Friday, August 17, 2012

I just had to post this remarkable invention.  It appeared on a web magazine I subscribe to.  This is an incredible feat considering his warp is more even than mine usually are.  The interview is in French but there's nothing to understand other than watch this in motion.  I Want One!   Lego Mechanical Loom

Our weather is very cool at night now (low 40's) but the rest of this week is going to be in the mid- to upper-90's.  WooHoo!  Love it.

Garden is growing well, weeds even better.  Just keeping up with both of those is keeping us very busy.  Out to mow the front yard today, daughter is cleaning house :-)  then pool time.  We had very strong winds the last couple days and our pool is full of bugs and pine needles so a cleaning is in order before any swimming.

Warm weather always brings out the critter (can you say spider?) hoards.  We found this quarter sized mama spider full of eggs in her abdomen the other night.  We both are so afraid of spiders we couldn't get close enough for a good picture, but you get the idea anyway.

Update 08/19 ... we found two more of these on our front porch.  Guess I need to get out the killer spray before these hatch their millions of babies in my house.  They are all making their homes under the roof but in between the metal roofing and whatever goes under that.  All I can say is Eeeeuuuuuooooooommmmmm  Yikes!


Sunday, August 12, 2012

For some reason I just can't quit taking pictures of our garden produce!   We've only got a few plants out there but they are doing so well.  After we had the garden area rototilled and fenced, we hauled over several tractor buckets of alpaca manure from the pasture.  These are dry pellets we've scraped out of the stalls, piled in the middle of the pasture for several years.  Then we scrape the ground because its not just in the stalls.  So our big pile now is perfect compost with the added grass clippings and leaves from our yard, and dirt from being scraped off the ground in the pasture.

As a result the produce is growing wildly.  Every day we pick, day after day there's more and more.  Thank you Jesus for your blessings.  I decided to try and dry some squash this year.  So far I have two large freezer bags filling up quickly.  Some of the crookneck squash I sliced and lightly salted, left it in the colander for about half an hour, then patted dry and put on the trays.  I tried some this morning.  Whoa!  Is that stuff salty.  More like very salty squash chips.

The others I simply sliced and dried to be used in soup or lasagne later this winter.  We use large thin slices of zucchini instead of noodles.  Its really good and no gluten.

In the 90's here, we been trying to spend some time every day up at the pool.  We get so busy in the mornings we forget until its late in the afternoon, then we are too tired.  The weeds continue to grow everywhere.  Trying to keep 2-1/2 acres weeded around the house is a nearly impossible task.  The pasture looks very unkempt since its grown so much even though I did do some mowing over there early this summer.  Its also 2-1/2 acres but with gas prices so high that's not going to happen again for quite a while.  But we are sure enjoying this summer.


Almost forgot ... our orchard is producing apples, purple and yellow plums, pears and cherries.  This picture is of the yellow plums that are almost ready for picking.  We eat them right off the trees or even better we like to dry them for eating in the winter time.  Sort of reminds of how much we love summer when its hovering around zero degrees.  And they are very sweet and juicy.


Thursday, August 9, 2012



With temps in the 90's lately, we have had to weed the garden more frequently.  Today we were trying to keep up with it all but only succeeded in weeding between the rows of zucchini, potatoes, green onions, hot peppers,  eggplant and tomatoes.  I know it sounds like a lot.  Not so.  Our rows are very short with only about three of each type of vegetable.  These are blueberries (check the size of these beauties!) and the other picture is globe green and yellow zucchini, along with some crookneck squash.  They are all very delicious, and right out of the garden makes them even better.

When I went up to turn off the pool filter I found this poor guy and fished him out with the little skimmer.  Some kind of a tree beetle, they seem to live in just about every state from Idaho down to New Mexico.  Good thing he was already dead, I don't do things that crawl or fly.  He was nearly 3" long with those antennae stretched out.

Dexter, our puppy is now about eight months old.  If he doesn't stop dragging my planted flower pots all over the yard and chewing them up, he may not make it to nine months.  He is such a playful pup.  But the 'destroyer' as we call him is getting in more trouble than he needs.  He attacked some mailing boxes I had stacked with my spinning supplies.  Grrrrrrr.