Yesterday's Visitor

I've seen the little hummingbirds enjoying nectar from the honeysuckle blooms, but yesterday was the first time I saw one go to the feeder this year.

I can sit at our dining room table and watch these little jewels flitting about. They always make me smile.

Update on the Bathroom Project

The bathroom is usable again, but far from finished. We tore out the particle board flooring and found there was a little black mildew even on the bottom layer of plywood. I cleaned the wood as best I could, then gave it a couple of coats of Kilz primer, and The Farmer covered it with a layer of roofing tarpaper, then put a new layer of plywood down on the old layer, another layer of tarpaper, then underlayment board, and finally the new vinyl flooring. It looks fantastic! The “Old World Fresco” faux finish on the walls and the pattern on the flooring blend beautifully together.

The new toilet is in place. It takes a little getting used to. We got one of the taller ones with an elongated bowl, so it’s a little different seating! It only uses 1.6 gallons of water per flush, and the flapper closes back almost instantly leaving half the water still in the tank, so that’s different too. But it does the job, and that’s what counts!

The guys got the vanity lifted in place and it looks lovely. We still need to buy handles and pulls for the drawers. That should make it look even classier once they're attached.

Then after all that work, the big moment arrived to finally see the cultured marble vanity top. I was so excited to finally get to uncrate it and see what it looked like! And what did we see when we opened the box?

Yep, one corner was broken off, so there we were, finally ready to use it and no can do. Bummer. Worse, this is a special order deal, so it’ll be around 3 weeks before we get another. We had to take it back to the store, get a refund, and order a new one. In the meantime, we just put the old top back on. It wobbles a little as this vanity is a different size from the old one, but it’s usable.

There are still a lot of odds and ends to finish up. I have to stain the new door on one side, and paint it on the other. We put the old door back in place for now, so we can use the bathroom.

The Farmer needs to change the hanger placement on the corbels, then I need to stain them. They’ll go up first, then the cupboard over top of the toilet will sit on top of them. We also need to put the medicine cabinet back up, but need the new vanity top in place first so we can see where to place it between there and the light bar over top. The crown molding and baseboard and trim around the tub and surround needs cut and put in place. We need towel bars, the toilet paper holder and light switch covers put up.

Since we have to wait for a new vanity top and we can’t devote another week to working on the bathroom full-time, it will be a while before everything is done.

But it’s gonna look GREAT!

Primal Scream Therapy

This morning when I went out to do chores the peacock was strutting his stuff and screaming.

I joined in.

Hey, I’m not the only person around here that does it. Sometimes neighbors walking down the road scream back, and last week I even heard one of the garbage guys screaming at the peacock while hanging on the back of the garbage truck as it went rolling by.

I figure it’s great therapy, doesn’t cost a cent, and that peacock and I can scream at each other for a good ten minutes before we get tired. And this week I need any stress relief I can get, so Primal Scream Therapy it is.

The problem is that bathroom we’re remodeling. Getting the wallpaper off was frustrating, but that hasn’t been the only problem. (Naturally!) After that, the Farmer had to disconnect the plumbing from the sink, and he and Geek carted the vanity out. No problem there.

However, the commode refused to leave in one piece, as the bolts were rusted in place. The Farmer ended up having to bust the bottom apart to get the commode loose. We now have a dead, slightly fragmented gold commode setting on our front porch awaiting final disposal.

Worse, once the water was disconnected, even though the valve was turned completely off, it wouldn’t quit leaking. We put a bucket under it, but it filled up so fast we had to empty it every hour. The Farmer went to work that afternoon, but thankfully stopped and got a new valve on his way home, and made the repairs that evening so I didn’t have to get up once an hour all night to keep water from overflowing.

Yesterday Geek and I painted all day. We trimmed out and painted the ceiling twice, both coats of “Cool Gray” (white with the barest hint of gray). I couldn’t believe how dingy the ceiling was once you could see the difference the fresh paint made.

Next we worked on the walls. That mess required trimming out three times, a coat of primer, and two coats of our base color of gray. We finished about 5pm, and decided to wait until today to do the faux “Old World Fresco” finish.

That took most of the morning as it’s tedious work. Brushing on lime wash, then color glaze, then brushing them together… the lime wash dried quickly, so you can only do a little section at a time. When we first started I wasn’t so sure I was going to like it, but now that it’s done – Wow! I can’t wait to see how all this looks together.

Of course, we aren’t done with problems yet. We ripped the old linoleum off the floor this afternoon, only to discover there were TWO layers glued together, AND glued to the floor. Part of it came right up off the floor, but part of it stayed firmly attached. We’ve tried various methods of removal, and none have been too successful. Since it’s only a thinner layer of paper and glue left, and we’re putting finish board on top, we may leave it. I’ll have to see what The Farmer thinks of it.

Last but not least, what do you suppose was under the linoleum? Remember, this is a bathroom. You know, lots of MOISTURE!!! So let’s use particle board, right? ARGH! The floor has gotten wet from leaks on more than one occasion, and one end was particularly nasty with black mildew. There are a couple of cracks in the board, but there is a layer of solid plywood underneath, so… once again, we’ll see what the Farmer thinks needs done.

For now, I’m just taking a rest until it’s time to go out and do evening chores and get in a little more Primal Scream Therapy.

Remodeling the Bathroom

We’re in the midst of remodeling one of our bathrooms this week, and I’m really wondering, who’s Bright Idea was this?

…. Oh yeah, I think it was mine. Somebody just slap me up the side of the head the next time I get such an attack of insanity!

This is our second major remodeling project in this house, the first being a kitchen makeover. It had wallpaper that was not put up properly and came off in little tiny bits. This bathroom also had wallpaper, which thankfully came off in somewhat larger pieces than the kitchen wallpaper did, but left tons of glue behind. I’m talking about a wall GUNKED over with glue. I was actually a little afraid when we got rid of the glue the wall might fall down.

At any rate, I have come to the following conclusion: Anyone who puts up wallpaper in a slipshod manner in a house to hide imperfections on the wall so they can sell it to some poor unsuspecting soul who will then have to deal with it and try to somehow fix the mess deserves to be put in the 9th level of hell (as in Dante's Inferno), and in fact, I think we need to invent a 10th level for such deception. It’s just too evil.

Young Son (aka to Ellie as “Uncle Geek”) and I worked on that mess today and we’re still not done. Understand this room isn’t that big, only about 4x8 feet, with one wall mostly taken up with the space for the tub & surround.

We rolled the liquid enzyme stuff on the wall to soften the glue, then scraped, scraped and scraped some more. Then we rolled more enzyme stuff on the wall, and scraped even more. We found holes we had no idea were hiding behind the wallpaper, and in some places a second layer of wallpaper. Preparing a satiny smooth wall for a paint job just ain’t happening. No, it would take more time and energy than we’ve got, and probably only new wallboard would actually do the job.

Instead, we formulated a plan B which supposedly works well for imperfect walls, and decided to use a Faux Finish, namely Color/Lime Washing to make what the paint company calls an “Old World Fresco” kind of finish. Since we bought a new pale gray commode, and the cultured marble countertop & sink are creamy white with swirls of gray and black, but the cabinetry and trim is all oak with a light stain so will put a lot of wood color in there, we decided to use some gray on the walls.

Specifically, after a primer coat, the base coat of color is going to be “Argent Gray”. (Who names these colors anyway?) It will get a lime wash and a tinted umber glaze.

We’re going to pick up the umber tint in the flooring, which is a good grade of vinyl with a pattern that looks a little like diamonds of slate in varying shades of taupe and cream with just an occasional slight brush of gray undertones. (Don’t I sound like a decorator? Ha!)

Tomorrow morning The Farmer & Geek are going to take out the old vanity and sink, and the old commode, then we’ll get the wallpaper hiding behind them off and finish prepping the wall and go from there.

We’re hoping to get the majority of this project finished this week, but you know how it goes with these things. There’s always surprises, and usually not good ones!

It’s gonna be interesting!

Springtime on the Farm

I love this weather. It's still cool at nights and the first part of the morning, then warms up in the afternoon, but doesn't get so HOT as it does later. Unfortunately, this moderate weather usually doesn't last very long, and we have a very brief bout of spring.

Trees, bushes and flowers are in bloom all over the place! When I walk out our front door, there's a flower bed with a white pulsatilla and several ajuga in bloom, coral bells and iris with buds not quite open, and several other plants greening up but not yet in bloom.

The pond is scummed over with pollen. Our vehicles turn yellow overnight from all the pollen the trees are puffing out.

We have a row of cherry laurels across the front of the yard blooming.

This is the first year the two dogwoods I planted in the front yard have bloomed. I really like the pink variety.
On the north end of the house, the hostas have got a good growth going, the Lenten Rose is still full of blooms, as is the Viburnum bush.

The honeysuckle (Alabama Crimson Red) is also blooming. I saw a hummingbird enjoying some nectar from the honeysuckle blooms just this morning!

When the wind is right, the sweet smell of the viburnum in the front yard and the lilac in the back yard mingle, and oh! What a heavenly aroma!

It won't be long until the roses start blooming, and out in the woods, I've seen trillium, mayapple, trout lily, and all kinds of wild dogwoods in bloom.

It's wonderful to see all this color. Later in the year the flowerbeds are still colorful, but when traveling down the road, it's mostly green that meets the eye, with only a few splashes of color from things like crepe myrtles or butterfly bushes.

I guess I'll enjoy the plethora of colors and moderate temperatures while they last, and try not to think of the heat to come!

Home again, home again!

After a long day of flying, I finally made it back to town about 9pm last night, and home by 10pm. Fortunately, all the flights were on time. That always makes it easier!

I got the wand treatment when going through security at Winnipeg, plus had my laptop checked for chemical residue. Maybe they think frumpy grandmother types are now making explosives in their basement? If that wasn’t enough, my luggage also got a sniff-over by a dog – quite a nice looking black lab. I don’t know if they were looking for drugs or more explosives or what, but the only thing the dog sniffed out was some leftover chicken salad.

It's good to be safely home, but after this latest trip, I’ve come to the following conclusion: I believe it's a point of honor with airlines that whatever gate you come in on, your next departure will be at a gate as far away as possible. Even in Memphis, which isn’t the biggest airport going, I ended up going from the end of one concourse, around the bend and to the opposite end of a different concourse. I seem to do a lot of walking in airports.

Kind of ironic that flying is such good exercise.

A Morning of Therapy

Besides going all kinds of places for therapy, Ellie has in-home therapy to help problems caused by her Cerebral Palsy.
This morning she worked on her big yellow ball. Dad tries to make sure it's as fun as possible!

Farmland in Canada

This is the field behind the kids house in Manitoba. As you can see, even though the weather has warmed up in the last few days, there is still patches of snow here and there.
Last year they grew canola in the field. In past years, they have also had potatoes there, and wheat. It will be interesting to see what they plant this year.

Taking pictures...

We're starting to take pictures for next year's fund-raising calendar for Ellie. The calendar pages start with shots like these:

I'll take this photo and build a picture around it with a "Little Red Riding Hood Theme".

We've also taken some shots of Ellie with a Winnie the Pooh outfit on, and will take more pictures tomorrow and Monday.

I just know it's gonna be a great calendar!

Safely in Canada

All did not go according to plan with my flights, but I figure it could have been a lot worse. I had to change gates 3 times in Atlanta, which isn't so unusual, even if they were on 3 different concourses. Minneapolis/St. Paul was the problem. The weather was getting bad with rain and sleet by the time I flew in, and by the time I left it was worse with snow and ice. The weatherman was predicting between 4-8" of snow!

We were an hour late boarding the plane, and sat on it another hour waiting our turn to have the plane de-iced before we could take off. I was way over two hours late getting to Winnipeg, but considering some of the recent traveling messes, and some of our past travel glitches, I figure that was pretty tame.

Yesterday we were kind of laid back, and I recovered somewhat from a long day of flights and sitting in airports. I read an entire book before I even got to Minneapolis (452 pages!), so I had time to people watch. Airports are even better than malls for people watching. At malls you have mostly an indigenous population, but in airports the people are literally from all over the world. Different languages, shoes, clothing, luggage... it's interesting to sit and watch all the people rushing by.

My favorite was a young man with a foot high Mohawk died several different colors. Wish I'd had my camera available! It reminded me of the joke about the old dude watching this young fellow with a multi-colored Mohawk. The young guy spouted off, "What's the matter old man, you never seen anything like me before?" To which the elderly gentleman replied... "Well actually, I fooled around once with a peacock when I was younger, and I was just wondering if you were my son."

Which reminds me of the old saying:
OLD AGE AND TREACHERY ALWAYS TRIUMPH OVER YOUTH AND BEAUTY!

Getting ready to travel...

I'm leaving shortly to head for the airport. It's going to be a long day of travel, trying to get from the southeast to the Canadian province of Manitoba. IF, and these days that seems to be a BIG if, all goes well with my flights, I should be there by 9:30pm.

I have too many irons in the fire right now, and besides trying to get ready for a trip to visit my son, his wife and our 3-year old granddaughter, I've been working on getting supplies to remodel one of our bathrooms.

In the meantime, farm chores continue. For some time I was milking Cinnamon, a little less each day, as her prodigious milk supply gradually dries up.

If you're of the praying persuasion, please pray I have safe trips today, no cancellations, no delays... just easy flights from here to there!

Sometimes Farming is Hard

Let’s face it – farming isn’t always fun.

If you raise crops of some sort, there are problems with the weather, fuel costs for heating greenhouses and running equipment, and a sometimes fickle market, to name a few.

When you raise animals, you have all those problems and then some. And it’s easy to get attached to animals, especially the little ones. Babies of any sort are cute! It’s great to look out and see lambs or kids or calves or colts or any little critters frolicking around in the fields.

Yes, it’s great --- that is, IF the moms are taking proper care of the youngsters and everyone is doing fine. But it isn’t always like that. Sometimes things go wrong. That’s when farming really tops the charts in the “not fun” department. That’s where I’ve been this week.

You can raise the same sort of critters for years, using the same husbandry practices, and then all of a sudden, one year it all goes wrong. Sometimes you can figure out the cause and adapt or change things. Sometimes you have no idea what the problem was, so there’s just not much you can do about it.

When our little twin goat kids were born this spring, I was a little concerned. The mother is getting up in years and had a difficult labor. Worse, she was NOT supposed to be pregnant in the first place, but was bred by one of her sons. One of the kids had a deformed leg, but that eventually improved. Overall, they seemed healthy enough.

At least, they seemed fine until this week. Then one get sick, and within 24 hours was dead. Then the second one got sick, and within 24 hours was dead. I worked over them until I could barely straighten back up, giving them antibiotics, dextrose, vitamins, and every other therapy I could find that would pertain to the problem.

Nothing helped.

I knew it was a slim chance going in that I could save either kid. It didn’t help that I read even though they've had vaccinations, once in a while, some kids still get sick. They were in my care, and they died.

That’s hard.

This morning Son #2 and I had burial detail. The ground is too hard and rocky here to dig down very deep, so we opt for an above ground burial. It’s easier, but not easy. It has to be done right to make a hot compost so the body is broken down quickly and with no odor. We had 5 big carts full of stuff we put in the pile: some below, some above the bodies. It was hard work. To make matters worse, it was raining.

While we worked the llamas hummed and the mama goat cried. Their mournful dirge made a hard job even harder. I’d moved them as far away as possible from where we were working. It didn’t matter. When we were finally done and I let them out, that mama goat made a beeline to where we’d buried her babies and cried some more. It was heartrending.

Sometimes farming is hard.

Birthday Greetings...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY ROBIN!!!