No progress...

Yesterday was my first day back to work after a glorious week of vacation time or staycation time. I miss being at home and following my own schedules. So, back to adulting I go.  This means that not much happens while I'm at work. Mostly because I want to be a part of the action and to say things like - "HEY! That's my tool you're using!" Because that happened a time or two.

This drill and the electric drill are the only two tools that I'm really comfortable with - actually the electric drill is a little beyond me too...you know anything that you can plug in.

Last night we tried to make the hinges that Tom found work, but then decided that they wouldn't. Maybe we could have tried to do something to make it work. So we took another trip to Parkrose Hardware - 2nd one for the day! 

 

This was an old hinge from one of the kitchen cabinets.

These will work much better and were a little more straight forward than the old hinge.  It would have been nice to not have to spend extra money, but there you have it.

There won't be much progress on a daily basis if I'm going to be a part of the deal. Things will have to wait until after I arrive home from work and after we eat dinner - if we choose to eat dinner first that is. 

A couple of days ago, Tom said that I have enough skill to build something like this on my own or anything with a good plan really. At the time I thought that was crazy talk, but I don't know, maybe it would be possible. If I took my time and really paid attention to the dimensions and measurements etc. I probably could build something. Especially with the YouTubes. It's crazy how much information is out there!! 

Can you picture it? Me being Joanne Liebeler of Hometime? BWAHAHA! She was my favorite on that show...whatever happened to her?

Why am I going down this bunny trail? Well, I might just find myself something to build...like...a...

BROODER BOX!

A little elaborate for a first project, but it would be SO COOL!

A little more straight forward...less angles involved here.

Why would I want a brooder box? Well, sometimes we find oursleves in a place like Wilco. Places like Wilco have chicks. There might be a day that I say I want a dozen...gimme a box! Maybe...maybe not...hard to say.

Okay...back to dreaming about being at home...doing hobby farming...homesteading...gardening stuff.

Being Inspired

Kickstarter Bonus for the Great American Farm Tour

Sometimes you have to get your inspiration from the YouTubes - we watch Justin Rhodes. I have to be honest, I did not find this guy - Tom did. AND when we first started watching his videos, I wasn't all that impressed. However, the more I watched his videos which was all about their homestead in North Carolina, the more I like him. Everything that he does is intentional and he is more than happy to show his successes along side the failures. Let's face it, none of us know it all! I know I don't. Because of that I choose to look at the things that I want to try as an experiment. Something that you learn from.

Now, the Rhodes family has hit the road on their tour and are posting daily...DAILY! That is something that I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around. Not that they are posting daily, but that they are traveling with their kiddos and visiting all sorts of amazing place and meeting amazing people! You wouldn't think that 24 hours would be enough time.

With that, I'm going to do my best to post here as many times a week as I possibly can. Last week was easy as I was on vacation and updating what we were doing on our little farm. It was an awesome week of being away from the crazy of work and focusing on what matters - getting our dream going.

I'm SO excited - the things that I call experiments are working. My seedlings are doing great! I've got the vision for the garden - which means that the weather could improve and not rain long enough for me to get out and dig out my raised beds. I'm shooting for 9, but I'm not sure.

I'm thinking the JM Fortier/Eliot Coleman way 30" wide by however many feet from the edge to around 3 feet from the fence. The paths will be 18" wide. Whew, that's going to be a lot of work!

We'll see...until the next post, check out the video HERE and give him a like and a follow.

Go ahead check them out...BE INSPIRED.

Seriously...then go HERE for all of his videos!

March 18, Saturday Projects

The rain theme that has been with us all week continued to this morning and we ended up doing our weekend run during what was said to be Sprinkles - it wasn't.

Then later in the morning we ran an errand...

Can you guess where? I chose to sit in the car and wait. When I parked it I didn't realize that we were actually in front of what was once Walgreens. Now that Walgreens is down the street "On the corner of healthy & happy" instead of a strip mall, Ace has moved into their old spot. Which threw Tom off for a moment. Now we are starting to spend a little money on the Chick Mobile project...it's not much, but it's a start.

After returning from running errands I went back into the hoop house to check everything out and move some trays around again. The main reason I did that was to take a peek into the trays to see what was going on. 

While I was out there I found my 2016 calendar and looked to see what I did during this same week a year ago...

First, it occurred to me that my vacation must have been in April and not March since there were all sorts of notes in April. Anyway, March 2017 doesn't look terrible productive because I started so many items at the end of February and had them sitting in our Living Room for a couple of weeks. I do have several things that need to be started NEXT weekend. So yeah, way ahead of the game this year. 

Also decided to take the low tunnel down. I think that the plants are going to survive just a little longer. It was a good experiment, even if I don't get any Flower Sprouts or Purple Broccoli - at least I know that they will survive the winter here. Let's face it, winter in the Pacific NW is more wet than anything. And snow, although not unheard of, doesn't last long when it does happen. This year was a freak year.

So - here are the plants that I grew under the low tunnel - not convinced that I'll get anything (besides Kale). If I do, it will be a welcome surprise and confirmation that we are able to grow through the fall and winter months around here..

More progress has been made to the Chick Mobile! Today the chicken wire was attached to the front corners of the coop, the wire goes from the corner to the door on each side and about the same distance down each side. It looks pretty cool - 

While I was resting Tom took a trip to the home improvement store after finding out that Shurway was closed for the day in search of 1x4 lumber. When he returned I helped with the nesting box frame which was a combination of re-purposed wood from an old deck off the front of our house along with the 1x4. It was kinda fun putting it together, but the best part was the Swivel Bar (which I had no part in). 

Coolest part of the whole coop!

See...the COOLEST part!

Tomorrow is a relatively short day at home for us as we have worship time in the morning and then later in the evening is our Small Group time. Also, I'll be getting ready to go back to work on Monday and will need to get my work clothes washed - ugh. There may not be much action on projects tomorrow :(

It's time to end this for today with a photo of my itty-bitty Marigolds.

Day 5

DON'T TELL ME...IT'S RAINING AGAIN...

Working on outside projects started off slow today...after a REALLY nice day yesterday the rain came back...

It would have been too good to be true for the sunshine to stick around for the rest of my week of from work. Maybe tomorrow will be better.

CLEAN UP TIME

My outside work was getting the hoop house all cleaned up and organized, now that I'm basically done with getting seeds germinated in trays - for now. In fact at this time last year I was only getting seeds into trays...and now I have all sorts of seedlings happening! Way ahead of the game!

SO EXCITED!!

Anyway, having the trays on the shoe rack by the door made it feel more crowded, so that needed to be changed. Some stuff needed to be thrown on the burn pile or into the garbage. It was a quick little project and during the moving of the trays I did see that the Chinese Forget Me Not's (Cynoglossum Amabile), Ellagance Purple (Lavandula angustifolia) and Nasturtium (Tropaeolum minus) were all starting to sprout, wahoo! I was a little concerned that the temps may not have been warm enough, but it appears that they were okay. Especially with the lids on the trays to keep them from getting too cold.

This is what the inside of the hoop house looks like after the clean-up...

Tom did some more work on the chick shaw and I was available to help out too! The first thing that I helped with was the ripping of 2 x 6 boards into 2 x 2's. Thus the hearing protection and the mask. Since I suffer from allergies and have mild asthma it's best that I "suit" up for this task.

Later on, Tom took the 2 x 2's and cut them even further for the vertical posts and the diagonal braces. This is where I come in and fasten the posts and braces with screws with MY TOOL.

Below you can see the diagonal braces and the two short posts to the rear of the structure. The nesting boxes (milk crates)  will be directly above the short wall in the back. That will be one of the purchases that we'll make to complete this project.

The Chick Shaw plans are pretty entertaining Tom is up to Step 18 where it asks "Are we having fun?" If not it's time to take a break - have some tea or have a stretch or whatever. Fortunately this is still fun for Tom and I am enjoying running that drill - MY drill! 

It will be MORE fun once it is ready to roll out in the field and add chickens. We'll also have to add a Portable Electric Chicken Fence...the brand is Premier 1 check them out HERE. The fencing is a future post.

Having it rain most of the time that we were outside - and during the days that we had planned to do stuff outside it was nice to see this...

These popped up in the burn pile again.

A little bit of sunshine in the gloom of the day.