Farmerjan's journal - Weather

[farmerjan]

Home from the service and a lunch afterwards. visited with the family a little... DS had spent alot more time over there over the years and is better friends with the family than I am... plus taking his dad a couple times to go see him and trips to poultry shows too...

In to change clothes,,,, had to answer a few texts and phone calls for testing. Got some stuff in the works, 2 farms scheduled next week too....
Heading out the door to get on the mower for a bit... Been sunny and real nice all day.

They showed up this morning to start pounding posts at the farm..... YAY....

 

[farmerjan]

Back in. Thought I sent this, but then got tied up on the phone with another farmer... never seems to go as planned.
I did get the spider plants watered good and the Chrysanthemums watered. Got at discount price a week or 2 ago... plan to plant them and see if any survive for next year...
Got the bags of feed from the explorer that DS got the other day when at Rural King... transferred over to the forester... and yes, the tire is still flat... Might try to get the air tank and get it blown up to get me to the co-op... DS is too busy with the guys with the fencing, and I am not going to bother him now. Made up 3 buckets for the calves (I mix 2 kinds together) and got all that in the car.

There was some dampness so did not bring in the clothes... haven't been here to do so anyway... Put a load in to soak, so will finish washing and take them out to hang, and bring the others in tomorrow...

It is so dry, that the leaves are coming off the trees as fast as they are turning... I want to get out the lawn sweeper and get some of these leaves up and bagged for the winter. and cut the grass and then sweep it again with the dried grass in it too...
Took down a section of the electric netting so I can get in the garden easier... but no sense in taking alot down as I will use it to partially section off the grass here at the house once the perimeter fence is up... at least along a couple sides/parts. I have a "rough sketch" of where I want the posts for the future fence... for gates and such.... but it is basically going to be full perimeter fence except across the front and directly around the house/driveway area.

So after all that food today, probably don't need to eat... maybe a little later. Since it is already dark, I will work on something in here...

 

[murphysranch]

You mention soaking your work clothes, alot. What do you soak them in, besides water?

 

[farmerjan]

Arm and Hammer detergent, and Super washing soda by Arm and Hammer...... if there are bad stains that have set more... I use A&H detergent and 20 mule Team borax...
I have had several allergic reactions to things like Tide, and other detergents... never tried the newer different "sensitive skin" formulations of the different ones, because A & H detergent works just fine.

The washing soda also seems to make "less" detergent work as good and is sudsy...

I usually put the clothes in the washer, half full.. agitate a bit... then leave to soak overnight. I add HOT water to that in the morning... making it barely "warm".... agitate a bit again..... let soak again for a bit (usually when I am outside doing something).. then start washer at the beginning of the wash cycle again to wash the full amount of time... and let it run through all the cycles... Sometimes I do a second rinse since my hard water does not always wash out all the detergent well... takes a little more time... but my clothes seem cleaner AND I have not had any allergic reaction to them since. I do sometimes use some softener since my water is very hard... I like Snuggle for not needing much and making them not feel like a board when they are dry.

 

[fuzzi]

Arm and Hammer detergent, and Super washing soda by Arm and Hammer...... if there are bad stains that have set more... I use A&H detergent and 20 mule Team borax...
I have had several allergic reactions to things like Tide, and other detergents... never tried the newer different "sensitive skin" formulations of the different ones, because A & H detergent works just fine.

The washing soda also seems to make "less" detergent work as good and is sudsy...

I usually put the clothes in the washer, half full.. agitate a bit... then leave to soak overnight. I add HOT water to that in the morning... making it barely "warm".... agitate a bit again..... let soak again for a bit (usually when I am outside doing something).. then start washer at the beginning of the wash cycle again to wash the full amount of time... and let it run through all the cycles... Sometimes I do a second rinse since my hard water does not always wash out all the detergent well... takes a little more time... but my clothes seem cleaner AND I have not had any allergic reaction to them since. I do sometimes use some softener since my water is very hard... I like Snuggle for not needing much and making them not feel like a board when they are dry.

I use washing soda and borax with my laundry detergent, too. I buy Aldi's non-scented detergent, works well.

 

[farmerjan]

Friday morning... Have to go to a farm to get their on farm producer program into their new computer. Hopefully they will not have the problems that I had at the last farm since this is a new computer without all these child safeguard lockouts and such....

Never got below 60 last night... it is cloudy and there was a slight chance of a shower but doubt it is going to happen. The weather is supposed to transition to much cooler for the next couple of days as a "cold front" comes through.

Yesterday was a "do stuff outside" day in the warmer weather. I got all the buckets and lids washed that were sitting here since the water in the big black tub had warmed in the sun pretty decently. Hoses in the carport... stuff like that. Started mowing some grass... and then got out the lawn sweeper and tried it on some of the leaves that the mower had run over... It works better on the whole leaves rather than the chopped up ones that I mowed. I need to drop it down more so it picks up "closer" to the ground probably. But since that section of lawn is now mowed, all the leaves that come down off the big maple should get picked up pretty good. I am going to bag them to use later on... that way they will be dry. I am going to try to get the rest mowed around the perimeter so that it will make it easier for them to see where the posts need to go....will make 2 passes, one in each direction so the grass is in the mowed part and should be able to pick some of it up with the sweeper... and in a day or 2 I will take the sweeper and pick up the dried grass that I mowed too..

Other than the possible rain for last night and today; there is no more moisture in the forecast until late next week...

Need to start digging potatoes but the ground is like a brick... way too hard to try to do much. It will be cold weather doing it if we don't get some rain soon. It has been a whole month since any measurable rain... and that was only .6 the first 2 days of Oct. This is very unusual and rare here... we normally get 3-4 inches rain a month and get it scattered out during the month.

It has been a very strange year weather wise. It has been nice to have the clear sunny light breezy days with no humidity for the hay making... but..... not normal.

Spring is holding up at the nurse cow pasture with all the heifers we moved in there... but it is still less than the number of cows and bred heifers we took out, and only 2 are nursing calves so not as much water needed as when there were 6 with 300+ lb calves on them.
Grass is getting short though with no rain to keep it growing with this late warm weather... going to have to start feeding some hay... I'd like to put a roll in there and see how much they are interested in it.

Time to get things put together to take the jump drive and head up to the farm .... need to eat something before I go.