30-40 minute presentations with 5-10 minute Q&A
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A Culture of Healing— Meeting the Challenges of Special Needs Children in the Context of Community
36b Amanda Lancaster, lifetime member of Homestead Heritage and home-schooling mother of an autistic child, and Kay Toombs, a wheelchair user who has lived over half her life with M.S., share their experience and explore how an integrated community life can bring wholeness, meaning and healing, not only to specialneeds children and persons who live with disability, but to us all.
Schedule: Friday & Saturday at 12:00
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Aquaponics in the Greenhouse
20 Aquaponics, as we know it today, is a new and perhaps novel method of food production that has piqued the interest of many people. In this seminar we will present an overview and explain some of the benefits and drawbacks of an aquaponics food production system. We will also consider its place on the family homestead.
Schedule: Friday & Saturday at 1:00
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Basic Soap Making
4 Discover how to create creamy homemade soap in your own kitchen. We will introduce the basics of soap making with a few simple ingredients.
Schedule: Friday & Saturday at 2:00
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Beekeeping Seminar
20 A seminar on the need for keeping bees as an essential part of a homestead, as a source for both honey and pollination.
Schedule: Friday & Saturday at 2:00
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Bread Making
4 An inspiring seminar on the ease of baking bread from whole grains-in your own kitchen, using utensils and ingredients you already have.
Schedule: Friday & Saturday at 10:00
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Building a Child’s Character
36b A discussion of the interfacing relationship between education and child rearing, home-schooling mother and advisor Amanda Lancaster shares practical advice on how to use the “windows” of opportunity in a child’s learning and development to build their character as well as to teach academic skills. She will include a brief presentation on how to use the Building Christian Character curriculum for both child training and education.
Schedule: Friday & Saturday at 11:00
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Changing Our Minds – The Impact of Digital Technology
36a Each year there is an exponential increase in the availability of digital technology (internet, smart phones, tablets). We will share research on how these technologies are changing the way we think and radically altering our relationship with nature, with reality and with each other, and consider the effects of this unprecedented change on the lives of the young and on our efforts to build sustainable, caring communities.
Schedule: Friday & Saturday at 11:00
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Cheese Making — Mozzarella
4 Watch a gallon of milk become mozzarella in this one-hour session as you learn what it takes to make your own soft and hard cheeses at home, with either cow or goat milk.
Schedule: Friday & Saturday at 1:00
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Cheese Making — Yogurt
13 Watch a gallon of milk become mozzarella in this one-hour session as you learn what it takes to make your own soft and hard cheeses at home, with either cow or goat milk.
Schedule: Friday & Saturday at 10:00
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Cheese Making Seminar — Mozzarella
13 Watch a gallon of milk become mozzarella in this one-hour session as you learn what it takes to make your own soft and hard cheeses at home, with either cow or goat milk.
Schedule: Friday & Saturday at 4:00
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Collecting and Storing Water for the Small Homestead
20 An introduction to sustainable water essentials for the homestead and small farm with an emphasis on collecting bulk water, rainwater catchment, water storage and water delivery. Topics will include calculating the water needs of the homestead and how to determine available rainwater according to specific locations.
Schedule: Friday & Saturday at 4:00
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Creative Writing Workshop
36b Find your own buried talents in writing by taking this one-and-a-half hour class and seminar. Discover how modern technology has altered our perspective towards research, study and communication, both written and verbal.
Schedule: Friday & Saturday at 1:00
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Food Sustainability — GMO versus Heirloom Seeds
4 Learn what is happening to thousands of seed varieties from recent generations, the importance of seed saving and how to save seed from your own family garden.
Schedule: Friday & Saturday at 12:00
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Getting Started with Poultry
20 Raising chickens and other poultry is an important step for the family homestead or small farm. In this seminar, we'll discuss some of the basics and what it takes to get started.
Schedule: Friday & Saturday at 12:00
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How to Improve and Perpetuate Your Flock
4 Chickens are remarkable. They produce fresh food in family-sized portions, both meat and eggs. They’re adaptable to a wide range of climates and varied purposes. Their manure, properly managed, can build your land’s soil fertility. They’re excellent foragers. And they’re easy take care of. Once you’ve begun raising a flock and have mastered the basics, you can learn how to improve and perpetuate your flock. In this seminar, we’ll discuss these things and how they can come together on your small farm or family homestead.
Schedule: Friday & Saturday at 5:00
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Industrialism and the Question of Sustainability
36a Beginning with the banking revolution of the early 1700’s, this seminar reviews the major historic developments of the modern industrial era. It will then present steps that everyone can take to achieve a practical, sustainable alternative model.
Schedule: Friday & Saturday at 12:00
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Keeping Your Laying Flock Productive
12 In this workshop, we'll explore how to raise and maintain a productive egg laying flock. Among other things, we'll discuss care, raising replacement layers, culling and the question of: How do I know which hens are laying well and which ones aren't?
Schedule: Friday & Saturday at 4:00
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Lacto-Fermentation
4 An introduction to making your own lacto-fermented foods, such as sauerkraut, as a means of food preservation that provides naturally occurring health benefits.
Schedule: Friday & Saturday at 4:00
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Nonviolence: A Challenge to Today’s Christianity
36a The Homestead community traces its spiritual roots back to the heavily persecuted, yet nonviolent and peace-loving, Anabaptist movement begun in the 1500’s. What is the perspective that has caused these reformers to tenaciously reject all forms of violence for over 500 years, and how might this perspective be still relevant today? Drawn mainly from Blair Adams’s book, Nonviolence: A Challenge to Today’s Christianity, this seminar will discuss how and why the issues of violence and nonviolence still present crucial questions for the serious Christian—questions that ultimately reach to the core of the Christian faith.
Schedule: Friday & Saturday at 1:00
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Purifying Water Using Sustainable Methods
20 This seminar continues the introduction to sustainable water essentials with an emphasis on water purification. Methods covered include the slow sand filter, ozonation powered by solar energy, boiling, distillation and pasteurization. A functioning slow sand filter which provides 200 gallons of pure water per day is on display.
Schedule: Friday & Saturday at 5:00
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Questions & Answers on Christian Community
36b Join members of the Homestead Heritage community for a highly interactive question-and-answer session about their way of life. This open forum will be hosted by a diverse and cross-generational panel featuring long-time members of the community as well as those who have just recently joined. Bring your questions!
Schedule: Friday & Saturday at 4:00
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Sourdough Bread Making
4 Come learn the particular steps in baking sourdough bread from your own kitchen with your own utensils and ingredients.
Schedule: Friday & Saturday at 11:00
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Starting a Family Homestead? — The Necessity of Proper Farm Design and Planning
20 The desire to have a small family farm or homestead is a desire that many folks have today. Although many have a desire, unfortunately, most people in today’s culture do not have much of the knowledge or many of the skills necessary to bring their dream to reality. In this seminar, we will present an overview of the vital steps that will help you realize your dream, and show how you can establish and develop a beautiful, productive and sustainable family homestead or small farm.
Schedule: Friday & Saturday at 11:00
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Struggling for a Culture of Life — Can Intentional Community Succeed?
36a An increasing number of individuals and families have expressed the desire to return to a simpler and more self-sufficient way of life. But they face the historic reality that the vast majority of such efforts have failed. To be successful, where might such a shift begin, and what will it require? Based on the book Life Against Death by Blair Adams, this seminar points to the key attributes of close-knit, cooperative communities in the rebuilding of a truly sustainable culture—one that will stand the test of time.
Schedule: Friday & Saturday at 10:00
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Sustainable Gardening
20 An introduction to producing your own healthy food in your own backyard or on your own farm, naturally and sustainably.
Schedule: Friday & Saturday at 10:00
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The Challenge of Feeding Your Family
4 Why would anyone want to go through the trouble to raise chickens, milk cows and goats, and grow a garden when milk can be conveniently delivered to your door for $1.98 per gallon, boneless, skinless chicken breast for $1.99, and a pound of green beans for $1.28 per pound. We’ll explore some of the motivations to take your first steps outside the industrial food chain and grow your own food.
Schedule: Friday & Saturday at 3:00