Summer Projects on Vacation

We arrived at Mom's a couple days ago. We didn't find anything worth reporting on the way down and then not much happening except getting started on the projects.

The first thing we did was trim back some tree branches in the front yard. Now you can actually see the flowers and the truck isn't getting whacked when we park it.

FabHub's main project for this trip is to paint the eaves and window trim. He started by pressure washing and scrubbing the eaves yesterday - and then he took the gutters off today. So he washed again.

Those oak leaves are hard on a house.

The only thing of note is that the ladder below is not very friendly. It is perfectly healthy ladder. It isn't any more wobbly than the day it was purchased, which really isn't saying much.

This ladder is fine for climbing on the roof as long as someone will hold it for you, but if you have to stand on it and scrub eaves or do something that your helper doesn't want to get covered in - well you might want to try something else.

Like the ladder below. It has several sizing options since the pieces slide together and it makes FabHub feel much safer, which is important.

Good news is the price wasn't bad and it fits in the back of the truck for easy transport back home so that we don't have to buy another one up there.

My project for this trip is two part - Part one is to stay out of FabHub's way unless he needs a ladder held or something. Other than that, he doesn't need any ideas of new ways to do things. Part two is to kill wood bees. I recently discovered there is a way to do some serious damage to those dumb bees and carpenter ants. I found the website www.carpenterbees.com and learned all about how those bugs makes their homes in wood and then I found out that the website's physical home is located about an hour from Mom's house. I also found out that one of the main ingredients in their product is permethrin. So I picked some up at the local lawn and garden store, but they didn't have the "puffer" to blow the powder in the bee holes. I tried another idea, but that didn't work so well. So I ended up just sprinkling the powder around the entrance hole of some carpenter ants in an oak tree and that stuff messed them up! I hate to be destructive to their little families, but they should leave us alone!

Since my "puffer" idea didn't work and we couldn't find one anywhere locally we took off for the website store. They had just what we needed. I got a puffer, some of their dust, and an additive for the paint that is supposed to keep bees away.

So here is me working on my project. Find bug hole, puff dust in, and see if anything comes out.

I used the lawn and garden powder in the yard and followed a wood bee to her home and gave them a shot. A few minutes later I went by to see what might have happened and the carnage was evident. There were eight adult bees in bad situations. They should have stayed in the woods.

We have a bad infestation of the bees at home too, so there is much dust puffing in my future.

In other non-bug and work news:

We went yard sale shopping this morning. There weren't many on a holiday weekend, but we found some stuff that we thought we needed.

Then we stopped in at the local 4th Celebration today, which is early, but allows us to go to another one tomorrow. They had a farmer's market and lots of things for kids to do. A band was playing some good music and a local guy was there with his smoked pulled pork for lunch. We might try that at our next picnic.

Now it is time for FabHub to take a nap and me to see about dinner.

Next up is a trip to another 4th party. See you later.

July Garden Update Number One

We have begun to enjoy vegetable from the garden! Some of them anyway. Some of them are not doing so well. It turns out that when my garden got its last freeze, so did the greenhouse from where we bought the replacement plants. Lesson learned. Thanks guy. The prices were right so we might go back, or I might start all my own stuff next time.

This is the first batch from the garden. A nice yellow squash, a red onion, and a kohlrabi that I started peeling before the picture. They were all delicious!

As for the garden itself, the top half is doing well.

The cabbage, squash, cucumbers, and marigolds are starting to fill out nicely.

The lower half of the garden - made up mostly of plants from the frozen greenhouse purchases - not doing so well. In fact the fertilizer I put on them seems to have overwhelmed some of the plants.

No close ups of those plants though. They would be completely embarrassed.

On a brighter note - FabHub's truck got some new Bling.

It is so tall we both got tired of the big step in, so we put rails on it. Mom and the nephew's kids like them too. The vent visors are so he can let some airflow without letting rain in and people can't really tell the windows are open when it is parked. The Lund tri-fold bed cover is so that we can get some "good" gas mileage on the road, he is still able to use the bed when he needs to since it folds open, and it is easy to remove if needed. We like that better than the hard shells or snap/velcro versions that are hard to replace in the winter time.

I hope he is done for a while!

Next up - we are on vacation and need to share some adventures. See you here later.

Spinners and the Stolen Lawn

We made a couple of additions to the garden this weekend. The beans needed something to climb so we added these old clothes line poles that I bought at a yard sale about a dozen years ago. They have been waiting patiently to be used. FabHub attached them to the raised bed frame and then strung cable between them. We had some old burlap like rope so that was used to give the plants something to hang on to. We haven't tried this before so we will see what happens.

Then we added the spinners as an attempt to confuse deer, birds, dogs, anything that wants to get near the garden. Here is a tip - try to buy something like the spinners that is "Made" to be in the garden and you might pay $3 or more for them. Go to the Dollar store toy section and you can find them with the handy extender sticks for $1.

Last Thursday, June 3rd, I came home to see my BIL had a mess on his lawn where he had mowed and left the cut grass in rows all over the place.

So, Friday, while he was at work I went down there and used the sweeper to "steal" his messy lawn. I wanted the cut grass to mulch the in-ground part of the garden. As you can see, he had plenty to share and didn't mind losing it at all.

Yes, I see the weeds popping through I will get them. By the way, BIL didn't even notice. He saw it was gone, but it rained after I finished and he thought the rain had knocked the grass down into the lawn. What he hasn't noticed yet is the two zucchini plants that I put in his garden. I just hope he doesn't try to give them back to me! I didn't think of that before!

Other than that everything is growing nicely. Thanks for visiting our garden.

Garden 2010

The garden is enduring another experiment. Last year we knew we were not going to be able to keep up with the garden, so I covered most of it in plastic to keep the weeds from taking over and to kill the weed seeds that I knew were there. This year we decided to cover it up again, but this time with some contractor grade weed block, with mulch on top of it, and switched the whole garden over to raised beds.

Before we got the first of the raised beds done FabHub planted some onions, kohlrabi, and cabbage in the ground. The first raised bed got banana peppers, yellow squash, and cucumbers. The second bed got tomatoes.

And then everything except the onions froze.

We had it all covered, but took the covers off before work. oh well. What can you do?

So we mostly started over again.

Now we are back to all the originals, plus some zucchini with the squash, basil with the tomatoes, beans got their own space, and more peppers and watermelon on the end. Mix in a whole bunch of flowers and this should be a really interesting picture in a few weeks.

The first two beds got "topsoil" from a local By the Scoop seller. I saw the hillside he was digging the dirt out of, not much Top to the middle of that hill. The dirt was about as poor as what I already have, but with fewer weed seeds.

The next two beds got bags of "topsoil" from Lowes. They had 40 pound bags for a price that wasn't much different from the By the Scoop place and of course since FabHub had his new big boy truck with us at the store we had to buy a whole pallet. It was a load and we didn't use all of the dirt, yet.

In an attempt to protect the raw wood I lined the boxes with more heavy duty weed block. I don't know if it will work, but I tried. I just really didn't want to use treated wood for food.

Just in case it ever stops raining, I created an irrigation system to get the most out of the hose when needed. Water comes in to the bottom of the first Y and up the left side PVC to water a row or box and then out the right side hose to the next bed. Repeat all the way to the end.

We are going to build two more boxes later. That will mean more dirt, more cutting up garden hose, and more plants.

I don't know if I will need that irrigation system with skies like this though.

But never forget that no matter the weather we can always dance among the flowers.

These buckets should be crazy in a few weeks too. Come back and check it out!

Latest Addition to BRSK Farm

I found this picture on my camera when I wanted to post the new baby calf.
This is FabHub and his sidekick delivering dinner to the cows. They look like a couple of gangsters don't they.
This on the other hand is the real gangster. Her name is Rasberry and she is a bit crazy. She has been running away from people since the day she arrived on the farm. We bought her at the market when she was already two months pregnant. We had no idea what kind of bull she was bred to and honestly we don't know what kind of mixed up cow she is either. Her face is Angus, her high waist line and the white belly are not, but that might be Limousin. We don't know.

What we do know is that the little black spot in front of Raspberry is her new baby - I call her Blackberry.

As soon as the guys got close enough to give her something to eat and tag the calf, Momma and the baby did a sprint out of the area.

They caught up with her and since the baby was kind of tired from the jog the only trouble they had was keeping an eye on Raspberry so she didn't knock them out of the way.

She kept a good eye on the process. Lucky for them it was a girl. A boy would be an additional procedure that might have taken too long for her patience. As soon as they were done Momma and baby where off again.
Blackberry is a pretty little thing. Not a drop of white on her. They are doing good now though they still aren't getting near the other cows. Raspberry doesn't trust anybody at all.

It Keeps Falling

Our yard has been snow covered since about December 19 2009.

WV does not normally stay snow covered. At least in my neighborhood. So what is the deal already. Ok, I know, everybody out there either has had it worse or has the same complaint.

This little frog dude wants to have his say though.Can anyone make it stop? Please? My skin is starting to wrinkle!

I decided the birds could use some of the food that I had stashed for them, but never seem to remember to put out. So yesterday I filled up the feeders and today the birds are working on emptying them.

These cardinals are enjoying the smorgasbord, which is a scandinavian word from my childhood. It means dinner is going to be Great! Here they have some safflower.

And this feeder has a mixture in it that the birds aren't cleaning up too quickly.

I figure it might have too much milo in or something they don't like as much as their preferred type of seeds

The weather might keep them from being so picky though. It is snowing again.

Here is a Downy Woodpecker trying out the Suet bar.

And here a little bird is on the finch feeder. I don't know if it is a Finich or not though.

This is a big bird we call a Roof Cleaner.

FabHub decided the roof of the side porch doesn't get enough sun to melt right, so he climbed up there to shovel the snow off. There was just a bit up there.

A few days before that he shoveled the snow off of the deck too. It really is insane around here.

You might even see the ice build up above the gutter. We keep taking down the hanging icecicles, but there isn't much we can do. The chimney runs through the attic space creating heat, which melts the roof and then the ice freezes on the eaves. If anyone has an idea of how to solve that I would listen... and then get FabHub thinking about it. :) After reading some it looks like more shoveling off of the roof would help, but then so would normal weather!

Well, that is the latest update. Take care everybody.

Done Deal

What did he do? FabHub bought himself a new truck. This is what happens when the schools are closed for days on end - he had too much time to think about it. Ended up emailing with a dealer at the Ford store and while I was working went down to "look" at what the guy was offering. He came home owning a truck he hadn't even seen yet since the one he wanted was still in Virginia.Saturday morning we went to pick it up and it is everything he wanted. Ford 250 Super Duty.
He is so happy he didn't even complain too much about getting his picture taken with it.

In case you didn't know what he was driving, we called it his school teacher car. We bought it before he started teaching expecting that he would be traveling the county doing some Substitute work before getting a full time position. He ended up getting a job immediately and it is only about 2 miles from the house.
That is the Taurus in front of the new truck. Somewhat different profile.
He is happy. And more snow is coming so he wanted pictures of it clean before we got on the road.

By the way, there won't be any Grand Adventure trips this year like we have done in the last couple of years. Unless you call riding in air conditioned comfort back and forth to the livestock market or running after pig feed an adventure. That will be nice though. Oh - and the old Dodge is still around to do the "dirty work" around the farm.

Anybody Had Enough Yet?

On my way home from work yesterday, the roads kept getting worse and worse. Then I finally made it into the garage and stood there for a minute watching great big wet flakes fall. Again, it was snowing.
This morning I got up and looked out to see a bunch more snow. It has been accumulating for days, but when the paths we use every day are filled in again in the morning - ARGH! That gate and the wire bundle are supposed to be 4 feet tall. They look to be about 20 inches under snow. The dog house is insulated with a thick blanket of snow, but Jake isn't getting near it until the temperature comes up some - and we can open the gate again.At least my frogs are staying warm under the snow pile.
This view is out the kitchen door. We probably need to shovel some of the snow off the deck.

You can kind of see the windmill in the back yard. The concrete Dutch kids are buried under about a foot of snow. I could see the tops of their heads the other day.

Further back in that picture you can see the cows.
They look like they have had enough.

Nothing to do but wait for someone to bring hay and follow their calves around in the snow.

Personally, I had enough. I didn't want to fight with it and stayed home today. Weenie I know. Oh well.

Winter Project - Outdoor

While we are working inside on the basement remodel - one of the neighbors seems to be busy working on his own projects in the yard.

This pile of sawdust is at the base of a pine tree in my backyard.
Here is the culprit. Mr. Woodpecker has been very busy.

Mrs. Woodpecker was watching him when I first went to get the camera, but she must have had some shopping to do - new curtains maybe?
Look how far he is in this hole!
If he keeps that up our summer project might be replacing some fence after this tree falls on it.

Winter Projects - Indoor

This winter we have taken on a huge remodeling project in our basement. There are three parts to it. The first was in November when we installed a heat pump to supplement our wood stove.

That means if the stove goes out if the temp in the house drops below 55 degrees the heat will kick on so that we don't get up or come home from work to a cold house. So far it hasn't run too much since we have also been working on the second part of our remodel. The insulation of the concrete block walls.

We don't have a moisture problem above the floor at all so we glued 1/2 polystyrene to the walls and then attached furring strips over that so that we could put moisture resistant dry wall on the inside of all that.

We have since had to back off on the amount of wood we are used to putting in the fire. Who knew there was that much cold air seeping through those block walls!

Another part of the second level project is to insulate the upper basement windows. When we built the house originally we believed the standard single pane window would be good enough. With this project we decided to make a change and put some glass blocks in those holes. You can see how deep the window ledge is with all the insulation, furring strip, and drywall inside the block.

We put a piece of marble under the blocks to create a level sill for the blocks and then filled the hole to the top. Light still gets in, cold air stays out.

The other addition is a mud room from the basement door. We added a wall and door to seperate the entrance. This will hopefully be a way to keep the dirty boots and wet coat odor in its own place.

After we got all that done a nice coat of "Pale Vista" paint lightened the whole place up. Next is finishing some interior walls so that we can get the ceiling tiles back up and then the floor needs to be figured out so we can get the furniture where it belongs.

We also need to get the trim around the windows so I can put the curtains back up and get the drywall out of the holes. These lower windows are at the perfect height for the winter sun to come right in under the porch and blind a person - if it isn't raining or snowing anyway.

Part three of the remodel will be putting a bathroom in the basement. The one big 7x40 foot laundry utility storage room is getting split into three pieces - laundry/utility room, bathroom, and storage room.

So that is where our winter project stands now. Later!

Winter Picture

Okay, one more post for today. I have to make a correction to all the winter posts that I have made so far this year. This weather keeps getting better and better, but when Winter makes you dress like this... you know there is real cold out there on the ridge. Most of the purpose for all the clothing is because feeding the cows takes place on an open tractor and 4x4 Gator. The layers really come in handy when the cows hide their calves in shelter that make them hard to find.

Christmas with Garrett

We had a pretty good Christmas in Georgia. Of everybody, Garrett did the best in the gift department, that would be expected of course. His pile is on the left and his mom's is on the right.

Mom likes having her picture taken when Garret is on her lap. FabHub doesn't even mind too much - and he is hard to catch in a lens. He can laugh at himself pretty easily too. He wanted new house shoes for Christmas. So my sister got him some.

Garrett likes to read too. I hope he keeps it up.

The craft project for Garrett's album finally finished. Mom and I took the cross stitch pattern and turned it into the front cover of an expandable album. He looks impressed doesn't he.

The cover turned out pretty good. It is meant to be expandable so the binding is not connected across the back so that left it a bit rough. I hope they are able to use it for years.

That was our holiday in Georgia.