Our land is home to us two, two part-time working dogs, a ginger cat, 30 odd beehives, anything from 20-80 chickens and a flock of wiltshire sheep. Our purpose with our land is to (eventually) be as self-sufficient as possible, and to generate some income from our surplus to fund future developments. Homesteading for me began before owning land. It began in my grandmother's kitchen on an island off the coast of Scotland, watching her preserve on her Aga, the buckets of cockles we had spent the evening collecting. It began when my mother would buy seasonal produce in bulk and make huge batches of marmalade and pickled beetroot in our house in the city. It grew when I moved to New Zealand and realised the cost of groceries.