Sharing Our Nightmare, DE +

It’s been about 8 weeks since placing a post on my blog. 

I’m back, and wanted to give you a head’s up.  I’m starting this post with a change. Since we’ve purchased a home, we’re no longer considered “Transients”. Therefore, I’m changing the name of my blog to 

Oklahoma Dreams

And you’ll still be able to access my blog through the same HTTP address.

Okay, now let’s get to the post…warning: this post may be long, with too many pictures.

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The French drain has finally been finished.  We picked up 2 more tons of gravel and 2 large bucket loads of a soil and peat mixture.  The gravel was gently placed on top and around the pipe, and we proceeded to cover the entire ditch with the soil, peat, and clay mixture.  Now we have a functioning French drain to pull water away from the back yard and direct it into the pond.  The true test was several days after completing the drain, it actually rained.  There was no longer any puddling/flooding in the back yard (a very successful project!!!). 

                        

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We have several ladders of various sizes stashed inside our carport, and needed to get them up and out of our way. Bulldog Man and I went to one of the large box hardware stores to pickup oversized ladder hooks.   These hooks worked really well, they allow us to hang ladders and car ramps out of the way, in order to make room to park the tractor under the carport. 

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A neighbor (approximately 3miles away on the old state highway) owns a farm with several dozen chickens and plenty of cows.  Her chickens produce all kinds of eggs, too many for her to use.  She sells her eggs at a decent price, and we all know nothing beats a fresh farm grown egg.  I’ve started purchasing eggs from our neighbor, that is, until we start raising our own chickens in the near future. 

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Peach season is pretty much over.  I decided to use the last of our peaches in a tart.  I had some Phyllo or Filo dough in my freezer. 

I cleaned and sliced each peach, mixed a little cinnamon and sugar together, layered the peaches on the Phyllo dough, sprinkled the cinnamon sugar mixture on top, and baked until brown (350 temperature).

Once cooled, I mixed 1/2 cup of powdered sugar with 2 tablespoons of milk, and a teaspoon of vanilla.  Then drizzled it over the top of each tart. 

The tarts came out really good, Bulldog Man gave it 4 paws up!!!

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Carpenter Ant Issues

Food grade Diatomaceous Earth is a great source for killing off Carpenter ants (or any ant).  It’s all natural and won’t hurt other wild animals roaming your property.  We have several large Carpenter ant hills close to our lagoon.  I did some research to find a way to kill off / deter the ants and came across “FOOD GRADE” Diatomaceous Earth.

Basically you just pour the Diatomaceous Earth into and around each ant hill.  The ants will eat the Diatomaceous Earth, and it will pretty much dehydrate their insides (which dries them out, and kills them). 

Diatomaceous Earth can be found at your local health food store and it’s not too expensive.

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Okay, you ask why I haven’t been around in a while.  Well here’s the reason why.  A bad thing happened on our homestead, a total nightmare!  Just recently, our laminate flooring throughout the home started to buckle. We weren’t sure what was going on and hired a contract inspector to go down into our crawl space to see if we needed to purchase and install a dehumidifier because of all the strange weather we’ve been having. 

After the inspection, the inspector advised the problem actually wasn’t related to the strange weather we’ve been experiencing.  It was because of a PVC pipe (plumbing) that came apart.  It didn’t break; it just came apart and water leaked on the ground under the crawl space.  This water created condensation (more water) which in turn caused mold to grow.  

OMG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

MOLD……..

We immediately contacted our insurance company and a mold remediation company to help us out.  

  

The end result, we had to move almost everything out of our home.  Removal of contaminated materials (floor), they contained affected areas, placed applications of disinfectants and antimicrobials, used HVAC to vacuum up and clean contents, sanitized, used water extractors, dehumidifiers, and air movers to remove excess water. 

Then our sub floors and primary floors were totally replaced.  We ordered the final flooring (wood) and are waiting for this to arrive from Georgia.   

When this floor arrives, it needs to be unwrapped, and it needs to acclimate to the temperature within our home, before permanently installing it. 

We’re also waiting on our insurance company to go through our contractor’s findings to start and finish the flooring in our 2 bathrooms.  

I have all kinds of pictures.  I think you understand what went on to rectify the problem.

 

This has been a true nightmare!  I’m talking about the problem, not the remediation company.  This company we’re using is Paul Davis Emergency Services.  They’re known all over the United States, and their work is amazing.  I would highly recommend them if you ever have a similar type issue (please note, I’m not getting paid to promote/recommend this company).  

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Here are just a few random pictures I took around our place I wanted to share with you.

I'm over all the construction noise!!!

Key found when working out on the property.

Just a pretty shot!

Farmer flying over our home after checking his pasture.

Skies of Central OK.

 

Hanging Pod.

It’s good to be back on the computer :-)