Oh Lawdy lawdy, what a ride it has been, this power thing.  Or lack of, for better understanding.  Off grid, generator issues galore, making do, getting by and thriving still. 

The electric company came out this week and it went better than expected in some ways.  The way we see it, the only possible hangup would be getting the neighbors to allow an easement to run the lines.  You would think it shouldn’t be a problem… expect the worse, hope for the best.  Sooo, if all goes right, we could technically have grid power within the next 3 weeks or so!

It’s quite strange actually.  When I called and talked to a lineman a year ago I was told there would be significant cost involved.  Either we had to pay for tree removal (have you seen our trees?!) or pay for the wire to run underground (have you seen our rocks?!).  Either way, he said, we were looking at around $1200 plus deposit and other fees.  Because, well, we grow rocks and trees.

Fast forward to this week’s visit and the shocker we were hit with.  It will cost us nothing.  Nada.  Zip.  Zilch!  If we wanted to go underground even, we would just have to dig the ditch.  3 foot deep.  But since I am fairly certain the FBI and CIA and every other alphabet soup agency is watching purchases of large amounts of dynamite, and I really don’t have time to deal with all those investigations, above ground it is.

Once we get the easement approval from the neighbors, the electric company will come out and clear the trees, leaving them in nice, messy piles for us to deal with.  Uh, free firewood anyone??  Bring a chainsaw and some chairs, we’ll grill and make it a party!

So how picky can I be??  There are 3 (maybe 4) trees that I desperately want to keep.  Like this one:

It speaks of resiliency – even though half of it is gone and one branch fell – it adapted and lives!

And this one:
 

It looks like a stairway.  To Heaven perhaps.  A reminder to always look upward.

They are big and unique and just oh so neat!  I’m gonna do my best to convince them.

After speaking with him, I have to wonder, if it is this easy, why were we told different so long ago?  Why were we not told it would be that easy to get power?  I know the answer – we had things to learn.  Learn we did.

Would it be bad to admit, I’m kinda saddened by it?  Thrilled, don’t get me wrong.  But also sad.  Like the ending of an era.  We did it.  We lived a year off grid!  We found and did alternatives.  We learned what we could live with and what we really don’t want to live without.  Even figured out alternatives to those things (both on and off grid).  I’m proud of us.  It was rough at times but so amazing at others.  I mean how often do you go outside and see the night sky, completely unobstructed by light pollution?  And we got to see it, every night for a year!  And the quiet of just nature and no humming electronics and mechanics.  Amazing.

Maybe the family won’t revolt to much if I deem a few months out of the year to be “electricity free”.  During decent weather months.  Not going to miss the freezing cold and burning hot.

It’s been another crazy week filled with a hold me infant, napless children and tons of STUFF sorted through.  Happily – as in I almost had a celebratory drink at 2pm because the hard part was fiiiinally over – I finished going through the “storage rooms” and have everything sorted into categories.  I’m honestly surprised at how much of certain categories we have.  Toys I knew would be a big one.  I did not expect us to have so many old clothes.  Or craft supplies.  Or holiday gear.  But I expected a lot more kitchen stuff.  

Another thing I didn’t expect – to have my OCDness so in my face!  Do you see this:

What??  Why yes, it is a tote full of bags.  Ahem.  Perhaps I take that “like items together and easily store-able” a wee to seriously.  And seeing the towering stack of now empty organizing bins and containers…   I wonder if there is an Organizers Anonymous…

But the positive side of that is now we know where to start on the purging based on how many totes they have!  See how that works.  Maybe its a good thing we have been living out of totes for so long!

 We got the window this week!!  Took some rearranging, but we got a 36×60 window to fit.  It required Mr. Littlest to move to the middle row… which made Lady not so happy when she lost rock-paper-scissors to Girly.  Isn’t that how all families settle disputes?  Seems the fairest way to me… and usually the winner.

So how do you cook when the solar oven isn’t finished, there isn’t a generator and mama doesn’t feel like standing in front of a fire when it is already 95??  Like this of course!  It actually worked fairly well – we got to sit in the air conditioning, watch a movie and the pizza warmed.  I’d say cooked, but since the crust never browned, I think it was closer to “warming”.  Hey, at least the cheese melted! 

I found this really nice article.  It’s not a Ready thing, let Now win.

It struck a cord with me.  Maybe because we did get “knocked up” early, and we got married early, and kept on having children, and bought a house, and and… all during “not ready” moments.  It’s how we lived our lives, unintentionally.  It’s just how things fell, how life happened.  To intentionally jump and get started on something important to us, even though we weren’t “ready” and didn’t have much of a plan, it sounds crazy to some.

But when would it have been a “good time”?  Doesn’t life just kinda happen like that?  Timing is never “perfect”, usually not even “as good a time as any”.  It’s almost always that “shake your head, really, now?” time.  How much more upsetting would our hiccups have been had we waited until we were “ready” and at the “perfect time”? We would still be waiting…

Just jump.  Do something this week, even a small something, to get started.  Getting started is always the hardest part.

On a lighter note – a couple of cute pics.  Just cause I can 🙂

 Before breakfast flutterby catching.

 Sittin’ like a big girl.  Just soakin’ up the AC.