Learning New Skills Each Year

I mentioned in a different thread that I gave up New Year Resolutions several years ago. Instead, I decided that I'd start learning a new skill each year. Some of those skills throughout the years have been:

1. Knit
2. Crochet
3. Make Soap
4. Pressure Canning
5. Water Bath Canning
6. Seed Saving

2020 and 2021 have been screwed up for learning new skills. I had wanted to learn more about solar power, but funds took a nosedive. So I spent last year and this year growing as much food as I could. Planning to get as many calories as possible from our land. Learning even more seed saving skills so I am not beholden to the seed companies.

I've been looking ahead to 2022. I'm thinking that I'd like to learn more about growing my own chicken feed. I can't free range my chickens. They have a big area to run around in, but I can't give them an all-access pass to my property. Thus, I need to bring their food to them. Their non-GMO feed runs about $30/month. I'd like to get that as close to zero as possible, but I anticipate I'll still need to buy their grains.

I'd like to learn more about protein, calorie, vitamin/mineral requirements, etc.  I've started growing pigeon peas with the intent of harvesting them for the birds. I have bookmarked a chicken protein calculator for mixing different foodstuffs. The rest of this year will be my research phase, but 2022 is the year I go full force!

My challenge for y'all: what new skills would you like to learn? Let me know about them, and I might be inspired to learn with you!

Fab post, Stacie! Love your ideas.
I can't find the exact video someone linked to in a different chicken fodder post, but these folks have a very small plot (less than 1/2 acre) and have some interesting techniques for growing chicken forage:  

My current goals are financially related - to reduce our dependence on pre-packaged foods and cook more from scratch, both to be healthier and reducing our grocery bill. This one is kinda tricky as I have chronic fatigue, plus hubby is autistic and has a deep distrust of home cooked foods! But no excuses, I need to work on it!  Also to get more food plants into our tiny less than 1/10 acre garden.
The flip side of reducing expenses is to work on developing new saleable skills, especially crafting small pieces I can sell, and to ideally do this using stuff I already have rather than buying new stuff. I currently write and also work as a virtual assistant, but it's not quite bringing in quite enough income.

My New Years Resolution for many years has been to learn something new.

One year it was to learn about different wines and of all the new things I have learned over the years that ones is still a favorite. A couple of years ago, I asked for Christmas a bottle of Asti Spumante.  I received a bottle of this Italian White Wine though I saved opening it until my Wedding Anniversary.  Even though it had been many years since I tasted this wine I still remembered the taste. Another favorite wine is Lambrusco, and of course, I have not tasted it in many years.

Another year, my New Years Resolution was to learn Excell. I went on the Microsoft Website and learn how to make a spreadsheet that I used for my work.  After I left that job and didn't have a need for a spreadsheet, I forgot most everything I had learned.

After discovering permies, I have learned about so many new things and done so many experiments with this new found knowledge.

For the last two years, I have been stuck on learning about DNA.


 

Jane, that video is SUBLIME! I've bookmarked it for inspiration.

Baby steps on the pre-packaged foods and your husband's food issues. That can get tricky. Maybe try one new homecooked food each week, and give your husband grace the rest of the time? I wouldn't even pretend to know his issues, so it's all conjecture on my part, but what if you let him pick between two homecooked foods he already knows? I mean saying something like, "Honey, would you prefer chili or burritos tonight?" That might let him feel more in control of the issue? Just a thought.

I hope you find your online business niche soon. My husband has an Ebay resale business, and his first strategy was to cast a wide net on his goods, then find what sold well and fine-tune it from there.

Anne, this is fantastic!

I have a sulfite sensitivity, so if you know of a GOOD sulfite free wine, I'd love to hear your recommendations. All the organic ones are too harsh, in my opinion. I much prefer a fruity, sweet wine.

I see studying DNA and permaculture could be a good partnership. Breeding plants and animals, "landracing" our crops, all seem to tie in to genetics and passing down desirable characteristics from one generation to another.

Sorry, my knowledge was learned before organic was popular.  I mostly learned about Wine Regions and which wines were produced in those regions.  The difference between French Wines and Italian wines.  The red wines, white wines, sweet wines, dry wines, etc.  My memory of all those wines has faded over the years and I have been just left with a selective memory of the ones I really liked.

Good advice, Stacie! My usual approach with hubby is to let him have his own meal and I have something homecooked. Sometimes, he'll want to taste, or ask if he can have a serving next time as a side to his prepackaged meal. So I celebrate the little wins. Learned long ago not to try to make someone on the spectrum do ANYTHING, until they've had time to assess it and consider every angle! Meltdowns are no fun for either of us, so it's always baby steps.

Still, in almost twenty years, we've come a long way.  The house no longer looks like a very conservative old lady furnished it, the tiny yard that was a lawn mono-culture is a thriving and productive wild garden, and he eats something other than french fries. Wins for both of us, as he finds the house more comfortable now and loves the wildlife that use our garden.

Business - my writing is doing quite well. I think I could support myself as a single person with it. But not enough to support a household. Selling handcrafted items is more likely to be a way to cover the costs of the crafting materials rather than an income stream, but we will see. I hope your husband's business goes from strength to strength.

Anne, wine is a wondeful thing to learn about! And DNA is fascinating.

Edited to add: Stacie, I haven't tried them, but this US winery does sulphite-free wines that are well-reviewed here in the UK, though I haven't tried them: https://www.freywine.com/index.cfm?

THANK YOU, Jane!
The prices on the wines are very reasonable. Gonna spend some time checking out their offerings. :)

I love the idea of new skills! I often find myself looking at the BB list and thinking, hm, which of these do I need to learn?
I've gone down the rabbithole of soapmaking, bokashi/composting, brewing, sourdough, pickle making, gardening, rabbit keeping, and outdoor cooking this way. Ah, maybe also knitting, sewing, crocheting, sewing, heck even cooking is a relatively late-in-life skill for me (only after having kids and moving to a country with minimal convenience foods did I really learn to cook). I'm waiting on more space to fool around with rocket oven baking, chickens, butchery, meat curing, building with bamboo, etc, etc, etc.... the list keeps growing.
Maybe the best accomplishment so far is seeing my daughter (age 21, home from college this year) start to pick up skills, which I greatly encourage because who knows what the heck employment is going to be in the future, but skills will always be super useful (being the brewer and baker has made me very popular, lol).

I was also going to recommend Edible Acres, their chicken videos are lovely. They feed produce and baked goods that appear to be waste from a local market, and the chickens are gorgeous. They also grow some things specifically for the chooks, if I recall maybe pumpkins and sunflowers?

Tereza, there is much wisdom in giving your daughter the foresight to learn skills in an unpredictable job market.

I've found myself looking at the PEP list too, thinking about if there is something I really NEED to learn sooner rather than later. If food was scarce, would I know how to harvest a chicken? I mean, my husband and I have done it together, but would I know how to do it alone? Probably not. I need to learn that skill. Or what if all heck breaks loose and we can only live on what we can forage? Would I know what wild edibles would nourish my family? I have books, but have I actually made a meal from only foraged foods? Uhm, no. I should probably learn it now before I have to.

with a currently-9-month-old baby, the skills i’m developing this year include better time management, the ability to change a diaper even as the recipient is trying to pry themselves off of a table, and gently bouncing someone to sleep who is simultaneously trying to remove skin from my inner-upper-arm via a series of brutal pinches.

i think other more homesteady skills will have to wait just a bit.

Greg, a wise person once described a parent's journey through their children's development as: "The days are long, but the years are short."

Enjoy the madness, the fatigue, the frustration, the joys. The time is too fleeting. The garden will wait for you.

oh, i’m enjoying it. this feral little elf is one of the best things that’s happened in my life.

I got garden & orchard, animals husbandry, everything fire & heat, water.
I am lacking in home defense, did not see it until this past 18 months.
Food storage & the farm cycle had been me main concern, but now I am not sure good people are
can walk the street in safety.

I don't have one big skill to tackle each year, but I try to improve on multiple fronts simultaneously.

This year I've tackled kefir. I also want to forage some new edibles or teas. I've also made progress on my hand darning skills, and a bit of (very amateur) wood working.

All small incremental things, but it means my daughters can see me strive towards more sustainability.

(Regarding chicken feed, have you considered comfrey as a supplemental protein source? It grows easily and copiously, it's perrenial and it's very hardy. )

I have a 5 month old baby, and she's helped me take a critical look at what I know and do. What do I want to teach and pass on to her? What habits do I have that I don't want her to follow? I recently enrolled in Traditional Cooking School, because cooking from scratch is a weak area for me. I've been learning sourdough for a couple of weeks, and fermenting veggies will be next.

Establishing routines, particularly when it comes to keeping things organized, is a skill I'm learning/implementing. That may not sound like much for a skill, but it's something I've never been good at.

Nikki Roche wrote: I recently enrolled in Traditional Cooking School, because cooking from scratch is a weak area for me. I've been learning sourdough for a couple of weeks, and fermenting veggies will be next.  

Nikki, Congratulations on the new baby, 5 months ago!

You might like to share some of your new cooking skills and earn some BB (Badge Bits) in our PEP Forum, just take some pictures and post them, Here are the details:

https://permies.com/f/404/pep-food-prep-preservation

https://permies.com/wiki/102815/pep-food-prep-preservation/loaves-bread-PEP-BB-food

https://permies.com/wiki/105983/pep-food-prep-preservation/Salt-brine-ferment-pickle-PEP

PEP is a  great place to show off your new skills!