Stuff That's Happened
I am going to try and keep this as succinct as possible, but considering the amount of time I have let lapse, and the amount of things that have happened in it, I'm not sure if I will achieve my goal!
We moved over to our trailer around the second week of August. Or, should I say, "we began to move." Moving is still an ongoing process. We had no water, heat, power, or septic at that point, but decided that since it was summer time, it would be fun to start "camping" here while we did some preliminaries, such as getting the kitchen, living room and bathroom painted, starting on the trailer skirting, and while I started unpacking my kitchen. Nearly all of my "kitchen" was in boxes in the SeaCan, and I secretly cursed the way things worked out as far as the placement of things in our yard. The SeaCan is only about 200 yards away from the house, but by the time I had lugged box after heavy box of kitchen items (amazing how much stuff you can hide in cupboards, isn't it?) across the dry, drought-parched grass, it felt more like a mile. But! I did notice a reciprocating benefit in my biceps and waistline! YAY!
We got our septic put in before we even had power, and the power finally got hooked up at the end of August. Foolishly, we thought we would immediately begin to have access to water, since our well has been dug for over a year. Alas, things couldn't be so easy--it wouldn't build nearly enough character, would it? Within two days of having power, we had internet. We got our gas on September the 9th. It was supposed to be in on the eighth, and the poor young fellow who was helping to dig it accidentally cut our power line with the trencher. Fortunately, he was able to find an electrician to come fix it that night, so we were only without power for a few hours.
The morning of the ninth, the temperature in our bedroom was only 12 degrees C (54 degrees F)! I was very grateful when the guy from the gas company showed up that afternoon to finish hooking up the gas! That night, an electrician-friend came by and fixed the problem with our wiring in about 10 minutes, and we had water, too!
Well, until the next morning. After a rainy night, I was amazed to hear that it was still pouring outside when I woke up the next morning. Then I went into the bathroom and realized the water was not pouring on us from above, but gushing from beneath. A hose had popped off the water tank in the night and was pouring gallons of water everywhere. Sigh... Yet another adventure.
You know, we all want more adventure in our lives, don't we? Okay, maybe not all of us, but there have definitely been points in my life where I have craved more adventure than I had been having. That is probably the part of me that lets me move across and continent and back, and that makes me game to pioneer a new property while raising three boys and home schooling. But then there's another small part of me, that just cries a little when something else happens on the adventure, and kind of whimpers, "But wouldn't it be nice if we could just take a day off from adventure? Just one? Or maybe even two? Please?"
Well, we actually got the hose fixed that day, too, so as of September 10, we have had all of our utilities. Well, except the land line phone, for which the waiting list is about a year. Unfortunately, cell phone reception is poor--the best connection is outside of our tin can of a home, but that could get interesting come January!
Meanwhile, and since then, we have been slowly moving things over from Magnussons and in from the SeaCan, and every new load must be sorted and organized and a new niche found for it. Some of it has been sitting in our way for weeks, because I simply haven't had time to deal with it since beginning school two weeks ago.
Had we known, when we were packing our 3000 sq. ft. home, that we would be unpacking it into a 900 sq. ft. one, we might have packed it differently. Then again, there were a lot of things we couldn't foresee then, weren't there? The boxes have been rearranged and moved and rearranged again so many times since then, it's no wonder I don't know where my roaster is! (By the way, I ended up borrowing Amanda's to roast the turkey. Thanks, friend!) Our small dining room is also our school room and craft room. The living room has a third of it "divided off" behind the futon, where we have a small computer desk, a shelf, two filing cabinets, and our school supplies. This makes for some pretty cramped quarters! The piano keyboard is going to be set up in the master bedroom, as soon as I can clear enough room along the wall.
We have been giving things away, getting creative with storage solutions, and down-sizing what we think we "need" as far as stuff and personal space. We were originally hoping to build an addition this fall, but that is looking unlikely, since the utilities ate up more of our small development mortgage than we thought it would--thus, we need to get used to things the way they are.
The adventure continues...
We moved over to our trailer around the second week of August. Or, should I say, "we began to move." Moving is still an ongoing process. We had no water, heat, power, or septic at that point, but decided that since it was summer time, it would be fun to start "camping" here while we did some preliminaries, such as getting the kitchen, living room and bathroom painted, starting on the trailer skirting, and while I started unpacking my kitchen. Nearly all of my "kitchen" was in boxes in the SeaCan, and I secretly cursed the way things worked out as far as the placement of things in our yard. The SeaCan is only about 200 yards away from the house, but by the time I had lugged box after heavy box of kitchen items (amazing how much stuff you can hide in cupboards, isn't it?) across the dry, drought-parched grass, it felt more like a mile. But! I did notice a reciprocating benefit in my biceps and waistline! YAY!
We got our septic put in before we even had power, and the power finally got hooked up at the end of August. Foolishly, we thought we would immediately begin to have access to water, since our well has been dug for over a year. Alas, things couldn't be so easy--it wouldn't build nearly enough character, would it? Within two days of having power, we had internet. We got our gas on September the 9th. It was supposed to be in on the eighth, and the poor young fellow who was helping to dig it accidentally cut our power line with the trencher. Fortunately, he was able to find an electrician to come fix it that night, so we were only without power for a few hours.
The morning of the ninth, the temperature in our bedroom was only 12 degrees C (54 degrees F)! I was very grateful when the guy from the gas company showed up that afternoon to finish hooking up the gas! That night, an electrician-friend came by and fixed the problem with our wiring in about 10 minutes, and we had water, too!
Well, until the next morning. After a rainy night, I was amazed to hear that it was still pouring outside when I woke up the next morning. Then I went into the bathroom and realized the water was not pouring on us from above, but gushing from beneath. A hose had popped off the water tank in the night and was pouring gallons of water everywhere. Sigh... Yet another adventure.
You know, we all want more adventure in our lives, don't we? Okay, maybe not all of us, but there have definitely been points in my life where I have craved more adventure than I had been having. That is probably the part of me that lets me move across and continent and back, and that makes me game to pioneer a new property while raising three boys and home schooling. But then there's another small part of me, that just cries a little when something else happens on the adventure, and kind of whimpers, "But wouldn't it be nice if we could just take a day off from adventure? Just one? Or maybe even two? Please?"
Well, we actually got the hose fixed that day, too, so as of September 10, we have had all of our utilities. Well, except the land line phone, for which the waiting list is about a year. Unfortunately, cell phone reception is poor--the best connection is outside of our tin can of a home, but that could get interesting come January!
Meanwhile, and since then, we have been slowly moving things over from Magnussons and in from the SeaCan, and every new load must be sorted and organized and a new niche found for it. Some of it has been sitting in our way for weeks, because I simply haven't had time to deal with it since beginning school two weeks ago.
Had we known, when we were packing our 3000 sq. ft. home, that we would be unpacking it into a 900 sq. ft. one, we might have packed it differently. Then again, there were a lot of things we couldn't foresee then, weren't there? The boxes have been rearranged and moved and rearranged again so many times since then, it's no wonder I don't know where my roaster is! (By the way, I ended up borrowing Amanda's to roast the turkey. Thanks, friend!) Our small dining room is also our school room and craft room. The living room has a third of it "divided off" behind the futon, where we have a small computer desk, a shelf, two filing cabinets, and our school supplies. This makes for some pretty cramped quarters! The piano keyboard is going to be set up in the master bedroom, as soon as I can clear enough room along the wall.
We have been giving things away, getting creative with storage solutions, and down-sizing what we think we "need" as far as stuff and personal space. We were originally hoping to build an addition this fall, but that is looking unlikely, since the utilities ate up more of our small development mortgage than we thought it would--thus, we need to get used to things the way they are.
The adventure continues...