Sneak Peak

I'm not sure how much I have talked about the "new girls room" on here. I haven't had my phone now for three weeks now (aka my camera, that's another long story about the repair shop being sold to a Russian man named Egor all while my phone was there being held hostage as I'd already paid half for the special order part that didn't end up getting shipped...doesn't really boost the confidence in the repair of said phone). During that first week of no camera is also when my builder friend had two days worth of time to dedicate to building us some built in beds in the little girls room. It just happened to coincide with the goat giving birth, the chicks coming and the bees arrival. Needless to say, that week was insanity.

I, like so many pintrest nuts out there, have been wanting built-in-bunks for a while now. I, not like so many others, have a really good excuse to build them (yay for having 6 kids, sometimes you get cool stuff). I have three girls crammed in one bedroom. They have been sharing two twin beds for the last two years. I have been saving up for this and finally hubby and I had had enough of the fighting and crying at bedtime. Something had to be done. This room is the largest kid bedroom but has weird quirks. There's the giant 5'x8' window on the north wall. It also has a basement bump out wall on two sides of the room. And the south wall has the closet all the way at one end and the door all the way at the other, thus eliminating the ability to put bunks on the door end. Ugh, I have thought long and hard about how to solve this room dilemma. I love the look of window seats, and that's what we would end up with in here, two separate window seat/beds built at the height of the bump out. The bottom two bunks would be shorter with no window and less head room, and they also would not have a base, the mattress must rest on the floor, but when it's your space, it's your space and it's still better than nothing. Also, since we only have 3 girls, there was no need for a fourth mattress, it's the perfect spot for the doll house, the extra dresser and, well, their junk.

After the room was painted all white (cut down on taping labor and time, all me) I had time to figure out what lamps I wanted in these 4 beds. Lowes had ugly wall mounted lamps for $42 each, so I easily settled on these hobnail milk glass wall lamps and just so happened to find 4 matching ones on Etsy the price was between $30-$50 each including shipping. The plan is to take some plain lampshades and doll them up with some cute bright pompom trim.

And remember the photo of the cute green chandelier with buttons? Well, I don't think mine is as cute, but it's cute. I spray painted our old "antique brass" one I'd gotten for the dining room (that was too small) and put it up in here. I also ordered the beads/buttons from a gal on Etsy. I'll add the bead necklaces as I find them around the house or as they break.

Notice the bunting in the background? Em loves to sew and she really loves sewing triangles. She did the bulk of the initial sewing and I finished them up on Friday. The vintage circus pictures came from the local antique store "Chickadees".

Here's a photo of the least messy bed (Fran's):

Eventually I'll have curtains up on the window, closet and on each bed. I'll also eventually get Sus her own big-girl-mattress and her own set of book shelves. I am ordering a mirror from the local gal who re-paints old pieces in super cute bright colors, I'll put that on the blank wall in the pic straight above.

And did I show you my quilt?

After I painted the kitchen my living room looked sort of off. On my birthday I made myself the quilt rack you see in the first picture. I bought the parts and pieces a month before but finally got a chance to build it. The shelf is wide enough to hold folded throw blankets for cold nights or movie watching.

The quilt haning on the rack is one my mom gave me from a great aunt or grandmother. It's period 1950s fabrics. The backing and binding are even turquoise! The binding is ripping and I want to fix it, but finding the exact match to that color is very hard!

I went back to Etsy and found a bunch of 1950s feed sack fabrics, but I didn't want a ton left over and wanted a good variety for a quilt. One woman had cut a bunch up into 6" squares and was selling a pack of mixed colors. I have them interspersed here with other fun fabric I found at fabric shops locally and some that were in my stash.

Almost finished! Just have a little Algebra to go...

Finished quilt. Just a throw size and just enough pop of color to really brighten up our new/used COMFY leather couches that a dear friend practically gave us.

Meger accomplishments

Today's accomplishments:

-getting 4 kids to do math
-wishing the 4-yr-old didn't want to do math but helping her some even though she's sick
-getting 4 kids to do chores
-figuring out and assigning punishment to oldest for very sneaky actions: chicken coop clean out duty
-made dinner on the cook stove
-did a minuscule ammt of work
-plan out a little boy's teensy b-day party, I'm so not a fan of b-day parties
-working on a quilt project promised to someone
-taking vitamin D since I can feel the un-motivation in full force again
-cleaning up water all over the floor in bathroom after the little girls had some fun

Nice day over all.

working on one of my "new" thrift store machines

My husband said I've gone insane

He's partly right, of course, but I usually am when obsessed with something new. At the moment it's Granny Miller and this link connects you to one of today's projects: pressure cooking my 3 roosters. They have been waiting patiently in the freezer for my day of inspiration, and today it came.

ready to be cooked

She also wrote about making your own egg noodles, this is a fairly simple thing that I've just never done. So today we made those too. For some reason I had it in my head that you need a pasta thingamajig and I HATE extra kitchen gadgets that take up precious room. So I've never even considered buying one, and I've never made noodles 'till today. You don't even need a fancy noodle rack...

our cheese spoon and chopsticks held up by rice

rolled as thin as I could muster, then cut with a rotary cutter by children with joy

My chicken is about done, and the only trouble tonight figuring out what to have for dinner is the opposite problem I normally face...I have too much food in both fridges, I'd thawed out moose for spaghetti but then made 3 chickens. Oh and I have a pot of rice from Saturday. I know I'll be making some chicken soup... but now I need to figure out how to combine the rest of the foods for this week.

Superbowl...er...canning day.

We got invited to a Superbowl party today. I don't remember the last time that happened. We were going to go for about, oh, 5 minutes, hubby wanted to...but the kids have been under the weather and I was just feeling OUT OF IT! Also when you have 6 kids to take with you I can't imagine our hosts and other friends would have tons of fun watching a game will a billion-and-six children running around screaming in their not huge house.

The other catch is that I put beans to soak last night for canning today and soaked another pot of chick peas to cook to make a boat load of hummus to prep for Lent and just to have on hand 'cause it's so good and cheap to make. The gigantic pot of chili I made last night also needed to be taken care of. I opted not to can the chili as it looses flavor and God gave us a nice frozen back porch so we don't have to even pay any electricity to freeze them. Once they are frozen they'll go in the freezer. More yummy food in the freezer for days I don't want to cook don't have time to cook.

they don't look pretty, but will taste good later on

Reality is, the beans won. Hubby went to town with the girls and picked out some sub-sandwiches and Doritos and all the wonderful junk food that husbands buy and you pretend to be "mad" about but really you love eating them just as much... I even saw him sneak some "flowers" for me into the freezer (A few years ago I decided I'd rather get Ben & Jerry's Vanilla Caramel Fudge ice cream rather than flowers, so that's what he's gotten me ever since) I had a few more cups of coffee, some food, cleaned up the kitchen and lo-and-behold, I felt fine. I know Sunday is my day "off" but during the week I don't really have time to sew or can and this year the sewing bug has not bitten, but the food storage OBSESSION certainly has. 

gotta love a good dose of junk food while cooking "healthy"

*Rabbit trail* I just read on Granny Miller today how to simply use the Food Saver (that we own), along with a jar sealer attachment (that I want to buy) to vacuum seal tons of stuff in jars including: nuts, noodles, chocolate chips, probably marshmallows! (I just thought of that), extra candy, and  basically anything that might go stale or rancid sitting on the shelf otherwise. Need. More. Jars.

At the moment my beans are cooking in the caner nicely on our new cook stove.

*Rabbit trail* Since most of the people who read this blog are either friends in RL or FB friends and I have blabbed plenty about the new cook stove...but I say again, I got a cook stove for last year's and this year's Christmas present. It's AMAZING and beautiful and all that I dreamed and more. Now I just want more counter space next to it to make it more functional. I've been baking and cooking on it when it's "on" but it gets so hot in the house we have to open windows if we keep the fire up for long.

Today is one of those hot days because it's my first time attempting to can on the stove, so far it's working perfectly...oops went under the 10 pounds pressure, got it back up above and re-set the timer. Here are some photos of getting them there and the recipe.

Easy canned beans:

1c beans per quart-soak overnight

rinse and put back in jar

1/2 t salt pour over boiling water

adjust 2 piece lids

Pressure cook for 90 minutes at 10 pounds pressure

adding the water

attaching lids

ready to go

gee, what was I doing when this was getting so hot? or right writing the blog

it seems happy at 12 psi, the chick peas are cooking along side

too cute

and, they're done...
notice the Veginaise jar?? it has a regular size top, score on the "free" jar, after processing the label even came off

Onto the hummus. Chick peas are cooked, we now have 8x the ammt for the recipe. This is a food that has grown on both of us and some of the kids are just now starting to like it also. I think my husband likes this recipe because it tastes lemony and he's a fan of lemon, I also leave out the green onions as he typically is not a fan of green things in food. The recipe was submitted to a church cookbook that I use all the time by a friend of ours, thanks Laura T!

Humus:

2 c cooked chick peas/garbanzo beans (either a can from the store or about 3/4 dry cups soaked and cooked.

1/3 c lemon juice

1/4 c tahini

2 minced green onions (not us)

1 clove minced garlic

1/2 t paprika

1/4 t salt

2 T water (this is usually the bean "juice" and sometimes I use more, just depends)

2 T olive oil

Blend in a blender or food processor (I use my hand blender in the pot, love that thing). Pure until smooth. Put in fridge overnight or days for best flavor. Serve with pita bread and kalamata olives, yum!

ingredients assembled

let the blending begin, I had to get some skins out of the blender 2 times

gigantic pot of hummus

Now what do you do with a huge pot (about 1 1/2 gallons) of hummus? Check the internet and see how to can it! Yes I did. Found a Backwoods Home post about it and she recommends 10pounds pressure for 35 minutes. She said that even with the oil you can can this, that it's just very important to have clean rims because oil can prevent the lids from sealing, so check carefully when done.

they are so pretty!

ready to roll

At this moment they have 17 minutes left and are at 13pounds pressure. I'm going to wrap this up here and go spend some time with my man when all is said and done.

Thanks to Granny Miller for the kick in the pants, to my Backwoods Home magazine for the other kick in the pants and my sister and bro-in-law who got us the subscription for Christmas.

Is there a school in the room?

Our school room is very hard to keep clean...4 kids learning every day, art projects, music, coloring books, JUNK...you name it, it's in here making a mess.  Not to mention my work office takes up 1/2 the room. 

It is, however, one of my favorite rooms.  I painted it 4 years ago right after Fran was born, the last room in our house to be finished (well besides the white paint and the boy's doodlings on the walls).  I new just what I wanted, my husband thought the color I was putting on the wall was crazy, but he liked it in the end too.

I got a new bookshelf and table for the room the other day and finally gave Em an actual "desk", we may set up a computer for the kids there too (no Internet!) we'll see.

Took some pictures since I had it mostly clean, it's very crowded as you can tell, but I've given into the fact that I will try to keep the house generally tidy, but there's no way around cramming it with stuff when both hubby and I work at home, school the kids at home and simply have 8 people in our family.

And yes, like most homeschool families out there, we do 1/2 of the work out in the kitchen where I actually am much of the time. However Stud Papa teaches them history in here most days of the week while I keep the little ones quiet. The bigger kids like to do their math in here. It's just nice mostly for them to have a place to put their stuff away.



I almost forgot my favorite part, it's when you look up and away from all the clutter...the letters my mom gave me when we moved in here and decided to homeschool.  She'd gotten them in Vermont where she's from and used them every year in her own classroom when she taught at the school when I was younger.  They meant so much to me and I wanted a good way to show them off, so I saved them for this room...one of the main reasons I wanted a school room...silly, I know.  I love the red trim around the room and they fit perfectly above that.  They remind me of the simple life that I'd like to lead. 

Winter is here, let's buy furniture, cook chickens & dream of sewing!

It snowed yesterday right as I was leaving to run errands in Wasilla.  It inspired me to buy a desk at Fred Meyer so that I can hopefully set up my sewing machine and get back into sewing this winter.  I know I won't have as much time as I'd like, but something is definitely better than nothing.



Children outside before the snow melts.

 After the kids convinced me (not hard to do) that they REALLY wanted to play in the snow, out they went instead of doing math.  Fran, in the meantime, convinced me that she REALLY wanted some pound cake with cream cheese and powdered sugar on it (her idea not mine) this idea sounded pretty awesome, so I made myself two pieces and her one before I got busy in the kitchen.

Fran modeling our snack.

I'd decided yesterday that I would bake some chickens today.  We have a huge freezer now, but it can only hold so much.  We had 20something birds from this summers chicken harvest, so that takes up a lot of room and I need to use more chicken!  My friend, Steph inspired me to do bake them this way couple months ago...roast 4-6 chickens all at once, then eat chicken for dinner and then shred the rest and freeze it for future dinners (like chicken pot pie!) and make chicken stock.  I forgot that it's time consuming to stand there shredding, but I think it's worth it in the end.  Here are my somewhat frozen birds going into the oven for a couple of hours.

Then I got busy on my new sewing area.  I have had plenty of sewing areas in the past, but ever since my business took over the school room and office last fall, I decided that it had to be my "hobby" for the winter so that I could get it back-on-track.  Well, it's in good shape, and I still work more than I'd like, but my paychecks pay for the kids music, art, and various sports.  I'm happy to be able to pay for those things with out flinching and thinking "well maybe we can't afford it"...that's why I work, to pay for those classes that I don't know or give a hoot about.  Anyway, K cleared out the corner by the piano for me and then I could get busy assembling the new desk while their Papa taught them some history.



My littlest ones enjoying the peace & quiet during history. 

In the meantime we had a brief visit from Steph (from Up North, Over Yonder & Out of my mind.) & her DH when they came drop something off and then their car decided not to start.  It was quite enjoyable since we don't get to visit that often.  They were eventually rescued by their daughter but I do believe I have inherited a pretty sweet non-running Volvo with many Libertarian, Republican and Progressive crazy person bumper stickers on the rear.  Sometimes I wish I didn't care what others thought as much as Steph...I'm working on it.  While they visited the 4-yr-old was invited to her friends to enjoy the snow and then my 4 older ones made their way over to their new music lessons that they adore.  I am stupid for not starting these sooner...but I'm spoiled that I have a music teacher as a next-door-neighbor, so she's ready to give my kids private lessons this year.  (Yay me!)  I got the sewing area somewhat set up, but not enough where I have to dive in just yet.  Still have chickens to de-bone.

While de-boning the birds we played the "what now mama game...with M&Ms"  This is the version with actual treats added so that there is not as much whining and moaning.  It's much more enjoyable.  They have to say, "What now mama?" and I give them a job and when they come back and say "What now mama?" they get a treat and and another job.  The house went from utter disaster to somewhat picked up & K went and milked the goats.  We also started clearing out a corner in the school room for the book case and table I got last night too.  Em's desk this year has been 3 boxes stacked up next to a bunch of other boxes...um, so, yeah.  Needed something there. 



Chicken stock.



I thought about doing the bookcase tonight but I'm so tired!  The chicken stock is cooking and Papa is watching a VERY LATE "coy boy night" with the kids.  My sewing area is all pretty and waiting for me now.  Don't worry, be patient.  I'll be there eventually.

My wonderful old machine on my new desk.

*Pictures taken with my new Blackberry phone that GCI "gave" me (along with a 2 year contract).  Picture quality isn't bad for a cell phone and it's so handy to get pics onto the internet.

Wine much?

I really don't know what I want to write about, but my husband is sleeping so I figured I'd pass this special time by writing somehting..................................................................................... wow, this is so far very boring.

Ok, so the painting is going....slllllloooooowwwwwlllllyyyyyy but yet faster than I thought. wierd, I know. The sprayer (borrowed from Mister newly divorced, that really sucks, Brett-the babe from high school and I know he will never read this A-wait, I better not say his name out loud) is great. She (yes, the sprayer is a fickle woman) works wonderfully, when she's in a good mood. I'm not usually in a good mood, so she's doing better than I am. The sprayer makes it go very fast. However I found out that green (our previous color) is very hard to paint over ESPECIALLY with the perfect yellow paint that has bearly any pigment. SO on some sides of our house we are on coat #4. Some still only have 3 coats but need more and some are just still totaly green. I bought another 10 gallons of expensive paint today and that brings us up to 30 gallons that should have only been 15. But I can rejoice that I'm the one painting our house and not a professional, therefore saving literally thousands of dollars. The trade off however, is that almost everything we own will have at least 1 drop of yellow paint on it when we are through.

I plan to spend that thousands of dollars on a trip to Hawaii. And, no, I'm not joking...but don't tell my husband...see he dosen't want to read my silly blog, so it's really fun to say things on here publicly and know he won't know about them...I'm still in the planing stage, so I'll keep you updated. Hmm, not sure if I'm going to post this or not....

I purposefully did not do the spell check, it counted 5 actual mis-spelled words, can you find them? Betcha you didn't know my blog could also be a game!

The perfect house color

*Warning* This post is altogether too long for such a simple subject. I suggest skipping this or skimming. This writer still has to work on mastering the simplified versions of stories

I have wanted a yellow house for years, at least 10, but I think quite a bit longer. I specifically wanted a pale-ish yellow with white trim, and white accents. Very girly, I know, but I have my girly moments.

We rented an apartment after we were married for about 5 months in Anchorage, then moved out the cutest above garage apartment ever. Living right next door to "my homemaker mentor" as I'll call her my "mentor". She's the one who helped me to appreciate being an actual homemaker including sewing quilts, canning, gardening, and even hanging my cloths out on the line. I'll have to write more on her later... My mother was definitely an awesome cook and seamstress, but since I got married as a teenager I never appreciated her skills until I needed them.

We lived there for 4 years and in that time the two of us and our 2 black labs grew to include 2 kids. We (I) wanted/needed a HOUSE! With a dishwasher please!

4 years was plenty of time to think/dream about our new house that we would some day be able to afford. At about 3 years into the apartment we met with a financial "helper" and she got us on the saving track and we saved up (mostly) for a down payment on a new house just about 3 doors down from our apartment in the country.

We realized after talking to the bank and builders that we had to go with a "budget" house, especially since we were buying 5 aces, that was eating a large chunk of the loan we qualified for. We would not be going with cedar siding, so it would be affordable T1-11. You could paint that.

Our house would be yellow.

Or not. See, I have a husband. Normally he does not care much about colors and I get my free choice on things. In this case as he said, "I will not live in a yellow house." Hmm, seriously? Why do you care? Are you sure honey? See, isn't it so pretty? Really, no yellow? Ok, fine. What color do you want it then!? Green or blue or....anything but yellow. Ok.

Our house would be green. A pretty, Martha Stewart green, mind you. One that we agreed on. Agreeing is very nice sometimes, but guess what I have obsessed about for those 10 years in a green house? Yes, yellow houses. I love them, and can't get enough of them. NOT the bright yellow ones, the pretty pale yellow with white trim ones - only.

2 years ago I came to realize that our house needed to be re-painted. A very expensive/large task. This year we're (well, I) am finally tackling it and I had to double check with him on the color again, since it could be yellow if he'd allow it. I asked, I double checked, still no yellow. Then a friend we don't know well gave me some hope when they said my husband had said, maybe. Maybe? Not sure? I had to get to the bottom of this. I asked again and no real answer. I finally go to Lowe's to buy the green paint and call him on the cell phone in a last ditch flat out nagging effort in desperation but no real hope of success.

Me: Hi, I'm here to buy the green paint and just wanted to be sure that we're NOT doing yellow.
Him: Heh, really? Me saying it over and over is not enough for you?
Me: I know, I'm sorry, I just need to hear a for sure...No, I will not live in a yellow house.
Him: Honey, I realized that if this is what you really, really, really want...
Me: It is what I really, really, really want! But I don't want to nag you into it and have you hate it and be upset about it.
Him: I know, if this is what you want then I don't care that much. I love you.
Me: OMGosh, OMGosh, I'm shaking! I'm so excited. I love you!

Grabbed some swatches, had 3 samples made up in the 1/2 quart size, told the checker all about it....and off I drove to my mom's to show her the new potential colors.

A week later (after pining over the choices) I'd chosen the palest color of my lot. I had borrowed a friends sprayer and pressure washer and got to work. Our house is now 1/2 yellow/greenish and no white trim and the windows are catching much overspray. It is messier than I had thought it would be, but the family is handling it for now. The dog is now black and yellow.

I'm going to have a yellow house. Deep inside I'm afraid I'll get sick of the color before I can even finish, it's SO different from the green. But I keep telling myself after all is said and done I'm sure I'll love it. I know I will, just hope the neighbors and my family can get used to it as well.

2010 Projects

I said on the side-bar that I would write about some of my/our projects. I figured I have more space here to write. I realized this blog could be handy when it comes to Christmas time and I have to recall what we have done that year.

January: Majong, it should be outlawed, but I'm pretty sure that's about all I did was play this on facebook in any free or not free time I had this month.

February: It's hard to remember this far back, but I believe that it was at the beginning of Lent that I decided to get obsessed with different foods. This is good for me because I normally don't like to cook and will find that some days it's fun to cook, this month and March were like that. My family was happy. First it was grains, namely millet, then I purchased a cast iron pan and flat breads became my new past time.

March: I found a cool YouTube website called Manjula's Kitchen http://www.manjulaskitchen.com/ and fell in love with her and her food. Became pretty much obsessed with Indian vegetarian food. Start flower seeds, school, canning beans, grinding flour, baking bread, getting ready for Pascha.

Fran is a serious painter, even naps right there to save time.

April: This month was primarily spent finishing up the kid's school and getting antsy to get back outside. I came to realize that all of the white fence posts that we put up 2 summers ago could not all be used where they were placed. I took a good day or two to mourn the loss of my time and future time and got to work digging up posts. We started painting our boards white. I marked out many of the "out of line" posts and had the kids start pulling posts for their outside jobs as they finished their math year. Now on the chore chart it says "math or outside job" so that in the summer they can work outside or do math if they like. I also built a new gate for the garden side of the chicken house (they will swap runs, one year chickens, next year garden.) I also put removable boards on the back of the chicken run side of the house and in May I finally put the wire mesh onto them. This way I can (and did) take them off if I want to unload some manure or "let" my neighbor rototill with his tractor. 

May: I spent some time re-digging only 4 or 5 post holes and re-placing my posts. Then I attached the boards to those shorter sections around the back yard. I also did this around the chicken coop/garden. The boards aren't needed there as I have wire fencing, but it looks so much nicer now. I still have to finish the back side of the garden, it only has temporary wire there now, but I'll save that for a rainy day....or one of the last days of fall before it just gets too darn cold. Papa Stud butchered and froze the chickens we'd gotten in late March. I realized a week or two before June that I needed to plant a garden SOON, so I rushed to go pick up free goat manure where the nice lady loads your truck for only $5. I went back for 2 more loads of that stuff. The last time I picked it up I asked her about her goats................

Terrible picture of the girls.

June: Beginning of June involved getting the rest of the stupid sod out of the new garden area. That stuff is a pain in the booty. Mixed in the manure, well threw it around, literally, hoed up some rows and threw in some seeds. This, of course, was the only hot time we have had this whole summer so they had to be kept watered (kids are helpful for these things). I then obsessed about getting goats, made a decision and paid a small fortune for 2 Nubian Queens as I like to call them. They were in milk but I didn't want them 'till the first of July which gave me one month to prepare. In that time we purchased a small Rubbermaid shed for them off Craigslist, I built a milk stand (too small for these ladys), purchased a new commercial size fridge for our new plethora of milk we were going to have (off Craigslist), cut a hole in the back door of our existing shed so we can milk them in there and get them in through the back, put up the 6' high chain link fence panels I bought 2 years ago in case we got goats, bought a book on goats and how to build animal shelter (I even got sick for a day so I had time to read it.) This month was also VERY busy baseball season, we had two kids on two different teams with 2 practices or games every week - EACH. It was SO nice when we had a night off. K also started her horse lessons again and wants to be in competition in the State Fair this year. She also is in a youth shot gun club, so that's once a week.

July: Here come the goats. Time for me, Papa and K to learn to milk. It's been K's dream to have a horse for years, hehe, goats too, so we are starting with a producer not just an animal that eats you out of house and home. We also had wonderful friends who gave us some lumber and another wonderful friend who came and enclosed our lean-to and turned it into our hay shed. Then to fill it up with hay. And the shed with grain. And now to learn how to make cheese (that was Papa's job, but I learned too) and sour cream, and yogurt, and pudding. I even learned to make mayonnaise with our chickens eggs in there too, it's pretty easy. This month also included quite a few trips to the doctor for my silly ankle that started hurting this winter. I had an MRI, then got hard plastic orthopedics to put into each shoe. Not fun at all, but my arches are collapsing and it's this or surgery. I miss my bare feet and slip ons. Give me a pregnancy any day.

The yellow we ended up with was cut with white paint...better now.

August: This month will consist of painting our green house yellow (started that yesterday), replacing the back patio door (my dad, the glazier, will do that), *crossing fingers* having our old crappy porch/deck torn down and getting a new one built with the lumber I had purchased for the fence that will take much longer than expected. Papa Stud also has his hunt to Adak planned for the end of August, and then there's always the fair (YAY) I love the fair.