Last weekend was the four day Easter weekend, and the perfect time to get some major jobs taken care of before winter. Fortunately the weather was fine. My husband took the days prior off work, so he could take care of some other things, and get some prep work done. And then it was into the first major job:
Re-roofing 1/3 of the house! The roof over our kitchen, office, foyer, laundry, bathroom and toilet has been needing replacing for a while. Naturally, these things are never as simple as you hope - once the iron came off it turned out a lot of timber needed replacing too (the house IS more than 100 years old after all!), and more wire needed to be laid to support builder's paper under the new iron. Fortunately my husband is a great DIYer, and so is my eldest daughter. In this pic they are removing the old iron. Now the new iron is on. It needs to age a while before it gets painted.
Next up, splitting all the firewood. We were blessed to be able to cut up felled pine trees that had been thinned from a forestry block, and the huge pile of them has been waiting on splitting. A borrowed log splitter, a couple of strong lads and my husband got it all done. Enough wood to keep us nice and warm over the coming cold months. Well done guys! Half of it is stacked under cover, and the rest is piled waiting for us to decide where to stack it.
Of course, what would a busy weekend be without an unplanned plumbing emergency? We woke Saturday morning to find a joint in the main plumbing under the house was spraying water violently. We had the plumber out for a similar problem a couple of months ago when my husband was at work - he said if it went again, the kitchen wall would have to be taken off and the kitchen re-plumbed as there wasn't enough pipe left to recut and thread it. SO glad this happened Saturday morning, not any other day of the long weekend, as the local building supply company was open Saturday morning only. So, my husband cut out a section of the outside wall with the sabre saw, and put in new pipes and joints for both the hot and cold systems, replacing the old copper pieces you can see in the photo. It was the cold one that needed doing, but since the wall was open, we may as well do both, so we can seal it up again and not have to worry about it.
And while the others were busy with these things, what was I up to apart from running to the hardware store, providing meals and normal chores? Well, it was time to slaughter the first of our ducks. The guys helped me with the killing, but the butchering was up to me. In the end, as I had 7 to do and limited time, I opted to skin them, remove breast meat and legs plus wing meat and put some of the rest of the carcasses aside to make stock or soup bases. Click HERE for the You Tube clip that shows the method I used. From the 7 ducks, I got enough meat to make 2 meals from breasts for the 7 of us, and enough leg and wing meat to make a yummy casserole, as well as the frames for stock.
I also cleaned out one of the sheds, so the partition wall my husband removed from one of the kid's rooms could be moved out there - when he first built it, he made it so it could come out mostly in one piece once the kids were no longer sharing a room, and we decided to set it up in the shed to create a better space for storage, and block the view of the shed contents (it's open at the front). I also got my husband to lay some carpet in a hallway extension, and I moved furniture from the shed to create the set up there I've been wanting. A local second hand store was closing down, so we went to have a look and came away with some great useful bargains - including a new dryer for free (the current one makes the most awful racket and the timer doesn't work), a brand new garden edging tool ($20), a sturdy long handled brush that connects to a hose for washing the outside of the house and windows ($2), a case for holding my current-use seed packets ($1), and a small decorative wooden chest ($10) - ok that one was just because I really liked it. :-)
The aim of homesteading is to live more self-reliantly, and doing so involves many different skills. You don't need to have all those skills before you start out - all you need is a willingness to give things a go and learn along the way. As my husband repeatedly says, he's not an expert at any of these things, but he can figure them out as he goes along. When we got married, I never expected to do much DIY - I left that kind of thing to my husband. But these days I mow the lawns, build fences or garden structures, butcher animals, repair tools and a myriad other things. I'm by no means an expert, and often I need some pointers or extra muscle from my husband or others, but I can do so much more than I thought!
Teamwork is important too - and never waste an available pair of hands! A local young man who was accidentally locked out of his home for a couple of hours came over and helped my husband lay the iron on the roof. The son of our neighbours came over to return a tool he had borrowed, and went back for his tool belt when he saw what we were doing, and helped with some of the prep work. Two brothers, sons of friends, helped with the firewood on two different days. And of course, our own kids pitched in too, when they weren't working. Many hands make light work. Besides, it's fun to work together and chat while a task gets done, as well as learn from each other. My husband started most of this work not expecting anyone would be available to help, but helpers seem to turn up when things are underway.
Teamwork is important too - and never waste an available pair of hands! A local young man who was accidentally locked out of his home for a couple of hours came over and helped my husband lay the iron on the roof. The son of our neighbours came over to return a tool he had borrowed, and went back for his tool belt when he saw what we were doing, and helped with some of the prep work. Two brothers, sons of friends, helped with the firewood on two different days. And of course, our own kids pitched in too, when they weren't working. Many hands make light work. Besides, it's fun to work together and chat while a task gets done, as well as learn from each other. My husband started most of this work not expecting anyone would be available to help, but helpers seem to turn up when things are underway.
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