Off the Grid

My darling hubs and I will both be off work and on a “stay-cation” next week. Never fear though, we won't be bored staying at home. We have often wondered just how well we would do if we were without electric for awhile and how much fuel we would need to store in case power ever goes out for a long extended period of time. Soooooooo next week, starting on Monday, we will be shutting off our electricity for seven days.

We will only be running our generator for two hours per day so I can check emails and do other things connected with my business. (When one owns a business, you never actually get a vacation.) We also will not be going to store for any kind of food product nor will we be spending any cash (or using our credit, debit card, or writing checks) during the week. We will also be logging our water usage for this week.

Some of the things that we are wanting to look at and will be keeping track of are:

• How much fuel does it take to heat the warming room using our kerosene heater and how well does it do the job.
• How much food do we actually consume a day.
• How much fuel does it take to cook our meals with our alternative cooking methods.
• How much water does it take to bathe, do laundry, flush the toilet, dishes, cook, and for us to drink and still have some sort of normalcy to our routine.
• Is our alternative sources for lighting at night sufficient for us to be able to read, play games, or to do work.
• Does the solar charger for the cell phone and tablet work as anticipated.

I will be keeping a diary of sorts through out this time, but depending on the amount of emails and so on that I will need to tend to for my business, I may or may not have time to blog about our experience.

Have you ever tried doing something like this? If so, I would be interested in hearing how that went for you and any tips that you might have.

Thanks for reading and visiting my blog. I do appreciate each and everyone of my readers and subscribers. :-)