Our Homesteading Goals For 2013

I like using the term goals better than resolutions.  “Resolutions” sound nice but have no meaning or structure. The word seems to have been reduced to mean “things you wanna do better, but probably wont.”

In my opinion, resolutions will not take me from point A to point B, and that’s the way I view things in life.  If I want to get somewhere I make a decision and I move in that direction.  Sure, sometimes you get off path, but you reset, gain your bearing, and start again.  Just like our debt-free goals, it may take awhile to get there, but we’re still moving in the right direction.  A —->B

So, enough with the rambling- here are our homesteading goals for 2013:

1. 6-8 Chickens with a Chicken Tractor

We’ve wanted chickens for a long time, probably 2-3 years now.  We want chickens for their eggs and their meat.  The plan is not to harvest the meat until a hen stops laying, or if we have an extra rooster.  We eat a lot of eggs, probably a half dozen a day or more and we’re tired of spending $3-4 a dozen for good eggs. We may add a few more in a fixed pen so we can turn the chickens into little composting machines.  We hope to have this goal complete by March.

 2. Build a Compost Bin

After a brief stretch of gardening this past year, I have come to realize that composting is necessary for a self-sustaining garden.  We want to get to a point where we’re not dependent on any outside products  (fertilizer, organic pesticides, etc) to keep our gardens going year after year.  In fact, we just built this.  One goal complete for 2013…yippee. By the way, I hope you didn’t think I was smart enough to figure all this composting stuff out on my own- I got the bin idea from SamPrep here, and I ‘ve been reading up on composting from this book.

3. Save $15,000 by 12/31/13

As part of our ongoing financial plan, we want to save $15k this year. $10k of it will be our emergency fund which will complete the first part of Baby Step 3 of Dave Ramsey’s Total Money Makeover Plan (more info on that here).  But there are a few catches to this…

• First Catch –  We live on one income, and I do not make 6 figures.  Far from it actually.  So, saving that much money and still paying the bills, plus recreational activities, and new homesteading activities will be tough.
• Second Catch – We only budgeted to save $450 every paycheck,  and if you do the math that comes out to $11,700 at the end of the year, not $15k.  Somehow we have to come up with the other $3,300.

This $15k will go towards a piece of property that we plan on paying cash for to homestead on.

4.  Rabbits and a Rabbit Tractor

(I refrained from adding a picture of a rabbit because all the ones I found were too…cute)

It’s not rocket science as to why we want these furry little guys- we want to piss-off as many animal lovers as possible…lol….JUST KIDDING.  I’m actually gonna have a hard time killing them.  I thought about buying a couple of rabbits locally and dressing them myself, but after I do, I may never want to do it again.  If I can build the whole set-up (tractor, breeding pin, nesting box ect)  and commit myself a little deeper, maybe I can desensitize myself to the slaughtering part. As horrible as it sounds, this is the cycle of life, and I will be completely grateful to these creatures for supplying my family with wholesome food.

5. Build 2 – 3′ x 12′ Raised Garden Beds

Building raised garden beds is not that hard, BUT filling them all of your own compost and growing a large amount of kick ass produce is. At least for us because we’re newbies. We’ve tried adding amendments and growing in our sandy, lifeless Florida soil and it wasn’t too pleasant. We don’t want to go there again.

So there you have it, 5 goals for 2013 that I think will be tough, but definitely obtainable.

Please let us know in the comments below what kind of homesteading goals you have for the year. If they’re good, we might steal ’em.

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This post was featured at the Homestead Barn Hop!

Photo Credits: LadyDragonFlyCC,  Images of Money, Linda N