Green Modern Kits

Well, it has been a crazy few weeks. We got my sister married off (and her husband's family is from Seattle so they came in early to spend time with their Virginia family here so it was not just a weekend but a nice time over awhile of the families coming together)... then I went to New York on business for about a week... (really, it was no fun *at all* ; ) ) Memorial Day Weekend appeared out o' nowhere, but finally, we were able to meet with Ron, our wonderful contractor, this weekend to plan the next phase of the prefab house kit: The Inside.

• To finish the house, we need financing. The financing we did earlier was to refinance our current home loan because interest rates dropped so much. Now we need to consolidate the *land* loan and finish construction. We're increasing the *land* loan by the amount we need to finish construction since a traditional construction loan in Virginia does not understand or value green building or off grid construction / systems. Once construction is complete and we have a certificate of occupancy, we have been told by mortgage lender of our first house that they will consider refinancing the land *and* house. Because co-op interest rates are higher, Handsome Husband projects that once we have a traditional first mortgage, the monthly expenses will remain the same after the construction is financed. So we will be paying about the same, to do more, after having finished the project!
• To get financing, we need to have a quote from our Fabulous Contractor, Ron Bernaldo of Giant Oaks Construction.
• To get a quote from Ron, our Fabulous Contractor, my Handsome Husband needs to give Ron details, a list of systems (down to the model number) so that the electrician / plumber can give us an accurate estimate.
• To get an estimate, we need to have the interior framing done.
• To have the interior framing done, we have to give Ron the customized floor plan. (Yes, people, these house kits are made so you can work with your contractor to make 'em as you want! We didn't change much, just added more room for systems and a nook & cranny for a bookcase...)

If ONLY the rest of the personal decisions we make as a family were as easy as it was erecting the actual house kit! So yesterday Ron was given the floor plan, a list of systems is on its way, and he starts the interior framing next Tuesday.

In the meantime, I hope you enjoy pictures from this weekend's off grid prefab-ulous adventure at the end of this long and boring post.

We had some dear friends out, and it was amazing how *comfortable* the house kit was in the heat. Before, we rarely camped this time of year because the sun beating down on our little 1960's Scotty camper in the field was unbearable. In the house kit, it was breezy, comfortable, filled with natural light yet soothing and cool inside. In the winter, the dogs snuck into our beds; now they flopped, lazily collapsed on the concrete.

When I awoke last night to an unexpected thunderstorm, snuggled in my bed as it rolled, rumbling, in, I reflected how our visit in previous years would have ended first thing in the morning, packing up miserable muddy wet dogs and children in the rain. Instead, we contentedly listened to the rainfall as the children played together indoors while the adults slowly woke with steaming strong coffee.

In the house kit, the light was diffused and off the cement, not the sharp slants of light directly on the concrete as it is in winter. That was the first thing I noticed- that yes, the sun was not warming the floor but had moved higher in the sky, and thus prevented by the overhangs to heat. We opened the windows and let in a wonderful crossbreeze. The difference between lounging comfortably in the house kit to walking into the open field under the unsympathetic sun was palpatable- we all remarked on it.

Another thing I noticed was... how grateful I am I chose polished concrete. SO easy to sweep and keep clean. We also have recycled pallets at the doors which have been extremely useful to curtail the dirt- it looks coolio industrial, is recycled, and provides a great function.

We installed the screens, so we don't have to worry about uninvited animals/insects during the night entering from the open windows, and Handsome Husband and Mr. H stopped by the recycling center and plucked a nice tire to create a tire swing for the kids! We hung it off the old oak that shelters the picnic bench. Which, by the way, I picked up a *second* picnic bench for $5 at a yard sale so we can connect them end-to-end and have a fabulous banquet table for lots of guests.

And speaking of guests... we will have an open house in September!

More on this later, but if you would like to tour our prefab off grid zero energy house kit, there is a wonderful bike tour going on in the area on the weekend of September 26th. Bike Heartland is a fun bike tour that goes all weekend long through a gorgeous, historic area of Virginia. I am working with some local farms to have other activities like tours of natural, community supported farms, a winery that will be open for you to enjoy, and more, so pack yer tent and come on down! For more on accommodations, see here (camping at the Heartland Bike Tour), here (Charlotte Courthouse), here (Appomattox), and here (Farmville); and also be sure to visit Miss Emily's, where Necia and her husband will show you great English hospitality. (And boy does she know how to cook.)

So, next, we begin the interior framing. We install systems. We survive children out of school for the summer. ; ) AND some big family reunions scheduled... so June coverage might be a little spotty.

Even after the house is done, we continue crop tree release and increasing function-yet-preservation of the land, so that in a few short years we can be there sustainably full time.

P.s. This north middle window that will eventually be my daughter's room? The children discovered how to open it and then jumped from the sand pile into the house kit, in and out, in and out, in and out... hence my thankfulness on choosing the polished concrete, *again.* There must have been twenty times a day I was grateful for the concrete. Ah the spills. Oh the mud. Gee the sand. And the polished concrete took it, and looked gorgeous.

The zero energy prefab house kit exterior is complete.

In about 2 weeks we move on to the next steps: interior walls of the modern house, off grid systems (solar energy, solar heat, and rainwater collection and filtration), and with it all, stepping back for a larger view: the land, and how we will encourage its health while bearing sustenance for our family.

Heather Barber, ASLA, of Topos met with us last week to discuss the land, and landscape architecture.

From the beginning, here are my thoughts about the land:

• I love the fact we did not have to cut down ONE TREE for the home site.
• However, we are big believers in crop tree release to help the woods become healthy. What that means, in short, is removing weed/competing trees to let the native, desirable trees grow strong and healthy. Along the field we have a mixture of poplar, hickory, oaks, walnut... mixed in with cedar, red bud, pine, a few dogwoods and... non-native evil ghetto palms! Ghetto palms, I'm out to get you!
• The 8 acre field can be rotated with
  • cover crops of warm season grasses that encourage the quail habitat (as well as leaving strips here & there in the fields, and other quail / wildlife management practices)
  • potatoes, garlic, onions: With friends we can plant the field, then harvest it together, keeping enough for our families and donating the rest to the Society of St. Andrews. I mean, why glean (although I do look forward to doing that with my friend Peggy, what fun combined with hard work on a gorgeous weekend!) when you could actually plant a field for hunger? (Also note: store bought potatoes have one of the biggest carbon footprints as they often travel quite far to reach the consumer. They're so easy to grow, try growing your own in your back yard!)
  • eventually move to the Rodale Institute's cover crop roller. Currently we have a tractor with a bush hog and blade.
• There is a smaller field downhill from the home site we could irrigate with rainwater... we've tossed around ideas of growing some kind of crop there, like asparagus... but the reality is that as it is much deeper in the woods it will be much more accessible to wildlife... but it's something to think about...
• I would love a root cellar in which to store food.
• ...and, I admit, we have a hankering for mid-century coolio functional cooking grills- purposeful practicality with kickin' design. YES I realize this is a murky area, in which I struggle. Half o' me is survivalist (heck my family has survived here for hundreds of years), half of me is forward thinkin' design, and half (fine I never said I was good at math!) o' me wants a third option from the solar cooker and propane marine stove. I mean, if the weed tree is felled, why not use it? (Or not? Considering.)
• Handsome Husband and the casa ti green building architect, David Day thought it would be plenty fun to have our friends hang on the slope next to the east side of the house in the evening and project old movies onto that north-east side of the house. They were even tossing around words like, "amphitheater." We'll see. They're such romantics. Which is why I love 'em. Which is why they're both more talented than I. : )
• We've already planted apple trees around the shed, and I was pleased to see they are all in bloom and healthy! In a few years we can invite friends over to pick apples!

Now I also must remind myself that we are on a STRICT BUDGET. So maybe most of these ideas will not happen for years. But in the meantime, here are a BUNCH of land pictures, so that the Virginia landscape architect Heather Barber can get a better feel of the entry, field, and area surrounding the modern house kit. I commented on many of the photos, so if there is something that interests you, click on it to see it larger, and with commentary.

We also met with Ron Bernaldo, also known as The Most Fabulous Contractor In The History of the World about our next steps. I can not re-iterate enough how critical having a knowledgeable, experienced contractor has been to the success of our house kit completion. The house kit itself erected easily; but the decisions we had to make as consumers, making the modern off grid house kit "our own"- could not have been affordably or successfully achieved without a contractor like Ron.

Regarding our green building progress, as I mentioned we start again framing the interior, then move on to solar and rainwater collection integration. And THEN we move to interior design of the house kit. Married to a fellow design enthusiast, living our role as house building consumers, I suspect there *might* be design fights ahead.

The first hint came when Handsome Husband nailed up some old sconces. Yes, they do help light the interior of the unfinished SIPs - exposed house kit, but... um... Fortunately they dribbled wax onto his pristine-just-polished concrete floor so I suspect that will be that. But we shall see... never underestimate Handsome Husband.

So maybe I should start a new blog category, called, "design fight" just in case...

In the meantime, here are a few more pictures of the zero energy modern house, it was a *lovely* weekend on the land!

We were SO excited for David Day and his family to visit! As you may know, the green building architect David Day is the designer of our zero energy, passive solar casa ti house kit.

Now finding our land is not easy. I had emailed a map, but felt it best to take my new recycled dirt bike from Richmond Re-cycles and pedal down the drive to the road for a trial spin to see how visible the yellow rope we hung as a marker was for a car. Imagine my surprise when, as I returned to the house kit, I heard a gentle beep behind me, turned around, and there was the Day family right there, already on the land!

They tumbled out, and the children promptly found the dirt hill, sand, and creeks. They have been very busy making "a campfire," "a kitchen," (on the sand pile) and "food." Yes, sand, twigs, and rock food which was served to us and was *absolutely delicious,* while David Day and his lovely wife Kerri sat down with Handsome Husband and myself for a beer at the picnic table to discuss the off grid house.

David was very, very happy with how the house kit had been completed, by the way, and I have asked him to give an architect's response some time later this week to share with you. I just loved seeing him smile as he walked around the modern house he designed, and when he got HIS camera out and started taking pictures... that was a moment I'll always cherish.

Now that we have a little more shelter than my beloved aluminum teardrop camper in which we have camped for four years through all seasons, we are starting to finally meet more neighbors. Earlier that day, we met Mr. Scott, a neighbor whose family bought over 100 acres on our road over three generations ago. He met Handsome Husband on the road as he was trying to make the driveway more noticeable for the Day family to find, and we invited him in for a tour of our passive solar house. I was wondering what an old school guy would think of the off grid house but... he loved it! He totally got it! He walked around and nodded his head as we explained the passive solar functionality, the practical concrete floors that also provided thermal mass, our plans for landscaping. We loved his deep knowledge, ready smile, and stories of the generations of families and land along our road- we learned his family used to farm what is now our land, and that it was traditionally planted with grasses and corn. We really hit it off with Mr. Scott- especially when he started talking about barbecue, and how his family starts at 4 a.m. to begin their roasts, and the detailed traditions they have in creating each community barbecue... I know we have found a good friend and look forward to having his family over when we have friends over and cook for a crowd!

Now this was also the first time we had visited since Handsome Husband sealed the floor. It made ALL the difference- I will never need a vacuum cleaner, a push broom EASILY cleaned the dirt and dust after a busy weekend neatly into a pile, easily finished with a dustpan and brush. We will probably add one more layer of sealant after the inside construction is finished, but really, it could last for years as is. David Day also mentioned we could wax it as well, something we might consider.

The weekend was mild, but at night it went down to the 30's. Inside the house kit, still with no systems installed, it remained 58 degrees. According to Handsome Husband, the zero energy house lost only six degrees from sundown till sunup. By 8:30 the next morning it was already 60 degrees. I wonder if that was not so much due to the sun rising, as it was still early, as much as the fact that little children and dogs were racing around like atoms colliding in the zero energy house! You really do understand the passive house reports where body warmth is pretty much all that is needed. With warm blankets and comfy clothes, we could easily not have to use our solar energy to heat the house except for very few times of the year.

We had a lovely weekend, but again felt the deep desire to "just move in!" The good news is that the interior begins again after Easter - and no, we can not wait. : ) In the meantime we dragged out an old trunk I have used since college in New York to keep kitchen things in, and a portable closet given to us when friends moved away to store coats and pillows and sheets in, so that we don't have to keep carting everything back and forth.

In the pre-dawn, as I listened to the coyotes howl (coyote here are the size of shepherds), I admit that as much as I miss camping in my camper it is nice to have my family safe within the modern home's strong structural insulated panels...

Oh, by the way, I have some good news regarding house kit tours / annual open house days! Keep September 26-27th on your calendar, because I am going to line up some fun farm tours, a house kit open house and more around Charlotte County's Heartland Bike Tour. There is so many history sites and cultural things to do, and you can even ride your bike, camp out, and more! I also plan to have regular "open house" days seasonally where I choose a date where interesting, fun & historical events are going on in the community so you can not only tour the house kit but make it a destination weekend in Virginia. Within fifteen miles of the land there is founding father (Patrick Henry's Red Hill), civil war, and civil rights history so plenty to see and learn.

So stay tuned...

On our way home, I thought it would be fun to take some photographs to show y'all our little town...

And on the drive home, I took pictures of the landscape, reminding us all why we all need to preserve and value these landscapes and see it as a national resource. Just an hour away, development encroaches with mass grading, ticky-tacky inefficient developments, and no respect for what may be our most valuable asset, our land. Remember: without local farms there is no local food...

So here are our house kit, little town, and driving home pictures, below! I hope you enjoy!
(I added lots of comments to the pictures so if you see something that interests you please click on the picture to see a larger version with comments.)

Our little town:

And the pretty scenes we pass:

Still no interior walls (Ron is off building his pastor's house who needs to move in by Easter), but that did not deter us from camping in the house kit.

After four years of camping in the tiny-but-fantastic 1960s aluminum Scotty camper, I have to admit it was nice to lug a bunch o' the camping equipment from the Scotty to reuse in the open, spacious off grid modern house. As I pulled the practical, necessary camping equipment we had relied on for years from our beloved camper, I looked at it anew and realized that a lot of camping equipment is not eco-friendly! When we bought the necessary equipment years ago, it was because the folding chairs, storage tubs, cutting boards, machete knife cases, blaze orange hunting hats/gear were IMPERATIVE to have in an isolated place when camping through all seasons.

Now, in the comfort of the house kit, I'm looking at all this and thinking, "Man. If someone made environmentally friendly affordable camping gear they would make a FORTUNE!"

(Hmmmm. HMMMMM...
...
Nah, I already have too many jobs. But YOU do it!)

I was gone all Saturday at a social media conference nearby, so when I returned the mattresses had been blown up, the sheets and blankets were on, the "solar soldiers" (as we call the solar exterior lights) charged from a day in the sun, and two happy pipsqueaks were jumping and playing in their new passive solar living space.

Just seeing the queen-sized air mattresses in the still-not-framed-in bedrooms gave me a better idea of the room dimensions. Setting out the beds, the card table, chairs along the east side, really gives us a sense of the future finished space. It's perfect. It's open, filled with natural light, yet warm, cozy, interactive without being cramped. I can't wait to see it more furnished. It's getting very hard not to jump ahead and move in.

It had snowed over ten inches earlier this week...
The ground was wet and there was mud.
Oh, was there MUD.
A LOTTA mud.

I swept muddy dog tracks, children tracks, my tracks, his tracks.
(This is starting to read like a Dr. Seuss book, no? Say it ten times quickly.)
Aaaaaand was grateful we had chosen the smooth take-it-all concrete instead of frou-frou bamboo.
(I would have spent the rest of my life trying to protect that floor. It would have been awful. I would have been miserable.)

Yet, just days after a major snowfall, it was so warm this weekend we opened wide the doors wide and WOW could you feel the cross breeze- I can not wait to spend time here in spring! The dogs naturally gravitate to the passive solar sunbeams in the concrete thermal mass- and love surveying their kingdom from the open doorways while listing against the frame, half awake, in the sun.

I went for a nice long (muddy) walk with the 4 year old, watching while she measured creeks with her stick, surveyed the breached pond, and climbed hills with the dogs. A lot of trees had been downed from the heavy snow, so we had to cut some. Don't worry, the ones that fell were scrappy young ones that weren't part of the crop tree release strategy we have. We will never timber; but are trying to help prune and encourage healthy growth of the woods through selection so they can grow strong vs. competing for resources with weed trees.

It was good to hear the frogs.
They, and the bees, have had a rough few years. So to hear them peeping so exhuberantly in March was glorious. (Listen to video, below...)
I remember a few years ago on my family farm noticing that the pond was quiet, the 35' deep pond where I grew up fishing and canoeing and swimming and... listening to peepers. It was so strange to hear the blowing of the wind, the water, and, on that day, no frogs.

Frogs are loud. My entire life had, until then, been filled with the cacophony of peepers and bullfrogs. So to hear the frogs so loudly happy on "the land" gives me hope.

On Sunday, I spent a good bit of time curled up in a chair, reading fifteen year old issues of Countryside Magazine given to us by Ron & Judy while the children and dogs played.

Now HandsomeHusband, I will remind you, is from a large European city. He delighted in the scouting camera he had erected on a nearby tree and what it revealed: two deer stopping by to check out the off grid house kit! I'm including some of that here too.
: )

Here are more pictures, below, than you would EVER want to see of our fun weekend camping in the off grid zero energy modern house kit!
Just click on 'em to get the large version and captions!
(And some videos o' frogs and passive solar musings, below.
Hey, it was a fun, muddy weekend. : )
)

It was in the low- to mid- forties when we arrived on the land and incredibly windy... but inside the modern passive house kit it was a cozy mid-sixty-ish.

Now don't forget that while we may have the exterior weather-tight, we have not yet hooked up systems. So that nice warmth was generated purely by the passive solar design.

This was the first day I have been able to take pictures of the finished structural insulated panels house kit exterior, so I went a little overboard- any of you whom have wondered what the completed outside looks like, well, you have more pictures than you could ever want to satisfy your curiosity. : )

I hope you enjoy 'em as much as I do!

I also apologize for some of the blurred photos- I will take better pictures and buy another 'cheap land camera I can get muddy and not cry about when the 6 year old drops it *again*'- it is clear it has been dropped one too many times.

As I mentioned, it was a very windy, brisk, February day; but inside the modern house it was calm, peaceful. Natural sunlight filtered in and filled the space in a wonderful way.

Really, there's no need for lighting except in the evening in my opinion.

Even without interior walls, the family naturally groups itself in areas of that main common space- we have thrown a fold up table and chairs on the west side where our dining area will eventually be, and some chairs and blankets for sleepy children on the east side where they naturally snuggle down and cuddle with the light falling on them, keeping them warm and secure feeling, as they rest.

I loved how I could (finally!) sit down at the card table and skim a homesteading magazine *while* having a nice view of the children and dogs playing in the dirt, see them, hear them, yet while they ran wild, everything was so calm and cozy where I sat...

Next we paint the west door black, and finish insulating around the foundation by putting foam all around the foundation that is currently exposed in these pictures.

Once that is done, the massive hill of dirt that my children have much enjoyed (yes I rue the day I tell them this) will be pushed back to infill around the house kit.

We also move on to framing the interior, then installing off grid solar and rainwater systems.

But more on that later, in the meantime, enjoy the beautiful day!

Below you will see a slideshow (click to get the bigger version that also has more detailed captions) plus some fun videos I made...

Oh, and yes, my Handsome Husband *did* run out and get us another camera after all these blurred pictures... : )

Ironically because the light was streaming in so brightly from the windows, the camera overcompensated these interior videos so they show darker than what it was in real life. In fact, I think all the pictures are darker as well. I'll take better videos / pictures next weekend...

My dogs were trying to tell me to let them inside as I made this video of the inside...
Look at that last frame, Khan rounding the corner while Pacha is telling me to Let. Them. In!

Here I talk about our vintage camper that, for four years now, has been our sole shelter here. We camp pretty much from early March until late November/mid December in that unheated camper... but cramming four people in there was getting pretty crazy and it is going to make a world of difference to now be able to be here year round in a house. (This video was made *last* weekend hence my reference to the unseasonably warm day- this weekend, it was your typical February temperatures!)

It was a crisp but gorgeous winter day and we headed out to the land.
I can't tell you how we all collectively relax but also become so alert / get SO excited as the car crunches slowly down the drive... it's calm in your heart paired with exuberance.
Car stopped by the camper, we tumbled out, and I ran to the modern passive house kit.

It was a cold day. We have no systems hooked up. Ya can't get more, er, zero energy house than that! ; )
Yet when I opened the door to the passive solar house kit, the air inside was noticeably warmer. Not hot-n-toasty, mind you, but the passive solar design alone was enough to keep us from being too chilled. I hustled the cold children inside, and the next time I turned around the four year old was warm enough to have kicked off her shoes. In February.

After getting everyone settled, I headed over to Ron and Judy's to pick up some reused chicken lamps, feeders / waterers for my, ahem, imaginary urban chickens.

As we visited, Ron updated me on the latest costs so I have updated the construction cost post accordingly here. This currently covers foundation, house kit, erection of off grid SIP house kit, installation of cladding / roofing membrane (we decided to have the north roof be membrane), radiant tubing in foundation... erhm, am I missing anything, readers?

That final danged piece o' cladding has arrived from the vendor, and the Amish will finish installing it (and all remaining cladding, they were waiting for that final piece) this week. So expect great finished pictures next weekend.

NOW, for the interior.
You may have recalled we are in the process of refinancing.
We'd be crazy not to- we have the opportunity to drop over 2 points! But... it seems everyone else in the world has the same idea... so we're just waiting...
And waiting...
And... waiting...

In the meantime, we are still sorting out the VMI basketball court wood with which we will line the interior of that main room in the off grid casa ti. It's a basketball court. Of wood.
So, it's takin' some time.

Like you, we have spent time and thought into what our home will look like so have searched and frugally planned over the past few years so that we won't have to decorate from a big box store.

We have acquired quite a few thrift store recycled / reused furniture finds that look, frankly... amazing.
I am excited to put it all together!

But first we need to finish the interior...
And modest systems... (because who needs big systems when you're energy efficient?)

Rolling, Rolling, Rolling... RAWHIDE!

Passive home solar design not only enables your home to "work", it allows you to use less to do more.

My green building architect friend Scott Kyle shared an article last week which embodies this philosophy, and is in line with our own thinking:

You don't need a bunch of systems stuff- if carefully chosen, less is more.

In Vivian Loftness's article Free-Rolling Buildings on GreenSource.com,

"More efficient technologies can help us to achieve a 30-percent reduction, but they will never get us to carbon neutrality. For that we need nature’s renewables—daylight, passive solar heating, natural ventilation, natural cooling. We need mechanical systems that are turned off as long as possible, buildings that “free-roll” through hours, days, months, and seasons."

I push down manufacturer prices to give you volume pricing for the passive solar house kits (homes designed by amazing custom architecture firms!), but everything is a huge investment and when having to make a choice between better but more expensive vs. cheap and poorly-made, your best bet is quality, every time.

This is especially true in systems choices. As our modern off grid house will depend upon energy efficiency, I have been researching the market for appliances that use little or no electricity.

Sometimes the choices I make will not be the most inexpensive, but I believe they will last years longer, even generations, certainly making them the longterm affordable choice. As I consider decisions I think 1. Invest in efficiency and durability but also 2. Do we really *need* all "this" (whatever "this" may be)?

One way we financially achieve systems purchases is by doing it in stages- each year we invest in one more thing, paid for in cash.

For Christmas last year I gave Handsome Hubby a... (drumroll) composting toilet.

Now that composting toilet is much more expensive than just purchasing "a toilet." (And what a wonderful gift, no? I got even with him for the year he gave me car parts.) But when you consider our freedom from having to dig pipes to hook up to a sewer, much less the fact that we won't be contributing to sewage... it's a good, long term, affordable solution.

This year, I will be purchasing the refrigerator and freezer. I have been looking at models that run on propane, and extremely energy efficient electric models that would tie in to solar power.

Regardless which choice I make, I am purchasing the smallest model refrigerator for two reasons:
1. less expensive and
2. our philosophy that really, since we will be buying from our neighbors farms / growing much ourselves seasonally, you really don't need the huge storage- much will be canned, preserved, then the refrigerator supplements/keeps what is used that week.

The freezer will certainly be larger, to hold meat seasonally acquired through friends' free range farms or hunting, but I may hold off on that purchase awhile as technology improves (although there IS a nice solar powered freezer I've had my eye on which could be stored in the shed).

In that same sense of evaluating what we "need" in systems, do we *really need* extreme heating and cooling? Thanks to the passive solar design of our house kit, thanks to the energy efficiency of the structural insulated panels (SIPs), our home will not have extreme fluctuations in temperature, or fast temperature loss/gain.

For heat, we installed radiant heat in the concrete thermal mass.

What about summer? I discussed this with Ron, our contractor... who, like I, wasn't concerned. I have never been a fan of air conditioning- heck, our air conditioning has been set to 80 for years, I just like to "take the edge off" of summer. I've always felt that when it's summer, you should be wearing summer clothes- light dresses, sandals... and often wondered about the health effects of working in companies where you must bring a wool sweater with you in August to work because the dial is set to "frigid."

By using a sun shade on the south side, overhangs in the architecture, and letting the cool air in at night while the hot air escapes through the clerestory windows... we expect to be plenty comfortable.

When evaluating systems, my constant question is "how low can we go?"

It will be interesting look back five years from now and whether our systems choices were indeed, too much or little. (I'm expecting them to be appropriate, as I've done much research, but I'm just saying...)

When I initially envisioned our own house kit, I had dreams of cooking over a wood-fueled kitchen stove which would also heat the house... I dreamed of masonry heaters and evenings spent huddled about its warmth with our children...

Instead, I realized I could be zero energy / more carbon neutral by giving up that nostalgic flickering flame, and achieving better, more evenly-distributed heat with solar powered radiant heat. Our solar cooker will help us supplement many tasks that would otherwise be done via baking / cooking. (You can see some of my early solar cooking experiments here. : ) )

How low WILL we go?

Here are some of the choices I've made: I have decided I really am not passionate about laundry. ; ) Why consume energy in a clothes dryer when you can air dry your clothes outside? (Heck, in winter I'll just hang them in the bathroom, actually, I could hang them anywhere as the floor is concrete! ; ) )

For washing clothes, I have decided to go waaaaaaaaaaaaay low tech, and low water (don't forget, we have no hook up to water, and the rainwater collection and filtration system has not yet been purchased):

Initially we will use (and then maybe not replace?) the Pressure Handwasher, because the Home Queen Wringer Washer is something I can purchase down the road but don't want to pay cash for now. It will encourage us all to not let laundry pile up, thus needing less clothes.

Handsome Husband makes a great point: In the army, they had to "clean" their clothes with a brush, without water. Now, I'm not going to get that rustic, but it certainly inspires me to make sure the "muck" is off the dirty clothes before washing them, therefore needing less water, cleaning better!

Handsome Husband: "I think frugality is fun in this life exercise. I don't see it as a limitation but as an adventure. It's about being conscious, and realizing you really don't 'need' much."

It's also reflected in our interior design.

Unlike a lotta "prototype" homes you see, we are reusing (mostly) thangs we already have and not asking for design handouts in exchange for "publicity." Like you, we have accumulated carefully over time our favorite things, that make a house a "home," that really reflects our family.

Because, like everything, we have carefully considered the future, over years of thrifting and reuse... we dream, we plan, we scavenge. : )

And make it fabulous.

Here are the latest pictures of our modern passive solar house kit! Handsome Husband returned from the land with these pictures of the cladding as it is going up. I couldn't resist just letting this post be pictures / video of the modern house and not the post I had planned- a business analysis on why finding affordable, national distributors of cladding for residential use has been so difficult. Hope you enjoy our Supa Mod House Kit Update! As you go through the modern passive solar house pictures, remind yourself that all of this: putting together the structural insulated panels (SIPs), the shiny super mod cladding, the passive solar design... all of this is being done by... the Amish! Pretty crazy, huh? Here's a slideshow, click on it if you want to get all up close and personal. And here he walks us through the affordable green house interior... And the modern house exterior...

TreeHugger's Land Sharing Is The New Trend article, though focusing on the UK, interests me because there are so many ways it could be applied to our own towns...

This is certainly not a new trend- people have been working collectively for local agricultural benefit for eons. My family farm had such a relationship - when we no longer had horses, we allowed a neighbor farmer to regularly cut the hay in the fields and roads. The hay was then his, and used to feed his livestock, and we didn't have to spend the hours bush hogging the trails or mowing the fields. It was a great relationship that worked for us all!

Where we live in the city is in an old urban neighborhood that has nicely sized back yards. We have always had a productive garden, but there are many here who are in their eighties and nineties who can't garden any more... And this is really where the TreeHugger article hits home to me.

How wonderful for an older person, often alone, no longer out and about, to have enthusiastic younger people working their back yard plot? Think about all the great things that could come from this, taking the community garden a step further from the median strips and publicly owned city land, into the private realm... mutually beneficial.

Wonderful! Just some... food for thought. : ) And smart growth!

I have a cool passive solar story regarding our modern house kit!

It is FROZEN on our land, absolutely FROZEN!

Yet Ron, our fabulous contractor, just called to say he went to check on our modern house kit and the glass he left w/water inside is still liquid!

GO passive solar energy efficiency with SIP!

Even without solar hot water, radiant heat or our solar energy systems hooked up and working, the passive design of our house kit is preventing the inside from freezing!

We all knew this, but it IS exciting to see it in action!