Thursday, May 11, 2017

Washer

I had a washer spin dryer way back when we first got married.  From my first real washing machine I have always missed the spin dryer.  They get so much more water out of the laundry than a regular washing machine.  They were off the market though - no one was making them, and parts for used ones were really hard to find.  And then I saw one when we were out pricing furniture.  I was shocked and excited by everything but the price.  Almost $500!!  I didn't buy it.  Came home and googled it instead.

Reviews weren't good.  But then I found other models, with better reviews and better prices.  I had my heart set on a Panda.  Tried to order it 3 times.  Amazon wouldn't ship it to me.  I found their facebook page and messaged them.  They didn't seem to understand that Amazon wouldn't ship it to me and I wanted to order it directly from them.  I had pretty much given up hope, and decided to just buy a used washing machine and leave it outside for the summer.

Then the post office got mad when my hockey bags came in. 


We use them for travel - Cadet trips, mostly.  They're 42 inches long, 18" wide, and about 4" high when empty and folded up.  I ordered 5 of them- all at the same time, all from the same seller.  The post office called and asked me to come get them now.  She had 5 huge boxes and they took up her whole room.  We went to get them, and I have no idea what they are.  The boxes were 6' high, and 4' wide.  They barely fit in the car with the seats folded down.

We get back home and open them up...  Are ya kidding me?  Each bag was in it's own box, when 2 would have fit in a box just over half the size.  Good thing it was free shipping.

So, that's when we decided to try Amazon Prime.  Husband ordered some tools, and I told him they aren't going to ship those, they're too heavy.  But they did.  Right to our trailer.  Well that's not fair.  So he told me to try the washer again.

I ended up ordering this 'no name' brand instead.



It was cheaper, and the reviews weren't bad, and I still didn't believe they were actually going to send it....  But they did.  And, hey, look at that, it's only 210 Watts!  It could run on solar power.  Set it up yesterday - not hard - take it out of the box and attach hoses.  I washed my sweaters.  Works pretty good.  The water was filthy afterward, but I need a scrub brush.  I always slop on myself, and there are a couple of spots that didn't come clean.  ( SEE kymber?  I don't know what I need until I need it, lol).  The cycles work the way they should, drain is good - but I'm draining onto the ground.  A couple of reviews mentioned problems with the drain, and I can see if you were trying to drain up into a sink or something it could be a problem.

Today I'm washing socks and underwear.  I don't have a clothesline yet - I have all the parts, but they knocked it down with the heavy equipment, so it needs to be put back together - but I can rig up a rope between the trailers for now.  I am just so happy not to have to sit in the laundromat for 2 hours at a time waiting for laundry.  Love it!

(And no I didn't get paid or asked for this review - but I would be open to writing more reviews if you wanted to send me free stuff, lol).

Wednesday, May 10, 2017

Insurance

 Insurance.  Hate paying it, 'cause what are the odds that you'll need it?  But then if you do, thank the stars you had it.

Our insurance covers replacement cost on the house.  They still haven't given us a budget.  They have to figure out the value of the cinder block, drywall, windows, furnace, steel roof, and on and on and on...  to rebuild our house as it was.  We're not too concerned about the budget covering the changes we want.  Cinder block is very labour intensive, and there aren't very many people who do it in this area, so quite expensive.  Then we also cut the second set of stairs, and the second story out, so the budget should easily cover upgraded windows, the deck, and an extra bedroom.

The second part of the insurance covers contents.  It's also replacement cost, but to a maximum of $X.  $X was fairly generous, so I'm not too worried about replacing stuff.

And then there's Additional Living Expenses (ALE), which is based on some percentage of the first two parts.  ALE covers motel/rent while you are out of your home - because you're still paying your mortgage, as well as additional expenses caused by being out of your home- restaurants for the first few days, extra gas because of all the shopping, propane for us, because we can't heat with wood, etc.

We got an advance on our ALE to buy the trailers.  They gave us a budget based on 5 months rent for a 3 bedroom house in our area.  Our requirements for a trailer were a queen size bed, bunk beds, and a couch or fold out bed, big dining area, and good storage.  The trailers we first looked at, with those things (generally one or two tip outs), a decent bathroom, and an outside shower, were almost double the budget.  The insurance company wouldn't budge on the budget, but they did offer to give us an advance on our contents, which we could recoup by selling the trailer after the house was built.

I was very uncomfortable with that.  We never have good luck reselling anything, and in the grand scheme of things, I didn't want to risk not being able to replace my dining set later because I bought a fancy trailer.




At the same time we were also looking into buying a sea can for storage, so we had some room to put things we were replacing.

We started looking at cheaper trailers, but most wouldn't fit us without folding the table down as a bed, which is annoying when you actually go camping, so I can't imagine doing it daily for 5 months.  Spring was getting closer and more people were advertising trailers for sale, and some were really, really low prices.  A lot of rebuilt hunt camps, some fancy ice fishing huts, old, heavy trailers.  I said to Husband, "We could but two of those.."  And that's when it all came together.  We could buy two of those.  Or three of these...  And we wouldn't need the extra storage space of the sea can.

So we bought our trailer - the main trailer first.  It was a little over half our budget, and as I mentioned earlier, is technically big enough for all of us.  We could go home as soon as the weather broke, even if we hadn't found the boys their own rooms yet.  And that's actually what we did, because it took another week after we were back at the farm to get the boys' trailers, set them up, and work out the heat situation.






#2's trailer came next.




And then, #3 and #4's.  I never took any interior pics of it, and they are messy teenage boys, so you don't get to see right now.

The three trailers came in a little under budget, although all three were delivered by the former owners, so we haven't paid taxes on them yet.  With tax they'll be just a little over budget.

The insurance company and their contractors are supposed to take care of figuring out the replacement cost of the old house and the estimate for the new house.  Then we have options on buying a new house (settlement), building a prefab, or building from scratch, among other things.

Contents is a real pain in the ass. 

We are supposed to list everything that was in the house.  Every single little thing.  And the replacement cost of each item.  The big stuff is fairly easy.  It's not too hard to pick out a new fridge, stove, couch, etc, that's comparable to what we had before.  Furniture stores are all too eager to help with that.  They want to lead you around and pick out every possible stick of furniture you had.  Huge commission.

The little stuff is time consuming and almost seems petty.  But it really adds up.  I spent hours in the dollar store writing down thousands of items I've purchased just in the past couple of years.  Similarly with the Bargain Shop and Giant Tiger (small Canadian department stores).

The hard stuff is the old stuff, thrift store/garage sale finds, or the "irreplaceable".  Ebay has helped with some of it.  There were a few people selling Holly Hobby lamps similar to the one my Grandmother had made for me when I was a child.  My tire ashtray on ebay - $135!  Apparently it's a collector's item.  Who knew?  I just put out cigarettes in it.  Photo albums and pictures...  good luck with that.  I am very fortunate to have a cousin with her own printing business.  She's been scouring all the relative's facebook pages, as well as harassing them in person, and printing new pictures for me.  Most people aren't that lucky.

Thrift store shopping helps.  I've collected a number of items that are the same as what I had before.  It's easier to buy them when I see them than to right down an arbitrary price for an item you can't buy new anymore.  Well, you could get something similar, maybe, but I've always been resistant to change.

And Amazon is my new best friend.  It was making my post office a little crazy though, so I've just upgraded to Amazon Prime, and now we're even closer.  If I think of something I need at 2am, Amazon has it on it's way in the next day or two.  If I want to comparison shop, read reviews, price check - it's all right there.  I can shop in my jammies, not have to worry about how I'm going to fit everything in my car (like I do on every trip to the city), and now I don't even have to go pick it up, it's coming right to my driveway.  It does have it's faults though.  Returns are expensive, and sometimes you don't get quite what you were expecting. 

I also really like the Wish List feature, because I can check prices for my insurance list and save the items to my wish list.  Then it'll just be a few clicks after the house gets built, instead of going back to the store I thought I found something in, to discover they're sold out, or it's the wrong store.

Another fault though, is that sometimes I get a little carried away at 2am, and order things I really don't need right now.

So what do we need?  Well, there was the obvious stuff in the beginning.  I escaped in my long underwear, nightgown, and sandals.  It was about -25°C that day, and we still had about 4' of snow.  Obviously, pants, sweater, jacket, socks, boots.  Husband and the boys had the clothes they were wearing.  We all needed a few changes of clothes, toiletries, boots or shoes.  The Red Cross was awesome with that stuff.  They gave us vouchers to go shopping, a list of emergency items that we would need, and booked and paid for our hotel room for the first 3 days.

The next thing we needed was food.  I have weird food issues, and waking up hungry anywhere, without something to eat makes me crazy.  It doesn't matter if I have money and transportation and Tim's is only two blocks away, I need to have food with me all the time.  Furthermore, I need to have chocolate, peanut butter and chips at my disposal pretty much all of the time. 

So the next stop was the grocery store.  But I am a mother of 4, who lives in the sticks and buys everything in bulk.  I don't know how to shop for two days, let alone two days without a stove.  I had a breakdown in the grocery store.  Picking things up, putting them back, trying to walk past a really good sale on pasta sauce, where I would normally buy 12 jars...  Husband kept saying "What are you going to do with that?" which made it worse.

We ate a lot of microwave dinners over the next few weeks.

The first microwave dinner night, I realized we had no salt.  The next day I went out and bought salt and pepper shakers.  It didn't occur to me to buy salt and pepper to put in them until we ate our microwave dinners that night.  The next day I bought the filled cheap salt and pepper shakers in the dollar store.

The first week or so was a constant haze of moments like that.  Constantly running to the store to pick up one or two things that we needed right that minute.  People kept asking us what we needed, but we didn't know what we needed until we needed it.

If you really want to help someone in the face of disaster, don't ask what they need, just pick out a few things that you use every day and give it to them.  I didn't have any place to put/use/wash a set of dishes (which I was offered) but a couple of coffee cups were really appreciated.  A couple of tea towels, a variety of teas (just a couple of each), hair bands, a comb - all wonderful.  Three garbage bags full of clothes covered in dog hair that didn't fit any of us was not helpful.  But a clean set of gym clothes from another boy in my son's class - awesome.  Small packages were not overwhelming.   Big ones were.  Furniture will be great after the house is built (or when the person moves into another house) but when you're living in a motel room with one drawer each, it's just another layer of stress.  I can't even remember who or how many people said they were going to save a couch or a bed or a dresser for us.

The other thing, is that everyone wants to help right away.  This disaster just happened you must need everything right now.  In a couple of days I had boxes full of all sorts of stuff stuffed into every corner of the motel room, and the school wanted to do a spaghetti supper benefit for us and collect donations.  I had to say no.  No, thank you.

Now that we're back on the farm, something like that would be appreciated.  But the immediacy is over, and people have gone back to their regular lives. It's over now, in their eyes.  And that's ok, for us, because we had insurance.  Someone without insurance would really be needing all of those things now, that people were so eager to give at first.  So it's ok to wait a while, let them recover.  Let them find a space where they can actually see and sort and make decisions. 

The next thing we needed was information.  We still need information.  I'm finding it as I go, but a jar full of business cards would have been very helpful. 

There's a woman on our local buy and sell who keeps posting adds to build her Tupperware sales team.  I asked where I could get a catalogue and she told me to go to the website.  Seriously?  Ok, I haven't been to a Tupperware party in a long time, but they do still exist, right?  That is the point of building the sales team, right?  I found a Tupperware lady at the Sportman Show last weekend (I was there with Cadets) so I bought two sets of bowls (the colours are terrible!) and got her name and number to replace the stuff I don't need right now later - and a catalogue.  Now I have the price list I need for the insurance company, and a reminder of things I had in my kitchen cupboards but forgot to put on my list.

Local businesses, artisans, crafts people - I need to know who they are.  I can't replace my Dad's knives in a store.  He bought custom made knives on his travels!  How do I find these people?

So...  If you've read my ramblings all the way to here, you are a champ.  I'm going to sign off now, because I need to go get propane, and wash a couple sweaters, and my thought processes have wandered off so far I don't even know what I was talking about anymore.  Thanks for listening.




Solar Power

Going home to trailers with no hydro meant we needed to replace our solar system right away.  And building a new house means we get to integrate solar right into the construction.  So it was time to go semi-big.

Bad idea.
The smaller camp starter kit I had purchased a few years back is no longer available.  Camp starter kits that are available now are mostly smaller than what we had, to charge a phone or a laptop.  Bigger systems cost big bucks.  Ridiculous mostly, for what you're getting

We found the local solar guy and purchased the kit pictured above, set up.
The panels are two 250 Watt panels.  We put them on the roof of the trailer.
The charge controller is a 30 amp Epever Tracer
The inverter is a Royal Power 3000 watt pure sine wave inverter.
 Batteries are Trojan L16E-AC  (2 6Volt cross wired to make a 12Volt)
 Cabinet and wiring were included.

So...  Right off the start, this guy wasn't making sense to me.  I do not understand electricity.  It's not hard to lose me.  But his answers to my questions were extra confusing.  And he kept pushing the Delco (generator).  Don't let your batteries drain completely, charge them with the Delco...  He couldn't tell us how much power the two panels would produce, or how long they would take to charge the batteries.  Just plug in the delco...

But, the price was better than the other kits we were looking at.  And we didn't feel quite ready to piece it together on our own.  So we bought it.  A little over $3000.

He wired the battery and solar cables into the charge controller backwards.  He used big fat cables from the charge controller to the batteries.  They didn't fit in the holes, so he cut them down and twisted them up.  He took twice as long to get it ready as he said it would.  And supposedly he "tested" it to make sure everything was working.

Husband accidentally touched the cables together somehow when setting it up at home.  The charge controller should have stopped the surge, but it didn't.  Fried the board in the inverter.

Took it back for repairs.  Should be under warranty.  Waiting for parts to come in.

Bought a 3000W Eliminator from Canadian Tire - on sale - $139.99.  Modified Sine.  (It will be our back up in the future as well).

Solar guy told us we had to find the 12V switch in the trailer and shut it off so that the inverter wouldn't be charging the trailer battery.  We fiddled with the fuse panel, called him about 6 times, offered to pay him to come out and help us...  No go.  Eventually we wired the trailer battery back to the system batteries, because it wasn't working any other way.

The first two days were sunny.  Batteries were doing ok, but not gaining.  We figured we'd be adding on more batteries and solar panels anyway, so not too worried.  Day 3 was cloudy and overcast.  No charge.  Husband sees the same readings as the previous days.  Figures out the wires are backwards.  Fixes them.

We start getting some charge into the batteries.  Trailer battery keeps draining.  We buy two more deep cycle marine batteries (We lost 2 in the fire, one was just for solar, the other was wired into our solar, but actually for our boat).  On sale, under $300.  We replace the trailer battery.

The batteries can hold enough power for our current needs for a couple of days, but they aren't charging properly.

We go to town on a beautiful, sunny day, come home expecting to be all charged up...  Nada.  The negative wire from the charge controller to the inverter fell out of the hole.  Husband puts it back in.

Picked up the big inverter ($400 for repairs - but it's a trade with a different one because the parts for ours still aren't in).

Three more days of snow/rain/cloud...  We're using the generator a lot.  It's not a Delco.  It sucks up gas worse than my car.

The negative wire keeps falling out, every other day or so.  It's driving us crazy.  Husband thinks someone is messing with the system.  Locks it up.  It falls out again, and again.

I do some research.  We don't need big fat cables there, just the same size as the cables from the panels to the inverter.

We buy new wire.  Rewire it.  New wire fits the connectors properly.  So far so good.  (knock on wood!)

So...  Don't believe you can't figure it out on your own - you're probably going to have to anyway.  Buy the parts, piece it together, save money.

__________________________________________________________________________________

Living Off Grid

A couple of things I forgot; 

  1. Always check the wattage of your appliances before you buy - especially the little ones.  I bought a 1500Watt toaster.  Didn't even look- until I knocked out the inverter.
  2. Power Bars with LED lights on them are draining just as much power as the LED lights on the tv/dvd player, etc, that you bought them to shut off.  (Phantom power).
Good things;
  1. Lap tops - extra power storage.
  2. Portable internet with built in battery
  3. Portable DVD player with built in battery
  4. Rechargeable power tools
  5. Rechargeable flashlights. 
  6. Stove top coffee percolator and kettle
Propane;
  1. Heat
  2. Fridge
  3. Stove
Lighting;
  1. Solar - cheap garden walkway lights
  2. Solar - motion sensor lights on sides of trailers.
  3. Oil lamps
  4. Candles
  5. Flashlights
  6. Trailer Lights
We charge the lap tops, portable DVD players, phones, tablets, tool batteries, etc, through the day.  If all goes well, we still have enough power in the system batteries to keep the heat/fan/fridge running through the night.  (The fridge has a 12V automatic electric start which is really annoying).  If not, we run the generator for a bit.

Everything gets shut off when not in use, day or night.  I know that's logical, but it's a big deal.  It's more than leaving the lights on when you leave the room.  We shut off the tv/dvd player before.  Now we also shut off the power bar that they're plugged into.  We shut off the internet modem whenever we're not using it.  That's new.  We use the internet a lot.  There always seems to be somebody doing something, so we never shut it off before.  Computers we only used to shut off at night - sometimes.  Now it's all the time.  It takes a lot of getting used to, especially for the boys.  If they forget to plug in in the morning, they aren't allowed to charge after dark.

After dark electronics are only in use until the internal batteries die.  Read more books.  Go to bed early.  Build a model car.  Play a board game.  Find something to do that doesn't suck up the power.

It's not bad, just takes a little getting used to.

_________________________________________________________________________________

Living in a Trailer

It's a little tight.  I haven't filled all of the available storage space yet - under the benches and bunk bed.  That's space for things that we don't need every day - mostly stuff on sale, or found at yard sale/thrift stores that we'll need/want in the new house.

Clothing was tricky at first, but not since the boys got their trailers.  We have rubbermaid bins on the top bunk for our stuff that won't fit into the tiny bedroom cupboards.  The boys are using a variety of cupboards in their trailers, and the kitchen drawers for socks and underwear.  We all have under bed storage space as well, so that's where the winter wear will go soon.

Kitchen storage is tight.  There's never enough space for dishes, pots and pans in a trailer.  We covered the sink with a piece of wood to make extra counter space.  I wash dishes in a rubbermaid bin - outside when it's nice.  We're using the bottom bunk as a pantry, as well as the laundry hamper.  TV tables to hold the crockpot, and to use for laptops.


The fridge is not bad, except that the door only holds little jars.  I buy in bulk, so learning to shop for just a few days at a time is hard, and then buying the smallest jars available is a pain. 

_________________________________________________________________________________
Back on the Grid - The Hydro Shed (aka Cheating)

We will put a real fridge in the hydro shed in the summer, and maybe a small freezer.  Then I can shop for real, and refill those tiny little jars for the trailer fridge.

We've been using water jugs up until now, as we did not have hydro to the well until today.  The trailer water pump may require more batteries/panels.

Washer/Spin Dryer - Will be set up outside the shed, drain on the ground.  No more laundromats.  I'm not sure what the wattage is, or if I could run it on solar- again I didn't even check.  It will be easier for water at the hydro shed, so that's where it's going.

Tuesday, May 9, 2017

Demolition, Planning, and Living

 After weeks of picking through the ashes of our lives, we were able to recover most of my coin collection, a porcelain smelling salt pig that was my Granny's, the first pocket knife my Dad gave me after we moved to the farm, and a bit of jewellery.

I expected to find my knives.  The Alaska skinning knife that was my Dad's, the hunting knives, fishing knives and butchering knives.  They were in an upper cupboard in the kitchen.

We found the remnants of the lower cabinets in the basement, with odds and ends of identifiable pots and pans and silverware.

The stove was out on the lawn toward the front of the house.  Sardines from the cupboard above, to the left of it as well.  But the main kitchen cupboards with all of the plates, glasses, cups, and my knives were just gone.

It was time to move on.  Demolition and clean up began.  Truckload after truckload of pit rock to fill the hole.  Gravel on top.  Still working on spreading it.  The old house will be the new parking area.



The well guys came and cleaned the well, removed the old pump and wiring (damaged by the heat), and installed new.  Yesterday Hydro finally got hooked up to the little shed.  We wanted temporary power to the garage right away, but it was too far from the hydro post, and crossed the demolition site.  No go on the coop or the barn.  Finally they agreed to the shed beside the pole, then spent another month waiting on inspections.  Husband has to connect the well to the fuse panel, and then we'll have running water again.

Floor plans are back with the architect.  We're on round 3 now.  Very frustrating.  I draw what I want, he messes it up...  I draw it again.  Originally I wanted a three bedroom tower.  I thought it would be hilarious to have one child on the main floor, one in the dungeon, and the "princess" in the tower.  Stairs and roofing were too complicated, and the footprint was too big.  The huge basement was getting bigger and bigger, and mostly empty wasted space. 
Basement
After lots of debate, we decided to put all of the boys in the basement.They each get their own rooms, the three remaining anyway, with the rec room in the centre.  The cold room is monstrous and will be under the kitchen.

Main Floor

The main floor is pretty much the same as it was, except opposite and open between the kitchen and living room, and the stairs used to be between the living room and the master bedroom.  Were also moving the sunroom to the south side instead of the west.

We spent a month and a half in motel rooms, waiting for winter to end.  Then we bought the first trailer (in the middle).  It has bunk beds and a fold down couch, so technically we all fit.  It will be lovely for camping later.  For all of us to live in, it's a nightmare.  Only one person can walk at a time (no tip outs).

We got the little trailer for #2, and the medium (green) for #3 and #4.  Both of them had been remodeled inside. 

The little one has a tiny composting toilet, a table, and a queen size bed.  It has  a small electric bar fridge (not in use), and a coleman cook stove.  The lights are all battery operated (AA/AAA - not RV battery).  It has two regular electric outlets - one for the fridge, one at the table.  Easy to plug into a small generator.  All of the previous electric/lighting/propane/wiring/etc, has been removed.

The green one also has a queen (maybe king) size bed at one end and a table at the other.  It had no mattress, so the boys are using the bunk bed mattresses from the main trailer.  There's enough space between them to keep them from arguing and kicking each other all night long.  It has a propane fridge that doesn't work, and a propane stove that might work.  They're not original, each requires a separate indoor propane tank.  Their table is a small dinette with two chairs on one side, and the original trailer bench seat on the other.  They have no bathroom.  I offered to make them a bucket toilet to use through the night, but they said they'd rather just pee outside than have to empty it in the morning.

We bought them Mr. Heater Big and Little Buddy's for heat. They work really well.

We have the fire pit set up, the BBQ, and a table for outdoor "counter space".  I still need to replace my patio table so we can eat outside when the weather gets nicer - 'cause we're still waiting for spring.  Temps are mostly above freezing now, but we're still getting a bit of snow every few days.  The winds this year have been atrocious, so we haven't put out the awning yet. 

All in all, it's good to be home.