Moving The Electric Goat Fence

This past weekend we completed a handful of the many items still on the to do list. 

As many of you may have seen from photos, our location on the farm has become more snug over the months. A goat fence in front of the house gave us just about 4 feet of room to enter the front door. This worked just fine for me, but for larger, clumsier people like Dan- it was an electrifying experience more than once. A few months later, a second goat area was made for Wiley- since he can't hang out with all the ladies after a certain point in the year- wink wink. That area extends up to just about 3 feet away from the back wall of our tiny house. The goats have us surrounded!

On Saturday we set out to give ourselves a little more room to romp- snow build up was also a major motivator. We took the major corner post of the fencing and moved it inward about 15 feet. We set each string/wire to the recommended tension and secured them. WOW! What a difference it made!!

***Note************************************
Our landlord farmers are having an issue with their electric fencing. It is solar powered, and right close to the power center, the fence readings are up around 7+ (amps or volts- I'm not sure) but then further along the fence it drops to below 2. They have looked along the entire fence and didn't notice anything that would ground or interrupt the current. Anyone have ideas?
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The whole area seemed to open up! Our tiny house seemed bigger somehow! We have a front yard! We were so jazzed by this new perspective and space, that we forged on with outdoor work. We cleaned out an area of the old fallen barn. The cement slab had collected a few inches of soil over the years. When we first moved, we covered the space with a tarp. I find it to be the cheapest, easiest, earth-friendliest way to get rid of a bunch of plants and break down the roots and soil. After removing the tarp, all of the soil and plant matter left scraped away easily. 

While Dan scraped and shoveled dirt- I collected cinder blocks and made us a temporary fire place- with a great view I might add! We hope to make use of this cement slab area by putting in a pallet shed and storing things like our bikes and whatnot. We are also playing with the idea of it becoming a nice outdoor seating area.

By the end of Saturday we were already making plans for a small deck. We finally put in a shelf for our Berkey too- now we can easily pour water, and have a rinsing bowl just below for hand washing, etc.

Great view!

On Sunday, we went to Dan's Dad's store to check out old deck wood. His Dad recently put a new deck on their house, and put all the old wood behind his store. Dan and I looked through the pile and picked out the best looking pieces of wood. It was all pretty weathered, cracked, and worn, but some was still usable. 

We drew out a basic deck plan and got to work prepping the wood. After brushing, de-nailing and de-screwing, we chopped the ends square and clean, cut them to length, and sent them through the planer. Just about every piece looks brand new! (Just don't look at the other side, haha)

We still ended up needing more wood to complete our deck, but we were able to salvage about half of our needs- saving us around $150 in materials. Not too shabby for a few hours work!

Next weekend, we hope to install the deck! I can't wait!
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An old board compared to the cleaned up boards...

Looks brand new again!