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What does an urban homesteader look like?
By Meg | May 23, 2008
Earlier this week, I learned a new phrase over at Finally Frugal: “urban homesteader”. According to Finally Frugal:
Urban homesteading is the practice of growing one’s own fruits and vegetables (and learning to preserve them), making do with what’s around the house rather than running out to 7-Eleven or Target for an overpriced plastic doo-dad, and spending time on making food from scratch, rather than purchasing packaged food. In short, urban homesteading is about frugality!
It’s easy to imagine urban homesteaders wearing grungy old clothes or homemade dresses in long out of fashion styles. At least, that was the first image that popped into my head. But as Finally Frugal rightly points out, some people may surprise you — like me!
I’m unapologetic about loving makeup and apparel. I especially love shoes and have quite a collection. I love dressing up and do pay a lot of attention to my appearance. So if you met me on the street you may think that I’m all about appearances. However, that’s not all of who I am by far.
Though I love shopping, you’re more likely to find me gardening in the back yard than walking the mall. And while we don’t have chickens quite yet, we do have a backyard chicken coop that is almost complete.
I’ll admit that though I grew up in the country, I’m still a bit of a newbie when it comes to some of the typical aspects of urban homesteading. I’m not particularly crafty and I still haven’t learned to sew. However, I’ve managed to come up with a few homemade doo-dads in a pinch, and I’ve gotten pretty good at repurposing items around the house.
I also don’t claim to be the best cook — that’s actually more my husband’s domain. However, most of our cooking is from scratch — as are some of our cleaning products. Yep, we have bulk bags of flour, baking soda, and sugar, as well as a huge bottle of vinegar.
But despite our own efforts and interests, my husband and I were both surprised to discover that some of our close neighbors are doing many of the same things that we are. When we set up our compost pile, we worried a bit what our neighbors might think, only to find out later that at least two of our adjacent neighbors have their own compost piles! The same two also have vegetable gardens and have been very generous by giving us some seedlings. And in fact, we decided to build a chicken coop and keep chickens after talking to one of our neighbors about his.
So, if you think that urban homesteading is too far out of the mainstream for you to try, think again. Stop worrying so much about what the neighbors will think because if they aren’t doing this sort of thing yet, you may just start something.
Tags: Food, Green Living, Home & Garden, Impressions, Priorities, Saving Money, Style
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May 28th, 2008 at 10:44 pm
I totally think I could be an urban homesteader! (Though I’d want to be a stylish one with the leopard print rubber gloves…) I’d highly recommend taking up sewing. Even with you don’t make a ton of stuff, it completely changes how you view shopping and fit.
May 31st, 2008 at 12:02 am
Yay, leopard print gloves, Sara! I’m all for being the fun and stylish urban homesteader. I garden in my purple plaid rain boots :D
I definitely want to sew. I guess I’m just still intimidated by it. Friends and family keep telling me that they’ll help me through the first steps, but they never get around to it. I know I should be more proactive and teach myself or take a class, but it hasn’t happened yet.
June 10th, 2008 at 9:30 pm
Thanks for stopping by my blog, Meg. Do you know about this wonderful blog written by the ultimate urban homesteaders?
http://urbanhomestead.org/journal/
They’ve turned their 1/5 acre California city lot into a paradise.
June 11th, 2008 at 12:37 pm
You’re very welcome! And thanks for dropping by here!
No, I hadn’t found that blog yet. Thanks so much for the heads up. It looks really interesting and I’ve added it to my Google Reader list. They are definitely light years ahead of us, but it’s very inspiring that way.