Snow

Winter is finally here in Northern Wisconsin.

It came extremely late this year, due to El Nino, which is fine with me. The day time temps have stayed in the 20s and we got our first big snowstorm. My son and husband turned a small hill outside our front door into a sledding hill. They built a cardboard box wall to crash into.

We got to test out our lawn tractor and snow blower attachment. Our property slopes to the south so the extra parking area/turn around spot was not able to get plowed. The tractor got stuck in the heavy wet snow and had to be pulled out with the Jeep.

My son turned 3 and I made him a construction cake. He only wanted the trucks and could careless about the cake. Next year I am just going to make him a donut tower.

We had our first Christmas here too! We roasted a ham and opened gifts.

My son received a toy chainsaw which he is over the moon about. During the heavy snow storm the weight of the snow knocked down a tree onto the sledding hill and he helped my husband buck it.

I received a voucher for rifle training through the Appleseed project. I am very excited to work on my rifle skills. I would love to be able to hunt grouse.

Our tankless water heater arrived!! The home store near us does not carry the wires to install it, so still no plumbed in water. The truck stop I have been taking showers at, their hot water heater broke so I have not been able to shower there. Some friends and (brother on Christmas morning) let me use their shower!

I joined a local moms group that has a meeting and gets together for coffee and moms night out. They also do some volunteer work in the community. Its sort of weird trying to make new friends as an adult, especially if you are a stay at home mom, you really have to get out there and make it happen. I did a painting night and I really enjoyed it. The advertising said "winter landscape on barn wood" I thought it was going to be like a Bob Ross painting event. Instead the instructor wanted us to paint snowmen. I did not want to hang snow men up so I painted a pic of our home in the woods. It was a great time!

Since it's the end of the year I'm reflecting back on 2015. It was in March that my husband applied for the job transfer and got it. Then we sold half of our crap to move into a place in the woods. We totally switched our lives around to live within our means and debt free. We are moving towards more and more personal liberty. My goals for 2016 

- tap maple trees

- start small raised bed gardens 

- remove brush trees and get fruit trees in

- build outdoor pizza oven

- start focusing more on homeschool preschool

- take more personal days for just me

- find a babysitter so I can have some time with my husband

splitting wood

Heating a small home with only fire is a skill that I am constantly adjusting. I mean getting the wood stove at the perfect temp and then maintaining it. We have one of the smallest woods stoves on the market because our place is so small. (360sq.ft.) Growing up having natural gas heat I learned nothing except do not touch the thermostat or dad gets pissed off. With our stove I found I need several sizes of wood split. Small kindling to start the fire, medium logs to get it up to temp and bigger logs to maintain temp.

Also, the arrangement of the logs in the stove is just as important. You have to allow for air flow. I did not understand the concept of the damper so I had to learn about that. I did get this little stove way too hot on Thanksgiving and burned off some paint on the stove pipe and we had to open the windows because it smelled so terrible. All the wood pieces we bought are so big they will not fit in our stove. They have to be split into thirds or fifths. I also learned that these pieces of wood with knots in them totally suck to split.

I do about 75% of the splitting but the knotty chunks I leave did my husband. My back is getting really strong from splitting wood and hauling wood. My son who is 3 also thinks it's fun to pretend he is a logging truck, he has me load him up (1 log) and haul it to the saw mill (front door step). We did pick a wonderful winter to move up here. It's been very mild, consistently in the 30s for highs and just a dusting of snow so far. I must have read too many Little House on the Prairie books because I had visions of us freezing to death out here. Our sleeping area in the loft stays between 60-65 degrees. At first that was pretty cold for sleeping but I have adjusted and sleep wonderfully.

My husband used the remainder of left over boards to start the skirting along the bottom of the house. Normally you need to use skirting that is plastic or some sort of metal like on a mobile home, wood wicks up moisture. We ran out of money so we have to make due with what we have until spring when we can do it properly.

The shower is installed but not plumbed in yet. Neither of us has plumbing experience so there must be some research done before my husband starts that job. So it's still truck stop showers for me. I swear I am going to take the longest shower ever when this thing is up and running. I'm still sad about losing the bathtub. Winter is my prime bathtub reading season.

I made my first batch of soap in Wisconsin! I altered my lard/coffee recipe and added in Shea butter and some fragrance. I'm getting annoyed with the yellow color, so next batch I'm removing the palm oil. I also made peppermint beeswax lip balm. The next thing I make will be body butter. The wood stove is making it pretty dry in here.

Well part 2

The well guys came back sooner than expected. They brought in a backhoe loader to dig 6 feet down to bury the water pipe. I found out they had to drill 95 feet down before they hit water, Thank God they did not hit the granite shelf like they did over at my neighbors house. It ended up costing my neighbor a fortune and busted the drill for the well guys. The Backhoe guy was very nice and had my son go into the cab with him to help dig the trench. My son was so excited he ran over after and got his toy backhoe and dug a trench.

The water tank is in our bathroom now since we do not have a basement. We do not have anything plumbed in yet, we fill a stock pot from the tank and heat on the stove to do dishes. We have a bucket under the sink to catch gray water and dump it outside. We got rid of the rain barrels for now since its going to be winter soon. We will catch water again in the spring for garden watering. My husband wrapped insulation around the water pipe and now we have to skirt the house to help keep it from freezing and help prevent floor drafts.

The lady we bought the place from collected a ton of junk and debris under and around the house. We spent 4 hours clearing and hauling the debris away in a trailer. I know building a house creates a mess but how can you just live with chaos all around you?

We have to haul a wood pile into the woods that the lady didn't know how to stack properly and its all rotted out. I split some of it to see if it was salvageable but its all just crumbles away. We will save some of it to put in the bottom of our raised garden beds in the spring.

I took an online beginners Basic Bee keeping class. I'm very excited to work bee keeping into our homestead. I use beeswax in my home made salves and candles. I have been researching beekeeping in my area and I have not seen any local honey products at the farmers market. I did see one home with bee boxes on the side of their property while driving to town. I think they might be empty though.

Well part 1

The well has been drilled!!! But still no running water. Two rigs showed up, one had a giant drill and one had a water tank and pipes on it.

The rigs showed up around 9am and drilled and drilled and drilled until 3pm before they hit water.

My son thought it was all quite magnificent. They had to mix in some sort gel that made this gunky mud stuff that will not dry, its all over the yard. I'm not sure what to do with it. It has rained a couple of times but it won't wash away. My husband tried to scrape it up but its very heavy.

They well guys are coming back in a week to hook up the well pump and water tank. The water tank is pretty big and since we do not have a basement we had two options for tank placement. Outside and build an insulated/ heated structure around it or inside in the bathroom. The well guy thought it should for sure be inside. He said it will freeze and it will be very expensive to get a new tank. So we are going to listen to him, which means my lovely claw foot bath tub has to go and be replaced with a tiny shower. No more hot baths with Lush bath products and a glass of wine reading horror/scifi novels. I guess its better to shower at home than go to the truck stop to shower. My son loves taking baths too and giving his trucks a wash down. 

We finished laying the vinyl tiles by the front door.

The compost pit for the Humanure has been built. Its walls are built from old pallets with straw on the bottom. When the bucket is full it gets put out here to compost down. It takes about a year for everything to compost down. We also had to fence it off because my husband caught our pug in there digging around. Pugs are nasty.

Here is a link about compost humanure. http://humanurehandbook.com/hacienda.html

We are in this last ditch effort to get things done before winter settles in. Since its the upper Midwest we could be getting snow anytime. We need one more trailer load of wood, finish splitting and stacking the green wood from the five trees we had to take down, spray some insulation under the house and put up skirting as a wind break around the bottom.

Autumn

WOW! The leaves are so spectacular up here. I mean, they were nice in Minneapolis too but up here on my 5 acres I am surrounded by Maple, Birch, Oak and Poplar. When the weather is gray and a bit rainy the leaves colors are even more brilliant and stand out even more. My son and I went on a leave walk, he is almost three and I was trying to teach him some basic leaf identification, he mostly just cared about the colors.

A friend of mine gave me some equipment for harvesting sap to make maple syrup. I had to make a spray paint mark on a few of my maples so I can identify them in February or March when its time to tap them. I'm not that good at identifying trees based just on their bark yet. Wisconsin is the second largest maple syrup producer in the country, behind Vermont. Its pretty cool to go to the store and buy syrup from a place two towns away from me or be driving down the road and see signs for syrup for sale.

Our shed came too! My son was super excited to see the truck pull up and unload the shed and move it into place with a forklift.

This thing is almost the size of our house. I unloaded our temporary makeshift shed and loaded this baby up. We still need some major organization time in here to get the tools, garden tools, tree cutting tools, bikes and house storage set up.

This past weekend we took a trip back to Minneapolis for the fall comic book convention. Its pretty small but my husband really enjoys it. We handed out some of our Werepugs mini comics and he bought some other stuff too. I have to say I didn't get that homesick feeling going back like I got when I lived in Connecticut and would come back. Its so peaceful up here that the city seems sort of crazy. I do miss my friends and my job at the co-op. I use to work with some pretty funny and interesting people. Maybe I will feel different come January and I have cabin fever when I'm stuck in a 360 sq. ft. house with -20 degrees ranging outside.

Fire!

When we first bought our place back in 2012 we took a class in Ely, MN on how to build a Rocket Mass Heater. We knew we wanted to build one in our new place. We have not gotten around to building one yet. It was such a hurried move trying to make the cabin livable before Travis had to start his new job that we simply ran out of time. We are still planning on building a Rocket Mass Heater but not until spring. If you are curious about Rocket Mass Heater please check out the link below and research it for yourself. They are really awesome.

 http://www.ernieanderica.info/rocketstoves
 http://www.richsoil.com/rocket-stove-mass-heater.jsp










We went the least expensive route possible when we purchased our wood stove knowing that it will not be permanent. Not to mention in a 360sq ft house there isn't room for anything. (One of the cool things about a RMH is that you can shape the cob into additional seating.) We got a clearance priced stove, yes there are cheaper stoves on craigslist but they were huge and we just did not have room. My husband scored free tile form one of the tenants in his work building before we moved. We used the tile and built a fire proof base for the stove to sit on. We also got free cement board that was here when we bought the place.

There was also this beast of wood cook stove we got rid of. We are trying to locate ceramic electric fence tiles so we can hang cement board and tile what will be a heat proof wall. We also bought an electric baseboard heater that we will put on a timer so when the fire dies out over night the heater will come on to keep the place at about 60 degrees.

We have been cutting and stacking green wood for next year. Its sort of hard to find dry wood to burn this year. I guess you can buy a loggers truck load of it but we do not have the extra money to buy that much. We got a trailer full from an 80 year old man that likes to cut wood as a hobby. I think we need about 3 more trailer fulls before the -20 degree weather and snow sets in.

Internet!!!

I. Have. Internet!!!! at my house!!! I have learned that if some customer service rep tells you "no" you call back and keep asking until you get what you want. People are lazy and its easy for them to say "We can't find your house on the map, so phone and Internet are not available in your area."

My husband is really against getting a septic system or holding tank. I for one, would like one, but marriage is a give and take so I agreed to a saw dust composting toilet for one year. The conditions are he is in charge of emptying the bucket. He built the "shitter" as he calls it, out of plywood.

. I sanded, stained and shellacked it. There is a 5 gallon bucket that fits in. 

Every time you use it you put sawdust over it. We still have to dig a giant hole for the compost to go in, so its not actually functioning yet. You can use the compost for trees and non edible plants and shrubs. For more information about saw dust toilets take a look at these links.

http://humanurehandbook.com/humanure_toilet.html
http://www.permies.com/t/14440/composting-toilet/Humanure-Bank-idea


We picked up our lawn mower/snow blower today. We were going to pay someone to plow for us this winter but with the size of our driveway and my husband's work truck driving terrible in the snow we did a cost analyst and it would be more cost effective just to buy something of our own to be able to plow anytime we needed to. Plus it has multiple uses.

We are still waiting on the well guy to come out. I'm not sure if people just work at a slower pace out here or if it takes a really long time to pull permits and drill wells and install pipes and pumps. The guy said he has two other customers ahead of us. I don't mind the hauling of water or the truck stop showers but doing dishes outside is annoying.

Friends

I am so grateful for the Internet! (even if I can not fully get it at my house.) I was able to connect with a local home school moms group. I have met with these ladies and their pack of kids for a couple of weeks. All of the moms I have met have been very nice and filled with information, and all of their kids are very friendly and include Ronin in their frog catching and running wild.

One of the moms brought her husband over, who is an ex lumberjack and he spent a 3 hours giving Travis lessons in cutting trees and chopping wood.

We have a small wood pile stacked for next years wood.

Travis still needs to cut the stumps closer to the ground. We still need to source dry wood for this years burning. I guess you can buy a logging truck worth of wood but it might not be all dry. Hayward WI is a big logging community. Along with the dry wood we need to source saw dust for the composting toilet. Travis went to one place and they guy asked "What do you need the saw dust for planting blueberries?" Travis says, "No the shitter."

Our neighbor two houses down is an ex farmer. he came over with his skid steer loader and took out some brush to make a spot for our shed.

Travis and I have zero building skills so we had to buy it. We bought a pretty big shed to store all of our tools and lawn mower with snow blower. Right now we have everything stacked against the house with a tarp over it It looks very white trash.

There are zero closets and no basement in the 360sqft house. My canning supplies and maybe some books might end up stored in the shed.I still can not believe all the books and comic books we have after we did our giant purge before we moved.

With all these trees coming down for the well driller truck, its letting in wonderful sunlight. I started looking at the property for possible garden site for next year. I think I know where I want the orchard to go in. With all the deer and wildlife around I have to consider fencing too. I'm very glad Travis took his permaculture design class in Montanan in 2012.

I remember for my 30th birthday I wanted to save up and take a trip to the Czech Republic but then told Travis I would rather use that money as a down payment on land. 4 years later we are living here. Pretty crazy how hard work and planning can pay off. (maybe I won't feel this way after the first winter.)

Keeping Clean

It's been a week of living in the woods. Without a well washing can be tricky. We have a dish/hand washing station outside at a table. A jug with a tap, hand soap and dish soap, wash bin and drying rack. We heat the water on the stove for dishes or a washcloth bath. We get water out of the rain barrel for this. 

We have a solar shower for after dark showers. The water is hardly warm but it's been in the high 80s with 70% humidity. It's very cold so you have to soap down and rinse fast. 

I have only washed my hair once a week and I do this at the truck stop. It's $8.00 for a private shower. Totally worth it.

We haul in water from town for drinking and coffee/ tea. We also have a Berkey water filter. (Never know if we have to haul water from river.)

Finally, we drive 7mins north to a lake and jump in to rinse sweat off mid day.