Living Free in Tennessee - Nicole Sauce

Today, we review the good, the bad, the ugly from the Living Free in Tennessee Spring Workshop with The Tactical Redneck, one of our participants. All in all, things went well, folks got to learn from each other about homesteading things, a surprise session on how to capture bee swarms happened, and we even got to be intimately involved with a real aquaponics installation. It was a good time, and we hope that the relationships forged at this event will serve all those who were here well for years to come.

Make it a great week!

Song; Cilly Song, by Sauce

Today we talk through 7 steps to take to deescalate tense situations, talk about bees and bee swarms, and share stores of what has gone on at the Holler Homestead over the past week or so. This spring has run away and we had snowflakes this morning, as well as some fun goaty antics.

Today we talk about 10 tips for coordinating a workshop on your own property. Want to know why? Well, selfishly, this is in part because ALL I am thinking about right now is workshop details. And also because I know lots of you are on your own side hustle or entrepreneurial adventure. It is so cool when you send me emails about what you are up to. And you guys have neat skills that not everyone has. When you are in this situation, it becomes tempting to host a workshop and share the knowledge. So today, we will go over some early lessons I have learned getting the LFTN18 Spring Workshop up and running.

• Dryad's Saddle
• Watercress is getting long in the tooth, deadnettle and wild mustard flower
• Raspberry leaves for tea
• Mint is starting to come on

• Play a little help from our friends
• The snakes were tamed by a very special set of visitors who reminded me to have fun no matter what - and fun we did have.
• The sweet potato slips
• Using up the canned goods: Weekend stew
• Making pickled quail eggs for the spring workshop.

• Seedling update - Houston we had a problem
• Getting materials for the Aquaponics system - and also getting excited

• Metal scrap pays for gas tomorrow
• Outdoor composting toilet is ready to go
• Last week's trip to Houston will knock out one of my debts

The 10 tips for hosting a workshop on your homestead

1. Organize your schedule around a foundational speaker.
2. Give yourself at least 6 months or a year to get this right: Marketing, mechanics of web sign up, overview emails, getting your grounds read, all take a ton of time.
3. Events a bloody expensive.
4. Infrastructure need to have vs nice to have list - then cut the need to have list in half and set realistic participant expectations.
5. When someone offers to help, find a way to let them help. Your community helping you go toward the same mission is what will make or break you.
6. Hire help. You may be really good at catering these things. You dont actually have time to do that. Know the roles, write them down, have some backups ready to go.
7. Empower the participants to make things better. (Slack)
8. Organize early and often. Remember the little things are the most important.
9. Inform your neighbors
10. Do a run of show two weeks in advance

And remember this tip from one of our friends: You will always wish you had 2 more weeks to get ready (from David at Cider Hollow)

And with that, go out, and make it a great week!

Song: Thanks Dave, Sauce

It's been awhile since we explored a freedom topic, and as most of you know, the ability to live life as freely as possible is one reason that Mark and I have chosen to go on this homesteading journey. So today, I thought that it might be fun to examine something about freedom that most people don't talk much about: building the ability to know what is none of your business. You've all heard the term "Nimby" right? Well today we will walk through that, along with our usual segments and a few tales from the Holler.

Direct Download

What Mother Nature is providing • Dryad's Saddle • Watercress, deadnettle and wild mustard flowers • Poke and hairy vetch should be coming out soon

Tales from the Prepper Pantry • The blue bins and resulting can of snakes • Pickled beets in deviled eggs • Three final squashes to be buried in the garden • Onions still hanging in there • 8 jars of turkey stock put up

Getting the gardens ready • Seedlings are in place • Need to trim the raspberries and thin out the wood chips • Hoping to see asparagus soon

Stretching meals • Turkey: Cooked on Sunday and lasted the whole week, yielding 8 jars of stock put up, 2 cans of stock in the fridge, 1 large stew, turkey tacos, and turkey scramble. Even the pigs got in on the scramble because I made too much. The turkey cost $11, carrots and other ingredients cost about $8 and we hardly had anything but turkey related items all week.

>>Surprise savings ninja segment

Operation Independence • The pump replacement store • Workshop preparations o Composting toilet o House of cards cleanup project o Outdoor shower redo

Questions to ask yourself as you explore the question: What is None of your Business?

Song: Feed My Hunger by Sauce

A friend asked me, while looking at a carcass to cut up on his butchering table, how I would butcher a lamb if I had one here for Mark and me. So today, we will talk about how to process your spring lamb - or goat - for two.

• Watercress season is here
• Wild mustard flowers - as usual in time for Easter
• Dead nettle and chickweed
• Dandelion greens and flowers

• The tools are organized!
• The last onions have landed in my kitchen - I kept finding more
• Avocado quinoa salad.
• Butternut squash bisque this week

• Turkey cycle again this time, but with new recipes - we will share some next week.

• The trout conundrum as they relate to operation independence. Help please.
• What is the Independence Fund anyway?

Great resource for cutting up a lamb from the Guardian of all places: https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/gallery/2008/nov/19/foodanddrink

Make it a great week!

Song: Cilly Song, by Sauce

Today, we are going to talk about some fun projects we did over the last week here at the Holler Homestead. There were some changes that needed to be done because of the pig, some fun wild plants popping up, goat hijinks and more. And yes, as usual, nothing went as planned but a bunch of stuff got done. This really makes me think the most important skill you can develop if you plan to integrate homesteading practices into your life is troubleshooting and keeping things flexible.

Rainbowcrawlers.com

What mother nature is providing More rain Stinging nettle Dead nettle (for salad) Watercress Egg recipe of the week: Tuna egg salad

Getting the Gardens Ready Story: Farmers market meeting

Tales from the prepper pantry Cleared out everything but the last 7 onions and 2 butternut squashes in the root cellar. Reorganizing it for the summer months Using up green beans and beets at a fast clip now that the new crops are about to be upon us BBQ story

Stretching Meals The Boston Butt Project

Operation Independence Pig shelter story

Make it a great week!

Song: Dr Feeley, Dr. Skinner by Sauce

How are you doing moving toward your goals? These past few weeks have had me thinking pretty hard about how simple it is to set a set of priorities in your life and family, then use them as a filter through which to make choices. It is so simple, in fact, that it is hard. Then I got to reading a book I was helping someone right and one of their chapter titles was "Organized people who are wrong beat disorganized people who are right every time."

What mother nature is providing

• Watercress
• Shagbark
• Stinging Nettle
• Mullein
• Wild Garlic

Getting the Gardens Ready

• Wood chipping in the garden space
• Trimmed up the peach tree and elderberries

Tales from the prepper pantry

• The Sweet potatoes have rotted
• Still have butternut squash - the powerhouse of the pantry

Operation Independence

• Another load of pallets arrives this week
• New Well Pump Installation
• Slogging through the taxes one day at a time

Make it a great week! Song: Belly Dancing Vamp Tune, Sauce

We are going to talk about life and more importantly life today, not yesterday, and not tomorrow. You hear people say all the time to live in the now but that seems kind of weird, right? I mean, if I just do what I want every day to be in the now, then when tomorrow comes, I will have used up all my cash and will end up out on the street. Well, maybe living in the now but being aware of the future is important. We will cover more of that in the main topic of the show.

What mother nature is providing

• I don't really know, but Houston has chick weed
• Watercress and Mint
• It froze again so some of the early starts and the daffodils will be beaten back when I get home
• Crappie

Getting the Gardens Ready

• All it does is rain...so nothing

Tales from the prepper pantry

• There will be a pig in the freezer when I get back so we will be makin bacon
• Centering meals around the meat in the freezer that needs to go. Goal is to keep as healthy as possible.
• Really focused on using up the canned goods
• Sugar snap peas, radishes and tangerines

Stretching Meals

• In a hotel:
  • Tamales
  • Sushi
  • Rotisserie chicken and salad
  • Uber eats

Operation Independence

• We are not going to have to buy pork for awhile...
• Focusing on operation yearly income through facilitation projects at least once a month

Song: Special by Sauce

Today we have a great interview with Chef Brett Corrieri, the instructor from Cider Hollow Farm's pork processing class. Brett walks us through the process to dry cure a ham, and describes why you would want to eat it a little too well. Also today, we have a roundup of sweet potato recipes from you, the listener.

Goat Video

Oven baked sweet potato fries (or cubes) Peel and cut 2-3 lbs sweet potatoes Coat with olive oil, toss with 1 tsp paprika (sweet Hungarian paprika if you've got it) 1 tsp cinnamon and 1/2 tsp salt. Bake 425F for about 30 minutes, stirring and turning after 15. Should be slightly crisp on the edges, soft in the middle. Yum!

Josh's Roundup Sweet potato chili Sweet potato flatbread NC Sweet Potato Tortillas Squash Sweet Potato Chili Interesting recipe Sweet potato fritters Ginger Sweet Potato Cheesecake SP Garlic Mac N Cheese SP Hummus Soul SP

From Tamlyn TWICE-BAKED SWEET POTATOES Bake sweet potatoes like usual, cool, halve, and scoop out flesh (be gentle, the shells tear easily). Mix with minced garlic or shallot, beaten egg(s), salt, pepper (be generous), Brie (rind removed and diced small), fresh thyme and a little rosemary. Bake @400 on greased, foil-lined pan for ~25 minutes. Remove when tops are beginning to brown and allow to cool before serving. (Adapted from Barefoot Contessa's https://barefootcontessa.com/recipes/twice-baked-sweet-potatoes)

Make it a great week everyone! Song: Strange Child by Sauce

Today, we've got a good one with an exploration of how well goats work for weed control, as well as some tactics we have learned about over the past "almost year" of having these playful little devils -- and they are devils -- on our land.

What mother nature is providing

• Shagbark Hickory Update
• Deadnettle is starting to spring up
• Bees legs are full of pollen
• Watercress may be big enough this week to harvest a round
• Bad mushroom year - all my best logs are gone
• Sprouts
• Eggapalooza -

Getting the Gardens Ready

• Seedling trays - maybe - big trip to houston coming up and not sure if things will be in place
• Special replay this week: Growing your Own Seedlings.
• Mud farming - facial idea

Tales from the prepper pantry

• Marty the pig will graduate in a few weeks - a confession
• Laying plans to eat more green beans - for some reason this year we've been finding lots of collard greens and not hitting the canned stores
• Still swimming in sweet potatoes - anyone got some fun recipes?
• Onions from last fall will be done in about two weeks, just as the wild garlic is coming on

Operation Independence

• Duplex taxes are done - so much more to do on taxes
• Arranged for Marty to be processed

Make it a great week!