Carolyn This One Is For You

On my previous post, I mentioned we ordered a part to fix our free digital camera.  The part arrived; Bulldog Man got to work removing the broken old part, and replaced it with the new part.  This fix was quick and very inexpensive……meaning: we didn’t have to buy a new camera. 

New Part

Broken piece and little pieces found.

 

Fixed Button.

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Every week, I usually bake off a beef roast, ham, or a turkey; to cut thin with our meat cutter to make our own lunch meat.  This week we selected a ham.  We coated the ham with brown sugar and crushed pineapple.  OMG…..talk about good!  The guys were happy to have homemade sandwiches with our own meat instead of the old processed lunch meat from the grocery store.  

 

I took the picture to late, Bulldog Man started to clean the slicer.

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We recently picked up a couple of new bird feeders from Lowe’s while in town.  As you can see here, the squirrels are having a field day with one of the new feeders.  I’m thinking it’s time to fix this problem and maybe have fried squirrel for dinner……..what do you think?

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I love to use tires for planting my potatoes.  As we all know, tires hold water unless you cut the side walls off of them.  In order to do this, you need to puncture the sidewall with something sharp, or an electrical tool (like a drill) with a spade bit attached. After puncturing the tire with a wide punch mark, insert the blade of a Sawzall to cut the sidewall off.  This is a tedious, time consuming, and back breaking process; but in the end your potatoes will grow and not rot. 

 

More to Cut.

 

This past weekend, Bulldog Man, Tank, and I removed the old garden fencing with the bamboo; because it really didn’t hold up as we expected.  This fencing will be chopped up and hauled off to the dump.  As for the remaining T-posts, they’ll be reused.  

Beans Investigating Some Pieces of the Old Fencing.

We had decided this year’s garden was going to be doubled in size.  That is, until we realized we would be dealing with some things we can’t control, like a sick parent (mother), and upcoming surgery for Bulldog Man. 

We ended up increasing the garden size, but not doubling it.  Bulldog Man pulled out his handy dandy measuring tape, marked off where the T-posts would be placed.   Tank and I pounded the T-posts in to their new locations.  As I cut the overgrown grass where the old fence used to be, Bulldog Man and Tank wired feedlot panels to T-posts and now we have a fenced in, expanded garden.

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My lettuce seeds have already starting growing.  It will be nice once again to have fresh lettuce in our salads in a matter of a couple of weeks.

 

Once lettuce seedlings get larger, I will thin the bed.

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While at our local Atwood’s Ranch store, I picked up several small pots of organic purple cabbage to plant in one of our garden beds.   As soon as you walk into the store you knew they had baby chicks for sale.  All that was heard was a constant chirping. I so wanted to head back to where the chicks were and surprise Bulldog Man with a couple of baby chicks, but I changed my mind.

Spring Knocking; Ammo Cans; Garden; Feedlot Panels

It finally looks as if our snow is gone until the next winter.  Everything melted, YAY…….spring is knocking at our door.  

This weekend, its spring a head time………for those of you who don’t know this or forget……………set your clock ahead 1 hour on Sunday for Daylight Savings Time. 

Picture from NEWFRUIT.ORG

The recent happenings on the homestead; we received a couple of deliveries of ammunition boxes for our son.  Apparently Tank found himself a good deal off of Amazon he couldn’t pass up.  He had ordered, I believe, about 10, 50 caliber boxes, and 5, 40 mm boxes.  I found this out because they were in the middle of my living room when I came inside the house.  At first, I thought I had walked into an Army Surplus store, lol……. The boy has another package or two coming. He’s waiting on another delivery from UPS/Federal Express.  

Late this morning, after the temperatures warmed up outside, I removed the plastic covering on my onion bed.  I also removed the feedlot panels holding the plastic, along with the bricks, to expose my planted onions to the sun.  Once the onions were exposed, I was happy to see they survived our radical temperature changes, snow, and ice.   As it warmed up outside, I gave the onions a nice long drink of water.  

Our dog, Beans, decided he wanted to stay outside with me while I continue to work in the garden.  He was in the middle of everything, smelling, and playing.  I guess he wanted to plant some lettuce seeds with me.  He grabbed a packet of seeds and ran around the garden box holding them as if to say, “Come on Mom we need to get started planting”.

I planted 4 different types of lettuce….Red Romaine, Paris Island Cos., Great Lakes, and Butter Head, in one of my smaller garden boxes.  Throughout the planting season, I generally will plant several different varieties of lettuce, to get us through until the end of fall when the temperatures start to change.

Initially, I was going to plant my lettuce in with my onions….companion planting.    Companion planting sometimes helps with confusing insects by luring them away from the plants they normally target. With onions you could plant beets, carrots, lettuce, cabbage, and summer savory vegetables.  I realized after uncovering the onions, I had no space to plant my lettuce or beets.  I’ll give the onions a few weeks to get bigger and see if there’s any way I could possibly squeeze some beets or additional lettuce seeds in between each onion.

While piddling out in the garden today, I noticed we have several strawberry plants producing new leaves.  It’s time for me to pull out any old leaves, cut and remove several runners, and place more straw around the base of each plant to prevent snails and slugs from getting at the leaves.

See this picture of feedlot panels? This is just one stash of several panels waiting to be used this weekend (weather permitting).  Bulldog Man and I will need to pull up the old fencing, move old T-posts, install new T-posts, and line the bottom of the feedlot panels with a smaller wire to prevent critters from getting through the squares on the bottom side.

What are your plans this weekend? 

Saved $

Not much to report, just snowing…again! 

Years ago hubby, and I received a camera free through points we used off of his credit card (actually we paid for it in the long run).  This camera is still a nice camera and works wonderfully.  That is, until I took the camera out to take a picture of an eagle, and the release assembly broke off the camera, and rolled out of site in the state park we were visiting.  

I attempted to continue to use the camera by sticking a finger and pen tip in the release assembly; to no avail.  The camera did not work.  

Instead of buying a brand new camera, I did some research on the internet and learned this happens often with this particular camera.  So often, I found a site called Camera Hacker, a forum with several posts by Glenn Gorman explaining in detail how to remove the old parts, and where to order the new part, along with how to install the new part.

I bookmarked this site so when the part arrives, I will have the instructions handy to complete the replacement.  

It pays to do research on the computer and saves you money.