Only salt and baking powder. Really! ​ In the spirit of full disclosure, we have some home canned goods that contain store-bought vinegar, but we have made enough vinegar to can next year's harvest. Also we will barter for a few items on occasion from friends and neighbors who directly produced food, such as honey, fish, apples, and cow's milk with cream. We are still buying animal feed and non-food items. None of us would be here if our ancestors didn't succeed at this, so we aren't trying to prove anything. We simply want to know what it is like in the only way one can truly know something - by experiencing it. We hope to increase our knowledge and skills and to pass this on. Lastly, our gratitude for what we eat will forever be greater as we are better able to appreciate what goes into every mouthful.

We both work part-time, which we have done for years. We built up our inventory working part-time, but for this year where we are grinding flour, making pasta, leaching acorns, pressing oil, etc. and documenting it, Karen took a leave from work. No, we aren't independently wealthy - this is a big deal for us. But this is another topic altogether.

We live in northeast Oklahoma.

Nope. Johnny has been gardening since he was in elementary school, but lived in a suburb of Texas. Karen grew up in western Massachusetts, and her family didn't even have a garden. We have been married for 25 years and have been adding to our homesteading and foraging skills this whole time, however.