First Day Of Summer

Summer has hit full force, hot winds and all.  Here are some bits and pieces of what we've been doing.

 Picking puncture weeds out of our feet.

 Hauling hay.  95 bales.  All for sale.

 Blue skies and dry fields.  Boyd has been watering and the ground is soaking it up and taking forever to cover the fields.  I suppose that if you are thirsty, you just drink deep and it takes more time.  I even got to help him change the water last night.  Happened to see two skunks, but we were in the truck which is better than finding them in the field.

 A sunset or two.

 iPhone app shot.

 I've been on a bike ride or two. 

 Sun in full force.   The safflower could use some rain.

 Pictures from a bike ride with the Adam's family.

 Last year we were flooded and this year we are bone dry.  Check out my posts from last May and June to compare the difference.  Last year we had water almost up to the back of the house.

 Some pelicans came by.

 Didn't seem to mind sharing the river with us.  Jasmin didn't want to see them go.

 And the best summer news of all...  another ripe tomato!  It was delicious!

Crop Update

 The green in the background is the safflower.  It is growing nicely, but could use a really good rain. Can you see the three deer?

 How about now?

 The zucchini crop is also doing well.

 As is the Spaghetti squash.

 We hauled 96 bales of hay the other day.  Now, we just need to get it sold.  Anyone interested?

 My rock/herb garden is finished for the time being.

 It seems I have built it in homage to my family in Jensen.  It so reminds me of the yards there.

 Lavender about to bloom.

 A frog hiding in my shadow.

And this would be Jasmin trying to harvest more squirrels or mice or both.

New Window Treatment

Nothing fancy.

Just a cactus or six.

I had herbs planted in these containers,  but they grew too fast.

I love them.

They have fake straw flowers hot glued on the tops.  ?????  Whatever.

Not this one, this is real.  The dumbest things make me happy :)

Garden Helper

 I have always wanted a scarecrow in my garden and never got around to making one.

 Finally, I decided to just DO IT!

 It didn't take very long at all.

I hope he keeps the goats away!

The 4-wheeler Saga

So, there is a really long story behind this broken 4-wheeler.  It involves a maintenance gone wrong, a borrowed 4-wheeler with a broken part and a whole lot of weed spraying with a 3 gallon back pack sprayer instead of a nice 20 gallon tank sprayer.

It finally seemed faster to strip down the 4-wheeler and fix the cracked oil balancing something or other opening.

You can see the hole that shouldn't be there.

And the piece that should be attached.

Here is it dry-fitted.

And here it is gooped up with some sort of gas tank repair kit stuff.

And yet another view.

The bolt head that Boyd made since the initial problem had to do with not being able to get the bolt out in the first place.

Here it is waiting for the test run.

Adding the oil.

Threading it in on!

So far so good!

Don't over tighten or we are back where we started!!

And the bonus!!  My dogs got their favorite water dish repaired with the left over goop.

Totally stripped down.

The happily ever after is that he got it all put back together, it runs and he has already sprayed in an hour what it took him at least 4 to do with the back pack.