Accomplishments

I had off this week, and thank god because I had a lot of work around here to do. And I got almost everything done that I wanted to!

I did a lot of weeding in the veggie patch, it took me two mornings but I got it done. I also got newspaper and hay around the squash plants to keep the weeds at bay. Almost everything is blooming, except the pumpkins, and I have two little baby zuchs and a few tiny yellow squash. The winter squash vines are starting to run. I have no idea how long they'll get, but the time I grew pumpkins they must have run over 20'!

For more on the garden, visit my garden blog, I'll be updating it Monday or Tuesday.

We're still waiting on the greenhouse, it should be shipped tomorrow.

We also made our semi-annual pilgrimage to the local liquour store and, as usual, bought a lot of different stuff. It is interesting to me to just go in and look around a good liquour store because you never know what you're going to find. This is what we bought:

• Sweet & Sour mix and a bottle of Triple Sec for my favorite cocktail, the Sidecar.
• A bottle of cheap but good white wine.
• Matt got a bottle of single malt scotch, his drink of choice. He actually has a book of scotches that talks about all the distilleries in Scotland and what they produce. He's going to try to get one of everything in the book to try. Hey, everyone needs a hobby.
• Matt also got a good ($$) bottle of tequila and a matching ($$) bottle of coffee-flavored tequila. The coffee one is very very good, I can't drink but a tiny sip of it but the aftertaste is wonderful.
• I got a bottle of Chocolate Zinfindel white wine. I haven't tried it yet, I'm waiting for an appropriate occasion.
• I also found a bottle of Maple Cream liqueur, which I've already cracked open and found it wonderful over ice.

I think that was it. I'm not going to tell you how much all that cost.

I finally received my business cards, they look great. I also ordered some mini cards from Moo.com to use as hang tags for my jewerly. I purchased a gorgeous brown leather 3-ring binder to use as a portfolio to take into local shops and show my jewelry. I bought some stuff at AC Moore to finish the portolio pages up and some grommets to use with the mini cards, I'll try to take pictures and post it all sometime in the future.

I think that's about it. I took a nap while I was off, that was exciting. :)

It's set in concrete now!

We recently purchased a 10'x12' greenhouse, which isn't here yet and is, of course, on back order. We don't know when it will get here because they keep pushing the date back, those silly people. But in order to have a nice home for it, we made a form and poured a concrete foundation.

The same day, we got a guy we know to come up with his bobcat and do what is commonly called 'work' around the property to help us with some problem areas. We had some straight edges that needed smoothed out and our driveway badly BADLY needed straightened out. I will post pictures of the work Joe did for us later.

The picture above is the 'before' of the place where the greenhouse is going. The brown thing is our incinerator, where we burn our paper trash. The pile of rocks on the left is...well a pile of rocks we got from the local quarry. It was free! It is their junk rock (below), they can't do anything with it because of the quartz veins running through it, can you believe it? So we asked for it so we could build some nice rock walls with it in the future, and they were kind enough to just drop it off for us.

All this is in the big hole that was supposed to be the site for our new garage, but since that was dug out we decided to rebuild the garage where the current one is and do things a little differently. So this is a perfect place for a greenhouse or two, sheltered, flattened already.

The bank in the picture above, right also was to come out and get smoothed out (see below).

As for the foundation, we had a lot of big PVC drainpipe that Matt used for the foundation (see below). It worked out, this will easily drain water away from the greenhouse while making it so we didn't have to buy a lot of wood to use instead. A money-saving idea! We likes these, yes we does.

Matt estimted 5 yards of concrete and the truck was due for 8am on Saturday and lo! That's when they arrived. And they actually made it up the driveway! Will wonders never cease.

Notice the drain sitting up in the middle of the floor. That's 'crush n run' that they are standing on, it makes a good base.

That's Matt and his dad, Ray, and the guy from the concrete company on the right there. I didn't catch his name, let's call him Magnus.

Magnus actually pitched in quite a bit, even though I don't have any pictures of it.

(Left) And here it comes!

(Right) Making sure there's enough in the far corners.

(Left) Pulling it from the middle to the nearer corners. You can't see the drain, but it sits a few inches lower than the edge of the foundation. It was covered up with duct tape to keep the concrete from getting in, but they needed to make sure the floor sloped away from the drain so they had to keep pulling concrete from the middle to the edges.

(Right) Starting to skreet the floor. The skreet is resting on the drain in the middle and Matt is using it to flesh out the slope of the floor from the edges. Ray is still pulling concrete into the corners and to the edge.

(Left) Almost finished skreeting!

(Right) Pouring the ramp. Before the greenhouse will really be a greenhouse, we're going to be using it for a shed. We needed a place to empty our garage into, and this seemed like it would kill two birds with one stone. Now, we can empty the garage, tear it down and rebuild a new one AND then have a usable greenhouse afterwards instead of a shed that we'd have no future use for. A lot of the stuff in the garage will need to be moved using a dolly, hence the ramp.

(Left and below) Matt, smoothing out the already skreeted floor with a hand-held 'float' trowel.

(Left) Matt. Smoothing out the middle of the floor. Balancing on a 2x10. If he had lost his balance it would have been a MUCH better picture.

After this was finished, we all went next door where they were also pouring a floor in the basement.

We also purchases some concrete sealer to use on the floor. It is stained a nice rusty red color, we thought it would be a nice color.

Stay tuned, this weekend I will probably post pictures of the work Joe did to the driveway area.

Busy busy!

I still haven’t received my business cards yet, but I am in great anticipation of getting them. I also haven’t yet bought the domain name or the moo.com mini cards, but Friday will be the day. I’m also thinking of opening a store on Ruby Lane. Go check out the website and tell me what you think.

I also haven't gotten through to anyone at the PA State Corp Bureau about changing my mistake on the form. I've left voicemails, not returned. I used their online form, which told me (twice) that the information I was trying to view had expired (WTF?). Typical state bullshit. Stay tuned.

Garden is fooming, all is well there.

We will be starting work on and around the house this weekend. Crush & run was delivered this morning for the greenhouse foundation, we’re hoping to get the forms up and pour concrete this weekend. Also on Saturday our buddy Joe will be up with his bobcat to do some work on moving land around. I’ve already taken some ‘before’ pictures and will post them with the ‘after’ pictures….after. We have quite a bit of outside work to do to get ready for that….

We did a lot of outside work this weekend, including but not limited to getting the asparagus bed finished and cleaning up the two flower beds in front of the house.

I also cooked a leg of lamb last night, which was a first. We both agreed that it could have used a better crust on the outside but all in all it was very good. We also tried to duplicate the lime & mint frescos we had at Olive Garden and they weren’t exact but they were pretty good.

My mother gave me a great cookbook recently called The Horizon Cookbook. It is a history of eating and dining through the ages and through various cultures. The first half of the book is all narrative, the second half is full of hundreds and hundreds of recipes from Roman times through present from all over the world. I’m just thrilled with this book. Tim, you will have to go through it when you come visit next, lots of French, Spanish, Jewish, German and South American recipes.

Greenhouse, Father’s Day, Veggies for Sale

This week was a relatively so-so week for me. I finally finished the business license. It took me forever and ever to get it done, mostly excuses. So of course when I finally do it I put in a date wrong and have it listed that my start-of-operations date is June 1st instead of July 1st, and now I'm trying to find some idiot in Harrisburg that can comprehend what I'm asking them and fix the damn thing. *sigh* Bureacracy. Not hard, right? I also ordered business cards (see above) in two different designs, and I'm hoping to add more. I'm also going to order mini cards for hanging tags, but I haven't gotten there yet. Oh, and I need to purchase a domain name. And I need to do the township permit (yes, you need a permit from the township to open up a business, $25).

Anyway. We ordered the greenhouse, Matt went to get the building permit (yes, you need a building permit to put up a greenhouse, $50). We’re in the process of trying to clear the place for it, get some crush & run stone and cement bids to do the base for it. We won’t get the actual greenhouse until sometime in the beginning of July.

Trimmed the garlic scapes on Friday and took them to David’s to sell. Tried to hill some potatoes but the ground was really packed so we decided to wait until it rained to loosen it up a bit.

Took my dad out for lunch, I’ll write more on this later.

I swiped this from another blog....it's a meme:

If you read this, if your eyes are passing over this right now, even if we don't speak often, please post a comment with a memory of you and me. It can be anything you want -- good or bad. When you're finished, post this little paragraph on your blog and be surprised (or mortified) about what people remember about you. Or, if you don't want to post it, but want a memory from me, say so at the end of your comment and I'll reply with one. But consider posting. It's fun to see what comes up.

Cool Harbors

We put our 3 window unit air conditioners in on Friday when I got home from work, thank god, because it is hot as hell right now. I think it will get cooler on Wednesday, only 89.

I wanted to get my business license done this weekend, but didn’t. I wanted to order business cards and buy a domain name this weekend. Ditto with the didn’t. Probably tonight.

Matt has a ‘date’ with the building inspector tonight at our house to see what kinds and how many hoops we’ll need to jump through with the upcoming garage demolition and rebuild and the addition.

Max had a bath, he is now Fluffy Yorkie.

We went to Olive Garden for lunch on Saturday, food was good. Of course. The best thing was the frescos they have on their drink menus for summer. I had the citrus fresco, which is citrus vodka, vanilla liqueur, and citrus juice with a lemon and lime wedge, and a touch of sprite. A bit too sweet but good. Matt had the lime and mint fresco, which had (duh) lime juice and mint, and rum. It was fantastic, we are going to try to find the recipe. Really good.

We then went to Target and got some things we didn’t really need but will be helpful. I got a nice light weight top for summer. Matt got some chocolate, we found some nice metal mesh baskets, and I found a nice brown leather 3-ring binder that will be perfect for a jewelry portfolio, all on clearance. He also found some shorts he can wear to work.

We then went to Cold Stone Creamery for shakes. He got dark chocolate maraschino cherry and I got the coffee caramel. It wasn’t too sweet, just right and great coffee flavor. Then we went home for a nap. We skipped dinner.

Sunday I worked outside a little at a time. I also made some cinnamon ice cream. I’m really happy with it, texturally it is the best custard-style ice cream I’ve ever done. It called for 2 whole eggs (not just a bunch of yolks) and half & half instead of milk. And I used the Penzey’s Vietnamese Extra Fancy Cinnamon and the flavor is divine. It’ll probably be better today once it’s had time to mellow.

Various and such

Work has been difficult lately, people are just morons. I don't want to go into too much detail (and besides I think I have only 2 readers so 50% of you have already heard all about this), but I'm working on an exit strategy to get out of here within 2 years via my jewelry business and our farmette, with a possible part time job on the side if necessary. Stay tuned.

The job search for the new fed in charge of our contract is apparently well under way, we had two people wander through yesterday casing the joint. It was interesting, we didn't know anything about it, but the woman who came through in the morning told us she was an applicant but failed to mention that she was invited up to take a look around. The gentleman who came through in the afternoon told us he was invited up to take a look around, but didn't tell us he was an applicant (by this point, though, Linda and I had figured it out because we're just too damn smart for them). Both were very nice and fairly young (40, give or take 5 years). We're not sure if this means interviews are taking place, but I doubt it. I think they're narrowing down the pool, our library is very small and a young up-and-comer who is looking for something larger may decide they're not interested after all and withdraw themselves from the running.

Garden is moving along. Matt and I stopped by to see David and Junko over the weekend, they are hurting for fresh veggies because the weather has been so cool for the past few months. Farmers just don't have much available, the only produce they had to sell at their stand was strawberries and spring onions. But he has veggie plants for sale this year, and I can supply him with some of those next year, we're selling them potatoes and garlic this year, and possibly sugar snap peas and berries.

We're seriously kicking around getting a greenhouse. It would be about $800. In addition to being a greenhouse it would also be a perfect storage spot for all the stuff we have in the garage because we need to tear down the garage sometime this summer. I was just in there and the walls are bowing even more than they were before. Scary. We cleaned out an old stove, an old heating unit, and an old grill (we took them to the scrap yard and got $58 for it all), but we still have all the garden implements of destruction, lawn mower and weed wacker, et cetera.