Category: Normal Life Updates

The First Snow That Sticks

Every year around this time we get a snowfall that puts a base down for the winter and will not vanish off again till spring. That is likely what’s falling outside right now. Our youngest and I went out to walk the dogs early this evening and it was raining, and windy, with temps that were quite bearable. I doubt I would have needed a coat if not for the wind and rain. I looked out the back door about ten minutes after we came in and there was a good inch of snow down! It has been falling since, and there is probably four inches down now, or more.

I have been listening to emergency dispatch for the county, where I have got a play by play of troublesome roads on the north end of the county with hills and slick roads stranding drivers who need chains to get up them. At one point someone called for any farmers with tractors to come help! Unfortunately, a house fire call out has also gone out; a direct reminder that nothing should be taken for granted.

We never know what tomorrow will bring. We can do all we can to be prepared, but as recent events have shown, we prepare for whatever may come, and then find out we readied all the wrong things, such as when Covid hit, and all the stores ran out of toilette paper. I am in the middle of a part of America where preparedness is constantly urged, and even here there was a total runout of TP! I guess nobody had long term stocks in their pantries.

I have a cold right now, and it was a lot for me to muster working the tarp back down over the hay today, to try to secure it against winds that had blown it loose. After that, I was knackered! I am reminded why a certain vigilance is maintained at a constant and consistent level, because we never know when a double blow will strike at us.

A look at the weather radar map shows the “atmospheric river” is pushing a lot of water right at us from Southern California. I think we can expect a lot more snow on the ground by morning. It’s nearing 11PM now, and hopefully the traffic situation will quiet down, and Emergency Services won’t have to be pushed by heavy traffic trying to get through heavy snowfall.

Maybe, just maybe, the snow will help button the tarp down on top of the hay, too.

Emptied the Trailer

Yesterday was momentous! I got the trailer hooked up to the truck and went down to the thrift store, only to remember then that the thrift store here is not open on a Monday. I wasn’t going to waste the time or the fuel, so I went over to the salvage yard and began sorting the stuff in the trailer onto the ground there for the big electromagnet to pick up and put to use in something new. One that was done, I went to the dump to take care of the rest of what could go from the bottom deck of the trailer! When I was done, there were only a very few items left that I knew Missus wanted saved, and that I was not quite ready to throw out myself. After I got home, I rested from the chores a bit, then took out those few items, and emptied the trailer out once and for all!

Why is this momentous, you may ask? Well, the trailer deck is much lower than the truck bed, AND the trailer has a ramp leading into it! This is something worth everything when one is loading in firewood! It has been tied up with this load of ‘not sure what to do with it’ stuff for ages now, and with this done, I can now easily get firewood (as compared to hefting the wood into the bed of the truck) as well as get more if I should decide to heft wood into the bed of the truck. I might have to plan a trip to fetch wood this week! It would be good to top off against what we have used this year so far and it never hurts to pile up against next year. With our plans in flux and the hot summer we had, this year did not see the accumulation that I wanted, but it is still not too late. On top of that, I need to get wood that will be ready to turn on the lathe come warmer weather, or when I can get the shop heater cleared away from for burning.

The dogs left only one bomb overnight yesterday morning, and I got ahead of them and thought that we may be onto getting them trained to go outside only. Then yesterday evening, they spotted over four places and left two bombs. So much for progress! So when I woke up at 4AM this morning I got up soon after and stayed up to be ready when they woke, that way I could walk them straight away, and probably a couple of times (as it is still early now) to try to get them out enough to not have excuses to mess. You ever have such things running around making noises, and sometimes walking by sniffing as they go? It does not help one’s trust. I feel like the dad in some sitcom, or worse, in A Christmas Story as he looks over his newspaper to have just missed the neighbor’s dogs running through his living room on the way to the Turkey in the kitchen. What’s that smell? My imagination? Good! Incidentally, they spotted once that I could tell, but did not bomb overnight last night! Good doggies! I think it might be progress of a sort.

Yard Rearrangement

Today was pretty warm for the second day of December. It was so nice that I went out and worked on rearranging the garden spaces to ready them for next year. If we are staying here, we are going to change some things around. one specific change will be to put a driveway around the west side of the property to give better access to the shed/barn and make it more usable than it currently is. The drive will come around back, and back out the center drive, or when entering through the center, should allow the trailer to back easily up to the barn, then exit through the west gate. It is not as garden focused, but it will allow us to raise animals and hopefully grow flowers for Missus. The goal will be to grow less food and more creative material.

I’d like to have the llamas moved soon. There is little feed left, and it would be great to get the girls over this side of the street and allow the males and the horse to roam the entire field. If it stays as warm and dry as it has been, there should be no problem for them to access the grass on the back pasture.

I wanted to get the goats up to the front pen ready for sale, but I had a plenty busy day today, and have not got to it. I split one of the llama pens, removed several metal posts and almost as many well placed in wood posts. We used a high lift jack to pull everything out. It was a good chance for our youngest to help out and show off how strong she is!

I think there will be better parking for the trailers we have. The barn will have the garden tools in it, along with some other things. I’d like to say we will be growing things across the street, but the irrigation shares are currently $9,000 each. WE could do with ten shares, if we are to look into the future to when the canal goes underground, which may be within the next two to three years, as I have heard it on the grapevine. It will be cheaper to drill a well!

Our two dogs are training to use the outdoors to go to the bathroom. It is not going perfectly, but they are getting the picture. It’s not bad for their age. We are using the orchard as a space to walk them in. Speaking of walking the dogs, it is almost bedtime, and it is time to walk them now.

Good Morning Wednesday

This week I have been bopping about on the place, doing different things, but never journaling any of them. So here’s a quick recap!

One of the best parts of any week is when grandson comes by with his dad. But when he was here yesterday, I realized that the toilette seat I bought so he could use our potty like a big boy was still in the back of the car. I ran out, got it, and showed him the box, and then opened it and showed him the inside. Finally I let him sit on it on a chair to see for sure what it was for, not to use, obviously. Then I promised him it would be on by the next time he visits. So I did that a little after he left. That’s the high part of the past few days!

There has been rain. We have been on the receiving end of all that rain that went through California earlier this week. It’s never rained hard or been very windy, but I did get new tarps to cover hay and to cover the firewood. I also got a handful of stretchy cords to hold things down, too. This weather may be a fluke, but there is the possibility that with La Nina setting up, and the jet stream waving north and south, we may have a pretty wintery winter. While it is always fun to see what happens, it is always better to be ready for it!

My light arrived for my lathe yesterday. The box was destroyed, the light was damaged, and pieces were missing. It seems like it would be a great light, bright, color changing. It’s real nice other than it looking like they mailed me out a customer return. I sent an e-mail to the shop I bought it through, and they said they usually get back in one to three days. I see…

I turned a couple of whistles on the lathe yesterday to see what I could come up with, and if Missus would like me to keep going at them to put on the Christmas tree and pass out during Christmas as noise-makers. She liked them. I’ll see if I can get them looking seasonable for the holiday. Yesterday was about making shapes, and putting lines around them using the welding wire I picked up this week. Burning the lines in is pretty neat. I have beeswax on order, set to arrive by Friday, I think. Maybe that will make a lovely finish to the whistles? Maybe it will taste nasty.

Those are the real highs of the week. The other is of course the unspoken of hum of happiness that is raising family and being together. I joined the girls in watching the original Star Wars Trilogy. They are carrying on with homeschool. Missus is still working from home. I make her breakfasts and keep her supplied on nutrients and caffeine as needed. I am preparing for winter. There is always a lot to do on that score. I have negotiated our hay for the winter, and will have to get it delivered soon. Aside from that, I try to sneak off to the lathe as I can to get to know it better, and how it works, and how to use the different tools I have. It is a challenge, but lots of fun!

Today’s Been Cool

With a cool day on us, I took it fairly easy today. I did a run to the dump to drop off some boxes and junk that needed to part ways with us, then ran to the store a moment. After that, it was home again, and lunch and then the girls had class and I took off out back to sort out something.

We have a bunch of really ratty old windows from the 80’s, aluminum frames and double panes with massive water stains between them. They were beyond hope, and beyond ugly. Not worth putting to use anywhere, even a greenhouse. So, I shot them. My youngest wanted to be out there to watch it happen. Well, I have a fairly powerful pellet gun for sorting out predators that can’t be sorted out any other way, and I know better than to foolishly have a kid running around while shooting. So I took care of breaking out the glass from the aluminum frames with the pellet gun while my youngest was in class. I still have not told her, either. Most of it was tempered glass, but there were two panes from large old sliding doors that would not break, and the shot unexpectedly ricocheted off it like one in an old west movie. I was glad she was not there for that! I’ll clean up the glass tomorrow and get the aluminum up to the salvage yard soon.

I did some practice work in the woodshop tonight. I did some dovetails and I made a concealed mortice and tenon joint. They are rough, but they are better than my first attempts, and not as good as the next ones I will do.

The weather will be cooler tomorrow. I better go shut off the frost free hydrant so it does not get inclined to burst on us where the water is stopped in the water timer attached to it. No good having to fix a busted water pipe right now!

Autumn On Us

Autumn is here! The first part of Autumn till around Thanksgiving is one of my favorite times of the year. Spring is pretty good, too! The weather is casually gliding into the season now, with forecasts promising us perfect outdoor working temperatures all the wat through the next ten days! That’s what I love about the two seasons between the extremes here in Cache Valley.

Missus found a table loom on the local classified site with a floor stand included. She was happy with the price, and I certainly was not one to question it, with my only superficial knowledge of their costs. So when she did, I called on it and thinking it was at the south end of the valley began to negotiate picking it up before I realized it was more than two hours away! Luckily the lady selling it was instantly willing to meet me half way the other evening, and so I grabbed the girls and we jumped into the truck and headed out to Ogden, Utah.

So, Missus has now added a four shaft loom to her growing collection, and she stays busy learning what she needs to know before she puts a warp on it. In the meantime she has put a warp on her little loom (about a foot wide) and is using up scraps on it, and has begun a fantastic looking project on it that admittedly may end up a dish cloth. I am just thrilled to see her getting into a hobby that she is enjoying, that will produce results from our llamas, and that she is getting fully tooled up for to work end to end. She has the llamas, the shears and the tools to prepare roving, spin it, and now weave it into something. That’s a long haul, and requires a lot! She has waited a long time to get set up to this point.

I have a couple of tools coming in the mail myself, one of which will be delivered today and will allow me to properly finish a dovetail joint made by hand. I do need to get a tool to let me properly copy and set up an angle on the dovetail, or even a dovetail set-up marker. Those will be soon, I’m sure. But for now, I have enough to at least practice some cuts, and with the results I got the other day, with inadequate tools and doing it my first time, I am confident I will be knocking out dovetails in no time. I’ll also be able to make box joints, too! I have the router setup to do all this, but it feels like a cheat, and there is a lot of setup which can go all wrong before I realize it has. I found I would rather do them by hand for now.

I want to make a pie safe. It won’t leave my mind. It is sitting in there, teasing me, and it wants me to include the elements of our convenience cabinet in it. That is to say, we would be able to hold foil, butcher paper, and cling film in the top and distribute it out from there as needed. I am also thinking of a pull out surface under the top to give extra workspace as needed in the kitchen. So, it would be a take on an old style piece of furniture, with some new twists.

The cabinet the oven mounted in is nearly done in the kitchen. I just need to make a drawer, and finish the trim work. I have today’s tool arrival to help with that, and one coming on Wednesday to finish it. We have used the oven once to make cookies, and they came out baked well, and evenly, which is about all we really want an oven to do, so that’s great. Moving the microwave up two inches to accommodate the space for a new drawer in that space has not caused any trouble for anyone in the family since I put it there, so that is good.

The only question for today is, will I work outside in the yard, or inside the shop? There are things to do in both!

Last Day of Summer

I received a report this morning that the last of the chickens in the goat pen is dead due to raccoon. I really liked that chicken, and am sad to know it. I will be out in a bit to feed the animals, and I’ll clean it up then.

I bought animal feed yesterday, with hopefully enough to get through October, apart from hay, which I won’t need for about three weeks or so from now. If so, this will be the cheapest month on record for us for years, ringing in at just under $100. With only two pigs left, and the animals still on the field, the cost is low for the moment, and will be till around November, when I need to get the livestock off the field and start feeding them hay.

With costs low for the moment, I am taking advantage of it and tooling up the workshop to be able to do some wood projects. I started last night making a drawer, complete with dovetail joints. There are a couple more tools coming to help me finish it. Starting it has helped me figure out what I still need, and what is hard to work with, and what will be easier. I want to be able to build a dresser by hand before say, November? Not that I need one. I want to be able to do it. I am really enjoying the hand tool odyssey. It is far less violent than power tools, and it is a lot quieter. It is helpful to make mistakes at a much slower pace, too. I buggered up my first dovetail, and fixed it because I did not want to redo all the other ones as well as it. All good lessons.

The drawer I am making will probably be used in the kitchen where we will soon be putting in a new oven, and I will reset the microwave box above it, leaving a space for a drawer above, below, or between them, which I figure will be great for holding the hot mitts and such, handy for the cooking appliances! There may be enough space when finalized for a second drawer, too, which might be good for stirring utensils and such. I will know for sure when Home Depot bothers to send me a notification to tell me the oven is in.

It was cold again this morning. We bottomed out at 28 degrees! And no, that is not Celsius! I have a fire going in the wood stove, and it is clear that it is time to replace the gasket around the door! I should probably pick that up when I am getting the oven and the wood to finish around it.

Autumn begins tomorrow at 1:20 PM. It is time to get serious about getting the firewood cut and stacked! Lucky I got dry wood in the spring when I was hunting it. It will be ready and fine to burn in a few weeks when we are really needing it to stay warm. The propane tank was filled yesterday. That was a costly thig to do! They charged over $400 for it! We only have a 360 gallon tank! Still, I would like to get both furnaces serviced this year, and running. That would probably be good for time to sell the house!

Listing Animals

We are listing animals for sale. I have the pot belly pigs listed, and someone has already said they would like to come pay for them tomorrow and pick them up on Saturday. I will be listing some of the goats soo too. We have a couple of llamas that will need to find new homes as well. Though they are old, or one that is young and needs to breed elsewhere because he is related to the girls we are keeping.

If the pigs do go, then we will lower our feed bill substantially, which is great! I welcome that. It is an expensive hobby to keep animals around for fun. Having some money free should allow us to focus in on other hobbies, too. We plan to get back into this animal business on the other side of a move.

This weekend we relaxed again. Missus has a lot of stress at work right now, and needs these weekends to come down from it a bit, and get her head back to Earth. We had our grandson by, too. That is always fun! We did comb the rabbits, and picked and carded some llama fiber.

This week coming will likely see us putting the new oven in, and hopefully getting that trailer in the front yard cleaned out and moved empty into the back. The weather should be cooler, so I really should get the chainsaws sorted and ready to cut some firewood down to size ready for splitting. I keep putting it off for cooler weather, so I won’t overheat doing it.

My spare time is spent looking for hand tools for woodworking. There are a few I want to get so I can get going on specific projects. There are a few specific tasks I would like to be able to do, and while some could be done with power tools, there is just no need for all the noise and danger of power tools for what I have in mind. It is getting time to order a new tool as soon as it is available from the tool maker, so I am getting excited, if you could not already tell. There is in fact one that I am getting when it is available no matter, even if I have to pay it on credit. It looks that useful. It is a tongue and groove router, and in my thinking, it is going to do a lot more than just allow lapping of wood panels. I see it for inserting backs, making drawers, and even making cabinet drawers with. We’ll see if I am right in only a few days after one comes available!

Missus has shown me a bobbin lace pillow that she likes, and I would love to be able to frame the wood pieces of it for her ready for her to put together the padding and cover. I think we can do this. I’ll need to get her some good wood, rather than doing it in pine and having it causing her troubles to do it being a softer, inferior wood to something like oak, which I think would hold pins for the cover much better.

So that’s where we are at on a Sunday night. The school week is about to start up again, and I have more than a few things to do this week, though none as stressful as helping little one through a meeting with her teacher, or getting her set up for testing, as we did last week!

Today Is A School Day

We are not busy today. But we are! Our youngest is in class this morning, then I have a meeting with her teacher this afternoon right after lunch, then youngling has a test that she has to do to see where her reading level is at the moment. Happily, I think she is doing better than she will admit to herself. Her trouble is, I think she realizes that when she admits to what she can do, and she tries a little harder to do it, she thinks she will have to work harder than she does right now. So today we are going to put in place some ideas to help move her along.

There are no plans for our older boy to come by with his son today. He might turn up on his own, but we don’t know and have no formal plan. Grandson will be over this weekend though, and that ought to be fun!

I have decided to commit to my hand tool workshop, and have a new scrub plane coming in the post today. Despite the status through package tracking indicating that it has been in the local city for the last three days, it looks like it is going to show up on the planned time, unless they drop it off with the post office to have them do the originally planned last mile delivery. Package delivery being the highest anxiety I have today, life is not bad.

The scrub plane is a roughing plane that helps get a piece of wood worked down to shape and size fast, as it removes a lot of material. I have had hits too that it can make a lovely rough finish, but I will have to see that when it comes.

Each payday, I plan on ordering one or two tools (depending on the combined price) and building up the workshop with tools needed to make some furniture. I want to be able in the end to cut down a tree and make a dressing table or chair from it with a relatively decent finish to it. All excess wood will go to the heating arrangement on the house. That’s the goal, anyhow. It is a motivator in moving, too, since I would greatly benefit by having a woodlot of several acres.

Well, I don’t like to talk specifically about my goals because that seems like a temptation for things to go wrong, but there we go. Braving the commitment and the possibility to failing and having to admit it is a lesson I need in my school today.

A Holiday Weekend

Today is the final day of Labor Day weekend. Summer as a school holiday is over. Next comes the real end of summer later this month, and autumn. It is time to start thinking about getting all that firewood chopped and any extra I might need for this year or next.

As for holiday time away, that is not something we do here on our farm. We don’t wish to burden any of our neighbors with watching our animals, nor our kid up in town. It is probably just a personal responsibility thing for us. But when we set up our next farm, I think we will be aiming to allow for a few days away at a time by setting up animals with water and feed access that we won’t have to worry about running out. The first step to that is reducing animals to ones that can be set out on pasture.

This weekend we did take a rest. We did very little in the way of any hard work, though I did get a honey-do list from Missus and am ready to tackle some new chores this coming week to further our readiness to move, should the land sell. I did mow the lawn, too. There were other various tasks I go to, but most of my weekend was spent with my feet up.