First Wood Fire This Year!

So nice to be warm and cozy when it is cold and wet outside.

I see chickens out there...

The girls have found something to eat.

Ah, I see, the last of the watermelon.

  

Looks like the girls are starting to molt?

The propane fellow showed up with his big truck

and filled up the tanks.

Wouldn't want to run out in the Winter

especially when the power goes out like it did a

couple of weeks ago.

Wood fire, propane or electricity.

Nice to have choices.

Solar would be good too.

Tom would like that.

Didn't work outside today.

I'm so bad.

~:>

Smiles

Note:

I just noticed that some comments

have shown up in my gmail

but with no way to publish them and they

have not shown up in my comments to publish.

So, apologies to you who left comments

and didn't see them published.

Late October Rain

One of my favorite Halloween decoration

that dates from

when my children were young.

Probably purchased this happy pumpkin

scarecrow man sometime in the middle 1980's.

He brings his smiley face and hangs around every October.

He is a cheerful fellow!

If you look closely you can see rain on the deck,

so if it rains some more today and really wets down the forest

and reduces the fire danger we might be able to fire up the wood stove.

Hope so! It's chilly.

The chickens don't mind the rain at all.

Looks like a lot of oak leaves to rake.

Lots of leaves yet to fall.

Sigh...ahhh...I think I would like to curl up there too and take a nap.

Morgan on her bed of many mattresses!

This morning the IT fellow came out to check out why my internet

connection has been running slow, hanging up

and at times losing its internet connection.

He replaced a piece of equipment and the problems went away!

It is nice when pages will load...snark, snark...

~:>

Smiles

Note:
I just noticed that some comments
have shown up in my gmail
but with no way to publish them and they
have not shown up in my comments to publish.
So, apologies to you who left comments
and didn't see them published.

New Roof Ready For Winter

The oak leaves are falling

and beginning to collect on the roof and the tops of the gutters.

Morgan likes her deck!

The chickens would like to get on the deck.

But they are too fat to fit through the bars and too lazy to fly over the top.

At least not yet.

No chickens on the porch anymore!

Genevieve is all ready for Halloween!

Soooo cute!

Happy Halloween!

My favorite holiday!

Smiles!

~:> 

Idaho Backyard

In the morning the plan so far is for a group of us to go to an orchard and pick peaches! I'm looking forward to spending the morning outside under the peach trees with family and some very nice people having a fun time doing some needed work. And I really would like some fresh peaches!

If anyone knows a good way to rid a lawn of thistles besides spraying, please let me know.

Here is a photo of my daughter's backyard that has a big thistle problem. My daughter tells me that the lawn needs to be sprayed to kill off the thistles otherwise the children won't be able to play on the grass. I have never been stuck with a thistle but it sounds pretty bad.

I am very thankful to my daughter's father-in-law for the drive to Idaho! This is a photo of the smoke from the American Fire as we drove through the mountains toward Nevada.

Smiles! Happy Summer!

Chicken Coop Envy

Today I was shown a photo of a beautiful chicken coop.

Later I went online and looked around for a photo of the coop

because I was sure I had seen it before.

And I found a link to

this page with beautiful photos of the beautiful coop.

Photo from the internet - http://heatherbullard.com/2010/03/our-chicken-coop/

Wow! That is a dreamy chicken coop!

But to tell the truth this coop is too small for the number

of chickens we have had and will have in the future.

And I don't think it would keep bears out.

But I can sure use some of the features of this coop

when planning my dream coop.

The smoke from the fire is only really bad in the mornings.

The chickens don't seem to mind the smoke at all.

Latest fire news.

I haven't been taking Morgan for walks because of the smoke.

She is getting old and the smoke bothers her.

Me too.

~:>

Smiles

Fire In The Mountains

This looks like a pretty photo of sunlight shining through

the trees and morning haze.

Nope!

Yesterday and this morning I woke up to the smell of smoke

and when I took Morgan out for her walk

it was smoky outside.

Yesterday, after there was a breeze

the smoke was blown away and the sky cleared for the day.

Hope the smoke goes away today too.

Most of all I hope the fire fighters are safe

and the fire will be quickly contained.

Link to American Fire latest news.

~:>

Smiles

New Roof Finished

Love the color of the roof and how it compliments the color of the deck.

It does look great!

And two new skylights,

the left one opens and a new ceiling fan too!

Next is new flooring for the loft.

~:>

Smiles

Roofing Repair

There were many places where the roof had damage

and needed to be repaired.

The roofers should be finished with the roof this week.

The light colored boards are new wood.

New board behind the gutter.

New board here also.

New board that replaced the dry rot or carpenter ant damage.

Not sure which?

The hens have been playing with flakes of alfalfa and straw.

They are still not all that content.

They want out!

Before I let them out to roam

I want to find out how long they need to be kept away

from the spray the pests control people sprayed around the house.

And then there are the foxes to worry about

but hopefully they have moved away to new places

to look for dinner.

~:>

Smiles

Roof On Tuesday Morning

The sun was so bright this morning 

that I had to get behind a tree to take this photo, which looks a bit dark,

otherwise the reflection off the roof was blinding the camera.

Went down to Auburn today to pick up some

medication for Morgan.

Thought we would try another course

of antibiotics and see if she 

gets a bit more perky.

And I bought a sun dress for myself.

I am a jean person usually always wearing jeans.

But now I have one cool dress to wear on these hot days.

One is all I need... I had another one and gave it away.

I think I'm keeping this one.

~:>

Smiles

Weekend Roof Work

Yes, the roofers worked on the weekend!

Hard workers!

At the juncture of the level roof to the A-frame roof,

this piece of cracked plastic was used to make a large skylight 

in the old roof.

That plastic will be replaced by two skylights.

The new skylight on the left opens

and when the skylight on the right is installed

it will be a non-opening skylight.

There was only one skylight that opened at the store

of the correct size and we didn't want to wait and place an order

so one skylight that opens is better than none.

I've been reading a lot lately.

The hot weather is giving me an excuse to spend time quietly reading

instead of trying to do much in the heat.

Kristine sent me the latest Elizabeth Moon book (Hardback!)

I have been buying Georgette Heyer books on my iPad.

I really do like real hardback books much better than ibooks.

But the ibooks are handy to have

and it is so convenient to buy a book and have it immediately

available to read whenever I want.

Happy Summer!

~:>

Smiles

Roofing Progress And Strange Plant

These two photos of the roofs were taken this hot sweltering afternoon.

The small roof is almost finished 

except for putting the skylight back. 

The roofers are hoping the A-frame roof will be 

in the shade when they get back from lunch.

The roofing job has been held up because of the 

thunder and lightning storms and rain forecasts.

No fun being on a roof when there are lightening strikes.

The green leaves in the photo are of a tomato plant 

and some strange plants that I can't identify...

the leaves with the smooth edge.

I thought they might be sunflowers 

but my neighbor said no and I don't know?

I guess I will just let the plants grow and see what happens!

Would be nice if the tomato plants made some tomatoes 

but not much sun reaches these beds.

Next year I'm switching to shade plants!

~:>

Smiles

Clouds And Mountains

Photos taken on the way to buy myself an ice cream cone.

The first cone was so good that I went back and got another one!

Too bad I didn't get photos of the cones...

they were so good!

It has been very hot here lately.

103º yesterday in Auburn!

It is not that hot up here in the mountains

under the trees but it is still very hot.

If we had stayed in the store much longer I probably

would have got another ice cream.

It has been a long time since I bought an ice cream in a sugar cone.

Here's wishing you ice cream on hot days.

~:>

Smiles

Sorting Stuff

Update from my iPad: (More to come)

Here is a photo of a pie safe I found when sorting through boxes of stuff that were packed up and stored away years ago. I kept this dish and cover but managed to send most of the stuff off to Goodwill. Still lots of boxes to look through.

Not much of a post but I thought that a little bit

would be better than nothing.

The weather has moved down into the 90's

and the cooler weather will hopefully mean I will have the energy

to start taking photos and write posts.

~:>

Smiles

Sunny Hot Hot Weather

Wow... I really haven't been blogging for a while!

I've been busy and didn't realize it had been such a long time.

So, I'll start up blogging again with a photo of one of my two sunflowers.

Well... part of one anyway!

I'll post some more on here tomorrow.

I need to record some of what has been happening.

Smiles

~:>