Times of Extreme Frugality: Not as Frugal as I Would Hope, but What Else is New

This year's summer-devouring project was supposed to be digging out and replacing the back plywood skirting on the house and building a wood storage rack beside it.

Then the Incident occured.

Treated plywood was no longer in the budget. And the will-to-take-on a-massive-amount-of-work emotional budget was strained also.

However, the need for wood storage remained.

We had planned all along to build a rack using pallets and I found many examples on the internet.

Here is where we pause and take some time to whinge about the internet and unrealistic pallet projects.

Pinterest and the crafty folk out there would have you believe you can build anything from free pallets. 

Have you ever actually seen the typical free, wood pallet? Or tried to take one apart?

Maybe pallets in other parts of the world are made of high quality hardwoods that have never spent a minute outside, but in upstate NY they are rough, poorly built creatures that splinter into lethal shards if you even think about pulling the nails out.

But, somehow, we did manage to scavenge over a dozen, more or less solid, pallets to form the base of our rack. 

We had a few 2x4's we had accumulated but no where near enough. And finding free lumber is next to impossible.

So, we had to buy 2x4's, osb panels for the roof, roofing paper, and some more screws. Our "frugal" wood rack ended up costing us almost $200. 

We could have opted to stack wood on the pallets and just cover with tarps. We've done that before and the result was wet wood and a hassle every time we accessed the wood, especially in midwinter.

So, this rack is, in the great world of building projects, a cost effective and necessary project.

But my tightwad soul can't help but think there should have been a way to do this cheaper and easier...but mostly cheaper.

Heatwave

They say wood heats you twice--once when you cut it, once when you burn it.

We've found it warms much more than that.

A woodstove provides a cozy place to sit and read and dream. A place to percolate coffee and simmer soup. A drying rack in front of the stove beats the clothesline on drizzly days and a table nearby provides a great spot for dehydrating fruits and vegetables using solar power once removed.

Burning wood warms your buy-local-carbon-footprint heart when you buy fuel from your next door neighbor who harvested it 1/2 mile away. And even those of us who don't cut our own gain exercise from stacking and hauling. And we get fertilizer from the ashes.

The financial benefits are heartwarming also. We dropped some serious change to buy and install this stove but I'm betting the price of propane will continue to increase and outpace firewood; as many have said, a woodpile in the yard is money in the bank. This stove will last a lifetime, unlike a furnace, and requires no electricity to run.

During winter, a woodstove becomes the center of the house. When you come in from the cold, you immediately feel the warmth wrap around you, your muscles loosen up, and you know you're home.

Welcome home.

Cookin' with Gas





The deal is done, Woodchuck Acres is sold. We got the check!

We have a loooooooooong to-do list waiting for this moment; at the very top are: get a woodstove and run propane lines.

Teapot standing in for yet-to-be-delivered wood stove.



We found some cheap, not too ugly ceramic tiles and I put down a base for the stove (my first attempt at tiling, not too difficult but hard on the lower back).

Then we made a foray into Louisville to the nearest store that sold Lopi wood stoves.

We had a Lopi in New York and were impressed with the ease of use AND it has a cooktop. That's two ways to save money! The store was busy and the first gent who waited on us didn't know if they carried Lopis--until I pointed out that he was leaning on one. He blushed and explained he was a repair guy filling in for sales staff. We eventually talked with the sales manager and agreed, not only on a stove, but a complete installation package. We're talking mucho dinero here but Tom and I were not thrilled with installing another chimney or trying to manhandle a heavy stove into the house, etc. Been there, done that.

Our Indiana house is taller than this with a steeper roof--I wouldn't be smiling if we did it ourselves here!



We have a few cords ("ricks" out here) from that dead elm but need more. In NY we bought from a wiry, elderly man who brought it in his dumptruck. I looked forward to his delivery and his wealth of stories and he only lived about 4 miles away. Here I called our nearest neighbor (the one who bushhogged our field and his bucket loader and tractor helped pull down a dead pine limb) for a reference and, lo and behold, he also sells firewood. So we can get it from a source 1/4 mile away--I love buying locally!

So, the wood stove is on it's way. Now on to the propane lines.

 I wanted a line for a kitchen stove, a water heater, and an outside valve for a propane generator. I had delusions of doing this myself--so what if I've never dealt with potentially deadly gas and couldn't figure out how to crawl the 20 feet that would need to be navigated on your stomach over and under heating ducts and water pipes and through a cement block wall? We briefly considered cutting a trap door in the floor of the kitchen so I could somehow snake pipe along and... In this case, the musician in the family was the realistic one and talked me out of this endeavor.

A plumber who knew what he was doing came and within 3 hours had all lines done and we were using our gas stove by that afternoon. Sometimes you've just got to admit your inadequacy and bring in a professional.

Two major things checked off! It's wonderful to have money--at least for a little while.