Rain, welding, cleanup projects

We woke to rain this morning. It was forecast to rain so that was not necessarily a surprise. The surprise is that it is more than the forecast called for. Mama and I were praying that we would get a larger amount than was predicted because we desperately need a good soaking while the weather is warm enough for it to make a difference. The temperatures will be below freezing by Sunday night, but right now we are seeing temperatures in the 70’s. These warmer winter temperatures are not unusual for our area, but they are certainly enjoyable when we get them. The only downside is that some of the fruiting plants and trees see the warmer weather and start to bud out too soon. That delicate balancing act happens every year in the Spring, but for the weather to stay this warm through December is really confusing to our plants. On the bright side, we enjoy it and it certainly helps our bees to winter over.  Plus, with Mama spending the day in the open at Trade Days tomorrow, the warmer weather will be a real blessing. The rain will be over with early this morning according to the forecast. It sure makes our pig happy to have that much of her pen soaked and all the holes she has dug to be filled with water.

A week or more ago, I ordered an inexpensive auto darkening welding helmet. I got it a few days ago but because of the special services at church and more urgent items at the farm, I had not been able to get it out and look it over – much less test it out. Last night I was able to test it. I love it!. It will make my welding projects so much easier to accomplish. The welding helmet and goggles I have used over the years were giving me fits when I used them. Some would not stay in place on my head when I wore them. Some would fall down too far on my head as I was welding, blocking my view. Some were just too dark for me to see wat I was doing when I was using the wire welder.

I have not tried the helmet with the stick welder, but it works very well with the wire welder. I was able to easily see what I was doing with the wire welder. The auto darkening feature is pretty amazing. It cycles from normal to darkening is a fraction of a second and vice versa. When the flash of the welder stops it instantly reverts to a non-darkened view so I can quickly reorient and begin the weld again. It will be a big help to me. I need a helmet for the welding I do because of the glasses I have to wear in order to see clearly. The older helmets were not very accommodating to my glasses and the goggles I often used were less accommodating that the helmets. This one easily adapts to my glasses. That is a blessing.

Before I got to work in the shop, I worked with Mama getting an area in the garage cleaned up. For some reason we allow a mess to accumulate in certain areas and it only gets cleaned up and reorganized when I get tired of it. Not that I am not part of the problem. I adapt to the accumulation as well as Victoria and Mama, it just tends to bother me first. Anyway, several months ago a table had been set up in the garage to accumulate the craft items Mama and Kimberlyn were working on. I have moved the table twice to limit the clutter, but I had not emptied it of its contents. I did not want to interfere with their projects, but it turns out that Mama needs the table for her set up at Trade Days tomorrow, so she and Kimberlyn unloaded the table yesterday before Kimberly headed home.

Mama and I then took all the remaining accumulation and either bagged it up to be taken to the dump or found a spot in the corner of the garage where we have certain boxed items that we actually intend to keep there and fit the items requiring storage into that space. The result was remarkable. We gained a huge patch of floor that had been poorly used in housing the mess we eliminated. Even Mama was impressed. With the rearranging and cleaning I had done in the garage a couple weeks ago, the garage looks good. Neat and organized, lots of space to get in and out of the vehicle, versus looking like a dump. I was happy with the time spent but I told Mama I would have rather done the cleanup by myself because she seems to be forever in the spot I need access to. We worked through that, but I spent a good deal of time waiting for her to move as we shared that limited workspace.

Tomorrow I will be on my own at the farm. Grandpa has the truck so he can make parts runs as he works to get his truck operational and Mama will be at Trade Days. I will have plenty to do and no one in my way.

That is the fun of having our little farm.