A Week in the Life at the J-B!

Why is it when I wake up in the morning, grab shirt and put it on in the dark and I put it on backwards? I mean I should have a 50/50 shot right? But no, it seems 9 times out of 10 I put it on backwards and have to switch it around. These my friends, are the struggles I deal with in my daily life. I know, I feel sorry for me too!

It's been a busy week here on the J-B. Barb and I have both been motivated to get projects done before the snow flies. Who knows how much time we have. 

Barb has been busy working on a headboard for the bedroom. She is using old fence boards from a cattle corral that we took down when we first bought our property. A long and tedious process. First you have to cut each of the edges getting them straight so they will fit together side by side. Then you have to cut them to length. Next is the planing to get them all to the same thickness. Once that is done comes the sanding, varnishing and put them together to create the headboard. She is still in the planing phase so it will probably be another week before she fits them together. Hopefully next week we can show you the finished product!

For my part, I spent a couple days helping Kevin on some of his projects. He is in the process of building 3 homes by himself. Yes, I said by himself. And he has two more in the waiting. Way overwhelming if you ask me but it's what he does for a living, so he knows what he is doing. He has occasional help when he needs it, and I was there for just that a few days this week. 

One day we spent on the rental (the bunk house) he is building on his property. The hope is to get this completed so he can start getting income next spring. We sheeted the two ends, trying to get it weather tight before winter. 

When we were done Kevin gave Cheryl a ride back up to the main house country style!

The next day we spent siding a house he is building down the road.

Then again on Friday I was back there for a few hours helping pour concrete. This was a 30x20' pad for a parking area outside the garage of a house he is building. Barb came along to help too!

We also lifted that tub surround unit into the loft of the bunk house. Did you know tub surrounds often have to be in place before you can finish framing the bathroom? Kevin and Sam are on the bottom, I am on the top. Then Sam held it in place while Kevin and I pulled it up to the loft.

Other projects around our house include clearing ugly trees and lower limbs on the trees around the house. We are doing this for two reasons. The first is to open our view around the house, the other is to help fire prevention. Should a fire break out around the house, it will be harder for them to reach the upper branches of the trees. 

My neighbor Jim and I spent a morning hauling gravel onto our driveway area around the house. We are about 80% done having hauled 60 ton of gravel around the house area. Then we have the main driveway to do!

Barb and I spent several hours at our neighbors down the road, Chris and Toni. Chris was a welder in his former life and said he would take a look at our camper jack that was damaged from hitting that deer. Well, he did it! And now we can finally take the camper off!

Which is exactly what we did on Wednesday. We hooked up the trailer and loaded it up with all our scrap metal from building the house. Then we headed to Rapid City with the truck, camper and trailer. Our first stop was the recycling plant where we unloaded all the metal. 200 pounds of scrap metal netted us a shopping $7!

Next up was Menards where we split up with our own huge list of items to pick up. I went to the lumber yard and loaded up (27) 2x10's 14' in length. Along with a dozen 2x4's and a dozen 2x6 studs, and some tracks for the sliding doors on our shed. Typically, there are a lot of employees out in the yard, well, that is until you could use some help loading something. Then they all vanish like some kind of endangered species. You see them once in a while, but it is just a fleeting glance sighting. I can load 14 footers by myself, but a little help would have been appreciated! The last thing we put in the trailer was a tub/shower unit for Kevin and Cheryl's rental unit. 

Lumber for the loft!

Then it was off to the camper repair place where we dropped off the camper. We are having a little repair work done on the roof. You could hear the truck sigh, a sigh of relief when the camper was finally off. It had been on there since April!

Our final stop of the day was the house of a guy who was selling a round comfy chair for our loft. Barb had been looking for quite a long time and finally found the one she wanted. We loaded that up in the bed of the pickup and finally started heading home. It was a 9-hour day, and the pups were certainly glad to see us when we got home!

It's not all work here. We took some time for some fun too. Barb and I spent an afternoon making Honey Liqueur. Something we have never done before. It is pretty easy actually. You take honey, water, an orange wedge and simmer it for a while, let it cool, add vodka and bottle it. We made two batches. The first batch was not honey enough and you really tasted the vodka so the second bath we added a cinnamon stick and 1/2 cup more of honey. Delicious!

Barb also made some apple crisp from the apples I brought back from the farm. That too was delicious!

My friend Doug invited me to go fishing at an undisclosed lake. There is an unwritten code when a friend invites you fishing. 1) You cannot ever disclose the lake to anyone. 2) You cannot invite or take anyone else there without the permission of the person who first told you about the spot. 

Break these rules and you will lose a fishing buddy and never get invited fishing again. 

But we had an awesome time, catching 10 plump and fatty trout! Barb and I grilled one and smoked the other. And you guessed it, they were delicious!

Saturday morning Kevin came over and prepped the site for one of our future projects. We got the area flattened out for the project and we are going to let it settle for the winter so we can start working on it in the spring. First Barb laid out some 8" pipe for drainage.

Then Kevin got busy knocking down a hill and flattening out the project area. 

What is this project you ask? Well, you will have to wait until spring to find out!

The wildlife this week has been frequent. I put out an alfalfa bale for the deer to enjoy. And Zoey enjoys watching the turkeys through the window!

And not blog would be complete without a picture of Dakota for Pam in Nevada so here is a picture of Zoey and Dakota going to the bathroom at night. Zoey is wearing her illuminated collar and Dakota is right next to her. You're welcome Pam!

Last but not least, Saturday night we went to a neighbor of Kevin and Cheryl's for a get together. We met Greg and Jan through a few years ago and they are really good people. Dan and Bonnie joined us along with Kevin and Cheryl for a few hours of libations and smart talk. 

Dan and Bonnie

Cheryl, Jan and Greg

Everyone was having serious stimulated conversation. Well, except these two!

Greg is an accomplished artist and was kind enough to give us one of his paintings to hang in our house! 

Whew, that was another busy week! I just realized something. All of the pictures are of Barb working and the only one of me working you cannot even see me! As of right now the only thing we have planned for this week are projects around the house, but I am sure that will change!

I have a question for you. someone recently posted on their blog about how to get people back on email notifications for blog posts. Over the past couple of months, I have received several messages from readers saying they are no longer getting email notifications on our posts. Does anyone know how to fix that?