We have a lot of major upcoming improvements around the property over the summer. And we're fighting with mother nature and old age as we go. Val has an upcoming gallbladder surgery that will keep her off of her feet a little, but she won't be doing any strenuous work for quite a while. But on a brighter note, we're also adding a much-needed mini-split heat pump that will allow us to take advantage of all of the extra solar power generation we're getting from our solar array. That is typically just wasted energy that we'll be able to put into heating, cooling and dehumidifying, making our lives a bit more comfortable and less dependent upon our wood stove during those cold winter days here in the upstate. We can take some small breaks from the constant hauling of firewood and stoking the wood stove! And if you're like us here in the east, we're stuck under a pretty hot weather pattern with high humidities that are just unbearable at times. So getting this mini-split installed will be a huge win for us year 'round! We just recently completed our lean-to addition on our workshop and have taken advantage of being able to work outside under cover and not worry about the sudden thunderstorms that crop up. Plenty of room to manuever large pieces af material too! The garden is growing and we've got to catch up with our weeding for sure! Soon, we'll be harvesting some fresh veggies for eating and canning or freezing too! This past winter, we ate fresh veggies all winter long and saved a bunch of money on groceries. Looking forward to that again! And we've been busy getting our wood shed stocked up for the winter. We've had quite a few trees that needed to come down, some from storm damage, others like our ash trees that simply died and needed to be cut down. There's always plenty to do in that regard with 30 acres of forest to maintain! Who says homesteading is easy? We've also been dreaming a bit more about the day when we can afford a good used tractor. THAT would make all the difference for a couple of old farts like us. We've been getting by using our lawn tractors for pulling large logs, but that's taking a toll on those little motors. Finally, our (hopefully) last major project of this year will be sometime in the fall when we get our Amish friends to cut us the lumber and come over to build us a post and beam carport that we'll convert into an enclosed garage next year. One thing at a time! It will be nice to keep two feet of snow from covering the truck all winter long!
We've also got some neat plans for YOU. We're working out some details for having some random free giveaways of our merchandise on our YouTube store. Check out the items we have now, and we'll be adding more as we go. We hope you enjoy the descriptions. It's not always about selling something!
And speaking of that, we're working on some NICE new logos, banners and other imagery that we'll be adding to items in our store as well as on all of our web sites. It's time for an update. The old logo shows us from over 15 years ago, and we've gotten a bit better looking since then!
And FINALLY, THANK YOU for being a part of our little community! We're not as much about the YouTube videos as we are about providing a place for folks like us to exchange ideas, information, experiences and our successes and failures. We can all make our lives better by contributing nothing more than our lifetimes of experiences with one another.
THANKS!
Al & Val
