Sunday we woke up and got quite a few things done...some things we weren't even counting on! Here are some pictures of Jim's "dungeon" as I like to call it- the battery vault for the solar power. These things have had quite the beating the last couple weeks, as this 1,000 gallon septic tank has aquired more than what we expected for water! With our unfilled trenches filling up with water and then making a waterfall into the tank, our batteries have seen better days. We installed a sump pump, and then on Sunday Jim built up the walls so that now we are only getting rain water that falls in that area into the tank. Tarring the tank was not the most fun, and I definiteley had the most tar on me after we finished. Four days later, I am still picking tar out of my nails and off my leg. But- for a water-proof tank, it is well worth it! Here is a picture of what the tank looked like a couple weeks ago! Thank goodness the batteries are in casings and appear to be OK.
While I worked on finishing up the covering for our foam around the slab, Jim worked on getting air bubbles out of the solar hot water. This turned out to be a much bigger project than anticipated with soldering required and spewing hot water everywhere. Not fun. Besides handing him towels, there wasn't much for me to do, so I put my eyehooks on my kayak rack to tie down the yaks, and then finished up my slab covering.
Before...and after.
Our next project was getting one of the empty water tanks onto the truck, so Jim could take it into work and get us more water. These tanks have been working out very well! With a nice shower and brushing my teeth, I apparently use 4 gallons of water- so a 330 gallon tank lasts us quite while. While pulling back the cover off the tank we discovered this on top.....
As Jim pointed out, I had a moral dilema. I don't want mice in my yard, but I can't kill babies.... I moved the nest nearby to an area on the ground where there squeaks can be heard by mama mouse and covered them with some tarp so they didn't get wet. The next day the nest was there but the babies were gone...eaten or moved, I choose to believe the latter. I'm OK with my cat killing them when they are older, I just can't kill anything that defenseless....even something I don't want.
We then riggeed the pump up to the other tank with zip ties so it is now off the ground.
Our next project was sheathing the house. I took a break when my friend Jill, an aid in my classroom showed up with her husband on motorcycle, but we otherwise just hit it and got it done fairly quick. Jim cut out all but one window, which I took the sawzal to yesterday when my mom was visiting so we could sit inside and enjoy the view =)
Overall, I think we had a pretty productive day!
Sunday we woke up and got quite a few things done...some things we weren't even counting on! Here are some pictures of Jim's "dungeon" as I like to call it- the battery vault for the solar power. These things have had quite the beating the last couple weeks, as this 1,000 gallon septic tank has aquired more than what we expected for water! With our unfilled trenches filling up with water and then making a waterfall into the tank, our batteries have seen better days. We installed a sump pump, and then on Sunday Jim built up the walls so that now we are only getting rain water that falls in that area into the tank. Tarring the tank was not the most fun, and I definiteley had the most tar on me after we finished. Four days later, I am still picking tar out of my nails and off my leg. But- for a water-proof tank, it is well worth it! Here is a picture of what the tank looked like a couple weeks ago! Thank goodness the batteries are in casings and appear to be OK.
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