I'm an urban homesteader

Like most things in my life the creation of our urban homestead has been the accumulation of a lifetime of experiences. I won't take time now to go into the background, but will instead try and keep focused on the WHY of it. Why do we do this? Why do we call ourselves urban homesteaders? What does it mean to be an urban homesteader anyway?

So...let's start with why we do this...

1. I like feeding my family wholesome nutritious foods. When I grow the fruits and vegetables myself I am assured of the quality of the foods because I'm the person selecting the seed, nurturing the crops, and enriching the soil. I know everything that goes into those foods. Nutrition and Food Safety

2. Growing my own food is the least expensive way for me to obtain organically grown fresh fruits and vegetables. Do you have access to organic strawberries for your family in June or organic raspberries in August, September, and October? Have you priced out organic blueberries yet (or any organic berry for that matter)? Frugality


One of the blueberry bushes - these are planted along the south side of the house

3. Our family enjoys working together. Some families enjoy playing together but our play is work. We don't think of it as work, but that's what other folks seem to call it. ;) We believe it's important for our children to be active participants in the work of our family. There isn't an allowance or a sticker chart - just the satisfaction of producing those things our family needs to grow and thrive. Family Unity

4. Our family is striving to be self-reliant. Food is one of the critical cornerstones of self-reliance. If we have the skills and knowledge to provide our own food that is greater independence for our family. Self-Reliance

5. We're trying to lessen our family's footprint. When we grow food ourselves and when we fill in the gaps with locally produced foods we're walking lighter on this earth. Less fossil fuels are used and fewer contaminants enter the waterways and soils of this globe when we grow our own foods. Environmental Awareness

Next we'll address why we call ourselves urban homesteaders and what we think urban homesteading is.

First, let me dispel any misconceptions you might have. Urban homesteading has absolutely nothing at all to do with the Homestead Act of 1862. That Act was abolished by the Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976. There are some individual municipalities that are still offering land/lots in exchange for "homesteading" but mine is not one of them.

The Hubster and I, together with the assistance of a mortgage, are working toward owning our property and it was a private transaction like most home purchases in the United States. We're just average homeowners in that regard.

We call ourselves urban homesteaders because we're working toward a point in time when we'll be providing most of our needed goods through the production of our homestead. We also currently live in an urban area.

Our city is a small city; according to the 2000 US Census only 50,792 residents reside here. We're within an hours drive of two larger cities, though. Our particular lot and house are within a block's walk of our downtown area. We're a few blocks away from our library, a grocery store, a hardware store, etc. It's not a small town. It's not a village. It's not a suburb. It's not rural. It's urban.

I don't quite know how to describe our lot as I don't know the exact measurements but it's tiny. It's smaller than most lots in our city because we're one house away from a court and that means our backyard is smaller because we have another neighbor behind our house as well as the neighbors to the north and south of our house.


In this photo you can see a view of our backyard neighbor (behind the chain-link fence) and a few of our raised beds. Our neighbor to the north is beyond that wooden fence.

We're surrounded on three sides by neighbors and the fourth side by our street. Our street is one of the busier streets in our city and is an emergency route. It's still a two-lane street and not a highway, but it's busy enough that the girls can't play in the front without supervision yet.

We really don't have a front yard. When we bought the house there were two little rectangles of grass turf and some overgrown cedar shrubs in the front. Over time we've replaced that with herbs and medicinal plants. I have some tiny bits of turf that I hope to eradicate this growing season and make the entire front yard productive plantings.


Some of the herbs and medicinal plants in our front yard

The side yard is essentially a driveway with a tiny strip between the driveway and a sidewalk near the house. We've put two large raised beds up on that strip and have a bit of turf remaining there.


One of the raised beds we constructed between the sidewalk and the driveway

The backyard has no turf. It's a series of raised beds, compost area, and perennial plantings - apple trees, raspberry canes, rhubarb, and strawberry plants. We put down wood chips that the city provides for free at it's compost center to cover the walkways. We retained a small area for some outdoor toys for the girls.

As to what urban homesteading is that is about as varied as the homesteaders themselves. In our climate we're limited to a two crop growing season. We have limited options regarding animals due to municipal ordinances and could keep rabbits, but would need neighbors' approval to keep chickens. Given our small space we opted to maximize fruit and vegetable production and purchase eggs and meat from local producers instead of trying to produce them ourselves. So for us urban homesteading begins with our growing as many fruits and vegetables as we can given our available space and climate restrictions.

You can see more of our urban homestead in some of these older posts:

A Tour of our Gardens

How Does Your Garden Grow?

Garden Update 08/17/2010

In addition to the annual gardens and our perennial plantings we also do other things to try and increase our ability to be self-reliant.

The Hubster hunts. He uses the land owned by friends or accesses public lands that permit hunting.

We also try to produce as many of the goods we use as possible. Longtime readers will know that I sew many of clothes and make a fair number of the girls' toys.

We're avid DIYers and are constantly learning new skills to improve and maintain our urban homestead.

Our dream is to eventually own acreage and create a rural homestead - but until that is a financial reality we'll continue to learn and advance our skills here on our little urban homestead.

What does your urban homestead look like?




This post is part of the Urban Homesteaders Day of Action.