I love the idea of being self-sufficient and making as many things as possible at home, but at the same time I don't know that I want to spend more money to do it. Like making soap for example: the hubby just shakes his head because we can buy 6 bars at the dollar store for $3. Same deal with laundry soap, candles, rugs, bread, and other stuff. I realize that home made is better quality, you have more control over contents, and there is great satisfaction in making your own. I don't know that these things are more expsenive to make than to buy, I'm just wondering what anyone else thinks. Is it really cheaper to make your own bread than buy a loaf at the store for $.99? Maybe I'm just not shopping right. Anyway, I'm still going to make my own stuff I just wondered what some of you thought about this.

-- Stacey (stacey@lakesideinternet.com), November 20, 2001

Answers

Stacey, Meli (my wife) makes all of our soaps. It cost her 15 cents to 20 cents a bar. She makes enough for us and extra to sell. She sells it for $2.50 a bar on Ebay. That makes the soap we consume, free and the rest is profit.

She also bakes some of our breads. White loaf bread is so cheap here, 2 for $1.00 that she seldom makes it. But, wheat bread is more expensive and is a little cheaper than buying it. Also, homemade bake goods are better tasting and of better quality. One of the things she does is to bake bread during the cooler mornings or evenings as this helps warm up the kitchen. So, it saves energy (money) that way too!

Sincerely, Ernest

-- http://communities.msn.com/livingoffthelandintheozarks (espresso42@hotmail.com), November 20, 2001.

I think it is important for people to learn how to do this stuff just in case you have to sometime--like learning how to make a water still in the desert. Some of these activities are very enjoyable in and of themselves (like knitting for example), but can be expensive hobbies unless you have a cheap source of supply.

I think sourdough is the cheapest bread to make, just starter, flour, water, and salt.

Sometimes people will spend more money for homemade, depends upon the area and the income. Other times, people will go for price every time, which is why it is not worth your time (unless you get some enjoyment out of it) to do some of these things, especially compared with mass produced or imports.

-- GT (nospam@nospam.com), November 20, 2001.

I am all for homemade provided one has a clear understanding of why we are doing it. I drove a 'homemade' car for more than 10 years, it was the most uncomfortable and impractical vehicle I have ever owned but the point is I enjoyed making it and learnt a lot in the process. Even when there is no monetary advantage 'homemade' is a vital learning thing. Once I stop learning and it becomes a chore I go down to the shops.

-- john hill (john@cnd.co.nz), November 20, 2001.

Shucks, it's lots cheaper to make your own bread than buy it. You just have to make the right bread---although why anyone would want to make WonderBread is beyond me.

But the kind of crusty artisan loaf I make would cost me $4 or $5 dollars to buy at the supermarket. I can make it myself for pennies on the dollar. It's fresh, it's delicious, and it's inexpensive. Now that's economics!

-- Julia (charmer24@juno.com), November 20, 2001.

Julia - I agree. The really cheap soft breads just don't appeal to me or my family. I can make some pretty fancy loaves for a lot less than I'd pay for them at the store. I haven't made my own soap yet but I plan to. Right now I buy other people's homemade soap - it's more expensive but doesn't irritate my skin, nor does it have perfumes that I'm sensitive to.

-- Bonnie (stichart@plix.com), November 20, 2001.

I prefer handmade when I can, if I can't do it myself, then often I am willing to spend a little more to buy handmade. Too many things are mass produced and have no character. I also feel better about giving my business to an artisan than to some faceless company.

About the soap, the recipe that I use calls for a can of shortening- about $3.00 or less, and half a can of lye (don't remember the price on the lye), also a quart of milk. This recipe makes about 30 small bars which sell for $1.00 each. So it's definitely more economical. You can even get the fat for free- then you only have to pay fpr the heat required to render it, and the lye!

If money were the bottom line, most of us wouldn't be trying our hand at homesteading. It is so much more soul satisfying to make something yourself and for the objects in your home to have a personal connection, than for everything to be the cheapest plastic from Walmart. Anyway, that's the way I feel about it. :)

-- Rebekah (daniel1@itss.net), November 20, 2001.

I wonder how you put a price on the smell of bread baking; the relaxation I feel kneading a loaf; the satisfaction I feel looking a a nice loaf sitting on the bread board at supper and knowing that I ground the flour and baked the bread; the knowing exactly what is in it?? The 2/$1.00 spongy white stuff doesn't look like much of a bargain to me.

-- diane (gardiacaprines@yahoo.com), November 20, 2001.

It cost me 40 cents per bar to make soap, and I know exactly what's in it so that's worth a lot. It costs 60 cents for me to make a loaf of delicious homemade bread. I don't think "wonderbread" even deserves to be classified as the same type of food.

-- Christine Young (Christine_Young@brown.edu), November 20, 2001.

Quality not price is the reason....Diane was right on the money.....satisfaction is really the "goal" of homesteading and making things yourself......saving money is just a bonus. IMHO of course!

-- Jason in S. Tenn. (AJAMA5@netscape.net), November 20, 2001.

I started my whole "homesteading" kick when I found the Tightwad Gazette. I learned how to make my own pizza, sauces, pasta, bread, everything dirt cheap. It's alot healthier for my family, and I buy my flour when it's on sale for 79 cents for 5 pounds. This next spring, I'm going to plant wheat!! I can't wait. My husband's cholesterol has dropped 20 points since we started our self- sufficiency quest. How can you put a price tag on that?

-- Dawn (olsoncln@ecenet.com), November 20, 2001.

Making stuff yourself is challenging, creative, & a learning experience. It is real. Throwing money at problems is just as empty a course of action as saving money but selling out on quality. If you compare, for instance, the flavour, the aroma, the nutrition, satisfaction and the meditative aspect of the making of bread yourself to the pennies saved --however you look at it--buying either the good artisan loaves or that cheapo white spongy stuff they call bread at AgricorpseFood, well, they're not even comparable. Everything doesn't just come down to the almighty dollar. Our society reduces everything down to numbers in a ledger. How small-minded a way to view the universe! You can't quantify the way the house smells with bread baking in the oven. But the most important reasons to choose to make your own anything are for the fun of it and to know that you can. It empowers you and makes you happy. Or it should. If not, don't do it.

-- snoozy (bunny@northsound.net), November 20, 2001.

Stacey, I agree with you on the price of soap. I am new to this so I am slowly trying different things. I do grind my own four and bake bread. I don't know exactly how much cheaper it is (if any) but it does taste better and the pleasure of making it myself is great. I guess the same thing would be true for soap. It may not be cheaper but what is it worth knowing you made it yourself? I also plan to make candles since my husband got 3 beehives this year and we have lots (well some) wax so all I would need to buy is the wick. Try making SOMETHING homemade and see how it makes you feel. Then determine if it is worth the cost.

-- Lou Ann in KY (homes_cool@msn.com), November 20, 2001.

I have never attempted soap. But we haven't bought things like green beans in a store for years. I can my own vegetables and they are just better than what you get at the store. Some people think it is to time consuming but we enjoy canning. I never buy dish cloths as I can knit them very easily and they don't cost very much at all but the quality is much better. Home made bread is cheaper for us. I quess it is a matter of what is more economical and what has more quality. I do what I enjoy but I also like to know how to do things if I had to. RenieB

-- Irene Burt (renienorm@aol.com), November 20, 2001.

This kind of depends on what you really want. Years ago my wife and I decided that it was important to be able to be proficient at most of the skills of homesteading. But, if you "do it all" you may not have much of a life in other areas. We had animals for a couple of years in the mid-70's. We had family and friends we enjoyed traveling to visit with and haven't had critters since. We now live in a small town on a half acre lot and have a nice garden that provides all the greens, root crops, tomatoes (canned over 120 qt. this season), herbs, etc. that we need. We grow about 30 ft. row of red potatoes to have small fresh ones in early summer, but buy most from a local organic grower. I run a small repair shop and for years have bartered for vegetables, fruit, berries, meat, firewood, etc. Most of the grains, baking supplies,etc. are purchased at a local Mennonite store. Homesteading is an individual, and family lifestyle that is has no standard "form". We can perform most homesteading activities but live a life that includes many other activities. I might also add that we would never be mistaken for yuppies. :)

-- Charlie (kneedrop@triwest.net), November 21, 2001.

Unless you simply don't value your time at all there's very few things that are commonly available on the market that you can make more cheaply at home. In any honest valuation of materials and labor that goes into making just about anything it's often the labor that makes the project uneconomical from a strictly dollars and sense viewpoint. If that is to be the sole criteria in deciding whether to take on a given project then you'll be better off to simply buy your bread, soap, canned goods, and so on at the store and not bother to make them yourself.

If that's not to be the sole criteria then the situation may change considerably. Certainly we don't want to spend more than we have to in making something but there are other criteria that can be equally or more important than just cost alone which will make doing the project worthwhile.

For what it cost me in time and materials to keep hens I could buy both my eggs and fertilizer cheaper from the store but then I'd be eating factory eggs that quite literally pale in comparison to the eggs my hens produce. I'd also have to go get the fertilizer and spread it myself rather than allowing the poultry to just do what comes natural and moving the henyard every couple of weeks when they've deposited enough manure to suit my purposes. There's also the general feeling of satisfaction I feel in doing it myself. Long-term I'm even working on producing all of their feed as well.

Money is important but it's not necessarily the most important factor in a decision to do or not do a given project.

={(Oak)-

-- Live Oak (live-oak@atlantic.net), November 21, 2001.

I make my own bread for 30 cents a loaf, which IS cheaper than the supermarkets! Don't buy the bread mixes: just mix 3 cups of flour (all-purpose is fine), 1-2 tsp yeast, 1 HEAPING tsp salt, and about 1 cup water. knead about 20 minutes (in front of the TV is fine!) let it double in size and knead 5 minutes. Put it in a large bread pan, let it rise again and bake it!

Your biggest savings is in what your family DOESN'T eat! My kids always want snacks when they come in from school, and they will choose to eat hot bread over junk food more often than not!

If you add sugar and raisins you get raisin bread, if you roll it out thin you have pizza dough to use up all those leftover meats, green peppers, or whatever; if you roll it thin you can dribble butter on it, sprinkle generously with brown sugar and cinnamon, roll it up and slice for sweet rolls, put it in a shallow pan sprinkled with more brown sugar and cinnamon, rise and bake; or get whole wheat berries from the health food store, soak 1 fistfull in the 1 cup of water you will be using for the bread, run it through a blender to crack the wheat and use it for cracked wheat bread. Add a little more water, as always if the dough seems dry: the grain will have soaked some of the water up. If you buy the WHITE, PASTRY type wheat it will be mild like white bread but INFINITELY better for you!

I have a bread maker now, which means we can have hot bread in the morning now, which is good because my family doesn't like it nearly as well the next day, and that leaves the entire day for the leftovers to disapear!

-- terri (hooperterri@prodigy.net), November 21, 2001.

I liked Live Oak's description.

It's the holistic nature of doing some things for yourself that I feel prods people on. IE: it's not just the eggs, but it's better eggs and free manure, etc..

I've not yet gardened at new glorious hovel. Nor have I gotten my goats. The sweet puppy dogs and the pretty goldfish give back in psychological ways but not in monetary ways. Well..I take that back. I use the water from the fish tank to water my plants [indoors and out weather permitting]. It's the best fertiliser. And free.

I get some store bought things with my buying club. The canned soups and veggies I use. But, I would not buy them myself. I make a lot of soups myself. But, who am I to turn down a couple of cans thrown into my parcels.

The breads, from the food club, I give away to a neighbor. I work in a bakery reknowned for their breads. I have a breadmaker..but why bother!

Once I get a garden up and running..and get into freezing and canning, I could live very easily without ever getting into my car to drive somewhere. Moving from the woods to a village location was a wise choice for me. With my little parcel to nurture and all the services I might need within walking distance I'm set till I'm ninety.

I'll buy things I cannot make. I'll buy things I don't want to make..within reason. I will not travel an hour away to do grocery shopping, like many people here do. But, I will walk to the store occasionally to get a bag of chips. :-)

-- pc (jasper2@doglover.com), November 21, 2001.

Some of us would rather muck out a barn or do almost anything rather than go shopping. I went to the mall with my Mother who lives in the city. I felt like Dorothy in Oz. I have made all of my daughter's clothes since she was born. I also make almost all of my own(ok, Goodwill has some cute stuff!). It is time consuming, but the quality is so much better. You can't begin to compare homemade garments to storebought. I made my husband a shirt out of thick flannel. The flannel cost 2 dollars a yard on sale at the end of the season. The same shirt would have cost 20 or 30 dollars to get one of the same weight flannel. He has worn the thing for several years now and the ones that we bought back then have shredded by now. Who can compare a homemade quilt or blanket to a storebought? Somethings just don't have a counterpart in the store. The quilts that I see in the stores are made with cheap materials, huge stitching, and wouldn't last very long with a couple of teenaged boys. The denim quilts that I have made for their beds could have double duty as a military tank cover. They are about 10 years old and have only faded slightly over the years. Not a tear or sign of wear anywhere on them.

We can all of our own veggies and fruits. We know what goes in the jars and the kids think that it tastes better. They wanted to know what that runny yellow stuff was at the buffet in town. I laughed because it was just applesauce. I lost on my applesauce at the fair because they said...of all the nerve..heehee...that it was supposed to move in the jar. Who can begin to compare the taste of homegrown strawberry freezer jam with storebought stuff? I also agree with the storebought bread! YUCK! I used to sell sourdough bread at the farmer's market. I made 40 loaves for about 8 dollars or less and sold them for 2.50 a loaf. I don't count the cost of eggs because we have chickens, but that wouldn't be that much more. And chickens...well, they are just plain wonderful little animals. I agree with whoever said that those pale egg things in the store are not nearly as good. and I just plain like watching them. Also much cheaper to butcher our own beef! You get the t-bones that way too!

So it all depends on what you like to do. I don't pretend to believe that everyone is like most of the people on this forum. We are different, but at least we are different together, right? As my neighbor around the corner says when I go get the milk from his dairy,".....my time aint worth much! Especially if you enjoy what you are doing! If I hated it, I think that my time would be worth a whole lot more!"

-- Nan (davidl41@ipa.net), November 25, 2001.

we try and eat organically as much as possible. for a good loaf of non-organic wheat bread, like brownberry (I am a snob...i think if you eat white bread, you may as well eat cardboard...no nutritional value...and you eat ONLY for the nutrients first) up here is about $2.50 a loaf. I get a bag of whole wheat organic flour grown and raised in Minnesota (next state over) for $17 for 50#. One batch of bread, I make 4 loaves. Two branches of bread/8 loaves, would be the cost of 8 store-bought, less nutritional, and mushier loaves. Plus, I have TONS of flour left! literally 40 pounds or so! so it is a better, healthier value. plus, the house smells so good, and kneading bread is better than prozac for stress/depression (okay, maybe not really, but it has that effect upon me.).

soap: we make a batch a year, and don't use a lot of it. it is cheaper, and I know what I put in it. plus soap and bread make great little presents when you go to someone's house. I have never even thought of selling it until recently, and think I'll make goat milk soap for the farmer's market nearby (and take one of the kids along for the folks to see and pet)...

however, making this stuff takes time and should be a pleasure. we make lip balm, all our own tinctures, salves, etc. but we buy when we want to, no guilt, and a treat. some day i would love to provide most of our stuff, and am getting there.

we do it for the love of it as well as knowing what goes into it. it makes you appreciate it all so much more!

-- marcee (thathope@mwt.net), November 25, 2001.

I think the happiest moments of my life have been when we could say that everything on our table had been made, grown, or bartered for by us. Being self-sufficent isn't a bad way to go and granted you can't do it all at once but just a little at a time will surprise you over the span of say a year. Just think about this wouldn't you rather know what goes into what you put in your mouth, It is a whole lot safer then not knowing. In todays world I would rather know then not. Sally

-- (mallardhen67@hotmail.com), November 26, 2001.

People shouldn't feel guilty about saving money by buying rather than making, though, if they are saving towards an end. If the money you save is going to make you more self-reliant by paying off your home or your property, for instance, then that's a good thing - even if it does mean buying end-of-day specials on white tissue bread at 50¢ a loaf; or generic house-brand soap at six cakes for a dollar. Or maybe you're saving for a vehicle, so you can move out where land is cheaper, and still get to work. Granted, what you could make yourself may be better, but hosting a mortgage-burning would be even better; and THEN you could afford to selectively do-it-yourself.

People had a point, though, when they said you've got to enjoy it. Fact is, if you don't, you'd be better off "hiring it done", and doing something you enjoyed with the time saved. The one thing you most have a shortage of is minutes in your life, so you owe it to yourself (and your God) to use them well. Wasting them in something that is just drudgery to you is NOT a good use of the time you have. If it IS just drudgery then you need to rethink. Either realise that it's a step towards accomplishing something else, and enjoy it in that light; or stop wasting your time if what you don't enjoy doing isn't getting you anywhere you want to be.

-- Don Armstrong (darmst@yahoo.com.au), November 26, 2001.