My Fall Projects Article Just Hit Newsstands

By Ceci Ellis

Cover, and byline

A couple of weeks ago, an envelope of author copies showed up, and it took me a second to place them. Turns out I had good reason: the piece originally ran in Issue 13 of Backwoods Survival Guide back in 2021, and they reran it for Issue 39. I'd genuinely forgotten it existed until it landed on my doorstep five years later.

This magazine is broken into "chapters." Chapter One is all about being outdoors: survival skills, taking care of nature, and the like. Chapter Two is all about homesteading: gardening, seasonal projects, and so on. Chapter Three covers various DIY projects, things like making mead and leather crafting. Chapter Four is essentially a gear guide, reviewing products essential to homesteading and survival.

Backwoods Survival Guide Issue 39 is on newsstands coast to coast this week, and my piece runs on page 47 in Chapter Two, Homesteading, under the title “Fall Projects: Get 'Em Done While You Still Can.”

The article walks through everything from putting up the last of the harvest and trying your hand at home brewing to prepping the wood-stove and chimney for winter, plus garlic and onions, both of which you plant now and won’t see any payoff from until spring.

Rereading it now, five years later, there's no single part of the article I'd point you toward as the highlight. Freelance writing works like that sometimes: you write something, move on, and forget it exists so completely that it can show back up years later and genuinely surprise you. That said, I'm just proud the whole thing exists in print, with my name on it, twice.

If you want to read the entire article and more, Backwoods Survival Guide is carried at most magazine retailers, look for it on the shelf.