Ridgetop - our place and how we muddle along

[Baymule]

Baked one batch, took them to Bay's, left most of them with the guests, ate the rest last night! LOL

Those cookies were delicious! I want the recipe, please!

 

[Baymule]

Harika had a great life with y’all. She had great working conditions, lots of coyotes to bark at and kill the ones dumb enough to enter the premises. Lots of love, the best of care and plenty of sheep to guard.
She will be missed.

 

[Finnie]

I love it that she went peacefully and you didn’t have to agonize over when would be the time to make The Decision.

 

[Ridgetop]

DSIL2 and DD2 came out this afternoon after church to dig Rika's grave. It has been pretty cold and the other dogs were sitting with her so leaving her body laying out was not a problem. These Anatolians will stay with a dead animal for at least 24 hours guarding it before leaving it behind. It took them all day to dig the grave since they culd only dig for about half an hour. Then heavy rain would suddenly come down and they had to run for the house until it passed. The weather was warm today and neither of the guys would wear jackets! Even after the grave was dug and we were covering our darling Rika Ozel was at our sides watching. She was uneasy when the dirt started going on Rika and we had to console her. DD2, DSIL2, Annabel, DH and I were there to put her in the grave. I will get a wood burning tool at Lowes or Harbor Freight to make a marker for her on a piece of 1x 4 and attach it to a T-post. They stayed for dinner - chicken enchiladas with fresh blueberry cobbler for desert.

DSIL2 said that Rika saved him from Bubba years back. He came in the yard and Bubba didn'tknow him and apparently didnt think he should be there. He charged DSIL2, tail up , head down, silently, which means business. Rika intervened, knocking Bubba away and staying between Bubba and DSIL2 until he could get back in the house. I had never heard this story. DS1 rightly named her "The Brains of the Operation".

 

[Baymule]

That’s best funeral a loyal dog could have. Attended by her working friends and her human family, to say good bye.

 

[Ridgetop]

Nine days left until Christmas. No Christmas cookies made - saving DH and I from a calorie overload - but DD2 wants to bring Maisie and Annabel over to "make cookies with Grandma". I normally make the Christmas cookies when the children are not around. When they were small it was to avoid burns and tripping over toddlers, when they got older it was to avoid watching the cookies vanish from sight as soon as they cooled! No wonder none of my children knows how to make the special family recipes - I am a bad, Grinchy grandmother. On the other hand my grandmother used to do the same thing and made them when we were at school. That was back when making cookies was not as expensive a proposition as it is now. She belonged to a lot of bridge foursomes and eightsomes and made cookie plates for all those people and the neighbors as well. Now with eggs and butter the prices they are, it costs more to bake homemade than buying a box of chocolates or bottle of wine for the neighbors. And is a lot less work! Some of the cookies are a lot more work to make than others so those I can either skip or do alone.

Yesterday evening DH found a Hallmark movie on TV. He watches them relentessly all Christmas season. It was rather amusing about a woman who kept repeating Christmas Eve (rather like Groundhog Day) until she realized the benefit of good friends, found her true love, blah, blah, blah, then it snowed. DH saw the first 15 minutes and woke up for the closing credits.

The protein tubs only lasted 2 weeks, so we might go back to the cheaper ones. DH just put out the last 4 yesterday so it will average out to about $150 per week if my math is correct. The Atwood tubs were half the price so may go back to them. Too expensive so may have to go back to bagged feed to supplement hay during the winter. DS1 put out hay just before he left on November 25. Payton came over and p ut out 5 more bales for the rams, ewes, and horses. The ewes have almost gne through their hay so we will need to have Payton come over and put out another couple bales for them. This is a whole new learning curve in Texas for feed.

We got the parts price list on the FarmTrac and with parts and labor it comes to about $6000. That does not include the front loader which was another $3000, or a 3 prong hay spear. We already have a single spear but DH wants to move 2 at a time and wants the convenience of a front spear. Plus after digging the grave yeterday by hand, I think we shoud look for a back hoe attachment. Digging yesterday in wet soi was a lot easier than it will be this summer when the sground is dry. The mechanic is a real fan of FarmTrac tractors and said that this model was the best one they produced annd is a rea workhorse so worth keeping. She also said that no matter what goes wrong with them they just keep on running. Which is evidenced by the fact that even though BB's transmission linkage falls apart if you lift the gear shift too high once you put it back BB runs fine. Once we get Big Blue back, we will need to have some work done on Baby 'Bota. It continues to run but you have to use a battery boost to start her and remember to remove the battery cables when you finish so the battery doesn't drain. Old truck, old tractors, old stock trailers, old owners, Oh well, still cheaper than a new $40,000 tractor.

Annabel is affectionate, a darling, and autistic. The older Annabel gets (4 in March) the more her differences are noticeable. She is going to a special school. DD2 has studied autism and knows how to work with her, but is wondering if she is HD as well. She is very quick and active. Make that EXHAUSTING!
DH and I bught some inexpensive toys for her to keep here at the house and are giving them to her a couple at a time when she comes over. My goal is to have a special box for her toys. Once the weather improves we can put up a swing, and get some outside toys and it will be easier when she can go outside which she loves. Right now she gets DS1's laundry basket from his closet* and goes around the house gathering everything she can reach, putting it in the basket, and dragging it back down the hall. DD2 says she is a hoarder. LOL. I will need to put all the Christmas decorations up high when they come over. Mostly that will mean the stuff on the coffee table and end tables so not a lot. The Nativity, Santa and reindeer, and Christmas Angel with the lights and battery candles are up hgh enough she can't get to them. I will make a space for them somewhere so I can whip through the house and remove temptation when DD2 is on the way from Wylie.

*Yes, she can open the closets and all door knobs! No use shutting doors hoping she won'tget into the rooms. I will have to replace all the bedroom and bathroom knobs with lockable ones and leave the keys on the molding over the doors. DD2 tried stacking all the empty tubs and boxes I had put in DS1's room in front of the bifold closet doors but Annabel is strong and determined and removed them. Locks will be the only hope. DD2 said she will bring over cabinet latches too. Just got away from all that in California. I do need to get a special lock for the kitchen door to put up high. I am terrified that Annabel will get out of the door and run onto the highway. She has no concept of traffic. I also want to get some carabiners for the gates to make sure the horses and sheep don't figure out how to remove the chain locks. If we had goats they would already have done so. LOL

I looked at the spare bedroom yesterday with fresh eyes and was impressed with how much I have unpacked, removed, and put away. I can actually get to the closet without having to pirouette and leap like a ballerina around and over the boxes! I see an end eventually to this process.

Now that we have been here for a while (counting all the times we came out for a month or so) I am finding out the drawbacks of this house. Drawbacks I can correct and work with, but drawbacks nevertheless.
Drawback #1
There are 2 storage closets in the hallway and one in each bathroom. Good storage BUT they are very deep. The hall closets are 24" wide x 30" deep! They are nice and deep for storage but then you have to unload everything from the front to get at what is in the back! Kind of defeats the purpose of accessible storage. In the bathrooms the master bath closets are 18" wde by 22" deep with again the same probem of excess depth to get to anything stored inside. The family bath closet is even worse - 15" wide x 24" deep. At least the shelves are far apart allowing me to store plastic bins of stuff which makes it easier to remove them to get to the stuff behind. I'll need to buy and install some pullouts for those shelves to access the stuff inside. Since the shelves are far apart I think I can order some pullouts that are double decker. Right now I have plastic boxes full of stuff stacked double on each shelf, double deep. To see what is in the rear bottom of the shelf I need to remove 3 plastic boxes to see what is in the rear bottom box. Then I find out that I am looking on the wrong shelf! GRRRR! The pullouts in the kitchen are working well and the cabinets that DS1 put in the kitchen as a temorary mini island are working well. Once we remove the peninsula I will order the 36" wide deep drawers for pots and pans, buy some oak paneling and DS1 and I can put the island together. It won't have the permanent top yet but we can use the peninsula top and extend it with some tiled counter until I can afford to replace all the kitchen counters.

Drawback #2
The closets are good sizes but are single rodded with 2 shelves above, and they are a full 24-25" deep which is a plus. I like the extra upper storage, but need to double rod at least our closets and the spare bedroom for more hanging clothes storage. The single rod storage because of the two shelves are not tall enough for any full length dresses either. The spare bedroom closet is the smallest at 6'6" x 25" deep, office is 9'6" x 25" deep and DS1's closet is a real beast at 8'6" x 42" deep! His closet is actually deep enough for a gun safe which is where we will eventually put it. I have already put shelves in the ends of the office closet for supplies. The MBR closets are 4'6" x 25" apiece. Once I double rod the master closets, they will be perfect since we keep our formal/cruise clothes in garment bags in a second closet. It will all get done eventually.

Drawback #3
This is a bigger drawback and we will have to do something about this before next winter. The kitchen door opens into the carport. This is good, EXCEPT there is an opening into the front yard from thecarport right next to the door. Rain blows into the carport through the opening and since the carport has half walls on either side the rain blows nti it frm bth sides. This means we walk through water from teh door to the car and back into the house tracking water in. We have aready decided to bud a storage shed at that opening to keep water away from the kitchen door. There is a corresponding doorway on the other side of the carport into the back yard. The area between the openings is about 4' wide and raised from the carprt floor. We are discussing closing it in like a mud room for boots and coats. The attic crawl spaces for the carport and house access from that walkway so DS1 wants to install pulldown ladders for those areas to make more storage. We will have to get up there and clean out the carport attic first since there is a lot of junk up there. We need to do it during the winter when the wasps, spiders, snakes, are not active. Then we can put up insulation and use the space for storage.
The next area that we need to address is the rear patio which is very small and opens into the living room. It also gets water blown into it when it rains which means more water/mud tracked straight into the house. I think we will make this area into a screened porch.
Finally the front porch which we like. It looks really nice and gives good curb appeal, but again rain blows into it. This is not a problem since we never use the front door. LOL The front porch is not really very usable since it fronts the highway which is noisy during the day. However, it would make a great evening porch when traffic dies down, and has 2 hanging ceiling lights. I am thinking to switch those out for ourdoor ceiling fans. Since mosquitoes would be a probem in warm summer evenings we might screen this porch in eventually if we end up using it. The sweet little barn swallows build their nests in both the front and rear porches and in the spring we like watching them hatch and feed their chicks. Screening in those porches would prevent them from from nesting there. Screening in the porches is in the future - the kitchen door and carport needs to be addressed this year.

Drawback #4
Insect life in Texas. Last summer we did not have the cricket invasion we had the year before. DH mosed the area near the house which seemed to control it. The wasps apparently are mostly the kind that eat the Catalpa worms so they are seasonal. Now we seem to be getting some sort of tiny millipede. They look like worms about 1"-1 1/2" long. They will curl up when disturbed but I find them either dead on the carpet or crawlng across the carpet or floor. Not that many have ventured inside and I looked them up. Texas Millipede or Greenhiuse Millipede - they will leave since the weather is better outside. They eat bugs and decaying pant matter, but won't live long in the house because their natural food is not available to them. This would be why I find them curled up dead on the carpet in out of the way spots when vacuuming. They may be coming in on mud on our boots, or crawling in from the porch. Minor drawback, and we can cope. At our house in California we had occasional invasions of earwigs, mosquito eaters, and the occasional tarantula.

All in all these drawbacks are easy fixes.

 

[fuzzi]

Nine days left until Christmas. No Christmas cookies made - saving DH and I from a calorie overload - but DD2 wants to bring Maisie and Annabel over to "make cookies with Grandma". I normally make the Christmas cookies when the children are not around. When they were small it was to avoid burns and tripping over toddlers, when they got older it was to avoid watching the cookies vanish from sight as soon as they cooled! No wonder none of my children knows how to make the special family recipes - I am a bad, Grinchy grandmother. On the other hand my grandmother used to do the same thing and made them when we were at school. That was back when making cookies was not as expensive a proposition as it is now. She belonged to a lot of bridge foursomes and eightsomes and made cookie plates for all those people and the neighbors as well. Now with eggs and butter the prices they are, it costs more to bake homemade than buying a box of chocolates or bottle of wine for the neighbors. And is a lot less work! Some of the cookies are a lot more work to make than others so those I can either skip or do alone.

Yesterday evening DH found a Hallmark movie on TV. He watches them relentessly all Christmas season. It was rather amusing about a woman who kept repeating Christmas Eve (rather like Groundhog Day) until she realized the benefit of good friends, found her true love, blah, blah, blah, then it snowed. DH saw the first 15 minutes and woke up for the closing credits.

The protein tubs only lasted 2 weeks, so we might go back to the cheaper ones. DH just put out the last 4 yesterday so it will average out to about $150 per week if my math is correct. The Atwood tubs were half the price so may go back to them. Too expensive so may have to go back to bagged feed to supplement hay during the winter. DS1 put out hay just before he left on November 25. Payton came over and p ut out 5 more bales for the rams, ewes, and horses. The ewes have almost gne through their hay so we will need to have Payton come over and put out another couple bales for them. This is a whole new learning curve in Texas for feed.

We got the parts price list on the FarmTrac and with parts and labor it comes to about $6000. That does not include the front loader which was another $3000, or a 3 prong hay spear. We already have a single spear but DH wants to move 2 at a time and wants the convenience of a front spear. Plus after digging the grave yeterday by hand, I think we shoud look for a back hoe attachment. Digging yesterday in wet soi was a lot easier than it will be this summer when the sground is dry. The mechanic is a real fan of FarmTrac tractors and said that this model was the best one they produced annd is a rea workhorse so worth keeping. She also said that no matter what goes wrong with them they just keep on running. Which is evidenced by the fact that even though BB's transmission linkage falls apart if you lift the gear shift too high once you put it back BB runs fine. Once we get Big Blue back, we will need to have some work done on Baby 'Bota. It continues to run but you have to use a battery boost to start her and remember to remove the battery cables when you finish so the battery doesn't drain. Old truck, old tractors, old stock trailers, old owners, Oh well, still cheaper than a new $40,000 tractor.

Annabel is affectionate, a darling, and autistic. The older Annabel gets (4 in March) the more her differences are noticeable. She is going to a special school. DD2 has studied autism and knows how to work with her, but is wondering if she is HD as well. She is very quick and active. Make that EXHAUSTING!
DH and I bught some inexpensive toys for her to keep here at the house and are giving them to her a couple at a time when she comes over. My goal is to have a special box for her toys. Once the weather improves we can put up a swing, and get some outside toys and it will be easier when she can go outside which she loves. Right now she gets DS1's laundry basket from his closet* and goes around the house gathering everything she can reach, putting it in the basket, and dragging it back down the hall. DD2 says she is a hoarder. LOL. I will need to put all the Christmas decorations up high when they come over. Mostly that will mean the stuff on the coffee table and end tables so not a lot. The Nativity, Santa and reindeer, and Christmas Angel with the lights and battery candles are up hgh enough she can't get to them. I will make a space for them somewhere so I can whip through the house and remove temptation when DD2 is on the way from Wylie.

*Yes, she can open the closets and all door knobs! No use shutting doors hoping she won'tget into the rooms. I will have to replace all the bedroom and bathroom knobs with lockable ones and leave the keys on the molding over the doors. DD2 tried stacking all the empty tubs and boxes I had put in DS1's room in front of the bifold closet doors but Annabel is strong and determined and removed them. Locks will be the only hope. DD2 said she will bring over cabinet latches too. Just got away from all that in California. I do need to get a special lock for the kitchen door to put up high. I am terrified that Annabel will get out of the door and run onto the highway. She has no concept of traffic. I also want to get some carabiners for the gates to make sure the horses and sheep don't figure out how to remove the chain locks. If we had goats they would already have done so. LOL

I looked at the spare bedroom yesterday with fresh eyes and was impressed with how much I have unpacked, removed, and put away. I can actually get to the closet without having to pirouette and leap like a ballerina around and over the boxes! I see an end eventually to this process.

Now that we have been here for a while (counting all the times we came out for a month or so) I am finding out the drawbacks of this house. Drawbacks I can correct and work with, but drawbacks nevertheless.
Drawback #1
There are 2 storage closets in the hallway and one in each bathroom. Good storage BUT they are very deep. The hall closets are 24" wide x 30" deep! They are nice and deep for storage but then you have to unload everything from the front to get at what is in the back! Kind of defeats the purpose of accessible storage. In the bathrooms the master bath closets are 18" wde by 22" deep with again the same probem of excess depth to get to anything stored inside. The family bath closet is even worse - 15" wide x 24" deep. At least the shelves are far apart allowing me to store plastic bins of stuff which makes it easier to remove them to get to the stuff behind. I'll need to buy and install some pullouts for those shelves to access the stuff inside. Since the shelves are far apart I think I can order some pullouts that are double decker. Right now I have plastic boxes full of stuff stacked double on each shelf, double deep. To see what is in the rear bottom of the shelf I need to remove 3 plastic boxes to see what is in the rear bottom box. Then I find out that I am looking on the wrong shelf! GRRRR! The pullouts in the kitchen are working well and the cabinets that DS1 put in the kitchen as a temorary mini island are working well. Once we remove the peninsula I will order the 36" wide deep drawers for pots and pans, buy some oak paneling and DS1 and I can put the island together. It won't have the permanent top yet but we can use the peninsula top and extend it with some tiled counter until I can afford to replace all the kitchen counters.

Drawback #2
The closets are good sizes but are single rodded with 2 shelves above, and they are a full 24-25" deep which is a plus. I like the extra upper storage, but need to double rod at least our closets and the spare bedroom for more hanging clothes storage. The single rod storage because of the two shelves are not tall enough for any full length dresses either. The spare bedroom closet is the smallest at 6'6" x 25" deep, office is 9'6" x 25" deep and DS1's closet is a real beast at 8'6" x 42" deep! His closet is actually deep enough for a gun safe which is where we will eventually put it. I have already put shelves in the ends of the office closet for supplies. The MBR closets are 4'6" x 25" apiece. Once I double rod the master closets, they will be perfect since we keep our formal/cruise clothes in garment bags in a second closet. It will all get done eventually.

Drawback #3
This is a bigger drawback and we will have to do something about this before next winter. The kitchen door opens into the carport. This is good, EXCEPT there is an opening into the front yard from thecarport right next to the door. Rain blows into the carport through the opening and since the carport has half walls on either side the rain blows nti it frm bth sides. This means we walk through water from teh door to the car and back into the house tracking water in. We have aready decided to bud a storage shed at that opening to keep water away from the kitchen door. There is a corresponding doorway on the other side of the carport into the back yard. The area between the openings is about 4' wide and raised from the carprt floor. We are discussing closing it in like a mud room for boots and coats. The attic crawl spaces for the carport and house access from that walkway so DS1 wants to install pulldown ladders for those areas to make more storage. We will have to get up there and clean out the carport attic first since there is a lot of junk up there. We need to do it during the winter when the wasps, spiders, snakes, are not active. Then we can put up insulation and use the space for storage.
The next area that we need to address is the rear patio which is very small and opens into the living room. It also gets water blown into it when it rains which means more water/mud tracked straight into the house. I think we will make this area into a screened porch.
Finally the front porch which we like. It looks really nice and gives good curb appeal, but again rain blows into it. This is not a problem since we never use the front door. LOL The front porch is not really very usable since it fronts the highway which is noisy during the day. However, it would make a great evening porch when traffic dies down, and has 2 hanging ceiling lights. I am thinking to switch those out for ourdoor ceiling fans. Since mosquitoes would be a probem in warm summer evenings we might screen this porch in eventually if we end up using it. The sweet little barn swallows build their nests in both the front and rear porches and in the spring we like watching them hatch and feed their chicks. Screening in those porches would prevent them from from nesting there. Screening in the porches is in the future - the kitchen door and carport needs to be addressed this year.

Drawback #4
Insect life in Texas. Last summer we did not have the cricket invasion we had the year before. DH mosed the area near the house which seemed to control it. The wasps apparently are mostly the kind that eat the Catalpa worms so they are seasonal. Now we seem to be getting some sort of tiny millipede. They look like worms about 1"-1 1/2" long. They will curl up when disturbed but I find them either dead on the carpet or crawlng across the carpet or floor. Not that many have ventured inside and I looked them up. Texas Millipede or Greenhiuse Millipede - they will leave since the weather is better outside. They eat bugs and decaying pant matter, but won't live long in the house because their natural food is not available to them. This would be why I find them curled up dead on the carpet in out of the way spots when vacuuming. They may be coming in on mud on our boots, or crawling in from the porch. Minor drawback, and we can cope. At our house in California we had occasional invasions of earwigs, mosquito eaters, and the occasional tarantula.

All in all these drawbacks are easy fixes.

For the deep closets, get clear plastic totes. Write an inventory for each tote, tape it to the side facing the door. You can also attach a clip board on the inside of the closet door with a simple inventory of what is in box A, box B, etc. and on which shelf. It's easier than I am describing it.

Here's one shelf in my hallway "linen" closet.

 

[murphysranch]

OH!!! I like your labeling. It took me two days of reorganizing my first aid stash - prepping. I'll have to be more specific on my scotch tape labels.

 

[fuzzi]

OH!!! I like your labeling. It took me two days of reorganizing my first aid stash - prepping. I'll have to be more specific on my scotch tape labels.

I sometimes use sheets from sticky pads to make labels, a piece of tape across it reinforces the stickiness. And you can rip it off easily when making changes.