Beautiful Day On The Farm

What a difference 24 hours makes. Monday night we had frigid cold weather. Last night the temperature struggled to find the freezing mark. Today the sky was crystal blue and the sun warmed the air. We still have water standing in some of the low spots around the farm. Just about all the mud holes are dried up now. Today was just a gorgeous day.

Today, I finished the fence project, got the security gate in place to prevent escapes, played Dr. Dad to G'mee (a.k.a. Carol) and played with Cody and Qianna. I decided to work on the gate first. I've built many gates in my wage slave days. This time I got super smart and bought a gate kit. This cool kit has all the pieces necessary for building a gate that stays square and does not droop. Half of the last 8 foot section of fencing provides the slats and rails needed to build the gate. After the framing is done, I have to reattach the slats.

          

Now that looks like a gate. Last step is to attach the other half of the 8 foot fence section. Each section is stepped down because the ground has a pretty serious slope about 10 feet from the dog center.

        

In time the wood will turn to a gray color and look more uniform than it does now. The fence hides the stuff behind it. Unfortunately I do not have a good before photo for comparing. I got all my tools loaded back in the truck and also loaded some 1x4 sidewalk forms that were on the ground in that area. These forms will be stored behind a building where other wood is stored. Even though the bed of the truck is full, there is always room for the feline critters that roam this place.

Dr. Dad had to take a break in the middle of the fence project to tend to a battle injury G'Mee encountered. Safe Harbor Farm has spay and neuter clinic for the community each Wednesday. Today, Carol assisted with the animal prep and observed the procedures. She was holding a dog during prep, and the dog was not cooperating. I can understand why. The dog ended up scratching Carol's left forearm. That is where I came into the scene as Carol asked me to help patch her back up. She will be OK but her arm will be tender for a few days.

Tomorrow, I get to help her bathe some of the dogs that will be going to Jacksonville on Sunday for the Adopt-A-Thon. Carol will also be grooming them. I have a water heater project that is on my todo list but that will wait until after the dogs are bathed and groomed. We took Cody and Qianna to the dog run this afternoon. They like the freedom to run and play there. Here is a view of Lynne's cabin across the pond from the dog run.

 
Then as were headed back to our home, I thought I would snap this photo of the Kindness Clinic. The building was donated to SHF a couple of years ago. In its for life, it was a Catholic Church. Downstairs is a complete vet clinic. Upstairs is a small apartment. You can just make out our flags beyond the fence in the photo on the left.

       

We had a quiet dinner at home just as the sun was setting. After Carol got the kitchen cleaned up, I went out the get a bucket of ice from our ice maker. The clear night sky was lit by a full moon. God done good with that. I leave you with our full moon.

 
Thanks for stopping by.

Don't Fence Me In

Carol was out of here this morning with the rooster. Well, not quiet. She did have a 7:30AM date with the doggies to help with morning doggie duty. I was up up at my usual 6:30 AM. Since is was colder than ice this morning, I had to check the outside temperature. This is what I saw when I stepped out.


That is frost on the truck this morning. The doggie water bowl also froze over. Cody and Qianna will be eating water until this thaws. The outside thermometer said it was 27 degrees. Last night the weather guy on the local ABC channel said we could expect 24 overnight. If I were in Corpus Christi, I would not think that is a big deal. Living in an RV with exposed water and sewer lines, that could be a big deal real fast. The key is how long will the temperature be below freezing. We would experience below freezing weather for over 6 hours. That is long enough to be a problem. I remembered reading on several RV blogs about precautions to take in case of freeing weather. I did these things

Disconnect fresh water hose from faucet and RV.
Drain water hose.
Empty sewer hose and make sure grey/black tanks are closed.
Turn on tank heaters.

When Carol returned from her morning doggie duty, I reconnect everything and checked to make sure water was flowing as it should and found no leaks in the water hose. Egg McMuffins were on the menu for breakfast this morning. I decided I want to kick mine up a bit. I had bacon instead of ham and Monterey Jack & Jalapeño cheese instead of American cheese. The only thing missing was some kicked up ranchero sauce.

Around 9:00, I thought I should get something done today. The fence project would be perfect. Replacing 20 feet of rabbit wire fence with a 4 foot privacy fence would not be too difficult. I wonder what condition the soil is here. I loaded my tools into the truck and backed it up to my job site. I kinda feel like Jerry the Handy Man. Good thing Lynne had a manual post hole digger. Sure hope there is no gumbo type clay here.
   
That was pretty easy. The gate post is set; the the rest should be pretty straight forward. The two 48" tall privacy fence panels will be held in place by clamping support rails to 1 5/8" chain link fence posts. These will be pounded into the ground. Hopefully. Since I am the guy with tools, TJ (the other workkamper's son) came over asking for my help removing a rusted bolt from a small hitch. I just happen to have a 1 1/8" combination wrench. We grunted and grunted. The bolt was not going to turn loose.
    
Back to the fence project. It looks like this fence is beginning to take shape. Tomorrow I should be able to finish this project.
   
Remember the runaway doggie from the other day? This is the gate where Venchensa escaped. In addition to the fence project, I am adding a second gate. A double gate arrangement will keep escape artists from making a quick get-a-way from this gate.
   
Carol set up her sewing machine for a couple of sewing projects she wants to do. She also groomed one of the dogs who will be going to an Adopt-a-thon in Jacksonville on Sunday. While Carol works the dogs, I will do a little shopping and will scout out the area.

That's it for today. Thanks for stopping by.

Weekend Is Over

Our weekend is coming to a close. The sun has set and the darkness is all that remains. After two days of persistent rain, the sun came out today and started drying out the mud. We have new neighbors today, Goats.
   
Due a scheduling mix up, Carol had to fed the cats this morning while I met with Lynne to talk about a couple of projects that I will be working on. For the past two days, we have been trying to get to a small guest cabin that sits on the back of the property so we can mop and wipe counters down to rid the place of cat liter dust. The rain and mud around the cabin prevented us from doing that until today. So this morning we took care of that before we headed out with Cody and Qianna.

First stop was the post office to mail birthday cards and a package. Then we headed to New Bern, 20 miles away, to visit Lowe's, Walmart and Petsmart. Our trip to New Bern was very long this morning because we followed a convoy of Marine tactical vehicles for several miles. While the posted speed limit was 55 mph, they were clipping along at the brisk speed of 30 mph. I passed one of the vehicles only to realize there were too many vehicles in this convoy to get around all of them. They turned off NC 17 just a few miles south of New Bern.

As we pulled into New Bern, Carol suggested going to a nail salon to so she could have a broken nail repaired while I went on to Lowe's. My trip to Lowe's took a lot longer then her nail repair so Carol walked a few doors down to Walmart to pick up a few things that did not make our shopping list from the other day. I finally got checked out of Lowe's and was headed to the truck with my shopping cart when Carol called me again to let me know she was done and ready for me to come get her. When I loaded my purchases into the truck I discovered a trash bag that I forgotten to drop off this morning before we left. The bag had come open on the 20 mile trip to New Bern and now had less trash in it than it did before. OOPS. I am sure the folks who were behind me on the highway had some interesting thoughts about that truck from Texas with the garbage flying out of the back.

Cody and Qianna were model doggies as we walked into Petsmart until Cody met an alpha Weimaraner. The sniffed at first then growled at each other. Of course Cody was corrected on the spot and from that point on, he behaved. As we were walking through the store, the Petsmart official pet trainer came over to visit and gave out doggie treats. It was good to see Cody and Qianna behave well again.

As we headed out of town, we decided to stop at Bojangle's Famous Chicken 'n Biscuits for lunch. For those who do not know, Bojangle's is a franchise operation primarily located east of the Mississippi River. Their fried chicken has a slight Cajun kick, not as strong as Popeye's Chicken, but certainly more flavorful than the KFC. Their biscuits are WOW good.

We got back home, tired from a day of shopping. The sky was clear meaning it will probably get cold tonight. As long as that helps dry the mud, that is fine with me. Tomorrow is a work day for us. I think I will get started on the fence project first. I promise to have pictures.

Thanks for stopping by.