Advice for beginners

[rlmueller]

I work full-time but have dreams of homesteading. I have an acre of land, a compost bin, I recycle, and container garden. I'm working to reduce my budget in order to move to part-time from home work. Please give advice on where to go from here--once my car is paid off.

[hildare]

sounds like you've got a good start!
I'd think about using the compost and starting a garden plot. you could just do a cover crop if you don't have time for the real thing till next year, but the better you can make the soil in your permanent location, the better off you'll be.
we just started rabbits, which is sounding like a great small space use of resources (plus the poo is awesome for the garden). chickens are great too; if you had chickens in a mobile coop, you could really get your garden spot in awesome shape. i'd get some general books and see what sounds the most fun-- barnyard in your backyard, or one of the storey's guides (libraries should have them) and daydream for a while.

[limette]

Have you checked out the Path to Freedom site? They have about 1/5th of an acre in the city and it is off grid and fully used for food production. They also have goats, chickens, ducks and rabbits.

[annethcz]

I think that enlarging your garden is a good next step. Do you preserve food? Canning, freezing, or dehydrating more of the food you grow would be a natural progression after growing a bigger garden. That would allow you to shrink your grocery bill.

If you're interested in animals, chickens are pretty easy to care for. They're not necessarily cheaper than buying conventional meat or eggs from the grocery store though.