Getting moving, eggs production, weekend plans

Yesterday evening started off kind of blah. Neither I nor Mama wanted to do any real work – although there is always plenty to be done. But she did want to go to a sundry store in Bridgeport to look for a couple items for the coop. So we made the trip and it was only after we got home that she realized she did not look for the one item the initiated the trip. I am not totally innocent because when we got there I could not remember why we had come.

The trip stirred us up enough that I got changed and went out to work on the stack of lumber that still sits on the flatbed gooseneck trailer. I decided to give a few minutes to seeing if I could get the switch installed on the tractor since I was out – and since we are expecting a lot of rain over the next several days. The installation turned out to be quite easy. I had the tractor running in about twenty minutes. That was a blessing.

When I started on the lumber I was pleasantly surprised at the ease with which all the nails and screws were coming out. I did not get very far into the load because of the late start but it was very encouraging to get something done. I will have a large stack of boards when the trailer is unloaded but it will take a while since all of those boards have to be cleaned of the nails and screws. This is the type of project where Grandpa’s help is invaluable just by virtue of the hours he can dedicate to it.

Terry Cobb cautioned Mama to avoid even walking on the backfilled areas for several weeks. I think that is wise because the ground is soft, saturated and unsettled. So we are avoiding those areas even though overall the dug up portion of the back and side yards is a very large area in total. For the moment it is not hard to stay away; the entire area is a slimy mess from all the recent rains on the exposed dirt.

I do not have any official numbers but it seems to me that we are slowly catching up to the reduced rainfall of the past four years. It is difficult to tell where we are right now but I am guessing the tanks on the farm in Bowie are filling back up. I would be a blessing to Danny to see them stay full. I have not been out that way in months.

Mama has continued to let her chickens out on the evenings that we are home. In total they are not out for more than a couple of hours but they enjoy it enough that they are laying a dozen or more eggs daily. The couple that operates one of the Chinese restaurant in Decatur really like that because they buy the eggs from Mama every chance they get. They have told Mama that at first they got only enough to feed them to the baby but now they have enough that the whole family gets to enjoy them. They do not like the store bought eggs; nor do I.

Mama and Victoria are babysitting tomorrow. Erin Echavarria will be dropping off the kids in the morning and leaving them through most of the day. Mama also has worked out a time with Wes to go see Misty. Wes is training her so it will be interesting to see how that is going. She, Victoria and all the kids will be going on that outing.

I will be at the house working all day because I want to get the microwave installed in the kitchen.

What a mess, lunch, help (?)

I am relieved that we got everything covered up before the rain started but the exposed dirt is now wet and muddy. It is impossible to get to the well house without going through the mud and the ruts we made in the back yard are now deep pools of water. It will be several weeks before we are able to do anything in the yard.

In fact, the entire yard seems to be draining to the hole that was dug for the koi pond. At least it has somewhere to go where I can deal with the flow. It does give me some idea how large a project it will be to eventually terrace the yard for drainage. It is a blessing to have the new septic system but it came with a big mess attached. This too shall pass. It is just the flip side of the benefits of rain.

Mama and I went to lunch yesterday and discovered an Italian place in Decatur that is at least equal to the one we found in Bowie. Since it is much closer and they have several items we really like, it will be a frequent stop for us – probably on Friday nights when we have RU. It certainly is popular with the High School students.

While we were there Mama started coughing and ended up wetting herself to the point that it soaked through the skit she was wearing. She needed to go potty badly but refused to go with a wet backside through a crowded eatery. So, we finished lunch and ushered her out of the restaurant. Later I guess she told Peggy about the incident because yesterday evening Peggy called to tell her she had found a coupon for Depend adult diapers and was saving it for Mama.

While she and I were out I also got the parts I need to repair the tractor and brush hog. We stopped at Lowes and got a blind for the bedroom but I had to shut Mama down when I saw her slip into shopping mode. We were on my lunch hour after all. It is nice to be this close to my work so Mama and I can have those times without it costing her all afternoon in travel just to meet with me during the workday.

From second hand reports I am hearing it appears that Grandpa and Norman are buying windows and doors for Victoria’s house in their travels around West Virginia. Victoria is a little concerned about the quality of the acquisitions especially since she has not seen any of the items that Grandma tells her are “really nice” or “just beautiful”.

I have advised her to encourage them to keep going; to maintain their focus. Anything they bring will be used in one way of another on one of the two properties. It won’t go to waste and as long as they are enthused enough to purchase the items and set them aside for the house we should keep the momentum going; but she does feel left out. (Welcome to my world in dealing with my in-laws.)But I never turn down their help.

God has mysteriously clever ways of using these times to our benefit and His Glory.

Shopping, cutting up, chicken roundup

Mama and Victoria went out shopping yesterday and to hear them tell it they made quite a haul. They spent the day in Denton going to some shops they knew and then took the time to look into several others, one of which was a furniture store they were very impressed with. Mama found a dining room table there that she would have bought right then – I did not say yes. It was the only one they had in the store. L

They did not get home until an hour or so behind me. In that hour I manually rolled a round bale of hay about 100 yards from where we store the bales to the next lot so I could get it to our heifer. She had eaten the last one down to a few handfuls of hay and was searching for any little sprigs of grass to fill her belly. I learned that round bales are not easy to roll at all.

In fact they are only round in the sense that they are not square. My shoulders were worn out by the time I got it into place. Mama’s request was that I put it in the barn so it would stay dry; another 60 yards through manure and muck. I did not get that far.

Once they were home and I helped get the groceries and sundries unloaded I got the chainsaw and cut up the tree that had been removed from our driveway. I had cut up the dead tree he dug out for us the day before.  Once we get the tractor running again (one of the kill switches went bad) I will load it all up and move it to the pile we have been accumulating. We are getting quite an impressive pile.

It will become more so as I take out several other dead trees as well as a few living ones that are in our way. Add to that the hundred or so small trees that need to come out by the dam and we should have many cords of wood available from our initial culling of trees.

My hope is to sell enough of the firewood to buy a pellet stove insert for the fireplace. I had been thinking of getting a wood burning insert but in future years I think it would be much easier to have the pellet stove. I had not really considered the pellet stove until Terry Cobb suggested it again to me. I can always use split firewood to heat the shop when I get that built.

In spite of the head start I was given on the koi pond I still have several days of work to complete it. Rain through this week and next will ensure that that is postponed for the present but it is a pretty obvious project since it sits right outside our large window that looks from the living room to the back yard.

Mama has been letting the chickens out a couple hours every evening we are home. They have certainly enjoyed it. We will not be able to do so for much longer. Once she starts on the landscaping she will not want them to go scratching through her bulbs and bushes. Every evening is a challenge to get them all back into the coop. They have not figured out how to get there on their own so they require some coaching.

The night before last, one of the chickens spent the night in the garage. I saw the door open when I left for work and shut it before I pulled out. When Mama and Victoria opened the passage door from the house to the garage later that morning, the chicken was looking for a way out. Last night it was the very last chicken to leave the coop and the very first one to return.

Our garage must have been terribly frightening. I can only hope it did not look into the freezers.

Covered up mess, tree removal, koi pond, feeling better (?)

When I got home yesterday afternoon Terry Cobb was finished covering up the trenches and holes he had dug for the septic system. It was not overly pretty but we can take it from there and do the finishing touches. He also had taken out the brick wall at the entrance to our driveway. That was a real blessing to have that gone. Mama said it took him about fifteen minutes. He dug a hole in the middle lot to put the bricks into. I thought that was a pretty good idea. We have a lot of other bricks and such we can add to the hole before we cover it up also.

He was waiting on me to help him take out a couple trees in the front of the house. One was a dead tree in the front yard. The other was the tree in the center of the driveway. I rode up in the bucket of the backhoe and looped a chain around the top notch of the tree and he backed out as far as the chain would allow and began to pull. In order the minimize the damage to our driveway I cut the base about half way through and the tree leaned cooperatively into the pull of the chain and fell into the circle of lawn in front of the house. I will have to grind out the stump later.

The other tree was a dead tree so we thought it would not be a problem. We were all wrong. He tried to push it over but it would not budge. He dug a bit and pushed a bit until he had dug about three feet deep all the way around the tree before he was able to push it over. It proved to be the most difficult of all the ones he removed for us. I used the last of my energy to cut it into pieces before I quit.

Earlier in the afternoon Terry spent about ten minutes digging out the open circle in the patio so I could put in a koi pond. It needs to be finished out but it is about four feet deep at this point. I am not sure how he did it because the bucket on the backhoe is almost the size of the opening he was working in. I could have it finished in a couple weeks. With all the extra work he did and parts he bought to make repairs he still only charged us a little over $5000. I was very pleased.

The back yard is still a gouged up mess both from his machine and our tractor. He believes the sprinkler system has been leaking for years causing the ground to be saturated. I noticed when we had the tractor in the yard the sod would wave and buckle underneath it as it moved through the grass like we were driving on a layer of cloth placed on top of sand. I will have to investigate it more but I believe we eliminated the lines to the sprinklers. We took out almost everything else.

We did not go to FBI last night. I am still feeling pretty badly and Mama and Victoria were not enthused about going – each of them is feeling poorly also. They were supposed to go shopping yesterday but neither of them felt up to it. I am pretty sure that will change today. Mama told me yesterday that she had not been out of the house for three days and I told her it reflected very positively in out bank accounts.

We are all feeling better but not by much.

New septic –what a mess, new calf, same old crud

I took Friday off and it turned out to be a very good day to be at home. The man doing the septic system, Terry Cobb, was out the day before and got the two tanks set in place and connected so we could use the system as normal. That was a blessing. Friday he was going to dig through the side yard where the electrical and water lines ran. He has a really large backhoe and I was not sure I understood how he was going to be able to be careful enough to dig around the lines. What I did not understand is that he had no intention of avoiding anything in the ground.

It was not long before he tore through the electrical line to the well. It was only at that point that I really began to understand his method. There was never an intent to avoid anything. He would rip through whatever he encountered and then repair it as needed. In doing so I ended up redoing the electrical supply at the well house – new line, new conduit, and new breaker box. The finished product is excellent. Better in fact than I had planned to do.

Fortunately he did not catch the water line on Friday so we had water through the night. However, it was not long on Saturday before he found the water line and we had to start the repairs on that. Again, we dug up all the lines at the well and repaired the broken lines as well as replacing several minor issues with the supply to and from the softener. We also removed several wires that had been taken out of use years ago. It all looked neat and well defined when we were done.

By Saturday evening he and his son had dug all the lateral lines (the leach field), put down the pipe, backfilled it with gravel and put the cloth barrier on top of the gravel to hold the dirt out of the system. It should be inspected today. Then he will start the process of covering the entire area back up and smoothing things out. Right now it is a real mess but that is what it takes to get this done. So far I have no idea about the price except that it started at about $4250.

Whatever the price, there is so much to be thankful for because of the way he did the repairs, the way he ran the gas line and the way helped me understand exactly what we have at this property. It is all done more properly now and the repairs should last us many, many years. It would have taken me and Grandpa months to do what has been done in only three days.

Mid-afternoon Saturday Mama and I went over to check on Daisy and found that she had just had her calf. She chose the far side of the dam and the brush that we have there to deliver her first little one – a bull calf. He is beautifully shaped and solid black. I am guessing he weighs less than fifty pounds. I have to guess because we cannot get near enough to him to do any hands-on evaluation.

Mama and I got sick together overnight Saturday night – with a cough and stuffed up head. Neither of us went to church Sunday. Joyce Horton told Mama that there were a lot of people in the church who were sick with the same thing.

It has been a long time since we had this kind of crud.

Travel, good news

I made a quick trip to the panhandle yesterday to deliver a letter that no one, including me, wanted to see done. It was not a pleasant meeting but it is done now and we will await the outcome to see if the message or intent of the meeting and the rebuke will accomplish its purpose as intended. It was a long drive over as I thought and prayed about what to say; about the heart of the individual I was having to deal with.

It is never pleasant to confront a person with wrong. It is even less pleasant to do so when they are convinced they have done no wrong; which is exacerbated by the fact they have gotten away with their actions for an extended period of time. Only the Lord can bring about the restoration we desire and the contrition needed to enable such a restoration.

While I was in the area I got with the man who does our taxes and completed the paperwork needed to get them filed. I was very pleasantly surprised to find out that what I had thought was a schedule for repayment of taxes due for 2014 through 2015 was actually a schedule to pay taxes for 2015 on a quarterly timetable. What that means is that Mama and I only owe a few thousand dollars in taxes for last year rather than the ten thousand I had thought. One check and we are done. That is a blessing.

When I told Mama she was ecstatic. I do not how many people she called but last night everyone I tried to tell at church already knew. That is as it should be. Now if I can find out about my longevity in my current job we will have two of the major financial questions answered for this year; at least, those we know of at this point.

On the way back yesterday I stopped in Quanah and bought a yard ornament for Mama. She wanted to celebrate our tax news – not that we did not owe anything, but that we did not owe as much as I had thought. It was one that I had looked at every time we go through the area so I stopped to ask the price. I already had a price in mind and what they asked was pretty close, so I bought it and brought it home. Mama loves it.

Shortly after I got there the young man from the tree service company showed up with the stump grinder and chewed up the three trunks to about six inched below grade. The machine made very quick work of the job. He was done and packed up in less than an hour. Mama and I can now make plans to plant in those spots.

Last night before church we went to Peggy’s house for a quick dinner. While Mama and Victoria had been at her house the other night Victoria had mentioned that she was looking for a recipe for chicken and dumplings. So, yesterday Peggy made some for us. They were very good. I thing Victoria has finally found her recipe.

The man installing our septic system should be at the house this morning. We are all pretty anxious to get that done.

Lost sleep, breaking and entering for FBI

Last night was even shorter than Saturday night. On Saturday night we lost one hour because of Daylight Saving’s Time; which I still contend is an outdated, unproductive and inconvenient waste of effort on a national level. Anyway we got in later than usual from FBI because Kaylen was not able to get into the classroom at the church where the TV we use was locked up.

Even though several of us tried various methods of opening the door, credit cards wedged into the latch, picking the lock (only the two ladies that play the organ and piano tried that) and oiling the uncooperative key, nothing worked. Finally someone showed up with another key and jammed it pretty forcefully into the lock and got the door opened. We shortened breaks and plugged through the three hours and were finally home a little after 10pm.

Prior to class I took Mama and Victoria to Peggy’s house so they could take proper showers. We are still waiting on the septic system to be installed. I lowered the tank level enough to be functional for several more days – especially since it is just me Mama and Victoria, but it will be nice to finally get the bathrooms and laundry back in service without the constant worry.

Grandma and Grandpa made it to West Virginia safely but they were held up on the second day by a flat tire. I do not know exactly what happened but I heard that they ran over something in the road which cut the nearly new tire open. I do not know if Grandpa had a spare or not but that seems to have held them up for several hours while they replaced the ruined tire.

Victoria got tires on her car yesterday. Grandpa had ordered them last week but they did not come in until yesterday. I called Mama to tell her that the man doing the septic was at the house to get the information he needed to apply for the permit. She had to turn around and backtrack to the house because she was following Victoria to the tire shop so the two of them could do some shopping while Victoria’s car was being fixed. They still managed to get their shopping done.

Tomorrow is going to be the first dry, sunny day we have had in several weeks. I am hoping the septic system redo gets started tomorrow.