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Posted on Sunday, April 05, 2015
Easter Weekend
Julie and Kyle came over early Saturday morning with Pauline and Brent.
After talking for a while, I went to Don Franklin's dealership in
Burkesville to trade the HHR for a new Equinox. I returned home and we
ate lunch, then Brent went with me to pick up the new car. After signing
all the paperwork and driving the Equinox home, we colored eggs with
Julie and Kyle to use on Sunday for the egg hunt.
Sunday
morning, I told the kids to each get a piece of candy to eat before we
even had breakfast or their parents were up. Then the Easter Baskets
were opened when everyone else was up. Julie and Kyle went outside with
their bubble makers and began floating bubbles across the back yard. The
grass was still wet so the bubbles that eventually fell to the ground
didn't burst right away.
Julie
and Kyle had fun with those for a while, then we had lunch. After lunch,
Brent and I took Julie and Kyle for a long 4 wheeler ride around the
fields and to the top of the hill across from the house. Pauline, Stacey
and Linda took care of hiding the plastic eggs while we were gone.
It
was a frantic race to find all the eggs when we returned, but with 156
plastic eggs hidden, it took a while!
After
opening the eggs and separating the candy from the coins, an egg count
was done and the results were, that 8 eggs were still missing. Everyone
helped to find the missing eggs, including Daisy. She was better at
sniffing the plastic eggs out than the rest of us.
When
the egg hunt was over, we road around in the Mule and let Daisy burn off
some of her energy. We stopped to throw rocks and pickup pieces of
tumbled creek glass too. Brent left with his family around 3 PM. It was
a nice weekend together.
Posted on Saturday, April 11, 2015
Daleville IN Trip
Linda was off for Spring Break at CCES, so we decided to go to
Daleville. We packed our new Equinox and headed to IN Tuesday morning
about 8:30 AM. Traffic was light due to traveling early in the middle of
the week. We picked up a few sandwiches at Arby's outside of Daleville,
then went to the house and ate. After turning on the water, water heater
and raising the setting on the thermostat, we unpacked the car. We just
can't skip a chance for a Pizza King Royal Feast while we're in IN, so
we ordered one and ate that at supper time. Below is a picture of the
house we purchased a tax lien against. Our 1 year wait time will be over
in November. The porch is the best looking feature of the house, but the
floors have collapsed and there are many other problems that the picture
doesn't show.
Wednesday
morning got off to a slow start. I guess we slept late, ate breakfast
late and began working on the bathroom ceiling late too. We installed a
few of the plastic pieces that resemble tin ceiling tiles. I would say
that they are a cheap fix, except they're not. Each 2' by 4' sheet is
roughly $27. We glued them to the thin plywood that Brent and I had
screwed in place a few trips ago. These plastic tiles are so thin they
are hard to hold up to check the fitments before applying the glue to
the backside and once the glue is on it is hard to trim without getting
glue on everything. Linda had planned to eat with Linda K and Imon, so
we stopped when we made it to the ceiling light as it was going to have
to be removed before we could place another piece. Linda K and Imon came
to the house, we talked a while, then went to Bird's Smoke House to eat.
We finished eating, then sat and chatted until the place closed.
Everyone went home after that.
Thursday, I took the ceiling light
down in the bathroom and we finished installing the 'tin tiles'.
Linda
decided to go see her Mom in Pendleton and Stacey wanted to go with her.
I decided to take a shower and maybe a nap. They returned a little
before dark. Linda mentioned that Reba was a little dizzy and having
some trouble reading and writing.
Friday morning I made a couple of
phone calls to the Delaware County Treasurer and Auditor, then went to
Muncie to pay the property taxes. Things went smoothly until I started
back to Daleville when a train blocked my progress on IN 32. I sat and
waited for 20 minutes without train moving an inch, so I had to find
another way back to Daleville. I ended up going west on IN 332 to I-69
and taking it to the Daleville exit. In the afternoon, Linda wanted to
do some shopping so I drove the car around for Stacey and her.
Saturday
morning we ate breakfast and turned things off. As we packed things into
the car, I happened to look across the street and noticed that Eddy
Bolton's car had two flat tires. I went over and told him. Tim and Ed
brought out an air hose and tried to air up the tires but found that
someone had punctured them with a knife. Eddy explained why he thought
it had been done and who had done it. I recommended he file a police
report, but I doubt he did. We finished packing and left around 9:30 AM.
Smooth ride all the way home with a short stop at King Fish. We pulled
the Equinox in the garage and unloaded. Then I hopped in the Mule and
took a ride to check out what had happened while we were gone and let
Daisy run since she had been in the pen since Monday. I quickly found
out that the creek had been out of the banks and into the fields. Also,
several places had jammed up with debris and over flowed. After
finishing Daisy's run, I returned her to the barn and took the tractor
to clean out some of the debris.
I
used the other tractor with the bush hog to cut up the debris in the hay
fields and then rode around a little bit to take a couple of pictures.
Right now is a really pretty time in KY. The trees are budding out, some
are blooming and a lot of spring wild flowers are blooming.
Fairly
soon it will be more like a jungle in the woods.
Posted on Saturday, April 18, 2015
Transplanting Strawberries
I asked Pauline and Brent to come over and help us transplant
strawberries to make a new patch, so they showed up early Saturday
morning with Julie and Kyle. I gathered up the shovels and stakes to use
and we all went to the patch. I had used the disk behind the tractor on
the previous Monday, but it had rained most of the week until Friday, so
the weeds were beginning to grow again. I started digging the plants
while Linda cleaned the debris and extra dirt off of them and placed the
plants in a plastic tray. Stacey carried the trays for Linda. Brent took
over digging for a while.
Juile
and Stacey kept carrying the trays of plants to the other patch and
dropping them in the holes that Kyle and Brent were digging for Pauline
to plant. They also carried the empty trays back to where Linda was
working.
Pauline
planted the entire six rows of strawberries as everyone worked to keep
her in plants. We slowed down on the digging as we neared the end of the
final row and made sure we had just enough plants to finish the row. We
planted the new patch the same way we did the old patch. I hope the new
patch will fill in as well as the old patch has done. We get somewhere
near 10 gallons of berries from the old patch each year.
When
we finished with the planting, I picked up the tools and took them to
the barn, then went to town and bought tenderloins at Hamilton's BBQ,
returned to the farm and we ate. After lunch and a short break, we went
around the hay fields picking up small limbs the creek had washed into
the fields and throwing them back into the creek. We rode the 4 wheelers
and the Mule, let Daisy run and the kids play in the creek.
We
finished the day with pizza at Major's in Albany, then back to the farm
and called it a night.
Posted on Saturday, April 25, 2015
Ball Games
We arrived at the ball park near Brownsville a little bit late. Julie's
game had already started at 10 AM and they were in the field when we
walked up to the fence at the correct diamond. Pauline told us that we
had made it just in time to see Julie bat.
Julie
is nearly 8 years old, so she is in the "coaches pitch" league, but this
is her first year, so she is struggling with hitting the ball. Her form
is good, the pitching is erratic and Julie hasn't learned to swing at
the ball yet. Like most of the kids, she just goes up there and takes
her cuts, if the coach hits her bat, ok. She will get it, I think. I'm
not sure if her team won or not, doesn't matter to me, I just like to
see them play.
Kyle's
game was going to start at 2:30 PM, so we decided to leave the ball park
and eat lunch. We followed Brent to a place in Brownsville, but they
were not open on Saturdays, so we all went to Wendy's near Smith's
Grove. After lunch we went to Pauline and Brent's house to kill a little
more time until the next game. Back to the ball park and Kyle's game
began. Kyle is 5 years old and he is playing in the "tee ball" league.
The coach has the option to pitch the ball to each batter and if they
don't hit it, then place the ball on a tee for them to hit. This
provides a lot more action and keeps some of the kids more involved.
During Kyle's turns at bat, he missed all the pitches from the coach,
but then hit the ball off the tee.
During
his first at bat, he hit the ball back to the pitcher who picked it up
and tagged Kyle out as he ran towards first base. Linda and I both
noticed that Kyle didn't like getting tagged out at all. Kyle seemed to
run faster his second time batting and he made it safely to first base,
then all the way around to score as more kids took their turns batting.
The
scoreboard wasn't used during the game, but a lot of runs were scored by
both teams. I mentioned to Pauline and Brent that the facility was
really nice and that everyone had a friendly demeanor that I had
encountered. We gave Julie and Kyle hugs before we left for home.
