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Product Description
Product Description
Anyone who wants to learn basic living skills the kind employed by our forefathers and adapt them for a better life in the twenty-first century need look no further than this eminently useful, full-color guide. Countless readers have turned to Back to Basics for inspiration and instruction, escaping to an era before power saws and fast food restaurants and rediscovering the pleasures and challenges of a healthier, greener, and more self-sufficient lifestyle. Now newly updated, the hundreds of projects, step-by-step sequences, photographs, charts, and illustrations in Back to Basics will help you dye your own wool with plant pigments, graft trees, raise chickens, craft a hutch table with hand tools, and make treats such as blueberry peach jam and cheddar cheese. The truly ambitious will find instructions on how to build a log cabin or an adobe brick homestead. More than just practical advice, this is also a book for dreamers even if you live in a city apartment you will find your imagination sparked, and there's no reason why you can't, for example, make a loom and weave a rag rug. Complete with tips for old-fashioned fun (square dancing calls, homemade toys, and kayaking tips), this may be the most thorough book on voluntary simplicity available.
About the Author
Abigail R. Gehring is the editor of Back to Basics, Homesteading, and Self-Sufficiency, and author of Odd Jobs and Dangerous Jobs. She s practiced living self-sufficiently since her childhood in Vermont, being home-schooled, home-canning jams and jellies, and enjoying natural crafts. She lives in New York City and Windham, Vermont.
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Most helpful customer reviews
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A Homesteading Favorite,
By
This review is from: Back to Basics (Hardcover)
I generally do not go in for all-in-one books, seeing as how they tend to be neglectful in some way on all the topics they try to cover. This work is neglectful in some areas, yet I would definitely have it on my homesteading bookshelf.
'Back to Basics' is essentially a book for beginner homesteaders, preppers, and even survivalists (the section at the back has some roughing it info). It tries to cover all the skills a homesteader needs, such as: choosing land, building a house (a variety of ways), alternate energy, growing a garden, preserving your harvest, raising livestock, dairying, blacksmithing, woodcarpentry, rugmaking, candlemaking, soapmaking, homemade cleaners, and more. As you can see, there is quite a list. Many compare Carla Emery's famous 'Encyclopedia of Country Living' to this book, but as Mrs. Emery's work focuses simply on food raising, this book provides the wider scope in a whole section devoted to alternative energy for the do-it-yourselfer, including plans for a solar food dehydrator, solar water heater, water wheel power, wind power, etc. That chapter and the chapters on numerous crafts/skills such as the above mentioned soapmaking and such, are the jewels of this book. Granted, as others have said, this book could use more depth, but as someone just making do with what I've got, I'm not too interested in making artisan cheese, so the dairying chapter which shows me how to make a few simple cheeses as well as yoghurt, butter, and sour cream completely meets my needs. As a back-yard gardener with a million things to do at once, I don't have time to make glistening jars of 5 different kinds of jelly, and so a few simple recipes/methods for preserving my harvest such as dried tomatoes and apple butter again, meet my needs just fine. All this to say, if you are looking to specialize in soapmaking (selling a variety of soaps) or raising a rare breed of chickens, this is not the book for you, and I'd instead recommend Storey's Guide to Raising Chickens or Simple Soapmaking. But if you are, like me, a homesteader striving to live sustainably, you likely wish you had four extra hands and 48 hours instead of 24 in a day, and likely can't go into the finickety things. You need a book that will teach you the basics of the many things that need to be done, and so this book would be a good place to start.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Greenhorn,
This review is from: Back to Basics (Hardcover)
My family came 'off the farm' less then 2 generations ago, and I can't believe how much traditional skills and knowhow has been forgotten. This book was a real eye-opener to the obvious gaps in my knowledge, but with it's common sense approach to all aspects of homesteading, it offers some much needed hope and encouragement as we head back to the land. A definite must-have in your pioneer library if you're planning a return to a life of voluntary simplicity.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Très instructif et détaillé!,
This review is from: Back to Basics (Hardcover)
On a commencé à lire ce livre et c'est une mine d'or d'informations. Il fait parti des livres de preppers recommandé par James W. Rawles, alors en partant, j'avais une certaine confiance que c'était un bon achat. Mais nous sommes totalement satisfaits!
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