Sunday, June 10, 2012

Hot tub and waterworks

 We scored a *free* hot tub off of Freecycle. It needs a new $175 heater part but is in great condition otherwise. Wade was kind enough to lend us his truck for the day. A few strong fellows and a little elbow grease and we got this sucker up into the truck.

With the help of a few friends the work was smooth and easy and we were soon lounging in the empty tub in the front yard. Of course it will be some time before the electrical work is done and we can run a 220v line out to the tub. It will happen though, we will soak!

On the way to the farm I found this dog igloo with a FREE sign on it. Good find. Tenzin thought it was great fun.

The garden saw a lot of planting action this weekend. Nicole and her mom were out there in the sun for 3 hours getting the beds prepped and start planted. This old sprinkler came back to life with a little help and waters the whole garden area.

It's not much to look at yet but there are a lot of veggies growing in these mounds!

All three mounds are fully planted now and the tall sprinkler is keeping them all watered.

Thursday, June 7, 2012

Field, mowed!

  
At the beginning of the year we had grand visions for what we'd do with the pasture. There's about 3 acres of open grass mixed with the pear orchard. We had hoped to turn the grass resource into some sort of yield, even if it was to donate it away. We searched for folks with difference kinds of animals and found a lot of options, most of which we had to rule out due to lack of really solid fencing. Our basic perimeter is roughly fenced and needs repair in a few places. Goats are really hard on fencing so they were out, cows and horses would do well but we'd have to fence them out of the main house area. We found folks with alpacas, llamas and sheep too. Lots of options but all of them require an investment in fencing, something we're not ready to do. 

So! The field needed to be mowed. We tried for a few weeks to nail down someone with a combine to bale up all the grass. There are a few such folks up here but they were all booked up for months to come, if we want to do this again we'll have book in January or February. In the end we called a field mower and he came out and made a few hours work of it. 

At 5 feet tall the grass was about to become a serious fire hazard as the dry season is about to begin. Also the high point of tick season is upon us soon too. No reason to give the ticks more place to live. 
 

One of our grand old pear trees, beautifully pruned and full of pears!

We have a few big walnut trees, this one, if I'm not mistaken, is California Black Walnut tree. We have a few each of the black walnut and english walnut grafted on black walnut stock.

These 3 pear trees are some of the oldest and most brittle of our trees. They still have a few years of life in them but have taken a real beating over the years. They don't yet have any pears growing on them, we think that's due to them being Comice pears, a later harvest pear.

 Our garden. The fence is a bit of a hodge-podge but it keeps the deer out. We'll be digging into the garden real soon!

All good things are Nevada County grown!

http://allgoodthingsarenevadacountygrown.wordpress.com/

Just wanted to share a great new blog about all the farming going on in Nevada County.

Inspiring!

Sunday, June 3, 2012

More electrical work please!

What a beautiful sight!  My lovely wife opening the gates into the farm. Those gates are totally a work of Jack's art.

Ah the attic! I'm pretty well over all my claustrophobia having spent so much time up there. This is where I try to keep all my tools together while I'm working. I'm learning it's quite easy to lose tools in a dark attic.

This has to be Jack's work too. There are 3 different size nails and they're mostly bent over. The wood is scraps from the wood paneling it's attached to. This all held the ceiling fan in the living room. 
 

This is what we replaced it with. A modern fan-holding bracket with light can attached. Easy to install and position and rock solid. 

Spent most of the day wiring up the second junction box for the lights.

Managed to get all the wires run to it but ran out of time to make up all the connections in the junction box. Next time!