Cottage???

I had to come back and edit this post because I thought I posted the above pic but I can't find the post. We bought this land back in Novemember 2010 (when this pic was taken) with plans to build our house on it someday.

Do you see the two dots off in the distance? That's my husband and Jada crouching down measuring out our new project. We have finally started the long process of building a cottage off the grid. It's a huge challenge and we have run into a lot of obstacles and red tape making for a frustrating few months. Anyway the above picture is before the big machines moved in.


This is looking back at the road and looking at the beginnings of our super long driveway.

Still working on the driveway. Remember I did say it was super long! anyway we wanted to be as far back on our property as possible.

A nice sunny day here in Nova Scotia. You can see that the drainage ditch has been started. This pic is standing where the cottage is going looking back at the road. Oh and I'm not looking forward to mowing all this 2.9 acres!

The driveway finished but still needed to be flattened and settle. I can't wait to wake up here in the morning looking out my window at the river (not shown in any of these pics. I will get a pic of the river this weekend)

Standing at the end of the driveway looking at the stakes that show where the cottage is going 24 x 24

Putting in the gravel for the cottage to sit on. see that garden hose? apparently they used it as a water level. Pretty cool eh?

The hardest part of all of this was getting everything level. Took about 2 days!

Just about finished the floor
This is all being built with the help of a gas powered generator. We hope to have solar panels someday to run the cottage lights off of

Hubby putting the finishing touches on the floor before the building inspector comes to sign off on this part of the permit (red tape). Did I mention my hubby is building this himself with some help from my dad? Hubby is at the soon to be cottage today dealing with more red tape and starting to frame up the walls and installing the windows? I think that's what he's doing lol

This has been especially challenging due to the type of permit we got. Apparently the county doesn't like the fact that we are trying to go off the grid. They really hate the fact that we will have a enviro toilet and are trying to put a stop to this! can you believe that? What has happened to our world that you have to get a permit and have a perk test (fancy word for testing the soil $$$$) to put in a enviro toilet? good god! We feel at this point the county is trying to help their friends make money off us. Oh I should probably tell you this is in a very tight knit community. I actually grew up there and my mom lives about 5 min from the cottage by car.

so if you read this far.........

Be on the look out for more posts about trying to live off the grid. I have some exciting sketches done up for the inside and outside. So please bare with me while I anxiously wait for walls and a roof oh and the final inspection! fingers crossed

P.s. In case you are wondering the pic as my header is not at the cottage. It's the lake across the street from our city house:)