Everyday Life

Looking back at 2008

2009-01-01T12:24:00.003-05:00

What an interesting year. The late winter and early spring I can hardly remember other than some snow, feeding sheep and waiting for lambs. Warmer weather brought lambs, bottle feedings, lots of outside time moving the sheep from one electric fence pen to the next, picking and canning strawberry jam and time at friends' houses. Summer was hot and dry again and then morning sickness hit and I zoned out for most of August. September and October were spent with our mouths open watching the financial world crumble while we quickly evaluated our own financial standing. The remainder of the fall and winter were spent feeding the critters, planning for next year and trying to incorporate more frugal and simple living guidelines. Personally: T spent lots of time working, studying and testing as well as getting a few moments with his wood working toys here and there. I was able to cement a social network here in SWVA and make it through my 2nd year of parenting with a healthy child and my own mind still intact. M is a running, dancing, laughing, talking, and singing bundle of joy and in a few months we will be adding her brother to our home.

There were many other bright points through out the year and a few disappointments as well but I think the overall feeling of this year has been good. We're settling in, T is moving ahead in his career and education, we're making our house a home, growing our family and working on being better stewards of our own little plot of land and the larger world around us.

Friday Happenings

2008-12-12T14:51:00.003-05:00

Breakfast: Me: Sausage & Egg on an English muffin, M: Banana and sausage patty. Apple juice (50/50 with water)for M and coffee and apple cider for me. Snacked on rosemary crackers and cottage cheese.

Lunch: Leftover baked chicken, stuffing, gravy and green beans for both of us.

Dinner: Out

Weather The rain cleared out over night and this morning there was.... Sunshine! Mid-40's for most of the day with a light breeze.

Critters: Chickens and sheep doing fine.. much happier not to be stuck under the deck or in the barn though.

One good turn: Stopped being lazy and brought a bin in to collect all of our mixed paper for recycling. Talked with my Henny Penny ladies about collective recycling to take advantage of municipal pick ups for items that our own home towns don't accept, like glass and mixed paper for me. Brought our own tupperware container to dinner to take home leftovers rather than using the restaurants Styrofoam ones. Tipped the waitress well.

FDDDC: House temp still at 67 during the day, ate leftovers for lunch.

Being local: Went out for dinner at a locally owned restaurant instead of going to a chain type place, then stopped by the local coffee shop for a warm cup of joe and a sweet cookie treat.

Housework: Made the bed. Washed a load of dress clothes and dried them. I should have hung them to dry on the line but the load was larger than I had pins for. Picked up the house in general. Loaded and ran the dishwasher. Vacuumed the bedroom and dining room. Ironed all of T and I's wrinkly dress clothes, 8 shirts and 2 pairs of pants. Fixed breakfast, snack and lunch at home.

Things I thought about today:
Ordered a bunch of new seed catalogs and can't wait for them to get here. Brainstormed group recycling with the Henny Pennies. Need to start putting together my meal plan for our guests next weekend.

Thursday Happenings

2008-12-11T11:48:00.005-05:00

Breakfast: Me & M: Rice chex. Milk and a banana for M, Coffee for me. Later we split a grapefruit.

Lunch: Leftover fried rice

Dinner: Baked chicken breast, cornbread stuffing made with leftover corn muffins I made yesterday, green beans and gravy.

Weather Highs in the mid to upper 50's with lots of rain. There is a flash flood warning for our area through late tonight. There is also a chance of snow in the wee hours tonight once the temperature drops below 40. We'll see.

Critters: Chickens are hating life today because the rain is too heavy for them to get out and scratch around. They've spent the day running back and forth between their coop where the laying mash is and the shelter of our back deck. They rarely spend any more time than necessary in their coop, even in terrible weather preferring the slightly drippy but open space under the deck.

One good turn: Nothing today.. since we stayed in all day due to the weather.

FDDDC: House temp still at 67 during the day, ate leftovers for lunch and used up the now stale corn muffins for the stuffing.

Being local: Stayed home.. can't get any more local than that!

Housework: Washed the new flannel sheets I got from Target for $13!! Put them on our bed. Washed the old set but still need to dry them and put them away. Cleaned both bathrooms, loaded and ran, unloaded and reloaded the dishwasher (lots of cooking today), hand washed the pots and pans from last night (rice cooker and wok). Wiped down the kitchen counters and work table. Vacuumed all the hard surface floors. Fixed all meals and snacks at home.

Things I thought about today:
Making a quilt for our bed. The new flannel sheets have a natural tan color background with a deep red snow flake pattern on them. I'd love to make a quilt to match! Gotta see if I can make it cheaper than I could find a decent quality quilt.. I think I should be able to.. especially when the holiday fabrics go on sale.

Seeds... gotta get a list together of the types and varieties of vegetable I want to grow in 2009 then see if any of my Henny Penny girls want to buy in bulk with me and split them up.

Gotta get better at keeping up with this!! Wednesday Happenings

2008-12-10T14:26:00.003-05:00

Breakfast: Me & M: Cheerios with granola. Milk for M, Coffee for me & T. Later we all had an over easy egg with crumbled sausage over it.

Lunch: Leftover Lentil and sausage soup

Dinner: Fried rice (Cooked brown rice, egg, carrots, peas, onion and little soy sauce), served with seaweed wrappers

Weather Highs in the mid to upper 50's with rain and drizzle off and on throughout the day. Felt really warm out compared to some of the recent weather we've had.

Critters: Chickens are fine.. still barely laying with only a couple eggs a week going into the fridge. I'll probably have to source some fresh eggs locally before they start laying regularly in the spring. Need to plan for some new chicks in the spring as well. The chicken who had been moulting is filling out her feathers well now and is looking almost like a regular healthy bird. I'm going to consider her moulting finished. So that gives us two moulted birds, 1 bird still dropping feathers and the last one still in her old dirty garb. The sheep have grudgingly accepted that they won't be anywhere but the barn for a long time so they just lay under the protective overhang all day waiting for fresh deliveries of hay. Since no one is pregnant this winter and their activity has dropped so much, their hay requirements are also way down.. 1 bale is lasting about half a week. I check their body condition everyday and they all still have a good layer of fat along their backbones so I'm not worried about it.

One good turn: Nothing today.. since we stayed in all day due to the weather.

FDDDC: Washed cloth diapers, but couldn't line dry them due to the weather. Ate leftovers and from the pantry today so no food expenditures. T worked from home so no gas was used in our lives today. Kept the house at 67 all day and the heat didn't run very often.

Being local: Signed up to be on a local farms CSA application list. They only have 50 full share spots available and its on a first come first serve basis with priority given to returning customers first.. so my chances of getting in are slim.. but I'll try anyway.

Housework: Made the bed. Washed and dried M's diapers, Washed and dried a load of socks and underwear. Cleaned the counters and swept the kitchen. Unloaded and reloaded the dishwasher. Made all 3 meals here at home. Wrapped Christmas presents.

Things I thought about today:
Had a strange dream last night that we were living in a huge house where I kept finding new rooms but kept losing track of my family. Every room came fully furnished with lavish woods, stone and metal surfaces and the house even came with its own little white yap yap dog (no offense to those who own white yap yap dogs, its just a description easily identified by most folks). I kept wandering around the house getting more and more frustrated because every room seemed to need cleaning and I couldn't keep up with it and I couldn't find my husband or kid when I needed them.. and then I finally woke up. I lay in bed for awhile grateful that I don't have a huge house. That I can hollar from any point in the house and my family will hear me and I felt like I could even have a smaller home and still be very content with it. So a kinda bad dream that allowed me to wake up and feel good about what I have. I'll take that.

Otherwise I've been thinking about gardening, both in my raised beds out front and using containers on my deck. Making "soil growing boxes" in the yard. These would be areas I would fence off away from the sheep and chickens and layer up with rotted hay, manure and compost and then put a green cover crop like rye or hairy vetch on to be fed to the animals later and then flipped over with a pitch fork to work the remaining matter into the soil.. then I would start again. Hopefully getting 2 or even 3 decent cover crops planted, harvested, and turned in over the course of the 2009 growing season. Next year that bed would be used for garden crops and I'd start a new green cover crop area. I need to talk to some of the local seed folks around here to figure out what I can plant when to give me the most yield throughout the year.

Monday Happenings

2008-12-01T19:29:00.002-05:00

Wake up: 6:30am

Breakfast: Me & M: Leftover pancakes with butter and maple syrup. Milk for M, Coffee for me.

Lunch: Leftovers of Hunan Chicken and fried rice

Dinner: Roasted whole chicken, steamed acorn squash, steamed green beans, bread

Critters: The sheep and chickens all survived without us for the holiday. We had two eggs waiting for us when we came back. I've tried yet another method of hay feeding for the sheep to help prevent waste. I'll take pictures tomorrow if it's successful.

Weather Low 40s for most of the day. Mostly cloudy with an hour or two of sun around 1pm. Had a brief down pour of ice balls about 10:30. It was enough to look as though we had had a dusting of snow but it all quickly melted.

One good turn: I bought a new re-usable shopping bag today. Kroger has their two handled black bags in an insulated version now which was great for my milk and chicken.

FDDDC: Washed cloth diapers, but couldn't line dry them due to the weather. Bought and cooked a whole chicken, (instead of caving into the convenience and extra cost of the bakery rotisserie chickens). We carved off the breast meat tonight. We'll have the legs, thighs and wings tomorrow and Wednesday I will simmer the carcass, bones, fat and organ meat for most of the day to make my homemade chicken broth.

Being local: Picked up our dogs from the local vet clinic where we board them now. We used to drive almost 20 miles away to board them at a fancier place but their hours and rates just got to be too difficult to work around and too expensive in general.

Housework: Washed and dried M's diapers, Washed and dried a load of socks and underwear. Swept and mopped the kitchen. Loaded, ran, unloaded and reloaded the dishwasher. Made all 3 meals here at home. Put 90% of the ornaments on the X-mas tree, oh and made the bed.

Things I thought about today:
Still wishing we had a wood stove.. looked at Vermont Castings and Hearthstone versions online.. sigh. Planned a shopping trip to JoAnn's for holiday fabric. I have one project to make for gifts and another project to make for our holiday decorations. Hopefully I can find fabric that I like tomorrow.

Tuesday Happenings

2008-11-24T22:06:00.004-05:00

Wake up: 6:30am but laid in bed until 7:15 with T and M

Breakfast: Me: OJ and an English muffin with butter and raspberry jam. M: Milk, cheerios, granola and cranberries (also got an egg and cheese biscuit on the way back from the grocery store)

Lunch: Leftovers of chicken & broccoli with brown rice

Dinner: Sushi from Fresh Market

Critters: Sheep, chickens and dogs are fine. No eggs today. :(

Weather Very windy today, occasional snow flurries, but otherwise sunny a good part of the day. Mid 40's during the day although with the wind it felt more like the mid-30's.

One good turn: Gave away my shopping cart at the grocery store to an old man who couldn't get the stacked carts separated.

FDDDC: T and I have been cleaning off my old desktop computer and will be trading that to my cousin for a couple loads of hay. Hung a fleece blanket to dry on the deck . Back to 67 again during the day and trying to make a habit of checking outlets in each room for any power vampires.

Being local: Not much today.

Housework: Put away clean dishes, washed and dryed a load of socks and underwear, too windy to line dry outside with wind gusts up to 20 mph. Washed one of the fleece blankets and hung that to dry in the basement. Cleared some space around the downstairs fireplace for drying firewood. Brought in one arm load.

Things I thought about today:
Really wishing we had one or two wood stoves in the house this year. I came across a biblical teaching today that I hadn't read in a long time. "One must not cast pearls before swine for they cannot appreciate their value and will trod them into the mud". I think that is actually a paraphrasing of a larger verse but it resonated with me today for some reason.

Monday Happenings

2008-11-24T14:04:00.002-05:00

Wake up: 6:30am

Breakfast: Coffee and Cheerios for me. Milk, a banana, some cranberries and a few of my Cheerios for M.

Lunch: Turkey Sandwich w/ mustard on whole wheat and some left over green peas for me with a glass of vegetable juice. PB&J on whole wheat and a roll of turkey and some of the green peas for M with a cup of 50/50 apple juice & water.

Dinner: Brown rice with chicken and broccoli for all of us.

One good turn: I tipped the guys $25 each for their work on the leaves. These guys are locals and I want them to stay in business!!

FDDDC: Froze two bags of left over bean & ham soup to have for meals in Dec. I turned the day time house temp down one more degree today to 67. I also plan to drop the house temp to around 55 for Thursday and Friday. No sense heating a house too much when there's no one in it. I'll set it to slowly come back up to 67 on Saturday. Tried to be very conscience of keeping the lights off in the house unless we actually needed light to work by. I sat by the big bay window to do my computer work and draw and color with M today. Unplugged or turned off at the power strip all appliances and electronics not actually being used.

Being Local: Hired a local family business to remove our fall leaves.

The leaf removal guys (a local family business) were here today. The first guy (who happens to live just a mile or so down the road) was here at 7am to start blowing the leaves into giant piles. The second guy, arrived about 9:30 with the sucker/shredder truck. They finished the job in 6 hours. Two full loads of shredded leaves were removed from the front of the house and 3 were removed from the back. All of the leaves are still on our property, can't waste good compost!!, but are now wonderfully piled behind the pasture fence waiting to turn into beautiful leaf mold to be used in the compost piles next spring and summer.

The sheep and chickens were not so pleased with this process since they had to be confined in their coop and barn the whole time but the chickens now at least are enjoying not having to move piles of leaves taller than themselves to find dirt to scratch in. The sheep.. well they didn't really get any benefit other than an extra flake of hay to keep them busy in the barn stall.

M and I watched the process from different windows around the house. She loved watching the "big truck" as it was driven from pile to pile to suck up the leaves.

Housework today: Was uninspiring to say the least. No laundry since I couldn't line dry it outside because of on and off light rain. I did empty the dishwasher, reload it and run it, picked up M's toys, defrosted the chicken for dinner, made brown rice in the rice cooker and started a packing list for the T-day traveling.

Things I thought about today:

I used the last of the store bought whole wheat bread today for lunch. Debated making my own loaf to replace it but couldn't get motivated to do it. Maybe tomorrow? Actually I probably need to buy a fresh batch of yeast.. mine has been in the fridge for a long time.

Need to buy some lime for the yards and pastures. Removing the leaves helps a lot but the soil is still way to acidic for good grass growth.

December power challenge? Idea.. make this year's December bill lower than last years. Maybe.

Being Thankful

2008-11-24T07:42:00.002-05:00

In this whirl wind week of travel, family get-togethers, big meals, holiday shopping and general busyness, I wanted to make sure I took time to reflect on all the many things I am thankful for in this past year and life in general.

I am thankful for:

Waking up every morning with a healthy mind and body
My husband
My daughter
My soon to be son
My parents
My sister
My large extend family with whom I have a close and loving relationship
My many friends
Our home and "farm" with a mortgage that we can afford
Our well maintained and paid for vehicles
Our nice neighbors who kindly put up with our farm and who secretly give treats to the sheep and chickens.
Living in a rural area that gives us room to stretch and grow.
Our country, even though its hurting right now.
Our new President-Elect
the internet which allows me to stay in touch with family and friends and find new people and ideas.
our nation's growing paradigm shift to more global, environmental and community responsibility and connections.

I will post more as the week goes on.. but these are the big ones for me so far.

Stuck on the couch

2008-11-23T13:33:00.003-05:00

I have a cold. A real doozy of one. Sniffles, chest congestion, and coughing. Lovely. Not really something you want to have when you are 5 and a half months pregnant. First of all its hard enough to get comfortable at night for sleeping without also feeling like you can't breath and secondly, coughing and sneezing while pregnant create a lot of stress on the already squished bladder. Not fun. But I think I'm recovering with lots of hot tea, OJ, natural lemon lozenges and being generally lazy.

While I've been lazy I've been reading lots of other blogs about all sorts of things that have my mind moving. Waste reduction, simplicity, sustainability, giving back, pinching pennies, eating real food and finding it locally, gardening, and the lists just goes on and on. I'm going to be adding some new formatting to my blog that will hopefully encourage me to post more often and keep me thinking about these important topics.

Here are some of the items I'll be adding

One good turn: I found this blog and love the concept.

FDDDC (aka Frugle Deeds Done Dirt Cheap): This idea came from this blog that I read regularly.

There are many more ideas that I've come across when reading other blogs that I hope to add in a little at a time. The internet can be such a wonderful tool for finding inspiration from other like minded individuals.

Bran Muffin

2008-11-07T19:13:00.002-05:00

I don't normally like quizzes, but since this one described me as a bran muffin and that would be pretty much how I describe myself I thought I would share. Although I would add a big glass of milk to go with the yummy bran muffin!

You Are a Bran Muffin

Some people have accused you of being all work and no play. And that does describe you most of the time.

You are very career oriented. When you're not working making money, you're working to improve yourself.

You have very little room in your life for fluff. You want to live as good of a life as possible.

You are competitive and driven. You like to surround yourself with other motivated people.

While you are a go-getter, you are by no means self centered. Quite the opposite.

You are a caring, together, and stable friend. You are grounded enough to be there for people.

What Kind of Muffin Are You?

Go Vote!!!

2008-11-04T07:46:00.003-05:00

Today is election day. Some of my friends voted early and one has already been to the polls this morning. She had close to a 45 minute wait. Normally she waits no more than 5 minutes. How exciting! I will gladly wait in line to experience real civic participation with my fellow community members. We'll be going to the polls once T gets home from his current trip to NC.

This morning will be busy as I put the house back together. The weather has been beautiful the past 2 or 3 days so M and I have spent a lot of time outside and not much inside cleaning up after ourselves. So today's post will be mostly a to do list to keep me on track.

Breakfast - oatmeal, bananas and eggs
Start the chicken thighs simmering for chicken soup
Shower and dress (Figure I should be clean and presentable for T when he gets home)
Bathe and dress M (see note above)
Start a load of laundry (need to wash diapers today)
Feed and water the sheep and chickens
Empty, reload and run the dishwasher
Pick up the den
Make up the bedroom
Clean off the kitchen table
Wipe the bathrooms
Quick vacuum
Grocery store run for staples (milk, butter, veggies)

There are probably some other things I'll need to squeeze in there but this is what I know for now.

Picture catch up

2008-11-03T08:21:00.006-05:00

We had a great weekend at M's Great Grandmother's a couple of weekends back. Lots of family showed up, over a dozen adults, half a dozen little ones (all under 3) and 5 dogs. What a circus. Here a just a couple pics of M during the "I'm not sure about these other kids, so I'm going to just stand here and stare." stage. It didn't last long so neither did my ability to take many pictures. Soon enough all of the kids were running around, well like kids.Hmmm... I kinda wanna play with this big pink ball.. but those boys look like they'd be a lot of fun to play with too... decisions decisions..
Sidewalk chalk... thanks Mom.. hmmm.. still thinking about going over there with the other kids...

Ok.. enough waiting.. I'm going to go play now Mom!
Wow.. after a long weekend of playing.. how nice to come home and snuggle up with my favorite furry friend.

I think Gaidin missed M just as much as she missed him.

We also carved our first pumpkin this year.

A beautiful shiny pumpkin given to us by our friends Dan and Jamie.
I decided to carve from the bottom up so that I could use the stem to carry the pumpkin around. I started by setting the pumpkin on a flat surface then tracing around the bottom where it made contact with the table. This way I knew it would sit flat once I carved off the bottom.The bottom is off and M really really wanted to smear that pumpkin goo around.
Necessary equipment going forward. I do NOT like the feel of pumpkin "guts" so nice long gloves are a must have.
All the insides are now outside.
And here is our nice clean hollow pumpkin.
This cat face is a template that I found on line a year or so ago.. I'm sorry I don't have a source to share for it. I used a great set of Exacto knives that T gave me years ago to carve the face. Didn't have any issues at all.And here is our finished pumpkin. I used a strand of Christmas lights to light up the inside. All in all I was quite pleased with our first attempt.

A new week

2008-11-02T21:54:00.002-05:00

I'm still reading the 1st chapter of Start with the Soil but I allowed myself to get sidetracked by great weather over the weekend and a great new book, actually a cook book. Nourishing Traditions. I'm still working my way through it a little at a time so I'll reserve review on it until I finish all the dialog sections in the first part of the book.

I've begun the fall yard clean up. The grass is pretty well done for the year so I need to push the sheep down to the barn pasture and keep them off of the yards until next spring after the grass is up and growing really well. I think I put them on too early this year so the grass never really got ahead of them. Being in drought conditions for most of the year certainly didn't help either.

I burned the first pile of accumulated sticks from the back yard and we have picked up all the major ones from the front and piled them. Tomorrow will be cooler and cloudy but I think I'll bundle up M after breakfast and let her "help' me get the sheep and their water trough down to the barn then move that pile of sticks in the front to the back where I have the fire pit set up. I burn my sticks in a commercial fire pit like you buy at Lowes so I don't have to worry about stray leaves blowing across the fire or the coals and starting little fires else where. I can't burn a lot at a time but its a trade off I'm more than willing to make to feel safer doing it.

After we finish with the sheep and front yard sticks I need to drag the old section of pear tree that was torn down last fall to a better spot so that I can cut out the decent firewood and kindling sections and then burn the rest with the yard sticks.

M and I will head in after that and I'll get her cleaned up, fed a light early lunch and then off for her nap. While she's sleeping I'll get those sticks started and will hopefully be down to just coals once she wakes up.

I imagine we'll spend the afternoon inside since I need to do some picking up and cleaning around here and I need to do some figuring on how I want to structure the feed for the sheep this winter. I have three food sources available, square baled hay, compressed grass forage bales which have molassas and corn oil added to them and finisher pellets. I'll think more on how I want to use all these sources for awhile then post my plans. I'll also need to do some cost figuring for the feeds and add the cost of a mineral block in there too.

RAL Update - Acknowledgements and Introduction

2008-10-30T20:51:00.003-04:00

I finished the Acknowledgments and Introduction sections of Start with the Soil. Both were very short so I only spent a few minutes on each. Let me begin by saying that this book was published in 1993. This is important because when I went to look up a few of the acknowledged sources I found that their web sites were either close to non-existent or hadn't been updated in a long time. One site that I did find to still be going strong was for ATTRA. I didn't spend a lot of time on the site but on their front page was a PDF for sheep and goat raising so my interest was definitely peaked. I've added them to my bookmark list and will go back to see what other bits of useful information I can glean from their site.
The Introduction was nothing fancy although the very first thing I had to do was go check up on how to pronounce this word: HUMUS. I know that makes me seem like a total loser.. but my last Biology class was about a decade ago! Even verifying how to pronounce this word... I find myself still reading it as hummus... as in the yummy chick pea concoction. I suppose by the end of the book I will have gotten past that.
There were two big points that the intro touched on. The first was how farmers went from natural manure and cover crop based soil fertility systems to buying bags of 10-10-10 (NPK) chemicals for growing their crops. Most of this came about as America was shifting out of war time production following WWII and the factories and their products: bomb making chemicals, nerve gases, etc were transitioned from war against humans to war against poor soil and pests. The second point of the introduction was to give a very high level pro vs. con comparison of traditional or organic soil care against the modern bare soil high petrol input farming.

So there ya have it. The rest of the book is divided into two main sections with chapters under each heading. The first main section is Understanding Your Soil and the first chapter is entitled Know Your Soil. More on that next time.

Time for a read-a-long

2008-10-30T15:15:00.002-04:00

Well I'm not actually reading along with anyone but I will be taking some notes about what I have read, what stands out to me, new things I've learned, and what I want to incorporate into my own plans.

Fall is probably my favorite season of the year. Its a time to reflect about what I accomplished, what I didn't get done and why, and what I want to do differently next year. I reflect on everything from gardening and critter care to cooking dinner and saving money. Its a time of evaluation and education.

The first book I'll be reading.. or really re-reading is Start with the Soil by Grace Gershuny. The subtitle to this book is The Organic Gardener's Guide to Improving Soil for Higher Yields, More Beautiful Flowers, and a Healthy, Easy-Care Garden. Now first and foremost I should start by saying I didn't have a garden this year. I started on one.. but I never followed through. I got focused on housework and the routines surrounding the care inside of the house that I really just let everything outside go.

I'm just about sick of inside work and I really need to relax, not worry about every spot on the bathroom sink chrome or a bit of dust showing up on the coffee table in the evening sun. I find that I get so caught up on making little things look right that everything else just falls apart, gets behind and looks a mess anyway. A load or two of laundry each day, and one major cleaning job each morning is all I'm going to tackle from now on until its time to make dinner. After dinner is cleaned up and M is off to bed, I'll do a quick pick up in the house and my inside work day will be done. I'm also a little miffed at myself for trying to arrange my house around the comfort of "possible overnight" guests and even beginning to plan huge home improvements to keep a fancy guest room instead of focusing first on what our family needs. Shame on me. I have a pull out queen sized sofa and a queen sized aero-bed that can be set up in pinch. Really. If someone wants more than that.. there are hotels in town.

So back to this book... sorry for the ramble but realizing how little time I allowed myself to spend outside this spring and summer is what brought me to my book shelves looking for inspiration to start next spring. Even though I'll have a new born, next spring and summer will be a spring and summer spent out of doors. And what better place to find inspiration than with a book titled Start with the Soil. I'll start the introduction tonight.

Nice weather

2008-04-18T07:20:00.001-04:00

The weather has been so wonderful for the past two days and today is supposed to be just as nice too. I spent a couple hours on Tuesday at my friend N's house. She had two new baby lambs from on of her Icelandic flock and was expecting 2 to 4 or even more in the next couple days from two more of her ewes. The Icelandic sheep are so nice. They are about the same size as my Black Welsh sheep, just slightly taller and a little heavier boned. They have a long double coated fleece that is sheared twice a year. I'm hoping to get at least one fleece at her first shearing this year to play with myself.

I've been using the sheep as four footed lawn mowers over the past week. They have cleaned up the yard between us and our neighbors to our south. I'll be setting them up to graze on the north side today. The electro net fencing is worth its weight in gold. I can set up a temporary pasture in about 15 minutes. I will definitely be buying another section of fence later this year.

Yesterday was a heavy housework day. I got most everything done except the kitchen. So I'll start there today.

The visiting baby lamb is doing well. She has finally "gotten" how the bottle works and is putting on weight. I let her out with the big sheep yesterday and while they weren't all best friends right away, there weren't any aggression issues. I think she'll be fine and will hopefully be ready to go back to her home flock in about 3 weeks.

We have a guest

2008-04-14T18:07:00.003-04:00

Another lamb has made its way to our farm, although hopefully for only about a month. The farm where our original two sheep came from had a ewe reject her lamb this year. Unfortunately no one is home there during the day to bottle feed the lamb so she has ended up here for the time being. She is 10 days old now. I'm hoping to get some good body weight on her quickly and work on getting her to two feedings a day, once every 12 hours by this time next month. If I can do this then she will probably be able to rejoin the other farms flock and bond with the other lambs before she gets too big. We struggled for the first 24 hours. She did not want to take a bottle at all and I was only able to get between 3 and 4 oz of milk into her over a 20 to 24 hour period. Well hunger finally overcame her aversion to the bottle today and she was able to eat a full 4oz bottle in just a few minutes. Hopefully this will continue and she will be well on her way to growing up a happy healthy lamb.

In the house today.. it was laundry day. Five loads worth. The last load (whites) is sitting at the top of the stairs laughing at me right now...because I just don't have the energy to get up and take it down the stairs to the washing machine. But writing about it is giving me the kick I need...so I'm going to go take care of this now.

Spring Cleaning... Chapter II

2008-04-07T16:33:00.002-04:00

In my last post I talked about using the baking soda and vinegar hair cleaning routine and the oil cleansing method. Here is some follow up opinions and ideas.

Hair:

I went ahead and washed my hair the same day as my last post since I needed to shower anyway before I went out to one of my knit night meetings. The results were good. No greasiness, no baking soda powder left in my hair and no vinegary smell. My hair wasn't "slick" the way it is after using commercial products but it was soft. I did use just a little olive oil on the end of my hair. I have a tiny bit of colored section still at the tips that sometimes produces splits and tangles. (I really need to to that cut off). But after just a couple drops of EVOO rubbed through they calmed down.

Tips and tricks: I used two re-purposed water bottles that were sitting in the recycling bin to put my baking soda and vinegar mixes in, separately of course... no science projects please! The bottles worked fine... my measuring and mixing method however needed to be changed. I put the correct amounts of BS and ACV in the appropriate bottles then filled each with a cup of water. I did this in the kitchen. Well by the time I got undressed, in the shower, and was ready to put the stuff into my hair... it was cold.. and pouring cold fluid onto a shower warmed scalp is NOT FUN. So... I washed again today... that right 4 whole days between washes and it only started to feel greasy today!! This time though, since I knew about where the water lines should be on the bottles when they had the correct amount of water added... I put the BS and ACV in the bottles in the kitchen again but waited until I was in the shower to fill the bottles and used nice hot water from the shower head. MUCH better. Final result: Fine again. Greasiness completely gone, no powderiness and no smell. I think I'll stick with this.

Now onto the oil cleansing method. Let me start by saying I have regular breakouts around the time of "Aunt Flow's visit" and about once a month I'll also get one bump that I never fail to mess with until it becomes an eyesore. So I've tried lots and lots of products to remove makeup, clean, scrub, exfoliate, moisturize and anything else the host of products out there claim to do. But at almost 30 years old now.. I'm still dealing with this. So you can only imagine my doubt that somehow slathering oil all over my face and not actually washing it or anything else off with soap was going to do anything nice for my skin. Well.. my doubts turned out to be unfounded. I have experienced no new breakouts and have actually seen an improvement in pore size and blackheads on my nose and forehead. I also had not one but three healing eyesore bumps when I started and in these 4 days they have nearly disappeared. There is still some darkness in the area that the bumps were, but there is no roughness, swelling or redness. Thats a big WOW all by itself.

So tips and tricks for the Oil Cleansing Method:
Compare prices on the Castor Oil at your pharmacy and your grocery store. It was $4.50 at my local CVS and only $1.50 at Kroger. Next.. premix just a little of the OO and CO in a bowl or jar before starting. Its much easier to just dip your fingers in the premixed bowl than trying to control the flow of oil out of the bottles and into your hand. Do take the time to enjoy at least one "wash cloth steam session" before wiping the oil off with said wash cloth. It feels really nice and I really think it helps in bringing any skin ickiness to the surface. As a bonus I also tried shaving my legs with the oil mix since I tend to have very dry skin that can develop irritation bumps after shaving. It worked great. A warning though.. its not like shaving with commercial shaving cream. It softens the top layer of dead cells so your razor lifts those up along with the hair stubble and excess oil. Your razor gets really gross really fast... so swish it in water often and keep a cloth handy to wipe off the excess goo that swishing can't get rid of. I did this on Sunday evening... my skin feels like silk today and the irritation that I had from my previous shaving is much improved. So I think I'll be sticking with this for awhile too.

Spring Cleaning....the body

2008-04-03T11:10:00.004-04:00

I've been doing some internet research recently on natural hair and body care materials and methods and I've found two new methods that I want to incorporate into my routine care. They are the OCM and no-poo methods. Don't they just sound grand?? Ok...not really by their names but here is the break down on what those names mean.

OCM - Oil Cleansing Method - Basically the thought process behind this is to throw away all the harsh crap that modern "beauty" companies have convinced us to buy and stop peeling, burning, and stripping our skin with their petroleum based, salts, acids, and mineral oils. After all...if their products worked...why would they have to keep inventing new ones and why would we have cabinets and drawers full of failed products? Instead...lets turn the clock back oh... about a thousand years, maybe even two or three and re-discover what the ancient Greeks, Romans and Egyptians might have used...after all I don't think Helen of Troy, the face that launched a thousand ships... was using ProActive or Oil of Olay. The oil cleansing method is based on two oils...Castor Oil and Olive Oil. Castor Oil works to cleanse your face and Olive Oil to moisturize it. Here is a site detailing the process.

"no-poo" - No shampoo hair cleansing - Hmm... I could start this description almost the same as for the OCM... bad beauty companies... stripping our hair with petroleum based detergents...then convincing us that its really our hair's fault for being dry and now we need to buy their petroleum based conditioner as well... and since thats going to leave a nasty film on our hair...we'll have to shampoo more frequently... and the cycle just goes on and on. The no-poo method uses baking soda and apple cider vinegar(ACV) to clean and "condition" the hair...condition referring less to adding moisture and more to creating a pH balance environment and smoothing the hair shafts. Using the baking soda and ACV cleans the hair of dirt and sweat without completely removing our hair's natural oil, which should be our own perfect moisturizer. Here's a site to get your started on this method.

So... I'll be running to the grocery store for my ingredients which include:

Castor Oil
Olive Oil
Baking Soda
Apple Cider Vinegar

Yes I have these things, sans castor oil, in my kitchen...but I don't want to be taking my cooking ingredients into our bathroom...gross. So I'll start a separate supply for hair and face cleansing. I'm also going to run into my bathroom, once MRS. W wakes up, and take out all of the shampoos, conditioners, face scrubs, washes, pore cleansers, anti-bump creams, etc. etc. that I can find. That way there's is no way I can cheat on my "Natural Body Diet".

Whats going to be interesting is how I deal with a potentially greasy head of hair at Passover dinner in two weeks. Hopefully my hair will transition well to the new treatments and it will be a non-issue.

If I can bring myself to do it. I'll take pictures of the process...but since I don't like pictures of myself to begin with...me with no make-up, slathered in olive oil and having a head full of greasy hair...isn't going to make it any easier.

Oh..and the last piece to the Spring Cleaning... get back to drinking lots and lots of water. I can sometimes go two or three days at a time now without so much as a sip of plain water during the day... instead I'm sipping coffee or juice. So... less of those in the future and more simple H2O.

We Have a Winner

2008-04-02T16:42:00.002-04:00

Drum roll please..?? Oh yeah I'm here alone so I would have to do that myself...nevermind. The winner of the name the lambs contest and the $25 worth of yarn/needles is.......

Catinblack (Ravelry link) with her suggested names of Malabrigo, Noro and JoJoLand. The girls will be called Mala, Noro, and Jojo. We thought it more than appropriate to name our wonderful girls after some wonderful yarn.

Congratulations Catinblack and thanks to everyone for your very creative name suggestions. We liked so many it was hard to choose just one set. Please keep these and more in mind for next year when hopefully we will have many more little ones needing names.

Time to name the babies

2008-03-23T21:19:00.004-04:00

As most of you know, our little home place was blessed with three ewe lambs this year, two purchased and one born here. Well, none of these adorable little girls have names and that is just a shame. So I'm asking for some help. I'll even make it a contest. Here are the guidelines:

I would like all the names to be part of a set. A set could be names that all start with the same letter, have a similar theme like plants, characters from a book or movie or any other creative idea that would identify these girls as all being born in the same year.

The last day for entries will be March 31st

Feel free to enter more than one set of names

I will announce the winner on April 2nd

You can assign a name to an individual lamb if you'd like but you don't have to.

And oh yeah...there is of course the matter of the winner's prize... $25 worth of yarn and/or needles from my LYS.

Here are some close ups of the girls as they are in order from left to right in the top picture.

Decluttering Life

2008-02-28T13:23:00.004-05:00

The ladies at Reclaiming the Home, a wonderful group on Ravelry have inspired me to do some decluttering. Today I worked on our Master Bath, specifically the cabinets and drawers under our sink.

Here are the 90 items that are being decluttered and removed from our house permanently.

Everything else is going back in for now. But its so nice now to be able to see where everything is. Here's the end result...going left to right.

Here's what makes up most of those cabinets and drawers.

Lots of cleaners. I'm going to work my way through these bottles and then NOT buy anymore. Vinegar, baking soda and occasionally some bleach water should be all I need to keep the house clean and it will be a much safer environment for MR.
Hair care products...hmmm..curlers...how strange...I already have curly hair...so I think these are going to find a new home, but everything else, what little there is...will be staying.
And finally hygiene products from teeth whiteners to a tub of blue body mud mask. Some of these things will be going as well. The Proactive stuff...while a fine product, just isn't a very good match for my skin. It dries me out way to much, so it will find a new home. The bath sugar scrubs however will be put to good use starting tonight.

Close Ups of the New Ewes

2008-02-19T19:51:00.002-05:00

The girls have posed for their close ups:

Here is the smaller of the two ewe lambs. She is 90% black with only a few white spots scattered around. Even though she is the smallest, she is the most adventurous. She was the first to jump up on my feed bins and check things out in the other half of the stall they are staying in during their quarantine period.
This is the larger ewe with a 50/50 black to white spotted fleece.

I have no idea what either of the lambs' mothers were crossed with. The previous owner said that she thought the ram that was running with the flock she purchased her ewes from was a Jacob. However after reading up on the breed it is generally thought that a larger percentage of black in the fleece indicates some type of cross breeding in the genetics. The ideal fleece ratios are 60-80% white to 40 to 20% black. Perhaps the past breeders of these Jacobs were simply not interested in maintaining breed standards and did not eliminate sheep with too much black from their flock. In which case these girls could be pure Jacob. But of course...without papers... I'll never know. Thats ok.. I'm just hoping their fleeces will spin well.

TD and I talked about what my real goals for owning the sheep were. And in the end I just want pretty fleece that spins well and can be used for knitting basic outwear garments, mixed with finer fibers for softer yarns, or spun for use in weaving blankets and hooking rugs. I'm not interested in maintaining blood lines for selling breeding stock to other shepherds. If other spinners want some spinning fiber lambs...great... be glad to sell them a couple as my flock expands....if not...well I like lamb chops.

Wind

2008-02-19T13:21:00.003-05:00

I don't like wind. Not the sweet blow MR's curls around kinda wind, but the wind that rocks the trees and makes a sound like thunder when it comes across the roof. This is the wind I don't like. I pace from room to room and back and forth in front of our deck doors, looking through the windows into the yard and pasture. I'm waiting, holding my breath, hoping that none of the 80+ foot oaks and pines come crashing across our fence our even worse, into our house. The sheep seem to feel some of my nervousness too. They call to each other frequently, even though they are only a few dozen yards from each other.. "Hey are you ok over there"?..."Yep..You"? "Just fine". Two minutes later...the same exchange takes place.

This is the state of affairs today. I'll be glad when this wind is gone.

On a lighter note. We have two new additions to the farm.

These two little lambs are female Jacob Sheep crosses. They are just over 2 weeks old and are having to be bottle fed. I got them yesterday from a lady about 12 miles from here. She made the very bad decision to pull 2 lambs off of two ewes to give to her grandchildren as pets. Yes..thats right.. pets. Well her daughter came to visit...saw what the adult sheep looked like and said... uuhh...no. No lambs for the kids. So this lady was then stuck with 2 bottle lambs because the momma sheep wouldn't take them back. She didn't have time to keep up with the feeding. So a few emails and phone calls later...and now here they are.

Catching up with Pictures

2008-02-18T00:02:00.005-05:00

Well here are some pictures of whats been happening around here in the last month. On January 17th we had our biggest snow of the year... a whole 4 inches. Ok..so its not much but thats doing good for Virginia

While I enjoyed watching it snow...the sheep were not so amused. My little black sheep suddenly turned into little white sheep with black faces and legs.
So we went down to the barn and hung out in the barn breezeway for a bit while they enjoyed some chopped hay and shook most of the snow off.
Ok...jump ahead to this weekend. TD and I got some serious outdoor projects done on Saturday...and here's why...Spring is on the the way. This little crocus has sprung up in our ornamental bed between the driveway and the porch.
So...what were our big projects? Well as you can see here my poor raised beds are looking pretty empty...ok..completely empty.
So TD and I picked this one, to fill up with some good stuff. Here is the bed in all its emptiness
And here it is filled with dirty goodness. This is a 50/50 mix of top soil and peat moss. We still have to add lime and compost. But before we do......
We have to move our compost out of the huge round fence rings its been cooking in for a year and into our new 3 bin very official looking composting contraption.
Peep approves
Ok...changing gears... I don't do a lot of shopping but MR and I went out to the local antique shop one day a couple weeks ago and here's what we came out with. 1 - lovely aqua blue two tiered cake stand, a vintage needle point book and a Little House on the Prairie book to add to MR's bookshelf for reading later.
I've also started baking our own whole wheat bread. Here's what it looks like. I'm using the King Arthur Flour recipe that uses molasses instead of sugar. It is very very good.
And no picture post would be complete without a few shots of our lovely MR. Here she is kicked back in a bouncy chair...yes she is way too big for it now... but she still enjoys resting in it now and then.
This is a pretty standard expression now... Its the Hey Mom...what do you want to play now look. Oh...and as you can see...she's walking now too.
And finally here she is "talking" to her daddy on the phone. I was actually on my cell phone with him but she's "talking" to him using the regular phone.

So...I'm hoping to get some more house keeping pictures and stories back on the blog. I should have some before and after shots up by the end of the week.

Happy Valentine's Day

2008-02-14T11:30:00.002-05:00

I'm not sure what to think of Valentine's Day. The idea behind it is very sweet and perfectly wonderful...but the consumerism surrounding it is appalling. Even so...I have already contributed my dollars to the store for a box of mixed chocolates and will probably spend some more before the day is out buying special groceries for a "romantic" meal. I'm still debating that part though. The meal isn't very romantic if the effort involved in making it is more trouble than the meal is worth. Taking a 15 month old anywhere can be challenging. Driving almost an hour just to get to the store you want to spend your money in and then driving almost an hour back can bring out the monster child in any little one.

And speaking of 15 month olds...that is how old MR is today. How quickly the time has passed. It has been hard work but so much joy has come from having her in our lives...I would not trade it for anything.

Our grass is pretty much gone now and the sheep are eating mostly hay with a handful or two of sheep pellets a day to keep them happy and to give Peep the extra calories she needs for the lamb. Her udder has started to fill with milk which hopefully means that lambing will come soon. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that everything goes well. I went out yesterday to purchase supplies for my lambing kit. So I'm prepared for the worst but hoping for the best. Bo has filled out since coming here in December. He was the runt of the flock at the breeder's home so was always the last to get to the feed and hay. Here he has full access to everything and has taken advantage of it. He is a very sweet boy who loves scratches and treats. I had some issues with him butting at me now and then but we seem to have worked past that. I have not had to correct that behavior in several weeks. I'm hoping to shear sometime in March. Bo's fleece looks wonderful and feels so soft. Peeps fleece is pretty ratty. She had a fleece break over the summer from the drought stress so sections of her fleece are much shorter than others and she has rubbed up against every available surface in the pasture trying to shed the itchy broken fleece off. I'll try to work with it to save some spin worthy fiber but her fleece may end up being attic insulation if its too much of a mess to bother with.

Knitting wise I'm in a serious rut. I've been working on a project that feels like it will never end. It requires my full attention while knitting it so I can't be watching TV in the evening and work on it the way I normally do my other projects. It is a patterned piece that has 34 repeats of the same pattern over and over again. I have almost finished the 10th repeat and have only about 10 more days to finish and block it. The pressure is mounting. I'm going to try to dedicate several hours to it this evening and as much free time as possible over the weekend. I also have another project that I must get started in order to send out on time as well. I think I'll run and at least cast that on now.

Sorry for the lack of pictures. I'll find some good ones from the last month and do a picture post later tonight.

December 30 2007

2007-12-30T09:53:00.000-05:00

Sorry for the unexciting post title...but after awhile you just run out of interesting ways to say "here's the day". So from this point on, unless there really is something neat that has happened, most of my posts will simply be labeled with the date. Easier for folks to tell if the site has been updated this way anyway.

TD made huge progress on our compost bins yesterday. We are building them using this design. He put together the wire filled frames, cut the other boards to length and pre-drilled some holes for easy assembly. Still a few boards to cut down...but it won't be long now!

I picked up the vaccine and needles for the sheep from our local Southern States and of course chewed the fat with the owners for awhile. Got an interesting story about our neighbors on the north side...have to ask him about it next time I see him. I'll verify the details before I post about it.

I got lots of knitting done yesterday. I've almost worked through the first ball of yarn on the pinwheel blanket and I'm almost done the Fake Isle hat! Here are pics of the progress. The baby blanket of course doesn't look much different...but the hat sure does.

Ok thats all for today.

Some Catching Up

2007-12-29T09:04:00.000-05:00

Here are a few pics from around the farm, a snowy day, Christmas, and projects in progress.
We exchanged some gifts at my Parents house early this year so that my sister and her family could share Christmas with all of us. This is my sister' s Husband Mark and her two Step-sons Jake and Cooper. TD and I got them both sock monkeys and I knit them scarves to help them keep up with which one belongs to each boy.

Here is the whole family opening one of my sisters gifts, a cupcake holder/tote. Sounds silly until you have two kids in school and a promise of cupcakes for the class.

Here is MR opening one of her gifts... the process of opening bags and paper was as much or more exciting for her this year than the gifts.

Here are a couple more pics of our two wooly friends Bo and Peep.

This is some hand spun yarn I made on a drop spindle with wool roving provided by my mother in law. Her spinning wheel is visiting our house for awhile so that I can practice and decide if a spinning wheel is something I want for myself.

Here's MR helping me pick through some fleece. My future fiber addict!

This was our first real (1"+) snow of the year. This pic is taken from our back deck.

This is the same snowy day, with the pic taken from the front porch.

MR and her daddy opening presents on Christmas day.

Playing with her new talking, singing, music playing, piggy bank.

MR playing with her new Laugh and Learn Puppy from her Uncle Jon and Aunt Linda. Very Cute.

MR playing with her new Maracas from her cousin Derek and his boys Hunter and Fisher. She also got some very cute clothes from them too.

Yippie for Christmas!! Insert big cheesy MR grin.

Here is one of my newest projects, just cast on last night and since the intended recipient doesn't have web access, I get to post about it. This is the Fake Isle Hat design by Amy King on MagKnits. I got 15 rows done the first night including two stranded color rows. So far so good!!

And finally...I'm still plugging away at the Pinwheel baby blanket that will go to David and Kelly's new little one due in February. I pick up this project anytime I have a spare minute or two during the day . The pattern is simple so I can pick it up and put it down as needed without worrying too much about where I left off.

Well...I think thats plenty for now. Off to Southern States to pick up the sheep's vaccines.

Monday Happenings

2007-12-17T09:22:00.000-05:00

It was really really cold this morning. The water buckets had ice in them...even the ones in the barn. But the sheep and chickens seemed to be fine. The barn is cold but its not drafty. There were ice "pops" along the ground in front of the barn that made a satisfying crunch as I walked through them. Unfortunately that also means that that area will turn into sticky mud once the temp gets up above freezing.

The critters got breakfast around 7:30 this morning. Hay for the sheep and laying mash and scratch for the chickens, plus a handful of hay for them to kick around and incorporate into their bedding. MR and I did breakfast and played until her nap time, 9:30. Once she was down I went out to the barn for about an hour. I let the sheep out and walked the pasture with them. They were nervous and stuck close by, only nodding their heads down to graze a few times. I left them out with their stall door open so they could use the barn as they wanted or explore the pasture as they were ready. There isn't much grass for them to eat right now but they'll find bits and pieces to pick at as they wander.

Bo is definitely the friendlier of the two and will walk up for a head scratching now and then and responds faster to the grain can. So this alone may earn him a long term position on the farm. Having a sheep that will consistently come to you is invaluable when working a flock because once one sheep starts moving forward, the rest will follow.

The sheep didn't stay out long as it was pretty windy and with the hay in the morning they weren't all that hungry. While out they did perform some cute sheep antics...bouncing around like prong horns and running round and round the barn.

The Critters are here

2007-12-16T21:00:00.000-05:00

We now have in residence...four lovely lady birds and two wooly friends. They are all hanging out in the barn right now, getting used to the new smells and sounds of their new home. The sheep are in a 12X12 stall and the chickens are in an 8X6 section of the feed room. Depending on the weather tomorrow....supposed to be very cold but clear... the sheep will move out to explore the pasture area for a few hours after their hay breakfast. The chickens will stay in the barn for now. Their new coop should be here around the end of the week but for now I'm keeping them in the barn with lots of hay to kick around and some yummy scratch grains in addition to their regular mash. This should keep them at least comfortable for a few more days.

Here are the ladies...

This is my neutered male, previously called Jesse by the breeder but we think we're going to call him Bo. He is a 10-11 month old lamb and is mostly here to keep my ewe company...but I'm also hoping his lamb fleece will work up to some yummy yarn when we shear in the spring.

This is my ewe (sorry for the weird eye glare in the pic)... previously called Ginny by the breeder but we think we may call her Peep. Get it...Bo and Peep...Bo Peep....ok...so its cheesy but cute. Plus she is the most vocal of the the pair so Peep kinda makes sense for her. She is either fat in a really strange way...or pregnant (pretty sure this is the case) and should have one or two lambs near the end of January. So exciting!!!

And here they are together enjoying some yummy cut hay. You can see how much rounder Peep's pregnant belly is than Bo's.

The posts are in

2007-12-05T21:08:00.000-05:00

The pasture fence is well under way. The guys have in 95% of the posts so I figure they'll start pulling the woven wire tomorrow. I'll try to get pics tomorrow too. The light here today was no good. We had flurries through out the morning and mostly overcast skies for the rest of the day. Hoping for sun tomorrow.

Sorry its so short tonight but I have to get my bolero done by Friday...so I need to get knitting.

Knitting Update

2007-12-04T20:32:00.000-05:00

As promised...here are pics of what I have on and off the needles now.

Holiday Bolero - on needles - 85% done. Still have an inch or so of the lace pattern, 3 inches of ribbing and then seaming up the arm holes.

Branching Out 25% done - Trying to do 3 to 4 pattern repeats each day.

Pocket Book Slippers - Done - Gonna put some buttons on these puppies and get them ready to be gifted away.

The Barn

2007-12-03T17:39:00.000-05:00

Here it is.. our beautiful barn. The outside is 90% done...the inside...well thats still in progress.

And here are a couple gratuitous pics of MR banging on her "kitchen drums".

Crafty stuff coming later tonight.

Hmm..I missed a day

2007-12-02T21:30:00.000-05:00

Well my plan to post everyday starting yesterday obviously didn't work. So I'll just start the full week of posts today instead. We had a super busy weekend. Our friend G. came over both Saturday and Sunday and helped TD finish the barn doors. The barn looks very "official" now with classic red walls and white trim..unfortunately its too dark to get a picture of it at the moment but I'll post one tomorrow. We also had some local guys come out bright and stinky early (7am) Saturday morning and remove all of the leaves in the front, back and side yards. Thats right... we paid people to get rid of our leaves. How un-self-sufficient is that? But you have to understand...we had a leaf PROBLEM this year. Here are some pics of the guys and the leaves...take a look at how big the piles were in relation to the men. I wish I had gotten some pics from the front yard too..at one point a guy was wading in leaves that were up to his waist.
This picture is of the back yard (you can see our wonderful new barn still in progress). This pile is made up of less than 1/3 of just the back yard leaves.
The same pile of leaves but they are pushing it together to make it easier for the vacuum truck to suck them all up. As you can see the pile is approaching the height of a full grown man.
This is the other side of the back yard prior to having the leaves piled. The round wire contraption is our compost pile for putting on the garden next spring and the pile of junk...well is just a pile of junk left from the barn lumber. Thankfully TD and G took all of the construction debris that couldn't be salvaged for anything else to the landfill later that day and G took some of the still useful scrap pieces back to his father's farm.
Here is the start of the pile on the right side of the back yard...all that stuff billowing up into the air was dust coming from a pile of leaves TD and I had raked up some time ago. The big black hose is not a giant snake...its the vacuum tube for the big suck-m-up truck.
And here is the far end of that leaf pile from above. You can see our lovely piles of wood chips over there too. All in all... 4 truck loads of leaves from our front and back yards. We would never have been able to get them all up by ourselves. As it is there is still 10-15% of the leaves still up on the trees. My plan for those... only rake up the areas of the yard where I plan to graze the sheep as I need to rotate them through...so that should be less than 1/8 an acre at a time. That I can handle. Plus the volume will be much less so I can make another compost pen for those.

Ok... enough blogging for now. Tomorrow we'll have crafty updates, Christmas updates, and house keeping bits.

One more quick post

2007-11-30T00:31:00.001-05:00

Starting tomorrow I am going to try to post everyday for a full week. I have been off the blog-wagon for way too long. So there might be some boring stuff on the way...but hopefully it will get me back in the habit. No detailed post tonight though. I'll save that for tomorrow.

Ack...I've been Tagged

2007-11-29T23:14:00.001-05:00

Darn you Sally...now I have to pretend like I actually know 8 other people with blogs! So I'll go ahead an apologize now to those people I'll be linking to. We may not know each other well, or at all in person, but I do read your blogs on a somewhat consistent basis and I've chosen to tag you since I think you'd be interested in Sally and her other linked locations.

Sally, of Adventures in Living & Learning tagged me for this meme.
Here are the Ye-Shall-Not-Break-Me Rules:

*link to the person who tagged you
*post the rules
*name 8 things others don't know about you
*link to 8 other bloggers

1. I drink pickle juice.

2. I hate Mayonnaise.

3. I own more uncrafted fabric, fiber and yarn by weight, than the total weight of all my actually crafted items.

4. I love semi-sci-fi fantasy fiction... Robert Jordan (RIP), L. E. Modesitt, Jr., Tolkien, etc.

5. I was a door to door Kirby Vacuum sales person. (I've also sold tires and been a cocktail waitress.... all in my "prior life" of course.)

6. I managed to have a completely natural (vaginal, no drugs) delivery in a regular hospital. I WALKED from the delivery room to our recovery suite less than an hour later.

7. I have a secret yearning to own a cat. (too many cute pics of cats with yarn on Ravelry)

8. I am a counter... steps to the basement, steps to the mailbox, number of plates in the dishwasher...etc.

So...here are the folks who get to tell us about themselves now...obviously the rest of my large and ever expanding family simply don't have blogs or don't have computers...so I've had to tag some of my new knitting acquaintances in the area and on Ravelry.

Pam at Diapers, Dogs, and Double Points
Cate at catie-catknits
Nikki at My fuzzy life
Liz at Life as a Spectator Sport
Sara at teleknitter
Leigh at Leigh's Fiber Journal
Robin at The Knittin' Coop
Sallee at knitnana

Christmas is on its way

2007-11-27T09:30:00.000-05:00

Less than 1 month until Christmas. Yippie!! I love Christmas, the tree, the lights, the presents, the cookies and cakes and of course finding neat gifts for friends and family. We also have TD's annual Holiday party hosted by his employer in VA Beach. My Mom will be going with us this year to keep MR while we are out. Maybe I'm over protective or something but I really don't think a 1 year old is ready to go almost 48 hours without her parents. Especially since she is still nursing. So thanks to Mom for agreeing to go along!!

This week I'm focusing on getting the house cleaned and all of the fall/Thanksgiving decorations put away. I'm hoping to put up the Christmas tree this weekend along with getting a new wreath for the front door, probably from Lowes. I also want to make stars out of bamboo stakes and strings of lights to hang across the front porch. I think the tree, the front door, the porch and one fireplace will be enough this year. Throw in a couple of festive scented candles on the dining and coffee tables and lights in the windows and it will be more than enough for us. After all...last year all I had was the tree. Which was plenty since I also had a 4 week old.

I'm back on my knitting kick and made half a dozen pairs of mittens last month for myself, MR and some cousins. Now I have a black and red bolero on the needles to wear with my little black dress to TD's holiday party.

I've made a bit more progress on it than is shown here, so its probably 1/4 finished now. Here is the original pattern site that I've adapted using my own sizes and yarn choices. I think I'll make another one later this winter to wear in the spring over little dresses and tank tops. This is super easy and super quick. This is my only knitted item with a pressing finish date (12/8) so I'm working on this almost exclusively right now.

Busy Busy Busy

2007-11-04T07:21:00.000-05:00

Wow...its been almost a month since my last post. Thats terrible. I'll try to do better. Lets see...what been happening. We have a barn!! Or most of one any way. Our brother in law JS and three of his crew came last week, Sunday through Wednesday, and did a super job. We still have some finish work to do but the really tough stuff is done. I can't believe I finally have my very own barn. It was a lot of work though, for them and me. They arrived Sunday around noon and worked until about 3:30 putting concrete into the post holes. Then everyone came in to watch the Redskins football game. Apparently they lost very badly. They were up again before dawn and worked until dark on both Monday and Tuesday. Wednesday was an early morning again, but they were packed up and headed home that day around noon so that JS could be home in time to do Halloween with the kiddlets. For my part...I have never cooked and cleaned so much in a 4 day time frame. Five grown men, including TD, eat a lot of food. And while they were very good about keeping my house in decent shape, I still made up and took down 2 spare beds everyday, washed down the bathroom, vacuumed and was constantly cleaning the kitchen and doing dishes every day.

So the rest of this past week was spent putting the house back in order and washing all the bed sheets, blankets, bath towels and rugs along with our regular laundry too. Gotta catch up on more of our regular clothing today. Yesterday we worked on the barn trim and taping up plastic over the windows and doors to prepare for painting. We're using a power spray painter and wow...what a mess. The paint has to be thinned out before it can be applied and then the sprayer hopper is nearly impossible for me to put on and take off to refill each time. So I ended up with lots of paint on my person and not so much on the barn. Just as I was really getting comfortable applying the paint it was time to pack up for the day...the sun was going down and MR had woken up from her afternoon nap. But I love the barn color....classic barn red..by Martha Stewart no less!!!

I have done a little knitting, I just finished a pair of mittens for MR and will start on my second mitten today. They are in a matching colorway called "Pink Camo". So cute. I'll also be knitting up a pair of mittens for MR's cousins CC and ZA. ZA's will be in a Sage Merino Wool and CC's will be in a Denim Marl Merino Wool. Then I've found a really cute baby blanket pattern that I want to start on for each of the two expecting Mommas in the family. Gotta order the yarn and needles first though. Probably do that tomorrow since Monday has become my online shopping day. And with the price of gas now, $3 a gallon, its cheaper to pay the online shipping charges than the fuel it would take to get out and back to the craft store in my own vehicle.

Oh and finally...we got rain...5 1/4 inches of the wonderful wet stuff. Our grass seed has sprouted and there is a faint green haze over all of the pasture and the areas we had graded and ditched for the underground cabling. We also have lots and lots of leaves that fell during and just after the rain that we will have to tackle soon. We have almost 2 dozen mature oak trees in the front and back yard and last year trying to keep them under control while 9 months pregnant..was.. difficult. Truth be told we didn't get up the last of the leaves from this past fall until September of this year.

Ok...one more thing...for anyone who is fiber crafty or aspires to be. Ravelry
Warning... this site will magically make hours disappear from your day, money disappear from your pockets and yarn, needles and patterns appear all over your house.

I'll post pictures later today...laundry is calling now.

We Need Rain

2007-10-08T20:10:00.000-04:00

TD and I spent most of the weekend putting down grass seed and straw over our many patches of red dust. We haven't had enough rain to give a rat a drink in months and unfortunately there is around 70 pounds of seed sitting out in our yard and pasture just baking away in the sun doing NOTHING because there isn't a drop of moisture to be had. But we've done what we can... we can just hope that we get some rain before the cold weather sets in...otherwise we'll be putting down another 70 pounds of seed in the spring and feeding our critters hay through most of the winter and next spring.

MR had several miserable nights this past week and weekend. One of her top front teeth has broken through but the other one is sitting just under the gum giving her pain at night and causing a stuffy runny nose that also kept her from sleeping well. Saturday night we didn't get to bed until 4am...scratch that...Mommie didn't get to bed until 4am...MR slept off and on in 15 to 20 minute intervals until 4am..however I don't function that way. Sunday night I made an emergency run to the local grocery store pharmacy at 11pm for baby Motrin only to come home and find that MR had finally fallen asleep on TD's chest. Apparently she just needed to sit up straighter to help her breathe... and I thought that her teeth were hurting her really bad because she would start to nurse and then pull away and cry as though the act of nursing hurt her mouth. TD's singing I'm sure helped as well. So we made some sleeping adjustments and were able to sleep until 7:15 this morning. The runny nose continued until around 3 this afternoon when it magically disappeared. All in all the day went pretty well.

I'll have a separate post later about the FlyLady system and how I've made some changes to my routine.

Diapers

2007-10-04T20:28:00.000-04:00

Wooohoo!! Our cloth diapers arrived today. Two dozen unbleached cotton prefolds, two dozen unbleached wipes, two overnight soakers, four diaper cover wraps, and two snappies. The diapers, wipes and soakers are in the wash now and will go through at least 3 hot washes and dryer trips to prep them for use. Washing them makes them softer and more absorbent. We will officially start our cloth bottom adventures tomorrow. I'm so excited. No more throwing money away on disposables, no more 20-30 pound bag of plastic and poop filling up the landfill each week, no more..."Honey can you run by the store on your way home we're out of diapers".

MR has cut one of her top front teeth and the other one is ready to come through any moment. We've had two or three very rough days and nights and I am just about dead on my feet. Thank God for coffee!! Today was less fussy than what we've been having and there's been no fever spikes so I'm hoping tonight we will be back on track with only one or two half wake ups to nurse or maybe just maybe a full nights sleep. I've almost forgotten what that is. I haven't had more than 5 hours of uninterrupted sleep in over a year!!

Our electric upgrade is complete and our service cable is now underground. Although not without incident. While the ditching contractor was moving their equipment around today getting ready to start digging, they snagged our overhead wires with the back hoe. They nearly ripped the service cable off the house and they did break our cable line. Luckily no one was hurt and the cable company came out to fix the damaged wire a few hours after it was broken.

I've been doing some small knitting projects during MR's naps and for an hour or so each evening after she goes to bed. I've finished a cotton dish cloth with a turkey design in it (got into the Thanksgiving spirit) and a head band, although it seems a bit big so I'll give it a wash to see if it shrinks up enough to make it snug. If not I'll have to either undo it and rip back a few rows or try folding it over on itself and stitching the fold in place. On the needles now is an experiment. I'm trying to make a jumper style dress for MR without a pattern, just using her measurements and my minimal knowledge of gauge, stitches and increases and decreases. Hopefully it will work.

The barn is on the books for this month... with completion tentatively scheduled by Halloween. Keeping my fingers crossed for this...but not holding my breath.

Well time for some knitting.

Grrrr....

2007-09-26T08:14:00.000-04:00

At 8am yesterday I got a call from our electrical contractor asking if I would be home that day because a technician would be coming by to change out the last receptacles we needed to pass inspection. I had originally planned on going into Roanoke to get some charts blown up on poster board for my volunteer organization but figured I could put it off until today to get it done. So I said sure... I'd be home all day. Well at 6 pm I still hadn't seen anyone and I never got a phone call to reschedule. It irks me to no end that people have so little concern about following through on promises or to at least call when they can't deliver. Well today I have no choice but to go out as I am running out of time to get these charts made and delivered. I imagine I'll be gone when they do actually show up and they will probably leave me a rude little note asking where I was!!

So while I was waiting around all day...I also got my house dusted and vacuumed, my dresser drawers in the bedroom cleaned out (not organized...but the junk is gone) and I sorted out all of my hanging clothes in the closet. I have two piles of clothes to get rid of now...one of things that are past their prime, sweaters that have pilled, shirts with snags or runs in the fabric and such and another pile of very nice office quality clothes that have been gently used but still look brand new. I'm not sure if I want to just drop these off at the Goodwill or try to Freecycle them.

MR has had a rough week with her teeth. Her top two teeth are trying to cut through now and she has been very fussy over it. She'll be playing fine for a few minutes then her little face will get all puckered up...and she'll do this pitiful little whiny cry. I'll give her some snuggles for a minute or so and then she's ready to play again...not too bad until after the 10th time in 2 hours!! Ahh the joys of being a mom. It might be inconvenient....but I still wouldn't trade it for anything.

Back on Track

2007-09-24T10:13:00.000-04:00

Today has gone well. TD got on the road this morning before 7am and will be gone until Wednesday night or Thursday, depending on how the job goes. MR and I were up at 7 and jumped into our day. I had some lingering laundry, the kind you forgot you had in the dryer, and some dirty work clothes from the weekend to deal with before I could start on washing the regular bedsheets and mattress pads. We also had the heating and air company out this morning to complete our regular 6 month service check-up and filter cleaning/changing. We had a whole house hepa filter system installed last spring and it has made a huge difference in the amount of dust that we don't see now. I also ordered some new all natural soaps from Sweet Hollow Farm. I chose the shampoo bar and the baby's breath soap bar. This is part of my attempt at moving our house away from icky chemical cleaners and such. We've already switched our Laundry Detergent, Dishwashing Powder and Counter Top Cleaners to all natural products. I've added links to the "good" products we use on the right hand links column. I'll write a review of these new soaps after they arrive and I've used them for a week or so.

I finished all of my Monday washing, finally, and got all of the carpeted rooms dusted. I also finished the Mission of the day which was to clear off the tops of all of my furniture in the Master Bedroom. The room already looks better...actually it looks a little empty. I need to find some decorations to go over the bed, the dressers and the doorways going into the bath and out into the hall. I'm thinking just some art prints in simple (but nice) frames and some pretty silk flowers and greenery. Sounds like a trip to Michael's craft store is in order and maybe do some yard selling or antique store hunting for some pretty glass or silver trays to hold candles and pocket items like keys and change.

And my ick factor for the day.... 3 giant nasty spiders in my basement! They met a swift end. Bugs and spiders are fine outside...I leave them alone...but the minute they come in my house....they become fly swatter targets.

Time to get back on track

2007-09-23T21:18:00.000-04:00

Ok..so last week was pretty much a disaster as far as blogging. I was without power for 3 to 4 hours each day on Wednesday and Thursday and then on Friday I had my MIL come by to visit and had my friend SF and her 3 children come to play with string and pegs. We all had a great time but the blog suffered some neglect. Oh well.. priorities.

Here's the run down of the days I missed.. Wednesday, electricians here but got most of the housework done, Thursday - pretty much the same thing but I did get the guest bedroom closet cleaned out and reorganized, which included taking 3 boxes of MR's outgrown clothes up to the attic, organizing all of my crafty gear and taking more outgrown MR gear, like the infant seat, up to the attic. Friday, MIL came to visit from about 12:30 to 4 and we had lots of good conversation about crafts, picture scanners, plans as MR grows, and all sorts of other stuff. SF and the kids were also here from 1:30 to around 3:00. MG worked on making an I-cord using some dyed handspun wool and a round knitting loom, EK worked on unwinding and rewinding several different types of yarn and helped with HR, HR kept me entertained while hotfooting it around the house, and SF explored weaving on the tri-loom with some navy acrylic. MR was intrigued with HR and kept squealing/growling (its an MR thing) at him. She keeps that up with the boys and I won't have to worry about the teenage years. After everyone left, I pretty much crashed for the day. Saturday was spent on the road visiting my parents, my Ma-Maw (father's mother), my Grandma (mother's mother) and my Great Aunt Ginny. MR did great during the trip although she wasn't real happy about sitting in the back seat by herself on the way home. TD and I picked up a basket of pictures that I'll hopefully be making into an attractive picture show DVD in honor of my Great Aunt Ginny and her husband's 50th anniversary. The pictures span their relationship from teenagers to today. Today TD mulched up a pile of leaves that was left over from last years leaf fall, and then spread the mulch on our blueberry bushes and I mowed and bagged the leaves out of the front and back yards and added the clippings to our new compost pile. We're letting the old one sit over the winter with no more additions in the hope that we can use it to make our raised garden beds with next spring. We also visited briefly with our neighbors from next door. They have another grandbaby due in November, just 2 days past MR's 1 year b-day.

Ok..so that catches us up...during the coming week I'll post any pics that I had from this past week as I have time. TD is on the road most of this week so I'll try to get some more work done on my neglected craft projects in the evenings.

Tomorrow starts a new cleaning area - zone 4, the master bedroom and bathroom. This area isn't too much of a challenge for me, I don't like a cluttered up sleeping space, but I will spend some time cleaning out my bathroom vanity and... uhhgg... my closet. I have clothes in there that I know I don't like, know don't fit and know aren't really decent to wear out anywhere...and yet I've been holding on to them forever! That will end this week!!

Oh and dinner tonight was Zingy Lemon Chicken Pasta with steamed mixed veggies.

Busy, busy, busy

2007-09-18T21:03:00.000-04:00

We had another very full day here at the homestead. The electricians arrived about 8 am and promptly began tearing up my house, literally. They had to drill holes in my ceiling in all of the bedrooms and the hall to install new smoke detectors. Yes we had smoke detectors already, but the new ones are special. The are all linked together, including one in the basement, on a single electrical circuit so that if one goes off, they all go off. They also installed GFIs (Ground Fault Interrupters) in the kitchen. These things were all safety measures required to bring our house up to code in order to upgrade our existing service to a 400 amp service. After tearing up the top floor they moved to the basement and drilled lots of holes in our basement walls. Very noisy business. Drilling through brick and cement block takes a lot of time, makes a big mess and probably rattled the windows in our neighbors houses. But we now have a new meter box hanging outside and two new panel boxes inside. Tomorrow I believe they will begin moving the circuits on the old panel to the new ones and may put in the 100 amp breaker in the garage. Great..more drilling and drywall dust.

Now while all this was going on I also got a visit from our fence builder. We walked what will be the fence line of the new pasture and talked about gate sizes and placements. MR, not being able to take her normal morning nap due to all the noise in the house, was snuggled into the Mojo baby sling while we were walking and finally fell off the sleep once we got back to the house and were standing around talking. The fence guy and his wife have a two and a half year old son and we were exchanging kids stories and general thoughts on how kids change our lives, for the better. Unfortunately for us, he is very busy and won't be able to start on our project until sometime in November... ahh well.. thats what happens when someone is good at their job...they get lots of work.

Later that afternoon our plumbing contractor also came over to look at the fixtures that TD and I had picked out and they layout that we wanted for the new bathroom. Well we passed the bathroom remodel test with flying colors. The plumbing contractor was impressed and I only had 3 things I had to add to my list of stuff to purchase, a second shower ring support, shut off valves for the tub supply lines and a trap for the new sink (only because our design leaves it exposed so I need to get a chrome finished one instead of the PVC one the contractor would have provided). We have not made an official start date on this project since we want to order all of our supplies and make sure they are correct when they arrive before we start tearing out our bathroom.

Just as the plumbing guy was leaving, the guy from 84 lumber called me with the pricing for our barn lumber and fastener needs (in case we decide to build this thing ourselves or with some family help). The cost of 84's materials was 1/3 of what local lumber yard wanted for their materials and construction. Hmmm... interesting. I was expecting more of a 50/50 labor and material cost split. So I plan on visiting again with the lumber yard next week to get some different pricing schemes from them...materials only price, and materials, concrete, footers and roofing with us finishing it from that point price.

After that, MR and I made a quick run to the grocery store for diapers and a couple of food items. I'm starting to think about cloth diapers again...I'm tired of dropping $13-$15 on a pack of diapers that lasts 2 weeks or less each time I buy them.

Housework today was sporadic at best. Got my bath towels, kitchen towels and baby bibs washed. Dusted and swept all of my hard surface floors and did some organizing work in the guest bedroom but I have a long way to go there. Tomorrow I'll work on the dresser in that room. It has some of my crafting stuff in the top drawers and some of MR's clothing in the bottom 3 drawers. I'll also get the windows wiped down and under the bed cleaned. Wednesday is usually my mopping day, and I will probably get the bathrooms done...but I don't see much point in doing the kitchen since the contractors will be in and out most of the day. Tomorrows Mission is supposed to be to clean out the Medicine Cabinet...however I don't have a cabinet...I have a closet. It has everything from my vacuum to eye drops in there...vacuum on the floor and everything else on shelves of course... but its a lot bigger than just a cabinet...so I may just try for getting one shelf organized to hold just medicines, bandages, sunscreen and such.

Oh well thats tomorrow..time to rest and answer some emails tonight before heading off to sleep.

Back to Work

2007-09-17T08:12:00.000-04:00

Well its Monday again, and boy am I tired. We had such a productive weekend. I've already posted about Saturday's adventures but we also went out that night and enjoyed a wonderful dinner at Grace's Pizza with our friends B and ML. We used this as an opportunity to try out MR's new booster seat. Yes, the wonderful Bumbo has been retired.
MR has finally just gotten too big for it and was ready for a chair with a tray. She really enjoys feeding herself, melon, green peas and cheerios are some favorite finger foods right now. Here she is enjoying lunch with us on Sunday.

Speaking of Sunday, we put down more grass seed, although this time in the yard, where the trucks and tractors have torn it up going in and out to work on the pasture. We also put up a temporary fence section in the backyard fence line and hauled more rocks out of the pasture and into the drain ways to keep the dirt where it belongs. We had to take the gate and four posts out of the woven wire fence line to allow space for removing the trees and the comings and goings of all the equipment while building the pasture. So now that we've closed that in with some T-posts and welded wire, the dogs have access to both the front and back yards. They both seemed to really enjoy having the extra space to run around yesterday. We also spent some time doing general clean up around the house. We raked up the last of the bark and limb scraps that had accumulated in the yard while the trees were being hauled out and
we raked up a bunch of old leaves that had piled up under the deck.

This week is going to be interesting. We have the electrical contractor coming out this week to upgrade our electric service in the house from 200amps to 400amps. This is quite a process since this old house has to be brought up to code in order to make the change, including putting in a new smoke detector system throughout the house, changing out receptacles in the kitchen and along the outside of the house and relocating the house panel in the basement. Right now the panel box sits over top of the laundry sink.. hmm water and electricity...not a good combination. We're also having a separate panel placed in the garage for TD's shop and running a line out to where the barn will be in order to have power available there. Finally we will be having the service cable that runs from the power pole in the front yard to the house buried so that we don't have a power line drooping across our driveway. We've had some close calls with that cable and the pasture equipment. All of this is supposed to take four days, Tuesday through Friday.

And of course while all of this is happening, MR and I will be attempting to get our regular cleaning done too. Todays tasks are washing sheets and blankets, dusting and vacuuming the carpeted rooms and starting on the Zone 3 cleaning list. This list is huge but after tweaking it to better reflect our room set ups...its not too bad. Its still huge..but hopefully manageable.

Dinner tonight will be roasted vegetable cheddar soup with bread and salad.

Here we go!

Building a Pasture

2007-09-15T09:26:00.000-04:00

Today will be our first attempt at building a pasture from scratch. TD went out early this morning to several of the local farm supply stores to buy a shoulder harness seed spreader and mud boots for both of us. Why mud boots? Well after having had no real rain for months on end we got plenty yesterday. Here you can see the water sitting on our front yard in giant puddles.

Our local southern states recommended a 3 to 1 mix of fescue and rye for the field. We just hope that the seed will germinate well...its getting a little late in the summer for seeding. But we have to try something. Looking at our local weather we aren't supposed to get any more significant rain in the next 10 days. Hmm..not sure if thats good or bad. Good since our seed won't get washed down into the ditch...bad if there isn't enough moisture in the ground now to get the grass growing.

MR and I did make it out to 84 Lumber yesterday, in the pouring rain. Thankfully it was warm. I spoke briefly with the sales guy there as we looked over the barn plan we are wanting to use with a few adjustments. We should hear back early next week with their lumber pricing. Then I can go to our local lumber yard and compare prices.

House wise MR and I got the rest of our weekly cleaning done as well as the laundry. Then we had a little fun when TD got home. Here is MR with her first "horse". This is Gaidin, our 80lb German Shepherd Dog mix who has the most gentle disposition. He graciously puts up with all of MR's pulls, pinches, smacks and scratches without so much as a yip.

Finally Friday

2007-09-14T10:35:00.000-04:00

Wow what a busy week MR and I have had and next week doesn't look like its going to slow down any. More on that later once I hear back from some emails I've sent out this morning.

So, what did I get done yesterday.. actually we did pretty good. Got my wraps and baggie drawers cleaned out and organized, went Grocery Shopping, washed the windows in the kitchen and the light fixtures too, called the fence guy and left him a message about scheduling our job and the rest of the time I spent hanging out with MR.

Grocery shopping was a lot of fun. We went to the Fresh Market in Roanoke where they have the most wonderful produce, fish counter, butcher and deli. I go in there and just want to eat everything!! MR and I spent quite a bit of time in there. Each time I picked out a fruit or veggie for the cart I let MR hold it while I got a bag ready for it. I would tell her the name of the item a few times and then move on to the next thing. People looked at me a little strangely but oh well. She had a good time touching and smelling all of the goodies. We even snacked on some sliced ham at the deli while we were waiting for our sandwich meat order. I love getting my meats there. I make a list of the types and amounts that I want then hand it to the butcher. He goes to each item, shows me a couple that match what I'm looking for and I get to pick which cut I like best then I get them all in neatly wrapped individual brown butcher paper packages. Oh so lovely. When your food looks this nice, cooking it is something you look forward too.

Speaking of food...tonight's dinner is teriyaki steak kabobs with veggies, also found at Fresh Markets butcher counter. Its raining right now so I'll probably broil them in the oven rather than grill them outside on the BBQ which is what we normally do.

Lets see...today's agenda, contact the plumbing and electrical companies about job schedules. Laundry - socks, t-shirts and such, the Mission of the day - check kitchen cleaning supplies and purge nasty dish rags and sponges, and the last of the Zone Cleaning - straightening my cabinets. After lunch I also plan on going over to 84 Lumber to check on their barn plans and packages, but we'll have to see how bad the rain is...this might get rescheduled yet again.

Friday is also my mini-job day... I send out any mail I have, clean the laundry room - just dust off the tops of the washer and dryer, then sweep the floor, clean out my purse and MR's diaper bag, and put any stray paperwork together that needs to be filed away or shredded.

So thats whats happening around here today.

Morning Musings

2007-09-13T07:23:00.000-04:00

I just read back though my post from last night and realized that I may have been a little too optimistic in what I thought I could accomplish today. One trip out to the grocery store is probably going to be enough for MR and I today. I doubt she would also suffer a second trip to 84 Lumber while I looked over barn designs and talked money. So maybe we'll save that trip for tomorrow.

Today's modified goals: Grocery shopping, de-cluttering my plastic wrap and sandwich bag drawers, Scrub the tub, and wipe down the kitchen windows and light fixtures. Calls to make include Dr.'s appointment for both MR and I, just check ups, and hopefully scheduling our fence job.

Dinner tonight: Pasta with Salmon Cream Sauce, salad and bread

Now for some pictures of the barn pad construction yesterday and the finished product.

Starting to cut in the pad area.. lots of dirt being moved

Here the pad is mostly cut into the bank and now its being leveled and a drainage route being carved in.

The giant pile of dirt that was spread out to extend the width of the pad.

And finally two shots of the finished product, one from each side. You can see our neighbor's shed in the first one. He's planning on putting in a big garden plot behind it next year for melons and such. He never had enough sun back there to grow much of anything before we had our trees taken down. Yay!, for keeping the neighbors happy while getting all this work done. Good neighbors are important out here in the country.

Day in Review

2007-09-12T20:40:00.000-04:00

The barn pad is now done and the bull dozer is sitting in the front yard awaiting pick up tomorrow morning. I got busy with cleaning and dinner and didn't get out to get pictures of the finished product before it got dark. I'll run out for a finale picture in the morning and post it then. So now its on to fencing and barns. We got our first quote on the barn today from a local lumber yard about 5 miles away. OUCH! However, TD says that the price, which works out to about $40 a square foot for the enclosed area is actually good. But I'll be going to 84 Lumber tomorrow to talk shop with them for awhile and compare plans and prices. I'll also call Darrell, our fence guy tomorrow to let him know we are ready for the next installment of posts and wire. He did a bang up job on our fencing last year so we are happy to have him back again. This weekend we'll be going to Lowe's for lots of grass seed to cover our current field of dirt and rocks, lots and lots of rocks.

But inside the house today MR and I did pretty well.. got the fridge cleaned out, the kitchen and guest bath mopped, menu planned for next week and my grocery list written out. But I didn't make it around to scrubbing the guest bathtub or washing the kitchen windows and light fixtures. I'll try to get the tub scrubbed tomorrow morning after a bath for MR, and finish the kitchen stuff while dinner is cooking.

Now though... I'm going to relax by working on the baby quilt for awhile. I'll try to get a picture of my progress on that up tomorrow as well.

Wednesday Plans

2007-09-12T08:59:00.000-04:00

Excavation continues today with a focus on the barn pad. I'll try to get more progress pictures up tonight. My house plans today are to mop the kitchen and baths and to scrub the guest bathtub. MR is the only one who uses the tub so it shouldn't be too hard to clean up. I'll also be emptying out and scrubbing the inside of the refrigerator today and purging any, too old, yucky or won't ever use stuff from the fridge. After that I'll plan my dinner menus for the weekend and beginning of next week and make my grocery list from them. Finally I'll wash down the kitchen windows and light fixtures.

Dinner tonight: chunky pasta with black bean salsa and cherry tomatoes with a salad on the side.

Time to get moving!

Tupperware Transformation

2007-09-12T08:16:00.000-04:00

Yesterday I organized my Tupperware stash. Here's what it looked like to start with.

And here is the end result.

Now, admittedly this is pretty boring stuff...but what I really wanted to share is what I removed from this shelf other than the container mess. We are the fourth family to reside in this house and we are slowly making adjustments and updates to what was here when we moved in. Here is one example. Take a look at this picture of the empty shelf before reorganizing. Have you ever seen so many cup hooks!!

It took almost a half an hour to remove them all...but in the end we have 32!!! cup hooks and one sore wrist from unscrewing them all.

Amazing Transformation

2007-09-11T15:49:00.001-04:00

What a change from yesterday. Today has been productive and smooth sailing. I'll get through the housework stuff first... Accomplishments today - Laundry - towels and such, Vacuuming- all the hard surface floors, Oven Cleaned, Stove Cleaned, and the yucky Stove Vent Hood thingy cleaned. That was pretty gross. Got my kitchen counters and cabinets scrubbed, although this wasn't much of a job. My counters and cabinets are white so I try to check for spatters and spills every night when I clean up from dinner.

Speaking of dinner...tonight is Boneless Roast Pork Loin, Lima Beans and Rice with a Green Salad. Pork couldn't be easier.. pre-heat oven to 350... sprinkle the roast with salt, pepper and thyme, cook pork fat side up for 25 minutes for each pound or to 165 degrees internal temp. About 20 minutes before the roast is done..put on a glaze of 1/4 cup apple jelly/butter, tsp vinegar, tsp brown mustard, and a quarter tsp of ground ginger. Important.. once the roast is finished cooking...take it out of the oven and wrap it in aluminum foil for 10 to 15 minutes... makes your roast nice and juicy.

Now on to the good stuff...the new pasture.

Well here's what it looked like 3 months ago... and this is one of our four legged critters checking out the apple trees in the back yard.

During the months of July and August we had all of the trees cut and taken out for lumber and firewood. We were able to trade the work for the wood with a local guy. Here is the pasture area after all of the trees were removed and the excavator was just starting to push away all the limbs and brush. What a mess.

And here is the result at the end of today.

The field looks short and flat here...but believe me its not...here are a couple photos to show you the slope of the field. This one is from one side looking over to the other side. To give you an idea of the size of the field...take a look at the right side of the picture. You can just make out the bull dozer. You can also get an idea for how tall the trees are too. They are huge!!!

And this one is from the bottom looking up to the house.

And finally... a detailed look at our Mountain-O-Mess. Thankfully the barn will hide this view from the house.

Terrific Tuesday

2007-09-11T08:51:00.000-04:00

The excavation has started! TD and I went back and forth about what to do with the tree limbs and stumps....pile them and let them decay and have to look at them for a couple years..or pile them and burn them. We decided to let them decay. The risks of starting a brush fire and endangering our own and our neighbors homes as well was just too great...not to mention the mess all that smoke and ash would cause. So while the bottom of our pasture won't be all that attractive for some time to come, I console myself by saying I'm creating great habitat for snakes, lizards, toads, birds, chipmunks and squirrels. I'm just fine with that.

Our schedule looks to be back on track, I was able to get up and get ready about 30 minutes before MR and she woke up on time this morning. Whats on the agenda today? Washing bath towels, bath rugs, kitchen towels and MR bibs and face wipes, in our house this only makes for one washing load. Purging and organizing my tupperware and other plastic containers. Dusting my rooms with hardwood and tile floors. Vacuuming those same rooms. Continuing with Zone 2 cleaning. And my regular daily cleaning.

So off we go!

Day in Review...the Mania Continues

2007-09-10T10:26:00.000-04:00

Uhhgg.. This day just didn't go right... Maddie woke up over an hour later than normal, which I think started our down hill spiral. Then she didn't go down for her "morning" nap until almost noon, two and a half hours late. And some how while laying down trying to get her to sleep..I fell right asleep along with her. So I missed my usual one to two hour cleaning window. We woke up and had lunch at 2:00. So at 3:00 I had to re-evaluate my to-do list for the day. Priorities...play time with MR, getting the bed sets washed and replaced and vacuuming the carpets. But somehow I was able to get through all of my daily routine stuff, complete the Kelly's Mission of the day (Flylady ref.) which was to clean off the sides and top of the fridge and get the microwave done, but the rest of the Zone Cleaning was axed. I also made the executive decision to have a frozen pizza for dinner since it was after 5:00 before Maddie went down for her afternoon nap.

But here are the things that made me smile today:

1. This fun link from Home Living - ah the froo-frooness of an afternoon tea. What fun it would be to have a regular High Tea somewhere with the pretty dresses, silly hats, and little cucumber sandwiches. Hmm...now where could I put a cute little round tea table.....

2. The excavators are here!! Due to the terrible drought we've had this summer, we are over a month behind on our barn project. I'm so glad we're starting to move ahead now.

3. My clean refrigerator...the outside anyway.

4. Wearing my bright pink cleaning gloves while doing house work. Pink is so much better than the yellow ones.

5. My clean microwave...inside and out.

6. Coffee, Coffee, Coffee

Just another manic Monday

2007-09-10T08:08:00.000-04:00

Wow what a morning so far. I had TD wake me up early this morning, about 6:45, so that I could shower and dress and look half decent before 7:00 am since we were expecting our excavator to arrive today with his equipment. Well getting up early would have been fine, except that MR had a very long night last night and I didn't end up falling asleep until well after 1:00 am. As it is, she is still sleeping soundly while I am downing coffee in an attempt to be functional. MR is almost 10 months old now and is cutting in her top front teeth. Night times around here right now are unpredictable at best.

But, moving on... It was a very good thing that I was ready early this morning as Mr. Cundiff, the excavator, and his two sons were here with a tractor trailer carrying a very large bull dozer by 7:30 am. Those guys definitely know what they are doing. In less than 15 minutes, they had the tractor and trailer backed in (not an easy feat at our house) and the bull dozer unloaded and pulled into the back yard. They will start the actual work tomorrow.

So now that the equipment excitement has passed, time to get on with the rest of the day. Mondays are for washing sheets, and dusting and vacuuming my carpeted rooms. I'll also be working in Zone 2 today. This is part of the Fly Lady system in case you were wondering what in the world Zone 2 is. www.flylady.net I've just restarted this program so we'll see how well it fits with our days and I'll tweak it as needed. After I've gone through the system for awhile I'll post more about my routines and weekly activities.

Current Project Pictures

2007-09-09T21:34:00.000-04:00

Here is the baby quilt in its current state. Its only the quilt top right now..and thats certainly not done. The quilt is for my neighbor who is due any day now..so much left to do and so little time. I'll try to get something done on it Monday during my first "break", also known as the baby's afternoon nap.

This is the cable scarf I'm also working on now. My intention is to combine this with a hat and set of mittens in the same yarn as a Christmas present for my sister. This is my first attempt at anything knitted with cables and so far I have to say I love it. This pattern is reversible with 3 cables on the front and 2 cables on the back. Here is the same scarf viewed from the back. I have a small error on the bottom left corner. Hopefully I'll be able to anchor that loose stitch with the yarn tail when I weave it in.

So here's the plan...my afternoon break will be for working on the baby quilt and I'll work on the scarf tonight during TV time.

Home Work

2007-09-07T15:27:00.000-04:00

Home work, house keeping, home making, there are so many terms but they all mean the same thing...take a box of brick and wood and make it into a place people WANT to live and WANT to spend time. Why is want stressed? Because we all need to live somewhere but when you delight in returning home at the end of the day, when you can have friends and family over on a whim and your home makes you feel relaxed, healthy, safe, and comfortable...then you WANT to live in this place. But how do you create this space without becoming a slave to it? Thats what I'm trying to do...balance the care and maintenance of a home without neglecting the care and maintenance of the people who live there, my husband, our daughter and myself.

So lets jump right in...see my next post for current craft projects. I'll try to get pics of the house and farm projects up soon too.