Homestead Updates 15 April 2013

My hyacinth (and the weeds) growing my north flower garden this spring.

I thought that I would give some quick updates today on things that have been happening on the ole homestead...Our experiment of being off the grid last week went very well. In fact it was very awesome.

• We found that we ate less food than we thought that we would. Which is good thing.
• We were right on the mark on how much fuel we would use for our alternative cooking and running the generator. Again, an awesome thing.
• We didn't get bored because there was always something that needed to be done.
• Our water usage was right on target. However, it would be nice to have more put back in case other people would be in need of water. We are not to concerned about the water situation though since both our water company and sewer plant are both totally operated from bio-fuels that are generated from, and are processed at, our local sewer plant.

However we did find a few areas that we needed to work on and improve in case the grid ever goes down for an extended period of time. Such as:

• It rained all week so there wasn't enough sun for us to be able to recharge our solar charger. After the first use, the charger was totally useless. We ended up having to charge our cell phones and tablets using the car battery, which might not be an alternative in a grid down situation.
• We did need more light for after sun down than what we had planned for. It was difficult for us to be able to read without straining our eyes in the kerosene and candle light.
• It never was cold enough for us to need to use our kerosene heater, so we were unable to test to see if that would be adequate heat source.
• The big lesson we learned was if one leaves kerosene in their lamp for a long extended period of time, one should light the lamp at least once a month. Other wise it s-t-i-n-k-s when it is lit.

All in all, we are very pleased in how things went. In fact, by the end of the week, we were very rested and ready to go back to our paying work this week.

 

 

Herb, Tomatoes and Green Peppers Update

I am very happy with the growth of my herbs and other seedlings. Since planting time for outdoor planting in my area isn't until next month, I couldn't be happier with how they are doing.

Thanks for reading and visiting my blog. :-)