Homestead Happenings
This week on our homestead we’ve still been doing some catch-up projects. We’ve been a bit all over the place, physically and mentally.
Prime project for the boys has been water. We do off grid water tanks for gravity feed, but a line broke a week or so ago, and we’ve been limping along. Less showers than normal.
So Andrew has been working on that system, and Adam stepped in today. He had been cleaning up around the cabin, and managed to break several parts to our pipes underground. He was in the process of creating a very nice platform around the spigot, but a stick went through the pipe, broke the ball valve, and the T connector all in the same fell swoop. One little bang led to all day of digging the whole mess out! And we are still not done!
Andrew is improvising, and has hooked up the generator to the well pump for now. At least we will get showers this week, whether we need one or not!
Twice at least today I’ve heard water whooshing down the hill because a fitting blew apart. Not my favorite sound!
So…today has been two boys in holes, up to their necks in mud. And still no water for most of the day. Now we do have a bit, so I’m grabbing me a shower quick!
We’ve had some ordinary school, weeding/garden prep projects. Kitten stuff. See Stinker’s Little Stinkers for that story.
AdYesterday I had a bad day. Took Austin into town to drop him off, and got run into on the way back. I literally was minding my own business on my own side of the road when a truck came around the corner, and the thought flashed through my mind, “She’s gonna hit me!” And then the crash!
I sat there, stunned, hurting, and crying a little bit. I somehow bit my tongue with the collision, and damaged my arm/wrist. So they were both hurting. But after a few minutes when everything seemed way too quiet, I forced myself to put my head up and look around. I got out of my car and noticed that the other car was hanging over the edge of the ravine, and nobody was moving.
That scared me, because I could see her axle was broken and she’d veered off the road.
I banged on the window, and thankfully she rolled it down. She was ok, just shaken up.
But she wouldn’t get out. I didn’t like her sitting there on the edge, because I was afraid the car could go over. Turns out the trees were holding her car up.
She had the emergency services via her car, thankfully, because neither of us had cell services. We were about a mile and a half from both of our homes, and we discovered that we are neighbors. What a way to meet!
It all turned out as well as we could have hoped. The On-Star called Greg and he came down to make sure no one else came crashing into us. Three EMS volunteers came and “opened her car door”, lol, which was the extent of the rescue. But that’s good that everyone was fine. We were able to mono our car away and she got a tow truck. They reported it as no fault due to the narrow roads. I kind of feel like it was actually her fault since she plowed into me, but I didn’t want to lose a neighbor over that.
I babied my wrist for the next day or two, and it’s not as bad with the pain now. Used some True Blue oil on it, and that seemed to help a little.
We did get showers last evening. The boys literally worked all day on it. They got the pipes fixed enough to run the solar pump to fill the tank. Then Adam opened a valve to test it or something and we drained the whole tank. That happened twice, and poor Andrew took over. He used the generator to fill the tank when we didn’t have enough sun for the solar. The shower felt refreshing and I appreciated all of their work.
I don’t hold animosity towards Adam. He is learning. Andrew is kind of a natural for figuring our things, and Adam will get there. Sunday we will get the other pipe fittings and hopefully get the lines buried again.
I’ll tell you what! The boys are learning by (bad) experiences what most kids their ages never learn. We can not claim that this off grid experience/experiment is easy. I get frustrated when I have a huge sink full of dishes to wash, meals that need cooking, a toilet to flush, and plants to water, when I have no water for several days. But in the grand scheme of things, it’s still a small problem compared to the real issues of life and death. We pray more when we feel our need of help than when it’s smooth sailing, that’s for sure!
That morning I got hit in the car? I was driving slowly because along that road (just before I got hit) I saw about twenty turkeys all puffed out, 6-8 deer eating trees, some cats, some purple phlox blooming on my side of the bank, and some white wildflowers along the hills. I’d slowed down more than normal just to look around at the nature.
What’s funny (in a weird way) was that I had an idea that morning about getting hit. For one, we left at the crack of dawn, me intending to never get out of the car. I had my PJ pants on, and flip flops and socks. I’d thrown a jacket over my top, and my hair up in a clip, but I joked that I was ready for a trip to Walmart. My friend used to joke that her mom insisted that she wear clean underwear whenever she left the house “in case you’re in a wreck”.
On my way back home, I listened to some music, and I placed my phone inside my purse (not on the seat like usual) and I literally told myself, “that way if I’m in a wreck nobody can say I was on my phone). I never do that.
Somebody almost hit me head-on down the road before I did get hit. He was flying all over the road and in my lane before veering off at the last second. Our back roads are just narrow and dangerous.
We are thankful that at the end of the week, even though we had three vehicles down this week (two now permanently out of commission) that all of us are safe and sound.
It’s now Sabbath, so we are looking forward to a day of rest and rejuvenation. May yours be that too!
Happy Sabbath!
Laurie
