New Chicken House

Jim's got a bunch of wood from a job he worked on earlier this year.  He did the gas main into a new facility and there was so much lumber leftover from the building that he and two other men brought away 2 trailer loads apiece.  It's nice that he won't have to spend as much money building it, since it's far larger than I expected.  

It's replacing the building on the left, half chicken coop, half garden shed.  

The rafters are already made, and he has the windows.  So, there is plenty more to be done. 

COVID-19

I don't think I can let 2020 go any further down the road without a post on the situation that is affecting our lives in so many ways.  

Pandemic:

an outbreak of a disease that occurs over a wide geographic area and affects an exceptionally hight proportion of the population

In our case -- the whole world.

I was reading a post on facebook that expressed in a few words the conflicting opinions concerning mask wearing, behaviors, gatherings, medical opinions and who knows what all. 

We have been little affected in the financial department having what is considered an "essential" business. We don't go out to eat much; we don't buy much; we have an emergency fund.

Other people have suffered much, loss of income, mental issues, coping with children learning at home or training them to manage alone all day.

I was very impressed with the way our grandsons learned to cope with each other and managing their time with a minimum of infighting.  They grew up a little during this time. 

Having my two daughters in the health care business, they were concerned for our welfare, reminding us to be careful.  Lorene did our shopping for several weeks, keeping her family away because working so much among the elderly, she didn't want to pass along the virus.  

And, Lynette in Texas, delivering babies in full gown from top to toes, masks and face shields, working with COVID patients, causing a bit of worry.

We live in an area of the state surrounded by meat packing plants with vigorous outbreaks, so we have been slow to go back to normal, as is our town in opening its doors to customers.  

This a curious virus, everyone convinced it is one causing respiratory illness, and it turning out to be one that wreaks havoc in all parts of the body by affecting the blood, or not, if one is asymptomatic. 

I have fluctuated between the idea that this whole thing is a bunch of nonsense, to not wanting to leave my house in case I get infected or infect someone else.  

I suppose the truth of the matter is somewhere in between those two ideas. 

Sensible caution, going forward.

Life Well Lived

Eight years ago I came home from the hospital after having surgery for my sinus tumor.  

I don't remember much of the time in the hospital and somehow I thought we came home from 

the hospital on the day before our 25th anniversary, but in checking the blog post of the time 

it was the 5th not the 7th of June.  

At one time we thought of taking a big vacation to celebrate 25 years, but instead I had cancer.

I found the following article in the June Reader's Digest.

"Life Well Lived

On our 13th wedding anniversary, we didn't go to Mexico as we'd planned.  Instead, on that day when we had avowed ourselves for better or worse, my husband helped me down the steps and into his car and took me to physical therapy.

This is the metaphor. Sometimes -- many times -- both in life and in marriage, you hope for the sunset overlooking the ocean off a deserted beach, but what you get is a drive to physical therapy.  That's OK. Maybe that's actually how it should be."

Excerpted from The Book on Being 40(ish) edited by Lindsey Mead

 

4th Annual Memorial Day Picnic -- At The Farm

Families are like pieces of art -- you can make them from almost anything, and kind of material  Sometimes they look like your DNA and sometimes they don't.  The only ingredient you need to make a family is unconditional love. 

--Mitch Albom, Author

Taking a nap on a plank bed.

Hunting frogs in the creek. 

 Gun safety, and shooting practice.

 

Hiding from the shooting range.

A better place to be safe. 

Checking out the camouflage. 

This is the fourth year we've gathered together to enjoy ourselves on Memorial Day weekend.  Three of those years, we've been on The Farm, one at our house, because it rained.  

The two other previous years at the farm, we left early because of threatening storm and rain.  This year, we were on our way home when the sprinkles fell.

In our experience, over our 30+ years of marriage, we've had more rainy Memorial Day weekends than not.  

Christian turned 7 during these crazy times of COVID-19k restrictions.  The plans are to have a party later with big brother Barry.  We brought him a gift on pool cleaning out day.

Christian still got a cake for the big day. 

Jim spent some time this month helping a friend with a sewer problem that turned out to be part of  the city's problem and resulted in replacement of both sewer and water lines.  Jim did some of the digging and got a thankful response.

Mother's Day.  

Lorene decided this year to give me fake flowers, since I've managed to kill every other plant she's given me.  The little one is a succulent.  They are harder to kill, since they thrive on neglect. 

May 16th -- Still too cold to go all the way in. 

It's A Sod Life

Starting a project usually leads to another one.  Jim put in that new rock pathway last week, and he wasn't satisfied with the ground level next to it so he used his sod cutter to cut away the sod.

Then used the sod cutter on the bare ground to lift up more dirt,

scooped it up with the tractor,

leveled it out,

rolled the sod back in place, 

and it's finished!

Looks pretty good, too. 

The Quarantine Continues

As the quarantine and volatile weather continues, we keep ourselves busy,

 just without any lookers-on. 

The boys are coping with a nice little school room. I think they spend some of their study time and most of their other time in a huge blanket fort in the basement. 

We started the month with snow.  The nice thing about snow in this season, is that it doesn't last very long. 

 Jim has been busy working outside on the nice days building rafters for a new chicken house/garden shed that has turned from a dream into reality due to a windfall of free wood.   

He also had a order a load of small rock for a job and with the leftover, extended our front sidewalk to a nice looking rock way instead of weedy grass.

It looks so nice, finished! 

Our chickens don't care anything about milk and egg shortages, so we are getting between 12 and 16 eggs a day.  One of our favorite ways to eat them is deviled.  I've learned a few tricks on how to boil new eggs so the shells come off easily. 

The eggs should be at least three days old and at room temperature. Put water in a sauce pan that will cover the eggs, put A LOT of salt in and let it come to a boil.  Using a slotted spoon put the eggs in the boiling water and boil for 15 minutes.  Cool in ice water and peel when cool.  The salt is important, because sometimes the eggs will crack and the salt contains the egg white so it doesn't all leak out and keeps in it one place.

I was hungry for fried polenta, so I made some.  It wasn't quite as good as I remember.  I think making a smaller batch next time would be good.  

We had a hard freeze the second week in April so I picked most of my daffodils so I could enjoy them. All the ones I didn't pick were done for, but I see ones that weren't blooming are struggling onward. 

My daughter was featured for her work on their facebook page.

I think.

And..

Happy Birthday to Jim this month.  We had better birthdays alone because we got these lovely homemade cards!

This is the only time he gets Lucky Charms!

It would be nice to see them, though.