Shelter completion, picking pecans, the canoe, the Marksmen

I focused all day Saturday on completing the siding on the goat shelter. When I gathered and cut to size the metal siding from the shed I had taken apart, I had just enough to complete siding the shelter. All I have left from the original shed is a few very small scraps and the angled tops that fit each end of the shed. It not only enclosed the shelter, it cleaned up another pile of scrap I had lying about. The shelter will be painted in the Spring to unify the two colors of metal used to cover it, but for now, it does not look bad. At least all the lines match and the colors are compatible – other than the rust spots. A few more little holes in the roof to patch and the shelter will be as complete as I intend it to be.  

Friday evening, I took three pallets to make a play area for the kids. I disassembled one pallet and cut the recovered boards in half lengthwise. I used those thinner strips to fill the gaps between the boards on the other two pallets. Then I attached legs to one of the pallets. Those pallets were carried into the goat paddock Saturday morning and set up to provide two levels of play area. One pallet was set on cinder blocks which will help delay the decay that will come naturally. The pallet with legs abuts the one on blocks. The little ones figured out right away what to do with the bilevel deck. As we were pulling into the drive on our way home from picking pecans, the four kids were playing king of the mountain, knocking each other off in turns. I was quite the spectacle. It will be fun to watch as all the kids grow more accustomed to the playground. Mama can see it from our bedroom window. We are still waiting on Dolly and Lilly to kid, but that should happen this week or next.

Mama talked me out of starting another project about 2 pm Saturday. She and Victoria had been shopping and were getting ready to head to Bowie to have some soup at Grandma’s. From there they planned to go to Rick and Nancy’s (our goat mentors) to pick up pecans. Having gotten to a good place to stop, I went along. I could not eat much soup because Grandma uses V-8 juice as the base. As much as I love the taste, I do not so well with that. Once we had eaten and visited a while, we went see what pecans we could gather. Between the three of us, me, Mama and Victoria, we picked up about forrty pounds of pecans in about an hour.

These were the large, long, paper shelled pecans. Premium quality. We will go back this week to gather more and to see if the other three pecan trees have ripened to the point of gathering those pecans as well. The other three trees have smaller, more round pecans. Good quality as well, just not as big as the ones we picked up Saturday. Mama may take Bro Plumley back early this week. He wants to get a stash of pecans to sell and he really liked those big ones. We looked at the pecan grove next to the church at the end of our road, but most of those pecans were very small. Mama had hoped she could take Bro Plumley there to get his pecans, but that may not work.

Late Saturday evening a man called to see if I still had the canoe. Mama took the call and gave him all the particulars. He really wanted it, so we agreed to be available Sunday afternoon for him to pick it up. He was later than he had told us, but he kept us abreast of his expected arrival time. He finally got to the farm about 3:30 pm. He was loaded and gone by 3:50. A man on a mission. He was very excited about getting the canoe. We are excited about selling it so that I can upgrade to a boat Mama and I can share with less worries. That was a timely answer to prayer.

Sunday evening, we had the Marksmen Quartet at church. It was a very enjoyable evening.