Baby Steps: My Homesteading Experience

Hello everyone in the wonderful hive family. Hope you are all doing great. I’m so glad I discovered this wonderful community where we can share our homesteading experiences. I am so glad to be part of this community.

Have you ever thought of homesteading? Are you worried because you don’t have much money or are you worried because you don’t have 10 acres of land? Guess what? You don’t have to get a million bucks or 10 acres of land before you start homesteading. You can start with baby steps, just the way I started with my backyard. Homesteading has to do with self-sufficiency.

Do you know what I love about homesteading? The joy in producing your own food instead of going to the market to buy things. Really cool. Personally, I feel excited when my hands get dirty from all the hard work.

I grew up in a home where we all depended on buying food from the market, but as time went on, things started changing. A friend introduced my mom to homesteading and she developed an interest in it. We started using our backyard to grow a lot of crops and rear some animals; mostly chickens and goats.

In all truth and sincerity, it was not easy at first. I remember my siblings and I complaining to my mom that we hated the stress it caused to keep making ridges and watering the plants. However, after a few months, our hard work started to pay off. Can you imagine how exciting it’d be if you grew your own maize and bananas instead of buying from the market? It’s so exciting.

My mom bought a piece of land where we grow maize. We also planted oil palms on that same piece of land.

We use our backyard for growing so many fruits like; coconut, soursop, orange, watermelon, and guava. We also planted some food crops like cocoyam, yam, and cassava. My dad also planted trees to prevent erosion and provide homes and food for birds.

2 years ago, we started rearing animals; mostly chickens and goats. I remember last Christmas, we killed two goats and three chickens, it was so delicious, plus we didn’t waste our money on buying meat from the market.

I know we are still on a small scale, but these baby steps count. Don’t wait until you are an expert or you have a lot of money before you start homesteading. Start now.