Snowed in, sludge water, and rotten eggs

March 13, 2018March 13, 2018 / Adventure This Life / 2 Comments

Moving to the country has definitely been an adventure, to say the least. And there have been, well, adjustments to learning how to live out here. It definitely hasn’t been easy, but it is kind of fun, even when it’s not, and even when it makes you want to puke.

Snowed in

Let’s talk snow for a minute. Snow in the city is a nuisance, snow out here is, “OMG! I’m totally, no, seriously, I’m trapped in my house!”

With 600+ ft of driveway roughly 9-12″ inches deep in heavy wet snow last week, shoveling the driveway was out of the question. So how have we been handling the ridiculous amount of snow we’ve been getting? By hiring a legit snow plow to plow us out. But what happens when your hired snow plow is broken? You wait until another can come plow you out. And in the case of last week, we waited two days. Which means, unless you’re going to walk to town in 3 ft of snow, you’re S.T.U.C.K. A big bummer when you’re out of groceries. Let’s just say we got real creative in our meals.

Lessons learned:

We need a truck with a plow
Stay stocked up on food in the winter

Part of our 600+ ft driveway

Sludge water

Now this is my favorite least favorite longstanding issues since moving to the country. We have well water. NEVER have I experience well water like this before. And before I continue, yes we did have the well inspected, and yes it passed inspection.

Two weeks into our new home, our perfectly clear water turned yellow and started tasting like a bloody mouth (e.g. iron) — just trying to paint a picture with your senses here — you’re welcome. Then, sludge water happened. Ew!

Here’s how it all went down. The boys needed a bath. As the tub filled up with yellowish water, the boys started blaming each other for peeing in it (hey, it definitely wouldn’t have been the first time). Then something really gnarly happened. It turned into murky brown water that can only best be described as diarrhea water. Are you gagging yet? I even have photographic evidence, if you dare to take a peek.

Sludge water

The water did the same thing to my whites in the laundry, turning them all a disgusting brown. More grossness.

Lessons learned:

The water filters we were having changed out twice a month weren’t cutting it
We need a more permanent solution for our water – which we’re still trying to fix
The rust will clog up the drip lines for the garden, so unless we can get the rust out, we can’t use our well water for the garden

Rotten eggs

Yep, you guessed it, or maybe you haven’t, but this is another paragraph on our well water.

Don’t you just love the way you smell right after stepping out of the shower? Like lavender soap, rosemary shampoo, and maybe even rain. But definitely not rotten eggs, right?

Well, that’s how WE smell when we get out of the shower. Like rotten eggs. In fact, that’s how our entire house smells when we shower. Which doesn’t bode well for the girl with the sensitive smeller (e.g. me).

Now imagine you’re about to take a big gulp of ice cold water and just as you do you catch a big whiff of, what was that, oh yeah, rotten eggs. Yum!

That’s my life people. And I’m okay with it, for now, but gosh darn we better get this water thing figured out soon.

Lesson learned:

The water softener we got just ain’t cutting it

This is just the start of all the fun things we’re adjusting to out here in the country. Stay tuned for more.

To Be Continued…

“What have you done so far?”

February 27, 2018February 27, 2018 / Adventure This Life / Leave a comment

Asked the host at a local happy hour event I was attending. This question was enough to send me into a mini tailspin of panic. What have we done so far? And has it been enough?

As I share this adventure we’re on with others, I get all sorts of questions. Some, like the question above, are out of excitement and genuine interest. While other questions are asked with an undertone of “are you sure you know what you’re doing?” which in response I assure them, “I have absolutely no idea what we’re doing.”

In either case, I appreciate the interest and the opportunity to tell people about this adventure. But holy crap am I scared.

Paralyzed by indecision – what we haven’t done so far

A name – we still haven’t picked a name. Turns out it’s super hard. Plus, pretty much this whole shebang hinges on a name. You know, important stuff like a website, an LLC, a business checking account, marketing, and this very important thing called branding.
Tools – a UTV, ATV, walk-behind tractor, truck, plow, riding lawn mower. Do we need it all?
Infrastructure – a hoop house, green house, wash house, propagation house, chicken house, walk-in cooler, fencing, water, garden plot. What do we start with and where do we put it?

Seriously! How’s a person supposed to know which to get, how much to spend, and when to get it? That’s the thing. We don’t know. And we don’t know anyone who can tell us. So, at some point very soon, we’re just going to have to take a leap and make a decision.

Building momentum – what we have done so far

Bought seeds – see the complete seed list here: Seed plots & schedule – Seed order
Got nearly all of our smaller garden tools
Started four flats of micro greens
Cleaned out our entire back shed to be used as either a propagation house or wash house or both
Measured and remeasured and then measured again about two more times where the garden will go (the sun is our biggest determinant and as the days get longer it keeps changing direction, meaning what once had sun has shade and vice versa)
Started lots of spreadsheets for seed plots and harvest time tables, etc.
Research, lots of research

So, have we done enough at this point? Probably not, but we’re learning. And through that, we’re also learning to have patience with ourselves and to not be afraid to fail, which clearly we are since we can’t make a frick’n decision.

But we’re getting really close to jumping – or at the least, pushing each other off the edge into the unknown and the scary world of decision making.

Moving day – a time for tantrums

February 18, 2018February 18, 2018 / Adventure This Life / Leave a comment

November 3, 2018

Closing was in Cumberland at 11 am. The final walk-through was at 10:30. All we had to do was get the cashier’s check for the 20% closing costs and then make the 1.5 hour drive to our new home. We were so close!

Nick, driving my dad’s truck towing a borrowed trailer and me in the van filled to the brim with all the stuff from the house that wasn’t in storage and didn’t fit in the trailer. Plus, two kids and a dog, who had to squeeze between the kids’ seats and all the stuff. We left our house in St. Paul at 8:30 am and headed to the bank. I had slight anxiety, but nothing too obnoxious. I was pretty darn confident that things would run as smoothly as could be. Boy was I wrong.

“Sorry, we can’t accept this check”

8: 40 am

We arrived at the bank. It was closed. I thought banks opened at 8 am during the week. Guess not. So we sat in the parking lot waiting. I texted my mortgage broker, “who do I make the cashier’s check out to?” “Yourself” she said. “Weird,” I thought. But she’s the expert.

9 am

I considered having the teller leave the cashier’s check blank in the “to” section, but didn’t. Mistake. Always go with your gut.

11:15 am

After a couple of detours and 15 minutes late, I met Nick at RE/MAX in Cumberland for our closing. He’d gone ahead for the final walk through.

12 pm

“Can we get your cash to close before we get started?”

“Yep! Here you go. The mortgage broker had me make it out to myself. Hope that’s okay.”

It wasn’t.

There weren’t any TCF banks in Wisconsin either. We called some local banks to see if they’d be willing to cash my check and reissue a new one.

They weren’t.

We called TCF to see if they could wire the money instead.

The couldn’t – at least not without me there in person.

12:15 pm

I loaded the kids back up in the car to make the 1.5 hour drive to the nearest TCF Bank in Stillwater, MN. Ryker (my 5-year-old son), at this point, was in tantrum mode. He’d already been in the car since 8:30 and the prospect of spending another 3 hours in the car sent him over the edge. I couldn’t blame him. I wasn’t far from a tantrum myself.

“The sellers aren’t moved out yet”

Right after arriving at the closing, Nick quietly informed me that the sellers, an 80-something-year-old couple, still had “a ton, and I mean a ton” of stuff at the house. What! What does that mean? Were we going to have to push off closing? Where would we go? We were already moved out of our old house.

While I headed back to the twin cities, Nick headed back to “our new” house and helped the sellers pack up and move out the rest of their stuff – sort of. They had to come back the next day for a few remaining things.

Thankfully, Ryker fell asleep almost immediately after leaving RE/MAX. I did throw my tantrum. It lasted about 10 minutes on the road on the phone with my parents.

The third time’s a charm. Or is it the fourth?

2 pm

We arrived at TCF Bank at the Cub Foods in Stillwater. I woke up Ryker and hurried the boys out of the van and through the busy parking lot, rushed them inside (the closer needed us back around 3), got up to the teller – I forgot the slip of paper in the van that had the name I was supposed to make it out to. You’ve got to be kidding me!

I rushed back out with the kids and back through the busy parking lot, grabbed the slip of paper and ran, dragging Townes and Ryker behind me.

Back at the teller window I slipped the teller the slip of paper and he proceeded to create the cashier’s check.

1st attempt – he printed on the back of the cashier’s check.

2nd attempt – he spelled the name of the recipient wrong.

3rd attempt (and by now my fourth issued cashier’s check) – he got it right.

7 hours in the car

I sped through the winding roads to get back to REMAX before they closed.

3:30 pm

Arrived. We closed without anymore hitches.

4 pm

The sellers were all moved out. After spending 7 hours in the car that day going back and forth, we only had a 5-minute drive to our new home.

The rest is history, or I guess the future.

Looking back, perhaps it really wasn’t all that bad, but in the moment, it was a time for tantrums.

Why Cumberland, WI?

February 7, 2018February 7, 2018 / Adventure This Life / 8 Comments

That’s the most frequent question we get, at least from the locals here in Cumberland. How we ended up here was somewhat arbitrary. We’d actually never even heard of Cumberland, Wi before. But here we are.

Choosing Cumberland…

It fit our search criteria

When we decided we wanted to buy land and start a small-scale farm our dreams extended as far as Northern California, Oregon and Colorado, maybe even the Carolinas or Florida where the growing season was particularly long. But alas, what we value most, family and friends, became our main determinant for choosing land. And so we set our sights closer, MUCH closer, about 1.5 hours from the Twin Cities, because that’s where all our loved ones are.

Aside from being just 1.5 hours from the Twin Cities, we also wanted land that was affordable and beautiful to hike and explore, which ultimately meant, non-traditional farmland — hilly and full of trees.

So, although our land is zoned agriculture, it’s not ideal for farming, which presents its own challenges, but it also made it more affordable to attain. The fact that it’s farther North with a shorter growing season (another challenge to overcome) also made it more affordable.

We fell in love

After seeing many properties in our price range that were, frankly, unlivable, unfarmable, and unbeautiful, we, to quote Alanis Morissette, “fell head over heels” for this property (yet to be named).

It was a warm and sunny September, Saturday afternoon and our now home was the third of three we looked at in Cumberland that day. It also happened to be the one we were least excited to see of the three (one reason why good pictures are so important). The first two properties we saw were, let’s just say, disappointing. The first was a clean and VERY small home, good farmland, not good for recreation — I wasn’t in love. The second was downright disgusting, and pretty much all marshland, but surrounded by a breathtaking view. By this point our expectations were low. We had already seen so many houses before these.

Maybe that was it, low expectations often equate to pleasant surprises. And so we were more than pleasantly surprised. It didn’t happen all at once but the excitement grew and grew with each step across the property, each new breathtaking view to behold: the pond, the apple orchard, the pine plantations, the rolling hills, and my absolute favorite, the butterfly garden (picture to come this spring).

Let’s take a quick detour to the butterfly garden

Now, bare with me for a second. The butterfly garden was the most dreamy thing I’d ever seen. It was bursting with colorful flowering perennials overflowing a winding zen-like walking path that led to an old twisted tree — perfect for the most romantic tree fort. And then there was the screen house with a wooden swing in it overlooking it all. But it was the butterflies at the koi pond that got me most of all. That’s right, butterflies and a koi pond. Take that every Disney-princess-dream-land ever to exist!

I stood there at the point of combusting with the overwhelming beauty of it all. As I watched the tiny golden koi fish dart between Lilly pads, that’s when the magic really happened. No less than 15 Monarch butterflies flittered boldly all around me. I hadn’t seen so many butterflies at once in the natural world, maybe ever.

Still on that detour — Chasing butterflies

You see, Nick says this thing when I get distracted, along the lines of, “You’re chasing butterflies again.” This inspired my first ever published piece (as an adult) called “Chasing Butterflies.” It was published in Moon Magazine just barely two months earlier. It felt serendipitous. It was meant to be.

Now…back to our regular scheduled programming

We looked inside the house next and relief shuddered out of us. My excitement grew. I could actually live here! It wasn’t the prettiest, nor did it have the most character, but it wasn’t gross and I could do something with it. Yay!

Nick and I were positively jittery with excitement and fear. He turned to me and said, “I don’t know how I can farm here, but I don’t even care, I want to live here.” Me too. Me too.

And so began three days of trying to decide if we purchase on emotion. It didn’t work in the past for us and we definitely didn’t want to repeat past mistakes, but we felt that in the case of chasing your dreams, you must always lead with your heart, not your head. And so we brought my parents back three days later, explored the possibility of how we might farm here, checked out the town (which is adorbs, btw) and made an offer a few days later.

The ~~End~~ Beginning.