Small Scale Life

Welcome to the Small Scale Life Podcast! I like to call it the “Half Hour Happy Hour,” and today is no different! I am usually selling Good Vibes to the audience, and I hope this episode inspires you to make a difference in your neighborhood and community. After all, our time on this earth is limited. It’s your life; do something positive with it! I am going to talk about some people doing positive things in their community, and I am going to talk about a new project and direction for the Small Scale Gardening project. Topics in this podcast episode include the following: Introduction Thank you, Lifers, and Member of the Month It’s Your Life: Do Something Positive Examples of People Doing Good Things Small Scale Gardening: Growing Skills, Growing People Next Steps Your Turn: Challenge Yourself For more information and links, check the show notes in the article titled: smallscalelife.com/do-something-positive.

As promised earlier this week, I am following up on my last podcast episode covering How to Extend My Garden Season. If you can tell from the title of this episode, I had some big failures and learned some valuable gardening lessons last Friday night and Saturday morning. In this episode, I am going to talk about the 6 Lessons Learned from the End of My 2019 Garden Season, and hopefully you will pick up a thing or two that you can use in your own garden! You can find out more at smallscalelife.com (https://smallscalelife.com) including show notes, pictures, infographics and my previous post titled "Frost is Coming: How to Extend My Garden Season" that is effectively Part 1 of this episode! (https://www.smallscalelife.com/how-to-extend-my-garden-season/)

Well, my gardening friends, they say "all good things must come to an end."  My question is: do they have to come to an end this early?  Frost is coming this weekend, and I don’t want the party to end.  I am wondering how to extend my garden season?  Should I try to push the limits and test my luck a bit longer? I know what you hardened and veteran gardeners are saying: “Don’t stop now; keep growing!” I know exactly how you feel!  I am feeling that way too! The problem comes into how I set up the garden this year with vine crops on trellis systems.  Is the juice worth the squeeze for keeping these plants going? Frost is coming, folks! You can’t stop it; you can just prepare.  I know others are wondering how to extend my garden season, so let’s dig into how we can do just that. For about methods to extend your gardening season, check out the post on smallscalelife.com!

Successful events and failed events do not just happen.  The success or complete failure is set in motion long before the actual event.  This past weekend, my family, Julie and I experienced both.  I am going to tell a tale of those two events and give you 10 Tips to Successfully Plan and Host an Event.  By following these tips, I think you will be well equipped to successfully plan and host your own event! For show notes, links and the 10 Tips for How to Successfully Plan and Host an Event InfoGraphic, please go to the Small Scale Life article titled "10 Tips to Successfully Plan and Host an Event." (https://www.smallscalelife.com/how-to-successfully-plan-and-host-an-event)

In this episode, I discuss a great Fall Equinox weekend including: Danny and David's Toughest Mudder Race in Dallas, TX; Exploring River Falls, WI; Canning and preserving the harvest from my garden; A very special and powerful lantern lighting ceremony at Lakewood Cemetery in Minneapolis, MN; Celebrating the Fall Equinox with a "Domres Special" Dinner; Happy Half Hour - Being Positive and Inspiring you to Learn, Do, Grow and Be a Little Better Everyday; Canning and Preservation Links on Small Scale Life; What's coming next on Small Scale Life! For all the links and show notes for this podcast, please go to Small Scale Life and see the article posted Happy Fall Equinox 2019 posted there. (https://www.smallscalelife.com)

How does a company grow 1 million meals in a place with incredibly high temperatures in the summer and cold temperatures in the winter? On top of that, this company has no tillable soil, no heavy farm equipment (i.e., traditional tractors or combines) and only asphalt and concrete to grow food. In addition, this company needs to move garden beds for new attractions and exhibits, so these raised beds need to be mobile. Impossible, you say? It is not only possible, it is happening right now in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. In fact, it is happening at the State Fair of Texas while the fair is happening! In this episode, I sit down with Drew Demler from Big Tex Urban Farms and discuss various aquaponic systems and mobile garden beds used to grow 1 million meals for the Dallas-Fort Worth area. We cover a lot of topics including who Drew Demler is, what kind of aquaponic systems are used, pests, fertilizers, wicking beds and small aquaponic systems you can set up at your own home. Big Tex Urban Farms has a focu

In last week's News from Around the Bend on smallscalelife.com (https://www.smallscalelife.com/news-from-around-the-bend-back-to-school-edition/), I opened the article by talking about kids going back to school. In some cases, our friends are taking their young adults to college for the first time. Julie and I have been there and done that. After all, both of our boys left our house and went to the US Army (Danny) or college (Ryan). We just took Ryan back to Winona, Minnesota, for the next phase of his college career. Whether you are taking your young adult to college for the first time, to kindergarten for the first time or sending your child to school for another round, we all have feelings of excitement, nervousness and doubt. Why do we feel this way and what can you do about it? In this podcast, I am mainly going to focus on young adults going back to school or heading off to college for the first time. A friend is feeling that sense of loss and depression after sending his son to college several st

In this episode, I am trying something new! This is the pilot episode of the new Small Scale Gardening Podcast. In this podcast, I am focusing on gardening and food preservation, which are my passions. As I learned from my good friend Greg Burns, I need to "Start with the Why" as I begin this effort. I talk about the following topics in this podcast including: Why I started blogging, podcasting and vlogging in the first place Our elders and their knowledge and experience Important Questions: Why start this podcast? Why split it out from Small Scale Life? What do you hope to accomplish? Check yourself before you wreck yourself.... Goals and objectives The future: interviews and garden tours; livestreaming on YouTube Call to Action This podcast will be hosted on Small Scale Life, and I will also provide links on Small Scale Gardening. Let's learn, do, and grow together! Special thanks to Hyde Free Instrumentals for the Acoustic Folk Instrumental. For more information, please see the following: Acoustic/F

July was a great month full of time spent with family and friends. We need to be part of our community and strengthening existing relationships while making new ones. It isn't always about the money; it's about building social capital! This is a Just Tom Show while I am on the road from Duluth, MN, to Minneapolis, MN. As I worked on the shores of the great Lake Giche Gume (Lake Superior for everyone not in Minnesota), I had time to reflect on July. We had a great time with family at our house and on the road in Stevens Point, Kimball and northern Wisconsin. It helped that we have a lot of July birthdays; that translates into family celebrations! Family can be hard to love at times, but as my dad said, "Blood is thicker than water." We have been working hard to build up those family relationships. At the same time, July has been a month of friendship. We are thankful to spend time with our good friends and make some new friends along the way! Friends have invited us over, and we have opened our house t

In this podcast, Julie and I talk about How to Budget Your Way to Financial Freedom. We unpack the 9 Steps to Creating Your First Budget (with an additional bonus step at the end). This is the podcast you have been waiting for! After recording this podcast, Julie and I realized that there was a lot to this topic. Budgeting so important to your future success, but creating your first budget can be overwhelming and stressful. Julie and I have done a lot of thinking about how to present this material and share our process with you. To help you with successfully creating your first budget, Julie and I decided to create and release a Quickie Monthly Budget rather than a complicated spreadsheet. We want you to try this method of budgeting in a simple and easy to follow format. As part of Creating Your First Budget Week, Julie and I will be releasing a Quickie Monthly Budget with instructions on Wednesday this week at smallscalelife.com. We will have a special page dedicated to this Quickie Monthly Budget

"Your goal is your destination; your budget is your roadmap." - Julie Domres Do you have dreams and goals? Are you making progress towards achieving those goals? For some people, it is difficult to dream. Others have big plans and goals, but they do not execute and take steps towards making those dreams a future reality. In this podcast, Julie and I discuss How to Dream Big, Set Goals and Take Steps to Achieve Them. Dreaming big and setting those goals are the "Secret Sauce" behind budgeting. You are developing powerful "whys" for those times when you are tempted to engage in retail therapy, splurge on meals or rack up massive credit card debt to impress people you don't particularly like! As we discuss in this podcast, you need to start with your powerful why. Before you begin budgeting, you need to do some deep thinking and dreaming about what you want your life to look like in 10 years, 3 years and 1 year. Once you have this vision set, you can focus on developing your budget that will set you

Have you ever thought you were climbing a mountain? Huge obstacles in life take on different forms and shapes. They can be finances, health issues, clutter, relationships, work or just life in general! Those obstacles have a tendency to start as molehills and become mountains. Many times, we do not put those mountains in our lives on purpose; they just seem to happen. What happens when we do put those mountains in front of us on purpose? Last weekend, Julie, Savannah, the Old Trapper and I got to witness what happens when 110 souls put running up and then down a mountain that they put in their life on purpose. We witnessed these 110 runners competing in the Last Runner Standing Ultramarathon where these athletes truly began climbing mountains with mindset, heart and dedication! In this post and podcast, I will discuss the following topics: What is an Ultramarathon? What is the Last Runner Standing Ultramarathon? The Ultramarathon Community Winners Running the Last Runner Standing Ultramarathon – In their Own

Last week, the gardening world and I got some sad news that made me think about leaving a legacy. Larry Hall passed away. For those of you who do not know who Larry Hall is, he is the creator of the Rain Gutter Grow System that I have experimented with in the past (and will be experimenting with this year). Larry was from Brainerd, Minnesota, and he created a low-cost way for people to successfully grow food no matter where they lived. We are all going to die someday. It might be today, tomorrow or years in the future. We don’t know when, where or how. We can’t stop it, and it is part of the life cycle. Knowing this, the question is: how are you leaving a legacy for those who come behind you (future generations of your children and grandchildren)? For the transcript of the article and lots of links, see the show notes in the article titled "Leaving a Legacy - A Tribute to Larry Hall" on smallscalelife.com. (https://www.smallscalelife.com/leaving-a-legacy-tribute-to-larry-hall/)

In this episode of the Small Scale Life Podcast, Julie and I discuss taking the first steps towards Financial Freedom. To do this, you need to start by Taking Inventory and Tracking Expenses. In previous episodes of the Small Scale Life Podcast, Julie and I have told our story about making mistakes and doing stupid with zeros on it. In order to break out of the box and go from Survive to Thrive, we needed to change our habits and our mindset. To start down this path, you need to get a clear picture of what your net worth looks like. Are you in the red or in the black? Do you know? Julie and I have prepared an inventory worksheet for you, and it is available on the Small Scale Life Resources Page. (https://www.smallscalelife.com/resources/) Once you complete this exercise, you can begin tracking ALL of your expenses. You can do this by writing it down in a notebook or using apps like mint.com (https://www.mint.com/). For show notes and more information, head on over to the article titled Financial Fr

In this episode of the Small Scale Life Podcast, I discuss a great Mother's Day Weekend with a full house. There was a lot of family and community building last week, and there is a big garden update as well. It's another action-packed episode of the Small Scale Life Podcast! I discuss the following topics in this episode: Happy Mother's Day 2019! Great Mother's Day Meal About Last Week....Community Building Social Events Garden Update....World War III Lesson of the Week For more information, check out the post titled "Happy Mother's Day 2019" at https://smallscalelife.com!

When a day starts out wrong and poorly, you might need to call in the experts to help out! In this Bonus Episode of the Small Scale Life Podcast, I talk about how my Friday started off wrong and went sideways in a hurry. When your YouTube University experience turns out to be a Pinterest Fail, you need to call in the experts to put it all back together again. It almost set the tone for the whole weekend, but I was able to recover while completing one of my favorite inspection tours on a gorgeous day! It's Western Wisconsin; it's sunny; it was awesome! At the same time, it was a great week at Small Scale Life. We got a great podcast posted, a newsletter (two actually) sent out and News from Around the Bend posted. What more could you want? Actually, it was even better than that....Julie and I are up to something good, and you will have to listen to find out what is happening! For more Small Scale Life, head over to the website for the following articles and links: **Sign up for the Small Scale Life Newsl

Julie and I are on vacation and podcasting on location! In this episode, Julie and I discuss our journey towards financial freedom. We talk about the good, the bad and the ugly, and we hope to inspire you as you begin or continue on your own journey! For show notes and more resources, check out the article titled Our Journey towards Financial Freedom on Small Scale Life!

In today's podcast, I talk about a number of subjects including the following: Wishing listeners and the Lifer community a Happy Easter! Weekend 3 Things on the Small Scale Life Facebook Group Working through our busy week Gardening and Demo Day of the old raised beds Starting to build community online and in person! Remember: * Start small where you are and start with a couple people. * Over time, develop 5 close friends that have your back, and you have theirs. * Develop and Abundance Mindset. For more information, check out the article titled "Starting to Build Community" at smallscalelife.com.

Even with the snow falling and wind howling today, it is Gardening Season! What did the story at the start of the podcast have to do with today's topic? Well, in today's podcast, I am circling back around to a discussion I had with Michael Bell about a new garden planting concept that some of us are experimenting with this year. We call Soup Gardening! What is Soup Gardening? That is the topic of today's show, so stay tuned! For a lot more information on this podcast, check out the article titled "Soup Gardening with Michael Bell" on Small Scale Life! (https://www.smallscalelife.com/soup-gardening/)

In this 136th voyage of the Small Scale Life Podcast, Julie and I hit the road and record a podcast. We are kicking off the Quarter 2 Renew You: Introction to Financial Freedom! Money is a tool, and having enough money can help you develop that life you love. Not having that enough money tends to lead to poor decisions, stress and relationship problems with your significant other. Americans have had a love affair with debt: we take loans for our houses, our cars, our cell phones, and buy lots of stuff using credit cards. We live in a country that borrows from future generations to build and repair roads, pay for benefits, conquer nations and protect the world. It is amazing that our money says "In God We Trust," yet we put all of our trust in banks and credit card companies. Getting a hold of our finances and debt is a critical first step in taking control of our lives and starting to develop a life we love. This is a huge realization we had this year, especially with a record-setting Government Sh