I'm not a fan of the stereotype that assumes all farmers are barefooted, overall-wearing, pipe-smoking, straw-chewing, backwoods hillbillies. Rather, when I think of homesteading, I like to envision the intellectual agrarian standard. I think of George Washington of Mount Vernon, Thomas Jefferson of Monticello, and...don't laugh...Bilbo Baggins of Bag End. These men not only cultivated the soil of their gardens, but they cultivated the soil of their minds with devoted habits of reading and study. In addition to admiring the disciplines of the intellectual agrarian, I also admire the discipline of the educated homemaker who also balances her time in managing the home and studying how to better manage it.