Sunday Stroke Survival: Self Sufficient in a Senior Living Situation?

 I couple of posts ago, I mentioned that I was giving up living on my homestead.  That loaded my comment section and email with concerned and disbelief that I would give up this lifestyle for good.

Can I continue my self sufficient ways in a senior living situation? I'm sure gonna try. First of all, I'm moving home and back to the only place I've really had roots. I know people and I have family there. Since I moved to north Georgia, I haven't seen any of them except when I went home. I miss them and vehicle and health issues have kept me from making the trip south for a few years now.  You long time readers know, I'm all about family, so it's been heart breaking for me. The few sporadic phone calls just don't work.

Second, I might be giving up my chickens here, but two of my sisters and one daughter built their own self sufficient homestead now. So if I miss the goats, chickens, rabbits and gardening I can always visit them. So you see, I'm really not giving up much except for the nonstop daily care of it all. If the temperature is below freezing or raining, I don't have to go out in it.

As far as food preservation, my canners and dehydrators are coming with me. My allergies are just too wicked to give up organically grown foods. I'll still grind my own flour and make my own bread each week. Believe me, they'll have to pry my cold, dead hands off my spoons and knives.  I'll continue to put up as much of my own food as possible like I've done for most of my life. I'm just using more gadgets to get it done now. I love cooking!

I'll be carrying about 500 various sized canning jars with me when I move. I figure 1 each of 3-gallon buckets of organic wheat, sugar, cracked corm and a blender to process it all with goes into a box for the move. That'll leave Mel with a little over fifty pounds of each got her use. When I need more, I'll hit one of my siblings or a child up for a road trip to get more.

I'll still make my menus up for 6-12 months at a time in advance. I've got farming friends that can supply me with fresh fruits and vegetables too so I won't have to depend solely on my family. I also know where there are u-pick fields and that I can glean in a pinch. Not that my family would really mind since I'm supplying free labor come butchering days, planting, weeding, and harvesting/preserving help too. My family is still doing the split lifestyle of working outside the home and homesteading too.

Granted, I'll be living in an apartment with a lot of other seniors but I'm not locked in. My time is mine. No more chopping and staking firewood to fend off winter chills. No picking up trash cans full of kindling nor sorting through junk mail to start a fire either. This is a definite perk. No frozen pipes or water shortages (I'll still keep 5-gallon water jugs handy). I'll keep my Coleman propane camp stove and oven. You never know when it might come in handy. There's nothing wrong with buying in season and being prepared even living in a senior community.

Where will I put it all? Those apartments aren't huge, but they do have a good sized food panty and closets. I don't have much need for closets. I've got one heavy winter coat and three dresses that need to be hung. All the rest of my clothes fit in mu four-drawer dresser. But I will have to do something about furniture again. But I don't need much... a twin sized bed, a table and a couple of chairs, maybe a love seat for company. A good second-hand or thrift store can deliver it. It doesn't have to be fancy....it's just me. I figure $200 should get me all I need. Worse comes to worse, I'll hit my relatives up for some of the things I gave to them seven years ago. It took half of a Grandma's Attic sized U-Haul (12' box truck) to move me up here, and with all the things I mentioned, It'll take that to move me back. 

I worked hard not to accumulate more stuff. What I bought made my life easier like a mandolin, a manual food processor, and an air fryer. Yes, they will all be coming with me too because I'll still be large batch cooking and processing food. Can anyone make a small pot of homemade soup? Me neither.

Nothing is impossible.