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I've been a member far too long to have a good excuse for never having listed my cook books; I've been lurking along the edges. Now maybe I'll get started! I (with my husband) live on a 5-acre smallholding and we raise most of our veggies, all our checken and eggs, pork, and beef. Our food is often shared with our grown children and their families. So I preserve a lot of what we grow and cook a great deal from scratch. I am a culinary and food historian and currently teach canning, bread baking, gardening, and raising and butchering small livestock. Having lost one large cookbook collection to fire I have collected more since 2001. I like books that emphasize primary ingresients as I buy very little ready made items (eg. I make our own mustards from seeds, all our bread, mayonnaise, pickles).

Welcome, Leni. I applaud your self-sufficient life-style. I would take your canning classes if I live close by.

I would take your canning classes too.

Sounds like you keep very busy!

I've done a little water bath canning but being only myself and a grown son I don't do much of it. My mother canned a lot when I was a kid and we had a big garden. Last year my sister started doing a lot of canning. My mother has recently started back to doing a little bit of canning with my sister. Mom downsized a few years ago and doesn't have the freezer space she used to. Last week she made soup and canned most of it. It's impossible to make a small amount of homemade soup :)

Welcome, Leni! (and greetings from just over the mountain and down the road a bit). 

Do get those books entered! Poking around in members' Bookshelves is some of the best fun here.

Deeply impressed by the scale of your from-scratch-ness.  Did you cook all the way through The Virginia Housewife?