Homesteader Chit Chat

Welcome back to another edition of :

Homesteader Chit Chat!

We’re continuing our conversation with Krystyna from Spring Mountain Living…

I understand that you are a big animal lover. Share with us the animals that are near and dear to your heart on your homestead…do they have names? Personalities? Any good stories?

The animal that is nearest & dearest to me would have to be Murphey, my service dog.  I’ve had him something like five years now & couldn’t imagine a day without him by my side.  It’s really hard to accept the fact that someday he won’t be – something I don’t know that I’ve fully accepted yet.  Other than that, I have a real love for all of our animals, even the ones that end up on our table.  They all have their own unique personalities & quarks, especially the goats!

 

 

I hear that you’re a whiz in the kitchen. How did you come to be eating only allergy-free foods…what’s the story behind that decision? What’s your favorite food/meal to prepare…care to share a BONUS recipe with our readers today?

We made drastic dietary changes about 18 months ago.  My health was less than good at the time – I had actually spent about a year mostly bedridden.  If I wasn’t at the hospital, I was at home in bed.  After a period of intense frustration with my allopathic doctors, I nearly gave up on my health completely.  I even stopped taking all of my prescription medications suddenly, which was not an easy task when you consider I was taking over 25 different medications a day.  My husband spent a lot of time researching other treatment options for me & convinced me to give one more doctor a chance & I agreed (reluctantly).  This time we chose to tackle things naturally.  After extensive blood work, I found out about several food allergies, along with deficiencies in my diet, & we also found out about allergies the rest of the family was suffering from.  We ditched the offending foods & everyone’s health improved, mine being the most obvious since I went from being stuck in bed & unable to do most tasks without assistance to, over the course of a few months, being able to get out of bed on most days & participate in the homestead. 

 

 Go get the recipe HERE!

Since we have so many allergies & allergen-friendly foods are anything but cheap, we started to make everything ourselves.  For some reason, I have had a lot of success with making everything from savory meals to candies & desserts.  One of the favorites around here is my Faux Rice Crispy Treats.  They’re gluten free, have no sugar & are super easy to make.

I know from experience that homesteading can be very rewarding yet challenging. If you could pick only one…what is the one big challenge you have had to face since moving to your homestead? And the biggest reward in your opinion?

One big challenge is where to invest money & how to decide what to invest in first.  There are a plethora of projects we need to complete, not to mention an endless supply of things that need fixed or repaired.  But where to start?  It’s not easy to prioritize what needs done, especially without digging into debt.  As for rewards, I’d say actually seeing progress.  Even if it’s something as simple as the driveway being cleared or cans of food filling shelves as we preserve our harvested bounty. 

As we come to the close of our chat today, care to share with our readers your hopes, goals and dreams for your homestead & family in the near future?

 

Walking into the barn always puts a smile on my face. How could a person now be in a good mood after stumbling onto a scene like this?

We have a number of dreams, but this year, our biggest goals are to repair & replace some buildings on the property, put in a large garden, bale our own hay & put in a greenhouse.  I also have a book that I hope to finish this year.  It’s not going to be easy, but we’re going to do our best!

Our many thanks goes out to Krystyna from Spring Mountain Living for joining us today and sharing her heart, vision and homestead with us!

Krystyna has an amazing website just full of information to help you on your homestead, and she has an amazing Giveaway going on right now too…make sure you stop by and enter ————>HERE

You can find her on Facebook ————->

She is Tweeting away ————–>

And Google +ing ———>