Getting back to our dreams

As a lot of you know, my husband & I bought land with a cabin on it. We moved to the land & lived there for a little over 4 months before having to move to a rental due to the extreme weather conditions. Our cabin is off grid, besides having a telephone connection. We will keep it that way! Since moving in to the rental, I've not done anything "homestead" like. I feel like I'm not working toward my dreams in one way but in another I feel like I don't have anything to do that *is* homestead-ish. I'm going to change that tomorrow. I have some things that we can do in preparation to move back to the cabin (which will happen in Spring). 

Our goals this coming year are to: 

• grow a lot of our food (be it animal, fruit or vegetable)
• recycle & reuse as much as possible
• start a new family business (that blends with our homestead lifestyle)
• dad quitting his outside job & coming home again to work the family businesses
• we all want to learn new skills (maybe 2 each)
• purchase new canning items
• build main addition to the cabin
• build work room on to cabin
• build pole barn
• live our dreams

I'm sure there's things I'm forgetting to add to the list right now ... but it is after midnight here. I'll post again soon! I plan on posting regularly ... and most importantly, I plan on getting back to our dreams!

Welcome to the new blog. As you can see, there are already some posts. I imported a few posts from an old blog that I felt would show what I plan on doing here. OMA means "Our Maker's Acres" ... as in the name of our property. I plan to fill this blog with homestead type stuff, home schooling things, bits of my personal journey in life ... and plenty of other things. Be patient as I set the background image, blog style eyc.

A money tree

So here we are ... in our rental house. We'll stay here until Winter is over. By that time we will have had enough time for weatherizing, repairing the roof completely, & getting our permanent power source up & running. I miss sleeping in our home! I miss the sounds of nature lulling me to sleep. I miss the wonder & amazement on my children's eyes when they hear new sounds or find some new creature.

I feel like we've taken three steps backwards  ... we have an electric bill. Ok, during the excessive heat, electricity to run an A/C was important to my health. We have a water bill ... we were hauling water for probably much less. We have cable now too ... I am bummed. Oh sure, there are shows that I love watching ... but really, it's just a giant distraction as far as I'm concerned.

Most people we know have said Winter here is horrible & how we may have trouble getting to & from our cabin because of the snow & ice storms. I don't think the snow will be a problem ... we lived in Minnesota & had 50 below zero Winters. Once we get a food storage area built I won't worry so much about the chance of being stuck at home.

I wish we had a money tree ... or seeds to plant one!

Slam the door on September

If I never see another September, it'll be too soon!!! This is a hard month for my family.  We have the anniversary of 3 deaths to deal with ... then another death being very recent. Now we have to deal with a horrible situation with "neighbors" on our mountain. I won't go in to detail about what's going on ... but will say that I can't imagine why I hate people more & more the older I get (note the sarcasm in my tone). I am thoroughly disgusted with these idiots who are so in life for themselves that they don't care who they trample to get what they want.
It's hard to "love thy neighbor" when they are satan disguised as friendly folk. It's also hard being a Christian in the midst of such an ugly attack!!

The missing link

I have noticed that I have written more in the past 2 months than I have in quite a while. You see my family moved completely off grid. We don't want to pay an electric bill nor gas bill nor water bill etc. So, we finally moved toward our dream. We bought a cabin & some land and are taking steps toward self sufficiency (but being God reliant). Any way ... this is the lifestyle we have dreamed about for years. We love it. We've been busy with "farm" work ... setting up our homestead, caring for animals, getting settled etc. But I always took time to write. Well ... still ... I didn't write nearly as much as I have since moving out of our cabin in to a temporary rental (we decided that because of weather, we needed to move, weatherize the cabin & then move back in) ... any way. I had been wondering why I've been able to write so much. I realized it today ... we didn't have a radio, stereo, CD player, mp3 player ... nothing. I turned my Windows media player on for the first time and waves of emotion hit me. I know it sounds silly but I realized then that for the past 2 months, we've been where we had music or sound other than our the ones we make and when I realized it tears started to sneak from my eyes. I love music ... it runs through my veins & beats in my heart. I'm going to talk to my husband about getting a solar panel & a couple batteries specifically for running our music "station." Eventually I will have a recording studio run off of solar power & a wind turbine.
Life is lyrics waiting to happen. Words will inspire & move you ... but the music can too.

Missing

My cat, Gotti got out of the cabin some how ... and did not return when my family went back up to the cabin to clean up a mess that a wild animal left behind. I am praying that my cat returns home. I miss him. This cat is strange but oh so kool!!! He meows the word "momma" .... and only does it when he's trying to get my attention. Dear Lord ... please bring Gotti home safely! In Jesus name .... AMEN!!!

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I am a bit unsettled about living away from our property & cabin. At times I feel like we've failed ... but I know it's good that we are staying in another place while we build. It's just not how we'd planned to do things. Oh well ... we plan & God laughs.

Life's little turns

I posted this to a forum I am a member of ... and then decided to use it for the latest blog post.


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Up until a month ago we were living off grid & slowly (but surely) getting things done around our property. We had to leave the property last month (temporarily) due to the extreme heat. We'd only had a generator to power a fan & A/C ... and then it broke. Being with out A/C when temps were getting too extreme is not a good thing. So, we were blessed enough to have a place to stay away from the land & cabin. Our animals are still there so we go back & forth to care for all of them. 

We have since decided that until our place is weatherized & we have a big enough generator to power an A/C & heater of some type, we will be renting a place in town. We're hoping it will be only 6 months. Once the temps cool down we will go back to working on upgrades & building additions ... but until then, we will design some new changes. 

If you dig an inch to 1 1/2 inches down on our property, you will hit rock. In order to build a basement (which is a must for us) we will need to blow the rock out with dynamite. Of course, we need to do this before we build the addition too .... so ... we wait! 

We're accomplishing things ... but it is going very slow. I try to not to lose patience ... but some times it's hard. We've waited 19 years for these dreams ... waiting a little while longer won't hurt, especially since we are actively working toward them. Really, it's the "ride" along the way that is a HUGE part of the dream. 

Our oldest is in California, living with my mom & grandmother. My grandmother had been hospitalized due to the skin near her aorta tearing. She refused to have surgery but healed due to lots of pray! My mom needed help taking care of her so my son offered to go. He has made some great changes in his life ... including rededicating his life to Jesus & expressing the desire to be baptized. 

We start school in 2 weeks & can't wait! Really, I just can't wait to be in a regular, daily routine. As far as a school routine ... it will be similar to last year's. Though we have our day planned ... it's filled with some package curriculum & unschooling things like lap-booking & lessons from life in general. 

That's our life in a nutshell