What a day! What a week!

 

If you happened to come to the blog today and got a temporarily out of service warning… it’s because we were featured on a very popular website/Facebook page this morning and it over loaded our servers!!!  Imagine that!

It was really a neat thing to be featured… and we’re so happy to meet some new readers and such.  Hope you like what you see and will stop a spell some other time!

Here’s the site and link…  very cool!  In about a span of 10 minutes upon being broadcast, we had upwards to 1200 visitors and the blog closed down.  It wasn’t long before it came back up, but it was pretty unusual for us!  And by the day’s end, over 2,000 folks had peeked in for a visit!

http://homesteadsurvival.blogspot.com/2012/11/new-induction-burner-nice-to-have-for.html

It’s neat that she found us for an old post through the moby… on induction heaters!  We have a real stove now, so I don’t use the induction heater as much, but it’s still a pretty neat thing and I’m very glad to have it.  When I build my yurt out back, I will be SURE to bring it along!  Simple, easy and fast.  Not too bad!

I’ve been asked to do a few guest posts there at the homestead survival blog too, that will be fun!  Just have to think about what to write!  I think this is definitely a bit of a divine blessing…  I’m been chewing over my idea of a book off our experiences and also writing some articles for a few magazines, but I just wasn’t sure if anyone would really be interested.  I wrote articles a long time ago, had four or five published, but that was that.  When the hostess mentioned “if I ever write a book, she’d be happy to share it with her readers…”  I though, wow… how does she know that is something I have been stewing about???  Pretty cool how things like that work out.

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Well, my busy week has been a little on the weird side…  prepping for a inland hurricane that was dying and falling at our doorstep, that was fun.  And then having some heating issues…  more fun.  And then having some rules and regulations issues… more fun!!!

This is how it went…

Sunday and Monday, we spent the time getting the place ready for superstorm Sandy and her breezy arrival!  I had heard all sorts of reports such as snow, sleet, rain, high winds and all.  We are in the Ohio valley region, at the northwestern side.  Most of our preparations included making sure the pastures and yards were clean of any possible projectiles, some raking so that leaves were contained instead of all over the place and making a good place for some of our pullets and other livestock.   We planned to keep the sheep and Cody locked up for a day or two, just to make it safer in case of any falling tree branches or bad weather that might wreck a fence or just prove too miserable for them.  I went to town and got a couple bales of hay and some bags of feed so that we would be set for awhile.

Monday evening was WINDY!  We had some very serious winds at times, gusting and blowing this old farmhouse!  We knew just which windows needed plastic by the billowing drapes and cold draft!  We have sealed up all but about 4 or 5 now.  It has made a huge difference.  Soon, we’d like to consider replacing the worse ones, but that will be another project for another year most likely!  In the meanwhile $20 worth of window kits will make us all much snugger this winter for sure.

With all the wind and the unknown weather conditions, it was a restless night.  Everyone in the house was up and down and up and down.  You could hear the sleet against the windows at a few points and it would wake us up.  Each of us was out on the screen porch at some point in the night,  checking the bunnies or the banties, or just peering out into the darkness to see what was going on.  Gideon stood in the doorway of his shack, chewing hay and watching like a sentinel in the darkness.   By morningfall, we had lost a few good sized branches, had most of the left over leaves off the trees and a slick layer of frosty sleet crumbles all over.

We decided we would still go to town that afternoon since we had errands and appointments all over and it would be hard to reschedule everything.   By the afternoon, the sleet had burned off and we were only left with cold and winds, of which, the latter was dying away.  We did have a magnificent sunset that day before the storm hit… simply amazing!  The picture above and below really show it off!  Stunning…

So all in all, we weathered the storm pretty well.  Far better than so many people.  Our hearts and prayers go out to those displaced and disrupted by this amazing storm!

 

 

Our last big adventure this week has been dealing with our propane tank/new furnace situation!  I knew we are getting low on the gas that was in our tank.  We started out at about 30% and we are down to 10%.  So I started to call around and pretty much got the run around!!

You see, having your own tank is somewhat of an oddity apparently.  And having an OLD tank is not good either.  According to the gas companies.  We finally got someone to come out and I rounded up the substantial amount of cash needed for the first filling and the young man was outside for a good 45 minutes before he came back in and said he couldn’t fill the tank.  What?  Well…  our tank did not have a “data tag” that tells him the gallons and other important information.  And he says, our regulators are out of their warranty period, so he can’t fill them.  He tested them and they are fine, but still, too old.  Both the tank and the house are out of date.  He thought those were *just* a couple hundred dollars.  But a new tank… wow.  Or if we could get it re-certified, then he might be able to do something. It’s always something!!!

Well, now I have to do some considering, thinking and calling.  Most of the places will rent you one, a tank, and that should come with all the trimmings.  But then, what to do with the old?  Our furnace guy, Mark, he also scraps, so he said he could take it and get rid of the beast, should it come to that.  I guess we have a few more days left of heating, let’s brave we can get everything done and figured out before we need to go back to huddling around the kerosene heaters!!!

 

But, hey, all things considered, we just keep moving on.  I figure everything that we eventually get fixed, adapted and stable, is just another step forward to a calmer and less expensive existence!  Soon… soon….   There are always alternatives and ways to make things work for the interim.  We’re tough gals, we’ll figure it all out.  Of course, some nice, not tooooooo cold weather will sure help!!!  We’ll have to see how it all goes!

Here’s hoping this weekend is nice and simple and calm!!!!  I got a new little coop to build for some beautiful sons of Bucka Roo that came home to roost!!!!  And my challenge is to build the thing ENTIRELY out of found elements here at the homestead!!!  I think I can… I have a plan!!!

Take care and welcome to all new readers!!!!!

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About Mobymom

the banjo player for Deepwater Bluegrass, and the editor of BuckeyeBluegrass.com as well as the main graphic designer of the Westvon Publishing empire. She is a renaissance woman of many talents and has two lovely daughters and a rehab mobile home homestead to raise.

Comments

What a day! What a week! — 3 Comments

  1. Just a note on how it works around here. Most propane companies will bring a rental tank and hook it up for no charge other than you pay for it’s first fill to 80 percent. My company (and most others as well) do not charge me any rental money as long as I use 500 gallons per year. If I don’t (which has happened to me as I am very frugal and my extra insulated house is small) my rental charge is $40/yr. The only advantage to owning one’s own tank is that you can shop around for the best price when you need a fill. But lots of times a propane company will charge you $50 or so to “test” your tank/regulator for safety, since you are not a signed customer of theirs so there goes your savings for shopping around. Plus, many companies run summer specials for their rental customers, guaranteeing a certain price if you commit (better yet if you pre-pay)to at least 500 gallons per year. Plus, being a rental, therefore guaranteed customer, will get the ability to go on budget plans, etc. that the company may offer. I would feel safer with new equipment since there sits hundreds of gallons of highly flamable liquid, under pressure….

    By the way…love the pump organ!!!

  2. Thanks a bunch for the info… yes, I knew about rentals, but just thought it would be more frugal and efficient to use the tank that is here. They tested it and it was fine. Just missing a dumb tag on it. And the regulators are 14 years old, so that is a problem I guess. Isn’t just a pain though, all the rules and regulations and such that everyone has for something that should really be fairly straightforward… I dunno…. frustrating!!! I called around and around here it’s $50 a year for the tank and they will set it all up and such, like you said, but then they charge a 15 cent a gallon surcharge for rental tanks! That’s kinda rude. And you’re locked into that company and all. And then the couple places I’ve called so far are so busy they can’t come out until the middle of the month! I think I’m going to make a few more calls and find out if I can get someone to certify and tag the tank and install the new regulators. See how much that is. Then I don’t have to move the old and get rid of it and all that. The tank itself is made from super heavy duty steel, and really shouldn’t be bad. if I get new regulators, and it tested, it should be as good as a new tank. Might even be a bit better since everything seems to be cheaper made these days. Who knows!!!! haha… I just don’t want to be coooooolllldddddd!!!!

    -sherri

  3. Sherri,
    If you have not relinquished ownership of your old tank, first advertise it on one of those places where you can sell things. My son and his friends buy old butane tanks and make excellent smokers. There are a lot of people who want the large tanks and some want small ones. You could probably get at least fifty bucks for it.