Andy's Little Homestead

A Tiny Homestead

Today I'm talking with Andy at Andy's Little Homestead.

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00:00
This is Mary Lewis at A Tiny Homestead, the podcast comprised entirely of conversations with homesteaders, cottage food producers, and crafters. If you're enjoying this podcast, please like, subscribe, share it with a friend, or leave a comment. Thank you. Today I'm talking with Andy at Andy's Little Homestead. Good morning, Andy. How are you? How's it going, Mary? It's going great. It's a beautiful day in Minnesota. I don't know what it's like in Michigan. It's beautiful, but the cold's starting to get here.

00:27
We were down about 29 degrees last night Yeah, we've had two mild frosts in the last two weeks and the the hard frost is probably coming next week So yeah, my wife was my wife was showing me on the weather report I guess next next week is our first chance of snow for the year, which is about average, you know middle of October Well, at least we're not in Florida today Yeah, yeah

00:56
That was a big reason that we had kind of looked at Michigan initially coming from Eastern North Carolina was there's no hurricanes. Mm-hmm. Yes. I don't want to live where the creatures want to kill me and the weather wants to kill me too. Yep. I'll pass. I'm not into alligators and poisonous snakes and spiders. I like Minnesota because we have none of those here. So...

01:26
Anyway, tell me about yourself and what you do. Well, um, I, uh, the short version of the long story is that, uh, at, um, at 30 years old, uh, my, my life hit a, hit a big restart. Um, it was all centered around, um, or more or less centered around when I, when I got sober, I was pretty bad alcoholic for a long time.

01:55
and moved up to northern Michigan and from eastern North Carolina and lived in a camper and I started filming. Somewhere along the way, I picked up a little over 700,000 followers on Facebook, though I'm kind of trying to push everybody over to YouTube.

02:25
on a piece of raw land that's got nothing here basically when we bought it and doing it on a pretty tight budget like many people are out there. Yeah, so that's what I do. I make videos. Fun, and a good way to make a living. I have no complaints about that. Yeah, exactly.

02:51
As I've said on the podcast before, I do not love doing video unless it's just the quick little thing on my phone outside when the kittens are being cute. Because video does require setup and thinking through the shot and trying to find something that people will be interested in seeing. And it has to be watchable and I don't have the patience. So I don't do video. Oh yeah, no. There's a lot that goes into it. Every angle.

03:20
every little change, you know, I um, so when the channel started to grow, I did a little bit of research, just like, I literally watch videos about making videos. Just to kind of figure it out. And, you know, one of those things that's not really thought about very much is that if you ever notice on my videos, I never have a single camera angle that lasts more than like six to 10 seconds.

03:49
and that's intentional, that's to keep everything visually interesting. You know, a lot of people have short attention spans, so that's, I don't want to call it a trick, I mean they've been doing it in movies and TV shows for years. But it's one of those things that is extra, it makes the projects take longer, it definitely adds quite a bit. And then on the back end, I've got, you know,

04:16
Each each individual video usually ends up with about 80 to 100 individual clips that have to get put together and the audio synced and You know putting what they call be roll footage over top of it That's you know, all of it has to kind of work together in a way that that makes sense one of the things that is you know,

04:41
I started making videos partially because I always liked and respected the guys who took the time to put something together to teach other things and I try and embody that spirit with what I'm doing. But one of the problems with most of the videos that have like it's just a lot of hard information, a lot of times...

05:03
you know, it's a guy who says, okay, now we've got to undo these four bolts from this manifold and he will keep the camera on and he's undoing four bolts from the manifold for the next two and a half minutes. So, you know, trying to make it all work in a way that flows is a challenge, but it's kind of fun.

05:23
Yeah, and for me, I'm a writer. I really do love to write, and I actually have to get on an article here for Homestead Living soon because they want it by February, and if I don't get started on it, it's not going to get there. But writing takes a lot of thinking through and how is this going to come across and what is exactly the right word for what I'm trying to get across to people. And I would rather write than do videos. I'm sure that you would rather do videos than write.

05:53
I've always wanted to write a novel and I sound like plenty of other people out there. I mean, for the number of people who like the idea of writing a novel versus the number who have actually done it, I mean, there's a big gap there. So like the much larger, rest of the much larger group, I've always liked that. I've actually, I started on one and...

06:21
It's, you know, where motivation dies, discipline has to take over. Yes. And with so much going on in our day-to-day lives, I've only got so much discipline for so many things. So it just hasn't happened. But I enjoy, I enjoy spending words because I like reading. So you like to read, you like to write. I was going to say that's okay though. You have time. You have time before you died and maybe write your book. So it's okay.

06:51
Yeah. So what else do you do besides doing videos? I mean, you're doing stuff that you're videoing. So what are you doing? Well, so, uh, we've got a we've got a 20 acre piece property up here. Um, Like I said, the only things that existed here when we bought it were an old house that is not Really salvageable for much um, and a shop, um, so when I say everything

07:21
I mean, everything. I've personally I've punched two wells out here at the property. One of them is on a hand pump and one of them is on an electric pump down in a pit. I've run the water lines from the well to the camper that we're living in. I have ran power lines back from the camper to the well so that we can

07:48
we can the the generator that we have is actually remote start so I can start the generator from inside the camper to cut the water pump on 400 feet away. Wow. Okay. And you know building the road that's to where we are so like our property I really like the setup of it because it's it's 20 acres it's fairly narrow it's only about 330 or 350 feet wide but it's half a mile deep. Okay.

08:17
where we're building and where most of the things are happening is actually at the back of the property away from civilization. So it's not that there's much civilization at the front of the property. I mean, we're the closest Walmart does is about 45 minutes away. So nothing's close. But you know, so we're doing that. We're in the process of building our house out here.

08:44
I've got a sawmill, an old circular rig from my best guess is sometimes in the 60s. Every scrap of lumber that's gone into building that house, when I got it, it was a log. So all the way down to doing that. We've got the house framed and we've got the siding on. I, we're really pushing to try and get.

09:12
get everything finished up soon, but you know, especially up here, a lot is, excuse me, a lot is dictated by the seasons. So you know, the snow is coming. I've got plow trucks that got to be ready to go. Nobody's coming to plow my driveway. It's me. Yeah, winter is definitely coming. Yeah. Yeah, it's definitely a, that was a new experience for me. But when I, when I moved up here four years ago.

09:41
But yeah, so everything, building fences, building pastures, trying our best to grow our own food with varying levels of success.

09:57
We've got chickens and pigs and goats and taking care of them. And there's, there's always something new to build. And on top of all that, uh, everything that I own breaks, um, cause I use it. And, uh, so like all, all of, I've got a few tractors, they're all the saw mill. Like I said, it's from the sixties. I've got a backhoe from the seventies. My daily driver truck is from the eighties. So it's all, you know,

10:25
stuff breaks and I fix it and generally I kind of you know I find the thing that week that I'm like alright well you know this could make a good video and teach somebody something and so I turn the camera on and start talking. Sounds like a great life to me. You were saying before we started recording that you guys are completely off-grid and that we would see how long this interview lasted because you use Starlink. Tell me about Starlink. So Starlink has been fantastic

10:54
We have a solar setup, 400 watt panels, and then we've got four 80 amp hour deep cycle batteries. Not the fancy lithium phosphate ones, we got like the trolling motor boat batteries. But they've worked pretty well. The only problem that I've had with Starlink is the power draw. It's...

11:23
There's a disconnect between what it seems to be drawing and what it's reported to draw. So it definitely uses quite a bit of juice. So being completely off grid, it's all just a balance. You know, I know like certain times of the day, I have a certain amount of sun on the panels I've got.

11:47
you know enough to do this or that and other times of the day it's like okay well we're gonna have to run the generator for an hour or two but as far as connectivity I mean I can I can upload a you know 10-15 minute video in 10 or 15 minutes which is about three times faster than what it had been you know at other other points so it's really it's been great

12:14
Well, I'm honored that you're using your solar power to take the time to talk to me because you're probably using it for something else. So I have a really dumb question because I don't know how this satellite thing works. I actually saw the Starlink satellites for the first time in the sky about two weeks ago. And I was like, oh, what is that? And I looked it up and I was like, oh, that's Starlink satellite, okay. I'm in Minnesota and it was dark so I could see them in the line. It was very cool.

12:44
Um, so when the satellites are not on our side of the earth, cause they orbit the earth, does that mean you don't have signal? Nope. I've had, I've had signal every time I've turned it on. Okay. So it's not just one. Yeah, I don't know. It's not just one set of satellites. It's a huge. Nope. And it's all magic and I don't know how it works. And, uh, that's, that's about it. I'm kind of like.

13:13
Yeah, my knowledge base is not very deep into that kind of stuff. You want to work on an old engine, I got you. But you want to know how we can bounce signals off of objects in the outer space and talk to each other. Yep, that's a good question. I have no idea. Well, Google knows everything. So if I really want to find out, I'll just look it up later today. It'll be fine. I was just curious. I had no idea how it works.

13:43
just regular old internet connection here because we're not off grid. So okay so you said you have chickens and pigs and goats is that right? Yep and one horse. Oh my okay is the horse just for fun or does it have a job? No the horse was a rescue. No you know just a real expensive lawn ornament really. She's a she wasn't all that well taken care of and and we ended up acquiring her.

14:12
She had a leg injury that we got fixed up and then, you know, she likes to injure herself again, because she's a horse. And that's what they do. But she's cool. She's got a great personality. She's a little sassy. I got the hat, but I'm not a cowboy. She's there. We've worked with her a little bit.

14:41
Um, but, uh, with so much else going on, any, any sort of recreational activities are pretty much minimal. Okay. So do you have the chickens for eggs and meat and do you have the pigs for meat? And do you have the goats for milk? Uh, the goats are my wife's idea and they make her happy. So we have goats. Okay. That's the extent of their usefulness.

15:11
Um, the, the pigs we've got, we've actually got a breeding pair. Um, they're, they're still little. Um, but we, uh, we plan on using them to breed and, and using the raisin, um, you know, whatever they have as for me. Yep. And then the, uh, the chickens are, are primarily layers. Yeah. Um, we did, uh, we've done meat birds, um, but to do that economically with the Cornish crosses.

15:41
if you're if you're able to free range them you can offset the cost but i did the math backwards on it and raising um raising meat chickens almost costs as much as buying chicken uh now the obvious benefit of that is that you know exactly what they've eaten and the conditions that they're raised in but um but as far as as cost goes um you know buying the cornish crosses

16:09
uh, and then raising them to, to, um, processing weight is, uh, it's almost a wash. So we're kind of looking into, uh, we're looking into that, but really the animal side of things, my wife is considerably more knowledgeable than me. Um, and she says, Hey, we need to do this. And I'm like, okay, yeah, we'll do that. And then I, yeah. So I build things and fix things.

16:35
Well, you must really love her if you're like, okay, yeah, because I say, honey, I want to do this. And he goes, let's talk about that. Well, no, I mean, that conversation does happen, you know, for a minute before I ultimately kind of just go with it. We, the, the running joke is that we have a unofficial agreement that for every three animals she gets, I get a new piece of equipment. It's a really good way to stay poor on both sides. Um, it's not, uh,

17:04
And it's not the exact agreement. But you know, we kind of just, we look at everything with, you know, from a view of like, okay, well, what does this provide? You know, what is it cost? What is its value? Sometimes the value is my wife is friends with the goats, so we have goats. Then sometimes the value is okay, you know, we're able to get this out of it.

17:32
you know, ultimately makes sense. I like I like the useful animals, you know, chickens are useful. The amount of protein that you get from a cost perspective, especially with free ranging them to what you get out of it, you know, that makes economic sense. And the eggs are delicious. So it's a win across the board. The conversion rate of

18:02
Excuse me. Sorry, I've got all kinds of drainage going on today. Uh-huh. It's that time of year. But the conversion rate with, you know, with pigs, the amount of feed you put in and the amount of protein that you get out and fat and everything else, it makes sense. Uh-huh. So it's kind of, you know, the conversation just happens. We talk about direction and, you know, the thing is we're really just making this up as we go.

18:32
Neither of us are experts in any of this kind of stuff. We kind of learn as we go along. So mistakes get made along the way. I mean, in a perfect world, we would have had the land, put all the infrastructure in, build the house, moved on in, been nice and comfortable and gone on from there and then worried about building barns and pastures and clearing trees, all those things. So, you know, but.

19:01
But sometimes excitement takes over and it's like, oh, I want pigs. And so the time and energy and resources will go towards that. But I think sometimes you have to do that. Like, otherwise it, like, it should be fun. You know, I mean, it's a lot of work doing this kind of thing is more work than I've ever done. And I owned a roofing company back in North Carolina. So, you know, 60, 70, 80 hours a week is not new.

19:31
And I'm doing probably more work now, but all of that is going towards something. You know, it's not just making a living, it's building a life. Yes, and I liken it to renting a home versus owning a home. When you rent a home, all you're doing is giving someone else to build equity in that property. But if you own a home, you're building equity that you have access to. So if you can afford...

20:00
If you can afford to own a home, you're building equity for you, not for somebody else. Yeah, absolutely. Well, and the other thing too, is where we're at is, and I'm never really all that specific with our location for privacy reasons, but we're northern part of the lower peninsula. So top of the men. Somewhere, you know how they in Michigan, they hold their hand up and point to a spot?

20:30
So, you know, top section of the pointer finger, that's where we are. Okay, yeah. But we, oh no, excuse me, I held up the wrong hand. Top section of the ring finger. Yeah, that would have been good on video. It would have been, yeah. The, where we are is a pretty economically depressed area. And nothing's getting cheaper.

21:00
things are difficult for a lot of people. And a lot of people, like especially up here, housing is a struggle. You know, when you've got people who are, you know, working in a factory or working in construction or something, you know, they're making 20, 25 bucks an hour, but your average like two bedroom home rental is like 12 to 1400 bucks a month. You know, that's just not sustainable. So there's, we're not the only ones around here who are

21:30
staying in a camper, you know, and, and that kind of, we'll call it an alternative lifestyle is, is actually by necessity for a lot of people who live around here. You know, people are going to find a way they're going to find a place to live. And sometimes that means violating building codes. And sometimes that means modifying a shed that they were able to get no money down.

21:59
no credit check financing on, those things are real. And people are going through that right now. So in a way, what we're doing, when I'm putting in a water line or I'm punching my own well on the property and showing like, yes, this can be done. This is not an impossible mountain to climb.

22:30
you know, we've what we've been doing has been put out there publicly. And, and I feel blessed to be able to to share that because there's a lot of people who are struggling. Yeah, absolutely. They are. The inflation that's been going on for over a year now, the really bad inflation has been going on for over a year now is so

22:59
I would use the F word but don't use the F word on my podcast, but I'm thinking it real loud offensive to me because we're fairly okay. Like my husband has a good job. We have a 3.1 acre property. We have a nice home. We have a dog. We have barn cats. We had chickens, but they were being lazy. So they have been dispatched and we're going to start with chickens again in the spring. We're okay. And I so worry about people who...

23:29
aren't okay right now because they weren't okay five years ago and now they're really not okay. Well and they're being gaslit into being told that oh it's not that bad like dude I've been to the grocery store like I'm not that that to me is a problem too like it's not that it's not that bad bullshit I'll use bullshit on the podcast yeah I mean it is and

23:57
and people are...

24:02
People are needing to find alternatives, you know, is what it comes down to. So sometimes that alternative is, oh, you know, you can't afford rent on this place, but you know, you can get a $4,000 camper. That's what we paid for this. This is a 38-foot park model. We got it for four grand. Oh yeah. Only had one leak, fixed the leak, we're good. You know? Like, people are going to find a way. The...

24:31
To me, it's tough because I have the ability to fall into a doom and gloom view of things. And I also try and keep a big picture perspective because there have been many other times where things looked a lot worse.

25:01
Here's the best example that I could give. I just got done reading a book called Redneck or Rednecks. It's a fiction book, but it's based around the, in May-June West Virginia, the May-June Mine War, that I don't know if you're familiar at all with this, but essentially the large fight between the union, its private.

25:27
detective agency that I hired that was essentially a private army. How the US Army actually got dispatched to break up this. It was a big riot. And essentially the coal company was they were kicking out people from their homes because the company owned the home and the money was fake. They were using script that could only be sent.

25:57
at their spent at the company store. Yes, yes, yes. And people were being kicked out with nothing. Like literal nothing. No safety net, no backup plan, living in tent camps in the mountains.

26:16
We're not there yet. Um, I think that, I think that mankind finds a way. And I think with a little bit of faith and a whole lot of work.

26:31
our definition of what's comfortable, what is kind of the baseline for existence has gotten pretty soft. Yeah. Little things that are often...

26:51
are often taken for granted. When that gets taken away by whatever circumstance, I think we look at it different. You know, when I moved up here, the camper that I was in, I mean, I had no power, I had no water. I was bringing water in in jugs, and I had a gas space heater.

27:12
that in the worst parts of winter could maybe get the inside of the camper to 40 degrees and it put out so much condensation that the walls were sweating. It would drip on me in my sleep.

27:25
but I was surviving. And...

27:30
From there, the perspective changes. And it kind of hit me, not very long ago, I was washing dishes and just looking out the window at everything that we had kind of built up to this point. I'm like, holy crap, man, I have hot water. I turn on this faucet and hot water comes out. That is a damn miracle.

27:59
Yeah, it's really funny how your perspective changes. It really is. Yeah, so I think that exposure to discomfort, whether voluntary or involuntary, has the ability to build character and to build resilience. It's not, we're all pretty soft, honestly.

28:29
you know in a in a global perspective we're all pretty soft in a time in history perspective we're pretty soft.

28:45
But, you know, circumstances change. My kind of underlying goal with all this stuff is essentially to build a life to where, should things get worse? Should whatever happens outside of my little piece of dirt that I'm not affected, you know? Yeah. I don't necessarily fear something terrible happening, and even less so because I am good to go.

29:15
But I like having the peace of mind of knowing, hey, we've grown our own food. I can hunt. I can take care of these things. We've got what we need. I've got a hand pump out there that'll pull water out of the ground 365 days a year. It could be negative 30 outside. I can pull water out of the ground. That's amazing. You've got the basics covered and really that's the most important thing.

29:42
Yeah. You know, and it's a process, you know, it's, it's all, it's something that we're, we're kind of working towards, which is, uh, it seems kind of strange to some people, you know, a lot of people like the comforts that exist and in normal day to day life. But you know, you, you match that up with the rates of depression and mental illness and suicide. And I, um,

30:13
I don't need to take a pill to fall asleep at night. I'm exhausted. But I know that I was working towards something good that day, even if it was something frustrating, even if it was an unplanned repair on a piece of equipment. I worked towards it and we're moving forward. So I think, you know, everyone chooses how they wanna live and this is what we've chosen.

30:38
Yeah, the best sleep ever is when you're exhausted and you're satisfied with the work you did that made you exhausted. Amen. Yup. All right, well on that note, Andy, we're at 30 minutes. I'll try to keep these at half to half an hour and we're there. So thank you so much for your time today. I appreciate it. Awesome, yeah, it was great talking to you. You too, thanks again. Have a good day. All right, bye. Bye.