How Does This Appalachian Couple Use Their Sawmill for Homesteading?

Jonathan and Katie say they're using their Woodland Mills portable sawmill to build their home and a new schoolhouse for their kids

Though Katie and Jonathan have a popular homesteading social media following, going by the name Rosehips Rewritten on Instagram, they don't necessarily view themselves as homesteaders. 

"In southern Appalachia homesteading is such a trending topic right now, but I don't see us as homesteaders. It's just a way of life where we live," says Katie, who chatted with Woodland Mills about how her and her husband's HM126 Portable Sawmill has helped them build up their home.

Katie points to some of the beams in the home they're building and says those were cants milled by Jonathan on their sawmill. Jonathan says his next big project will be a little schoolhouse for Katie and the kids.

Their property is a little slice of nature, where hard work meets the natural beauty of the land. And now they're able to use their own lumber to continue to grow their ambitions.

How it Started

The couple had built their first home together in their early 20s in 2018. They'd just had their first child and home prices had skyrocketed, so they chose to sell and live with family under the hopes of building a new homestead.

While Katie says it's popular for people to leave the city and move to the country to do homesteading, in southern Appalachia, everyone raises chickens and grows vegetables. So when they were building up their new homestead she started sharing videos of it on social media.

"It's a way of life, we're just living and a lot of people really long for that slow living, homesteading I guess you would call that," says Katie.

To support that the couple bought a Woodland Mills HM126, and found it was a great tool for self-sufficiency. They've used it to make everything from their bedroom set to jewelry boxes to the posts for their home they're currently building.

Katie says it may not have been obvious to them at first that a sawmill would make a great homesteading tool but now it just makes so much sense.

"If you're wanting to build a barn or a chicken pen or anything, it's at your hands. It's nothing but air and opportunity then, and it's a lot easier than people think," she says.

Making a Profit

But Jonathan's ambition doesn't just end at supporting the growth of their own property, he wants to start milling cants and selling them to make money.

"I want to start selling those because a lot of people are wanting them," he says.

Now that he runs his own sawmill it's become clear how easy and fast it is to mill a cant, he says. Yet other sawmill owners nearby are charging in excess of $1,000 for cants in his area and people are paying for them.

His plan is to start milling cants and charging far less to rake in profit.

"It would be pretty lucrative for me as a side thing," he adds.

What comes next?

On top of finishing the house, Jonathan has eyes on his next project: building a homeschool for Katie and the kids.

It will be a fairly small building, roughly 12' x 16', but it will be a cozy space for the kids to be taught while continuing to live off their land. It helps too that Katie's dad runs a grading business, so trees which come down from other peoples' properties are often considered waste and end up on Jonathan's mill.

It's part of the many ways Jonathan and Katie are supported by the land, and how their land supports them. And that's helped by their HM126 portable sawmill.

"It comes in handy, I've more than got my money out of it," says Jonathan.