Perfect Homesteading

Posted on by November 5, 2010

I just got this wonderful DVD in the mail today and without too much of a wait, I had to pop it in the computer and take a gander at it.

I really love the West Ladies, and their beautiful farm in Tennessee.  They are just so lovely and just, well, wonderful.  I think they would be such delightful neighbors.  Sweet and ready to help with hard stuff as much as the fun stuff in life and living simple and all that.  I like that even though they are gentle spirited and sweet, you can see a little spunk in their eyes and smiles and you know they are not just little zombie clones of Little House on the Prairie meets the 700 Club.  And best of all, they sing and make music!  Just luvs them!  I do…

The DVD is basic, but really nicely done.  Good information and nice video techniques and they are just nice to watch.   I think I’m going to be ordering one every week or two.  I’m hoping that my girl children will enjoy learning some of this stuff by video which is their favorite way of consuming info like this.  I love that they are learning from me as well, and that much of this, they have already done with me, but it’s nice to fill in the blanks and see it in a nice easy to digest video.  They are definitely going to be a part of our keep library!

I think I’m going to get the soap one next, and then perhaps the candle one.  That is something we’re into right now.  Oh yeah, I wonder if they have a beer one.   (haha, probably not.)  My Mr. Beer kit arrived and I’m very excited to get that started this weekend!  I’ll take lots of pictures.   The girls are excited to help, but not too interested in the final project.  That’s fine.  (And oh, just if you’re wondering… I’m not much of a every day beer drinking gal.  But I do appreciate a fine brew once in a while, especially with a really decent cheeseburger and some hand cut fries!!!  Or on a super hot summer day after working on the estate, kicking back with a cold one is a delight.   I really can’t remember the last time I had one, though, at least a few weeks ago, so don’t worry, not falling into some dreadful moby home stereotype of lottery tickets, booze and smokes and all that.  That is JUST not this Moby Home gal!)

That being said, I’ve always been fascinated by home brewing and the graphics for the labels…  hahah… yeah, I like those and can’t wait to design my OWN beer labels!!!  I’m not sure if I want to brew because of the learning process and the beer or the excuse to make my own labels and all.  Well, whatever the reason, I asked the gentlemen in my band if they would be willing to help me taste test my batches and they unselfishly volunteered to assist me in any home brewing assistance that I might need.  They’re like that, you know.

Anyway…  I got done watching that DVD and then I headed over to their website to take a peek and I’m telling you, I got a little down.  I started to think, I really want that kind of life, a little couple acre plot of land, homesteading, animals, big garden, woods, etc.  I want that so badly for my kids.  Although they are pretty much not kids anymore…  at 16 and 20!  I love my Moby and all, and hope to get us a little RV in the spring to ramble around in, but it seems like every year we’re still not there.  And I just felt a little ache in my heart.  I’m sure it’s Barnheart… that condition that affects people who want to live a bit more agrarian then they are…  I’m quite sure my sigh was heavy enough to be felt through the whole place.

Had a LOT of client work this week, and though I am thankful for sure, I’m really not doing much of that anymore and just helping my loyal clients I’ve had for the last ten years or so.  But they all apparently got the notion they wanted major projects done NOW and thought of their favorite graphic artist!  And so that usually makes me pine for a simpler life because I’m just not that good at doing everyone else’s dream projects when I have a big old pile of my own I want to keep working on.  I should be a bit more caught up over the weekend…  it’s too cold out right now to really do too much outside.

But then, I started to think about it all, and realize, the heck with that…  this is here and now.  We’re doing just about everything I’d like to be doing on a couple acres, NOW.  We put in a garden and got nearly 200 pounds of produce this year… we rehabbed this old Moby and have continuing rehab projects that we’re doing… we canned a TON and froze stuff and have a stuffed panty.  We are paying down our debt, work at home, live simply.  We craft and sew, we buy local, we recycle, we are very green.  We have critters, just not farm livestock.  We compost.  We have old cars.  We have a friend nearby with chickens and we buy from the farmers market and love all things second hand and handmade and all that.

Really, all we’re missing is the livestock.  And they are a lot of work.

I guess I should be careful about letting other people’s perfect homestead world impinge on my perfect little urban homestead world.  I think there is a time and place for everything and who knows what is around the corner.

I think I need to make beer tomorrow.  That would be fun.  And maybe do a little sewing. Yeah.  That’s the ticket.

Pin It

Dreaming again…

Posted on by November 1, 2010

Well, it’s happening again… just dreaming about building my own little place, with my own ideas for simplicity and easy living. I see folks with their little tiny homes and then gypsy wagons and RVs and mobile homes… haha… it’s hard not to start picking bits and pieces from it all the various ideas and make your own dreams to start to come together.

I saw these pictures and thought, wow.. love the built in bed idea.  I think I might rather have the bed built in the long side, not the short side, because I can’t imagine crawling into bed when I’m 60 or 70.  But I love the idea of an enclosed bed area though.  With the curtain, as a sort of canopy, you don’t have to have a real bedroom and you still have a bit of privacy if you wish.   I had a canopy when I was a young woman, and there is something wonderful about closing up in the tent-like comfy zone to read, take a nap or just lay and listen to a rain.  I think a little bed enclosure with a little window and bookshelves instead of a headboard would be a little hideaway I could dig.

I also like the idea of storage under the bed.  I’d like to take it a little further and make some very low flat platforms on wheels so you can pull it easily in and out from under the bed.

I think it would be easy and a great use of space to make the bathroom totally tiled, head to toe.  And a drain in the middle of the floor.  You can have a simple little ship cabin style stainless sink in a corner for basic day to day needs, and I love the idea of a composting toliet.  Add a shower head in the corner and you can shower in the whole room, and keep it easy to clean!  If you designed the toliet right, it would be a great seat for showering, if you needed that as you grew older.

I love this show of a very simple little frig, and a cooktop/sink/counter combo.  I just don’t see why you need 4 or 6 burners much anymore.  Aside from a holiday or two, I don’t ever use more than 2 burners at a time.  And you can always adjust your cooking plans if you need more stuff done.

I really would love to ditch  my big refrigerator.  I’m quite sure it’s one of the largest energy drains in my home.  And for the most part, we keep too much stuff in it and so much spoils before we really use it.  I think it’s a case of just forgetting what is in there.   And I’ve been reading a lot about how so many things don’t need that constant refrigeration.  Obviously your fruits and veggies really don’t need constant refrigeration.  They need a cool dark place, and you can always build a little veggie box that would work great.  And just don’t buy so much at a time.  I love going to my local fruit and veggie store.   I think it would be cool to be able to go twice a week and just get smaller amounts.  It would be fresher and you would save a TON of energy and space, etc.  And you could maybe get some exercise if you walked there, or biked??? Hmmmm….

Another great idea that I’ve seen is to add lockable wheels to tables and large furniture pieces.  A couple clicks and you can easily rearrange your space to whatever you need.  Super easy to clean under larger pieces, and with clever window-dressing, you can hide the mechanics so no one needs to know or see.  I also like the idea of staggering the heights of things like desks and tables so that they nestle together when needed.  Even ottomans and side tables, you can tuck them out of the way when you don’t need them and make your small space easily more spacious.

It will be a while before I can build my little dream home.  That’s fine.  The time that I spend daydreaming and collecting ideas is priceless.   When the time is right, I’ll be ready.

I absolutely adore these simple shelves with all the glass jars open and ready with their beautiful colors and textures.  Easy to clean, easy to use in your cooking and baking.  This is definitely something I will incorporate into my little dream home.

I started a binder a year or so ago, and I call it my dream and goals binder.  I seperated it into several different categories, like home, garden, family, goals, business and fun.  And I added to each section a bunch of plastic sheet protectors.  I also took the time to make some goal pages for each section.   I added pictures and saying, quotes, goals, idea, whatever made sense for that section.  And I add stuff that I find and I like.  Maybe a recepie or a clipping of some plant or floor layout I like.  Sometimes I add a lot to the binder, sometimes not.  But I like to go and look at it often, to keep my goals and ideas fixed in my head and current.  It’s like a winnowing down area for me, so I’m not all willy nilly about how I really want to live and enjoy the rest of my life.

My birthday is coming up in this month, yeah, towards the end.  And I will be 47 years old.  Hmmmm….  Almost 50.  If I am blessed I will see another 30-40 or maybe even 50 years!  One thing that I am giving myself this birthday is the freedom to live as I want.  Not as others want me to.  If I want to buy an old class C Van RV and take all the insides out and make it custom to my tastes?  I’m gonna do it.  If I want to take a nap in the afternoon and work later in the evening?  I’m going to do it.  And I’m going to stop doing things just because I think I HAVE to.  Life is way too short.  It’s time to start enjoying things and live simply and deliberately.  It’s time..

Pin It

My Week’s Work…

Posted on by October 31, 2010

It’s ALMOST done… just a few little tweaks and last minute additions. I’ll probably have them done tonight. It’s been my project for at least half the week and all the weekend.

Jessy has taken her company and officially split it away from my Westvon Publishing. You see, we’re eventually going to be leaving the Westvon name behind because well, it was a company that I formed with a friend and former partner and is named after his children. It’s not quite suiting the rock and mineral business right, and to be honest, it’s not suiting me with my publishing and music directions either. So the first step was to establish Jessy with her own sole propriatorship, of her company, Dragon Mountain Treasures! Ta-Da!

After 2 months of waiting, she is official with her own credit card merchant account, shopping cart and websites. And we decided that to celebrate, we would totally revamp her main site and start up a companion site as well. And since the web stuff is what I do, I wanted to see her off on her new adventure with a decent site that will help her to succeed! And, well, we’re all done and ready for it’s debut on Monday morning.

But you all are getting a sneak peak!

www.rocksandmineralskits.com

We’ll be converting over her other site, www.RocksMineralsandFossilsforKids.com as well, and will be running the same exact website.    You might wonder about the two odd URL domains, and that makes sense…  it’s an effort to capture some great keywords that people might search for to find rock and mineral kits for kids.    Many people will not search for her company name, Dragon Mountain Treasures.   But they will type various searches such as rock kits or minerals for kids, etc.   So, that helps for her to get more attention out there.  The internet is a very competitive marketplace!

She’s a chip off the old block for sure… working hard on her company for hours and hours a day.  It’s starting to get busy, we do about 1/3 of our years’s orders in the next 6 weeks or so.   I’m super proud of her, done with college, working on her company, starting her new photography business as well, and just being a super wonderful daughter!  Both of my darlings are wonderful and Maggie works just as hard helping out in the family “mines”, especially during the holiday rush!   Heck, our friends and neighbors help out during the holiday rush!!!  It gets crazy around here.

Well, now that this done, I think I can get back to some other client work and a few personal projects as well this week!  And I have some fun things in store as well…  including this…  can’t wait for Ron, our UPS man, to bring it to me!  I’ve been inspired to give home brewing a shot…  it was both reading about Jenna over at Cold Antler Farm and her adventures and then reading a great article in Urban Farm magazine and then a bunch of reading on the web….  I thought at once I’d like to try and make wine, but then I thought, heck no, I’m the Mobile Home Woman… and frankly, I’m just not really a wine drinker.   I like a cold brew now and then and I love to collect beer label art, so this is something I’ve wanted to do for a long time…  so I just finally said, the heck with it…. I’m gonna give it a whirl!   Moby Park Pale Ale is coming soon!

Related Posts with ThumbnailsPin It