've actually moved across the country twice in this calendar year, and so we'll not this calendar year. Well, last year, right, they got sick and so we had moved to take. Care of her and then and then come back and so but in general, I'm want I got to qualify. I think we've had seventy or seventy five percent self sufficient. But that's talking food, you know, So again it is it's. A bit of a moving target depending on how you can find that. But most years for our food producing almost all of our food other than grains and. And some of the bull things that we don't grow. So it's it's up there somewhere. Yeah, it's pretty high. So that's definitely not getting in electricity, and then. You know some of the other well. No, no, no, I understand, and you know, I completely understand it certain modern amenities, it's kind of just easier to have. But I have Melinda Lee here in our chat. She is apparently as much of a fangirl as I am, so she's through. But she is when will she wants to know when will they be at mother Earth. News fair or a homestead in conference because their fans want to meet them. That's very nice, thank you, you know. And it'll probably be a year or two before we open the door for that. For travel, just the business of our lifestyle. We've got a lot of young ones in the house and so we're sure open to that. But but I definitely not too. Got to get a few things up and up and running right and we'll just have to see from there, she said. The idea of that, she did say, bring the kids, just throw them all on a big bus. Awesome. You know what the kids travel really well, it's the milk cow that doesn't. She doesn't get on planes very well. She's just not that well trained, I guess. So. Question thought about how to hook up the system along with the stock trailer, but I haven't. Got to that yet. But you know, Melinda, we would love to get out there and meet you guys too, because we love getting to touch base with people in person, and we have dreams of being able to do events here on our property and get to invite y'all here to the homestead. Well, and that's I was going to say that we can't say when, but that is coming on to the purview. Actually a little more in focus is hoping to open the door soon to do some sort of farm doors maybe combined with some hands on Oh, you. Let me know. I will be there. Say that again, I said, you have to let me know when, because I will be there in a heartbeat and help. However, I have to sounds good. That would be fun. Sometimes our plans get ahead of us and Josh and I are both planners and maybe a little bit of dreamers, and so we think that we can get a lot more done in a shorter amount of time than we often try not to get ourselves in trouble with all of our plans here. But yeah, we love getting to meet all of you guys, and we have had multiple opportunities to run into different followers in events, and it's just so wonderful for us because we want so much to be able to inspire people. We love getting to hear the stories and what everybody's doing on their own homesteads and in their own lives right now. I think it's wonderful. So y'all started. Out on your own tryingness, learning and studying and you know, failure and error and then learning from there. But did you expect from where you started that you would be where you are today, especially even with the amount of viewers and followers with what you do, Because I know I've learned a lot from you, and I actually even do except for the tumoric I do your pickled eggs and my husband loves that recipe. Yeah that's a good one too. So did we expect to be where we're at I don't. I don't know that much of our life we could have predicted ten years ago. Even well, I'm pretty sure didn't set out in the home studying knowing that we. Were going to pursue, you know, sharing. I mean, we had some. Ideas about sharing with people early on, but not you know you two. I mean, that wasn't really even on our radar, certainly when we started this life. When we started this lifestyle, I don't know. If YouTube existed, and even when we got started video was like, nope, not doing it. It's going to happen photos maybe on Facebook, and we just weren't even planning. To go there. So that was just three years ago. Yeah, that's the lesson three years ago. So no, it's as as we got a vision interview to grow, we didn't really know where it would go. And so it's been an exciting ride. Yeah, it really is. But we've been so encouraged by the amount of stories that people share with us just of how that education and the things that we're sharing have helped them and have helped their families to just make small steps towards healthy you're living and you know, maybe a simpler lifestyle that it just really exists on to keep going and to share more. No, I think it's nice. I want to share another element that No. You good, You're good. Sorry, I wasn't saying that to you. I wasn't saying that to you. I apologize. Go ahead, Yeah, no, it's all right. We just got a little lack. One thing that's really exciting encouraging to us is we have a fantastic viewer base on YouTube and Facebook that is so positive. I mean, anybody that's on YouTube knows it can be a kind of real environment sometimes. And we just have an exceptionally cool audience. Yeah, and so any of. You guys listening out there, we love you to death. You guys are so encouraging to us. And just the comments and then the people that engage. It's a really cool group of people. Yeah. Really, and it inspires us to keep going. Yeah. Absolutely, Well, I think that homesteaders in general are people who are involve all in living more intentionally, are just cool people. I think that's a special niche in the world of people, and that really comes out with our followers. Yeah. I think unfortunately, with with our type of lifestyles, you usually get one or very opposite ends of this spectrum, you either get people who are very comfortable with it or people who are very thrown off and off put it, off put by it. So even on my end, I'm not near to where y'all are, and I would that is my goal, is to eventually get to that point. Even my husband were discussing it today. But even on my own I've gotten a lot of criticism just with being that I include my children in the butcher and cleaning process all the way to the kitchen process of our meat. Yeah, that's people don't understand because they're so disconnected at this point, and which is optimously why you're you're you're including your children and why we include ours, because we need to be connected to our food, on to life, the cycle of life in order for us to live, death happens on. Better to understand it, respect it, and be involved on you know, just not know, which causes a lot of other problems. Absolutely right, with people so disconnect from their food source. Well, and our children are involved in every single stage of raising and butchering and cooking all of the animals, from the birthing process to feeding them, caring for them all the way through to the butchering, and then you know, right into the cooking. They do a lot of the cooking too, So they see it from a very young age, and you know, they've never been upset by it. I don't think that's ever been a problem for our family because they're involved at such a young age and it's just what we do around here, and I think it puts it into a lot of context for them about why we take such good care of our animals, why we treat them so well, why we make sure they have a good life, they have everything they need. Is because those animals are really You're gonna give their lives for our full well, and that's what we can get back. Sorry, I got I got an extra co host with me tonight. Oh yeah, she's mad because I'm not holding her at the moment, so real quick to go offbeat. Someone asked, Okay, Millnally even asked their videos are so nice? What type of camera are they using? And who does the editing? I love how the clarity and quality of your videos. Wow, that's very nice. That is my iPhone eight that I'm filming on and I do the editing most of it. Josh on some of the videos pretty much edit our own video. Each of us kind of edit our own videos and that's usually done with about nine kids running around us. Wow, and they are really good videos because. We certainly don't have training. Yeah. Yeah, and that's that's on the iPhones. It's really you know, for us and just trying to do this and live the lifestyle we do. It's got it's got to work. It's got to be pretty simple. Yeah. And so while we've done some professional video and will for certain things in the future, for for. The everyday things that we're doing, we've got to be able to just set it up up. On a tripod quick film and edit with without a huge amount of production. That is amazing, really okay, you know, when when you get really into the homesteading lifestyle, kind of the guiding principle. Is practicality key in a lot of ways. It really just has to work. You know, and uh, even applying it to the digital. Even when you're applying it to your digital you know, you're filming and all of that, and that's kind of what we're doing. And you know, I look back at some of our older videos and the sounds not as good. We didn't know as much about lighting. And you know, though, people still loved them back then even when they weren't as good. And I'm sure I'll look back at the video as we're doing right now in another couple of years and be like, oh, my goodness, I can't believe I was actually publishing videos. They look like that, you know, because you just learned so much through the process. But I think the reality behind it is that we're trying to share things that are very practical and oftentimes have almost been lost. You know, a lot of times it's stuff that people aren't talking about, they're not clarifying or really a lot of times it's stuff people don't really understand them themselves, yet they're trying to teach it. Well, sorry, that's okay. Yeah, I think a lot of knowledge. We have too when it comes to raising food. Food preservation, cookings maybe a little more open, but. It's based on the industrial commercial standards at a lot. Of the guidelines that we have. Yeah, and you know, some of those are. There and they're necessary and they're they're. Appropriate to keep people safe, but they make things often a lot more. Complicated than than it is to get. The job done and to produce some of your own food. And I think that's a big mission for us, is showing that what can be done and that yeah, you know, there's a lot of hard work, there's a lot of different elements they're challenging. There's also things are a lot more simpler to do than is often portrayed right by you know, those standards that we're all used. To, right and really a lot of the times, I think the amount of information that we have out there right now, you know, you just go into Pinterest, right and you can be lost just feeding on information for hours if you let yourself. And the reality is is all those different points of view, all those different directions on how to do something, what not to do, what to do, it makes it really confusing, and it makes it it's hard to jump in and just try because you're like, well, this person says this, this person says that, I don't know who knows what they're talking about to begin with, and I don't really know which way to try, so I don't know, I just give up. And I think one of the things that both Josh and I really feel is that you know, you're just not going to mess up most things very much, jump in and do it. You're going to be further ahead than you ever were. And you know, most methods out there are going to work. You know, if you're talking about canning, Yes, there's dangerous things that you don't want to get into, but there's a lot of things that work if you understand the principles behind them. And so getting back to the simple, the basic principles that just work and taking the fear out of it, taking the confusion out of it, and just saying, hey, this isn't as hard as the million different people on Pinterest are making it seem. Just jump in and give it a goup. Well, and if I expound on that, I'm going to use is one of one of our products. But Carolyn has a class on bread making, and recipes are a big deal. Everybody wants the perfect recipe, and just this is an analogy that's for a lot of homesteady life. Everybody wants perfect recipe, Just show me how to do it this way. Well, in bread. Making, one recipe can work in one kitchen in one location, in one region and not work well in another. Because of all these different factors. And so you need the skills. You need a simple set of skills and tools that helps you take a recipe and then apply it in your environment to have your bread come out well consistently. And if you have those skills, you can take the same recipe that maybe was made down south, and you know it's different up here in the north, but with the skills. You can apply it. And so I think a lot of what we're trying to share is those principles, that knowledge that gives you a toolkit to work with. And you know, for me gardening and soil it's the same way. There's a lot of different ways to garden. They all work, but if you don't understand some basics, then one might work for you. Another one might not. So a lot about how to apply that and all it's in a simple way, right right. I think that's a perfect way of explaining it. And like you said, with the gardens, you may be able to grow grow something in your soul that our soul just can't handle, even though you know, not not traditionally like for here, I am not able to throw my root vegetables strictly into the ground. I am learned. I've had to actually raise my root vegetables and containers. So it's learning what works for you and and your area with the skills that you have. I think that's great. So I want to speak on something if it's okay when I spoke with you Ms Carolyn before, I want to ask is how you determine the skill sets for each of your children within that house. Now I know a little bit more. On it, but I would love for the listeners if you're okay with sharing it understanding how you do it, because I think it's wonderful. You know, I start my kids out with an additional responsibility every year so they get one extra thing at it on top of their chores, on top of what they're already responsible for, just to gain more skill set. How do you manage that with nine children? Yeah, that is a great question and one that becomes really important when you're living a busy lifestyle where you really need those moments of all hands on deck because you really need to keep training everybody to be as knowledgeable as they can be at their age. So in our house, Josh and I have always had a principle that we will slow down and include the kids even if it means we don't get something done. And I think that's really important, especially when you have very young children that are too young to do chores yet, because they if they come into the knowledge of their existence just expecting them we just work. I work alongside Mama and Papa in the garden that they wouldn't even know that, but that's just their normal experience. So I think that that is principal number one for us, is that we slow down and include them so that it's just a normal part of their lifestyle from the time really that they're born, or they could be outside, they can be doing anything with the family. Even when they're little, they'll often be carried around or set on a counter or somewhere where they can be part of what's going on. So getting that culture into your family that we just happily work together is kind of a key principle actmis But then in our house, they tend to start actually doing what we would call chores at about two two and a half, depending on the child, and that's they start with sorting the silverware when it comes out of the dishwasher clean and I like to call that my preschool. You know, some people go to preschool to learn to sort things like the things. Instead, we sort forks from spoons every day for about five to ten minutes every morning. So that's the beginning of our chore education. And at the beginning of that two and a half half year old always wants to be involved. You know, that's an exciting thing. For about the first three weeks, right right, it's not so much. So then you get to start kind of dealing with that really gently guiding, well, this is just what we do, and you try to make it fun. And of course at that age mom or dad is totally involved in making it a fun thing and just getting it done without any you know, like frustration or you have to do this or else. There's none of that. You just want to get them involved in the idea that hey, before we eat breakfast, we do a little job and it's fun and this is just what we do. But then after that point, I know me for when I'm creating choor lists, especially for the in the house jobs, I tend to reevaluate, reevaluate the chores that everyone's doing about twice a year, once in the spring and once in the fall as the seasons are changing. Of course, here we have such drastic changes. Our household needs change according to the season. And then I think about what needs to be done to make our house and our homestead run smoothly, and I often will make just a master list of everything that needs to be done, and then my goal is to go through and find the youngest child that is capable of doing each store. And what that does is allows the older children to move up in responsibility to gain a new skill, and those younger ones to also gain a new skill, because it's so easy. Once you have an older child trained to do something, it takes so much weight off of you, right because then you can just say, hey, go do this thing, or they know they have to do that at your time, and you really have very little responsibility. But as soon as that new younger child comes up into that position, you're back to training them all over again. It takes your energy all over again. So it's a really easy to default to just let the older child do that. They know how to do that. But I think another guiding principle for Josh and I is to let the children see how they're growing from season to season. Let them see that they're gaining knowledge, they're gaining skill, and they're getting to move on into areas of greater responsibility. So really looking at who is the youngest child who at this moment can do this chore allows those younger children to keep gaining new skills and those older children to move on and gain those new skills at the same time. So that would be really how I approach it. Do you have thoughts to add. To that, Joshua, No, I think that's all will well said as far as our philosophy. And one of. The things that does for the kids is they always have something to look forward to as they're growing. They know they're the they're moving on, and it's really important to us as raising kids towards adults, to know that they are moving on towards assuming their own identity. I mean, you know, we have a lot of hopes. Yes, they'll appreciate our lifestyle and they want to engage and continue with it. But more importantly than that is that they know they get to become their own person. And so what Carol's talking about cultivates that. As you're getting into teenagers and helping them see who are you going to be? What your vision? That feeds into that a lot. So they always know that they're they're they're headed somewhere. And most of us as humans, and they don't. They don't want to feel stuck for the rest of their lives. You know, they wanted to be stuck doing chores. You know that they're going to develop their own vision for life, and that's really important to cultivate that. And so I think part of that process from down starting it, you know, two years old and even younger. I'll tell a story, you know, similar to the silver ware story. But today, Rebecca a year and a half, eighteen months, and she's out with me in the great house and I'm having this greenhouse, cutting some wind, doing things, and she just loves to mimic us. Right now, so I'm cutting some boards and I'm throwing them out. She sees me handling the board, so she keeps bringing the ones in that I'm throwing up, her up and trying to bring them back again. And it actually took me a second because you know, I'm like, well, no, no, no, I don't need that, you know, And and it took me a second to realize what she. Was doing because I was in my workflow and all I had to do was just stop and take the board from it and say, oh, thank you. You know, she was just trying to do what she thought in her mind and just. By taking the board and it was like two or three boards that. I said, no, I don't need that in here. I took the board, accepted that. I told her how great she was and thank you so much. And she saw doing it. She she fulfilled what she was trying to do, and that little bit gave her the you know, satisfaction. She did something well and she contributed. She didn't even know she but she was. But she's trying right there. Yeah, yeah, And it starts right there in those moments that leads all the way up to thinking about the children becoming adults. And having an identity and knowing that what they do is valuable and they have a valuable contribution to make to the world. Right now, it's just the family mostly, but they're learning that they have confidence and knowing they've got something valuable to do for the world. That's important. So at the moment, we have the fourteen year old son and a thirteen year old daughter right behind him, and as we're looking at the year and the different things that are going on, I'm regularly having a discussion with him that goes something along the lines of you know, what do you need to learn next on your journey to being an adult? And I know, especially my daughter and I have this discussion quite a bit because she has a lot more responsibilities in the home and in the kitchen, and you know, what is it that she needs to learn in order to be ready to be a competent adult? And a lot of times I'm asking her that, and I try to get that into her chore schedule, into her routine so that she can say, you know, she really is interested in herbal medicine, and so she can say, you know, I really need to work on learning how to make this thing better or how to do this. And I can take that interest of hers and try to correlate that to be part of the family culture and to give her an actual responsibility of something she sees she needs to learn to be a competent adult. And that just turns that chore concept really on its head a little ble bit, where all of a sudden, chores are in her mind something that's getting her closer to being an adult, closer to her goals of growing up. And instead of being this I'm stuck here doing this awful thing because I have to I can't to get out of here and move on, you know, I don't. Well, there's always elements of that. Somebody has to do the dishes right, somebody has to change the diapers. There's these things that have to be done that we don't want to do. But I always want there to be this element of I am growing and I'm getting somewhere in my life as I'm doing chores, as I'm helping the family, this is getting me something personally that's beneficial to me. So yeah, I think I want to give another angle too about chores that because most of us grew up at least I did, a lot of people I know grew up getting paid to do chores. Oh I wasn't that, Oh I wasn't. There's a lot of there's been a lot of expectancy at that. We do not pay the kids to do chores. That is part of working the household, the homestead together. It's part of everybody's contribution at their ability level. And so we don't pay to do chores. Now, if it's something extracurricular, if they're doing something that helps with business, different things, absolutely. We pay them. So there so they're they're learning the difference that you know, there's just parts of life. That we do. It's just it's what we do. We have to do it, and so. We felt that to pay them for those types of. Things sets up an incorrect expectancy of life. But on the other side, making sure that when we're stepping out of that and we're asking them to do something extra, that that is a place space that's appropriate and that they need to value their into it. Yeah, they need to get compensated for it, and they need to also understand that, you know, where their value is needed necessary for home life and where it's it's a contribution, whether it's us or anywhere else, that they need to be adequately common to say it before, Oh no. I absolutely agree. We do not pay for chores here either, because we believe if it's just a part of life, you know, it's some of the same thing, why do we have to pay you for something that you're going to have to do anyways. But we do, like for my son, if he helps with the dogs in certain ways, he gets paid for take and care at those dogs because they're not a part. Of the chores for the week. With that being said, though, I am going to actually take us into a quick commercial break. And then we will come back. We'll check the chat to see if there are any more questions, and we'll keep talking about what's going on with for y'all in the homestead and family. All right, all right, yes, sir, hey everyone, Morgan here join me every Friday night at eight pm Central Standard Time, where I will be sharing tips about family preparedness, modern preparedness, women's preparedness, and everything in between that I can think of anything happen to do with prepping, preparedness, every day of preparedness. Come join us every Friday at eight pm Central Standard time. Conquer tomorrow by preparing today. Ryan Difford here to remind everyone that you can join us in the chat room while listening to the live recording of my show The Next Generation. It's a show that bridges parenting and preparedness for you and your family. The Next Generation airs every Sunday at three pm Pacific six pm Eastern Time, So go to Prepperbroadcasting dot com and be sure to check us out live every week where we explore the little things in lifeline that make all the difference in the world. All right, So we are back on a family affair I'm your host, Jay Fergie, and I have Carolyn and Josh with the Homesteading Family. I actually jumping right back in. I actually have several questions that have popped up into the chat and these are actually some really good, uh good questions. What are their thoughts on the negativity of prepen and is prepin giant? There are few and far between prepin expos and it seems to be a trend is moving to homestead and away from up from prefin which for me, homesteading and present are very very similar to the same for how I grew up. So that is a that is a great question and a great thought really, you know. And so I mean it's kind of how do you define prepping? And if you're defining prepping as beans, bullets and band aids, which there's a lot of people doing thinking. Meaning meaning you're just stocking up on everything in your basement, right and. You're it's going to be there for you when it all goes bad, whatever the reason is. Yeah, you know that that's how I think of prepping. And yeah, that's not a good idea that that's not going to help. You're not going to have some seeds in and not have gardened and think you've got a plot of land and you'll pull those seeds out when the grid's down or whatever the scenario is, and you're going to successfully provide for your family. That that's a bad plan. So from that side, I mean, whether or not the idea is dying or not, I don't know, but we would sure encourage the idea of living prepared no matter where you're at, whether you're out here on forty acres or you're in the city and you're on a small lot, and skills however you can. Yeah, you're saving seats, you're stuck and food, all. Of those, but you're learning how to use them now and you're applying it to your contact again whatever it is, and to us, the spirit of homesteading. We just did a talk on this, Carolyn and I did on on what is homesteady and it's you know, today there's really a mentality of. Living in how you can. Where you're at, and that's to me, that's prepping. That that's prepping that's going to be successful even if you're in the suburbs or you're in the city. But you're building skills along with stalking up on appropriate items, so you know how. To use them. You know, home. Stading, prepping, people can call that both things, but it's important to be building the skills, not just preparing by putting up a bunch of stores. Oh absolutely yeah. And I think you know, prepping when it comes to just building up a stash of stuff, you know, that is really fear based, and that is going to come and go depending on how people feel. And as political climates change, as economics climates change, that's going to really kind of come and go. And so I think right now you're seeing a little bit of kind of the ebb of that side of it. But the thing about homesteading or prepping in the sense that you're gaining a lot of skills is that you know you have those skills to fall back on. So even if you're not using them, you still have them and that can't be taken from you when you have those skills, unlike just having a collection of seeds in the basement that you're waiting to grow when you need to. So you know, but you've never gardened, and you know those are going to go bad. You're gonna finally get tired of seeing them. You're gonna dump them, you're gonna move, you're gonna forget them, whatever happens, and those won't be there. But once you have that skill, that's always there. And I guess maybe this is a sensitive subject because we both deal with people all the time saying, well, I don't need the garden now because I have a bunch of seeds in the basement, and if ever the food supply goes bad, I'm just gonna pull out my seat seeds and garden. And anybody who has ever gardened or trying to raise their own food will know that that is a really bad plan to wait until you're dependent on that food to put your first garden in. So so yeah, I think I think that's a great question. And just you know, stock up on the stuff, build the skills that go with it. Well, yeah, wherever you're do what you can with what you have, and you're moving in the right direction. And to be clear, we stock up on things too, you know, we stock up on our food. We're always putting up a year's worth of food and trying to get to even more than that regularly to you know, just just as part of living prepared, not as part as of just prepping and having a bunch of freeze dried meals in the basement. There's economics to that too, just sound economics to stalking up to buy in full. That's kind of a whole. Nother tide weight topic, but yeah, there's economic value. There as well. The great question really like that one, No, I think that goes with I've mentioned before another shows you know, a good prepper is a practice and prepper and that is and that does include your their life skills and being able to because you do see people who take prepping as in well I have to just hold onto this stuff. And for me, prepping is an active is an active thing. It's not just something idle where I sit on a stash and hope it doesn't go anywhere. It's active of rotating out my food from what I've put up from the year before and preserve and rotating out and checking because seeds will only last so long anyways. And you know, how did I dry my plants? Did I get enough from the harvest to be able to put seeds up or put enough food up? So I see that there. So Flying Dutchman asked, is there is there electric company a co op in the bunnies oh, boonies ours is and they got approval and ran fiber optics Internet and it is great. I guess he's just trying to see if y'all. Are going to be able to get anything more as far as modern amenities. Well, we're in the Boonies, let's just put it that way. And you know, in some ways we're real happy about that. In other ways it can be challenging, especially when you're running an online business. Right, So, yeah, satellite internet an online business. I tell Carolyn, you know what, the power can go out, the propane tank can get empty, just don't let the satellite die. We need that Internet. And that's a that's a business perspective, not a survival perspective. Right. Yeah, well that's a part of your life. I don't think we I don't think we have any hope of fiber optics anytime soon, although we can all cross our fingers to that because it sounds really nice. Oh, we've been trying for four years here and it's still up to no luck. So someone else, I'll tell you what, have five g anytime soon? Around here? Yeah, there's nobody else around us. We've got two neighbors that are not even full time within well to four miles at least each way, probably a little bit further. So yeah, I don't think we're gonna get fiber optics. So I have another question for you. They ask, do they grow micro greens? Have they tried indoor year round gardener yet? And hydroponic or tower garden? Okay, so microgreens, I'll start with that. We grow I wouldn't call it micro greens, and I have a strategy of planting what we'd call cut all greens, a lot of greens that grow very upright, very close together, like an inch apart, and we'll harvest some of them, and microgreens. But thin so that we're getting we're getting some. Greens in early, and we're actually up setting up a bed for this right now, and then you fit it as it grows. And so it's not really a micro green strategy other than it's a harvest strategy that we harvest some of it at the microgreen level, and that allows us to get a harvest earlier, make better use to the space, and have a continuous harvest. I think that's in context of like growing under lights, so that we're eating year. Round, right, We're not growing those underlights. Those are in the greenhouse and hydroponics not for us. That wouldn't be my preferred method, even in an urban environment. But you know, people use hydroponics in certain places. It's pretty technical and it's a hard system to keep up if you have power issues or challenge and. With you know, technical type situations. So I'd go more towards aguaculture, but even that, you know, in an urban environmental challenges, but it's I'm going to say it's better than hydroponics. In my opinion. As far as growing food year round, we're not very Yeah, that's that takes some infrastructure in our environment that we. Just don't have. It's just more of a cost to it than anything. Well, we've definitely done some soil based sprouts in the house and of course just regular you know, like kitchen jar sprouts, so we do a little bit of that. But you know, up here we are getting to We saw negative ten a couple of times in this winter and several feet of snow groundcover for a couple months at a time, So there's not a lot we can do in the ground outside until we start getting into greenhouses and coop houses. And things like that, and so that that's those are economic investments that costs. A lot of money. You know, even I mean Elliott. Coleman's great at that, if you got if your listeners are familiar with him. It's a great resource if you want to extend seasons. But those systems cost money. Love to invest in those, and we will eventually, But we have really focused on skill building on extending the seasons, on you know, what plants to use, what soil, what location, how to really extend our season? What foods can we put up besides canning that and Carolyn has been great at it. What foods can we preserve that take less energy than canning? Canning's great. Dehydrating is great, and there's lots of methods, but what foods can be cured and put up you know that don't take that energy? You know, squash if you're being winter squashed being a great one. So we focus more on that for year round. Eating than than growing green vegetables per se, which takes an investment level that we're. Not ready for yet and a lot of people. Aren't that that's that's challenging to invest in that kind of infrastructure. But one of the really cool things is you can root seller cabbage pumpkins. You know, a lot of your root crops in a lot of places, and a lot of places across the country, you can actually calm and put those in common storage, not even in a technical root seller, so you can keep those around. I know, I've got pumpkins that are still sitting in the kitchen that have been there all through the fall, all through the winter, and they're just waiting for me to cut up, open and use because we did so many of them last year. So we're still getting there to can some of those. We're still going to can some of those. And those, yeah, you know, for the here. Right exactly right through the famine season. But but we you know, so that's been a lot more. Our theory is to work on what we can just grow during the main season or the late season harvest and keep in just common storage without all the work of the canning and the dehydrating and and go with that in addition to all of that. Yeah, so I guess at this moment that's our that's our position on all of that. No, I think that's great, hopefully answered. Yeah, Actually I think this question, you, Josh, you're probably more of the garden individual. Correct, Yeah, we both are. We both got our hands in the soil, just a division of labor. I focused a lot more on the gardening for food production. Carolyn's focuses a lot on the culinary herbs and medicinal herbs. Right, so we're both gardeners. Well. One of our listeners asked, and do they use the no till method for weed control or lasagna method or what did they do for weak control? I know I've watched in a video before where you kind of let it do its own things, But could you further, you know, go a little more elaborate on what it is y'all actually do as far as your crops. Okay, you bet, as far as you know the style of gardening or method, we mostly apply a no till, But I'm not a purist, and that there's a time for you know, turning the soil for different scenarios of disruption as you were, But a year after year, we want to build layers for soil similar to nature, and. So we we term that as no till, so that that would definitely be. The general philosophy as far as we control. There are a lot of different ways to go about it. And a lot of that depends on your environment. I spent a lot of time letting lately, letting the weeds grow up and kind of them down before they see and self mulching with them most of your weekis are nutrient miners. They're they're repparative, and so they're bringing up nutrients and so. Let them grow and then chop and drop them as a mulch is a great strategy. So it's a bit labor intensive, you know, some of your normal cultivating the soil around your plants and and. Killing the starts when they're young is great. And actually this year, because of our scale, we're growing in scale. Trying to produce more. We're actually going to use some landscaping cloth. That's not my preferred long term method, but we've got some grasses in the garden area and I just don't have the time to fight with them, so I'm going to use that system. And so it's it's it's a variable and the no tail method overall, I think is great. Whether it's Lasagna gardening. Paul Gouci style, square foot gardening, there's a lot of great methods. Yeah, all those you've got to apply to your environment. As long as you're building healthy soil and building carbon, you know, or humans is the garden term that's really really important in any scenario, and what method you use kind of depends on your situation. I'm not going to just work foot gardening. We've got too big of a family and we don't need that. But that's a great scenario for some people. So that's the kind of permaculture regenerative agriculture answer is it depends. Well, and it goes right back to what we were talking about earlier in that so many of these specific methods will work. You know, these methodologies will work, but what you have to understand is the ununderlying principles. What is good soil? What does that look like? What do you have to do to get to good soil? And the answer to that is different depending on what the soil is in your environment is that you're starting with, and so knowing these principles is really what is going to make all those different methodologies work, because honestly, they all were They all work in the right scenario. And if you understand the principles of gardening and the principles of healthy soil and reading the landscape, reading your land and what your soil is telling you. Then you can apply any of those methods really and make them work. So what you were going to add to that, well, just that, Yeah, understanding soil that we're building soil, that's what's key. Whatever style you use, some people are going to teach as on your method it's the best or these different methods. And as long as you're building healthy soil, you can use all those methods and you can figure. Out what's best for your particular scenari area. And building healthy soil is not that complicated that that seems to be kind of a mystery. Well, and it's just not that complicated that that's you know, what people need to learn. Yeah, so my son actually has a quick question, if it's okay, here go ahead side, why does the food nago rotten? He wants to know how you keep your food goat from going bad? And do you mean the cancuter the vegetables that they can leave out all? He wants to know how you keep all your food from going. All? Right, I love it. That's an interested mind. Good job. Well, let's see it doesn't go rotten because we choose the right way to preserve it. So that it stays on our shelf until we're ready to eat it. Whatever. That looks like one of my favorites. We've already talked about common storage with the root sellers. Yeah you have. You're gonna clarify your question. Go for it, like what like Grandma's like yes, so yes they can. They can like we do as well as they have a room in which, like winter squash takes so many days before it actually starts to turn, they can put it in there and it'll stay cool. Like refrigerator. It's like a big free right, it's like a big frigerator. All right, there, we have it now. He loved it because when you were talking about the garden and the pumpkin, his eyes went big, and I don't think he quite understood. In our house, unfortunately, pumpkin doesn't last very long. I tend to have it perade and put up or made into pies before it has a chance to turn. Yeah. You know, when you're down in a place like Mississippi and you're dealing with the warmth and the humidity, that changes the scenario a bit, isn't it. Yeah, those those crops probably aren't They're not to put up, so well as they do, hear, unless you can get them into the right really into the right environment. Yeah, like with the root seller for winter squash, winter squash, if I'm correct, I'm not one hundred percent certain. I've read before that it should be able to last one hundred days before turning when harvested at a certain point. Well, our winter squash actually, even though I had it in a place that I thought would be safe away from a heat, they actually started to turn in the cabinet. So I actually am working on building my own root sellers so I can actually keep things maintained. Because you're here in the South, even if you think your house is cool, the humidity will always get you one way or another. All right, Yeah, Now there are some squash that you have to eat in the fall because they won't last very long. I know one of our favorites in the house is a Dellacotta squash, But those really you've got to eat those definitely before Christmas and oftentimes before given before you know, because they're going to go. But right now I'm looking at about a dozen of the Oregons sweet meat organ homestead sweetmeats, and they are just I think, don't probably last until July. If I just left them on the kitchen floor. They're just solid as could be and doing great, So I'm not going to push it that far. I'm going to get them canned into something really soon. But they're looking very solid. Oh no, I think that's great. Checking the chat real quick, man, that everybody is just so someone says so many Melinda says. So many questions, so little time. I will. Actually we got late on update in the page, so I will be updating either late tonight or first thing after church tomorrow. Update in the page to. Have Carol, Carolyn and Josh's website as well as they're links to their social media so you can check them out. I will. And you also offer a few free PDFs on your website. Correct, I know therefore a while you did bread. But right now is it your egg noodles or which one is the PDF that you are actually putting out for people who are curious or interested in some of the stuff you make. You know, I don't think actually we have any of them up on the website, but they are multiple different YouTube videos. So we have an egg preserving. Eggshops, we have a. A fermenting fermenting pdf up, and we have an entire free class on building bread making skills so that your bread turns out consistently well regardless of what recipe you use, because again that goes back to having the skill to, like I say, read the dough rather than the recipe so that you can make it turn out great every time. And likewise, there's actually a soil basic building soil pdf attached to should be attached to any of the gardening videos that just gives you some basics on basic soil, you know, developing soil. Right, that's really easy to follow. Okay, So I see my note. Your egg Noodle PF is part of your you. I know you offer a membership on your website in which you have more included, more videos, more on, more in depth. Correct, we do. It's not open for enrollment right now. We are working on upgrading that this year and so hopefully soon that we're gonna we're gonna re release that and open that for membership. That you're right, We do have an entire mastered class on making bread which covers oh just so much on bread, from sour dough to basic bread, to to sprouting your own wheat to buying wheat and bulk. All of those things are covered in that class. And we also have a class on on herbs. Yeah, I'm using Herbs Introduction to tow herbs and uh more on the preparations methods. Right yeah, making your own herbal medicines out of them. So that's the herbal Medicine cabinet colds that's out. And then this summer we're getting really excited about releasing our preserving class, which is going to be based on canning. We're still working that, we're still getting it all dialed in, but we're getting really excited. Probably pressure Kenny. Definitely, definitely. Yeah. As a start. Yeah, and at some point we will get our membership reopened. We opened that right now it is closed, but it will reopen at some point here coming up. Oh no, I think that's great about that. Let's see looking through here real quick. I didn't know if you are are going to be able to go over a little bit or if you need me to go ahead and close it out. We're good, Okay, We're good. Okay, No, No, it's great because it's like you, it's so much information. I kind of kind of feel bad. It's one of those we're not limited, do right. I'm sorry sorry, I. Was just going to say I have a telp of your listeners and you've got some more questions. We're here for a little bit, happy to happy to answer what we can. Okay, question, okay, hold on it. Okay, So if y'all hear that in my chat room, we are gonna go over one hour because the show actually does not have a set time and we are going to run it the way we want. So, uh, those questions that you had, Melinda Lee, Phil, free to blow throw them in here, Flying Dutchman, Mike Ray, you know who you are, let me know. All right? So what was the other question? My question? Mm hmm? What what will they be doing in the least the class they open? How will they be open the jaws? What do you mean? Oh? So her class? So I'm going to answer this for him. I think I think you'll be pretty much. So he's trying to understand, is what the canon class? Your master cannon class is going to be? Are your cane class that you're going to be offered in the membership? Right? Yeah, Well, it's going to be a full canning class where I teach everybody how to do water back canning from everything from jams to pickles, and then also really focusing on pressure canning because I know that makes a lot of people nervous, but we love putting dinners on our pantry shelf, phull the dinners that are ready just to pull out and heat. And boy, let me tell you, when it comes to harvest season and you get busy and you have those long days, it is so nice to be able to open up a jar of something like loaded baked potato soup, or a hearty vegetable beef stew, or even just can meat. A lot of people are afraid of can meat, and a lot of times arden season we need to quit meals. We've got greens, they're easy, but we'd like to meet with it on that can meat just support out heated up span. Yeah. So we'll be teaching on all of those things in depth in the pressure canning class, focusing on safety and making sure that it is healthy and safe to eat. So one of the listeners, don't blow up your pressure can right. One of our listeners is Melenna Lee's asking said, you have an All American pressure canner? What type of pressure you I have the giant that it's it a four to ninety one All American pressure canner. It holds. Actually twenty ports pork jars at a time, and I love that thing. Oh they say nineteen. They say it holds nineteen jars at a time. She put them in just right, you'll get twenty. But yeah, I love I absolutely love that. I've had several Presto canners before, and the gasket seal type canners, and you know, I like being able to pull out a piece of equipment after it's sat for several months and not worry about needing a replacement part. So I love that metal to metal seal on those All Americans. They're just good to go whenever you need them. And with that, I always get a weighted gauge in instead of using the dial gauge, so that I never need to have it tested. I just know it is safe and ready to go. Wow, I think that's great. That actually makes people probably feel a little more comfortable. I like writing this down. My brain is blown, my son said, he blew his mind. Yeah, well, it makes me more comfortable because I know that I am not going to get my dial gauge tested as often as I should and so just having that weighted gauge, you never need to have those tested. And I just I absolutely love the peace of mind that comes with that. And just you know, that's one less thing on my to do list before I can start canning. So I really like So for. The listeners who were not falling, Carolyn and Josh, you should be on the instagram. I think it was your Instagram. I saw where y'all had meat hanging from the ceiling hearing getting ready to be smoked. Correct, Yeah, yep, that is our bacon. We do an old style of salt cure on our bacon, and so once you get that cure, that becomes the shelf stable at reasonable temperatures, meaning probably not in Mississippi in the summer, essentially in High Community right but for our cool, cool, dry days right now, it is absolutely fine up here. And yeah, you know, I think I put on that post how much that makes me feel like Badger from the wind in the willows to have meat hanging from my ceiling. And I just I think that should be the next home decre bad. I think we should all. Josh is laughing at me, but I think we should. We should all just vote that in is like the ultimate comfort item of decor is having meat hanging in your kitchen, because it just says provision right. It says something that nothing else says, of just saying, Wow, I have everything I need sitting right here, and I really like that. I think it says confidence over the electric grid too, and lots of other industrial modern systems. Absolutely says you know what, I don't really need you, freezer. You're really handy, and I like you, but I don't need you. You know, you know, I like that. It just sends a message right off when you walk in my kitchen, you have no doubt who I am. Right. I think that's great. See down here though, for our usually the butcher in for pigs, even though we've been doing it throughout the year to be able to cure and set out to smoke. It is usually the big time a lot of people down here start butchering. It is late fall, early winter, at the end of the year, when the temperatures are cool enough to leave it hanging and leave it sitting out. So down here in the South you probably don't see too much other than we'll butcher a pig to immediately chill in the freezer. Then to throw on the smoke or throw into the grill, but nothing that can actually be left out or we'll have to do an infrigerator cure method to be able to make our bacon. Yeah. Yeah, well, there's definitely a reason why the old timers would do their their pigs after the first part freeze, because usually your temperatures are reluctably getting down cold enough to be able to cure you know, pork that way. Now, if you're in an area where you're not getting heart freezes, you have different issues to deal with there, and you have to handle it a little bit differently. But if you're somewhere where you're getting those hard freezes, you do have a time of year where you can cure that pork without refrigeration quite safely, and you know, have it around through your winter months until you get back to when you can grow things. So that's really handy if you don't have that refrigeration, that freezer. No, I agree. Let's see going through my notes and check and chat. See they are loving this. I'm loving this. Your son. My son is asking if he can go to your cannon. Plus, I think we could make that work. Absolutely. How old is he? He's nine. He's nine, all right, So he's right up in there. My ten year old daughter is getting her first lessons on you know, filling up the pressure sure canner and making sure it's at the right pressure. So he's right there. See, he's at a point where I'll let him make homemade pancakes from scratch start to finish. But I haven't. I haven't pushed him to the cannon part yet, only because as he wasn't ready well with this fall when we start or this summer, when we start harvesting and canaan, we may see where he's at. You know. I try to base each of my kids are as you're aware, each of my kids are very different, so one skill set may be a little more in one direction than the other. Absolutely, yeah, and we want to help develop that their natural abilities and mindsets as well. I mean, they need to learn things that are uncomfortable, right, so great to help them grow in those areas that they're naturally inclined. Yeah. Well, and even when I get people pressure canning, I watch it closely because that's one of those things you really want to be able to trust when it's on your show. And so while I have them do the work. I do supervise from the background at least and make sure it's getting done properly. Oh no, I understand. I'm that parent who probably hovers just to make sure they're not going to get burnt or pond. And my favorite thing to do is legos. Your favorite thing to do is legos? Because that's great, brother, Let's see, and I'm blaming. Them right now. Yeah, we've got a household the lego lovers, Yes, and they are. Oh, it's amazing how many legos legos can actually fit in a container. I was actually surprised. Yeah, especially when they get dumped out. You're really surprised. So Melnda Lee also asking, She's asking all the great questions so far as I'm waiting to see on the other ones. Uh, what books would they suggest for homesteading? What are books or items that you think individuals who are homesteading or wanting to get into this lifestyle should could add to their library. Oh. You know, here's the thing about that, most books that cover a lot of homesteading topics are not very good. They're kind of fun to look through. The exception to that, I would say would be maybe Parla Emory's Encyclopedia Country Life, the Encyclopedia Country Living, and that's the one that I tend to pull off the shelf when I can't find an answer anywhere else, because she might just have it tucked in there. So I like that one. But aside from that, I think getting into your particular skill that you're building and finding a book, there is a lot you know a better answer because you just can't cover it all in any decent detail. In fact, I've got a great story about when I was ten. I guess I was about twelve years old, and I did not grow up in a homesteading lifestyle. My mom always gardens. She always did have a garden, and a few times I can remember going out and picking wild blackberries and she made them into jam and can them. But that's about what I can remember. Now. She was a great cook, she cooked us all our good meals. But I just I guess I connected with his lifestyle very young, because somewhere around twelve years old I ended up with a copy of story. I think it's stories in what is it? Country country Living? The real base is out there. Everybody, almost every house I go into has a copy of this on their shelf, and you know, in it they have a whole two pages on raising and butchering chickens for the freezer. And I took that out to my dad and said, Dad, can we butcher that rooster of moms that we don't want anymore? And with a whole four steps in that book, we tried butchering, the first time I had ever butchered anything. My dad was so great he just went along with it. It was not anything he ever wanted to do in his own life, but he went right along with it. And you know, let me just say that that was incredibly over simplified in you know, the butcher chicken in four steps. So I think to me, you need to get the book on the specific skill if you want to really dive into a subject, and there's really good ones out there. So do you have a specific skill. We may have a few books made, maybe not, may have a few books that we would recommend on that. That would be my question. All right, I'll see what if there's a response for that one. Someone else asked which medicinal herbs would they suggest for homesteaders to grow? Oh, you know, the way I like to approach that is to ask instead what health problems do you deal with regularly? Because really, if you look back over your last twelve months with your family, you're going to see a pattern. Did you get every stomach flu that came along, or did you get every head cult that came along? You know, and really approach it that way, and I would say, start growing the herbs that immediately address the issues that you have in your own home. And some of the reasons for that is because if you grow an herb for something you don't experience often, you're not really going to get the experience of using it just because you don't need it very much, and you'll never feel very confident about it. Whereas if you start with an ailment that you experience regularly semi regularly in your home, then you're going to be able to really get your hands into using that herb. You're going to build confidence much more quickly. And honestly, confidence is one of the key factors I feel to using herbs well. Because you have to dose a lot higher than a pharmaceutical drug. You can't just take one and call it good. You can't just take one cup of tea and think that that's going to fix your issue, you have to be ready to really take an herbal remedy regularly, and so having the confidence to do that is really important. Some things that are really great to have on hand regardless are things like lemon balm to handle insomnia, you know, days where you can't sleep, or calming down children some of those. And that's lemon balm. I love. It's totally safe, it's uh, you know, doesn't have any contraindications, doesn't have any known problems with drugs, so you can kind of take that pretty comfortably and safely. Obviously, it's good to have things like peppermint on hand, you know, and those are kind of just for dealing with general issues. Garlic is always good because you can treat about a million different things with garlic. So those are some great places to start. But I'd really say, look at what your health issue is that you have and start right there with whatever that is, and that's going to get you a lot further. Oh that's great. So what is something you would suggest as far as a basic sinus issues? Is that something that y'all deal with? Like down here with the weather jumping back and forth, we see a lot of people who end up with the common you know, the head colds because of the sinuses. Yeah, the head colds, And that is what this entire classes that I have out is based on colds because you know, that's what we experience the most of in general. Right, that's what you're going to get one or two. You know, the average American I think gets three colds a year or something along that number. So for the sinus issues, I would really look at something like horse radish that is really known to be very strong for sinus issues. Wow. Yeah, Cayenne a really good one that can really help. So you get the hot, spicy things that are going to make those sinuses start moving and running and kick out sinus infections. A Melnda Lee said, yes, allergies, allergies. Yeah, do some research on alfalfa and taking a lot of alfalfa for allergies. I know, we do a lot of good local local honey. Yeah, that's noted to be really good too. Have do y'all raise bees or have y'all considered raising pollinators? We're both the honey and the wax. I'm lagging behind about four years. Yeah, I've been I've been asking for bees for the last I don't know how long, but we're getting there. We're getting there. It is definitely on the list. We haven't done it yet. Luckily, my mom is going to be moon up here on the property with us, and she's really into her bees, so she says she's bringing along some hives. Oh wow, that's awesome. So yeah, but right now where we're at, we're so far out in the boonies that not only do we not have fiber optics, we also aren't around agricultural fields, and so we actually need to start. We need to grow a lot of pollinator friendly plants. Right, We need to get a lot. More food in pretty heavy forest and pasture. So we've got to really develop our trees orchards or berries, a lot of different things that are going to give a pollinators place to be. Right, being as as out as far out as you are and being ascluded as you are, how do y'all deal with predators as far as in your lifestock. Dogs and guns? Really, the dogs really do a lot. They have done great. And when we first moved here five years ago, not to this property, but to different property we're in the middle. We've got about every predator. Imaginable from coyotes to mountain lions, usually bears to wolves, and we've had very few problems. We had got one mountain lion problems, which we had a lot of where we were at before. And the dogs do a lot of that. They really do well. Having a couple of dogs, and you know, you need the right dog for your area. And and but just having males intact that that kind of know their home and cruise the property. I think that a lot has helped. And sometimes you've got to have game cameras. Sometimes you've got to hunt, and you know that that's part of too. Sometimes you have to put an animal down if it's causing destruction. So those are those are two of the main ways as far as I mean that's larger predators. Right now, I understand we have coyote issues and I've lost actually a lot all of my angora rabbits to coyotes ripping through the pens. So I was curious. My son wants to know how y'all keep rodents when you live out in the country out of your food storage and animals out of your food storage is at your house. Yeah, Well, we definitely employ an army of cats, so we like having that kind of natural option where the cats are on patrol and taking care of a lot of that. Now we don't we personally don't like cats in the house. We do have one cat that comes and goes in the basement and kind of takes care of that area. Presumably we don't have any rodents down there, but we definitely with all the outbuildings and all the animal feed you can definitely get them out there, and so just bringing in the cats take care of that. Yeah, we're really trying to mimic natural systems to create balance. So the dogs and cats help do that, you know, within our world of balance, which is obviously more cultivated, but we try to do that where we can as a first line strategy. And then yeah, occasionally we've had the trap roads and that's part of too, but the cats really do a great job on that, just like the dogs do with the larger ones. The cats don't do it. Then we put a bounty out to the kids. I'll buy a collection of mouse traps and give the kids each you know, reward for every road that they bring in. And I'll tell you what's that takes care of it. They're ready to earn that money and they're excited about getting their mice, so they take care of that. One thing about cats, though, you can't just whether it's indoor outdoor cat. If you're just going to fill it fill it full. Of cat food, you know, out of a can and have it be a pet, it's not going to do the same job. So when we say barn cats, we mean cats that live in the barns. We feed them, but you know. Their their purpose is there to you know, feed themselves and help control the population. So it's it's not the same as a domestic cat that we're just taking care of. They're they're sometimes handlible, but they're going to be more wild and and they function as as really you know, living there to go after the creators. So I've got a question. What type of dogs do y'all have? What breed? And do you feed the dogs and cats storebut food or do you make them their own types of meals as far as when you feed them. So we have Australian shepherds and a German shepherd German shepherds new he's full grown, but he's he's new to our farm and his family. Well, Carolyn Spokes, doogs come with us. Yeah, and so it's been a. Lot of the German i'm sorry, Australian shepherds that have done a lot of the protecting. But are our guy here for German shepherds, turn it out, he's gonna do a great job too. And as for feeding them, we do a mix. Every year when we do butchering, we make sure we keep all the bones and any extra parts and we feed them to the dogs throughout the year and then we'll put all those in the freezze there and then just hand them out every so often. And then we do keep a dry food, just a store bought dry food for them to make sure that they always have a baseline healthy amount to eat. And then we as we can. As you know, one of our dogs, one of our Australian shepherds, now is getting old and she's kind of becoming the hearth side decoration. She likes to lay around by the fire and keep warm and just enjoy the family. So we at this point are making her some special food out of eggs and milk and homaye bread and bone broth, and she seems to be doing really well on that. But in general they actually get a really long ways with all of our butchering. Extras, our love dogs food. They do have learned. To hunt the wild rabbits off the property and amazingly enough, they don't bother our chickens, They don't bother any of our small animals around the property. They know that they protect those, but they will still go out and hunt their own meat, which is wow. They've done a really good job. So my children have actually started to pass out around me. So I'm probably gonna cut this short here at nine point thirty. I hate to cut it too short because I'm enjoying this. But for my listeners on your videos, or say for any Joe who wants to really get out and try this or wants to start getting their way into the homestead and style, where would you suggest someone starts? Because it is you know, seeing seeing everything that is done can seem overwhelming and it is a lot of work. But what would you suggest to someone who's never done it before for their for their first time. So, as an overarching principle, start right where you're at with what you have. If you have five foot. Of five square foot of soil and dirt, start turn it. Into soil and grow some you you need to go to the grocery store and start learning to prepare food from scratch by buying fresh vegetables and learning how to cook from scratch. Do that, Carolyn, Maybe preserve some of those things if you need to. I mean trying to go just baseline here. You don't have a lot of resources, but start with what you have. Yeah, you start right where you're at, with what your have. You do not need forty acres, five acres, even one acre to start homesteading. You start right where you're at, doing whatever it is that's in front of you. And I think a big part of the starting is right between your own ears, right, it's in your mind where you decide you're going to start looking at things and saying, how can I produce instead of buying it? And you know that might mean knitting your own washcloths, It might mean buying dry beans and starting to can your own beans so that they're ready to put you on the shelf instead of buying canned ones. But just start right where you're at, doing what you can. Yeah. And a lot of our focus within a home steadying world is on food growing. Like we said, cooking it, but likewise, try fixing something instead of buying it, you know, and whether it's electronic or small motor, just take it apart, try to figure it out, you know. And that's another skill you need if you're ever. Going to get out on the land. You got to be able to fix things. You got to be able to make tools work when they break and you can't get a new one to get the job done. Lots of things. So you know, just whatever it is you've got in front of you, you know, fix it first before you go by it if you can. Yeah, that's another big part of doing things right where you're at. Oh no, that's great. I appreciate it. And so as every as Carolyn and Josh said, start with what you have. I think that's great because so many people try to go big so quick that it comes absolutely overwhelming and it's discouraging. With that being said, though, I am I. Didn't want to cut you off. I'm sorry, No, go ahead, I was just agreeing with you. You can run into a lot of grubble going you big, right, So with that being said, I am gonna wind down the show. I want everybody to know thank you for coming. I hope everyone has a great week and check out Carolyn and Josh's website and YouTube videos instagrams. I will set up the links and post on the page, and we'll put it into the archives so you can actually view it at anytime. At the top of the screen where the images roll past, you'll be able to select there. I'm trying to think of my notes real quick. Sorry, yeah, I've actually watched my turn. I thought I've lost my feeling in my foot. I have one flor on one leg and the other one on the other. Would that be said? Yes, I appreciate it so much. I honestly hope should y'all ever have time. I know the summer will be busy. Maybe next fall or when things start to wind down. I'd love to have you back again, if you know time permits. I understand life with nine kids stays busy and stays crazy. Oh, we'd love to get a visit with you again, yes, ma'am. Well all right, everybody, I hope you had a great weekend. I hope you have a great week Tune in next week, come back and check out their shows, listen to the download, but have a great weekend. Have a great time. See you next Saturday. By System stof. Sign has inside Deben Marbles straight from inside no. Way. Thank you for listening to the Prepper Broadcasting Network, where we promote self reliance and independence. Tuning in tomorrow for another great show, and visit US Prepper Broadcasting dot comm