BUSY TIMES AT THE HOMESTEAD
With spring in full swing, my son and I have been busy out at our self sustaining homestead. The weather has been good to us, but we definitely could use more rain, as it's been very dry.
So, with the pleasant temperatures and abundant dry time, we have been tackling a few things that we have been wanting to do.
THE DEEP FREEZE
So, with our upgrades to the solar panel array of adding more panels, we now produce enough electric to power a deep freeze. This is a massive game changer for us, and will allow for us to not visit town nearly as often for what groceries we need, or for me to run to my Dad's house...where we have access to his freezers for storage.
It will be put out in the unfinished part of the shed so....I did have to build the floor so I'd have a place to put it. 😃😁
*You can see the finished product in the picture above this one, but this is the start.
THE GUESTROOM/CLUBHOUSE AND OUTDOOR KITCHEN UPDATES
With us doing so much of our cooking outdoors, either over the campfire or on our small stove top, improvements to this area are always great!
And this one is the first stage of a massive upgrade. Until now, we used the campfire for cooking, mainly because we enjoy sitting around it and making memories while we make food. But during times of inclimate weather, we are forced to use the stove. The stove area was just an open space and we had a thick tarp we used to cover the area.
*The old cooking area. See the morel mushroom in the picture?
Living in the forest in balance with nature has it's benefits...like mushrooms growing all around our home and walking trails😁 While this little tent kitchen has served us well to this point, it was obviously never intended to be long-term.
...So in with the new. Our new kitchen will ne in the same place, about 60 feet(18.2 meters) away from the house, on the trail that leads to the garden and spring. It will use conventional wood building methods. And the top of the kitchen will be used as a raised guest room about ten or twelve feet off the ground!
*Where the wood meets the concrete...
The first step was hauling the concrete back to the kitchen area and then measuring out where the footing holes needed to be. Then dig the holes, pour the concrete and mount the metal brackets. Then we install 4X4s and secured them with screws.
At the top of them, we attach 2X10s and build a square. Then we attach the floor joists to them and install the wood sub flooring.
*The floor joists.
*The subflooring, some new, some repurposed.
After this step, it was time to build what will soon be the guest house. We have a pre-constructed metal building that I will assemble on top of it. The coolest part is that it will be wrapped in plexiglass on the walls and the ceiling so that those who stay in it will have a completely open view of everything in our forest!🥰
*A view from the ground of the future guest house.
*The view our guests will see when they walk out their front door onto their raised patio.