I've been spending more and more time lately reading homesteading websites of others who have achieved self-sufficiency, reading how-to websites, looking at solar energy plans and such.  I resubscribed to Mother Earth News this month (I'd let my subscription lapse when we first moved to Canada because it's so much more expensive here.  Still, I think it's worth it) and am looking at buying a few more books on the homesteading lifestyle.

Sometimes I feel far away and disconnected from the simple dreams we have but it's only a matter of time.  We are already taking small steps toward self-sufficiency and now that we own our own first home (close to town as it is, and on a tiny lot to boot) we are headed in the right direction.  Next summer we will have the opportunity to plant our first real garden on this land, and I'm alreadly planning exactly what all that will entail.  I'll be using raised beds, as the soil here is not the best quality and our lot is filled with (almost impossible to eradicate) quack grass.

Something I've been feeling guilty about lately is my desire to live in a more "traditional" style home.  I know it's less friendly to passive solar energy, but I've had the floor plans of our future home picked out for quite some time and am rather attached to them.  I've been reading up on dome and earthship homes and I feel in some ways like that is what we "should" build to be properly energy-conservative off-the-griders, but I just can't see myself in one of them.  I really love stone cottages, and that is what we are planning to build.  I like the idea of them, but I just can't wrap my mind around the curving walls (how will we hang art?) and odd (to me) floor plans.  This is a silly thing to feel guilty about; I know our home will be built as energy efficient as possible, and I'm well aware that not every "off the grid" family lives in that type of home.  I just have such mixed feelings about it, like if I were a "real" off-the-grider I'd *want* to live in an earthship or a dome.  Bleh.

Trying to save rabbit fur to spin into a yarn is more difficult than I'd imagined.  The bunny doesn't seem to want me to harvest her fur, so I've given up.  I brush her regularly, but more comes off in my hands than in the brush because she is such a wiggler.  What ends up in the brush she tries to eat.  It's hopeless.

-Katie