Green Roof

This October has been glorious. We are lucky, the greenroof has been more labor intensive and expensive than anticipated.


-Waterproof membrane $1000 and 700 pounds needed help to move it (thanks to those who helped)
-PearlLite from Mallad Idaho (in the giant white bags) $500 a light weight soil mixture to help with drainage
-Top soil $200
-Peat Moss $300
-Plants $500 got a great deal from Willard Bay Nursery on succulents and other small rooted, draught tolerant, evergreenish plants
-Crates $500 keeps all the planting medium from sliding off and provides drainage

Give it a few years to grow in and it will be beautiful.

Digging in the dirt is such a joy to me. It is something that gives me pure happiness. That magical chemistry of life and death and renewal. Now we not only have plants underneath our feet but also over our heads.


I couldn't find a Thoreau quote on roofs, this surprises me because they are the ultimate symbol of our disconnect with nature. We build this structure to keep out the cold, the wind, the rain. This structure protects us from the dangers of the unknown, of a world that can be violent and unpredictable. This structure becomes the line between the natural and the man made. Humans can spend their entire life never leaving a place with a roof over their head. You get into your car in the garage, drive to a parking terrace, never have to feel the heat of the sun or the biting cold. Never feel the wind in your hair or the rain on your face. Without these constant discomforts and unpredictable possible dangers we lose our ability to adapt-- to problem-solve-- to enjoy the few brief moments of perfection. The natural world teaches us how to cope with the discomforts of being human. To be patient and hope and know that all that is beautiful will return again.

One Season

Live each season as it passes; breathe the air, drink the drink, taste the fruit, and resign yourself to the influences of each.

~~Henry David Thoreau

We have lived the life of Walden with Wife and Kids for a quarter of a year, the season of summer. I am not sure where the time has gone. We are not finished with the house; I didn't expect to be. We have spent the last couple of weeks sealing things up for winter. Insulating the pipes and attic. Enjoying the warm days and cooling evenings. Preparing in many ways physically and psychologically for winter. I look forward to finishing the green roof and library this fall, then enjoying the wintery days of rest, sitting in front of the word burning stove reading many wonderful books.

Peaches

Our appetites have commonly confined our views of ripeness and its phenomena, color, mellowness, and perfectness, to the fruits which we eat, and we are wont to forget that an immense harvest which we do not eat, hardly use at all, is annually ripened by Nature~ Henry David Thoreau



The only thing I miss about our house in Logan is the peach tree. We have planted 3 peach trees in our orchard, but for some reason they haven't grown large enough to produce fruit. Rabbits, voles, and grasshoppers love them as much as I do. Now that we live there hopefully our dogs will keep the tree devouring pests away.
In the past I have bottled enough peaches (from our one little tree) to have one jar per week for 10 months. Eating a peach in winter is like opening a momentary doorway to summer. All the sunshine and warmth is captured in the sweet juicy taste and color of a peach. Greg went back and picked the peaches, but with no water all summer they are small . My son called them "two bite peaches". I froze them instead of bottling, but at least we have a little of summer put away.

Laundry

So that all the pecuniary outgoes, excepting for washing and mending, which for the most part were done out of the house, and their bills have not yet been received . . . were

House, $28 12 1/2
Farm one year, 14 72 1/2
Food eight months, 8 74
Clothing &c., eight months, 8 40 3/4
Oil, &c., eight months, 2 00
In all, $61 99 3/4

~~ From Walden by Henry David Thoreau

I realize that things will be different in the deep dark depths of December, but right now we are creating more energy than we use. A laptop surprisingly takes little energy, our kids are happy about this one. With LED and the compact florescent bulbs (and daylight hours), the power consumed by lighting is insignificant. Greg even uses power tools almost daily. The only quirk to our 1000 watt system is laundry. Last fall, Greg could no longer patch together our washer of 15 years. We ended up with an energy efficient model, which is still our highest wattage appliance. To do laundry we need a sunny day with everything else turned off and we do not generate enough electricity to run an electric drier. As of right now we are hanging clothes to dry. We are a family of four with different cleanliness standards than the days of Thoreau and he paid someone else to do his laundry. How would it be to have the means to pay someone to do all your drudgery so that you could spend time doing what you love? One of my weaknesses is getting too caught up in getting work done and not taking time to enjoy the moment. Living in the country is helping to teach me to take those moments. There are birds to watch, the little ones that chase the hawks away are my favorite... now I need to take time to learn all their names. The sky is so amazingly big with clouds that just hang there slowly forming pictures, a constant kaleidoscope. The sunsets are my moment. As a child I loved to watch the sun set. Our house in Logan didn't have a Western view, so having missed this daily routine for many years, it is the one moment I always make time for. Sunrise too is amazing as the world gradually blooms in color like the hand painting of a black and white photo. It is good to be living a type of Walden with Wife and Kids.

Solar Panels

Every man casts a shadow; not his body only, but his imperfectly mingled spirit. This is his grief. Let him turn which way he will, it falls opposite to the sun; short at noon, long at eve. Did you never see it? ~~Henry David Thoreau
We finally got our solar panels! Now we have a lot to learn by experience. Living without electricity for a month has actually been a good thing... instead of changing to limited power, a little power now is a miracle. When you do not have a utility company that will give you what you pay for... when you live with a limited amount of power... it changes the way you view things you need. Solar is an amazing thing. More efficient and less expensive than years past. I see the day when every house has a grid-tied solar system. Grid-tied for a few reasons: power companies will not want to lose their power, most people do not want to carefully monitor their power consumption, and the expense of batteries. Batteries cost more than the solar panels, the person who can invent a new way to store energy will vitalize alternative power sources. Now I look at the power consumption of everything, it is facinating to me.

Baths and Kitchen.... water

I believe that water is the only drink for a wise man.

~Henry David Thoreau










In this quote, Thoreau is referring to the Transcendentalist belief of not consuming alcohol. I will refer to this quote as the preciousness of water. Water becomes more precious when it does not automatically come out of the tap. Maybe in solar contractor language the date they give you really means two weeks later, still waiting for power. No power, no pressure pump, no pressure pump, no water to our facets.

We have never had a dish washer. When this task is rotated between four people, it is not bad. When you have to haul and heat your water, it becomes more difficult. It takes me 3 gallons of water to do the dishes.

Moved

"A man is rich in proportion to the number of things he can afford to let alone." ~Henry David Thoreau

We begin to work frantically. My first priority for completion is the basement and bathrooms. We are uprooting our children and taking them into the wilds. In attempt to make this less painful we get their rooms done first. Spend a surprising $400 on joint compound and $600 on paint. Sanding and painting will it ever end? Once painted, what I thought perfectly sanded walls are eye-poppingly flawed. Got to let it go, I sanded until my hand cramped and I couldn't feel; we worked from sunup til sunset for multiple weekends. Not much more we could do. We got the rooms done on a Monday (had to be to work on Tuesday), carpet on Friday $1400, and moved (thanks to all who helped) our heavy furniture on Saturday. Greg tiled the bathrooms and installed the fixtures... Greg is great at finding clearance items, we spent about $2000 for both bathrooms and they are beautiful fully tiled bathrooms.

I have never really moved. I lived in the same house as a kid. When we moved to the house in Logan we had just been married a year and didn't have many possessions. I can't believe the amount of stuff we acquired. I can't believe how much work it is to move. We yardsale, donate, throw out alot of things. Why did we have it? Where did it come from? We still have another weekend of moving things.

We spend the week in barebones Logan House for showers and electricity, and finish the master bedroom (with carpet recycled from the house in Logan). Get our payment... pay off the mortgage and start spending our equity. Life without a mortgage how will it be? Got to invest in retirement. I quickly learn that when subcontractors give you a date, in their language it really means a week later. I quickly learn that every thing costs more than you think (all those small parts not included really add up). Saturday, we move the rest of our belongings to a house without running water, appliances, finished floors (but the basement) or electricity. My nice plan is put off by my lack of fluency in subcontractor language.

Ordered a solar pump $2500 and generator $1500. The solar pump is amazing. I love it. It is quiet, and even works on partially cloudy days. We should have built our storage tank higher for gravity pressure, unfortunately we need a pressure pump to get the water up to the sinks and shower, this is an additional $1000 plus all the fitting and shut off valves add up to a surprising $500. $4000 for running water ($5000 if you count the tank we bought last year) and we aren't even there yet because the pressure pump needs electricity. By the time we get there I will really appreciate running water. The propane tankless hot water heater cost $750, the venting pipes surprisingly $250. So if you are thinking about hot water it is $6000. But a hot shower is one thing in life I am not willing to live without. It is worth every penny.

We wait for the gaslines to be pressure tested. Wait, wait, wait one week. Then Greg tiles the kitchen floor (tiles Greg got a year ago, traded for labor on a tile job) and we have the propane tank and line installed $4000 with the tank filled.

I usually do not splurge, do not buy what I want only what I need. But when it came to the fridge and stove that I will have for the next 20+ years I wanted what I wanted. Propane is more expensive and I wanted stainless so we pay a painful $3500 for both. They had to be shipped from the midwest and when we unpackage they have dents (we only later read the instructions to not sign the delivery forms until you have inspected them and now have to live with it) but we are living the theme of not expecting perfection. How I love refrigeration. Spend a hot end of June week without it and you will appreciate a cold drink like never before. We have also spent more money on convenient foods than normal with no easy way to keep things cold or to cook them. You can do alot with a campstove, but I only have so much energy.

I don't think the solar guy took us seriously. He didn't order our panels and wouldn't until he cashed half the payment (why is he just telling us now when I thought he would be here to install the panels). We pay the half of the $10,800 for the solar system and wait. Fourth of July he is gone on vacation. We still wait.

We go to my parents house every few days to do the laundry, shower, and charge batteries. So far it has been light from 5:30 am til 10 pm which is sleeping time, but each day we lose a few minutes of light. We have solar flashlights and haul buckets of water to make the toilets flush, wash dishes, or to take lukewarm baths in. The water all drains perfectly to the septic tank, it just doesn't make it to the taps.

Three weeks of living in the wilds. Done a lot of driving. The dogs love living in the country and the kids have been amazingly adaptive and tell me that I haven't damaged them for life. The mornings and evenings are the best. In Logan I never went outside after dinner... too many weird neighbors. It is beautiful here, quiet, and we play frisbee every evening watching the sun set and the stars begin to dance. We are now really living at Walden with Wife and Kids.