Arizona Land

I now have some land in AZ. My brother Clinton and I bought a 40 acres near Show Low, AZ. Now that I have some land I really need to work out all the details about my house and how I want to go about doing things. 
This is my most up to date floor plan.

There are many things that needs to happen in the next year. I need to get a well drilled. I want a large greenhouse. I will also need to get a lot of tools.

Being in the military and moving all over I haven't collected many tools. The ones that I would have collected really wouldn't help that much anyway. To start with the big stuff... I need some sort of earth mover. Bobcat Backhoe... I will be moving a lot of dirt. If I don't do my rammed earth by hand I will need some sort of rammer. That get expensive because you need that tool then a compressor and a generator.

Well back to planning. I have just over a year before I start.

Heirloom Garden

One thing I want to do when I have my garden is use heirloom seeds. I also want to recover seeds for the next season. I have never tried to reuse seeds. I have looked up how to do it and it seems straight forward.

http://blog.oregonlive.com/homesandgardens/2009/08/save_heirloom_seeds.html

http://www.victoryseeds.com/information/save_seeds.html

There are a couple of things I wouldn't have known had I not read up on it but it seems easy enough.

One thing I really want to do is corn. There are a lot of different types of corn and I think it would be cool to try some out. I would like to try strawberry popcorn like the one in the picture. Blue corn, Indian corn and some sweet corn too. There are all different types so each year I want to try some new ones out.
 

I want to do the same with tomatoes. Home grown tomatoes are the best. We only grew some one year but when we did I loved to just sit and eat them. I would put a little salt on it and eat it like an apple.

So now I just have to figure out what different types I want to grow? Does anyone have any favorites that they would like to share? And not only corn or tomatoes but anything in the garden. And if anyone has ever used heirloom seeds and have any pointers on how they recover seeds that would be cool to hear about too. Well thats all for today.

Ecovillage

Ecovillages are intentional communities with the goal of becoming more socially, economically and ecologically sustainable. Some aim for a population of 50-150 individuals because this size is considered to be the maximum social network according to findings from sociology and anthropology.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecovillage

I would like to start an Ecovillage. Now let me clarify this a little bit. I have told people that I want to do something like this and they thought that I was a tree hugger or crazy and even thought I wanted to start a cult... But the truth is I just want a place that I can learn, grow and raise my family in a good environment. Another thing is I don't want to be a hermit. I want to be somewhat close to a town, under 20 miles. And the only reason I want to be that far out of town is one for zoning and two for the cost. Land near towns cost more and I want quite a bit of land. For the whole Ecovillage I want at or over 150 acres.

I would love to have my whole family live there. This would be cool for many reasons but mainly because it would just make everything easier. Think about off the grid power. Say in one house I set up solar power and I get 20 amps and only use an average of 15 amps. Now this means I can only use 20 amps at any given time. But say there are 10 homes and we are on a local power grid. Now the max amps are 200 with an average of 150 used at any given time. Now we have a larger peek range from 5 to 50 amps. This is just one small example of how life is made easier.

Other things that are nice about this is that you are not alone. You have shared resources like tools and such. We could buy in bulk to save money. Have a public warehouse "Grocery Store" where bulk foods are stored. This can also be where we put our food that we can. We all have different skills that would benefit the community. I for one like computers. I know how to do networking. I would like to network everyones homes for both Internet and phones. We could share our movies across our network so we could watch them at any home or even a "Movie Theater" :)

Now one other concern came up about one family or house would feel the burden of the community because of get togethers or whatnot. Well I think that in conjunction with the warehouse we would make a community center. This could slowly happen over time as more people moved there and the demand for additional services came available. The first thing I would want is a kitchen/rec area. This could be a place to get together, do our canning, play games, watch movies "Movie Theater", have cook outs, and do whatever. The next thing I would like to do is make a work shop. A wood shop, auto shop, welding, crafts and more... I would like more ideas of what you would want.

I have talked about canning and that is because I want to have a garden. I want it big enough so that it can produce enough for everyone in the family. We could have some greenhouses and some other garden plots. I would like chickens and even rabbits. If others wanted other types of animals we could do that too.

In closing this blog post I just want to say that I know that this is a lot of stuff to do. The only reason I say all of this is because I don't want to waist time and money moving and redoing stuff. We could start slow and modest and move from there. But with a plan we are more likely to do it right. If anyone has any ideas comments or concerns let me know so that we can make our plan better.

Growing Spuds

I just wanted to share this with every one. This is a cool way to grow potatoes. I would do this a little different though. I think I am going to do this with 4 boxes. I want to have some red and brown potatoes and then I have room for 2 of each kind.The cool thing about this is that you get 100 lb per box. Thats a lot of potatoes :) I also like that you can use a little at a time and still let more grow.

With all these extra potatoes I want to try this...

Mock Maple Syrup Made From Potatoes

Peel 6 medium sized potatoes. Boil these uncovered in 2 cups of water until but one cup of fluid remains. Remove the vegetables for use any way you want. Stirring the liquid until it reaches the boiling point again, slowly add one cup of white sugar and one cup of brown sugar. Once this has entirely dissolved, take the pan off the heat to cool slowly.

… But bottle the syrup and tuck it away in a cabinet for several days to mature. Taste it again at the end of that time and see if you are not pleasantly amazed.

We were still amazed that morning. The flavor was almost beyond comparison, a phantom bouquet that haunted our taste buds; something to be savored very deliberately and lingeringly. It tasted to us now exactly like prime maple syrup, and we’d both been reared in maple syrup country.

–from the book Wilderness Wife, by Bradford and Vena Angier

If you come up with some other cool uses of potatoes let me know.

More About My House

This is the house I think I am going to build. It is 1550 square feet. I may make some small changes of some walls and where windows are. I might add a garage like this next picture.

I found this from the site: http://rammedearthdevelopments.com.au/ It has some really cool homes.

This site has some cool info about how to make a foundation with rammed earth. nzdl.org. The only thing is I hope that where I build that this is in code. I have been trying to look up how to make sure that a home like this makes code. It is hard to find stuff. But in New Mexico you have to make 5 sample blocks of your rammed earth that are 4" x 4" x 4". They do pressure tests on them to see how hard they are. I hope that these tests dont make it to difficult to make a home this way.
One thing I'm not 100% sure about is how I am going to do my floors. What I may do is make my foundation wider than my walls and then attach the floor to that foundation. The only problem is the floors still would have to be shaped around the walls because the walls go all the way down. Do you have any ideas? If so let me know what you think.

Home Sweet Home

I think I know how I am going to build my home. I am going to make my home using the rammed earth method. Sounds kinda crazy but it fits into my plan. Basically it is made out of dirt, compacted to make a kind of sandstone.

The dirt has to contain approximately 30 percent clay and 70 percent sand, with a small amount of cement. You add just enough water to make it damp. You don't want to make it to soggy. You know you made a good mixture if you grab some of the dirt and it clumps in your hand but brakes if dropped. You make a box and fill with dirt, only 3 to 6 in at a time. Then start pounding it down. When the box is full let it dry, move the box up and keep going. You can make unique openings for doors and windows. It makes a good mixture between modern and rustic.

It makes a nice pattern on your walls and will last forever because its stone. The result of this is a modern home that you made yourself. It is cheap in materials. All it requires is work and for something that comes out like this is worth the work that you put into it.

There are a lot of videos online about how to do this. I have had fun today looking and getting different ideas on how I want to do my house. One thing I want to try is using Masonite to make curved walls or rounded corners. As I look I find more and more things I want to do.

I think I will start with a storage shed. I want to practice getting the mixture right. By the time I am done on my shed I can begin on my house. I want to do this on other parts of my land too. Like making small walls and stuff. The nice thing about it is you can reuse your frame over and over. So what do you think should I make my house out of dirt?

The American Dream and The Self-Made Man

I have been thinking a lot about what I want in my life. What can I do to make my life have meaning or to take care of myself and my family. I want my “American Dream”. I looked up The American Dream and this is what I found.

The American Dream is a national ethos of the United States of America in which democratic ideals are perceived as a promise of prosperity for its people. The idea of the American Dream is rooted in the second sentence of the Declaration of Independence which states that "all men are created equal" and that they are "endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable Rights" including "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."
From: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Dream

For me to be happy I need to be stable. I don’t want to become stagnant though. I want to work. Through work I want to learn. And I never want to stop learning. I want to make something that will last, something that is mine, which I made with my own hands. I want this for my family. I want this for my family not only because they will be stable but because of what it teaches. I want my children to be hard working and productive. I want them to think and ponder and ever growing.

This takes me to The Self-Made Man.

The Self-Made Man is as old as the United States. Benjamin Franklin, one of the Founding Fathers of the United States, is also sometimes said to have co-founded that very concept. In his Autobiography, he describes his way from a poor, unknown son of a candle-maker to a very successful business man and highly acknowledged member of the American society. Franklin creates the archetype of someone coming from low origins, who, against all odds, breaks out of his inherited social position, climbs up the social ladder and creates a new identity for himself. Key factors in this rise from rags to riches are hard work and a solid moral foundation. Franklin also stresses the significance of education for self-improvement.
From: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-Made_Men_(Frederick_Douglass)

In America we have wealth. We are the wealthiest country there is. But what do we really have? We have debt, and the idea of “what is the littlest I can do to get the most”. And above all we want it Right Now. I will not pass these ideas to my children. I will give them "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness" through hard work and learning.I am married and have a 6 month old son. With in 2 years from now I want to be self sufficient. I want my own land. I want to grow crops. I want to build my own house. I want to learn. I want to be a Self-Made Man. Over the next few years I want to go through the process of how I try to make my Dream come true. I would like to encourage all that read this to do the same.