This is the third post in a series from the Schaap family about their effort to reduce their dependence on the modern system and increase their self-reliance called March Off Grid. Read their introductory March Off Grid post here.
It’s easy to feel overwhelmed when you are an aspiring off-gridder.
Especially when the grid is all you’ve ever known. There’s a lot to learn. A lot to do.
It can feel like you’re staring down a towering giant, a far-reaching grid Goliath, with you as little David armed but with a sling and a few organic chicken eggs.
For our family, escaping the grid’s clutches is a spiritual matter. It’s about having faith that even an egg can take out a giant. It’s about reclaiming the God-given liberty that we gave up.
March Off Grid is the pun-intended theme we adopted this month to focus on the homestead life we pray is waiting for us. It was a small way for us to increase the collective voice of off-gridders who look Goliath in the eye and say, “Let’s do this.”
Some days we march head on toward the giant. Some days feel more like a slow shuffle.
That’s okay. Because even our baby steps helped teach us a valuable, somewhat ironic, lesson.
Our march off grid, we learned, was going strong well before our March Off Grid. Or at least stronger than we knew (and we suspect the same goes for many others who want off the grid).
For example, spring stopped by for a few days last week and let us hang up some laundry outside. We installed those laundry lines almost three years ago.
We don’t have chickens yet, so one of our sons recently started taking our kitchen scraps to our neighbors’ egg-layers. We’ve been taking our scraps outside in a kitchen compost bin since before we came to Ohio.
Sewing clothes. Baking bread. Family board game nights. Making laundry soap. People thinking we’re lunatics. The list of things we had done before kept growing.
This was a pleasant, yet humbling surprise.
We do not want to be boastful nor content. We know we have a very long journey ahead of us.
Recognizing this past month, however, that we’re doing better than we thought has been a source of encouragement.
It has made slaying the giant seem a little less daunting. Like hiding a smooth stone in your egg pouch just before you look Goliath in the eye and defiantly say, “Let’s do this.”
Read the First post in the March Off Grid series
Read the Second post in the March Off Grid series
What if there was an off-grid way to heat your home with less fuel (like 80-90% less wood)?
There is, and it’s called the Rocket Mass Heater. In this design, the fire burns sideways, the smoke doesn’t come back up, and the heater stays warm for hours. As a result, it uses 80-90% LESS wood, while producing very little smoke and less CO2 than natural gas or electric heat. Better yet, folks have built these heaters for less than $20!