- Thread starter
- #91
Reice
Lovin' The Homestead
Still no grandbaby, she is decided to wait a bit longer. Due date is Christmas day, so we'll see. It would be funny if she decided to make her appearance on Christmas eve, since that's when her big brother decided to enter the world 3 years prior. 
I gotta say after just looking at our first full month of living here's electric bill, I am impressed. Full electric other than an occasional use of a Mr. Buddy heater only in the early morning to take off the chill, and it has been a fairly cold month. Add to this single pane windows, skirting not up, space heaters, lots of weather stripping needed, and higher rural pricing on electric, I was expecting much worse. Was hoping to keep our power bill around $150 a month or lower. It is $185 this month. All things considered, still not bad. And definitely gives me something to work towards on getting it lower. I can't wait to see how it does in the summer months. A year ago our total electric former home was around the $300 or more range.
Hubby had a snafu with his truck, does the mechanic'ing never end for him? lol Driveshaft came off going down the road, a towing and hunting down the part later and he's rolling again. So very, very thankful to have had my new-to-me wheels going, we woulda been screwed otherwise.
Probably not a big deal to most, but a milestone to me, finally have a mailbox up. Woot!!! Took a while to get a created address with many emails back and forth and coordinates to hunt down and trips to the post office. The hubby decided to get fancy with the mailbox with stuff he found sitting around. His grandmother had a former big rural box that got prettied, an iron scroll-worked L-shaped metal bar for it's base got attached and was placed into wheel rim for weight and stability, all painted to match. 100% repurposed.
So far so good with the internet out here in the boonies in a hole. I've been pushing it a bit to see how she does after the 23gb hits and deprioritization starts. Have been streaming a lot so I'm sure I'm past it. So far so good. TV wise our antennae is iffy with it's 4 channels of OETA (like, you gotta hold the cord just right and stick a tongue out sideways and look to the left and maybe you can see the station clearly), so for entertainment we've been streaming. Mostly free stuff on Vudu (although their channel does have a severe buffering issue that is a pain) or with stepsons Hulu account which streams flawlessly. Even tried online gaming and it does better than our former wireless internet that I paid $66 a month for 3 years (only one available where we lived then). Yes, gamer here, I did miss my WoW.
For trash we've started some burn barrels. This is all new to me, being a former city girl. My whole life you took the stuff from the trash can and put it in a dumpster and just forgot about it. Now, having to actually burn stuff, you really get to realizing what happens to all that stuff. And how much comes in you have to physically burn yourself. Really makes you think!! Now I may have to start haunting the zero waste forums to help cut down on how much comes in cause it really just didn't connect before. Was always someone else's problem when I put it in the dumpster. Now it's our problem. Such waste!!! It's sickening.
On that note, one of hubby's side jobs is helping his aunt fix up her house. She lives next to his grandmother on this land, as well. She had an issue a few years back and was living with her mother, but wants to fix up her own house to live there again. Well, things didn't go great sitting there for that long, a roof leak and critters later, and she pretty much wants to almost gut the place. Which means getting rid of just about everything inside. That's where hubby comes in, helping with that. Hey, it's extra dough, right? And just down the road. But the amount to be thrown away, o m g! Just the gas to get to the dump back and forth and the fees would pretty much negate what he was going to be paid, so instead he decides to burn most of it. And since some things shouldn't go into the burn barrel he is going through all the bags. I cannot even begin to say how depressing it is to see how much total waste. Complete, total consumerism. I have gotten some items from it though, some candles, cleaning products, jewelry, a fairly decent rug that's on the living room floor, and a lot of loose change.
Next up to get done, let us see.. fencing for a small dog run and doggy door for the spoiled shih tzu, seeing if the metal round tub we found will work for a kitchen sink, figuring out if the 50 gallon water tank we got for $20 will fit in the hole we have or make it work from outside, complete the skirting, complete the plumbing, replacing a living room window with some plexiglass we found, weather stripping both doors, some plywood for the kitchen floor, removal of the bathroom toilet,.. wow, this list is long. And I'm already pannicking about spring being right around the corner and not having a set plot picked out for another garden attempt.
That's it for now, laters all.
I gotta say after just looking at our first full month of living here's electric bill, I am impressed. Full electric other than an occasional use of a Mr. Buddy heater only in the early morning to take off the chill, and it has been a fairly cold month. Add to this single pane windows, skirting not up, space heaters, lots of weather stripping needed, and higher rural pricing on electric, I was expecting much worse. Was hoping to keep our power bill around $150 a month or lower. It is $185 this month. All things considered, still not bad. And definitely gives me something to work towards on getting it lower. I can't wait to see how it does in the summer months.
A year ago our total electric former home was around the $300 or more range. Hubby had a snafu with his truck, does the mechanic'ing never end for him? lol Driveshaft came off going down the road, a towing and hunting down the part later and he's rolling again. So very, very thankful to have had my new-to-me wheels going, we woulda been screwed otherwise.
Probably not a big deal to most, but a milestone to me, finally have a mailbox up. Woot!!! Took a while to get a created address with many emails back and forth and coordinates to hunt down and trips to the post office. The hubby decided to get fancy with the mailbox with stuff he found sitting around. His grandmother had a former big rural box that got prettied, an iron scroll-worked L-shaped metal bar for it's base got attached and was placed into wheel rim for weight and stability, all painted to match. 100% repurposed.
So far so good with the internet out here in the boonies in a hole. I've been pushing it a bit to see how she does after the 23gb hits and deprioritization starts. Have been streaming a lot so I'm sure I'm past it. So far so good. TV wise our antennae is iffy with it's 4 channels of OETA (like, you gotta hold the cord just right and stick a tongue out sideways and look to the left and maybe you can see the station clearly), so for entertainment we've been streaming. Mostly free stuff on Vudu (although their channel does have a severe buffering issue that is a pain) or with stepsons Hulu account which streams flawlessly. Even tried online gaming and it does better than our former wireless internet that I paid $66 a month for 3 years (only one available where we lived then). Yes, gamer here, I did miss my WoW.
For trash we've started some burn barrels. This is all new to me, being a former city girl. My whole life you took the stuff from the trash can and put it in a dumpster and just forgot about it. Now, having to actually burn stuff, you really get to realizing what happens to all that stuff. And how much comes in you have to physically burn yourself. Really makes you think!! Now I may have to start haunting the zero waste forums to help cut down on how much comes in cause it really just didn't connect before. Was always someone else's problem when I put it in the dumpster. Now it's our problem. Such waste!!! It's sickening.
On that note, one of hubby's side jobs is helping his aunt fix up her house. She lives next to his grandmother on this land, as well. She had an issue a few years back and was living with her mother, but wants to fix up her own house to live there again. Well, things didn't go great sitting there for that long, a roof leak and critters later, and she pretty much wants to almost gut the place. Which means getting rid of just about everything inside. That's where hubby comes in, helping with that. Hey, it's extra dough, right? And just down the road. But the amount to be thrown away, o m g! Just the gas to get to the dump back and forth and the fees would pretty much negate what he was going to be paid, so instead he decides to burn most of it. And since some things shouldn't go into the burn barrel he is going through all the bags. I cannot even begin to say how depressing it is to see how much total waste. Complete, total consumerism. I have gotten some items from it though, some candles, cleaning products, jewelry, a fairly decent rug that's on the living room floor, and a lot of loose change.
Next up to get done, let us see.. fencing for a small dog run and doggy door for the spoiled shih tzu, seeing if the metal round tub we found will work for a kitchen sink, figuring out if the 50 gallon water tank we got for $20 will fit in the hole we have or make it work from outside, complete the skirting, complete the plumbing, replacing a living room window with some plexiglass we found, weather stripping both doors, some plywood for the kitchen floor, removal of the bathroom toilet,.. wow, this list is long. And I'm already pannicking about spring being right around the corner and not having a set plot picked out for another garden attempt.
That's it for now, laters all.
