Hi. Just wanted to drop in and say thanks for letting me join you guys. I have reviewed some of the posts here and have found some interesting topics and friendly discussion. How refreshing! As for neo-nazis in north Idaho.....this is my 9th winter here and I think I met one...once. Thats it. Where I live is further north than the Butler compound....closer to Ruby Ridge. I am sure there are some around, but they keep to themselves up here I guess. Down in Coeur d' Alene, 50 miles south of here, is where they have been active as far as wanting to get in the city's parades etc. What a bunch of sad (but scary) folks they are.

This area can be a bit rugged in winter, some years. I have been tested more times than I can count. When I started out doing this homesteading off the grid thing I was in my 40's, and fearless; now that I am 51 it seems harder at times, in some ways and easier in others. I sure never figured on still doing it alone for this long though, I can tell you that.

I think this board will be a nice place to converse with nice people. I am pleased to meet y'all.

Idaho Gal thinklove@webtv.net

-- Anonymous, January 07, 2003

Answers

Welcome Idaho Gal . . . I hope you find this BBoard to be one of your favorite places to 'set a spell'.

A short introduction: I live in a small city in deep south Texas. I am about to turn 40, and am married to a middle school English teacher, with two kids, a four year old boy / nine month old girl. I am an architectural draftsman by trade. My hobbies include reading (especially about homesteading), hunting, hiking, a little camping / fishing.

Pleased to meet you. :^)

-- Anonymous, January 07, 2003

Welcome, fellow "Webtver"!! I'm waaay across country in Maine and I've heard that the winters out there in Idaho are worse than mine here on the coast of Maine. Is that true?? Could you tell us what life is like for you and what you raise or grow?

I've enjoyed my "cyber-connection" with these folks here. They're all super nice!! But be prepared 'cause we can all be brutally honest sometimes...in a GOOD way :-)!!!!

-- Anonymous, January 07, 2003

Hi-daho Gal! Glad to see you made it here.

As a brief intro I'm in my mid fifties, married, work as a courior driver and live on 7 acres in central Wisconsin.

We've got a large garden, a few chickens and a bunch of white rock doves plus a bunch of fish, bass and bluegills, in our ponds.

When I have time I enjoy woodworking, working on my sawmill, reading (mostly Hinduism, Buddhism, mystery traditions).

Welcome!!

-- Anonymous, January 07, 2003

Hey, Idaho Gal,

Glad to meetcha! How'd you happen to light in the Idaho Panhandle, anyway"?

I settled here (Josephine County, Oregon) because of a pleasant breeze on a hot August afternoon, almost thirty years ago, when I was visiting some friends of my ex. Pretty dumb way to choose a place to live, but I lucked out, I guess, because the only place I have seen which I like better is in South America, and I don't want to be that far from my grandbabies.

I'm a semi retired builder, glass beveller, well driller, pump installer, water system designer, hydrologist, and probably two or three other things i can't remember. (I have been trying to figure out what I was going to be when I grew up until I finally realized that I'd already grown up, and was quite satisfied with the search, even though I never had a real "career".

Managed to build my house, and a few really nice rental houses, mostly from lumber I milled from trees which occassionally died on my 43 acre woodlot, where I live. I love it here, although it's growing way too fast.

I've been politically active, fighting various "bad" things: unbridled growth in the area, big government, the USA PATRIOT Act, the Homeland Security Act, corrupt potliticians, etc. In my spare time, I play landlord, experiment with alternative power, and nurture my forestland.

I'm "happily" married, have one biological kid and two adopted, and three grandbabies, which, alas, now live in Floriduh.

Glad to have you here, Idaho Girl!

John, I'm envious of you having a lumber mill. I've investigated buying one, but the cost is more than I can justify, when I can haul my logs to a mill four miles away. It would sure be nice to save the haul of logs, and hauling the lumber back, though. What kind of mill do you have, and how do you like it? The only one I've found which can mill logs as long as I sometimes need is over $20K...

-- Anonymous, January 07, 2003

Lots of warm welcomes! Thanks. Well, the way I managed to "light" in the Idaho panhandle was probably not far from how jumpoff landed in oregon. I left northern Virginia/DC area in 1970 headed for San Francisco and the land of the flower children. but, by the time I got there, there were no flower children left that I could find... just a bunch of junkies and other scary folks. So, upon hearing of a good rock festival coming up , (Strawberry Mountain) and having a couple hundred dollars, I decided to take a right and head north to Washington state. Loved it there, stayed there till the California migration got to be too much and headed for Idaho in 94. Jessie Colin Young's song "Ridgetop" had been my inspiration and driving force since 1973. I always knew one day I would leave and go live in the woods somewhere. So, now.....all these years later ....here I am. Signing off before I get "ouched"! Peace.Idaho Gal

-- Anonymous, January 07, 2003

Awesome, Idaho Girl! You were a couple of decades late for the SF scene, methinks.

I've always had a connection with that song. It pretty much says it all: "the curves in the road keep the tourists at bay; the folks in the flatlands think we folks are nuts, etc.

I live on a ridgetop, but with a lot more than Jesse's six or eight Pine trees that "just love to dance in the wind" (I am making an attempt to paraphrase his song...

JOJ

PS I didn't even know he'd written that song back in '73. I think the first time I heard it, I'd already moved to the woods (but not my ridgetop, where I've only lived for six years now.)

-- Anonymous, January 07, 2003

JOJ: My mill is homemade, but not by me. It'll handle a 24" x 16' log. It has a hydraulic loader for loading the carriage, a sawdust blower, hydraulically operated carriage (the windlass winch that moves the carriage is hydraulically powered) and the powerplant is a Chevy truck drive train. It handles two 30" blades in a topsaw configuration. It was designed to be portable as its built on a Greyhound bus frame on an axle but I have it set up as a permanent rig. I haven't done any serious cutting on it yet (still working out some bugs) but the idea is that because I have to buy my firewood in 8' lengths I select some of the logs to saw up for lumber which I'll hopefully sell to recover at least some of my heating costs plus I'll have lumber for my own use. I paid $750 for the mill and have about $1100 in it by now.

-- Anonymous, January 07, 2003

Hi there! I'm Sherri, and I'm one of the city-dwellers on the forum. I live on 0.2 acres in a subdivision on the outskirts of Indianapolis with my fiance Keith and our 3 cats. I'm 39 and Keith is 38. I have a couple of 4'x12' raised beds in my back yard for veggies and a 4'x6' bed next to the patio for herbs. I canned spaghetti sauce and salsa for the first time this summer and they turned out really yummy thanks to Polly (another forum member who mailed some salsa mix to me when I couldn't find it here).

I work during the day as a Regulatory Affairs Consultant for a medical device manufacturing company, and evenings and weekends as a Massage Therapist. My eventual goal is to do massage full-time but that's a few years down the road. I'm also interested in herbalism, alternative health, energy healing, flower essences, and a lot of that other "funky woo-woo stuff" as one of my massage instructors called it. :) In my spare time I like to read, sew, play RPGs, and I'm learning how to crochet.

I was raised on a small farm in eastern Michigan and most of my family still lives there. I miss the country life and plan to escape the city soon. I've been working for the past 3 years to clear up the last lingering debts from my divorce, now we've started to save up for a downpayment on some land in the next county north of Indy. Hopefully by spring of 2004 we'll be ready to put our current house on the market and make the big move.

Welcome to the forum! I hope you like it here. :)

-- Anonymous, January 08, 2003

I'd like to welcome you too, Idaho Gal! For the past year and a half, I've been in suburban St Paul. where I live in a log home on a litle lake on 3 acres of woods with my partner of nearly 28 years and two teenage daughters, two dogs, a cat and a cockatiel. Until about a year and half ago we were on a 330 acres farm across the border in WI where we raised and marketed organic meat and all manner of critters. I just turned 54 and have gotten fat and sloppy since moving to town.

It's been kinda dead around here lately; hopefully you can help liven it up!

-- Anonymous, January 08, 2003

Hi Idaho Gal! I'm glad you've joined us. I like your story about how you ended up where you are.

I live in SW Ohio, about 50 mins. NE of Cincinnati. We live in the country on a 2 lane highway. I'm 39 and married with 4 children (17, 9, 7, and 5). We homeschool, garden, rescue Australian Shepherds, and various other country things. Like Sherri,I'm into all kinds of "funky woo woo" things like herbs and alternative ways of healing and nutrition. My husband I started back to the gym recently after many years of being away and we are quite involved in that also.

That's all I can think of for now. I hope you like it here!

-- Anonymous, January 08, 2003

Hello Idaho Gal and welcome!

We know a family that lives in a part of Idaho very near the Canadian border. They always have wonderful tales to tell of the beautiful landscape and all the wildlife they see. We would love to be able to visit your state sometime.

I live in NW Ohio near the Indiana and Michigan state lines with my husband and three sons-two born to us and our youngest we adopted at six months . We have lived here for almost five years coming from Maryland and before that Oklahoma and PA. Our homestead is a 100+ year old farmhouse on two acres with a small barn and one other outbuilding. After butchering our pigs and broilers, giving away our rabbits, selling our goats and milk cow, we now have eight laying hens only. We need to spend a huge amount of our time this year working on our house so all the animals had to go for now. It will certainly be a different summer around here and I will miss them. We are fortunate though, to know several sources that we can buy organically raised hogs and beef and we buy our milk from the lady that purchased our cow and from another at this time when Rosy is getting ready to calve.

We have homeschooled for 20 years - mostly what is referred to as "unschooling" but our youngest has Down Syndrome so I have the need to do things a little differently with him.

I have always enjoyed learning about, growing and putting to use herbs and continue to learn more about alternative forms of healing.

Am looking forward to your posts

-- Anonymous, January 08, 2003

Oh and Idaho Gal, I love your email address! :)

-- Anonymous, January 08, 2003

John-what a great deal! I'd love to find something in that price range.

How do you cut a twenty-four inch log with a thirty inch blade? Rip from one side, then flip it and rip it again??

-- Anonymous, January 08, 2003

Greetings Idaho Gal ~

My name is Joy. I am the de facto moderator here -- because no one else wanted (or was foolish enough) to do it. The board was started by Jim Morris, who departed because Real Life took over. We miss him! The board was an outgrowth of the now-defunct Countryside forum (the magazine continues, but the forum is gone, having morphed into a different forum in a different location).

I am a suburban dweller (southern Wisconsin), hoping to have somewhere in the country someday. I'm 50, l live with 2 cats, a large dog, and 9 birds. I live in a condo, but the association has garden plots available, so I have rented one for the last two summers. I grew really yummy tomatoes this past year. I miss them so much, the store tomatoes aren't even close! So I'll probably do it again this next summer. Love those tomatoes! I am still a novice gardener, but learning new stuff every year.

I have a sister, Julie, running around the board too, if she ever shows up again. She lives more than 200 miles north of me and is far more into gardening (and much better at it) than I. Her gardening experiences might be closer to yours, climatically speaking, than most of us.

I also like to read and sew, and I am a Lord of the Rings movies junkie. :-D

-- Anonymous, January 08, 2003

Hi there. I'm in NJ and moved to the country to have my horse in the backyard (which I never ride.) I have 6 acres that I FINALLY finished fencing in this summer. I have Boer goats, rabbits, chickens, a cat, a parakeet and some fish. Oh and the Quarterhorse which is 28 yrs old.

I unfortunately, am going to be looking to move out of the country life in a few years when my husband retires. It was my dream, not theirs (I also have a son. City boys, both of them) and it's hard to do on your own. I'd love to move to Florida where it is warm all the time. NO SNOW. We'll see.

-- Anonymous, January 08, 2003

Wow, You guys are amazing! I have received a whole bunch of e-mails from lots of you. Do all responses end up here and sent to the poster's personal address? I am not familiar with this format. There is no way I could answer all of them individually. So I will try to cover most of my responses here. First of all, my critters are all pets. I have 4 dogs and 4 cats. I am very active with the local animal shelter and sit on the board of directors. Rescueing animals has been in my blood for my whole life. I have never raised any kind of livestock. I know that if i ever did, it/they would become pets. I have a very difficut time eating 4-legged animals.....so, mostly I don't. I have no problem whatsoever with what other folks choose to eat though.

You guys all sound so nice and friendly. I have not found this to be true on the other board I was visiting; except maybe occassionally.

As for gardening, I am single, so, I just have about 6 raised beds for my favorite stuff. Mostly, I am into perennial flower gardening! And I love to make stuff with all the plants that grow everywhere around here. This place is a treasure trove of medicinals.

More another time...thanks to you all for your kindness.

Idaho Gal

-- Anonymous, January 08, 2003

Idaho Gal: I suspect the reason you're getting all those e-mails is because when you initiated your thread you clicked yes and the "Do you want to be notified of responses?" prompt. IF you click no I doubt if that'll happen.

I'm gonna keep this short since my first response was "ouched". Whats up with that any way?

JOJ: Around here used Belsaw mills can be had for $1500 or so. More on the next response(ouch avoidance)

-- Anonymous, January 09, 2003

JOJ: Note I said my sawmill has TWO 30" blades. Its set up in a top- saw configuration so the top saw blade trails the lower one very slightly, enabling the bottom of the top blade to be slightly lower than the top of the bottom blade, thus enabling me to cut thru a 24" log.

-- Anonymous, January 09, 2003