Rural Revolution

Hating wholesomeness

noreply@blogger.com (Patrice Lewis) — Sat, 28 Jan 2012 21:42:00 +0000

Here's my latest WorldNetDaily column entitled Hating Wholesomeness.

Connections

noreply@blogger.com (Patrice Lewis) — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 20:51:00 +0000

Back in the late 1970s, there was a British television show called Connections. The premise of the show was how discoveries, scientific advancements, historical events, and technology are all connected. I only saw one or two episodes, but it was fascinating.

Well this morning, I had my own mini-version of Connections when I received the following email:

I want to start by saying thank you for your blog! I read it every day and look forward to it. I also homeschool my children and am trying to become as prepared as possible on one income. The reason for my letter today is that my daughter has Cystic Fibrosis (a genetic disorder when pancreas and lungs blocked with mucus) and I have been searching for an over the counter digestive enzyme to stock up on and was having some trouble in doing so. That is until I read your post on making mozzarella cheese of all things!! You mentioned in your post that you use powdered lipase. That is an ingredient in her prescription medication. So that prompted me to look that up which lead me on to many other articles and an OTC medication that is very affordable to stock up on. What makes all of this even more wonderful and amazing is that my husband and I had just been going over the things we really need to do to get MORE prepared and this was number one on our list. I believe that God had his hand in this! God bless you, your family and farm in all you future endeavors!

I found this email stunning. Who'da thunk?

Making mozzarella

noreply@blogger.com (Patrice Lewis) — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 05:18:00 +0000

A neighbor named Wendy had a cow who lost a calf at birth, and Wendy's been forced to milk the new mama in the absence of the baby. Wendy called and asked if I could make her some mozzarella cheese out of the milk.

It's been over a year since I've milked Matilda, so I said sure! I wanted to see if my cheesemaking skills had atrophied. So Wendy brought over five gallons of fresh milk. (I kept it in our "outdoor refrigerator" until I had a free day to make cheese.)

Cheesemaking isn't arduous -- it's mostly a matter of keeping an eagle-eye on the temperature -- but it's a lengthy and drawn-out process. Don't try making cheese unless you plan to be home the whole day.

I followed the directions found in this book, Home Cheese Making by Ricki Carroll. If you're serious about making cheese, this is a wonderful reference book.

I won't repeat the recipe since it's too much typing, but I do have another blog post on mozzarella cheese here.

To two gallons of milk, I added some citric acid to make sure the acidity was high enough. Mozzarella cheese has to be somewhat acidic in order to have that "stretch."

Adding lipase powder. This helps give mozzarella its characteristic taste.

My thermophilic starter was a little old, so I wasn't sure it had enough kick. Fortunately it did. However I plan to use some of the leftover fresh milk to re-culture my starter. (Don't worry, I'll blog about it.)

All the ingredients are added and the temperature is correct...

...so now it's time to add rennet. This thickens and "gels" the milk into curds. Takes about 75 minutes for this process to occur.

Cutting the curds. Cut in about 1/2" strips one way, then the other way (criss-cross), then diagonally one way, then the other way.

The curds end up looking like this. Stir, then let them rest for 20 minutes.

Pouring off the whey. Whey can be used to make ricotta cheese, but I wasn't making that today.

As with canning, kitchen timers are your best friend while making cheese.

The drained curds are kept in the colander over a pot of hot water to keep draining, and they're flipped every 20 minutes for 2 1/2 hours. (Sorry, didn't take any photos of this process.)

At the end of this process, it's time to turn the curds into cheese. Start with broad wooden spoons. Do NOT use slotted spoons of any sort (as I found out the hard way) because the gooey cheese oozes between the slots and makes a mess.

Start a pot of water heating toward 170F.

Meanwhile, take the dried curds...

...and start slicing 'n dicing.

It's a juicy process, so be sure to keep a towel beneath the cutting board. During the second batch of cheese, I balanced the cutting board across the sink and let the excess whey drain directly, which worked much better.

When the water in the pot reaches 170F, add the curd cubes. Adding the curd will cool the water, so add more heat as necessary to keep the temperature at 170. Don't go any higher.

Then take the wooden spoons and start working the curds, pressing them together. The water will get very cloudy with whey. Keep working the curds, and keep the temp at 170.

The curds will start to get shiny...

...and stretchy. It's now officially cheese.

Next take the hot and stretchy cheese and plop it in a bowl of cold water to cool.

Here's the two batches of cheese I made from Wendy's milk. Looks like nothing more than a couple of brains sitting on my counter, doesn't it?

I still need to reach Wendy to find out whether or not she wants me to brine the cheese. Personally I like fresh mozzarella better when it's lightly brined, but of course it's her call.

I never saw a purple cow...

noreply@blogger.com (Patrice Lewis) — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 00:59:00 +0000

Remember that favorite rhyme from childhood?

I never saw a purple cow
I hope to never see one;
But I can tell you anyhow,
I'd rather see than be one.

It seems a little bull calf has been born in Serbia with purplish (well, looks more like washed lavender to me) coloration. Kinda cute!

Tidbits

noreply@blogger.com (Patrice Lewis) — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 14:51:00 +0000

A friend has been sending me little clips he's finding on Facebook, which I think are great.

Congrats to our winner!

noreply@blogger.com (Patrice Lewis) — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 05:54:00 +0000

Is this fabulous or what? It turns out that our very own reader, Maria S., won second prize in the Safecastle Freedom Award!! How cool is that??

You might remember that Maria wrote a piece called Preparedness for Young People. Don and I both agreed that this was an excellent piece, and we selected it to send to the Safecastle folks for their final round of judging. Opened to a much wider public for voting, Maria won second place! Her prize is an Excalibur 9-tray dehydrator.

Maria and I emailed back and forth this morning, and I told her one of the reasons her essay was so strong was it addressed a very thorny topic in a very practical way. It also differed from the more nuts-and-bolts approach many of the other essays took. All in all, we couldn't be prouder of Maria.

While there is no way we could take even a modicum of credit for Maria's win, I will say this: Rural Revolution's entry was up against some of the biggest prepping blogs out there. Fifteen blogs sponsored essays, and to have Rural Revolution's choice get second price is sort of like a tiny town's high school football team competing against the big urban schools - and showing well.

At any rate, we couldn't be prouder of Maria, and offer her our heartiest congratulations.

Garden of Eden in a bucket

noreply@blogger.com (Patrice Lewis) — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 14:40:00 +0000

Wouldn’t it be nice if you could pop the lid on a huge bucket, open it up, and have an instant homestead? Inside that bucket would be a ready-built off-grid cabin, a huge raised-bed garden area fenced against the deer, a well with a hand pump, a pond, an acre of wheat, two milk cows, a flock of chickens, and all your seeds sprouted in pretty little containers, ready to plant.

Well I’d like that too, but it doesn’t exist.

While I applaud any and all efforts for people to adopt a more preparedness lifestyle, I must point out a dangerous tendency: the mindset that someone can stash away all kinds of supplies and equipment, but they won’t bother learning anything about it until such time as the bleep hits the fan. Bad idea.

It’s a whole lot easier to talk about doing something than to actually do it. Preppers must learn how to walk the walk, not just talk the talk. A mark of a real Prepper (versus an armchair Prepper) is the determination to make sure that his efforts won’t be wasted. This means testing your theories, supplies, and equipment; and it means learning how to do things by alternate means. And this must be done before the bleep hits the fan.

There are some people – the “garden of Eden in a bucket” types – who would have you believe the skills to run a self-sufficient homestead can be acquired after the fact as long as you have the equipment.

This is not only a foolish assumption, it’s a dangerous one. If the bleep ever really and truly hits the fan, you are going to be stressed, scared, desperate, panicked, and unfocused. If you think you’ll suddenly have the leisure and the interest in learning the intricacies of cooking from scratch, growing a one-acre garden, or plinking at targets, think again. Because make no mistake: all these skills take practice.

Remember, preparedness is a three-legged stool: supplies, knowledge, and community. You might have all the supplies in the world, but without the knowledge of how to use those supplies, they’re useless.

A reader once wrote, “My Grandmother was a true child of the Great Depression. She tried to teach me to garden, can, sew, knit, etc. I had little patience or interest. Now I find myself struggling to learn to do the things I thought were passé at the time.”

Sadly, such is the fate of most of the modern generation. For most of us, the mantra was “Study hard and go to college.” Our parents and grandparents were anxious to spare us the hardship and struggle they themselves experienced while growing up, little realizing they were doing us a disservice in the long run. Struggles and hardship breed knowledge and experience.

Let's face it, most of us didn't grow up learning homesteading or survival skills at our parents' knees. If we want to acquire the wisdom of our pioneer forefathers and their seemingly (emphasis on seemingly) effortless techniques for living a low-tech rugged lifestyle, we have to learn them the hard way. I had to teach myself to can, to milk a cow, to make cheese, to garden, and an endless list of other skills. And let me assure you I fail all the time. That's the price I pay for having grown up living a soft and modern life.

Today, almost everyone lives a soft and modern life. It's not meant to be an insult, it's just the truth. If you want to overcome that handicap, you must work very hard to do so. The dangerous part is when we think we can just effortlessly – tra la la – waltz into a pioneer lifestyle in a "bleep" situation and expect everything to be just like it is in the books. If we plant a garden, it will grow. If we get a cow, she'll be gentle, healthy, give endless milk, never get mastitis, and can get pregnant without breeding. If we buy a farm, fences will never break down, barns will never need repair, and cougars will never take a calf.

The pioneers didn’t launch themselves into the unknown without adequately preparing their brains as well as their supplies. They knew they would be without convenient “rescue me” resources. They brought what was necessary to ensure their survival in a new land, but they also brought the know-how and wisdom to understand the use of their supplies and equipment. Anything less would have been suicide.

Buying a “garden of Eden in a bucket” will not make you competent to run a successful homestead any more than buying a fancy rifle will make you a marksman. The time to make mistakes is NOW, while you can still purchase food from the grocery store if your garden fails.

My friend Enola Gay summed it up very nicely: “Walking the preparedness walk requires effort, commitment and inconvenience. You will be in for an expensive education, but an education that will serve you well when the grid goes down. Don't be the smartest guy in the room – the guy telling everyone else how to do it – with no real life experience backing you up. Be the guy who has done it. Be the guy who knows how to do it, not because you have read about it but because you have lived it, because you have practiced it. Be the guy who walks the walk - not the guy who talks the talk.”

I encourage any and all prepping efforts, but please – please – don't think homesteading or low-tech living will be easy or trouble-free if you spend enough money or read enough books. You need to go through trials and errors and endless failures at a time when those failures won't mean the difference between life and death.

There’s an old saying that goes, “Sweat in practice saves blood in battle.”

I suggest you start sweating.

Playing the piano with no fingers

noreply@blogger.com (Patrice Lewis) — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 04:14:00 +0000

Next time you're inclined to whine about not being able to do something, watch this video. It's a Chinese talent competition feature a young woman whose right hand is missing all its fingers. It's a magnificent performance guaranteed to make your eyes sting.

And to top it off, she's only been playing the piano for three years.

A friend sent this. Made my day.

Cassandra and the sheeple

noreply@blogger.com (Patrice Lewis) — Sun, 22 Jan 2012 15:08:00 +0000

So it's early Friday morning, maybe 5 a.m. I'm drowsing in bed, comfortable, snuggled up to Don. Suddenly my eyes pop open. Crud! I have a WorldNetDaily column due by noon!

Don'cha hate those types of wake up calls?

We've had such a busy week with the snowstorm that I literally forgot about the column. I didn't even have a concrete idea to write about. I scrambled to get dressed, got a fire going in the woodstove, started my computer, made some tea, then sat down and tried to be brilliant. NOT.

By the time Don got up I had an idea sorta developing, but didn't know where to take it (a frequent lament). Don shook his head and said the idea wouldn't stand on its own, so I was back to square one and running out of time.

So, rather by default, I pulled together a modification from an old blog post and sent that in. It was pathetic beyond words but the best I could do. The reason I waited so long to post this is because frankly I was embarrassed.

But oh well, ya can't win 'em all. Here's the column, entitled Cassandra and the Sheeple.

Winter wonderland

noreply@blogger.com (Patrice Lewis) — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 06:18:00 +0000

Well, it looks like the storm finally blew itself out. What a week it's been!

While Wednesday morning was calm, the wind blew hard Tuesday night and drifted snow across the road to about two feet deep. For some reason there's a sort of vortex at the end of our driveway which often makes the snow even deeper. Sure enough, here's a neighbor, stuck in the snow.

So Don and I grabbed shovels and went over to help.

Another neighbor with a snow plow attachment on her truck managed to make a little headway in the vicinity, which finally freed the stuck neighbor.

Then off went the truck in an attempt to make headway on the road with the plow. Got, oh, about a quarter mile and bottomed out. Boom, stuck.

Tools of the trade in this weather.

The first stuck neighbor backed his vehicle up all the way home, then returned to help free the second vehicle. He came with his dog sled. Well, why not?

It took five of us three hours to clear the truck to the point where it could be slowly backed up. Most of that was accomplished on our bellies, scooping snow out from under the truck chassis. Guess this means we're really and truly snowed in!

Or at least we were until late Wednesday afternoon when a fellow who lives nearby ran his grader up and down our road. Thanks!

For the next two days, it snowed and snowed and snowed. The plowed road quickly became unplowed again, undoing the work of the grader. However, our neighbor with the plow attachment was able to keep up after that, so long as there wasn't wind and drifts.

We got about a foot of snow above and beyond whatever we got on Blizzard Tuesday. Here's a tire sporting a jaunty cap.

The chickens aren't terribly happy. It's been much too snowy for them to wander far from the coop. They mostly stay huddled inside, the wimps.

Here's how to move hay bales in snowy weather.

The temperatures haven't been terribly cold, especially since the wind died. The beasties don't especially like the deep snow, but they beat down paths and so can get around fairly easily.

Pitched metal roofs are such an advantage in heavy snow. They accumulate snow up to a point...

...and then it all comes sliding down. Piles up underneath, but oh well -- better than a crushed roof.

Snow on the barn roof, which isn't pitched as steep as the house but still sheds snow nicely from its metal surface.

Snowy landscapes.

I like the way this photo turned out.

One of the dirt piles from the pond construction.

Quail in the garden.

"What??"

A tentative moment of sun.

Older Daughter and some neighbor kids sledding into the pond hole.

They spent hours sledding. See? The pond isn't even finished and it's already providing recreational opportunities.

Here Older Daughter made a crash test dummy to see how steep a certain slope is.

Test result: too steep. The dummy died.

The temp actually rose barely above freezing today, and the worst is over. A neighbor and I even managed to get into town this afternoon to get our mail. Now we'll see how much, if any, of the snow melts.

The death of ambition

noreply@blogger.com (Patrice Lewis) — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 16:39:00 +0000

I've written about it before, but here's a cartoon that beautifully encapsulates an age-old point: government incentives destroy ambition.

Snowstorm

noreply@blogger.com (Patrice Lewis) — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 17:44:00 +0000

Well, yesterday was pretty wild as far as weather. I don't think it fit the technical definition of "blizzard," but it was still pretty durned crazy.

The wind blew hard all day, between 40 and 50 mph. I made an early-morning dash to town to mail some packages and cancel our mail delivery until Friday (our mailbox is two miles from our house, and I didn't want mail sitting for days at a time).

This is the plowed portion of the road leading to our house. It wasn't this part I was worried about; it was the two miles of unplowed road that we knew would be drifted shut by the end of the day.

This sight made me so thankful we homeschool. I wouldn't want to entrust my children to a bus on slippery icy roads!

The snowplows were out in full force! Our neighbor, who drives for the county, was roused from his bed at 4:30 am yesterday morning to keep the highways clear. Never underestimate how hard these drivers work to keep the lanes of traffic open.

Don made a futile attempt to shovel a path to the shop. I say "futile" because the wind drifted his efforts shut within minutes.

This photo was taken through a rather dirty kitchen window. I was trying to capture the drama of the whipping snow but wasn't really able to. By the way, do you see the path Don tried to shovel? Neither do I.

Ice crystals on our bedroom window.

Weeds bent over in the wind.

Here's Major, after an outdoor excursion. Needless to say, both dogs preferred to stay huddled by the fire all day, the wimps.

Toward the afternoon, the house became unusually dark because many of the windows were covered with snow.

Needless to say, our evening livestock chores were just a barrel of laughs under these conditions. Here I'm pulling the hay sled and it's being lifted off the ground into the air by the wind. I had to wedge it into the doorway of Matilda's stall to keep the door open so I could clean the stall.

The livestock huddled in the corral for shelter, since it's more protected from the wind. The dominant animals took over the barn, the less dominant animals were stuck outside.

Everyone's milling about, waiting to be fed.

The feedboxes were full of snow and far too exposed to the elements...

...so we fed in the corral, which made everyone happy.

We kept the woodstove well stoked all day long, and the girls did their schoolwork around it.

Toward evening the lights started to flicker, so I lit an oil lamp to provide illumination in case the power went out. It didn't, which surprised the heck out of me considering the strength of the wind.

Today things are much calmer. We're still getting snow, but the infernal wind has died, making conditions much more pleasant.

We have lots more snow coming in today and tomorrow, but nothing like the windy conditions of yesterday.

Who's the real rat?

noreply@blogger.com (Patrice Lewis) — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 16:53:00 +0000

Just when you think things can't possibly get any loopier, they do.

Allow me a bit of history. Years ago when we lived in Oregon, when Older Daughter was just barely a toddler, we had a rat infestation. We had rats all over the house, in our basement, in our barn, in the chicken coop, in the shop, everywhere. Rats are BIG. And when you're watching your tiny toddler facing a rat, maternal instinct kicks in and you really, really want to make sure your kid isn't bitten.

We set traps and soon our problem was eradicated. If we were to have a repeat of that problem today, we would solve it in the same way.

So it's just durn lucky we don't live in Washington D.C. where it's the LAW that you cannot exterminate a rat. Please, spare me the lame jokes about politicians (because I agree with you), but the fact remains that rats are not endangered in any way. What they are is numerous, clever, filthy (their urine and droppings contaminate food), and vectors of disease.

The Wildlife Protection Act, passed unanimously in 2010, prohibits pest control operators from killing pests such as rats and mice. Instead -- get this -- the animals must be relocated. And more than that, pest control operators cannot break up rat families. Yes, you read that right. You can't leave Grampa Charlie Rat or Aunt Matilda Rat behind -- you have to round them all up and transport them together. (I'll leave you to speculate as to the impossible logistics of this feat.)

This is, Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli notes, "a triumph of animal rights over human health."

What on earth does the Virginia Attorney General have to do with this law? Simple. The "relocated" rats are being transported across the river into Virginia, where they are released (in family groups, of course). "Actual experts in pest control will tell you, if you don’t move an animal about 25 miles, it will come back," Cuccinelli said. "So what’s the solution to that? Across the river."

Gene Harrington of the Fairfax-based National Pest Management Association called it a "stupid, stupid, ill-advised, ill-conceived law." Bingo, couldn't have said it any better myself.

So here we have an example of the entire population of Washington D.C. held captive by the bleeding-heart legislation of a few. And this, I think you'll agree, encapsulates the entire problem America is facing at the moment -- the entire population held captive by the bleeding-heart legislation of a few.

It is my sincerest wish that those doofuses who saw fit to pass this law will have their homes invaded by rats.

Gonna get whomped

noreply@blogger.com (Patrice Lewis) — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 14:42:00 +0000

Up to this point we've had a mild -- an unbelievably mild -- winter. Couple inches of snow, max. Most of the time we've had bare ground.

Looks like that's all about to change. See those giant pink-and-blue splotches all over the Pacific northwest? That's us.

Right now it's howling wind outside, but with only a light dusting of snow. But more is forecast. As in, a lot more.

Granted weather reports have been wrong before, but of course we can't take chances. The forecasts are calling for as much as two feet of snow. Couple that with wind, and we'll have drifts that could be chest high or higher.

And since we're two miles off-road, meaning the county doesn't plow, our road WILL be drifted shut. That's just a fact of life around here, and we expect this to happen two or three times every winter.

We were supposed to have our steer Nebuchadnezzar butchered tomorrow, but I think we can comfortably assume the mobile butchers won't be able to get anywhere near our place. So Nebuchadnezzar gets a temporary reprieve.

Normally Tuesday (today) is our "city day." The girls both have lessons (music and gymnastics) in the city, and it's a chance for me to do errands, etc. But it also means we don't get back until after dark, and the Palouse Highway is famous for being virtually obliterated during snowy and windy conditions.

I have no desire to become a statistic, especially with the kids in the car, so we're staying firmly PUT this week!

I'll take lots of photos as this storm unfolds...

Random pix

noreply@blogger.com (Patrice Lewis) — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 15:24:00 +0000

Here's some random pix from the last couple of weeks.

A random egg. Found this tucked behind the rake and pitchfork I keep in Matilda's pen. Hey, I guess when you gotta go, you gotta go.

I liked the pattern the thin snow made on the frozen mud in the corral.

Lydia, hiding in her "cave" behind the Christmas tree. Notice the ornaments she's managed to knock off.

I was making peanut butter pie last week as dessert for our neighborhood potluck, when I stopped mid-mix to put on my apron. When I came back to the bowl, I noticed this pretty swirly pattern of peanut butter. Don't ask me why I took pictures, but I thought it looked kinda cool.

Turkeys in our yard. (The dogs were in the house and didn't notice.)

Shafts of evening sun on one of our upstairs clothes drying racks.

Our tractor after a brief snowfall.

Some amusing signs I saw recently in a store.

Some pretty glassware arranged in an antique store in Coeur d'Alene.

The full moon behind some clouds, setting in the west just before dawn.

Lydia and Major, playing in the yard.

Come and get the stick!

Chickens in the barn.

A family who sadly lost their home from a fire a couple months ago, apparently decided to clear the building footprint by torching the remaining structure. The girls and I drove past and saw this startling sight of the entire house consumed by flames, with the homeowners standing nearby to monitor the situation. They'll bulldoze the ashes and rebuild on the same spot.

The full moon setting behind the willow trees on a bitterly cold morning.

On that same morning, the cattle are waiting to be fed.

We had a couple of inches of snow last week, and it's stayed and stayed because the temps have been cold. Here's the road leading to town, crunchy and glittering.

Pretty sunset.

Ineptocracy: a definition

noreply@blogger.com (Patrice Lewis) — Sat, 14 Jan 2012 22:41:00 +0000

A reader sent this.
_______________________________

Ineptocracy (in-ep-toc’-ra-cy) - a system of government where the least capable to lead are elected by the least capable of achieving, and where the members of society least likely to succeed or even to sustain themselves, are abundantly rewarded with goods and services paid for by the confiscated wealth of a diminishing number of producers.

Tebowing for life

noreply@blogger.com (Patrice Lewis) — Sat, 14 Jan 2012 15:51:00 +0000

Here's my latest WorldNetDaily column entitled Tebowing for Life.

More tankards up

noreply@blogger.com (Patrice Lewis) — Sat, 14 Jan 2012 04:50:00 +0000

We decided to put a few more tankards up on our temporary retail page (located here, or click on the tankard button on the upper left hand corner).

We have a few different kinds of styles, such as the tulip (shown above), or a twisty (shown below)...

...or a lidded.

Anyway, we'll probably keep these up until we have to swipe the shelves bare and sent them to a wholesale customer. Meanwhile, enjoy!

Coffee with Jesus

noreply@blogger.com (Patrice Lewis) — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 14:36:00 +0000

My husband was sent this cartoon on Facebook and he passed it on to me. It's supposed to be all one panel, but I split it up so the words are more legible.

Whoops

noreply@blogger.com (Patrice Lewis) — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 01:47:00 +0000

How embarrassing.

It seems that history has been made with the New York Philharmonic Orchestra.

"Tuesday night, during the final movements of Gustav Mahler’s Ninth Symphony, the music was brought to a dramatic halt by Maestro Alan Gilbert." The culprit? A ringing cell phone in the first row.

Read the story here.

Me, I'd want to crawl under a rock somewhere if that cell phone had been mine.

Proto-pond

noreply@blogger.com (Patrice Lewis) — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 01:23:00 +0000

We have a pond! Well, to be more precise... we have a great big hole in the ground. Someday it will be a pond.

A couple of days ago, we all went out and marked off where the pond was to be placed. It was a real-life example of the Pythagorean Theorem in use.

In fact, as part of our math work that day, the girls figured it out. If a pond is square with all sides being fifty feet, what is the length of the hypotenuse? The answer came to 70.7 feet. So we all went out and marked things using the length of the hypotenuse to make sure the marked off pond space was perfectly square.

Then yesterday a couple of inches of snow fell, the first snow in a long time. This morning was decidedly brisk.

The day started with the arrival of a huge rig driven by a fellow named Gale.

Though Don had peeled back some of the fence along the road so Gale could come in over the pasture, I couldn't figure out how he was going to unload his rig. What he did was detached the front portion of the lowboy and move it out of the way...

...then offload the trackhoe and move it out of the way...

...then re-attach the rig together...

...and move IT out of the way, just in time (since a neighbor drove up in his pickup).

Then Gale drove the trackhoe through the pasture, with Don leading the way to show him where to go.

Big rig!

This is where the pond is to go.

Ready, aim...

Breaking ground, about 8:30 am.

Gale knew exactly what he was doing. In fact, watching him operate that trackhoe was like watching poetry in motion. He started at the deep end and worked his way to the shallow end, piling the dirt on one side. (Another neighbor will come later to get the dirt.)

See that whitish layer? That's hardpan, about 18 inches below the surface. It's why my fruit trees keep dying -- the roots can't punch through that hardpan.

The trackhoe bucket was huge and probably scooped out a cubic yard at a time.

Can you see my shadow as I take pictures?

It was amazing how precise such a big machine can be in the hands of a master -- look how closely Gale aligned the hole with the original boundaries.

The pile of dirt grew and grew.

With about half the hole dug, Gale moved over and started a second pile of dirt.

Then -- get this -- he drove his trackhoe into the pit, back and forth, back and forth, packing the clay-y dirt firm.

Here's Gale, checking out his superb handiwork.

Here's Don, standing next to the bucket...

...and standing next to one of the dirt piles.

And that was it! It took Gale five hours to dig that huge hole. Can you imagine how long it would have taken by hand? He came back through the break where Don had peeled the fence back...

Here's the pit with the twin piles of dirt on either side.

It's important to remember that right now, this isn't a pond. It's a big hole in the ground. There's still lots left to do before it turns into a pond. A neighbor who wants the dirt will come collect it when he has a chance. We have to put guttering on the barn and on one side of the house, then dig a trench to lay pipe to move the roof runoff into the pond. We have to trench an outflow as well.

But without this huge pit, of course, we would never have a pond. Oh, the potential for both usefulness and recreation! The girls plan to swim in the summer and ice skate on it in the winter. We can water the garden and the livestock even if we lose power (since our well pump is electric). A pond will make as much of an improvement on our farm as a barn!

A pond, even as we speak!

noreply@blogger.com (Patrice Lewis) — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 17:42:00 +0000

As I post this (about 9:45 am Wed Jan 11), our pond is being dug!

If you recall (here), we've needed a stock pond for quite some time. You might say this pond is our Christmas present to ourselves. It's been an exciting morning, watching it being created out of nothing!

Right now the trackhoe operator is digging through a lot of clay. He's dug many stock ponds and is confident (as is Don) that it will hold water without needing a layer of Bentonite in it, though we'll confirm that when the hole is finished.

More tonight or tomorrow, but I just wanted to update everyone that our pond is being dug!

Sale on Tattler Lids!

noreply@blogger.com (Patrice Lewis) — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 17:36:00 +0000

A reader directed my attention to a Facebook announcement regarding a sale on Tattler lids. I'm not on Facebook so I was unaware of this sale. Tattler, as you may or may not know, makes reusable canning lids. I'm a huge fan and bought a lifetime supply a couple years ago, and can testify to the quality and customer service of this company.

Anyway, here's the Facebook announcement:

Tattler Reusable Canning Lids
DON'T FORGET!!

40% OFF! That's the deal TATTLER will be offering this Thursday, 1/12/2012 on www.markdown.com ! This is a limited, one time offer of 100 Regular lids and 100 Wide Mouth lids bulk packed and shipped for $85.75! Quantities are limited on this custom pack, so tell your friends and visit markdown.com this Thursday 1/12.

Twelfth Night

noreply@blogger.com (Patrice Lewis) — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 02:04:00 +0000

If you remember, on Saturday we attended an SCA event called Twelfth Night, as vendors.

The SCA is a Medieval living history organization with chapters all over the place. It is dedicated to re-creating the best parts of the Middle Ages and discovering the chivalry in everyone. Collectively, members of the SCA have done more historical research than any other organization on the planet.

Don manned the cart on Friday and Sunday; the girls and I went on Saturday. Sadly, sales were abysmal, but it was so much fun to be at an SCA event again! We used to be active before the kids were born, but between babies, livestock, and a remote farm (i.e., far away from most large events), it got too much and we dropped out. But with this event held practically in our back yard, we went and had a blast.

Our cart ended up in the hallway outside the Merchant's Room because we applied too late to be fitted into the room. However this turned into a blessing in disguise, because we were just across from the open double doors of the ballroom of the hotel, where Court was being held. The hotel staff had set out chairs for 600, although only about half those were filled during Court.

I don't know whose coronet this was, but I thought it was very pretty. And very Northwest.

There was a charity auction held before Court (with proceeds going to the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation), to which we donated a tankard.

It was auctioned off for the astonishingly high price of... $105!!

This was the last Court of the outgoing King and Queen.

There was lots of royalty present, and they gradually made their way up to the dais...

...including this Princess with her amazingly well-behaved baby.

A second Court was held later in the evening, during which the incoming King and Queen were crowned.

Our girls had never attended an SCA event before (unless you count a local event we went to when Older Daughter was a baby) and they loved it. I thought they'd be bored, but they were NOT. They wandered through the hotel all day, marveling at the pageantry and the costumes... but most of all at the manners. Men and women alike were chivalrous and kind. In the SCA, this is very ordinary. But in the "mundane" world (as it's known), such manners are uncommon. The girls found it wonderful.

They got their share of attention, too. Younger Daughter wanted to purchase a decorative dagger from a vendor in the Merchant's Room. The vendor needed my permission (since Younger Daughter is a minor) so I went around the corner and introduced myself. This gentleman was 88 years old and looked 60 (no exaggeration), and he immediately seized my hand and kissed it, complimenting me on rearing such well-behaved and polite daughters. He wanted to hire both girls on the spot to work his booth!

Later in the evening, the back end of the ballroom was cleared out and a Queen's Rapier Tournament was held.

The hotel grounds were still lit with Christmas lights.

Despite the bad sales, the girls are begging to attend more events. It's all going to have to depend on distance, of course. A farm anchors us down and one adult will always have to stay home. But perhaps we can start attending some of the larger events if they're not too far away. It sure was nice being back in the SCA!

Report card

noreply@blogger.com (Patrice Lewis) — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 00:47:00 +0000

Here's a cartoon a friend sent.