July 28, 2014 Rattlesnake!

Nice, big potatoes from our garden already!

Friday 7/25. Left for Down There at 8:30 am and was back by noon.  Spent the afternoon putting everything away and reading the week's papers all about the fires.  The one thing that jumped out at me from the photos of the burned houses was that they were surrounded by trees, right up to the house.  We get to feeling to so safe after living in town, that when we move to the country we forget that Mother Nature is really in charge.  Especially out here.  Landscaping doesn't matter diddley.  It's all about being safe.

Our high for the day was 75 with a soft breeze.  Very pleasant.

Saturday 7/26. It was 60 with clear skies this morning.  Here comes the heat again.

I drove Miss Kitty over to the flats to loan a book to some local neighbors on pole buildings.  They weren't there, so I left it in a zip lock bag on their steps.  It was a nice drive, except that I had forgotten to gas up before I left.  Made it back to Rose Camp okay though - on fumes.

Finished another Dresdan book, and started the next one.

I saw the hawk again, or at least I assume it is the same one.  Got a few pictures of it in the trees near the house.

Dug up a few more potatoes from the garden.  We already have big ones because we were able to plant a whole month early.  So nice!

We had a high of 80 today with higher temps on the way.  Wasn't too bad as there was a nice breeze.

Sunday 7/27. It was 65 and clear this morning, but still 71 inside.

I spent most of the day thoroughly cleaning the house, doing laundry, etc.  JB will be home tomorrow. Yes!  Waited til the shade was just right in the afternoon and then finished splitting and stacking the rest of the wood.  Turned out to be a wheel barrow load and a half.

I pulled all the onions in the garden whose greens had fallen over and began to dry out, which was about half of them.  I laid them on the porch to dry.  Cut the stems off leaving a few inches and will try to braid them and hang them on the inside clothes line to dry and cure.

By noon a light overcast had formed.  Our high for the day was 86, but most of the day was about 80 and very muggy.  Thunder storms are in the forecast for mid week.

The rain last week filled the water barrel behind the wood shed 1/3 of the way up, which is about 18 gallons.  The barrel by the hen house got about 5 gallons.

I decided that we need to put a roof on the whole chicken run to add more shade and protect them more from the rain and snow.  I think we have enough wood and tar paper to do it.  Just need to get some roofing.

Larry and Elsie came up to visit this evening.  Our neighbor to whom I lent the book had left two water barrels by our turn off from the main canyon road and they brought them up for us.  Found out that the photo I had posted of Elsie's "onion" stems tying themselves in knots, were actually garlic.  About 10:00 pm, Elsie walked over to their Arctic Cat (they haven't named theirs) to get a drink out of the cooler and suddenly yelled, "Snake!"  I was standing on the porch and could hear the rattling!  I grabbed a flashlight and my snake stick.  Larry got his out of the atv.  The snake was coiled up under the vehicle by the rear tire and was pretty good sized.  A green timber rattler.  Larry's snake stick is a golf club without the club.  He smacked it on the head and then skewered its head in to the ground and held it there while cutting off the rattles.  Big rattles!  A dozen of them!

Well, that episode got our blood coursing.  They left about twenty minutes later and there was no way I was going to sleep.  I had a bowl of ice cream and read my book for about an hour.  Seeing a rattlesnake during daylight is one thing, but finding one at night is quite another.  The main reason why I usually don't go off the porch after dark in the summer. . .

Monday 7/28.  It is 71 with smokey skies this morning.  The smoke is coming in from the northwest from the Chumauken fire northwest of Leavenworth.  It is a little over 50% contained and the wind has kept the smoke from us for several days. 

JB plans to leave for home by 9:00 am and should be here by 1:00 pm.  Woo Hoo!

Thought for the day: Just live while you're living and don't die til you're dead.  Rebekah Teal from her column "Here's The Thing", Mary Jane's Farm magazine, Aug/Sept issue