Solar systems design & other projects

It's been a thoughtful couple of weeks as we research the details of our systems and place many orders to obtain all of the components.  Taking this route is certainly not easy - especially when you have to shop online and can't browse the aisles at Home Depot!  After four days adding 80ish items to an online cart I finally placed an approx $1200 order yesterday evening.  Did I buy everything we will need? - I am hoping we thought of 98% of the needed items for the plumbing and electrical systems.  

Husband has been going back and forth on email with Northern Arizona Sun and Wind and hopes to place the solar system order today.  

In the meantime, while planning systems, we have done some manual labor. We had 20 yards (two large loads) of cinders delivered and, with the help of my folks we spread it around the buildings. This will keep the dust down as well as control the mud during the rainy season. The pile doesn't look like much here, but looks are deceiving and took us two days to spread!

We also dug up the plumbing we put in the ground 10+ years ago as we now intend to finally use it!

Our goal is to live on solar power for everything except for the use of an outdoor propane grill for some cooking and a wood-burning stove for heat in the winter.  I will be using the solar oven more and more.  Speaking of the solar oven, I am really getting the hang of baking bread in terms of the time of day, length of time for baking, and keeping the oven oriented to the sun properly.  The other day the solar oven reached 400 degrees for the first time!

Something I am very excited about is the solar water heater we ordered!  We will have an completely passive solar hot water system thanks to Sunbank.  It is on its way here and I am really excited about setting that up!  We are also adding a solar panel to our RV with a roof mount....I will share more details later!  We hope to have all of the components of the systems around the same time the garage door/end wall is installed in our new building (mid-June) by the contractor.  Then we can get to work putting all the systems together so that we can finally have running water & power in our house!

Freedom and inalienable rights

It's the American Dream - the rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness - these inalienable rights are meant to be protected by the government.  Our right to life is under attack by both the pandemic and our government's failure to protect the population.  We will soon reach 100,000 deaths from this virus and most leaders are encouraging people to resume their normal economic activities despite the fact that nothing has changed in terms of a vaccine or a treatment (though there is some promise on the horizon).   Liberty is a nebulous concept when you live in the country with the highest per capita incarceration rates.  The pursuit of happiness is limited by the extraordinary economic divide between the haves and the have nots - and this situation grows more dire every day during these Depression Era levels of unemployment, hunger, and inequality.  Of course our government is all too willing to bail out corporate America and leave the rest of the country with no health insurance, no safety net, and a paltry stimulus check.  We are an Empire in decline with leaders who are unwilling and unable to ensure our most basic inalienable rights.

There are no saviors in this day and age - if you are waiting for one you have a long wait ahead; if you think you have found one it is only a matter of time before they let you down.  No saviors.  We've moved beyond that testament to the last - we have to save ourselves. 

It's daunting, I know.  I've been working on this problem for 20+ years on and off between periods of wishful thinking that the current systems could reform, that a great leader would emerge, that the world was not mad.  I deluded myself because the path to self-support is a long an difficult one with no leaders, no models, no community for support.  We are lone wolves, nomads, and travelers sharing stories of what works and what does not.  We have to consider unique individual contexts so that each solution is tailored to that time and place.  We can not mass produce our way out of this, we have to craft unique solutions for difficult times.  My solution can't be your solution, though there may be a resemblance.  It's time to burn down the walls in our minds that keep us from following our own bliss and forging our own way.

In saying this, we can agree on the problems - that we must free ourselves from systems that are unsustainable, crumbling, and failing.  If we don't free ourselves from these systems we will be unprepared to thrive when they dissolve, and dissolve they will, the warning signs are everywhere.  Do you put your faith in the mighty Amazon?  Is Jeff Bezos your savior? A man who will become the first trillionaire while 20% of American children go hungry?

The good news is that you can look at your situation and move on a path towards your own self-support.  There is nothing more comforting than knowing that I can free myself from many unsustainable systems.  I can grow and make food, educate my children, produce renewable energy, remain socially distanced, and create a life, full of liberty and the pursuit of happiness.  While many people are struggling with realities of life during a pandemic we are following the less trodden path we have forged.  We planned on spending this summer working on completing the homestead and the pandemic gave us an extra month away from the city (due to remote working). 

Joseph Campbell said, "If you do follow your bliss you put yourself on a kind of track that has been there all the while, waiting for you, and the life that you ought to be living is the one you are living." He also said, "Follow your bliss and don't be afraid, and doors will open where you didn't know they were going to be.” I had no idea that a pandemic would give us an additional month to work on this project, but I am grateful for the time. I'm living in a moment where a goal set over 20 years ago is near fruition. So many thoughts and possibilities occur to me - for I had spent so much time thinking how to get here I had not given much thought to what happens once we achieve it. Finishing a goal (or even approaching the finish) allows you to think beyond it. This is such an exciting time for us, standing on the precipice and ready to jump!

During these difficult times I hope that you accomplish your goals and find a life full of liberty where you can pursue happiness; because creation and vision is the antidote to worry and despair in the midst of these troubling times.  If you do create a vision, a mission, or a plan please share it because we nomads can certainly use the inspiration as we each take this crazy journey.

Homesteading while living in an RV

We've made a number of homesteading moves since arriving in St. Johns.  Though the mail has been very slow and many companies are overwhelmed with orders we have managed to obtain some really great items that are enhancing our stationary summer!

First, we started a container garden, we planted on May 1st and we had sprouts in the first week!  Inspired by a trip to Biosphere II back in February I made ollas out of clay pots - they are working very well to keep the containers moist.  We have carrots, onions, lettuce, asparagus, zucchini and sweet potatoes growing.

We also got a composter...sister has had an excellent time adding refuse and spinning it!

Finally, and most exciting to me, I got a solar oven!  I've been using it to bake my sourdough bread - it is so much fun. I am going to branch out to cook meals I would make in a crockpot soon!

We've been doing a lot of cooking and I am subscribing to Purple Carrot to receive two vegan meals each week.  Here are some pictures of the many amazing meals we have been making.  It's good to have time for cooking and planning great meals!

New building at Rancho Status Quo...

We've kept ourselves very busy here in the White Mountains of AZ.  Between the end of the semester and projects at Rancho Status Quo I have not had any time to blog!  Let me take some time to outline the happenings towards getting our self-sufficient, off-grid homestead up and running.

Our first order of business was getting new concrete slabs poured - this took place in the middle of April and was completed by Hardcore Construction (Snowflake, AZ).     Here are some before pictures from early in the project.

Watching the guys work, prepping the area and building the frames was the height of quarantine entertainment for the family.  My parents, who had planned to only spend a couple months in AZ during the winter, have extended their stay through mid-June due to not wanting to travel during the Covid-19 pandemic.  We have RV sites right next to each other and they have been helping us with the kids and the land project since we have been here.

And then there were slabs!

Back in November 2019 - we took delivery of a new steel building (SteelMaster) at our site in Mesa.  Taking delivery of these buildings is an adventure.  This was the second time we had one delivered - our first was delivered to the land.  This time a semi pulled right up to our lot in Mesa!

You then work with the driver to unload your building.  Though it may not appear to be much, the pieces are awkward and heavy and there are a lot of them!  We unloaded into the driveway and then loaded most of the pieces into our cargo trailer for storage.  Anyhow, when we moved to the mountains we moved the cargo trailer with the new building.  In April and early May we were finally able to construct it on the new slab!

The first step is to drill holes in the new foundation with a hammer drill we rented from Home Depot.

You put anchor bolts into the newly drilled holes in order to secure the base plates to the foundation.

Then we unloaded the cargo trailer (yeah! we have our cargo trailer back!!) and started putting together the first arch.

Next, you raise the first arch and secure it to the base plate.  The first arch is not very stable until a second one is raised and attached to it.  There was no time for pictures between the first and second arches!

We raised the first two using ladders, but it was clear that scaffolding was the way to go!  So after a trip to Home Depot (rented it for a week) we were back to raising arches!

So. many. bolts.

And we put in a turbine/whirly... which meant cutting the steel - that took some time...

And more arches...

And then the arches were done and it was time to add end wall panels

And this is how the building looks at present.  We still have to cut the last two corner panels, but we don't want to put those up until the front of the building is done (which will be completed by a contractor - they are installing a garage door).  The weather has been beautiful in terms of temperature, but the sun is brutal!  Also, it gets fairly windy in the high desert.  

We are SUPER thankful for all the help my parents were able to provide!  This new building will hold all of our water works, electrical components, and garage stuff.  In the meantime we are collecting all of the needed components for our water and solar system.  

Each evening we have been walking around the RV park - here is a pretty picture taken when the  irrigation water was running.