It's Feeling More Like Home

         Just three school days left, and today I don’t even have any classes.  I hope to get all of my exams graded.  The science department is also going to lunch together.  We are bidding one of our fellow teachers farewell and good luck. He was pink slipped and is "moving on".  So, there will be fun mixed in with sorrow.

        I still have a ton of unpacking to do here. Wednesday night I finally got all of the rest of the hanging clothes into my closet.  I ended up folding more shirts and stacking them on a shelf in the closet.  I also am giving more  to Good Will.  Next I have the bathroom stuff to get put away.  I am still trying
                                                                                    to buy two
medicine cabinets for two of the bathrooms.  I have been shopping around, but can’t find what I am wanting.  Then there’s the books and office stuff and photo albums followed by nick-nacks and wall hangings. Can’t wait to get it all done so I feel settled in, can find stuff I am looking for and can relax some.  

      Daniel is helping out a lot around here.  We give him all sorts of jobs, the big ones being mowing, trimming and painting.  He has also removed
fence posts and electric rope, helped move things around from building to building as we
sort through old farm junk and reorganize what we are keeping.  He cleans where it needs cleaning, picks up sticks, helps with the burn pile, etc.
       
      We plan to get 2 barn cats from the Second Chance Animal Rescue.  They have just been spayed and neutered and should be ready soon.  We have been instructed to “lock” them in the barn for 2 or 3 weeks until they adjust to and adopt our barn as their new home.  Keeping them in the barn is going to be easier said than done.  Joe put a screen where the north outside hay door is in our hay loft.  It gets way too hot up there when all closed up.  He also got boards to cover the hole at the top of the ladder inside the barn so the cats won’t jump down.  Now we are ready for our two new barn cats to arrive.

     I have been doing lots of odd jobs in and out side the house. If it is nice
                                                                                    out, I work
outside planting flowers, trimming, weeding, walking around and thinking about how I want to change/improve things.  We have had record breaking rains this spring, which has really hurt the local farmers, made it hard to get into our lower pasture, and prevented our fence man and tack room builder from being able to come because they are farmers and trying to get their fields planted.

     I worked on getting the gravel brine pit ready for the pond this week.  I started by digging a hole after having Daniel remove the gravel.  It was a mess. There were only 4 inches of gravel on top of OLD cracking plastic. Then we hit a dark black, wet clay type dirt under the plastic.  And I hit a  rather large rock.  Got all of that out and then put in sand to fill in around the pond after I finished digging the hole. The pond was set in and then we filled back in with the gravel we had removed.  The pond was filled with water.

      I am about 3" low on gravel so will buy more to finish it off.  After the water sat for a bit, I put in Mr T. (our painted turtle).  I need to wait for the water to age more before adding the goldfish.

     We people and animals are starting to feel at home, which means getting into a familiar routine, knowing where most things are, and being able to relax some.