The benefits of our woodland homestead are many, but one drawback is that trees are known to fall, and every so often, they fall on power lines or other electrical things, and suddenly, hey, the lights are off. If we’re lucky, it’s a quick flicker and then back to Netflixing, but with larger storms, we’ve experienced power outages lasting a week or longer. This is when portable power stations come in super handy.

Yes, Food and water insurance. Because I get it: you don't want to be the person who buys a “food bucket.” So my suggestion is merely to add a couple small one-time expenditures — covering EMERGENCY FOOD & WATER — to your insurance portfolio.

After we got a quote for $6000+ to install a water softener system to address the sediment and heavy metals issues in our water, we instead created this custom 5-stage water filtration system for less than $1500 installed. Here’s how we did it.

From March 7-9, 2020 (the weekend before the Covid-19 pandemic forced us into lockdown), I did a research trip of sorts to the Louisville Survival Expo & Gun Show. It was bleak. But in my conversations with preparedness experts across the political spectrum—including survivalist Bob Gaskin, emergency food purveyor Teri Whisenhunt and archeologist/author Chris Begley, I learned a lot about how people in this country are approaching and preparing for an ever-shifting reality.

When we found this "Visible V8 Engine" building kit from 1960 in my in-laws’ basement, in near-perfect condition, in July 2020, the dog days of the pandemic…we figured it'd be a good opportunity to keep busy and learn the basics of how an engine works. Won’t you join us on this journey of frustration and super glue…

Around Weeks 10-14 it’s probably time to harvest your cannabis. This is not as simple as cutting and consuming, it’s a multi-week process, a stage unto itself. You’ve come this far, and it really pays to properly CHOP, TRIM, DRY and CURE your product, so you can avoid any last-mile problems and get the most quantity and quality from your harvest.

Sometime around Week 5, your ladies will begin to flower. In case it’s not clear, the cannabis plant’s flowers or “buds” are what most people harvest and consume, so this stage is all about maximizing the yield, size and quality of these flowers to ensure the best possible harvest.

By week 3, your cannabis plants should have entered the vegetative stage. This means you’re starting to see more of those laughably stereotypical fan leaves, and the plant is doing its job, and your job is to try to create the best conditions for it to keep growing and producing those leaves. Here’s what that means and what you need

Ok, so you’ve got some cannabis seeds that you found on the side of the road, or were maybe gifted from a friend in the same state. Nice job! The next step is to germinate these seeds. Again, I’m growing outdoor, in soil, and was gifted three autoflower strains, so everything below is specific to those parameters.

Laws vary greatly from state to state, and some of them are draconian or downright silly, and it’s important to only undertake this effort legally and responsibly, or at least know exactly what you’re getting yourself into.