It was 5 wearisome days since the moving van pulled away and had been returned. The boxes were unpacked, broken down and now it was time to begin our purpose: Why we had moved to Manti. We had felt the call to come and to learn how to heal a piece of land…our land; our almost half of an acre. However, this story really began in the home long before the yard. We had spent a great deal of time setting our home in order and learning about Holiness. We began purging those things that God called abominable or offensive to the Spirit, such as movies and music. We began to…

Last year I was introduced to winter sowing from a good friend who showed how she was starting her seeds in milk jugs making little tiny greenhouses from them. I was intrigued by this method but wasn’t ready yet to try. It was only after this last year when I did not have one tomato or pepper grow from the garden that I decided it was time to try these mini “greenhouses!” The idea is that you simply put them outside without the lid and let nature with its wind, rain, snow, and ice fall upon it. So began our first attempt at winter sowing this year. Tomatoes, peppers, onions,…

Have you ever gone to the canyon to pick wild fruit or berries? Have you ever noticed there are no weeds and no one is watering these plants yet they grow and produce very well? No one goes in the woods to rake, hoe, or rototill. No one goes into the forest to fertilize the plants. Every spring you will find a family outside who is laboring, digging, raking until the spot they have chosen is a beautiful spot of fresh-turned soil. Most are excited about the season and filled with optimism for their garden. They then plant, with endless watering all the while hoping their garden will grow! However, somewhere in June,…

When working in the garden I will often notice a flower growing in the wrong location. For years it was the yarrow plant for me, and each spring as I began clearing the path that ran along the side of the house I would notice this flower, and it was perfect. It was straight, healthy, and had blossoms on it already, but it was dead center in the middle of my path. The exact wrong place for it to be in this particular garden area. Many times I would attempt to relocate the flower, but its roots were deep and my attempts to move it to where it was supposed…

In recent years it seems as if more and more people are wanting to know about the foods they are eating and the chemicals they are unknowingly bringing into their homes. I know we do! Fresh Farmer’s Markets are a thing now and old skills that our great-grandparents knew from childhood are being rediscovered. People are wanting to live a more self-sufficient, sustainable life.  Many people who are wanting to live this lifestyle refer to themselves as “homesteaders.” WHAT IS HOMESTEADING In the quest to settle the west, The Homestead Act of 1862 granted land to anyone who applied for little to no cost.  They simply had to agree to…