FROM STAY AT HOME DAD TO HOMESTEADING DAD

As  the title suggests, there are going to be some changes around here.

 I haven't posted in a while because we have moved -- literally.  We have decided to chuck it all in and move to the country.  We bought 40 acres a while back, and were planning on making this move, but not so quickly.  You see, my wife's father, Harry Eugene Orcutt, had a dream for years to live in the country and in a log home.  His entire family, his wife, children and their spouses (myself included) share in that dream.  I have lived in big cities all my life, but have always enjoyed trips to the country, and to tell you the truth, I prefer the wide open spaces to living on top of other people, and they on top of me.  Harry had put off his dream time and time again in deference to taking care of his family in the here and now.  Well, as cruel fate would have it, he was LITERALLY 8 hours away from retirement and bringing that dream to reality when he was struck by a massive, fatal heart attack. 

We were all planning on making this move a little later, but Harry's sudden departure shocked us into action.  Why have a dream is you don't actually work to fulfill it?  We're not waiting.  So we are forging full speed ahead to the 40 acres we all bought together to make Harry's dream come true. 

Here's where it gets interesting.  Our land is in central Arizona.  It's high desert, cattle country.  We are quite literally 30 miles from nowhere.  Oh sure, there's a general store and a gas station here or there, but if you want a Starbucks you're driving 30 miles one way.  When we startedearlier this year, there was nothing but a barren scrath patch of desert, all bugs and dust.  Today, there isn't much else.  We've had a couple acres of it scraped and cleared, and we have parked our camping trailers atop.  The whole fam-damly is here, 5 adults and 5 kids.  The kids range from 10 years old down to 3 months old.  yeah, we're a little nuts!

So anyway, not to make this a novel-length post, this blog will be shifting focus from a stay at home dad's perspective to a home MAKING dad's perspective.  I won't have time for a while to post recipes.  For the time being, I really don't even have a kitchen.  Instead, I will be chronicling the steps we are taking to carve out our little slice of heaven, and to fulfill Harry's dream.  I'll be touching on things like setting up camp, fighting off bugs, beating the heat, finding/making shade, living with a well not suitable for drinking (yet), no pressurized water (yet), generator power, swamp coolers, M*A*S*H* style tents, solar PV systems, and so on, and on...

So let the adventure begin!  I used to say that being a stay at home dad was the hardest, yet most rewarding job I've ever had.  Now I'm not so sure.  I'll blog later about our struggles to get that water cleaned up and running, and how glorious it feels to finally take a REAL running shower after many many days of teapot sponge baths.