About - Joe Stone

I grew in the Artondale area of Gig Harbor, WA in a neighborhood that wasn't quite suburbia, but wasn't quite out in the sticks either. There were plenty of woods for us kids go play in though. Now, not so much.

Growing up I had very little experience at home with anything remotely close to homesteading or farming. My only experience learning how to be self sufficient was when we went on vacations out on the boat-and that was more rationing than sustaining. There was a limited fresh water supply, and electricity came from the boats batteries that had to be charged with the engine running, or by using this new technology called a "Solar Panel" that converted energy from the sun into electricity! Crazy right? It kind of was for the early 90's. When not on vacation, my folks both worked full time and we kids (I was the oldest of 7 from a mixed family) were what came to be called, "Latch Key" kids and the "MTV" generation. After some turbulent teenage years with much of it in a cloud of Tetrahydrocannabinol that I pulled myself out of going into my senior year, I graduated high school with a less than stellar GPA and followed my dreams; enlisting into the Army...as a mechanic. Not quite the GI Joe job I initially wanted, but I was ready to serve and be all that I could be.

Renlistment - Naray, Afghanistan (2006)

The next decade and a half was full of trials and tribulations, marriages and divorces, life and death, and much time spent away from home. I spent time in upstate New York in the dead of winter, enjoyed the outdoors in Colorado, swam with the fishes in Guantanamo Bay, toured the pyramids of Giza, walked the mountains of Afghanistan, spent long hot summers in Baghdad, played in the sands of the Mojave Desert, and stood and worked in the rain for hours on end at Fort Lewis. 

Pyramids of Giza, 1999

OP Mustang, Afghanistan
2006

Camp Muleskinner,
Iraq 2004

Yakima WA, 1998

It wasn't all fun, but I learned a lot and made a lot of great friends-and even lost a few (sigh). I learned how to make do with nothing and out of nothing, make something. There wasn't anything that couldn't be done.

I MacGyver'ed my way though a lot of stuff and fixed things that had no business being fixed. Unfortunately,towards the end of my Army career, my back wouldn't keep up as we trained for another deployment to Afghanistan and I was given a medical discharge; a mere 5 years out from retirement. It was heartbreaking, but I was getting tired of being away from home. The timing wasn't great though as I was discharged the same month my second divorce was finalized.

On my way out things seemed pretty bleak, but I was optimistic. I looked forward to being close to home again and getting a fresh start with my 3 youngest kids. My uncle gave me a job with a small aerospace outfit (no, not Boeing) doing test work so at least I had a job lined up. I met my wife (who is a budding horticulturist-see what I did there?) online just a few months after getting re-situated back in Washington. And wouldn't you know it, two weeks after our first date I was involved in a fairly serious motorcycle accident when someone pulled out in front me.

As soon as things were looking up, it took a huge nose dive. My kids stayed with their grandparents and I spent the next year dealing with blood clots and tying to get my busted up leg to heal. Through all of that, my now wife literally helped walk me through the pain and rehab. And even helped through some latent struggles with PTSD that seemed to crop around the fourth of July (thanks honey).

Some hobbies or interest of mine involve anything involving creating. Music, art, amateur carpentry, and anything electronics. I'm not a fan of anything having to do with plumbing. At all. I will do it if needed albeit, begrudgingly and with a smile on my face. :)

At any rate, I'm really excited about starting this project and sharing ideas with other homesteaders. Most of my interest is in the science portion of homesteading, not so much the farming portion of it. That's more of my wife's specialty. 

My personal goals for this project in no particular order:

1. Build a Chicken Coop for up to 10 hens.
2. Solar Panels
3. Water heating with closed loop thermal system. 
4. Rain catchment
5. Grey water reclamation. 
6. Hydro Electric System
7. Hydroponics & Fish Farming
8. Irrigation system for gardens. 
9. Help with the Vegetable/Fruit gardens. 

Stay tuned. We'll be adding updates as we get to it.