Goings On

The game cam caught the chickens settling in at dusk. I think it looks
So pretty in that light

So... the washing machine is broken. It piddled out about a week ago. Luckily, it was immediately after I had washed all of the clothes and my brother threw a few loads in while they were here. I unplugged it to reset it after we got the extra power drain of the camper out of the way. It worked long enough to wash the next 2 loads that we had accumulated over the weekend and went again. For good this time. Brad took it apart and it turns out to be a cheap plastic piece. He said that they use plastic for that specifically so that if something happens it will break the cheap part and save the expensive part that it is attached to. The shipping cost more than the part, so hopefully that is it and we will be back in business! A washer is one of those things that tends to be taken for granted until it isn't there anymore. Then it is painfully apparent how important it is to day to day life! I can't believe our luck, though! If something is going to break, what are the odds that it will work out like that? We are blessed.

I worked on the tractor for over 30 minutes yesterday. It was mostly running around to the battery and making sure there was a good connection, running back and trying to crank it, running back to the battery to check the connection again, back around to crank it, unscrew the solenoid, push the pin in, screw back onto the tractor, try to crank it.... yeah. Good times. After much running back and forth I finally fell back on my tried and true method: coddling, talking to, and pleading with the tractor to start. Finally, she decided to be my friend again and turn over. I spent about 10 minutes dragging heavy things from one side of the yard to the other before I realized that the gas gauge was pointing to the great big E. Maybe I will manage to get some diesel in the fairly near future... hope hope hope! School starts soon and Keegan's birthday is coming up so money is tight and even something as small as a few gallons of diesel or a push mower pull cord, has to be put off for a bit.

We will make it through this like we always do. Faith is an amazing thing and God always finds little ways to make things work out perfectly. It is still frustrating sometimes. Especially when I have SO MUCH that needs to get done and everything seems to be broken, I don't have the money to buy what I need, or I simply don't have the ability to get it without help. For example, I need another bale of hay for the coops and garden. I have a round bale of hay! It is about 3 miles down the road at the back of an overgrown field that my car won't make it through, I don't have a truck, and the "big" tractor (with hay fork) isn't running right now. I'm going to see if I can borrow a truck for a few minutes this weekend and go hand load the bale (handful at a time) like I did the last one. Everywhere I turn is something else that needs to be done and yet another problem standing in my way preventing me from doing it. Have I mentioned that my wheel barrow is broken too? Keegan pulled the axle off for some reason and the last foster puppy we had ran off with it. He tended to do that with a lot of things. I've been moving things by hand as much as possible, but there are some giant logs and piles of dirt that I just can't physically move without my wheelbarrow! It is just frustrating. *Brain scream!* Phew...Sometimes it is so very important when the world seems to be closing in around me, and I think that at any moment my head might just start actually spinning in circles until it explodes, to take a step back. Stop, take a deep breath, and look at the big picture. This too shall pass. It always works out and I have faith that it will work out again. It is amazing how things just seem to pull together at the last minute. In ways that I never would have imagined, at times. Looking at it all, honestly makes me feel even more blessed. How wonderful are problems like this? Simple. Small. Easily fixed. Everyone is still healthy, relatively happy, and I am living my dream.

On to happier things! I got some more brush cut. I know... it is taking forever. I can only work for as long as my chainsaw battery lasts. By the time I finish dragging everything I cut to a burn pile, I really need to stop anyway. The heat down here isn't enjoyable, but the humidity... Well, as it turns out, there is a reason that people down in the deep south are known for taking things slower. People will keel over and die if they don't in this humidity! I think I have gotten much more used to it than I was when I first moved here though. But, the battery times the work period pretty well and gives me no choice but to take a break and cool off. I would love to have an outdoor shower some day! I wouldn't care if it had heated water most of the time. During the summer the cool water would feel better anyway, and I always feel so nasty after working outside, even after a short period of time. Its impossible to take a few steps out the front door without breaking a sweat, and it would be nice to wash all of the ick off before going back inside. Anyway, we are that much closer to being able to put the new fence up.

Miss Tallow left her nest yesterday for a good leg stretch and I took the opportunity to go check on her eggs. I was worried before I even caught sight of them. The smell greeted me first, followed quickly by the soft buzz of flies. Her eggs were rotten and a couple had busted under her. Poor girl. She was trying so hard! I quickly pulled the stink bombs out of the nest and cleaned out the tee-pee. Luckily, I had set up a new tee-pee and filled it with eggs. Tallow happily hopped onto the new, stink-free, clean nest full of shiny new eggs. She decided to move back to her old one this morning, so I moved the eggs over with her. Hopefully she will have better luck with these ones. She is already protective of them. She started hissing at me when I went to check on her. She is all talk, but I was kinda proud.

Tonight I made a mostly local dinner. I do this pretty often, but I would like to keep track and improve on it. I made fried chicken with our very own chicken. I normally never fry anything. I make an exception for chicken and fried green tomatoes a few times a year, simply because Keegan and Brad love the chicken and I love the tomatoes so much. Don't get me wrong. I'm not an angel. I eat fried foods. I just don't fry it myself so that I'm not tempted to eat it more often than I already do. The flour I breaded it with was store bought, but the egg, herbs, and onion powder added to it was 0 mile, coming from our own homestead. We had it with jasmine rice. Not even close to being local, I'm sure, but we buy it in bulk so it helps decrease the fuel used to transport it. Sliced Cherokee purple tomato complimented it amazingly well! Oh I love these tomatoes. They are so good! Being spoiled by these tomatoes has made it impossible for me to buy those tasteless store-bought imitations. There is no comparison! The meal was rounded out by a loaf of Challah bread. None of the ingredients were local, but I have to think that I localized it at least a little by baking it myself. I need to look into buying flour in bulk. I know I'm biased because I cooked it (and grew some of it too), but it is amazing to me that we can eat meals that are this amazing on such a small budget! That was a meal fit for a king.... or Queen! Again I say, we are blessed.

Challah Bread. It ripped a bit taking it off of the baking
sheet. It was delicious though! 

It has been a long day and is late.
In the words of Dr. Seuss
"Today was good. Today was fun. Tomorrow is another one!"

Hope you have a beautiful day as well!