Simply Sustainable Family

Simple, Sustainable, and Healthy Homestead Lifestyle

How to Make Instant Pot Yogurt from Raw Milk

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Out of all the meals in the day, breakfast can be the most challenging. Not because it is hard to make, but it is difficult to have much variety. And, I want breakfast to be reasonably filling and nutritious, since we are often doing manual labor around the homestead. My go-to breakfast is fried eggs. My toddler will eat 3 eggs for his breakfast, and be perfectly full and happy until lunch time. I also like to make Thai Sweet Chili Egg Bake, French toast with homemade bread, baked oatmeal, and a few other staples. One of these breakfast options is plain Instant Pot Yogurt from Raw Milk that we get at a neighboring farm.

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bowl of homemade instant pot yogurt from raw milk with blueberries and granola
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How to Get Rid of Potato Beetles Naturally

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When it comes to our homestead, we do many things together as a family. But, we each definitely have our own areas we focus our attention on. Warren enjoys his machinery repairs, welding, and other greasy endeavors. The kitchen and garden tend to fall under my domain. Potatoes happen to be the main exception to this. Warren would happily eat potatoes with every meal, so he has a vested interest in our potato crop. And, it became very obvious that we needed to know how to get rid of potato beetles naturally.

We had one year that was a particularly awful year for the Colorado Potato Beetle in our area. One of the common gardening mistakes is not catching a pest issue in the earliest stages. And, during that year, we fell victim to this mistake. We engaged the invading Potato Beetles hordes in an all-out war. But, they were too well established at that point. The potato plants ended up being mostly bare stalks by the end of the season, with undersized potatoes. Since we did not want to repeat this experience, we experimented with various ways to control potato beetles. We finally were able to figure out how to get rid of potato beetles naturally.

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pinterest pinnable showing how to get rid of potato beetles and their eggs
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How to Build an H-Brace Fencing System for Animals

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If you have ever raised any animals, even pets, then you know the panic that comes when they get out. A recent experience reiterated the importance of knowing how to build an h-brace fencing system for animals that is pretty indestructible. Until this past year, we had never dealt with any major escapes from our homestead. But, this year, our fences were due to be upgraded. And, we had a group of young steers in the barnyard (definitely a recipe for disaster).

Some howling Coyotes spooked them around 2am one morning, and they ended up going right through the fence and down the road to the neighbors farm. We did not realize they were gone until about 4am. It took us over 2 hours to get them back, only to realize that we were still missing 2 of them. Dad found one of the steers meandering along the river bank the next day. And, the second one ran free for about 2 weeks before we enticed it back. Needless to say, the fencing project became our top priority after that. This time, we tried a new design for our Corner Post and H-Brace Assemblies. We have been very pleased with the design. So, we would like to show you how to build an h-brace fencing system for animals. This design is very strong and simple to make.

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pinterest pinnable showing an h-brace fencing system from a distance and unclose. field in the background.
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