whew! 4 weeks of class, over today. To celebrate, our instructor is taking us out to lunch. We are also starting late this morning so I detoured on my way to work and am sitting at Panera enjoying my standard Panera morning treat. I really look forward to having Wednesdays off again, but not looking forward to working the eight hour days.
Last weekend Conrad went on a bike ride, completely outfitted with a new helmet. He does okay, but we hope he gets a little more used to riding in the trailer. We had to make a few stops to calm him down (we even resorted to using the pacifier!!). We were biking with Sarah and Lyle - they definitely deserve gold stars for being so patient with us :)
Our other big weekend event last week was getting our garden started. We rented a 13 HP tiller and broke ground for the garden. It took a solid two hours of wrestling the beast and ground, but Tim did a good job (I was supervising). Next step, fencing.
In other news - we're making progress on house plans. The bank is ready to order the appraisal, for which we'll need design plans from Shelter Architecture to produce. John at Shelter said they would have these plans ready mid-May! We are very excited at the prospect of having so many questions answered in the next 1-2 months. Once the appraisal is complete, we will know exactly what our financing options are and what kind of timeline we can expect for getting into a new home.
I also spoke with an administrator at the Township Coop Planning Association yesterday (the township's equivalent of the Olmsted County Zoning and Building). Apparently the county doesn't care if a home has electricity at all, nor do they care how it is supplied. This means we won't need to pay the $10,000+ to connect to the utility grid and instead can use solar panels and wind turbines to supply our electricity. The only permit we would need to apply for would be for the wind turbine, depending on size. One grid down, two to go (septic and well). I have the contact information for both the county well inspector and township septic inspector so the next step will be calling them and getting the application process started for variances.
That pretty well sums up the past week. Looking forward we have a busy week ahead of us (all fun stuff though!). Tomorrow we are going to the state fair grounds for the Living Green Expo, we're sure to come home with new crazy ideas for our future plans! http://www.livinggreen.org/
Tonight Tim and I going out for dinner at Michaels (Conrad gets to play with his favorite Auntie Tricia), and early next week we'll be digging holes for fence posts so I can get seeds in the ground for our garden. Spring time is great!
