The Drama of the Well

Water. Our one hold-up on moving into our home has been water. The old hand-dug well on the property is beautiful and useful in ways, but it wouldn't provide our large family with the water needed for a modern lifestyle, no matter how modestly we live in comparison to many. Yes, we'll be homesteading, and many look at what we're doing as akin to the Ingles, but we'll still be using our fancy HE washing machine and bathing more than once a week in a good ol' shower/tub. Yes, we'll be needing water if we're to continue living the life that we would like. I hesitate to use the word "need." No, we don't NEED a huge source. Most of us here in this country don't need most of what we have. But according to our lifestyle preference at this time, I dare say we need water before we can move in to our homestead. Reliable, clean water.

The well was supposed to be simple. But there's always that chance that things don't go as planned when you dig a well.

Clyde the Witcher came with his witching stick to determine the best spot and found three veins of water converging in one spot just behind the house.

Perfect! That is just what we were hoping for. A close well site with as little pipe as possible to run water to our home. And a site that would give a good return so that we could not drain the well from washing clothes and children. The drilling began,

the children watched,

the mud was plentiful.

They hit water! But they also hit crude oil. Not the amount of oil that makes you say YIPEE! Just enough oil in our water to spoil our precious water.

Move on to well site number two.

Not what we were wishing for at all. We could have water by now, but instead we're starting over at square one. Disheartening, for sure. Especially for a Mama that is ready to get her family into their true home, move her turkeys and her chickens home, and get settled into our new space by autumn, and autumn is moving in fast in this valley. Site number two, water at 50 feet, and what do we hit at 70 feet? Crude oil. AGAIN. After water testing, weeks of decisions, and lots of avoidance and pacing from Mama (thus the lack of posts...), a decision was made to seal up the bottom of this site and use this well, plus a cistern holding tank to give us enough water volume to sustaine our family.

The result, finally? Water at the homestead. A bit farther from the house than we would have liked, but water none the less.

And Mama can breathe a sigh of relief, as we are one HUGE step closer to being home at last.