My holiday project is to build a sovereign node stack from the ground up, doing it all myself and not using a prebuilt package like Umbrel or Raspiblitz. I am not an software engineer, the first time i ever used command line was on my first Bitcoin node. I've installed the server version of Ubuntu on a Del Optiplex, downloaded and verified Bitcoin Core and am now in the middle of IBD. I'm following @k3tan Ministry of Nodes Ubuntu video series guide. My goal is to learn some new skills, set up a Lightning node and learn first hand now all the core tools and applications of Bitcoin work. So far so good!