I just created 2 new albums in the gallery

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Whew.  Mother nature saved me a bunch of work today.

It’s been dry here for a while.  I took Mason fishing on Memorial day, and we had a hard time finding worms due to all the dry dirt.  Over the weekend we planted/seeded/transplanted just about everything we had in the works for this year.  Last week’s tomato transplants were looking good, but I figured I’d have to start shipping water to the farm to get everything off to a strong head start.

Woke up this morning to rain. 

Other quick updates:  Finished our barn board picket fence in town, ran some electrical in the crib, mowed the farm, cleaned up all the branches/logs/trees that had been scattered about.  There are a few piles left to clean up, but at least they are near the edges and getting smaller.  There were a few little inside jobs at the house that were also done.

There were also some interspersed bike rides and runs from all of us too.

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Sunday was more of the same at the farm.  We nearly finished the recycled material stairs leading to the crib.  I’d like to add a few small chunks, and someday cement all this together to get rid of the cracks.

I got a lot more re-grading done around the crib and moved the old compost piles.  I thought the old compost site would be a good place to create a new fire pit, as it was next to the giant pile of scrap wood (ie, the barn).  It turned into more of a giant courtyard, as the dirt scooped out easily, then lined it with most of the leftover rubble.  After we burn here, I’ll clean it out and make it grass or garden and leave the new retaining walls.

Monday found us using old corn crib siding as 4′ tall fence pickets at the house.  Our back fence is 2/3 of the way done.  We ended the day going back to the farm to pickup the last of the picket pile we didn’t bring up beforehand.

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Wanna know how to get things done fast?  Rent a skid-loader.

We had one dropped off at the farm this morning, and put it to use over the next 9 hours.  Doing what?

Building an entryway, a retaining wall, re-grading around the crib, getting rid of the rubble and field rock piles, and I poked the barn with it once.

This was the biggest recycling project yet at the farm.  Everything served a new purpose.  For example, there is a bank on one side of the driveway.  By digging it back, I had dirt to pile around the corn crib.  Then this new hole made a home for the field rock piled with the rubble.

We also used a lot of the rubble for some of the deeper fill around the crib, and the good parts became our ‘urbancrete’ patio and stairs.

First, there is an awesome, blue, cube-shaped rock that you would step on first.  Then a step of large concrete slabs.  The next step is built from a few large sections of brickwork.  Finally, we had a stash of nice limestone steps that brings you to the French entry doors of the crib.
Our day consisted of moving things around and around the farm.  I was quite good at the skid loader.  I could scoop, drop, flip, and place large concrete blocks right where they needed to go.  There were many pieces we could not have moved by hand, and the smaller ones would have worn us out by the end of the day.  This was the right tool for the job.  I did use it to push the last standing door off it’s track from the back of the barn.  In the process, I took out the post that I previously attacked with a chainsaw.  Now there is a section of second floor balancing on a single beam.  In another day or two of Iowa wind, things should work out.

I took a bunch of pictures, and will be uploading soon to the gallery.

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Finally, a day to get something done at the farm.  We’ve made a few after dinner trips or stopped by long enough to plant something, but it has not felt like we got anything done yet.  I did start the day by serving coffee for the Mother’s day bus tour of Greene County, got the truck, cleaned up some branches, got lumber, dug up some rouge hostas which were later delivered to the Offenburgers, and found lunch.
Anyone around the midwest saw how much rain fell, then all this nice weather.  You know what it’s not good for?  Grass.  That stuff grew 6 inches this week.  Problem was, is that I had the tiller still mounted on the tractor.  You can’t do both.  I started out by removing last years tomato cages, trellis, supports and what not before tilling out the remaining rows.  I gave the other empty rows that I tilled a few weeks back another quick pass, just to make sure the weeds were dead.  I also made a pass over the big garden plot too.

Finally, getting the belly mower on.  This came far easier than I expected.  However, the trailmower might have sat under a drip in the shed roof or the mice really got in it.  The linkage to engage the blades was nearly locked solid, and the belt was toast from last year too.  I had a spare, but decided to skip working on this for today.

I mainly focused on mowing the grass between the garden rows, and the 25′ buffer around the property lines. I got a few passes done around the crib, but it’s not pretty.  There are a few other random lines, or paths running around the property too.

Then I went home, helped Reagan set posts for a picket fence.  The pickets are made (by Rick) from our old barn siding.  Then I made meatballs and sauce (from last years tomatoes) and a pot of spaghetti and some garlic bread.  Yumm.  I’m still full. While rolling out the meatballs, I keep looking at my creations.  Every few minutes I’d think to myself “That one’s too big.  Emie would come over and squish it and throw it back in the bowl!”  I told my dad this, and his first reaction “Oh no, not the 800 little meatballs”

Only family is laughing now, the rest of you are confused.

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