Hello

[Al_Coda]

Hi All, Been brought here by google searches than a couple times over the past few years but just decided to join. The Mrs and I just built our dream home in January - 10 acres in the Huron National Forest, off-grid, ICF, passive and active solar (and hopefully some wind power soon).

Hoping to get some help shedding the last of our suburbanite ways, and look forward to garnering some of the knowledge here.

Al.

[CarolAnn]

Welcome, Al Coda! This is the place!

Tell us more about you, your family and your homestead, please! (We also have a place to post pictures if you'd like to!) We have lots of folks who have found their dream, those who are still looking, and those who haven't decided quite yet what it is - all are welcome here!

:)

[333]

Peace,

Welcome and enjoy,

333

[Al_Coda]

Thanks, just me, the Mrs, and our Niece. Been planning this move since 2001 after we bought the property. Designed the house ourselves, 2,200 sq ft, two-story, 8" concrete core walls, R-40 above, R-10 below. Upper level has 3" of concrete under the ceramic tile for thermal mass, almost 240 sq ft of south facing glazing. Air tight woodstove on the lower level supplies all the heat. Nearest neighbor, electricity,and our mailbox, is 4 miles away. Due to confusion between the bldg inspector's office and the register of deeds, our address was changed 3 times during construction - because of all the confusion, our permanent address now isn't in the postal service database (or mapquest, googlemaps, etc), and that is just fine with us.

Power system is 10 Kyocera 130w panels, 8 Surrette 6CS-21PS batts, Xantrex 4024 inverter, and a 9500w LP Honda generator. One Air-X still in the box, waiting for the tower install. Very impressed with the system performance so far, generator usually runs for about 4 hours per week (on laundry/dishwasher day).

Looking forward to warmer weather to start getting the yard in order - and for morels, blueberries, and fishing. I'll post some pics in the next week or so.

[bookwormom]

sounds like you have a lot to share, :) :) :)good to have you here

[nancy1340]

Welcome and I agree your place sounds interesting. Hope you can post some pictures for us to drool over here. :D

[DavidOH]

Welcome.

"our permanent address now isn't in the postal service database" I love it.
Keep it that way for as long as you can! ;D

Love to seee the pic from your neck of the woods. :)