Option C was discovered when we realized that the farm house will be ours at some point in the future AND my inlaws have always assumed they would build a house one day.
So option C became: we will live with my inlaws while they build a house and then continue to live in that house until the farmhouse becomes available.
I'm excited about cohousing as I feel that bringing the child rearing village in closer proximity can only be a good thing. My inlaws have been very accomodating as we have difficult conversations (can we move the silverware? Who gets what bedroom? What about when my sister in law is home from college over the summer? etc.) about logistics.
And I'm disapointed to not get to use the knowledge we've gathered while intensely researching house building.
But I was disapointed when we thought we weren't going to get the farmhouse and would have to build instead.
So now we're back to our original plan (before there was a plan A or B or even C) and that's exciting.
We're both so ready to GO but know there are several compelling reasons to wait until spring. We're excited as we reconnect with old friends who are in the same area we will be in starting complementary ventures. For now we're focusing on the day-to-day and in any spare moments (not many this time of year!) we're dreaming, planning, researching ... everything farm.
Monday, October 11, 2010
Thursday, October 7, 2010
pantry
Our "baby" chickens have started laying. At least one of them has. I would guess Soleil (our buff orpington) because A)the eggs are typical in color (so that rules out the americanas) and B) she's the biggest of the babies. Here's an egg comparison: the smallest is the baby egg, the roundest is Dixie's (the Rhode Island White) and the longest is Lulu's (the Rhode Island Red).
And half of our apple stash from Vaillancourt Orchard in North West Vermont. These have since been turned into delicious apple butter. Yum!
I said we've been getting into canning. Below is our current stash of canned yumminess. These are the jams - plum made at home, plum/peach made with a friend, and peach made with said friend.
And then most of below is courtesy of Ren Man (because I have to share the fun some). He's done beets and most of the tomatos shown below.
I have been talked out of canning more tomatoes. I missed them so much last year and don't want to go without again this winter! Ren Man pointed out that his mom canned sooooo many tomatoes this year that there is PLENTY. But that means canning is done which is disapointing.
And half of our apple stash from Vaillancourt Orchard in North West Vermont. These have since been turned into delicious apple butter. Yum!
I said we've been getting into canning. Below is our current stash of canned yumminess. These are the jams - plum made at home, plum/peach made with a friend, and peach made with said friend.
And then most of below is courtesy of Ren Man (because I have to share the fun some). He's done beets and most of the tomatos shown below.
I have been talked out of canning more tomatoes. I missed them so much last year and don't want to go without again this winter! Ren Man pointed out that his mom canned sooooo many tomatoes this year that there is PLENTY. But that means canning is done which is disapointing.
Jamboree!
Oh my!
It's been a while - huh? And I still need to talk about Plan C.
Exciting things are happening this harvest season. We're canning for the first time!
It started with jam. Plum jam which lead to a jam-making-day with a friend making plum jam, peach jam, and peach/plum jam.
But here's the plum jamboree at home:
All those plums! From Hill Orchard. What to do with a million plums. A friend that we met at the orchard mentioned jam and that was all it took. I thought maybe we could dry some too if we needed to - and then Ren Man reminded me that that would be prunes and I'm not a prune type of person. There were very few left over plums and we gave those to my mom who is all about wine-making. So plum wine is in our future.
Washing all those plums. The recipe didn't say to skin the plums so we kept them in tact despite my skepticism. I later learned that the skin has pectin in it.
taking out the pits - I saved a lot of them in the refrigerator. There's a way to use them to grow your own fruit trees that involves refrigeration. I need to research that again to see what the next step is. I think they have to be refrigerated for a couple months first?
And then the plums are cooked until they reach a hot high temp and they need periodic stirring while they cook. No problem thanks to Ark Boy.
mmmm! The smell of hot sticky plum yumminess.
all the sterilized jars laid out ready to be filled
and now they are filled.
Yes, Christmas gifts we're thinking - although it will be hard to part with any of the deliciousness. I'm not a jam person AT ALL - but when Ledge Ends gave jam as a end-of-csa-gift ... I was hooked to homemade jam!
I bought The Busy Person's Guide to Preserving last year and have used it for jamming, tomato-ing, beet-ing, etc. It's awesome!
I'm sad because the canning season is almost done. Just a batch of apple butter is on the agenda. I'm excited about next year though! We'll have a tremendous garden and so canning will be necessary. Plus, our goal next year is to minimall buy anything from off our farm. Lofty, lofty goal. Doable though.
It's been a while - huh? And I still need to talk about Plan C.
Exciting things are happening this harvest season. We're canning for the first time!
It started with jam. Plum jam which lead to a jam-making-day with a friend making plum jam, peach jam, and peach/plum jam.
But here's the plum jamboree at home:
All those plums! From Hill Orchard. What to do with a million plums. A friend that we met at the orchard mentioned jam and that was all it took. I thought maybe we could dry some too if we needed to - and then Ren Man reminded me that that would be prunes and I'm not a prune type of person. There were very few left over plums and we gave those to my mom who is all about wine-making. So plum wine is in our future.
Washing all those plums. The recipe didn't say to skin the plums so we kept them in tact despite my skepticism. I later learned that the skin has pectin in it.
taking out the pits - I saved a lot of them in the refrigerator. There's a way to use them to grow your own fruit trees that involves refrigeration. I need to research that again to see what the next step is. I think they have to be refrigerated for a couple months first?
And then the plums are cooked until they reach a hot high temp and they need periodic stirring while they cook. No problem thanks to Ark Boy.
mmmm! The smell of hot sticky plum yumminess.
all the sterilized jars laid out ready to be filled
and now they are filled.
Yes, Christmas gifts we're thinking - although it will be hard to part with any of the deliciousness. I'm not a jam person AT ALL - but when Ledge Ends gave jam as a end-of-csa-gift ... I was hooked to homemade jam!
I bought The Busy Person's Guide to Preserving last year and have used it for jamming, tomato-ing, beet-ing, etc. It's awesome!
I'm sad because the canning season is almost done. Just a batch of apple butter is on the agenda. I'm excited about next year though! We'll have a tremendous garden and so canning will be necessary. Plus, our goal next year is to minimall buy anything from off our farm. Lofty, lofty goal. Doable though.
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
teeny tiny micro mini
We're building right? (Not really, an Option C was discovered (options A and B)but let's pretend that we're still planning to build for the sake of this post and I'll update at a later date what Option C is - the current plan.)
I stumbled across Tiny House Blog which lead to Tumbleweed houses and ideas started flowing.
At first I was convinced we could live in a house less than 100 square feet. The secret?
The loft!
Eureka!
The kids could share the loft and we could....well, we can add a bedroom onto that little house. So maybe we could do it for 150 square feet. It's doable, right? Right?
Okay... so three rooms would really be better.
What about less than 1,000 square feet... Say 800-900 square feet?
I'm in love with the cuteness, the eco-friendliness (really? do we need 2000+ square feet? No, no we do not!), the potential for expansion if necessary, AND we know it's short term. Yes, short term could mean 10 years but as I said, there's room for expansion if needed but also a great challenge to live within a smaller space. Besides, as it is now, the kids are always in the room, preferably on top of us literally (their preference, not ours) so why would we need more thanone 5 rooms?
I stumbled across Tiny House Blog which lead to Tumbleweed houses and ideas started flowing.
At first I was convinced we could live in a house less than 100 square feet. The secret?
The loft!
Eureka!
The kids could share the loft and we could....well, we can add a bedroom onto that little house. So maybe we could do it for 150 square feet. It's doable, right? Right?
Okay... so three rooms would really be better.
What about less than 1,000 square feet... Say 800-900 square feet?
I'm in love with the cuteness, the eco-friendliness (really? do we need 2000+ square feet? No, no we do not!), the potential for expansion if necessary, AND we know it's short term. Yes, short term could mean 10 years but as I said, there's room for expansion if needed but also a great challenge to live within a smaller space. Besides, as it is now, the kids are always in the room, preferably on top of us literally (their preference, not ours) so why would we need more than
Friday, August 27, 2010
reality check
Many people are curious about our thoughts on buying vs. building after I posted asking for opinions on facebook. While we were in Vermont (seriously need to upload garden-in-process pics!) we got sucked into thinking about buying again. The housing prices are low low and mortgage rates are also low low. If we were ever going to buy now seems like a sensible time to do so. This would also give us space from the farm and some in-town presence for potential farm store in the future.
It also came out that we will likely be the family moving in to the farm house at some point in the future... we just don't know at what point. So we need something temporarily.
So buy? 200k.
rent? 1k/mos
build? 100k
trailer to replace trailer that is falling apart? 20-70k
Buy
... We can't afford 200k, we can't. And what if we couldn't sell it? And we're really home bodies so if we had a house off the farm we'd slowly move our projects to our house which we don't want to do.
rent
... we could do this but this has the same issues of having the off-farm house that buying does. Plus, rent at 1k/mos means in less than two years we'd have paid off a trailer. If we knew it was a 6mos wait until the farm house was available, sure. But it could be 2 days, it could be 10 years.
build
...hmmm, maybe we can't even afford 100k especially because we'd like to get a cheese make room up and running as well as a cheese cave. That should take precedence. And part of the build included a photo studio... do we really need that? Should we consider that in another building at a later date if we're missing it? And the 100k house also included space for future fostering of children. But we don't have those children now and if we can't afford a room for them maybe wait until we can add on or until we're in the farm house?
trailer
... I've been very anti this from the beginning. Would you invite someone over to your trailer for dinner? No? I don't really want to either. But we could do it... 10 years would blow but it could be doable.
So we look at trailers... well it looks like:
option a) 1977 model
option b) 50k-75k
If we could find a trailer that falls into an option c then trailers will be discussed again, I'm sure.
hmmm- couldn't we make a house for less than 50k?
Okay so maybe not a 2k square foot house but do we need that much space?
We're constantly in the same room - all of us. I'm sure that will change as the kids age but as they age we anticipate having money to expand small house and/or have the farm house. Plus we're anticipating being outside a. l.o.t! Farming=outside. How much space do we need to eat and sleep? And if a small house gets cramped -all the more reason to go outside to work, play and maybe even eat and sleep.
So I think that's what we'll do... same building materials, probably not octagon, much smaller (like half the size or less).
ps we have considered a yurt and it's not totally off the table but it's definitely near the edge.
It also came out that we will likely be the family moving in to the farm house at some point in the future... we just don't know at what point. So we need something temporarily.
So buy? 200k.
rent? 1k/mos
build? 100k
trailer to replace trailer that is falling apart? 20-70k
Buy
... We can't afford 200k, we can't. And what if we couldn't sell it? And we're really home bodies so if we had a house off the farm we'd slowly move our projects to our house which we don't want to do.
rent
... we could do this but this has the same issues of having the off-farm house that buying does. Plus, rent at 1k/mos means in less than two years we'd have paid off a trailer. If we knew it was a 6mos wait until the farm house was available, sure. But it could be 2 days, it could be 10 years.
build
...hmmm, maybe we can't even afford 100k especially because we'd like to get a cheese make room up and running as well as a cheese cave. That should take precedence. And part of the build included a photo studio... do we really need that? Should we consider that in another building at a later date if we're missing it? And the 100k house also included space for future fostering of children. But we don't have those children now and if we can't afford a room for them maybe wait until we can add on or until we're in the farm house?
trailer
... I've been very anti this from the beginning. Would you invite someone over to your trailer for dinner? No? I don't really want to either. But we could do it... 10 years would blow but it could be doable.
So we look at trailers... well it looks like:
If we could find a trailer that falls into an option c then trailers will be discussed again, I'm sure.
hmmm- couldn't we make a house for less than 50k?
Okay so maybe not a 2k square foot house but do we need that much space?
We're constantly in the same room - all of us. I'm sure that will change as the kids age but as they age we anticipate having money to expand small house and/or have the farm house. Plus we're anticipating being outside a. l.o.t! Farming=outside. How much space do we need to eat and sleep? And if a small house gets cramped -all the more reason to go outside to work, play and maybe even eat and sleep.
So I think that's what we'll do... same building materials, probably not octagon, much smaller (like half the size or less).
ps we have considered a yurt and it's not totally off the table but it's definitely near the edge.
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
ICF
When I discussed shape choice I mentioned (again) that we're going to use ICF.
ICF stands for insulated concrete forms. The forms are made of two pieces of insulation connected by webbing. The two pieces of insulation remain in place after the pour (of concrete) to act as insulation for the structure.
When we first considered building and we were thinking seriously about a dome home we thought building an ICF basement and placing the dome on top made sense (I was insisting that a full basement is necessary in New England). We then started thinking about doing ICF for the whole structure. We briefly debated using SIPS but ICF are not as heavy to manipulate (in fact our children enjoyed pushing a form around the house that we were given as sample from AMVIC, the VT ICF company we are working with). This increases the aspects of the job we can complete ourselves - something that is very important to us.
ICF seems more "green" - AMVIC is a small local company shipping in very lightweight product, 2/3 of the concrete material is coming from VT or nearby Canada, and the resulting structure will be very very well insulated.
ICF stands for insulated concrete forms. The forms are made of two pieces of insulation connected by webbing. The two pieces of insulation remain in place after the pour (of concrete) to act as insulation for the structure.
When we first considered building and we were thinking seriously about a dome home we thought building an ICF basement and placing the dome on top made sense (I was insisting that a full basement is necessary in New England). We then started thinking about doing ICF for the whole structure. We briefly debated using SIPS but ICF are not as heavy to manipulate (in fact our children enjoyed pushing a form around the house that we were given as sample from AMVIC, the VT ICF company we are working with). This increases the aspects of the job we can complete ourselves - something that is very important to us.
ICF seems more "green" - AMVIC is a small local company shipping in very lightweight product, 2/3 of the concrete material is coming from VT or nearby Canada, and the resulting structure will be very very well insulated.
Sunday, July 25, 2010
Tomatos! and detour explanation
They are finally coming in! I've missed tomatos so much!! The plan was to have enough ripen at once to make tomato paste.
The tomato plans didn't receive that memo so they are staggering their ripening. Maybe we'll dry some. There's a bunch more green ones on the vines - maybe enough will be red at once to make a paste? We just know from experience that it takes A LOT to make A LITTLE of any tomato product.
Detour
Ren Man started the detour/distraction. He was looking up something (can't remember what) on craigslist in Vermont and came across an almost 2k sf home with a huge carriage barn for under 100k. This got us thinking... maybe it would be better to have a house that needed fixing up so we could do that and focus on the farm instead of building a new house and fitting the farm in to that.
So we looked. There were five homes were were very interested in.
After much discussion though (and fantasizing) we decided that being on the farm, building a house to our own specifications, and replacing the trailer that is currently on the building site made more sense.
It came down to this:
OR
we could work on the farm and build our house with less expense to us (so more time to devote to family and farm)
While owning had it's appeals (that I won't detail because then it gets me thinking about it again!) I was having a very hard time imagining being off the farm and commuting (arguably minimally) 2miles to the farm.
So that was the detour.
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