Winding down 2011

Here it is New Year's Even and I sit blogging.  I still have two hours left of this year.  I'll start partying soon.  Then again.. I might just go to bed.

We are still settling in to the farmhouse.  Our clothes are in boxes, on shelves and stacked up nose-high on dressers. Peter and I can't seem to agree on what should go where in the kitchen so it sits piled on the counter.  Our dining room still has two dressers in it. A work in progress to be sure.

We are not retrieving my things from storage just yet.  We peeked under the 1970's shag carpeting in the living room and found beautiful fir flooring.  Unfinished even.  Apparently when the house was built in the first half of the last century they tossed a carpet over it and never looked back.  We can't believe the luck!  It's like striking it rich at a goldmine.  Next week we're going to take out our meager furniture and start on the floors.  I'm very excited - although a week or two break wouldn't be entirely objectionable.  I'm starting to miss my fiber.

Jill came up for a couple of days and we found ourselves forced to shop.  We needed shower curtains, drawer dividers, storage cabinets.  Gobs of things.  It was a dirty job but someone had to do it.  We slapped lipstick on a pig and managed this fine product out of the guest bathroom:

The walls and fixtures are a lovely harvest gold - which honestly doesn't look too bad, considering.  I can live with it for awhile.

Today I had to put my daughter on a train headed south toward her home.  She passed her brother and his wife somewhere around Tacoma as they were headed up for a visit.  It was kind of like the changing of the guard.

At any rate - Kyle and Mary are here now.  They've gone to bed already as they've been up since 3:00 today.  Kyle helped us with the refrigerator swap.  It involved three refrigerators.  We took mine from storage and brought it into the farmhouse.  Took the one from the farmhouse and put it into the mother-in-law's suite (former batchelor pad), and then took the one from the batchelor pad to storage.  I found orange juice with a "best buy" date of July 9.  It was green.  Ewwwwww.

Now I must go join the non-festivities. 

Happy New Year!

Move it move it move it!

End of moving day one finds this blogger pooped.

I had this theory that since we were swapping houses I should not make any trips back and forth without my arms full.  So Peter's mom spent the day packing and boxing things up and I spent the day carting stuff from here to there and there to here.  Usually when one moves one at least has the trip back out to the moving van to gain some sort of recovery before the next armload.  Not today.

My trips back and forth were sufficiently hampered by pets. 

My cat, Monster, insisted on dashing out the door the second it was opened.  I would have to put my stuff down and dig under this and over that to fetch her and put her back.  I eventually had to incarcerate her in a pet carrier.

My chicken, Carmen was incredibly intrigued by all the goings on and she kept getting under foot.  Twice I found her on the porch trying to gain access to the inside of the house. 

House rules:  Cats stay in, chickens stay out and the dog has full rein.  To me these seem like simple rules.  I'm not sure why they struggle so.

By 4:00 I was telling Agnes (Peter's mom) that we still had our bedrooms to set up and there was no rush and we should stop moving stuff back and forth and concentrate on getting our bedrooms and the already moved items put away.  She happily agreed and when next I checked on her she was still packing things up.  This, of course, guilted me into continuing moving.  An hour later we had the same conversation with the same results.  An hour later the same thing.

Peter came home and did some of the heavy lifting.  By this point I was ready to drop but they both kept going.  How could I possibly stop?  By 7:00 I was almost ready to weep.  STOP MOVING ALREADY!

Fortunately they did finally stop.  However there is still a long way to go.  When I was finally allowed to sit, this is the view from a chair in my new living room.

Not very restful - but we're making it work.

Although there are many features I like in this farm house - a big kitchen, cove ceilings, arched doorway, I want to make some changes.  Most of the light fixtures (although I really REALLY like the one in the laundry room - it is trendily retro).  I want to paint everything.  Change the floors and the wallpaper.  Seriously.. Here's the wallpaper.  Should I keep it or should it go??  I'm voting for go.

Another thing I like about this house is that the master bedroom has it's own bathroom, with a BATHTUB!  I have a pile of stuff in there that still needs to be sorted through and put away - but I just think I may actually take a bath.    Ohhhh.. That'd be swell.

Midnight Madness

Peter has a job.  He has to go to the office and see patients, which means work around here, like building walls, has to wait until he get's home.

We started work around 7:00 after a run for more lumber.  By 9:00 the framing was finally done.

By 11:00 the drywall was almost finished.

By midnight the drywall was completely done.  We still have to mud and paint but that's the easy part.

And.. somewhere under all that drywall is a construction lovenote.

Today's progress means the move is actually on for tomorrow.  We will finish up the details (mud and paint) afterward.  With Jill getting here on Thursday and Kyle and Mary coming on Saturday we really need to get moved so they have places to sleep.

Still on Tenterhooks?

Still on Tenterhooks?

Let me put you at rest over that right now.  We didn't get the closet done.  Monday Move day will have to become Tuesday Transfer.  Tis very sad. 

We spent the morning exchanging presents and generally relaxing.  It was Christmas morning after all. Then we went for a lovely drive to Silver Lake and Maple Falls.  The weather isn't particularly cold today but it has been.  There was ice on the lake that glistened and sparkled, the water pushed it to shore in sheets that stacked up on each other.  It was beautiful.

After relaxing and enjoying the day, we finally got around to working on the closet about 6:30 pm.  We already had time working against us.  We made some progress and then it became apparent that I wasn't really being very helpful.  I'm not sure if there just wasn't much for me to do or if I just wasn't in the mood.  Anyway - I found other useful ways to keep myself busy, dishes, facebook, dancing with the cats and Peter continued building. 

Then we ran out of wood.

Construction ceased about 8:00

We have most of the framing done.  We still need to put in studs.  And of course the sheet rock.  And mud.  And paint.

I just hope it doesn't become Wednesday Welocate.

Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve fun!  This certainly has not been a traditional Christmas Eve.  No kids around.. No meals to plan, no presents to wrap.

Instead - construction.  We were supposed to get to work on closet building right off the bat this morning.  The problem?  It turns out my husband is pretty much a typical man. Quite an eye-opener for me because up until this point I really believed he was anything but typical.

We had just finished our morning coffee this morning when he looked at me and said..

"I have to go to town." 
I said, "without me?" 
His reply:  "Yes, without you." 

You know what that means... he had to finish his Christmas Shopping..  Maybe even start it.  No amount of prying could make him tell me what he was up to.  Oh well - I'll find out tomorrow.

Once he got back from his errands we had to eat lunch, then go all the way to Bellingham to purchase sheet rock, THEN we got to work on the walls.  About 7 pm.  sigh..

At 8:00 I was enthusiastically cutting sill seal.

By 9:30 we had some studs.

We quit at 10:30.. 
Wall is not finished.  Monday Move Day might be a bit touch and go. 
Are you on tenterhooks?  I am!

Merry Christmas! 

Be good humans.

I'm in hot water - Thank goodness!

Today was flooring day.  I'm sure I've mentioned it (like a gazillion times).  By this time we should be getting very good at it, and we are! Flooring a room now takes us hours instead of days.  We still have a lot of opportunity to use these skills again.  In the spring we will be converting the garage into additional living space in the batchelor pad and at some point we will most likely be putting down new floors in the farm house.

Yesterday we put self leveling stuff on the concrete floor and last night we applied sealer. We set the hot water heater in place this morning and got started on the floor at noon.

By 3:30 we were ready to install the last row.  3 1/2 hours!  See?  We're getting good!



By 5:00 we were actually hooking up and filling the hot water heater.  I tell you..  these are the best inventions ever created by man.  Give me hot running water over microwaves, dishwashers, electric blankets and toasters any day.  I'd even take hot running water over sliced bread - which is apparently the pinnacle of greatness (so they say).

After dinner we began laying out the outline for a wall we'll be building tomorrow.  This wall is going to provide a partition creating a hallway and shelving between the two doors on the one side and a closet and a more intimate bedroom space on the other.

We "decided" to call it a day by 8:30...

Countdown: T minus 4 days

This little house on the ditch has no hot water.  The hot water heater is sitting in the driveway.  If we want hot water out of it, we will need to set it on fire.  We can't re-install it until the flooring is down - and we still have to put leveler and sealer down before we put the flooring down.

My "dresser" is a saucony shoe box I keep tucked under the bed (talk about downsizing!). 

Peter, myself, two cats and a dog are living in approximately 300 square feet.

Thank GOODNESS we've set a move date for Monday.  Just 4 full days away.

Tomorrow we put down the stuff that levels out the floor.  While that's drying I'm going to pick and choose what we can move into the farm house.  Friday we should be able to put down the new floor.  Saturday we'll build the closet.  Sunday is Christmas!  Monday - we move.  Tuesday & Wednesday we start moving stuff about and getting organized.  Thursday Jill get's here. Saturday she goes home and Kyle and Mary get here.

It's sure nice I don't have to worry about what I'm going to be doing from one day to the next.

Ceilings, walls & floors

Saturday was "Wash the walls and patch the holes in the walls and ceiling" Day.
Yesterday was "Prime the ceiling" Day (as well as "visit the Museum of Glass in Tacoma and eat copious quantities of Pad Thai" Day).
Today was "Wash more walls, apply 'Kilz' where necessary and paint the walls" Day.  You probably thought it was Monday.  Ha ha.. you would have been wrong.
Today may also be move the "hot water heater so I can paint behind it and we can put flooring under it" day.
Tomorrow will be "Put another coat on the walls" Day and hopefully "Seal the floor" Day.
Then there will need to be:
A day for skim coating the floor.
A day for laying the new flooring.
A day for building a closet, and of course painting it.

I'm getting a little punch drunk.   As I was painting the walls today I got a little silly.  The previous color of the walls could best be described as the color of dried up orange sherbet.  You know - how it darkens and loses it's orangie-ness unevenly after it sits in the freezer for two or three years?  (Not that I've ever done that).  The new color is a creamy color called distant white.  It looks much better and provides a nice contrast to the old color for writing words on the wall.

Racing toward the finish line...

Christmas is just 7 days away.  Kyle and Mary will be here in just 14 days.  I'm so glad we are making progress!

Yesterday I moved the bed into the living room.  It's quite cozy in here and I can drink my coffee while still in bed.  Gosh.. It's so cozy I can almost MAKE my coffee while still in bed.

The bedroom had 5 different kinds of carpeting in it.  There was an orange shag, a brown swirly patterned atrocity, and orange swirly patterned piece, another incredibly ugly and gross piece and then a salvagable beige berber over the top of that.  You can see three here:

By two o'clock the ceiling was coming down and the carpeting was coming up.

Sparky supervised.. and because there was a risk of asbestos in the popcorn ceiling, she wore protective gear:

By 10:00 pm the ceiling was all down and the carpeting was all out.  Tomorrow I attack the walls with bleach  (there seems to be a bit of a mold issue) and start filling holes and prepping the ceiling for the new finish.

Gotta love the Haaaaaa-lidays!

Thanksgiving was lovely.  Wish I had a photo to share but would you believe I forgot to take any pics??

Peter and I rented a house down on the Oregon coast for 5 days and the kids came over and joined us.  Jill, Kyle, and his bride, Mary were there. The house was strange but we were all together.. as it should be.  We did jigsaw puzzles, played card games, went to the beach.  We harvested mussels and feasted on the bounty.  Jill was only able to come for Thanksgiving day.  (Peter and I briefly discussed the legalities of kidnapping my daughter and forcing her to relocate up here.  Would it be a crime if I'm her parent?)

Christmas is going to be hard for me this year.  Not only is it the first one with out my mother, but neither of my beloved children can be here for Christmas and it's really not possible for us to go there again so soon.  That's the bad news and it's sad news.  I'm slightly comforted by the fact that they will be spending Christmas with their father.  Something they haven't done in years so it's certainly past time for it.  Other good news is that Kyle and Mary are coming for the New Year and will be able to be here for most of a week.  Jill is trying to make arrangements to be able to join us as well.  (It would be a perfect time for a kidnapping!)

So now the push is on to move.  Today is the 11th, they will be here the 31st.  Yikes!  The trick is to coordinate the move with Peter's mother.  She has to move in here the same time we move in there.  We still have the floor, ceiling and walls to finish in the bedroom but we're taking stuff, one closet and armful at a time, into the big house.  I'm figuring a week (20 days tops) and we'll be moved - if not settled.  All of this chaos and activity will be the perfect remedy for my holiday blues.

Now I should go

no time to chat

I must grab a load

of this and that

Happy Holidays

360 degrees

It has dawned on me that where I live is a mystery to some of my favorite people:   My brother and his wife who will be out to visit next spring, my friend Sherry who I keep inviting up to visit, my daughter-in-law and other dear people I know.  I talk of ditches and bachelor pads and border crossings.  So here is a quick tour of my new home:

I took these photos standing on the foot bridge that crosses the ditch.  The ditch is fed from a lake in Canada and was originally a creek.  For some reason, when they put in the road, they decided to split the creek in two and run it on each side of the road and re-name it a ditch.  Salmon spawn in our ditch.  I don't think it's actually a ditch at all.

The ditch occasionally floods.  That's a bad thing.  The bachelor pad is built on a cement slab at ground level.  That's not such a good thing either.   We're trying to create landscaping and such that will direct the water away from the house.

Looking North:

Looking West:

Looking South:

Looking East:

Now you know where I live.  Stop by anytime.

ThermosKat

It's cold here at my little house on the ditch. It snowed overnight even.

brrrrr..

We built a fire in the woodstove this morning to take the chill off the house. We have baseboard heat (eww!) but the fire is so much nicer. The house was nice and warm and even Kat thought it was toasty.

As the morning progressed, the house cooled and it came time to add wood to the fire.
I bet you're wondering how I knew when it was time to add wood to the fire. I'll tell you how. I have a rare, environmentally responsible ThermosKat. Most people just have thermostats. I'm ahead of the curve on this one.

The house is a comfortable temperature:

Time to add wood to the fire:

I'm thinking of a whole marketing campaign around this clever idea and selling them at the Lynden Farmer's Market in the spring. There could be a whole line of ThermosKats: Scottish Fold ThermosKats, Siamese ThermosKats, Tabby ThermosKats, and for those of you with deep pockets, Persian ThermosKats. Preorder yours now! (production takes about 15 weeks - and two cooperative felines)

If you would like a rare, environmentally friendly ThermosKat - just send your check or money order to "My Little Goat Shop."

Baby Wolf's first run..

I took my baby wolf out for it's first run today.  I decided that rather than starting from scratch I would try to use what was already on the loom.  It wasn't a mess - but it was sure something I couldn't figure out.  So I undid all the heddle threading the previous owner had started.  I unwound all the yarn and THEN I ended up with a mess.  The cats were quite intrigued by the process and really wanted to help.

I eventually got it straightened out.  Not an easy task.  There were 99 warp ends.  (that means 99 strings - see I'm learning the lingo!)

I decided on a simple basic basket weave and began pulling the warp ends through each heddle as appropriate.  I finished a third of them before I figured out that I had neglected to find the middle.  You MUST center the threads on the loom or everything goes whacky (no .. that's not official weaving lingo).  It was an important lesson learned that I shall certainly remember in the future.

Finally - everything was threaded and ready to go.  Seriously - 5 hours into the project I finally had it ready to actually weave.  I feel confident that as time goes by this process will be less cumbersome.

I hope. 

20 minutes later I had actual fabric!  How exciting.  The process began going much faster and I'm quite pleased.

And..  miraculously within a few hours I had an actual thing.  A thing I tell you!

Now I want to figure out how to set the treadles and heddles to create a twill.  So far I'm not understanding the drafting of such a project.  There is a weaving guild that meets in the same place as my spinning guild that I shall maybe have to join soon.  They can probably help me over the rough edges.

I am now faced with a daily conundrum..

Should I knit?
Should I spin?
Should I weave?

My life is so complicated!!

flooring - day 3

We scraped all the glue and goo from the kitchen floor.  It took hours.  I have blisters.

Here is a shot showing the nearly done floor - and all our junk.  Don't look at the junk.

So tomorrow (maybe) I'll move all the stuff out of the bedroom into the living room and get started on THAT part of this project. Of course I'm thinking if I can get doors on my fiber studio we could move stuff there.  Minimal fiber studio construction may need to be done first.  Decisions, decisions.

Batchelor pad floors - day 2

Today started out so promising.  We actually got started putting flooring down on the floor.  Then Peter had to go to work.  At this early stage the job is much easier with two people.  I mean I COULDA gone on alone - but it just didn't seem like a wise choice.  We got this far before Peter had to go.

While he was gone I took a nap.  I know.  I should have been working, slaving away on this project but a nap called to me.  I am unemployed - an official "laze-about" and I have to take advantage of the few perks I can get.  After my refreshing nap I started scraping up 40 year old linoleum.  What a job!  I worked at it for hours.  Peter came home from work and (still in his work clothes) he poked at the floor just long enough to get his picture taken. 

By the end of Day 2 we got the living room almost completely done.

Tomorrow Peter does not have to go to the office.  Tomorrow we should be able to finish up these two rooms.  I'm looking forward to it!

Batchelor pad floors - day 1

The time has come for the floors.  This is exciting because once the floors are done in the living room and kitchen - we move out of the bedroom, get it done and get moved.

Peter had to go to the office this morning (why does that seem to always be the case?) so I started the morning by clearing out the living room.  This was the hardest part because we just don't have room for all this stuff.  We are going to have to move it all back and forth like we did for the walls.  Right now all the stuff that was in the living room is shoved into the kitchen and the bedroom.

I cut the carpet into 4 pieces and hauled it all out to the barn. 

I quite like the reddish color of the carpet pad. But it had to go too.  As well as the tack strips and all residual glue and gunk.  I managed to get the pad up in one piece - I even managed to get it to the barn in one huge chunk.  I think I'm getting muscles.  Peter came home just in time to help me get up the last of the tack strips and goo.

We brought the boxes of flooring in from the car preparing to get to work.  Cleverly, we read the directions first, and they stated emphatically that the flooring be installed at room temperature.  Sigh.  House:  65 degrees (ish), car: 40 degrees (ish).  Whoa Nelly.  Stop the presses.  Hold everything.  Keep your pants on.  Cool your jets.  
 
So now, the flooring is inside and nearly everything in our world is displaced until the stupid stuff warms up.  sigh..
 

 
Tomorrow we should be able to get serious about laying down the new floor in the living room.  Then we'll need to move all the stuff from the kitchen to the newly laid floor in order to work in there.  It's like we live in a Cuisinart.

Everybody needs a little Salt and Pepper..

Meet Salt and Pepper

I went to Lynden Farm and Garden to pick up some chicken feed.  That's all.  Just chicken feed.  But Debbie - the clerk there - had brought in three young silkies to sell.  They are such a cute breed.  They have feathers that look like fur that even cover their feet.  The three she brought in were white, black (which might be a male) and buff.

I walked away without them.  I mean I'm crazy.. but I have my limits.  It seems though my limits stretch a little too easily.  After a brief consultation with Peter, I went back to get the three silkies the next day.  On my way in I named the buff colored one -  "Buffy the Grub Slayer" and I pondered names for the white and black one, settling on some lame ones.  Just as I walked in - there was a young woman at the counter paying for the buff colored chicken.

Grumble grumble.  I considered taking the woman down.  But her father was with her and I decided against it.  Given that I only had the pair - I decided my lame names needed to be replaced with a "set" of names.  Thus:  Salt and Pepper.

This morning Pepper decided to wake the universe with several very loud "Cock-a-doodle-doos!!"  yeah..  He's a boy.

I have a dream..

I have a dream.  It's a dream of a fiber studio. 

I've thought about this long and hard.  For more than a few minutes even.  I want a place to weave, spin, dye and knit away from the house. 

I can see myself getting up in the morning and skipping happily out to my studio.  I could spend all day in the studio creating wonderous things and not feeling guilty that I haven't left the house in days.  Because I will have.  It would be like getting up and going to the office every day - only WAY better.  WAY.

We have a large white 3-room shed/schoolhouse in the back under the trees.  I asked Peter if he minded if I turned one room into my studio.  He replied: "this is your house too - you can do whatever you want."  Ahh... I like that man.  :)

Anyway - the building is a wreck.  It has no doors.  It has studs for interior walls - but no sheetrock or insulation.  The existing floor is plywood and it's full of stuff.  It has no heat.  This is what it looks like:

I have a friend/neighbor (friendly neighbor?  Freighbor?) who has a "party barn" that is my inspiration for the task I'm about to tackle.  Her party barn is so clever and attractive.  I think I can do something like that.  I hope she doesn't mind that I copy her style just a little.

The room is 11 x 24.  A fine size.  The exterior door opening is a double door.  I picture sliding glass doors.  I'd prefer french doors but I think sliders are more in my budget.  I'll put up sheetrock and paint it white and bright.  I'll hang a beautiful re-claimed chandelier from the vaulted ceiling and put down wood floors and a big warm area rug.  I'll add left over cozy furniture from the house  (we have way too much) where I, and my friends, can sit and knit or spin or visit.  I'll hook up my wood stove for heat.

I will create a lovely path lined with hostas and ferns through the woods from house to studio.  I'll need a small deck outside my shiny new doors too.

I started today by clearing out the room.  It's better but not great.  I've a long way to go.  I think the next thing is doors.  Next week I'll go shopping for doors. 

Baby Wolf

I need a Fiber Studio!  A big one.  Yesterday I purchased a Schact Baby Wolf Floor Loom.  It looks like this  (only without the textile on it)

I bought it used for less than 1/2 the price new.  The perk of buying used is that the previous owner has accessories.  Loom benches, shuttles, books, videos, yarn, fleeces, warping boards, hooks, samples, and more that she just "threw in."  She's 81 and getting out of the business. 

Haha - the funny thing is I have absolutely no idea how to use a loom.  Thank goodness she's throwing in all the books.  I just assume I'll like weaving.  Man.. I hope I do.

I also swapped three buckets of potatoes for a car full (literally) of fleece:  mirano wool, alpaca, romney - some custom dyed.  I turned down the samoyed.  I don't think I'm ready to work with dog hair yet.

So now I have 2 looms - this one and a very very tiny one given to me earlier this year.  I have two spinning wheels - my antique one and my new one.  I have boxes and boxes of yarn and roving and fleeces. 

And I'm living in 650 square feet. 

What was I thinking??

Peter says I can use one of the bedrooms in the farm house as a studio, once we move but in the mean time I think I have problems.  I might have to rent a storage unit.

On a similar front.  I really do need to come up with a suitable business name.  I've decided "My little goat shop" is not really a good one for a business.  Perfect for a blog and a dream, but not so much for a business.

So..  Help me choose:

• Woolingdon Farms  (get it.. Willingdon... Woolingdon?)
• Phase 2 Phibers  (Finished with the corporate world and now on to this new adventure)

Any other ideas?  Help.. really - I'm about to register for a booth at next year's Lynden Farmer's Market and I need a name soon..

Mouse poop!

When are mouse turds cool?  Never - but it's part of this new process that is my current obsession. A few weeks ago I went to the Canby Flock and Fiber Festival in Oregon.  While there I purchased a bag of unwashed fleece recently sheared from a lovely silver/chocolate Romney sheep.

Unwashed means there are bits of hay, grass and (eww!!) even a mouse turd or two in it.  It smells somewhat unpleasant as well.

I didn't know what to do with it - but I knew that to make yarn you had to start here and I wanted to experience the whole process from start to finish.  I looked on the internet to find out what to do first.  Because, of course, if it's on the internet it must be true. 

The first thing I had to do was to spread it out and pick out all the bits of dirt, grass and turds (again.. EWW!!!)  Then I washed it via a very specific process (one wrong move and it could turn into a block of felt) - and then I spread it out to dry:

There are several options for the next step.  Use a fancy drum carder, use hand carders or use a flicker.  I have a flicker.  To use a flicker you take a lock of the washed and dried fiber:

and then you flick it with a flicking tool to get loose fibers that can be spun:



You spin them and end up with this:

Yarn!  This is just the coolest thing!  I'm so digging it.  I currently have a big pile of fiber drying on the kitchen table.  We don't need the table. We can eat in the living room in front of the TV. Soon my freshly washed fleece will be ready to be flicked (flucked?) and spun.  Once I have it all spun, I will knit it into something wonderful and will have created something from start to finish.

I have discovered that fiber is warm and alive and satisfying.  It makes me feel complete and connected to nature.  The process is fascinating.  Working with hand-spun yarn is better than therapy or yoga or even exercise.

My mother-in-law is amazed that I do this voluntarily and enthusiastically.  When she was a child she HAD to do this.  It was war time and if you needed a sweater - you started by shearing the sheep.  I wonder if I would enjoy it so much if I had to do it?  Maybe not.

Ramblings

My brother told me I should blog more.  Apparently he doesn't realize I generally collapse into bed every  night with barely enough energy to brush my teeth.  I never, EVER lay in bed wishing I could fall asleep.  Jerry (my brother) seems to think that my grandchildren will be interested in what I'm saying here.  Maybe.

So here I go.. a bit of rambling created just for my brother and my future grandchildren.

Potatoes

Today was potato harvest day.  We've managed to dig 13 rows of 26.  That's like.. half.   This is a photo of one of the first potatoes I dug up today.  Perhaps not so appropriate for my grandchildren.  Haha..

Digging potatoes went something like this.  Scoop the hill to the right. Scoop the hill to the left.  Sift through the soil with bare hands to find the potato.  Place it in a pile.  Shovels and other implements can damage the spud.  We must do it by hand.  The hills, of course, are on the ground (I know.. duh, huh?)  but that means crawling through the field on hands and knees, unless of course you're suffering from a sore knee and a back (that's me.. after our adventures in roofing).   So my method was to sit with my legs out and the row between  them.  I would lean forward, scoop to the left, scoop to the right, find potatoes then scooch forward on my backside.  I left interesting butt prints in the soil and my overalls have seriously ground-in dirt.  Peter thinks that with enough time I would level the whole field.  Thank goodness we don't have THAT many potatoes to harvest.

Getting fixed

Peter fixed me today (my back that is).  It's fortunate I'm married to a chiropractor.  Chiropractic Neurologist actually.  We went to the office this evening and he treated me.  Chiropractic neurology is not your traditional chiropractic.  It involves stuff that doesn't seem relevant to the patient but is really important.  It has to do with the fact that the brain controls everything.  The stability of the spine and the muscles.  To increase spine and muscles strength, you need to strengthen or activate certain areas of the brain.  This activation is, of course, followed up with appropriate traditional chiropractic treatment. He had me looking at numbers, watching red squares, following a moving object.  By the time I got home I could pick up my shoes from the floor without a lot of whining. 

On our way to the office we passed a car.  It was on it's roof.  In the ditch about 1/4 mile south of our house.  We have salmon in that ditch.   Poor salmon!

Enough rambling for now.  I shall go brush my teeth now, if I have the energy.

Little House on the Ditch

Sometimes it feels like I live in the Little House on the Prairie.  I no longer go to an office.  I'm one of those "stay-at-home" people.  I've stepped back in time. 

• I wash laundry and hang it on the line to dry.
• I feed the chickens, ducks and guineas.  Soon I'll be feeding and milking goats as well.
• I make dinner and I wear an apron!  The other day I roasted a chicken.  Today I turned the leftovers into chicken pot pie.  In the process I made chicken broth and will turn that into chicken noodle soup for tomorrow - and I'll make the noodles from scratch.
• I go out to the garden and dig potatoes and vegetables to make that dinner.
• Tomorrow I plan to do some canning.  I'm going to make sweet pickles and pickled beets.  Gotta get prepared  for the long hard winter.  I wish I had a root cellar.
• I fetch water from the well  (okay.. not really - but I don't get water from the tap. I get it from the bottled water we keep that we get from an artesian well.)
• I knit and spin and card wool.
• There are salmon spawning in the ditch under our driveway bridge.
• We do not have a microwave oven or a dishwasher.

I made pie crust for my chicken pot pie today.  No rolling pin to be found  (mine is still boxed up). I ended up using a wine bottle as a rolling pin.  It worked quite well. Yet another valuable use for a fine fruit by-product!

I'm not complaining.. not really.  It's just so completely different than my previous life or any life I could have imagined.

The other day I put on high heels to go to Thanksgiving dinner and I could barely walk in them.  It was very sad.

I'm hoping we're out of the batchelor pad by early November.  I'm sure it will all be better then.. Of course I'll still be knitting and carding and spinning and cooking and washing and feeding the chickens and..

I guess nothing is going to change.

That's good because actually, I like this new life.  I just wish I could still walk in heels!

Batchelor pad roof - days 3 & 4

Day 3..



10:30 a.m. Peter had to work this morning - I spent my time continuing tear down of the green house.  Do you see Sparky?  Isn't she skinny??



3:30 pm Green house was finally cut back from the house and the underlayment started getting put down. 

 Day 4 (it was only supposed to be a two day project!!)

Felt is down and significant progress was made on the shingles



3:30 day 4. The rain started.  Sprinkles mostly. 

We did manage to "mostly finish" the roof by 8:30.. in the dark.