I stand on the tip of my toes reaching to the heavens with the mobile phone in my hand. Finally it connects, hopefully the one bar will stay.
Quickly I dial the number, but than: “beep, this number doesn’t exist try a different number or contact our service…” “Of course this number exists stupid lady voice in the phone, ” I mumble a bit grumpy.
There is a thick mist. The last time I checked the thermometer, it pointed minus six degrees Celsius. An icicle forms on the tip off my nose. “Come on mobile-thing,” I say impatiently to my phone while i press the repeat button.
Oh wow it rings. “Hey, it is me. Congratulations, it is so hard to imagine you as a grandma, again. Is it a boy or a girl? Not important, just as long as it is healthy, right? By the way, how are you..”
Again the wind blows into the wrong direction. 
And…nothing! 
“Stupid lady voice in the phone!” 
one more try 
Here we go!
The one bar connection
It could be you have missed us for a while on the world wide web. But don’t worry, we are still there and doing all fine.
Our mobile phone connection depends on the direction the wind blows. In the worst case that means, no more than a flickering between zero and one bar. On a very good day this might be an amazing Two bars 3G network.
There is a rock on our property we call the hotspot. This is the only place for miles around where we can at a minimum send a SMS message… well, at least till this moment.
If we are lucky we can go online and even update the website. But this is a painstaking process. The connection is slow and breaks up regularly and naturally this always happens during a upload
A little bit of sunshine, a little bit of good times
Now the nights are getting longer and the days cloudier, there rises a new problem. Some times the solar panels generate just enough energy, so we can use the light for cooking no more than a single hour.
That means we enjoy the rest of the evening romantically around a candle and the fireplace, reading a book, play the guitar and doing some card games. And because our mobile phone is the only lifeline we have in case of an emergency, we can’t spill the precious energy to the internet.
Then on the other hand we have more time to extend the farm, collect hay and cut wood to let it dry for the next winter. I love to be totally of the grid.
The second solar panel is installed. 
It’s freezing cold, but cutting wood makes you feel warm. 
Who needs electricity with this kind of atmosphere.
Dear mamma, our light in the darkness
My mother in law gave us a couple of days before the start of the five month prep-challenge a great present: a second solar panel. We are really happy, because otherwise the battery would have already died last week.
But I’m still not sure if the two panels will be sufficient enough for the next two months, because the days start to get really short now. At the moment the sun rises around 8:40 and sets at about 15:30 in the afternoon.
Just only for a couple of hours the sun peaks just above the treetops. And the shortest day has still to come. The situation is realistic that we can’t generate enough energy for a couple of weeks.
Don’t forget about us.
So though there might be a chance we are out of touch for a while, please don’t leave us. We will come back with more great adventures and keep you, even if it takes some time, up to date.
Don’t miss a thing, keep checking our website, Facebook group and Instagram pages.
But Most importantly, don’t forget about us, we certainly won’t forget about you.
Annet & Ter
