This Week in Homesteading

First, I really should welcome you to my new blog: Little Red Homestead. I blogged for many years back at Life In Beta, but in recent years, it became clear that there were two main areas I wrote about: (1) my web development/design business, and (2) our little family homestead/farmstead. So, I decided to do two niche blogs instead of having an unfocused personal blog. So, welcome to Little Red Homestead. Here I’ll be writing about raising our family in our 1801 farmstead, raising livestock, growing a garden, and cooking and preserving homegrown foods. My other blog isn’t up and running yet (hopefully before the end of the year), but you’re welcome to bookmark it at AmandaWeber.com.

This Week in Homesteading is going to be a weekly feature, posted on Fridays, where I share links to all the interesting homesteading-related blog posts, articles, and videos that I’ve come across this week. (Plus a few photos. Just because!) I hope you’ll find something educational or fun that you haven’t seen before, and definitely share your links in the comments!

• These plans for an easy DIY chicken water heater for under $4 are brilliant! I have a heated dog water bowl I’m going to try first, but I may build one of these as backup too.
• Here’s how to harvest, cure and store all those lovely winter squash that are ripe right now, so you can enjoy them all winter long!
• Amy’s “Vomiting Chicken” blog (you can read the story here, if you’re wondering about that title) is one of my favorites, and her post about making refrigerator pickles with Mexican Sour Gherkins made me add them to my planting-wishlist for next year!
• Author, blogger, and all-around superstar female farmer Jenna Woginrich is trying out daily vlogging on her YouTube channel this week and next. (Also, if you haven’t read her books, you need to — like, now.
• Finally, a shout out to my friends at Abundant Permaculture: Their film, Permaculture Chickens, is going to be available to the public very, very soon. I’ve seen it in digital format because I was lucky enough to get in on the Kickstarter project. Trust me, you’re going to want this one for your DVD-library! Be sure to get on their mailing list so you can start learning and be the first to be notified when the film is available to purchase!