Almost August Already!!!

How the heck did it get to be the end of July?  Beats me, and it's still hot and muggy here, but something in the light or the air is making me think suddenly that it's time to start making sure we're ready for winter.  I am pretty sure I'm not ready for that particular train of thought.

The end of the month is always a bit of a financial challenge around here, and we were looking for something inexpensive to do for one of our "adventures."  We ended up at Big Falls County Park, about 10 minutes from Janette's house, where we took a little walk and enjoyed the scenery:

Apparently, it is forbidden to pitch a tent in this tree.

 

Mom takes her friend George for a walk.  He follows her everywhere.

Walking while looking downward is a family trait.  We find interesting things that way!

The path was of unknown length and started to get pretty rocky and unstable, so we decided to cut our stroll short and try to find the actual Big Falls on a day when we're all feeling less wobbly (honestly, the three of us are like the Weeble family sometimes) but the walk we did take was very pleasant.  The park showcases the South Fork of the Jump River, which plays a big part in the life of this area. 



The view from field mouse height.  Cool, no?  Janette taught me that you could get interesting images from this level

 

Looks like the locals entertain themselves here the same way they do in NC.

Not a bad way to spend an afternoon, and no more costly than the price of a couple gallons of diesel.  Now, it's time for a little nap...

 

Poor Hadjo!

Oh, dear.  Yesterday I glanced over at Hadjo and saw a big lump under his left jawbone.  It just appeared, out of nowhere, without any warning:

I worried and obsessed over it for a while, called my friend Lorrie, a vet tech back in North Carolina, and decided to watch him carefully overnight and see how it looked today.  Well, this morning it was bigger and he was looking pretty miserable:

So we called the Medford Veterinary Clinic, a group we hadn't had experience with yet but one that I was hoping to get to know, and they agreed to see us at 10:40.  Once the vet had taken a good look at him and poked a needle in the mass, she diagnosed it as an abscess, probably from a small puncture he'd gotten while rooting around in the overgrowth we haven't gotten to yet.  So they sedated and numbed him up and lanced the thing there in the office while I paced like an expectant father.  Finally, a second vet, their very strong cow and pig specialist, appeared in the doorway carrying my 79-pound (I know, I know.  But his back legs hurt him too much for him to exercise).  The doc said Hadjo was very cooperative and brave throughout the procedure, which went just as planned.  But he was still draining some bloody fluid and they were worried that he'd stain the upholstery in the truck so they wrapped his head in Vetrap, a type of stretchy bandage that clings to itself.  This particular wrap was pink with blue hearts, and in the words of the vet, "He was walking around just fine, but he got embarrassed about the bandage, and as soon as the thing was on, his legs just quit working."  Poor thing really HATED that pink stuff!  But we were instructed to remove it as soon as we got him home, and he acted as though he felt much better once it was off.  Maybe it was smashing his ear or something that was making him physically uncomfortable, but he sure did look like he was embarrassed!



Mom!  Do you have to take my picture NOW???



Now he's home and recuperating.  He gets antibiotics twice daily and we will go back to the office on Wednesday to have the drain removed.  Hadjo is exhausted and doesn't want to eat right now, but I'm sure he'll feel better in the morning.  Meanwhile, he's camped out on my bed, lying on several old blankets and towels.  Poor baby!

While we were gone, a big storm came up, with rain and lots of wind.  Our poor tomatoes are sporting the "windblown look" this evening:



but hopefully will recover.  They're loaded with baby tomatoes and it's going to be really depressing if they don't deliver on what they've been promising! 

The last picture, below, I found in my camera's memory while I was uploading today's images.  It's a much better shot of a pair of sand hill cranes and their baby than the unidentifiable lumps I showed you before, so I thought I'd share it with you.  I love these birds; they were all but extinct from Wisconsin at one point but are doing really well since they were reintroduced a few years ago.  We have three or four families in our little corner or the woods.

Today's storm has cleared the air and the next couple days are supposed to be really nice, with temps in the 70s and clear skies, so I'll work outside again.  But I'll take lots of breaks to go inside and check on my poor patient.  I'm hoping he'll be a happier boy tomorrow.  I know that if he is I will be, too!

Dog Days

The weather people were right for a change and this past week has been pretty miserable, with temperatures between 90 and 100 degrees and humidity around 70%.  Reminded us both of the last several years we lived in North Carolina.  I got a surprise this morning, though, when I researched the statistics on both states and found that the average humidity for both North Carolina and Wisconsin is 74%!!  I would have sworn that the air up here was significantly drier than that soggy southern stuff.  Further investigation yielded the information that how we perceive humidity depends on the accompanying temperatures.  The hotter it is, the more miserable we feel.   So the fact that I don't sweat like mad here is only due to the fact that our average temperatures are 15 to 20 degrees cooler.  We learn something new every day.  If we're lucky.

 The water in the animals' tub was getting too hot for them to drink and I wanted to keep them well hydrated, so I floated a gallon jug of frozen water in the tub all day:

I was worried that they'd be afraid of the new thing (some new predator, perhaps, waiting to SNAP! at an unsuspecting nose?) bobbing around suspiciously in their water, but they took it in stride.  Bella actually acted as if she were thinking it might make a good toy:

So what did I do to pass the time yesterday (the worst day of the whole week)?  I turned on the oven, of course, and heated up the whole house so I could bake bread.  Sigh.  I had a real craving for rye bread for some reason, and didn't want to drive 30 minutes to buy a decent loaf.  So I whipped out my handy copy of  "Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day" and made a loaf of what actually turned out to be rye bread!  It really takes hours from start to finish.  The book title refers to the fact that you make up a large batch and bake small portions at a time, and the fact that the authors' technique does away with the usual kneading time.

 

Ta Daaaaaa!

So for supper I had a couple of pieces of my homemade rye and a bowl of Mom's homemade cauliflower soup.  Mmmmmm!!  Who needs meat?



The temps have moderated some today and we're supposed to get stormy weather over the weekend, so I'd better get on my riding mower and get the grass cut.  Otherwise, we'll be overrun with vegetation, as we were when we first moved in!

One Little Cartfull at a Time



The barn, as it looked when we moved in.

We worked again this week at beating back the native flora, a never-ending job here.  Much of the property was really overgrown and a lot of our good weather work involves chopping the overgrowth down and "making little ones out of big ones," as Mom says.  She has been working on the trees (and pieces thereof) that the fence guys left laying around all summer.  Our system has evolved to where I go in with the big weed eater and clear out enough tall grass so she can start yanking tree parts out, then she cuts the wood up, bundles it neatly and stacks it to be torched in the burn barrel (after calling the local Fire Warden and getting permission, of course.  Nothing is as easy as it once was.). 

The southeast corner of the yard, being cleared this week.

Well, the "burn the wood" part hasn't actually happened yet, but that can be done anytime.  But, a little at a time, she's opening up the yard and making things look more "lived-in."  Her wood pile is pretty impressive right now:

It reminds me of my grandmother and her little two-wheeled garden cart.  She did the same thing when she "homesteaded" the Mignin Drive property, moving stuff around, as she used to say, "one little cartfull at a time."  All you need is a little cart (or, in Mom's case, a little red wagon) and enough time and you can move mountains.  It's a good philosophy for the two of us, with our limited energy and stamina.  We might not be able to put a whole day or an entire weekend into a project, but we can do a little at a time.  You learn to be happy with progress that's measured in small increments.  The "happy" part is all that really matters.

My current project is to dismantle the old milk house attached to the west side of the barn, before it falls down of its own accord.  I would like to get it down and at least build some sort of temporary cover for the old hand-dug well inside before winter comes.  I pulled off the grape vines that had grown up over the walls and roof and next will carefully pry walls and roof apart and tear them down.  I was a little worried at first that the grape vines were all that was holding the building up, but it's still standing so far.

The old milk house, before I started

After grape vine removal.  Apparently, grape leaves are a treat.

Hidden treasure

I saved one large vine, growing next to the main barn, that has a few new shoots growing from it.  It's hidden from the animals right now, until they lose interest in the area.  Then I will weight down each shoot into a pot of dirt.   After the shoot takes root, I'll cut its connection with the old vine and transplant it to a horse- and sheep-free zone where we can cultivate a new arbor from our little cuttings.  Someone planted that grape vine years and years ago, and it will be nice if we can harvest some grapes from it next year.

Meanwhile, our tomatoes are really taking off!

                                                              And we have babies:

 We also found raspberries growing both along the south fence line and just behind the primrose bushes we found last week.  I think we'll eventually transplant some of these into the spot between the north side of the driveway and the south pasture fence, where we will someday have a little orchard.  We want to have apples, cherries and a cold weather type of apricot, along with raspberries, blackberries and maybe even lingonberries!

For now, though, they are just bird food.  By the time we are able to get to them they'll be picked clean, I suspect.  That's all right.  We enjoy our bird friends too, and will leave some berries growing for their benefit.  Our "tame" berries, though, will be off limits.  We're going to have to invest in a LOT of netting!

Today, though, it's 90 degrees out with 70% humidity; it's supposed to be this way all week.  Dick next door just called to offer us some of his homegrown lettuce and remarked that they never got this sort of heat spell until we moved in.  Hmmm....  So for the next week we are probably going to be doing inside work, which is good--the place gets a little dusty and cluttered while we work outside.

Bison Barbeque and Horse Pulling Contest

Saturday we went to Pioneer Park, by the river just east of town, to enjoy the annual Beef and Bison Cookout and Horse Pull.  There was quite a crowd, and more competitors than I'd thought would be there.

In a horse pull, a sled-type contraption is loaded up with concrete blocks, each weighing several hundred pounds, and two draft horses are hooked up to one end of the sled.  This hooking up process is definitely not as easy as it sounds--those horses love to pull and they understand that the game starts the second the hook at the end of their harness meets the iron hoop chained to the pulling sled.  They are off like a shot as without a microsecond's hesitation, and having witnessed this explosive start I can see why that iron hoop is so big (it's around 8 inches in diameter); a person could easily lose a hand while trying to thread a steel hook through a smaller space before 3000+ pounds of horse jerks against it!

Weight is added to the pulling sled, while one of the equine contestants looks on, unimpressed.

In the lightweight category (in which the teams weigh 3000 pounds or less), my favorite competitor won.  She was the only female in the category and was driving two unusual mares.

The mare on the left was on her way to the slaughterhouse when the woman saw her and bought her.  Someone had thought this horse wasn't worth keeping.  The mare on the right had had a growth in her sinus cavity and ended up with a tracheotomy--this horse breathes through a hole in her neck!  They both seemed to be fit and sassy, in their matching pink halters and personalized tack, and enjoyed beating the boys by at least 4 feet, pulling a full 2 tons on the last pull!

There were fewer teams entered in the middleweight division, but they were just as impressive-- the winning team pulled 6000+ pounds and loved every minute of it!

After the middleweights were done we had a half-hour break, during which we ate our bison burgers (ok, Mom ate the bison burger.  I had a hot dog.  But I did get brave enough to take a bite of hers, and it was really good!) along with potatoes, beans, sweet corn and ice cream.  Then the heavyweights started pulling.  These massive animals were magnificent!  I have to get me some of those!  And some more pasture, I guess.  And a job...  Anyhow, the heat and humidity got to me during the first heavyweight pull (that's the problem with fibromyalgia--when you're done for the day you're done, without any warning) so we ended up leaving.  But it was a great old-fashioned way to spend a Saturday.  We got to say howdy to our neighbors, the Kiltys, and meet a few new people.  We had a great main meal for the day for just a few dollars and I got to moon over horses.  A perfect day!

Meanwhile, Back at the Farm:



The grass needs cutting.



Actually, those were taken at the edge of the field at Janette's house, but as you can see below our grass is just as high in spots.  But we found hidden treasures in our tall grass--yellow primroses, just bursting into bloom there where no one can see them!

But we're working our way back there (behind the hen house) and will have these pretty little things free in no time. 

Visitors from Illinois, North Carolina and the Pits of Hell

Yesterday was July 4th and we celebrated by not doing much of anything.  The long holiday weekend had been pretty busy up to that point, though.  On Saturday Erica Mennerick, one of Mom's grandchildren-by-choice, dropped by with her kids and new boyfriend for a brief visit on their way to his place in Cable (an hour or two north of here).  I haven't seen Erica in ages, not since we went up to IL for her husband Skip's funeral almost 2 years ago, and it was great to see her under happier circumstances.  Tom seems to be a really nice guy and the kids are just growing like weeds.  Kiera is a shy and wiggly 4-year-old and Cole (who is now 6, I believe) is a smart and self-assured little guy.  Skip would be proud of them both.

Just after they left, and before I had time to charge the battery in my camera, the sheep shearer called and asked if he could come by and get the sheep taken care of right away.  Since they had been suffering from the day's 90+ degree heat and 80% humidity (our visitors from North Carolina, who had dropped by to remind us of why we left), I agreed that it would be a good day to be a naked sheep and rounded them up into their new stall.  A far cry from last year, when we were still chasing them around the yard when the shearer showed up!  It was too hot and sticky for shearing day to be much fun, but at least they obviously felt better the minute all that wool was gone.  They're funny, though, when they've been sheared.  They're really jumpy and stare at one another as though they'd never seen each other before.  Bella was a hoot, too.  As each sheep lay there bawling, she'd come stick her head over the top of the gate and nicker in

encouragement.  A real mother hen.



Sheep Before Shearing



Totally Naked Sheep

Our final visitors arrived, straight from the fiery depths, shortly after sundown Saturday evening:
                                                  :::cue dramatic music:::     
The dreaded, hated, evil bugs from Hell, the No See 'Ems (Women scream, crowds panic, buildings topple)!
We hate these bugs more than all the other bugs in this pesticide-forsaken state put together.  They really are so small as to be almost invisible, but when 2 or 3 billion of the little monsters swarm in through the window screens they make their presence known by biting the bejesus out of anything inside.  We suffered through an onslaught of these horrors last year about this time (we both ended up sleeping in the living room since the ceilings of both bedrooms were black with the little suckers).  I had just been wondering a couple of days ago when they'd show up this year, and then Mom discovered them covering the ceiling tiles in her room Saturday when she went to bed.  This development put the heat and humidity in a better light, as the miserable conditions had saved us from a full-on assault: we had closed the windows downstairs and turned on the air conditioning (a luxury absent from most Cheesehead households as it's unnecessary for all but a couple of weeks a year) so they didn't have a chance to invade there.  Unfortunately, Mom doesn't get much cool air upstairs (but does get great cross-ventilation) and so had left the windows open in her room.  She spent Saturday and Sunday night downstairs sleeping in her chair, poor thing.  As I write this, though, they seem to have all died off and she was able to sleep upstairs again last night.

On Sunday, Mom went back to her never-ending branch chopping chore and I dealt with the results of the shearing.  We got "two bags full" of nice, silver-black wool from the sheep:

I spent Sunday afternoon "skirting" the wool, which is a nicer way of saying "cutting out the poopy parts":

 The skirted wool was soaked overnight in soapy, cold water.  Hot water and too much agitation will cause wool to felt up, ruining it for spinning, so I had to be careful with it.  On Monday I rinsed it and spread it out to dry again.

                                                                                

In the past, we had sent wool out to be cleaned and machine carded (the process by which wool is combed out so all the fibers are running in the same direction, ready to be pulled out a few at a time and twisted together by the action of the spinning wheel), so this was a first for me.  It may be a last, too--wet wool is REALLY heavy, and the process is quite difficult for someone with fibromyalgia.  Took me hours.  But it was fun, and the end result will be interesting to work with.  The wool should still have much of its natural lanolin since I used cold water, and I will hand card it in small amounts before spinning.  Spinning wool that still has its lanolin is called "spinning in the grease" and results in a water-resistant yarn that makes good, storm-proof sweaters. 

Though we didn't go to see any fireworks last night--Janette is still laid up after her vicious reaction to the tick bite and we were pretty tired--we hope to attend next Saturday's Beef and Bison Barbecue/ Draft Horse Pull being held at the Pioneer Park in Ogema.  Stay tuned!