Pep Talk

I had to give the kids a talking to this morning. The kids being the birdies. We talked about staying close to home, preferably in our yard or at least so they can see the house. We also had a good discussion about stranger danger.

This morning at 9am duck hunting opens.

The Expensive Appliance You Don't Think About Until It Brakes

Two weeks ago I woke up and there was a noise coming from the basement. No biggy, I figured it was the well or the water softener regenerating. I left to go to work. 

When I came home the noise was still there.

Not good.

It was the water softener. After consulting the manual and calling my father I figured the timer was shot. We would need to call a repair man.

I unplugged it and turned off the water to it. I would call later in the week after I talked to Mr. B. You see he was "up north" bear hunting and stuff never seems to take a shit when he is home. Nope it's got to happen when he is gone. Then I have to deal with it. At least he married a capable woman, I remind him of this fact often.

Discussed broken water softener and called the repair man. I was told since it was almost 20 years old it would be expensive to replace and might brake again soon, as the average life expectancy on these bad boys is 20 years. I researched to make sure they weren't messing with me, they weren't and more discussing with Mr. B.

We decided to replace.

$1000 Later we have a new water softener.

OK $999. You know they do that to make you feel better, three digits looks so much better on paper than four.

Hopefully I don't have to think about this bad boy for another 20 years. Except for every few months to remind Mr. B that it needs salt.

Sistas at the Game

I went to the Badger game this Saturday with my sista's. The boys came along too, but that's not important.

It was a blast!!

A nice mini-vacation.

We pre-gamed. A beer at 9:30, I think so.

We sat in the student section. I got to do the Jump-Around. Scratch that one off my bucket list.

We went to Stadium bar and some random stranger told me I had a fabulous ass. (highlight of my day right there)

We walked allot. I got a blister. It bled all over my sock.

Blister aside, It was THE BEST DAY EV-AH.

(ok that might be exaggerating,

but the awesomeness scale it was at least a 8.5)

 Then we went home.

We left the other two sistas to party on with out us.

I took a nap.

It was great.

Mr. Gus and I snuggled.

Seriously!

I went to Menard's yesterday, my home away from home. I am there at least once a week.

I picked up my paint trays, storage shelf, and clear plastic bins which I didn't know I needed, but decided I couldn't live with out. (They were on sale.) I was making my way to the check out when I walked past this.



I'm for real. You can't make this shit up. It's September and they already have the light up nativity set out. Retailers can't even wait for Halloween any more. 

Running with the Pack

I went for a run.

You heard that right a run, as in moving at a speed faster than a walk and never having both feet on the ground at the same time. 

OK maybe not the second part. It's been awhile, like seven years a while. I had to walk some. But I ran more than I walked. So we can it still counts as going for a run.

Gus went with me. I didn't ask him to, he just started to tag along. That's the nice thing about our street. It's not busy. There are five houses on our road and really the only people that drive down it are the ones who live there. So we don't leash our dog. That way he can run ahead and come back and run ahead and come back. Or run ahead and lay in the grass and wait for me to catch up.

I'm running all graceful gazelle like with Gus tagging along. We run past the first house. Ruby, the short hair pointer, decides to join us in our romp. I thought she would go back as soon as we got a ways down the road. Not so much. I was in my groove; I didn't want to turn back. Not to mention I was beginning to sweat, my face was beet red, and I was starting to gasp for air. Ruby would just have to come with us. Hopefully no one would notice she was gone.

We continue running with Ruby and Gus up ahead having a wonderful romp. We go past the next house. Their dogs barrel out into the road to great us. Chester, the old Black Lab who is three toes short, and Lilly, the Puggle who is a tad on the round side, both decided to come with.

So now it's me and four dogs. Going for a run. It must have been a sight. I should have had a camera. To take a picture of the dogs; you really don't want to see me all red faced and sweaty gasping for air. Not a pretty sight. But all four of the doggies romping together, that would have been cute.

We reached the end of the road and turned around. We ran past Chester and Lilly's. They had had enough and decided that a nice long nap on the couch was a good idea Chester is old and that was more than enough exertion. for Miss Lilly. 

The three of us kept on. Gus, Ruby and myself. It was tough going for Ruby and I for a while. She's a little on the old side and I'm a little on the out of shape side. When we made it to her house and she had had enough too. She went on home to find a nice shady spot to spend the rest of the afternoon. 

It was just me and Gus. The home stretch. Up the hill. We did it. No puking and no crying. It was brutal.

I might do it again tomorrow.    

OMG!! I Must Have

I was perusing the Internet the other day and came across this. Don't ask me how I'm not really sure. I think I was searching Etsy for some goose art. I'm always on the hunt for some classy ways to let the crazy-goose-loving side of me show through.

MUST HAVE!

My life will not be complete until I own this t-shirt.

Canning Pizza Sauce Fail

Not an epic fail but still a fail. 

I peeled and chopped the tomatoes, added an onion, a bunch of garlic, some spices, and some red wine vinegar. I let it simmer for three hours. I even used the submersion blender to get a nice even consistency. It tasted great. It was going to be pure awesomeness. I got everything sterilized and ready to go. I had enough sauce for seven half pint jars. (I figured a half pint was the perfect amount for one pizza. That way there would be no extra sauce hanging in the fridge growing green and white fuzz)
 I was cautious when I arranged the jars on the canning rack and filled in the open spaces with empty jars. I submerged everything for the fifteen minute water bath. 

When the timer buzzed and I lifted the lid. Not good. One of the jars tipped. And no, not one of the empty ones. It had to be one with the sauce. Sauce all up in my water. When I pulled up the rack three of my jars pinged, they sealed ok. The other three didn't. I knew even if I let them sit over night they wouldn't. When the other tipped it knocked them off balance, and they were angled in the pot.

At least none of the canning water got in them. They were still savable. I could refrigerate until use, but they would only last a few weeks in the fridge. I like pizza, but not that much. 

I consulted my mother-in-law, the woman who taught me the basics. We devised a plan to save the three unsealed jars. The next day I reheated the sauce and put in sterile jars. I used new lids and gave them another water bath. They sealed perfectly.

It wasn't a complete loss. It was just extra work.

We can't be canning goddesses all the time.

So what we learned form this:

• You can re-can stuff (new lids are a must, the seals on the old ones are shot. I would also wait until the next day and let everything cool down and reheat it.)
• You want a nice rolling boil for your water bath, but not too violent. (I'm positive that's why my jar tipped. Those of you with a gas stove have it good, much easier to bring the temp down)
• If I had a cuss jar in my kitchen, a quarter a cuss, I would be able to take that beach vacation in no time.

An Undisclosed Location

This picture appeared on Face book yesterday. It is Mr. B's brother and a bonfire he built. He is 6'7", so that fire is probably over 13 feet tall.

We did take that family vacation a month ago and I vaguely remember Mr. B saying some thing about his brother stopping by to burn some stuff.

He says he cannot confirm or deny his location at the time of the photo, but it suspiciously resembles my back yard.

Clean Up

Two nights ago we had a storm pass through. Nothing world ending, no major damage. Standing on the porch watching the front move in, feeling the temp drop, and hearing the wind pick up was rather eerie. Not that I'm afraid of storms, I'm just not particularly fond of them. 

We haven't had a good storm in quite a while with that heavy of winds. We have a trees. We have allot of trees, BIG trees. We don't call it Shady Acres for nothing. 

The day after the storm cleared we had a bit of pick up to do. No trees fell, but lots of branches. Here is the pile we collected. We shall have a nice fire soon. 

The birds weathered out the storm in the coop. 

No worse for the wear. 

Gus hung out in the house with Mr. B and I. I'm glad he isn't afraid of storms. He's my nice brave boy.  

Then and Now

I was going through the photos and came across this. 

Our bathroom when we first moved in. 

Yes that is really carpeting, no shower, and one very blue bathroom, tube included. 

This is our bathroom now. 

It's still blue, but a less intense blue. We now have a shower and there is no carpeting.

Much better. 

Introducing Bertha

I would like you to meet Bertha.

No not the beautiful lady, the pepper. Bertha is a ginormous pepper that we grew in our garden.  The beautiful lady happens to be my sista. She was kind enough to help model Bertha.

Check out how big she is compared to the Fresca. She an all-natural pepper, no chemicals on this lady.

Mud Room Progress

This year the big project around the Acres has been gutting and redoing the room off the back of the kitchen. We want to turn this space into a "mudroom". The main entrance to the house. A place to take off coats and shoes and some extra storage. 

When we started this spring it looked like this. 

The room was not insulated. Because it wasn't insulated it would freeze up in the winter and thaw, then freeze again, then thaw. There was allot of moisture in the room. We had a slight mold problem. See the right hand side of the picture, that's not a bad paint job, that would be mold. Yup it had to go. 

So at the beginning of the spring it was all torn out. The moldy fiber board the crappy "wood" linoleum flooring. It all went bye-bye. It sat empty for a few months. Nothing but the sub floor and the studs. 

A few weeks ago my parents came down and helped with the wiring. Since then Mr. B has been quite the handy man.  

He insulated and installed the vapor barrier.

His brother came over and helped hang dry wall. 

He laid plywood over the floor to create an even surface for new flooring. 

I think he made some major progress these past two weeks. 

He also wore a tool belt. 

Ralph

For some reason Mr. B calls all spiders Ralph. Don't ask me, I don't understand how his mind works some times. But check out this Ralph that built his home by the living room window.