Tuesday, April 21, 2015

Technical Difficulties...

Dear Readers, I have not abandoned you! It's been an interesting couple weeks around here, that's for sure!


The last couple weeks have been a wild ride. It all started almost 2 weeks ago, when the kitchen faucet head (which Brian has repaired MANY times already, although it's only barely 2 years old) broke off the hose and sprayed water all over the ceiling, curtain, window, and myself...

Then there was the unexpected truck repair. We know that it needs brake shoes ASAP, but we didn't expect the CV joint to crap out on his way from work! The money we spent on the truck repair was supposed to replace that broken faucet.

Then the whole reason we are having the technical difficulties in the first place occurred... After over 20 years of owning pagers and cell phones without any problems whatsoever- Someitme during the night, my bedside water glass spilled onto my phone, which was plugged into the charger. I can turn in on briefly, but it begins to overheat right away, and it will not charge. Totally shot.

You don't realize how much you really do rely on your smartphone til it's toast. I take and edit all of the photos for the blog with it, and update Instagram/Twitter/Facebook with it! The phone/texting issue isn't a problem at all- I can get a SIM card for Brian's older Android phone til I'm eligble for an upgrade. BUT, social media updates are an entirely different issue.

I thought I'd be able to get away with using Brian's tablet... Nada, only a 2mp camera without flash, and is not compatible with Blogger's App or Instagram. I can however, edit photos via Pics Art I've emailed to myself. I thought, well in that case, I'll use my old 12mp Sony camera, upload to PC, email to the tablet, email back and update the blog via PC. Nope, the camera has completely disappeared. I had it out a few months ago, sat it on the piano, and it's nowhere to be found now... Oy vey... I'm working on a solution of some sort, but in the meantime, Brittney has been posting occasional pics to the Facebook page, and I did post a few grainy pics from the tablet to Twitter LOL

It's not ALL bad around here though! There's plenty of good news as well! The duckies have moved in with Baa, Opie and Daisy for the time being til we can get out and pick up their house from my parents. We're making them an enclosure with a doghouse and kiddie pool in it all to themselves! Brian built the cheepers a brooding cage out in the barn til they're ready to be introduced to the adult birds. The cage will be used for sick/injured birds once they move out.

The vast majority of our seedlings are doing well. Summer Savory and Bee Balm sprouted fine, but didn't make it. I have never grown these before, any advice is helpful. I may just go ahead and try direct seeding and see what happens. I had 2 whole Lavendar seeds germinate out of 18, and 1 Spearmint out of perhaps a dozen or so. Not sure what the deal was there. I should perhaps contact Baker Creek about the problem, perhaps they have a solution?

We bought a disc to enlarge the garden, but it's not working out as well as we'd hoped. Brian's coworker kindly has offered to let us borrow his large tiller in exchange for some eggs and produce this season. After the grass has been broken up, the disc should work just fine, though! We're thinking about purchasing straw for mulch. At $2.50 a bale, it can't be beat.

That's about all I have right now. I'm working on a big batch of Bone Broth to can as I type. I'm hoping I can get Brian or Britt to get a photo for me tomorrow so I can post the instructions for that on Thursday. (I wanted to get it done and canned before the weather gets warm since we don't have A/C! I roasted the last turkey Friday when it got to 74 outside, and the indoor temp was 81!)


I'm still on Twitter doing #Foodiechats and #gardenchat every Monday night starting at 8PM ET if you'd like to join in on the fun! Lots of great recipes and gardening tips!

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