Heather, 

My husband and I do live off the grid.  We do have a generator (propane, 16kW) but only use it on average an hour a month.  Our source of electricity comes from solar panels.

Before setting up our system I sat down and decided just what appliances I absolutely wanted to have.  We have a chest freezer (sold our upright to buy a much more energy efficient chest), energy efficient fridge, LG front load washing machine, bread machine, counter convection oven, crockpots, electric pressure cooker.  What I do NOT have is an electric stove top.  My oven (propane as is cooktop) does NOT have a glow bar as a pilot light either.  Most ovens do and that glow bar uses a lot of electricity.

So, you just need to sit down, add up the watt usage of all of your appliances and see where you are.  There are online calculators you can use to help you.  Remember it's much less expensive to purchase more energy efficient appliances than to purchase more energy making generators, solar panels, wind generators, etc.

Hope this helped a bit.

Donna

Heather, my husband says it probably is large enough to run these appliances, but will you be using it on a regular basis or just as a back up for emergencies? Because it's going to require gasoline or diesel and that's expensive. 

We too live off grid. And much like Donna we have a "whole house" generator that we run when our solar panels aren't quite enough. We have a propane oven/stove like Donna above too - with no glow bar. We have energy star super efficient refrigerator and a chest freezer. We also have a Staber washing machine (designed for the Amish) that is super efficient. We have a lap top computer, a KA mixer, and a Vita Mix blender.

We love living off-grid!!

Amy,

We would be running it to charge a bank of batteries so it wouldn't be running all the time like a back up generator to a house with electricity.

What's a glow bar? and what are the pro's or con's of having one on your propane stove/oven?

Amy

We lived off grid with the bare minimum 6 solar panels 20 batteries and a trace inverter. We lived this way for 5 years. We live in high mountains of Arizona so we have a lot of sun shine.  

My sons family (7 of them) and us lived there.  My husband said 5,000 will charge the batteries.  We had a 7,000 and he said it did the minimal for us.  He said it took 3-4 hours to charge the batteries on cloudy days. 

Also he said it will not run full sized fridge, a stand up freezer, a washing maching. These will take down your batteries in no time at all. We also kept oil lamps for times we might need them, like several days of clouds or storms.

My daughter-in-law had a Staber washing machine.  They have parts that are easy to fix.

Whatever you do-DO NOT plug washing machines etc directly into the generator.  We found out the hard way from a local repairman that this will eventually ruin your appliances (and it did), they need to go through an inverter.

I had a 50's gas cook stove that had been refurbished.  I loved it out there, as sometimes we had to heat our water, and was great for preserving garden vegetables by canning them. This did have a pilot but no glow bar that requires electric to start your stove.  

We both had RV propane refrigerators (because we could find used ones fairly inexpensive).  We tried a freezer but our system just would not keep it going long enough. We mainly canned food.  We were 45 min. one direction to a one grocery store town and 60 minutes the other direction to a wal-mart, etc.

Another thing to consider is the noise.  When we had to run the generator we would get tired of the noise and it was not near our homes it was at the battery shed.

When the generator was running I would use my kitchen aid mixer, run a vacume, sewing machine, grind wheat, watch a movie, etc.  

You must also consider how your water is getting into your living quarters.  We had a very large tank that required the electric pump to fill it.  Then it was gravity to my DIL but I was up hill so had an RV pump to get it into our home.

We learned to work around all these things and basicly you just timed when you did things. The thing that really got expensive was the cost of diesel fuel and we could barely afford to run a generator. We wished we had got a propane one as they were more efficient.

Hope this helps

Nina, that's a lot of good information... Heather, did you get all that?

I did Amy! :) I have actually set my mind away from all of this for a little while. It was completely overwhelming me and keeping me up at night! I know that the Lord doesn't want me to be so immersed in this property that it takes over my every waking (and sleeping!) thought. I am greatful that our plans to move aren't until the end of the summer so that I can feel as though I don't have to rush into all of this. I'm going to take my tim, breathe and pray!

My husband and I have been doing a lot of researching lately about generators.  Thank you to all that have posted.  I just read him all of your comments.  Someday, I'd love to live off grid and be self-sufficient.  Our family goal this year is to become more prepared for emergencies.  I just found this site today and it's already given me more to consider.  Thanks!

Rachel, wish I could help more. We're just now looking into solar panels and I wouldn't be the best person to advise. Others on this site have much more experience. Perhaps someone else can chime in here???