Public Transit

This past week Dad and I went up to spend the night Wednesday after he got off work.  The plan was to just ride the bus around on Thursday to see how it worked and where it went.  It was quite the adventure.  First on Wednesday when we got there we set up my "new" (which is actually my old) mattress and checked on the bees.  I actually got pretty close to the bees and didn't die!  I was really cool to see all the bees and they had wasted no time making a comb off the queen box.  I chewed on some beeswax and talked to our neighboring horses.  The horse are drop dead gorgeous! 

Thursday morning we woke up around 6am and caught the bus in Oroville at 6:50 heading to Chico.  Got to Chico about 7:40 and went to a horrible (no joke) breakfast at this place called Jack's.  Never eat there.  Never!  We couldn't even choke it down...and I had pancakes (how do you screw up pancakes that bad?)!  At 8:50 we caught the bus back down to Oroville, hopped on the Olive Highway route 25/26 bus and rode around for a while.  We found out the bus stops right in front of the casino and in the parking lot at the Lakeside Store.  We also found out parts of town to stay away from, where to eat, and that the Wagon Wheel is supposed to have an incredible deli. 

By this time we were starving from lack of a decent breakfast and headed back to Bangor for burgers.  After lunch we fed the bees and I hungout with the horses.  That concludes our adventure for the time being, until next time!

Release the Bees!

Last week the Sacramento Bee Store called to let my dad know the three pounds of bees he ordered were ready for pick up.  "Unfortunately", he had to pick them up on Friday which was not one of my days off.  So I went to work and Mom and Dad went to pick the bees up and set them up in their new hive at Hobble Rock Ranch.  It is kind of funny since it was Friday the 13th of May...so many possibiilties for unfortunate events.  

When I got off work and got home I got a call from Mom and Dad to let me know they were just starting to "Release the Bees".  Although there is part of me that is truly excited about this event, there is a larger part of me saying "Run!  Run for your life!" since I have an irrational fear of bees.  No, really I am excited to learn to keep bees, harvest honey and market the products. 

Epic Awesomeness

After a late morning final dress fitting, my friend Jessica and I headed up hwy 65 to Bangor.  We made good time and stopped in at the Bangor Bake Shoppe and picked up some chocolate chip cookies for dessert.  We fired up the gas BBQ and grilled up some hot dogs and snacked on chips and salsa for lunch.  After we were good and full, I showed Jessica around the property.  We walked most of the five acres, the grass is getting tall and it was a little soggy from the morning dew. 

Jessica and I got a nice bon fire going in my firepit.  It turned from a baby fire into an epic amazing fire.  We got all the brush that Dad and I piled up there burned with the exception of a few long pieces that wouldn't fit and I didn't want to start the chain saw.  Then came the rains!  It wasn't too bad at first, then it started coming down! 

The clouds did break for a while (with some ominous ones coming along behind them).  We made BBQ burgers for dinner and had our cookies for dessert.  We were in for an epic stormy night!  The tarp over the trailer was flapping and one of the tie-downs snapped, rain pounded against the trailer all night long! 

I had a wonderful morning sitting on the big rock, talking to the neighbor's horses and thinking (dangerous, right?)  For breakfast we had scrambled eggs and salsa.  After just hanging out for a while we headed for Primetime Pizza in Marysville before we headed home.  And let me say, Primetime Pizza was amazing as always.

Snakes and Toads...

Well, I can say I've officially encountered a Western Rattlesnake.  Yup!  It was around two feet long and too young for a rattle.  The scariest part is that I have no idea how close my hand ever got to that snake.  I was moving the black plastic tarps we are using to control some areas of weeds and  I turned around to grab another and there it was!  That was the end of moving tarps for the day.  On a less dangerous note, I found a Western Toad.  Unfortunately I had no success in capturing it. 

We are currently in the process of renovating the trailer for me to live in while I go to school.  It is looking better, still wishing I had a barn to live in....oh well.  Dad is going to hopefully get the water heater hooked up this week, so there will finally be hot water in the closet that is called a shower.  I'm going to make an oak pull-out cutting board for the trailer to have a little more counter space.  Mom is painting of the 1970s infested wallpaper...I can't say the color is much better. 

After the wedding we will finish the pump house...hopefully no one gets hurt on that venture and I'm pretty sure that is why we are waiting until after the wedding.  It would be bad if any of us got laid up in a hospital before that major event of the year.

Next minor two projects for me are a chicken coop and a dog run.  I'm hoping to take the majority of my animals with me while I'm in school.  But like the pump house these projects have to wait until after the wedding.

Thursday we are going back up with plans of hooking up the water heater, tilling the garden, planting some sunflower and pumpkin seeds (just to see what happens), beginning the never ending task of weedwacking, and working on the road.  Ummm, that's just one day...want to take bets on how much actually gets done?

Camp Out!

Last week Brittany, Blitzen and I went "camping" at the property.  Despite the weather guessers forecast of a rainy trip it turned out to be a lovely sunny two days!  It was so much awesome seeing the sunset in the evening and being there for it to rise again the next morning.  I realized how tiny that trailer is for two people and a large dog.  Definitely cramped quarters! 

I cooked all our meals on the propane bbq!  We had cheese burgers for dinner, eggs for breakfast and spaghetti-o's for lunch!  All of which were great meals!  We even got a bit of work done.  There is a ton of fallen/cut branches laying around on a rocky hill, so we piled it up by the road to pick up with the tractor and trailer. 

Guess what!  We have two or three barn cats!  And I saw them up close! A fuzzy grey cat and a black and white fuzzy cat!  Those are some of last spring's kitten!  I'm super happy that we have ratters!
Now it is rainy and stormy.  And I'm going to be stuck in Citrus Heights for a few weeks.  Oh well, I'll be up there permanently soon enough!

Good Food and Good Company

Been in the draft folder for two weeks...oops!

After a month of being stuck at home, I finally was able to go up to the property.  Mom and Dad had been up a few times since the last time I went.  The electricity and tractor have been long repaired since my last trip.  There was cold soda waiting for me and Brittany and that made us very happy!  We skipped breakfast and opted for some bbq burgers.  Dad went to a local butcher and got some hamburger to bbq.  It was local beef and it was amazing!  It didn't even have cheese and the burgers were awesome. 

As for the work we did.  Brittany and I unloaded the utility trailer that was full of horse manure from our stop at SHA.  Then the we fixed all the tarps on the ground to finished killing off all the grass so we can plant our orchards.  After that the real fun began.  Dad used his new torch to start the fire and we had a huge bon fire.  We got three nice size piles burned and then cleaned up more from the bottom pasture.

It Was One of Those Days...

You know those days where nothing goes your way?  Today was one of those days.  Or it seemed that way. 


When we first walked in the door and opened the fridge the light was off. Uh-oh!  Something had tripped the line, we reset the plug and everything seemed fine.  Then Dad and I riveted the pull start back on to the log splitter and split some logs (that went very good).  Then we took the auger bit off the tractor (this didn't go so nicely).  One of the bolts was bent and we had to take to forceful persuasion to coax it out.  Then the bit itself would not detach.  After much more forceful persuasion it finally came off.  Not too big of a deal.  Then we went down to cut out the last of the brush in one particular area.  Chainsaw worked, loaded the trailer, took it up to the firepit and unloaded it.  Took a cocktail break and started lunch. 

You would think lunch would be easy, considering we were having canned ravioli and spagetti-o's.  All you have to do is open the can and heat it up, right?  The microwave refused to work.  The electricity had shorted out.  No real problem, just use the propane BBQ, right?  Not so easy.  Before the food was warmed we ran out of propane!  So now was the time for some American Ingenuity!  The old 1970's trailer had two propane tanks we had never touched...now was the time to test them out.  One tank was empty, but the other was full!  We had a hot lunch!

Now, back to work!  Take the tractor back down and finish cutting out that patch of brush.  Cut the brush, load the brush, meet you back up at the top!  Not so!  While heading back up the hill, the tractor just died on us!  Seriously!  Just died wouldn't do nothin' no more!  Call the tractor repair guy, hopefully he can come out soon!

So on to the next project...put the bottom boards on the long side of the pole-barn style pump house.  First board was nicely warped.  Oh joy!  Next boards were nicely straighter.  After getting two boards nailed on each of the long sides, we spliced together the warped board and the straighter board on top of it (I neglected to get pictures of it today...will do next week).

While Dad and I were having this lovely day, Mom had a much eaiser and not so disappointing time building a small rock flower bed around two of the crape myrtle trees and working in the crape myrtle grove.  I must say that Mom's area looks wonderful.

So in conclusion, we have to have a tractor repair guy come out and an electrician come out in the very near future.  But in reality we did get a lot done today, despite the set backs.