Making a living...
Frugal living
More ideas.....
Childcare -our daughter is a nanny in a small neighboring town.
Other options could include snow removal, firewood cutting and delivery, yard work, pet sitting, pet boarding, house sitting or watching someone's home while they are gone for the winter....just remember that these options are typically low in pay but are not as demanding as a steady job leaving you with enough time to work around your homestead.
Selling your excess eggs from a backyard chicken flock many times earns enough to pay for the feeding of the flock. Especially if you have brown egg laying hens or Araucauna hens which lay eggs that very in color including blues or greens. There also seems to be a demand for eggs from free-range hens.
If you are good at what you do, a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) is a good idea and can be successful and very rewarding. To get an idea on them check out
Also, one important thing you can do before you move to the homestead is educate yourself! In as many aspects of it as you can. One of the best ways to see to it that you have work from your homestead is to get medical training of some kind. There is demand for many different positions in the medical field, from CNA (Certified Nursing Assistant) and Phlebotomy to other more advanced (and demanding) levels of medical care. Just remember a couple of things about all this: 1: Don't expect the higher pay you would receive by staying in the city; and 2: Try as as much as possible to get as debt free as possible. The more debt free you are and the more marketable skills you have, the more assured you are to succeed in these rural areas where it is notoriously difficult to make a living.
Also be aware that there are many schemes and scams just waiting for desperate homesteaders to fall for. When people come from the city unprepared, they often end up falling for these scams and lose everything in the process. Sad to say, but true. I'm not writing this to scare you out of your dreams or ideas on homesteading, just to warn you to be as prepared as you can.
You'll find more on preparation on the Homesteading page.