Such a dreary rainy day to….clean the barn!! Josh and Sarah came late this morning and we got to work. Here’s a before picture:
Not horribly bad but considering we’re heading into winter I wanted to have it cleaned once more. It rained off and on all day leaving all of us wet and miserable. Here’s after:
This requires an explanation. The chickens hop up on this table and small roost in order to fly up to the roost above. I hung the tarp in the corner under the spot where all the manure collects. The concrete is all broken on the floor making it almost impossible to scoop the floor clean. So…I hang a tarp under the roost – when it gets dirty, I lift the tarp off the nails, drag it outside, shake it off and return it to the barn. It’s a way for me to keep the manure under control. I have tarps hung behind and on the floor under all the roosts. “As we get older” we have to make concessions, don’t we? Haha!
My friend Ema, shown here with her kiddos, bakes THE BEST sourdough bread. I’ve had three slices today!
My rhubarb jam is almost gone for the winter already.
Yesterday Hank got to come and visit – I’m just sure Keeper thought he had died but he had not forgotten his friend.
I think Hank has recovered from his surgery, don’t you? We have missed him!
And this is Hank later at home – a tired boy! But still mama’s sweetie.
Reader photos
After the barn cleaning Josh cut down the pampas grass. Now the only job left is putting the porch covers on. When it dries off we’ll mow the leaves and call it good till spring.
I had to have a nap in the chair while I watched Iowa State get slaughtered by Kansas. What happened to Iowa State???
I can’t wait for the college basketball season to start.
To all the readers who have written about health and family issues recently, please update us when you can. We care for you and want to know you’re doing ok.
Have a blessed Sunday!
Mary, this post brought many smiles.
# 1. Beautiful picture of Ema and her precious children.
# 2. Keeper and Hank having a great time rough housing.
# 3. Hank and his proud Momma.
# 4. A clean barn and another project checked off your
To Do list.
# 5. Thank YOU!!
Great pics once again. I hope you can find a safe place for Heidi and JB while you are gone perhaps your dog run. If I’m remembering right you have something like that. We are having to do something similar for our cats this weekend. They are inside/outside cats but mainly outside.We are watching our daughter’s puppy. The puppy loves to chase cats. We don’t want them to get hurt or run away. We put them in our large unused chicken house. They are warm, dry and safe and more importantly they can’t get out. It’s not perfect but it works
Getting the barn cleaned had to be a super hard chore. I’m glad you had help. Must be a weight off your mind.
So good to see Hank again! Amazing lap dog. I’m glad he and Keeper can play together.
Your friend who made the sourdough bread looks so happy with all her children around her. How nice she shared her baking with you.
Praying for Carolyn and her husband. Caretaking is the hardest job. My brother did it with my mother for so long. My father passed in 2005, Mom in 2013. She wasn’t aware of his passing. Very hard times.
Will keep in mind our Veterans this weekend. Especially the ones facing unemployment.
A good Saturday all the way around. My time was so captured by watching “Night Passage” and then “Stone Cold” that I forgot to post this link to Season 1 of Foyle’s War on Amazon. Season 2 is $4.39. dh spent a couple of hours organizing the garage and made remarkable progress with the aid of a couple of guys for hire. A timely service before it is wet as well as cold. Finding fabrics for a few large log cabin blocks. https://www.amazon.com/gp/video/detail/B00366LGWQ/ref=atv_dp_season_select_s2
Your barn looks wonderful. Your chicks are lucky to have so much inside room to roam. My chickens had a nice roomy fenced area with fencing on the top to keep predators out but the chicken house was pretty small for staying in during frigid days. It was a task to clean because it was small. I couldn’t put them in the barn because my husband is not supposed to be exposed to bird droppings due to his immune suppressants and the possibility of viruses in their droppings. My barn now can use a thorough cleaning. The spider webs are heavy and everywhere and the dust is really thick. I only have the two little donkeys in there now but I cough and coke so bad when I just muck their stall so I keep ignoring the rest of the barn. Lazy right!
Love seeing Keeper and his buddy Hank enjoy each other.
We are having a much needed rainy day so I will enjoy old movies while doing a lot of applique. Blessings to everyone.
Linda – I wouldn’t call you lazy but I know how hard it is just to START that barn project. I still haven’t done the cobwebs But I intend to hopefully before I go. I really love checking off these jobs. I’m really concerned about Heidi and JB – both are old and I’m afraid they’ll die without me – Rick won’t even realize they died and I’ll come home to a dead cat hiding in the basement or locked outside. I am so worried about this I can’t sleep.
Nothing like seeing best buds back playing together. So so happy to see Hank and Keeper!!! Then seeing Hanks mom with him on his lap, well, what a wonderful picture to begin this week with! He recuperated and all is well.
What a lot of work in the barn, but what a great sense of accomplishment! Good for you and your helpers. I worked on a wall hanging yesterday. I should take a picture. I have a pdf of a pattern much like the Boho Blanket that is called Simply Serene. I love to see Hank sitting on his mom’s lap. And homemade sourdough bread is the best. Hopefully more quilting today.
Simply Serene is identical to that pattern! Simply Serene is sold by Annie’s and Shabby Fabrics, reputable sites. I did some checking; Boho Blanket is the name of the website selling the pattern, which they call “Colorful Corners”. And they don’t credit a designer. Annie’s listing for Simply Serene credits a designer.
The Boho Blanket website seems fishy to me, with no information about who they are and where they are. I did an image search on one of their other patterns, “Midnight Mosaic”, and found a Pinterest post of an identical quilt, labeled as a free pattern. (But as typical for Pinterest, there was no link to the free pattern.)
Dot – sounds shady to me, too. I just liked the layout but I’ll bet they took it from someone else especially if you can’t find any info on them.
What a great before and after and no wonder you needed a nap. That’s a lot of work! Glad you had help; can you imagine tackling that by yourself??
Lovely quilts today. I’m so glad people share but it always makes me want to set aside what I’m working on and start something new. I have one last row to quilt on a project I’ve been working on since April and I’m sick to death of it. The only thing keeping me sane is knowing it’s almost done and I can move on to something else. Like all the lovelies that are shared here.
You don’t think Keeper and Hank missed each other do you? Haha
Pat in AZ – HURRY and finish that project! You’ll feel so much better – how much is left to do? A day’s worth?
Probably 2 or 3 with the binding, which is already made. I’m determined that come hell or high water, I’m finishing it this week!
Pat, tell me about Row by Row quilts. I have two kits plus some patterns for additional ‘rows’ but I have seen what a completed looks like, can you make them any size? This is done sometimes thru a shop hop. I never see many in any store I visit when I am on a shop hop tho.
Hi Mary, the 11th November is my sons birthday, 44 this year, so we are out to dinner at the restaurant with the robot service, Stella and Luna decided! Keeper and hank have so much fun together! We had it all today, rain,wind and sun,very heavy rain down the south island! I am doing a bit to my Japanese bear paw each day, decisions made as we go,makeshift design wall in bedroom so l can ponder at night time! Great work on the barn Mary, take care everyone, best wishes from Sandy
Sandy – tell Stella and Luna hi from a friend far away!!
wow, what a day you had cleaning the barn. it looks so nice now. but what a heck of a lot of work. so glad you had help. now you can not think about it til spring. glad you got moisture in the shape of rain.
i didn’t get alot of sewing done today. mr. ed swapped out my pfaff 2046 for my janome 6600 as it has a larger harp and i want to try to quilt a small quilt for a friend. she had given me scraps from fabrics she bought in australia ages ago. i finally got it into a small top today. could be a table cover or a throw over the back of a chair. it will be a memory for her. also needed to wash some plaids and something for labels as i have two quilts to label and send out of here. one to said friend and one to my sister in memory of our mother. i have discovered that i have nowhere downstairs to layout a quilt to baste it. guess i’ll be forced to clean off my kitchen table. woe is me. i am so spoiled. (my kitchen table has become my desk and is my central area i’m in these days – i haven’t seen it empty in many years)
the quilts today are wonderful. i’ve seen the online quilt before today but can’t for the life of me place it. will drive me nuts now but i will figure it out.
hoping everyone has a quiet rest of their weekend. blessings to all, patti in florida
I spent the dreary day at church working our Christmas with a Cause event. I’m so glad this is over so I can now clean up my sewing room of the crafting supplies and get back to quilting. Quilting has taken a back seat since mom was diagnosed and passed way and I need the distraction bring to me back to center. Off kilter a bit and miss my mom. Tomorrow will be a me day after we get home from church and I plan to spend it cleaning, sorting, and tossing. I love a good purge day, don’t you?
Diana – I’ll bet you do miss your mom! How’s that grandson? Was your event like a craft sale/flea market? Did you make things or work behind the scenes?
our sale is Christmas With a Cause. All the vendors are global makers with very unusual items. Beaded ornaments, felted ornaments, tin work, leather, paintings, etc. Very unique and not the usual craft show fair. I worked the church women’s ministry booth. I made several quilted runners, toppers, wall hangings, some candles, and wood crafts. We had a steady line all morning with people waiting to pay. I only brought home 3 small items that didn’t sell.
The grandkids are doing great, but we had the stomach flu go through our house. We are finally feeling better. My hubs cousin passed away the day after my mom – her funeral is today.
It is absolutely beautiful this morning. Can’t believe we are looking at upper 50’s and 60’s this week!!
Diana – your sale sounds lovely – wish we could have all attended. And the stomach flu on top of your mom’s passing? And another family funeral. I’m sorry.
We got glorious moisture. Between last night and today, wonderful, glorious snow and rain.
Keeper and Hank look so happy playing together. The barn looks cozy and clean. I think fresh wood shavings smell good.
I’ve had trouble with sewer gas. I poured several pitchers of water down the floor drain and still had a bad smell. I could see the water so I knew the trap wasn’t dry. Finally called the plumbing company. They had been here in August. The fellow took one look in the floor drain and told me the second pipe didn’t have a cap on it. Hence, the smell. He went to his truck, got the cap, and installed it…NO CHARGE! Who knew there could be a second pipe? What does it vent? I should have asked. It comes in from the side, the floor drain goes down. Another joy of home ownership. Did I tell you the well company pumped 640 feet of sand out of the well!? The deck has settled 5”. The carpenters jacked it up and the stairs split… new, rebuilt stairs. Loretta and I have been busy with very expensive issues. Hopefully ever is fixed and we can do fun things, like quilting.
Remember our veterans on their special day.
Jo – don’t you just hate home maintenance issues???? I do! And I’m too dumb to realize what’s wrong. Right now my basement is just too warm for all my plants down there – so how come? I’ll have to have them come, I suppose. Thanks for the reminder about Veterans Day and give Loretta a hug!
Thanks for showing us Hank again. Glad he is doing so well. I need to find a new place for sourdough bread. The bakery I had gone to has raised the price to $12. More than I want to pay. Had to have repair work done on my car & the shop has a puppy. She decided to sleep on my lap for at least an hour. Almost put me to sleep too. 🙂
Vickie – any car repair place with a puppy would be where I’d go!!
It’s a lot of work to clean the barn. I’m glad friends can help you. I’m glad the dog pals had a play date. We had a heavy wet snow overnight. Got about 5 inches and it is almost gone already. We certainly needed the moisture. But, oh my, people either forgot how to drive on winter roads or just don’t know how to. There were many accidents and roads blocked by cars and trucks in the ditches. I’m glad we didn’t need to go out. I’m hoping that it isn’t too slippery in the morning as we want to go to church. I hope you all have a wonderful Sunday.
Martha – and then there’s Colorado with 20”!!!! I agree – I think people forget from one year to the next how to drive in snow and ice.
Thank you for sharing all your barn pictures. You could send us some of that rain, we are still in drought. Beautiful reader quilts and of course my favorite pictures of Hank. You are right we do what we have to in order to get things done in our twilight of life. I am on oxygen 24/7 but need to have the leaves raked. I put my condenser in garage and plugged it in so I could rake the banking in back of the house. I have 50 feet of hose so I went to the end of the hose and started raking. Lot more to do as we have 2 huge maple trees and a dogwood tree. My husband has Alzheimer disease and is asthmatic and would have an attack if he did any raking. I do what I have to do to get things done. I look forward to your blog each night and I thank you for doing it. As a caregiver I need happy thoughts you are my happy moments of the day.
Carolyn b Shenandoah Valley Va
Bless your heart, Carolyn. Women are so strong when needed to be. Praying for you and your husband. God bless.
carolyn, i applaud your ability to rake leaves. i agree we all do what we have to do until we no longer can. sometimes we are called on to do things we don’t think we can do, but somehow get through it. being on oxygen myself, i know how difficult it is living on a ‘leash’ so you can breathe. i pray for your ability to keep on doing as much as you can. i, myself, can no longer do what you do. blessings, patti in florida
Carolyn,
You are a tower of strength for how you preserve to do things around your home. It’s the place you and your husband are most comfortable and I commend you for continuing with its upkeep despite conditions most would grumble over. A little at a time and chores get checked off just like Mary’s barn cleaning. All well worth moving around to stay mobile as long as we can. East coast needs some rain so despite the sun shining this morning, I’m hoping for rain to move in later today.
So glad you had help to clean out the barn. Glad to see that Hank is doing well!! Loved the picture of him in his Mom’s lap. I used to have a 100 lb. chocolate lab who was convinced he was a lap dog!! He was the sweetest dog ever!!
It was great to see Keeper and Hank going at it once again and to see Hank sitting on mommy’s lap as though he weighs only 10 pounds instead of a whole lot more. Keeping the barn going in all weather is sure a lot of work. My parents came from farms, but I never had the opportunity to live the farm life and always dreamed of that life. But, they did mention how hard the work was. Seeing all the cleaning work you had to do in the barn sure shows what a lot of work it is.