Living here has really slowed down the amount of work we are doing, but it’s nice because we also don’t feel rushed all the time. We are also concentrating on paying off some of our bills. Buying the new car before school started has been really hard in the pocket book, but we are actually seeing some light at the end of the tunnel which is really refreshing.

We were able to finally move the stove we bought into the house. We can’t fill the hole in front of the house yet so instead we built a really sturdy bridge to help us move giant heavy things into the house.

The moving of the stove was actually sheer genius on C’s part. He took apart almost every part that could come off. The burners, griddle, back part, doors, until it was basically just a shell. Then we jacked it up, put a furniture dolly underneath both sides, removed the legs, and strapped it on the dollies with straps. We could wheel it right into the house after that. Putting it back together was super easy too.

and VOILA! We now have a $4000 commercial stove that only cost us $1000 (we bought it from a restaurant that went out of business after a year)! We need to clean it up a bit still but that’s not a huge deal.

Pancakes are so easy now.

We have been in the house for about three weeks. There are still a few things that need to be fixed, like the big hole in the front, the concrete floors covered in dust, and the lack of a stove, but all in all it’s quite lovely. The worst offense, however, has been the discovery of giant holes where the insulation has blown out from around the eaves. First we bought a kerosene heater, which has been fantastic, and helps with our lack of a stove.

Then we bought a propane heater which worked great for the two hours it took to use up a small propane tank. Way too much money than we wanted to spend. We are selling it.

Next we decided to suck it up and invest in a wood burning stove. I hate wood burning stoves. Have I mentioned they are my arch nemesis? I fought hard against it but in the end it won. C brought in this neat little thing that is about half the size of the one in the cabin. It’s also way easier to start a fire. Fifteen minutes is the longest it has taken. the only issue is that we need to use vice grips to close the door.

The stove helped a lot, but our main problem was the holes with no insulation. We had bought a small set of spray foam a few months ago and had the great idea to hold the fiberglass insulation in with it. This would have worked wonders if the spray foam hadn’t malfunctioned and sprayed foam from one side all over everything outside. We were still able to get about a third of the outside of the house sealed. Today we went and got more insulation and a replacement spray foam. Thankfully we only had to show them the pictures for them to let us take another. We did the easy fixes today and tomorrow will be going after the rest. It’s already so much warmer in here. This is exciting.

We are officially living in our new house. It’s not as ready as we would have liked but it’s ready enough. The toilet and sink were installed last week by C which, other than installing the stove, were the last things needed before we could move.

We did learn one very important thing after moving: priorities are definitely changing. At first we were going to focus on getting the front room and kitchen finished. Instead we had to fix some insulation issues after the first night and pick up a temporary heater for this winter. A typical earthship has a large greenhouse facing south southeast in order to get full sun all day. This keeps the house heated all winter and then you vent it in the summer. Once we got the wall of windows up we realized that we really lived the view and didn’t want to obstruct it with a greenhouse. Instead we have decided to invest in a pellet stove, but the heater works for now until we can get that installed. We also decided that we needed to finish one of the two pantry walls so that I can start putting things away and use the kitchen more effectively.

(This is the view from one of our windows, we are working on getting rid of the pile of wood garbage and will eventually be building a back patio too)

We still don’t have the stove installed, but that’s mainly because we are waiting on the conversion kit to change it from natural gas to propane. The company was missing a few parts buts they said it should be shipped out by Monday. Hopefully that means I could be cooking on my new stove by next weekend.

We had bought a futon before we moved that was going to be used as a couch during the day and a bed for C and I at night. We slept on it the first night, then woke up thanksgiving morning and headed to Walmart to get us a queen size inflatable mattress, yes it was that bad. We have a king size bed but we were able to put down some plywood to put the mattress on until we can afford to get an actual mattress that fits.

Probably the worst thing though is the amount of dust in the house. The concrete floors still have residual dirt ground in which create a fine layer of dust on absolutely everything. I have been vacuuming 1/4 of the concrete everyday which has been helping a ton. Once we get the subfloors down (I’m the next few weeks) the amount of dust should start to subside too.

It’s not going to be easy at first but we definitely love it, and we can really envision what it is going to be. We are so glad to finally be out here too. We still have about half of our stuff left in the cabin but it won’t take long to move it.

Now that we are to the little things it’s going pretty quickly. This past week not only did we get our gas installed but we also had our septic hooked up too! I didn’t get pictures of those, sorry. C has been doing far more work than I have too (because most of my work is piddly stuff that can be done after we move and requires his help). He installed the bathroom subfloor, laid most of the bathroom tile (enough to be able to put in the bathroom vanity and toilet), and did a whole bunch of behind the scenes plumbing stuff that I can’t keep track of.

I sanded and painted the living room wall where the tv will go. I was nervous about the color but it ended up looking fantastic! The color is called “software” which partly helped with our decision making. It will go really well with the kitchen wall which will be painted a pinky- orange. the kids were really excited and wanted to be in the picture.

We have been working really hard to get moved in that I have been too exhausted to write about it. Sorry about such a long delay! There is much to catch you up on.

First off… we officially have a kitchen sink with running water!

We also finished putting up the drywall in the living room and kitchen. As the person with the least fear of heights I tackled that job. It was not pleasant. Now to mud, sand, remud, and paint it I’m not looking forward to this next stage. BTW: I did not use the orange ladder which (if I had) is positioned in a completely incorrect and dangerous way to use. We put it here to move it out of the way. The silver ladder below is what we used. I am in no way looking forward to getting back up there… 16 feet in the air.

Finally we not only have an address, but we also have a mailbox! We have been waiting almost 4 years for this. Now for the daunting task of changing our address everywhere… we did take care of some of the important ones already, which is super cool!

P.s. I think we have the nicest mailbox around, oh well, we love it!

We painted 4 rooms so far. We still need to paint the ceilings, but that will get done soon. The colors so far are pretty amazing. We are painting the ceilings a nice off-white-almost-tan color. Then it will finished with dark brown baseboards and crown molding.

They also started digging the hole for the lagoon. Hopefully we can get the pipe run from the house to the septic tank before they finish the job so that maybe we can get the hole in front of the front door filled in. We also are putting drywall up on the ceiling in the main room. This in itself has given me nightmares. Right now it’s going really easily but soon we will be the part that a ladder can’t reach. I’m not too thrilled. We may be waiting and hiring professionals for that.

Finally, just in case I haven’t told you lately, I love our house. Like, LOVE our house. So much that I don’t want to leave LOVE MY HOUSE. here is a lovely living room/kitchen picture.

We are pushing really hard to get the house to where we can move in. We are very close to finishing the drywall. The electric is almost all hooked up. The water is almost all hooked up, and we will be putting in floors soon. It’s really exciting but also super overwhelming. I have been going out to the house almost everyday for anywhere from 2-8 hours at a time and C has been going out on the weekends and after work. We are both exhausted. Here is what it looks like so far: the kitchen is above and the boys and girls rooms are below.

The upstairs

We did so much this weekend!!!

First off, with the help of my cousin B and her wife K, we completed the drywall in half of the upstairs. We need to finish installing the outer walls and the ceiling in the bathroom and bedroom. It looks amazing! If we can get it drywalled, mudded, and primed we can start moving some smaller boxes. Yay!!!

That was Saturday. Then on Sunday we attacked the 25 foot wall, getting drywall and insulation up. We also hopefully fixed the flooding problem by installing the rest of the water system (we are missing an essential connector but at least we have a shut off valve between the (now full) water cistern and the house), and also backfilling more dirt around problem areas, adding drainage away from the house in those areas, and adding plastic on to of that. I failed to get pictures of the backfilling progress, but here is a great picture of the water setup. The connector we are missing connects into the pump and will join the pump to the filters.

We have really amped up our construction in the past two weeks. Last week we were out almost every night working on things.

Last weekend we started installing drywall. Our friend K came out with her daughter to help. We were able to put up most of the main wall and half of the girls’ bedroom.

Then C came out every evening last week and built stairs. I put up some more insulation. His stairs are amazing.