Rain and Horses

Well, looks like we got the rain we needed to put out the fire in the Pinenut Mountains.  It flooded on Johnson Lane.  I don't think it was too bad but we do tend to get flash floods if we get a lot of rain.  In this case, the area of rainfall looked very small on radar but very intense.  It rained around here a bit and we had just enough thunder to upset the corgi.  She doesn't like thunder.  It was much cooler yesterday due to the cloud cover.

Today has some puffy clouds and I hope it stays a bit cooler today, too.

I have a pressure pot for fertilizing the plants right on the drip system.  You hook it up to the line with fertilizer in it and it fertilizes while you are watering.  It has been a life saver.  So much easier than carrying buckets.  I have all the zones fertilized except the fruit trees and the street zones which I will do tonight and tomorrow night.

The neighbor came out to see my little horse and help me hook him up to the cart.  We kind of got side tracked onto breeching which we weren't able to do up because it doesn't look like all the parts are there.  We took the little horse for a spin after deciding that the harness looked pretty good.

Nobody does this but he left the halter under the bridle.  That way you can hook up a lead rope to the little guy if you have to open a gate or something and have some sort of control over him.   I like the idea because otherwise you have to get an over sized alter onto his head while he is wearing the bridle if you need to have him stand while you do something like open a gate. I am undecided as to whether this is a great idea due to not having seen it done before.

The guy said I was doing good at talking to the little guy while he had his blinkers on.  The neighbor drove the horse and his style was quite a bit different than the show ring style of driving.  Frankly, I think it was more relaxed and much better than the show ring style.

In the show ring style of driving you are constantly trying to gather up the reins as you get the horse to trot and then loosening them up when you walk.  You are really on his mouth.  The neighbor says he thinks that just creates a hard mouth.

Cliff didn't try to steer the horse constantly like the trainer was telling me to do.  I think I will lighten up a bit when we are out.  Of course, the neighbor emphasized that you must have enough play in you arms to pull back on the reins for a whoa moment.  You don't want to be pulling the reins back in an emergency and have your elbows up to your chest with no more room left to pull.

The little horse did great.  Wiseguy really is sweet and I just need to keep working at this.  The in-laws are coming over today and, if the weather holds, I am taking them for a ride.

Mom in law originally said that she was from a ranch and that having a worthless mini horse went against the grain but she now sounds excited about coming out and meeting the little guy.  Go figure.

Home Improvement

Today was a BIG day for working on the shed and shade cover.  I got 2 facia boards on the end of the rafters.  I got one corner facia boards put on.  I got 6 seams covered in the back.  I got the last seam covered on the south end.  I got  the top seam covered on the north end.  I got a  bunch of the seam covered boards ripped from a piece of OSB.  I got the second to the last piece of the roof on.

The one piece of roofing I have left is a bit tricky but I will have to see what I can do about it.

I got most of the bottom trim work done.  I used 2x4's since the 1x4's actually cost more that the 2x4's.  A piece of solid wood at the bottom will help keep the string board skin from soaking up water this winter.  It seems to be working on the greenhouse.

I have to get some more screws in on all that facia trim work.  I also have to get the underside of the eaves filled in.  I need to clean out the shed a bit and put in a couple of more shelves.  The neighbor girl is coming tomorrow and I am definitely putting her to work.  I also have to get some cement in under the west side where the wind is trying to dig out a huge trench and expose the posts in cement.

Caulking, foam crack filling, tarring the roof and base coating and painting the units will still have to be done as well.  Geez, this is such a big project.  At least there is a light at the end of the tunnel.  Oh yeah, I also have to get the lattice walls framed and the lattice up.  Goal, September 30th.  I can do this.

Picked from the second batch of corn today.  

Watered the Front Zone for 3 hours.  Watering and fertilizing the West Side Wind break tonight.

Garden

Picked several large bunches of Bok Choi. A huge basket of garden peas.  A couple of corns.  A number of yellow crooknecks and one patty pan and two zukes.  Also a small bowl of strawberries.

Fertilized the Front Zone, the Back Zone and the East Windbreak.

Found some string board pieces in the shed.  Managed to get a couple of nice facia boards for the shed cut and put up.  I also manages to cut the last piece of the roof for the backs side of the shade cover it was 12 inches at the top and 20 inches at the bottom. That is a pretty wonky shape but now that it is up I don't think you'll notice it a bit.

I heard it would be 30MPH winds and about an hour ago it started roaring.  Looks like it will be windy tomorrow as well so I may go grocery shopping.  I need  a few things at Home Depot, as well.  I need to check how much paint I have.  I'm going to need to see how much base coat, too.

Projects

Oh boy, Hubby helped me bunches today on the shade cover area.  He got the three 4x8 OSB up and he put the screws in for me.  He also cut the rafters to the right length.  It was great.  He has one more set of rafters to cut to the right length on the long shed and he is pretty much done helping me.  I won't say no if he volunteers for more, I suppose:)  I was so tired I was practically drooling but I hung in there since I only get his help once a week lately because of his work schedule.

We had more of those delicious filet beans I love so much for dinner along with the mini cobs from picking corn today.  The good looking corn was blanched, cut off the cob and frozen into 8 sacks of Chinese stir fry sized bags and 2 bags of dinner for two sized.

Big day tomorrow.  Hope I am up for it.  Need to pick a lot of stuff and freeze it and need to work on the shed. Hubby has agreed to do the cooking when he gets home.

Watering and lightly fertilizing the North Side Windbreak.

Fertilized the veggie garden this morning.

All of this and I got the laundry done and the kitchen cleaned up twice.  No wonder I am tired.  I am taking the rest of the night off.   Heading for the shower.  Good night.

House Cleaning

I cleaned so much today that I am half dead.

Watering and fertilizing the West Side Windbreak overnight.

The neighbor girl cam e to the house and helped me clean for four hours.  She did good considering her age and she was a big help.  I am having her come back again tomorrow.   Hopefully the whole house will be done by then.  I might need to clean on Wednesday as well.

What did we accomplish?  We vacuumed all the window tracks and washed all the windows inside and out.

We cleaned the fan and light globes in the guest bedroom and got the globes and bulbs back into the fixture.  We moved the bed out of the way and vacuumed under the bed and around all the edges of the room as well as under the dresser and around the guitar amps.  We wiped down the walls and got rid of the cobwebs.  Wiped off/dusted the shelving and dresser.  Wiped the high traffic areas and doors.  Gave it all a thorough vacuuming.  Put the bed back together with the frame facing in the right direction.  It was backwards.  Made the bed with nice clean sheets and freshly washed blankets and a bedspread to keep the dirt off.

We got all the light globes down all around the house.  I washed them up this evening and they are ready to be put back up tomorrow.  We got all the curtains taken down from all the rooms in the house. We washed the large red drapes for the bedroom and got them hung out as well as the kitchen curtains. I washed the den, living room, dining room and office curtains this evening.  All the curtains and table scarves and such  are ready to go back into place tomorrow.

There is a lot left to do tomorrow but the other rooms should go  a lot faster since they have been sort of cleaned more often than the guest room.  Also, I have already gotten some parts of the living room dining room cleaned.  I also am not too worried about the kitchen since I clean that a lot and it gets wiped down everyday.  I already cleaned the kitchen doo dads, pots and pans above the cabinets and the bowls and canisters on the shelf by the back door so it mostly needs to be swept and mopped.

I have washed all the houseplants over the last few days.  Gave a number of them a trimming. They are ready to  go back into place.

I took an aspirin for breakfast, lunch, snack time and dinner and will probably need one more for bedtime.  I hope I survive one more day of big cleaning.

Garden

Giving the fruit trees and the West windbreak a water booster.

Watering and fertilizing East windbreak.

Garden

Picked pea pods and snap peas.  Only got a few but that will give us some for our home lunch salads and Hubby's work lunch.  Three kinds of lettuce make that four plus pea pods, home grown carrots, store bought sweet peppers and my first teensy tinsey little zuchinni.  Fun!

Bean plants should start producing in another week.  Potatoes are putting up flowers and that means I can start digging up little potatoes soon.  If you are careful you can dig in from the side and leave the plant unharmed for more potato production. The melons are taking their time getting off the ground but some of them are starting to grow faster.

Watering for three hours from 11:30am to 2:30pm.  Seems to be working out well.

Hung a couple of loads of laundry out on the line again today.  Looks like I am done with that chore until next week.

Fertilizing the front three zones.  That would be front, back and East Side windbreak.

Fertilized with VF11 all zones.

Really cloudy.  We have been threatened with a mega thunderstorm but so far, nothing.  Doesn't surprise me.  That is why we live in one of the driest places around.