Homestead and Financial Ledger Books- Part 2, by S.T.

We have been looking at the use and benefit of Homestead Ledger Books. In Part 1, we looked at documenting activities, items harvested, canned or dried, and items sold or orders received. We have looked at a possible scenario from January through September and left off at September after participating in the farmer’s market. Furthermore, let’s look at what activities we might record in our ledger for October.

October

In October, the family could take time to plan out the next year’s garden and locate free buckets. The buckets that could be used to expand the garden output by growing additional plants in these containers. The family could try to locate other containers to use for the plant starts for which we took orders. The children could log information into their own Homestead Financial Ledgers. They then plan out any future income producing projects they wanted to work on. This economics exercise could of course be part of homeschool. The children’s planning should include the items, material costs, sale price, profit, et cetera. They should locate and purchase the materials needed. Success as well as failure are lessons that need to be learned.

November

November could be spent hunting and preserving meat. The ledger should contain the amount of jerky and canned meat that was preserved. The family could work on additional projects that will be sold at the farmer’s market next year. Perhaps rendering lard for cooking and future soap making. Each item and the amount should be noted in the homestead ledger.

December

December could be spent performing winter house cleaning and to get the home ready for the long winter ahead. It is a good time to work on the indoor projects. A root cellar is an excellent example of a project that could be built or expanded. Possibly build an outhouse due to the amount of time you spend working outside. Build an outdoor wood-fired earth oven or an outdoor canning kitchen. Make more toilet paper kits and aprons for sale.

Garden Aspects of the Ledgers

Why would a family want to or need to track their garden output? Suppose, as an example, you plant 12 Roma tomato plants (for sauce) and 12 tomato plants (for canning whole tomatoes). You find that your output was not only inadequate to get your family through to the next canning season but there was not enough to put up any extra in the case of a garden failure. (You ran out of home canned tomato products in February.) In this case, your notes in the homestead ledger would have listed how many jars were produced from these plants.

With this information, you would be able to calculate the number of additional plants you will need to plant the following spring. You will know what is required to provide the necessary canned tomatoes products for your family. Not only get through the next year but also to set aside in the event of a future crop failure.

Further, if you were to take in additional family members, a ledger of this type will assist in planning out the future size of your gardens to allow for the increased population and production. If you plan to sell any garden produce, this system will be invaluable in planning what your family needs and to plan out the number of plants you will need to plant in order to produce the desired excess to sell.

Time Aspect of the Ledgers

Next, consider that there are homesteading chores that occur only one or two times a year. There are also items or events that occur only every few years. These will be new chores to the inexperienced homesteader. And some need to occur at a certain time of the year. Therefore,  you should not try to have your septic system pumped out in January with four feet of snow on the ground and a temperature of only 5 degrees outside.

Time information would and could reflect that you spent one week making seed envelopes and seed envelope storage boxes all from free materials. But as a result it produced $380 in profits. Most of all, this type of information could lead to thinking about future items your homestead could produce and sell to make a profit.

Financial Aspect of the Ledgers

As you grow as a homesteader, you will see in your, ledger of expenses the amount of food you grow is increasing and the amount of store purchased food is decreasing. You could, after only two or three years, have to purchase only wheat berries, salt, sugar, lentils, barley, split peas, milk, butter, and cheese at a total cost of $130 per month. If one person worked outside of the home what a boost to your income not to have to spend this money on store purchased foods.

As a result of keeping ledgers you will also see the amount of manufactured items that you once purchased now not only being made on the homestead but also being offered for sale. These could include soap, eggs, lotions, washable toilet paper, washable feminine hygiene products reducing your expenses even further and adding additional income.

Depending upon the current rules of your local farmer’s market there are probably items that you could not sell at this time. However, you could have a price list of items you have available to hand out to your potential customers. Thus, you could pick them up from a different location at the end of the day, or on the following day.

New Business Opportunities

If the ledgers are used and updated as they should be (each day), your ledger would show for example the first year you started raising chickens you spent $400 to build the chicken house, fencing, feed, and the baby chickens. You were able to only provide 20 dozen eggs for your family and produced no income. The second year your chicken operation provided 52 dozen eggs for the family and sold 200 dozen eggs at the farmers market. Two hundred dozen eggs at $2.00 per dozen for a gross income of $400 and you spent only $50 on supplemental feed for a net profit of $350. Further, you see that your family could have sold three times the amount of eggs.

Would it be financially beneficial to increase the size of the chicken coop? Perhaps add a rooster to increase the size of the flock, if you have the available land? If it was just two adults, you may not have the time to manage the increased flock. However, if there were children and one child was willing to take on the work for 25% of the net profits, it may well be a very profitable endeavor.

Future Circumstances

In future years, if things go from bad to worse, your ledger may note that you are taking more and more orders for future starter plants for the following year and selling less vegetables. It may also reflect that instead of charging $2.00 for a dozen eggs, you are now charging two pre-1965 dimes. Further, you realize that with the amount of starter plants you are selling that the people who purchase these plants will also need to be saving seeds. They will then need seed envelopes and a storage box that you can make and sell.

Homeschooling Aspect of the Ledgers

You likely have children that are homeschooled and assist on the homestead. If so, each child should also have their own ledger and money envelopes.

These ledgers will be an invaluable tool in homeschooling. They will not only improve their reading, writing, English, and math skills. They will also foster creative thinking and provide the needed education of running a home and business.

As a result, these ledgers will also provide many practical skills and money management skills and very large financial start for your children.

Final Thoughts

I hope I have given you ideas to start creating your own homestead ledgers.

Farmer’s Market Record Book

In conclusion, after one year of using this type of ledger, I found that the household, planting, canning, and dehydrating information all worked well. However, for the farmer’s market products and sales, it created just too much clutter in the original ledger and there was not enough writing space. (I also needed a more tangible way to track not only the income but also the expenses.) So, as a result I created a Farmers Market Record Book. (Commercially-made equivalents are also available, for expenses, or for general ledger entries) For the front and back cover I used some of the scrapbook paper that I received for free. I added a label to the front cover (noting the year).

Each year, I use a new Farmer’s Market Record Book. I will just use a piece of scrap paper for taking special orders for the next week’s market. Each Farmers Market Record Book was only 10 pages, so I was able to create them with little cost using my computer and printer. If there is no power for my computer or printer, I have a pad of 8 1/2” X 11” columnar paper. All I need to add is a front and back cover and a label for the year and then fill out the column headings.

Ledgers for Your Kids

If there are children on the homestead, each child should have their own Farmers Market Record Book with name and year on the label.

P.S.: The Farmers Market Record Book worked so well that I created a Grocery Price Book. The Grocery Price Book was created in 8 1/2” X 11” landscape format. It folded into a booklet that I could carry in my purse. I used some more of the free scrapbook paper for the front and back covers. I only wish that I had the plastic and knowledge to create a reusable cover.

SurvivalBlog Writing Contest

This has been part two of a two part entry for Round 71 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The nearly $11,000 worth of prizes for this round include:

First Prize:

1. A $3000 gift certificate towards a Sol-Ark Solar Generator from Veteran owned Portable Solar LLC. The only EMP Hardened Solar Generator System available to the public.
2. A Gunsite Academy Three Day Course Certificate that is good for any one, two, or three day course (a $1,195 value),
3. A course certificate from onPoint Tactical for the prize winner’s choice of three-day civilian courses, excluding those restricted for military or government teams. Three day onPoint courses normally cost $795,
4. DRD Tactical is providing a 5.56 NATO QD Billet upper with a hammer forged, chrome-lined barrel and a hard case to go with your own AR lower. It will allow any standard AR-type rifle to have a quick change barrel, which can be assembled in less than one minute without the use of any tools and a compact carry capability in a hard case or 3-day pack (an $1,100 value),
5. An infrared sensor/imaging camouflage shelter from Snakebite Tactical in Eureka, Montana (A $350+ value),
6. Two cases of Mountain House freeze-dried assorted entrees in #10 cans, courtesy of Ready Made Resources (a $350 value),
7. A $250 gift certificate good for any product from Sunflower Ammo,
8. Two cases of Meals, Ready to Eat (MREs), courtesy of CampingSurvival.com (a $180 value).

Second Prize:

1. A Model 175 Series Solar Generator provided by Quantum Harvest LLC (a $439 value),
2. A Glock form factor SIRT laser training pistol and a SIRT AR-15/M4 Laser Training Bolt, courtesy of Next Level Training, which have a combined retail value of $589,
3. A gift certificate for any two or three-day class from Max Velocity Tactical (a $600 value),
4. A transferable certificate for a two-day Ultimate Bug Out Course from Florida Firearms Training (a $400 value),
5. A Trekker IV™ Four-Person Emergency Kit from Emergency Essentials (a $250 value),
6. A $200 gift certificate good towards any books published by PrepperPress.com,
7. A pre-selected assortment of military surplus gear from CJL Enterprize (a $300 value),
8. RepackBox is providing a $300 gift certificate to their site, and
9. American Gunsmithing Institute (AGI) is providing a $300 certificate good towards any of their DVD training courses.

Third Prize:

1. A Royal Berkey water filter, courtesy of Directive 21 (a $275 value),
2. A custom made Sage Grouse model utility/field knife from custom knife-maker Jon Kelly Designs, of Eureka, Montana,
3. A large handmade clothes drying rack, a washboard, and a Homesteading for Beginners DVD, all courtesy of The Homestead Store, with a combined value of $206,
4. Expanded sets of both washable feminine pads and liners, donated by Naturally Cozy (a $185 retail value),
5. Two Super Survival Pack seed collections, a $150 value, courtesy of Seed for Security, LLC,
6. Mayflower Trading is donating a $200 gift certificate for homesteading appliances,
7. Montie Gear is donating a Y-Shot Slingshot and a $125 Montie gear Gift certificate.,
8. Two 1,000-foot spools of full mil-spec U.S.-made 750 paracord (in-stock colors only) from www.TOUGHGRID.com (a $240 value), and

Round 71 ends on July 31st, so get busy writing and e-mail us your entry. Remember that there is a 1,500-word minimum. Also,  articles on practical “how to” skills for survival have an advantage in the judging.