Self-reliance Archives - Backwoods Home Magazine

Make a quilt out of Levis

By Dorothy Ainsworth Issue #77 • September/October, 2002 Back in the 80s I worked as a waitress in a busy little café where our mandatory uniform was a pair of Levis and a T-shirt. The only...

By Kathy Parkes Issue #49 • January/February, 1998 Unfortunately hospital practices that negatively affect breastfeeding are often the cultural norm. Our society pays only lip service to breastfeeding and then makes women feel guilty if their...

Choosing a chain saw

By Steven Gregersen Issue #119 •September/October, 2009 Winter will be here soon and along with winter comes cold weather and high heating bills. Obviously there's nothing new about any of this but with the current economic...

Funerals don’t have to be expensive

By Kelly McCarthy Issue #95 • September/October, 2005 Being of Celtic extraction, I am naturally disposed to dwelling on the blacker side of life. I started to wonder what would happen to all the dead bodies...

Kick the credit card habit and learn to stash cash

By Claire Wolfe Issue #107 • September/October, 2007 My friend Jeanie, a professional woman, whips out her credit card at every spending opportunity. Wal-Mart expedition? Credit card. A week's worth of groceries? Credit card. DVD rental?...

Dealing with heat stress

By Joseph Alton, M.D. Issue #154 • July/August, 2015 In the wilderness, there may not be shelter to protect you from the elements. Even on a working homestead, physical exertion in hot weather can easily lead...

Lessons learned from an ice storm

By Anita Evangelista Issue #108 • November/December, 2007 The weather reports indicated ice could be coming in. It was already raining and getting chilly on that early Friday afternoon in Springfield, Missouri. Hubby and I drove...

10 day survival pack for your vehicle for just $25

By Jeffrey Yago, P.E., CEM Issue #104 • March/April, 2007 It seems like every winter there are news stories of people getting stranded for weeks in bad weather while driving through the many remote areas of...

Digging a shallow well

By Jackie Clay-Atkinson Issue #165 • May/June, 2017 When we first looked at the land which is now our off-grid homestead, the realtor mumbled an apology for an old gravel pit on the property from the...

Pump water for free

By Kai Moessle  Issue #158 • March/April, 2016 I opened the valve on the output side of the pump slowly, like the instructions said, and after a few more starts it ran just by itself. Still...

Drive your own freshwater well

By Len McDougall Issue #128 • March/April, 2011 The well point's slotted holes permit water to enter, while stainless steel mesh inside keeps out abrasive sand. X marks the spot. How "witching" for water works is a...

Tale of a country family

By Rachel Baxter Issue #66 • November/December, 2000 Dave and Dianna Saleh (pronounced "Sally") always knew they wanted to live a rural lifestyle. They both came from big cities before they met and fell in love,...

Just for Kids: Life in the forest

By Lucy Shober Issue #34 • July/August, 1995 Click on pictures for printable, full-sized versions to color. "It's a jungle out there!" You've probably heard that phrase time and again, but did you ever stop and ponder...

Protein — The Cornerstone of a Survival Diet

By Jackie Clay Issue #111 • May/June, 2008 It goes without saying that preparedness is not for "radicals" or "weirdos" anymore. I picked up a preparedness leaflet at the County Agent's office last week and another...

Food security 101: part 2

By Rowena Aldridge Issue #139 • January/February, 2013 Last issue we talked about some things you can do to stretch your food budget and make great use of every bit of food...

The joys of making soap

By Grace Brockway Issue #84 • November/December, 2003 My initial enthusiasm for making my own soap was deflating with each book I read on the subject. They all warned of the dangers of lye, one of...