Introduce yourself here !

Hello Everyone. New member here from Minnesota. My wife of 33 years and I are from the twin cities, but our hearts are in northern Minnesota where we lived for 10 years, started our family (children ages 21, 24 and 27), heated with wood, and still own land near the Canadian border 1.5 miles inland from lake Superior. We built our second home/cabin ourselves up there where we spend as much time as possible. We hope to retire there.

I spend most of my time free time gardening, hunting, fishing, darkhouse spearing, canning/preserving food, as well as cutting firewood off our land to heat our cabin, and for our fireplace at home...birch, black ash, aspen, and the odd balsam, spruce and alder that are in the way.

Our neighbors up there are loggers and we buy 3 cords of split mixed sugar maple and birch from them every 3 years or so as well ($310 per 1.5 cords delivered). Their family matriarch logged our land for aspen pulpwood and some sawlogs at age 85, and finished up just after his 86th birthday. He has logged continually in his single man operation for over 66 years straight!

http://northernwilds.com/no-push-button-machines-85-year-old-logger-just-keeps-cutting/

If this link works you can see picture of the man himself. The color pictures were taken while he was working on our property.

I love everything about firewood from cutting, splitting, stacking, hauling it, smelling it, to heating with it.

Not a tech guy and have avoided smart phones so I don't have any pictures - yet.

 

Welcome, you've found the right place!

 

Hello hovlandhomestead, nice to meet you! Thanks for the article about Duane Johnson, he is an inspiration!

 

Welcome hovlandhomestead You're gonna enjoy your new home here! This is the greatest forum on the internets.

Dont be afraid to share pics if you come up with a way to post some. We love pics here. Everything from wood piles to chainsaws to stoves/fireplaces to pets to......you get the idea

I would especially enjoy seeing pics of said cabin if you get a chance

 

Thank you All. I am glad to be here, and moreover that you folks can enjoy the article about Duane Johnson. He is truly an inspiration. It was interesting to watch him work. He would get to his landing everyday around 8am, cut until 10am for a 15 min coffee break, break at noon for a 30 min lunch break and chain sharpening, break at 3pm for another 15 min, then quit around dark, which is about 4:30 to 5pm in northern MN during the winter months.

He told me that in his later years he only works days of no significant precipitation and temperatures of zero f or above. When their 6 children were young he worked 6 days a week in just about any weather to keep them all well fed. Even during his peak work years, and to this day, he and his wife Virginia take Sunday off for church, then fishing in the afternoons.

He really is a good builder too, with his own sawmill. Both of them generally taciturn people of the highest character, it was an honor to my wife and I when Duane and Virginia dropped in to our cabin while we were working on it one day, and gave us some compliments on our work.

Regarding pictures, we have some in an older photobucket album. Is it possible to copy and paste from there to here?

 

Not sure if this will work but here goes...I found a couple pictures on my LG slider phone from fall of 2017. I will try and contribute a few better shots as I figure this picture posting thing out!

Top picture is one of our sons in the back of our cabin heading out for some well earned deer hunting the fall after his deployment to the Middle East (Sargent US Army Medic)

Bottom picture is above the front entry to the cabin off of the mud room.

 

Is this anywhere near Tower? (home of the famous Kuuma wood furnace)
And welcome to all the new members!

 

Welcome to the group from way down south. Great bunch of folks on here. I'm sure you will enjoy it.

 

X2 ^^

Welcome aboard, and thanks for the link.

 

Welcome to the club! If you dont like smartfones ... a half decent digitalcamera works for me fine most of the times.

 

dont forget pets...

lol

 

Welcome to the club, Jim Barry !
Glad you found us!

 

Welcome to the club, Kysebey8547 !
I think you're gonna like it here!

 

Welcome to the club, Ron T !

 

Welcome to the club Sir! Participating in firewoodhoardering aint a bad decision at all!

 

"Is this anywhere near Tower? (home of the famous Kuuma wood furnace)
And welcome to all the new members!"

Brenndatomu, Tower is about 60-70 miles west of us...as the crow flies. To drive there is about 3 hours I would guess, due to having to go down the shore along Lake Superior about 50 miles to hwy 1, then up through Ely, then on to the Tower area.

 

Hi all I'm Wayne.

 

Welcome Wayne aka Dub11 welcome to the coolest place on the web.

 

G’day and welcome aboard to Ron T, Dub11 aka Wayne, hovlandhomestead, and anyone else I missed.

I hope everyone is staying warm.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

Welcome to the club, Dub11 !
What brings you to these parts?