projects – Page 10 – The Hermits' Rest

No One’s a Fan of the Crop Duster

This morning, loud noises started. Now, we are used to the sounds of airplanes flying fairly low, because a neighbor has his own runway, and he has just gotten a new plane, so it’s been going around and around, taking off and landing, over and over for the past couple of weeks.

However, today it was real loud. The first couple of times it happened, Goldie and Alfred were barking away, since they are the two who hate deep sounds the most (they also hate what we call “growly trucks”). We humans knew what it was, since we’ve lived here a long time: the crop-dusting plane was here to spray the defoliator on the cotton.

What? You city folks may wonder what that’s about. Well, when the cotton has made pretty white cotton bolls, the current practice is to kill all the foliage (leaves). This makes it way easier to harvest. So, one week there will be happy green fields and the next week there will be sad brown fields with little white snowballs in it. So, there you go. Here, that is done by a plane, especially on small fields.

Also, I have a lump that needs to be looked at tomorrow by the vet.

Once we took Goldie and Alfred outside and they could see the plane, they lost interest.

The newer horses, on the other hand, were not thrilled at all. Kathleen ended up putting all her horses in the pens, so they could settle down. Drew huddled up with them, but he sure was on the alert for that dang loud thing.

Apache has been there and done that, since he’s lived here most of his life, and Fiona seemed to figure it was better than Goldie chasing her all over the pasture (which happened yesterday).

I’ll watch to see how long it takes for the cotton plants to die. They contributed, though. That’s good, I guess. But now you know why cotton isn’t the greenest of crops. It requires a lot of chemicals when raised in the modern way.

Good News BONUS

I heard from the swimming pool dude, and we don’t have to wait until September 20 for them to start…they start tomorrow! We’ll have all the fencing under control by then, so no problem from our end. The family teased me that now I will have endless blog material. I promise to talk about other topics. No one but me (and Kathleen) is THAT interested in giant holes being dug, and I realize that.

No doubt I’ll have many things to rant about or long-ass horse stories. It’s a wonder I get any blog hits at all!

Getting Started on the Pool of Dreams

Getting started already? Where’s the concrete mixer? No, before the pool people get started, the Hermits’ Rest team has to prepare for their arrival. The first step for that is to reconfigure our fencing so a) the equipment can get into the back yard, and b) the dogs are kept out of the construction zone.

The dog part is made difficult, since we have to block off part of the back porch, but lucky for us, there’s a gate waiting to be used for something.

Then we had to figure out where to put a temporary fence. It was important to Lee to have as much space as possible for the six dogs to poop, and I certainly saw his point! The first place we selected was deemed too close to where pool workers will have to be.

This was deemed too close to the future pool.

Eventually we figured something out, and vowed to get more fencing up in front, which is already in the plans anyway, so the dogs won’t feel confined. The poor dears. After that, it was a quick matter of putting in the t-posts.

Only one post got all bent up by a rock or something, so that was pretty good. I got to fetch more posts, and had the challenge of getting them out of their packaging with nothing to break the strap that held them together. Ranchhand Suna managed just fine!

The posts aren’t in all the way, so it will be easier to get them out when the project is over. Next up is adding the actual fencing material. The plan is to re-use some old shorter lengths of fencing rather than use any of the new rolls, which we will want for permanent fencing that is going up soon.

After that, the fence between the house and the garage will have to be removed so that bulldozers, bobcats, cement trucks, and equipment delivery vehicles can get in. One good thing about having absolutely NOTHING behind the house other than one pitiful tree is they won’t harm anything as long as they stay away from the propane tank and septic area (which will be marked!).

Hope your weekend was productive or restful, whichever YOU prefer!

Why is This Baby So Happy?

Baby Suna and her mom were really happy the day Suna climbed up onto the dresser to look at herself in the mirror. Suna was around 9 months old, a bit young for climbing. But, mirrors have always enticed her.

My favorite baby photo. My parents loved to tell the story of this.

Adult Suna is also happy after climbing up high today. It was “clean out the office closet” day, which required much upping and downing.

World’s greatest portable ladder, and my friend. It’s lightweight but sturdy.

Since we moved in I haven’t been able to organize that closet very well, and as of last week, people had piled boxes for me to unpack and multiple air beds plus huge rolls of memory foam in there. I could barely open the door. There is no photo of that.

I got Lee to move the foam, made air beds with leaks disappear, and unpacked the random boxes. They turned out to be full of baskets, so I embarked on a long-planned basket display on top of my bookshelves. More baskets will appear when the Bobcat House stuff arrives.

Most of the day today was spent taking all sorts of stuff out and putting it elsewhere…or taking it straight to the stock trailer, which we are filling with garbage from there and the garage (a separate project). Once I got things that didn’t belong in there removed, I remembered it was a big closet.

Harvey thought I was making him his own room.

I’m going to get shelves put in there for my knitting books and yarn, so I arranged everything in bags or boxes for easy removal. It was good to have access to my looms (one simple Cricket loom and one Navajo tapestry loom ready to start a project on) and their accessories again.

Looms at right. Bags and boxes have needlepoint, sewing, and knitting supplies.

So far it’s a little goofy, but I know where everything is, so that’s good. We are yet to find out how much of my stuff will fit in and how much will have to find new homes.

I am happy as Baby Suna to have this all cleaned out, ready to prepare for the onslaught of things from my other house.

I think I visited my grandparents on my first Christmas or Thanksgiving. Glad I found these photos during my cleaning frenzy.

It was a good day. All this cleaning also led to sharing family stories, hanging out on the porch, and bonding with Apache and Fiona until sunset. Heck, even the work stuff I did today was fun!

Hope you had a day of productive fun, or get to have one soon. I’d missed them, so that made today even better. (I didn’t forget friends dealing with floods, illnesses, and worries that I now live in the fictional country of Gilead…I’m just dealing with the present.)

What the Heck is That?

Fiona and Drew knew something was up this morning when the round pen suddenly turned horseshoe shaped.

Then a big rolling thing came right up to where Drew was attempting to eat. How rude!

The thing turned around, stopped, and made some loud noises. But it wasn’t TOO scary. It looked tasty.

Then it made more loud noises, and that scared Fiona and Drew off for a bit. But soon, Drew had to check out the back of the big red thing.

So, that thing is our other shipping container, which had been living over at Mandi’s house back when we were trying to renovate it. It’s the second part of the shelter for the horse pens. Now that it’s there, once it’s finally in place, we can empty out the other one and turn it into our tack room and hay storage.

It was fun watching the unloading, so here are some pictures of how that happened. I also enjoyed talking to the wrecker guy, who knows everyone in town, of course. A fun time for all!

A Fruitful Visit to the County Courthouse and Horse Lesson

Hello, and happy Tuesday, I think. It’s been a full day for me already and it’s not even 4 pm. I’m losing track of days and times right now, but that’s okay, I’m going with the flow.

The day started off right, when six members of the local Master Naturalist chapter and Master Gardener chapter came together at the Milam County Courthouse to meet with the County Judge. We wanted to talk to Judge Young about whether there could be any meeting space for us in the new county office building complex that’s being created out of our old hospital.

Master Gardeners and Master Naturalists preparing for the meeting.

Judge Young showed us a map of how the buildings will be organized, and it was obvious the planners had put a lot of thought into it, like how to keep the people doing parole meetings separate from citizens coming to pay their taxes or seniors getting their meals. There was also a good security plan and a good parking plan.

Then he showed us where there will be meeting rooms we could use. There are a couple of large ones around Bea’s Kitchen that will be free after 3 pm on weekdays, plus another couple of shared ones with other agencies. When someone asked if we could use any of them, Judge Young said:

“Not only can you use it; I want you to use it.”

We talked about helping out with landscaping the inner courtyards as a way to pay back, and that went over well. He even offered us storage space in the old nuns’ quarters they are renovating for a storage building.

No one could read the map, but we got the general idea.

This will all be available sometime after March 1. It’s so great that the county got a large grant to fix the buildings up nicely for all the citizens of the county. I couldn’t stay to go on a tour of the progress on the buildings (I’d been in them before, when the space was for sale), but I hope everyone else had fun. It’s good to see positive things happening in the community.

Next Activity

I had to run home and get ready to go to my second horse and rider training with Apache. I got my timing off and ended up slamming him in the trailer with no warning, but he eventually got settled down when we got there and we started working on things. I’m learning leadership skills up the wazoo and Apache is figuring things out really well. I even got great advice for walking appropriately and that turned into how I can control his urges to wander off and trot.

He enjoyed getting braided, but they didn’t hold up well. I’ll try something else next time.

I even managed to trot him in circles while remaining centered and in charge. A first for me! We also started figure 8 circles. All of it was very educational in subtle ways, though it looked like I was just going around and around to anyone watching me. This trainer is a very, very good teacher. But whoa, is noon a hot time to try to learn anything outdoors in August.

And Then…

I was taking today off, because I had these obviously non-work things to do, but I ended up working anyway, and was very good at projecting a positive attitude in one of those meetings where that kind of thing matters. I just pretended everyone was my friend and tried to be helpful. I even passed on the Mary Poppins tactic, if you can believe that.

Now that I’m feeling all empowered for the moment, I can go call my insurance company and ask them why the same medication I’ve been on for years that usually costs around $5 was over $90 today. Don’t get me started on health care in the US!

The Little Pond Miracle

I mentioned a while back that Lee was building a pond for in front of the house. He has worked very hard on it, hand-placing every decorative rock, and constantly rearranging it. We were mighty disappointed when the water started disappearing out of the lower part every night. We’d come in, and there would be just a small amount of water in the bottom.

Pond, in good shape, with grass that needs to be dealt with.

Lee worked hard to fix it. First he put some foam stuff in to seal the leaky area (or as far as we could tell where the leaky area was. The next day the foam was floating like a black iceberg, and the water was down again.

Next, he tried some paint-on stuff. Nope. Third, he tried different stuff, and it appeared not to work. We left it for a few days with just that little bit of water in it. However, Sunday night he filled it up again, just so we could enjoy the sound as we sat around enjoying the sunset with our friends.

The fountain has rocks with shell fossils in them, from the driveway. Maybe not great for fish health.

The next day, a miracle occurred. The pool held. It’s still holding. I think the last stuff just needed to cure longer than we were letting it cure. Happy dance! Of course, thanks for sitting still for those few days, the pond was now a mosquito hazard. Something had to be done.

I went and fetched two goldfish out of the horse troughs and put them in there. I am not sure how much good that’s doing, since the fish can only eat so much. Plus, the pond gets a bit hot for them. I’m going to look for some of those mosquito fish. Or, I’ll put the goldfish back where they were and put in mosquito dunks. Sigh. I don’t like using chemicals.

There also appears to be a dog growing in the upper pond.

Anyway, there is still a bigger plan for all this pond stuff, so I’m going to sit back and wait to see how Lee does it. I’m proud that he fixed it after all his persistence!

Alfred has not managed to get rid of many larvae, but he does explain why we have a hose right there. He and Goldie are heavy drinkers.

The dogs are very happy with their new outdoor water bowl and are convinced we made it just for them, so they don’t have to walk ALL the way to the pond on the other side of the driveway. Besides, the bullfrogs scare Goldie. And the grasshoppers think I put the pond plants in there just for their snacking, at least the ones who live. I got a net to fish out the dead grasshoppers.

I look forward to sitting on the porch and listening to the water gurgle, which should make things harder for the mosquitoes. Another reason not to wear shorts!

Progress, Despite Heat

It’s the time of year that we can’t get much done outdoors, but Lee and I are getting a few things accomplished (mostly Lee). His pond project has made it to the “proof of concept” phase, in which he connected all the parts, added water, plugged in a pump, and saw it work. It makes a nice sound, and you can even hear it over the sound of the giant fan we need to make sitting on the porch possible.

The dogs like it, and it’s getting prettier and prettier as he adds rocks and such. Plans include adding river rock and some larger rocks around it, and then adding more water features, like a stream bed and another pond. I’ll wait and see how that comes out before trying to describe it.

When he first got it running. The top fountain part is a concrete planter.

Lee also did a lot of work on the small pond, mainly smoothing out an edge, for easier dog and frog access.

He also added more rock to the front walkway, which I think makes the front of the house look better. It no longer looks like the house was just plopped down in the middle of a pasture (which it was, of course; in fact the concrete was poured seven years ago, yesterday).

Finally, some landscaping is in progress!

What Was I Up To?

Meanwhile, I had to stay inside much of the day, due to not feeling up to par (I am sleepy so much, and can’t figure out why!). I spent a long time on yesterday’s blog post (thanks for the nice comments!). Then I decided to start another knitting project with some interesting yarn I bought years ago. It’s called Haze, from Queensland, and has corn fiber in it, along with cotton.

I had been looking for a pattern, and didn’t think I’d found exactly what I wanted on Ravelry, but then my knitting friend Terri posted a photo of what she had started. That looked like what I wanted. It turned out to be one of the projects I’d already been considering, so I knew it was right. It’s a popular pattern from back when the Bones television show was on, named after Dr. Saroyan. It will be fun to knit. The leaf pattern edging is weird, but it ends up looking nice.

Eventually, I knew I had to go out and mess with the horses. Sara came over and we sat in the shade, which wasn’t too bad, thanks to a slight breeze. I practiced making Drew stay out of my space, but also enjoyed him and Goldie (and precious Fiona).

Eventually, we got up the gumption to do some work. I got Apache in the round pen, to see if Sara thought he had lameness or what. We are still not sure. Next, we got his food and put it in the trailer, because I want him to be comfortable getting in and out for lessons in Milano. Feeding him in there is how Sara had gotten him used to her trailer many years ago.

I’m in and eating! Of course, the first thing I did was poop. Sara got a picture of that, but you don’t need to see it.

I didn’t have much trouble at all getting him in. The trailer makes some weird noises and has a floor surface that was new to him, but he handled it fine. The main problem was that Goldie kept trying to “help” and when we were busy with Apache, she snuck in and ate his food. I do not want my fancy supplements going into the dog, sheesh.

I do plan to clean out the poop before the trailer is used to haul more of Anita’s stuff. But, we successfully got Apache in and out twice, despite the dog’s “help,” so I’ll practice a few more times before next Saturday, when he’ll actually go somewhere for the first time in a long time!

Here are some pictures from this morning of all the animals I saw.

Otherwise, it’s a burning hot weekend, so I’m mostly going to relax. I’ve been out petting and saying hi to the other horses a bit, but they’re just happy in their pasture. Everyone needs a day of rest; I guess that’s why so many religions mandate them!

Late afternoon sky to the south. No rain found us!

Lee Has a New Project

This is exciting! Lee has been thinking of doing something for a long time, and decided that now’s the time to get going on it. He’s working on a series of decorative ponds for the front of the house (these will not be cattle tanks, but nice ponds, with water plants and such).

A project begins. That orange paint got all over Lee, by the way.

He got started over the weekend, and spent much of yesterday digging the holes to hold a waterfall and a main pond, next to our new walkway. Since it was a very hot day, this all went in stages! Kathleen and I served as consultants and beverage fetchers. That’s very important!

Water will flow out of the top one, which will be covered by a big rock.

The idea with the pond is to eventually have the current one flow down a little creek lined with river rocks into a much larger pond, then recirculate back up. Rain overflow will go into another planned diversion.

The general idea of the pond. The pipes are for going under the path, I think. I need to get rid of that grass.

We will have to see whether we can put anything in there other than native mosquito fish, because we don’t want goldfish washing into Walker’s Creek, which is bad news! And we realize birds will want to snack on fish, dogs will want to mess with the pond, etc. So, this is all to be determined. At this point, Lee is going to get the small pond and waterfall going.

The stream will go down that low area, over to the new pond at the corner of the house. We like ponds.

And Dogs

I can’t resist sharing dog stories. Yesterday, before our biweekly Board meeting, Goldie decided I was a chair. I guess anything’s a chair to her.

We’ve also been enjoying watching all the dogs play. Goldie and Carlton have ended their embarrassing love affair, now that Goldie’s heat is over at last, and are now just buddies again. They have a lot of fun together.

Let’s see what further adventures this new week brings!

Rocking and Rolling, with Rocks

If I needed to take my mind of things today, I was in luck, because today we got lots and lots of rocks and pebbles delivered to make our driveway more driveway-like. That had needed to be done, um, a few years.

Not exactly a before picture, because it’s already been smoothed out.

There was a low area from when we put in the electrical lines, and a few dips that made icky puddles. So, first we borrowed a box blade kind of thing from the neighbors and smoothed out the existing driveway. That also at least slightly annoyed the grass trying to take over.

Then, a guy came in a big dump truck with a bonus dump trailer. The dogs liked that.

The dogs seemed to think they were a vital component to the whole operation.

They were fascinated by the dumping process as well, especially Alfred and Gracie.

After the first load was emptied, we realized Alfred thought the rock was a gift to him. but all the dogs were fascinated.

The second load surprised them all, but then they sniffed some more.

It didn’t take long for all that stuff to be laid down and the area by the cars smoothed out.

A Doggy Diversion

In an hour or two, another load was scheduled. In that time, we went to get diesel and put trash in our dumpster. Yes. That’s how we do trash here. Vlassic jumped in the truck and rode in my lap, cuddling, like he loves to do.

All was well until he jumped out of the truck at the old church and took off. He trotted down Main Street and disappeared into someone’s yard. I called and called. He finally emerged with a big ole sandwich crust in his mouth. I think he thought he’d found a new family. Too bad. I took him home.

Back to Rocking

The second load arrived and got laid out just fine. Then we looked up.

Of COURSE the day you get loads of rock will start out sunny and cloudless, then end up raining like crazy. Thus, frantic rock smoothing ensued.

The tractors were flying like dancers as the rain came down harder and harder. I was really impressed.

Then came a welcome surprise! I got a path from the driveway to the front porch! That’s huge! There are two drains in it to drain rain, which got tested immediately in the rain storm.

I was able to help a little by smoothing the piles down to make a slightly more level pathway. It was fun to work in the rain! And it wasn’t hot! I’m glad I get to help out some.

Lee inspects the path, as the smoothing continues in the rain.

I hope to border the path with leftover limestone brick from the house, once we get it smooth and the right width. That will be so fun.

Now we have to wait for the new rock to dry, see where there are new low spots, and fine tune it. I’ve waited a LONG time for a safe, smooth path. I know it would have helped my sister when she lived in Cameron.

But That’s Not All

The front-end loader got a lot of work in today. Before all the road base arrived, it had its narrow trench digger attachment put on, and it dug the long trench for the water line to the cattle trough.

And now the trench is full of water. At least all that goes in there is water line!

There are still some fun things coming up for the horse pens, like the structure to support the roof extensions and making custom gates. Oh, and a lot of welding. All those cross bars are only tacked up, I’m told.

Still, all is well. We’re getting close to move-in day. And the driveway is gonna be way better.

I Could Have Worked Harder Yesterday, But…

Now, I’m not referring to my paid employment, which did get it’s time in, but to my after-work job, helping with the pens and other jobs. It was an uncharacteristically pleasant day, so I can’t blame the heat. No, it’s my little buddy Vlassic who kept me sidelined for at least 45 minutes.

I went outside around 5 to water the chickens and check on progress, and I sat down to watch the hole-digging process in the stall area. Vlassic jumped in my lap.

He obviously needed some Mama love, because he only got down once for a minute until 6 pm, when I had to get out of the hard chair and help out. He snuggled, he licked, he cuddled, and he sighed from happiness. I love when the weather lets me hang out with my doggie dude.

Before digging holes. You can see one of the water troughs set up and markers for posts to divide the stalls.

Now that the dirt is all moved, the stalls can be completed. There will be four of them (thus limiting the number of horses that Kathleen and I can acquire). Each trough will be shared by two stalls. It will be cool.

The holes in the pens were easy to drill, but there were also three holes farther out, to support a water trough area for the cows.

The new posts are past the big gate. The water line has to go way out there.

The last hole was a doozy! The auger just wouldn’t go down. It just bounced and bounced about a foot down. It took at least half an hour to get that hole dug, and the soil had to be loosened, and the auger had to go sideways for a bit. But, once it got past the hard stuff, it happened. It turns out there are a few areas of really compacted soil right there. That’s interesting, because just a few feet away, there was no problem.

Looks like a normal hole, but it is not.

The good news is that all the poles are in their holes, to make a rhyme. And I DID get some work in. I filled in some of the holes, including a large and very wet hole where the water line got cut and had to be repaired. Let me tell you what, damp clay soil is heavy. My back reminded me of that!

It may look like an area with dirt and some random fencing stuff, but that used to be a big hole.

Of course, that was all a drop in the bucket, compared to all the work that has to be done on this project, but it’s nice to get some sweat equity into my project. By the way, Lee also filled in two holes. Nice, dry holes, I want to point out.

It looks like, at least for now, we have all the posts needed for the horse area. Now, to just fill everything in, finish burying the water line (ugh, a great deal of hand trenching is involved), set the troughs up with their floats and stuff, and add gates.

While the “getting the horse over here” part of the effort is coming close to an end, the project will go on and on, so I’ll keep chronicling it. Why? Mainly for me, I guess. It’s fun to look back on things once they are done. I sure enjoy the photos of building our house!

The container gets to be turned into a tack room and hay storage, while the second container, once it get here, gets to be other storage. Or something. Plans are fluid. Then, the great cattle fencing stage of the operation will begin. Our ranch will look very different, and there will be lots more space for rotating cattle and adding to the herd (which, to be clear, is NOT my area, but it’s fun to watch). Speaking of cattle, the new young heifers behind us want to not only be friends with Goldie, but also the chickens!