Monday, April 25, 2016

Very windy days.

Fresh eggs.

Son Craig takes care of a friends chickens when the friend is away from his house. We reap the benefit of that by having a nice supply of organic eggs. By the color I imagine the chickens are of all colors. The size of the eggs vary also so some must be smaller than the others. It makes no difference as they all taste good. Did I say free!

Not much of interest going on here. What we need most is rain but I guess that is done for this year. Bummer!

We have been working in the yard as usual. Always weeds to pull. I did put the cover on the gazebo on our back patio. I hope it lasts for one more summer.

I am working through my list of to-do items for the RV in preparation for the 10 days I am at Ranchero Visitadores starting a week from tomorrow. I have my menus planned, my food list made, and equipment list updated.

I have checked all the wheel bearings and added some new grease to all 4 wheels. The batteries have been checked and are good to go. I flushed the water heater and replaced the sacrificial anode. The water tank is full and I have started to put a few items in the RV as I come across them. Most things will need to wait until next week to load. I fill the RV and the truck to the max.

We have had wind for days now. Today was really bad. It really is drying out the hills fast. They had been so nice and green. It’s back to the golden hills of California I am afraid.

Saturday, April 9, 2016

The time sure goes fast.

After we got home, it was time to tackle the weeds in the garden, again. Rain while we were gone meant more weeds. I did a quick mow job in the garden and Craig mowed the lawn. The next morning I found the lawn mower sitting by the shed with the starter cord hanging out all the way. Oh-oh. I tried taking it apart but had little luck with that. Craig looked at it and said it was worn out. I went off to do something else and a few minutes later I heard the mower start. He had just wrapped the cord around the starter pulley and gave it a tug. It started and that’s the way we have been using it.

I really don’t want to buy a new mower as this one has a Honda engine on it and Craig got it for free. It was sitting on the curb with a free sign on it. He tinkered with it and got it running and we have used it for several years.

I actually am looking at a battery powered mower from Amazon. It comes with 2 lithium batteries and has 2 mower blades. I actually saw one advertised on TV today. I hate small gas engine power equipment. I have always said that my goal in life was to get rid of all my gas powered equipment. This may be the time to start. To that end, I did my lawn edging with an old fashioned hand powered edger this week. More work but less hassle and no sprinkler heads sheared off.

We did not do all work and no play this week as we visited friends who are embarking on a new adventure. Well, new to them anyway. They bought a motor home and will give work camping a try this summer. We wish them good luck!

I found myself glued to my computer chair this week. I have so much family history to enter in my Family Tree Maker software that it will take me years to complete it. So, I started with Clyda’s family. Mainly because of the data I had from her sister’s passing and it seemed like a good place to start while everything was fresh in my mind.

I have all the pertinent data entered but there is much data still to check and all of the family stories to be added. I am sending off what I have to Clyda’s cousin to do some of the checking as much of the data came from him originally a few years ago.

Also, I have been corresponding by email with a friend on local history of the area in Wisconsin where I grew up. He has access to all the old newspapers from that area from which to draw on for stories and to check facts. I am using a local history book created for the Centennial years of 1874-1974 for that area. My parents had gotten a copy for me and it has been an invaluable source of local history. The one flaw in the history is that it may not have had all the facts thoroughly checked.

I made the comment that I wish my father was alive as he could have answered many of my questions as he had lived in that era. It has been fun to add the few facts that I remember from my father and from my days living there as a kid. The problem we are having is identifying places mentioned in the Centennial book as no one is still alive who can verify the data. To that end I have been looking at old plat maps which tell me who lived on what piece of land in the time period we are working on. A puzzle for sure but rewarding never the less.

Sorry no photos, as I need to move some from my phone that I took on the way home from Washington before I can put them in the blog. I forget to do that when I have time and only think of it when I do the blog.