Weekends

Memorial Day Weekend – Coronavirus edition

This Memorial Day Weekend we found ourselves back at the lake. Last year we skipped out on the lake and went to KC house shopping, but this year, what is there to do? 

We bought a camper earlier this year and had big plans for it. So far, the best it has done was to house my husband’s office when schools closed.

Finally, it got to move… And guess what, it didn’t crunch the cab of the truck! Yey!

And while we had plans to SCUBA dive this weekend, we had more fun on our boat. What? Yup, we got a boat. It’s not new… in fact, I’d call it vintage or classic… do they refer to boats like that? It’s a 1976 Baja. It was my grandpas. He passed away in 2010… The boat had maintenance done to it just before that. We pulled it out of the barn a few weeks ago, hubby changed the gas and she fired up. She has a few issues. 

In fact, the drive cable broke. Simple fix and really one of the easiest things to go wrong. I wound up towing the boat back to shore on a kayak. (more…)

Surprise… We Bought a New Truck…

After our incident on January 1st (where coincidentally enough I asked if this was a sign of what the year would bring…) and buying the camper that caused the problem… We started discussing options to keep from having to replace a back window a second time. My husband’s truck was a short bed and while most campers wouldn’t have an issue like that… This is a toy hauler… so the front is different.

Our plans really weren’t to get a new truck for another year or so… and when I say new, new to us, not brand new.

Anyway, we have some plans to start hauling the camper coming up in the very near future and I’m just about sick thinking about that back window.

Hubby went online, just so happened to find the needle in a haystack truck that we’ve been looking for. He contacted the dealership, deals were made over the phone, and BAM at 2 am yesterday we loaded up in the truck to make an almost 6-hour drive, which took us through 3 states (ours and 2 others). They made plans to have everything ready to go at around 10 am so that we could be back out on the road and hopefully not get home too late. 

My mother-in-law went with us. She gets off work at 2 am, came to our house to shower, we all loaded up in the truck, and we were off to Greenville, Texas. I seriously think some days we need our heads examined.

We went through Paris

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Mother’s Day – Coronavirus Style

If there is one thing this Coronavirus season has brought… it has brought a lot of people staying in and staying away. But… it has brought a lot of people wanting to get out into the great outdoors. Us included. Even though I’ve spent a lot of time outside.

And for some reason, we thought it would be fun to take up hiking. Yup, you read that correctly. Why not? I have been working my butt off here lately outdoors (which when hubby isn’t working his real job, it’s made him work outside too, plus our little. She’s great). So we thought it would be fun to take a break. And you know, go hiking. Something we’ve never really done… but my little has been wanting to do things like that so now is the perfect time.

Happy Mother’s Day to me :). (more…)

Breaking a Calf to Lead

We’ve been having fun around these parts. When you can’t go anywhere or do anything, might as well make the most of it the best way you can. 

When I was younger, I wanted nothing more than to show at the fair. While I showed horses so I could compete that way, that’s not really the type of horse showing I wanted to do. Plus, it wasn’t the same as if I showed livestock. I had the privilege later in my FFA years to show sheep. And through friends, I learned how to show hogs, goats, and cattle.

I really wanted to show cattle, but it wasn’t in the cards for my family and me while I was growing up. No big deal. And maybe the little won’t want to show cattle. But right now she’s a PeeWee… So we have our bottle calf and we’re going to try and show in the PeeWee show at the fair.

Part of what is required for that is breaking this stubborn calf to lead on a halter and rope. I put stubborn up against stubborn. We’ll see who wins. Wish us luck!! Oh, and hope that we don’t break any toes in the process!

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I’m a Jerk… Coronavirus Day 49

I’m a jerk and here’s a picture of a load of bricks. Scratching your head yet? Well… Here’s the story…

My hubby (and I…) bought a camper just before all this coronavirus stuff hit the roof. The sad fact of the matter was, we had discussed this last fall, but then nothing more was really said. Then come January, I was told by a couple of different people (none family members or him) that I was buying said camper. I got a little annoyed because we really hadn’t decided one way or the other.

Then he bought the camper, hauled it to our house, and parked it. The goal was to remodel it and have it ready to go by last weekend when we were supposed to have our Trails for Kids fundraising horse ride. Well, the ride had to be postponed as we all know. And the camper wasn’t ready anyway. (more…)

Septic Problems – Coronavirus Day 43 & 44

I saw this meme and it cracked me up. Seriously… I think my husband kind of feels this way with everything I’ve made him do since this whole quarantine time. I haven’t sat still once. Not once.

That included this weekend, but this weekend’s project wasn’t my idea. It all started last weekend. Let me set the story…

Last weekend I decided to get the weedeater out. It was messed up so I had it sitting on the bed of my truck. My truck was parked about where this trackhoe thing is in the picture below. I stepped in a bunch of water and it smelled like a sewer. Not a good sign. When hubby got home I had him check it out. The next day he called a septic pump to come clean the septic out. We hadn’t done that since we bought the house so we figured it may be full. (more…)

Adding Soil/Fertilizer… Coronavirus Day 36

I gave up on the seeds in the ground. Grandma swears I should give it a little more time. And truthfully my dad always says I’m a little impatient… but they’ve been planted since March 30 and here we are April 18th (that was Saturday this all went down) and no signs of anything. The seedlings I planted were for cooler weather. Not cold… there’s a difference. But they prefer the cooler weather of April, May, and possibly June versus the summer heat of July and August.

3 weeks and nothing. So I pulled the tiller out and said screw it. Hubby started “feeling sorry” for me because I really wanted more soil from our manure pile, but we don’t have a front end loader. I wasn’t in the mood to try and bucket it as we did back in March. And truthfully he’d been wanting to rent this machine because it comes with multiple attachments including one to work on the brush in timber. (more…)

My New Greenhouse… Coronavirus Day 36

Some days I have great ideas… and other days I have ideas that make you scratch your head wondering where on earth I came up with this. Today’s project might be one of those… WHAT?!?! moments. So between the gardening and landscaping this year… I’ve really gotten into plants. I bought a lot of the flowers that I’ve used for landscaping, but the vegetables for the garden are a different story. I really wanted to grow my own plants. After garden planting #1 went awry, I decided to try the little miniature greenhouses. You know the little starter kits you buy at Home Depot (<– I used that one… not an affiliate link, just a link to what I used) or Lowes and I even found them at Dollar General.

Those starter kits are addicting. So I accidentally took over my kitchen table. Whoops. That was when I went on the hunt to see how much it would cost to make a greenhouse. There are kits you can buy but this was a DIY Greenhouse that we decided upon. This round anyway :).

My New Greenhouse

First things first… you need to decide how big it is going to be. Where you are going to put it. And buy the materials. Since I already had the trailer on from taking scrap to the scrapyard, it was the perfect time to get the materials. We decided on a 12×16. So here’s the material list: (more…)

The Day I Lost My Cool – Coronavirus Day 35

Oh gosh, they never tell you how hard being a parent is. Throw in a pandemic and gosh, I fail. I receive a Big. Fat. F. This is one of those tales…

First, can you look at the picture above and see what it is focusing on? Maybe… maybe not. I’ll give you a hint… look at the hair.

They tell me every little girl plays hair salon at some point in their life. Mine happened when I was in 2nd grade. The difference was I didn’t cut my own hair. My cousin cut my hair for me so I’m told. I don’t remember that.

So let’s paint the picture.

I am having Major allergies right now. Hello, my gray truck will be green from now until June. My allergies have been in overdrive. So I took a Benadryl on Thursday night to dry me up. Those usually kick my butt but help too so… (more…)

The Coronavirus Easter… Day 30

I’m pretty sure most people would agree this wasn’t the Easter we planned on for 2020. Everyone talked about the Roaring ’20s but I seriously doubt this Coronavirus is what they had in mind. Honestly, truth be told, this is probably the Easter I don’t care to remember. Not because I want to forget the true reason for this season. In fact, Jesus is what is getting us through this. Him and God. Otherwise, this would suck a lot more than it does. I love that a lot of churches were broadcasting Easter Church services online because we’re not allowed to congregate at Church right now.

But Easter with my family this year could have gone better. I seriously think I’ll just leave it at that. 

At least the Easter Bunny was able to make it through to our house. Whew!!

What made it “perfect” was the fact that the little said that she loved this day and couldn’t wait until next Easter. That right there and Jesus are the true reason for this! (more…)