The City Mouse in the Country

    **EDIT**  Someone just pointed this out to me in another group that I belong to that many homesteaders - or those attempting to homestead (or just simplify life like I'm trying to do) have must more to worry about than ceiling fans and paint.   They have drought, predators and wildfires to worry about.   It is a fair criticism.     I am not belittling those facts.   This blog is only about my adventures and worries.   I may have to deal with those things one day.   If I upset someone because of this piece I am sorry, that was not my intent.   However we are all on our own journey.  This is mine and I decided to share it with you.          In the past couple of days Susan and I realized something.   We had goals set for the winter, things that we wanted to accomplish...and for what ever reason, we failed to meet those goals. Even though winter is technically not over yet, the day are getting longer, the weather a little warmer.  We are using our pellet stove a little less, and s

   Hey everyone!  Did you know that this page now has a companion Facebook page?    It will have articles, memes and such that interest me that relate to this page but don't really apply.  Be sure to check it o ut!        To be honest I expected errors, I expected mistakes, missteps and even the occasional "oops."   This is new to me, and I'm doing things like I've never done before .       This time however I let myself get carried a way a bit and made an error that could have been costly indeed.             Our wood pellet stove needs cleaned out at least once a week.  You can push it a few more days but the ash does build up.   This time we didn't have the air intake for the fire set right and the pellets built up, all the way to the hopper gate.  This concerns me because we have a friend that had the fire in their auger which ended up destroying their stove.   A rarity to be sure, but if their is one thing I've learned in my life...is that the millio

      Imagine the scene, a family fights for survival in a cold and dark world, where the winds blow ceaselessly and the wolves are always at the door.   A ragged man, tired of the weight of the world, exits the home and fights his way through the snow to a lone generator...with a single mighty pull the dark dissipates as the lights come on.  His family inside cheers for now they have heat and don't have to worry about eating cold beans out of a can!        Dramatic music swells.....       Okay, maybe it's not that dramatic.  Maybe the wolves at the door was a bit over the top, but the point is that ever since we lost power for just a tad over 24 hours recently; the idea of a generator has never been that far from my mind.     Plus, I work from home and I depend on power to not only allow me to access my computer and phone lines...but to also keep the pellet stove running.        When it comes to generators however, I quickly learned that I know less than diddly squat about t

 we honestly don't know where to go next. Our power was out for over 24 hours.  Luckily our house held the heat pretty well and we did not lose any food or other things.   It did however present us with some challenges and got me thinking that with winter coming, we are going to need some sort of back up power supply. One of the biggest problems that we have with our home is that it's all electric.  We do have some long term goals to help correct that issue.   Everything from solar panels to switching out the electric range for a propane range and getting a tank for it.  It looks like for now though we are going to have to go with a generator, and if we are going to go with a generator we have to ask ourselves what we want from it. The biggest issue that I have honestly is that I know literally nothing about them!!! I have never used one and wouldn't even know that to ask or where to begin. Here are my questions/concerns:   We have to have the following running come colder

     Every homesteading article I read says the same thing.   Take it one step at at time and learn new skills.  Now that's all well and good, the only problem is that I am a "City Mouse" and I've become used to having things either "on demand" or having someone that can do it for me on my time schedule.          Thus it was the first weekend in November that I had planned on learning how to split wood.  Sue and I ended up buying a pellet stove, and buying a ton of pellets (50 forty pound bags) which were stacked into the back of the garage to fuel it.      Originally we were going to go with a traditional wood burning stove and had even bought a cord of wood, however that plan fell through due to cost to replace the original wood burning stove and bringing everything up to code.  (See previous posts).        So we gave the cord of wood that I had previously bought to a family member and spent part of the day Saturday loading and unloading  two pickup truck

        I have to be honest, I wasn't sure if or when I would get back to this blog.   It is easy to make excuses but honestly, I've not done much of anything to improve the "homestead" in over a week or two; and that honestly bothers me. An old Caboose in Stoneboro     I do tend to be a lazy man and I just feel that I should be doing more to help prepare this home for the coming winter, but so far the temperatures have not dropped below the mid 40's and the last  two days have been a pretty consistent rain, which makes doing anything outside unpleasant at best and down right near impossible at worst.      What this has allowed the lovely Sue and I to do however is spend a little time traveling, exploring and finally getting our new pellet stove installed.  Well Sue grew up in this particular part of Western Pennsylvania, I did not.  We decided to go sight seeing, take in the wonders of Autumn and just relax for a bit.       Now generally speaking I would get all

      With everything that has been going on recently, the recent death of my mom and some changes in my job which required me to go through an intensive background check, getting a new roof - which should be happening this week hopefully -installed on the house and our new wood pellet stove installed next weekend (more on that in a bit).  I've simply not been able to move forward on some simple projects.   For example, I wanted to get the mulch pile for the gardens started in mid October.     Now here it was, getting into late October/early November and I still didn't have any mulch piles started.  Nor do I think that I'll have them ready by spring.  For example, not only do I have to deal with my Dad's needs - he's currently living with my brother, which is roughly a 75 minute drive south of me - but I've meetings with a lawyer, insurance to sort out and other things.   Thanks do to an internal change in my company, I have to fingerprinted and undergo an inte