Today is a windy, cloudy, rain off and on kind of day and we've decided to be lazy and take the day off. I should be cleaning up inside but I just don't feel like it.... and so, it's time to sit and put together the blog for March. And I will confess now that this will be mostly a blog of photos showing the progression of the projects here at The Mason Martini Estate.
The greenhouse, as I've stated before, was a monster of a project. And winter stopped any progress with it. Sebastian was a trooper and filled in the dirt on the sides for me.... and then I loosened a few screws (like I didn't have enough loose screws...) and the sides caved in. Not completely but enough to put the whole thing out of whack and Sebastian, (you are my hero!) dug out all the dirt he had put in so we could shore it up which required boards to go across to hold it upright at the level of my head. #!@$#!! That was a major setback and I had moments of wanting to just burn the whole thing. Then a friend stopped by who's a carpenter and he gave me some excellent ideas on how to salvage the project and the last 3 weeks has seen major progress! Thank you Mark! Without you guys I'm not sure I would have had the energy to continue. So below is the progression from beginning to today and I have to say I'm once again excited to see it finished. Oh! And there are a couple of photos of plants coming up from my seeds. I've turned the dashboard of the RV into a mini greenhouse for those and it's worked splendidly!
For those of you following on Facebook, you've seen a few photos of the chicken coop being built. While I have helped on this project, it's really the work of Eileen Muza, artist extraordinaire, who lives in Cisco. She designed the coop, has gathered all the materials (everything has been free so not one dime was spent on the project), and has put in the labor. She has made some great videos of the project you can find on Patreon if you are interested in seeing the process. I encourage you to check it out. Patreon is not a free service for users or viewers... but she has a lot of great videos (not just the coop) that you may find interesting. We are sooooo close to being ready for chickens!!
When Sebastian wasn't digging in the greenhouse dirt (he came to hate that greenhouse I think... lol) he helped to pound in fence posts. He actually did the majority of the pounding and that row we are working on in the photos was NOT the easiest of places. On many of the posts we hit a spot where the post just stopped moving any further. In spite of the hard labor, we had so many great laughs! I miss you my friend.
The posts are not absolutely perfectly straight.... I know this bothered Sebastian much more than me... so we decided we would tell people that they were crooked because every 3 posts we would have a shot of Tequila. Maybe that was a story.... maybe it wasn't....
Sunsets and sunrises.... what more can I say. I'm sure you guys are bored with the sky photos but I'm never tired of this amazingly beautiful sky.
A couple of miscellaneous projects. We built a platform to get the water tank higher and put a new awning on Sebastian's trailer. The third photo below is the old awning that we repurposed for waterproofing under the tin on the coop! We try hard to not wasted anything here.
The horses have been hanging out here more. They come almost every day and hang out, lay in the sun, and munch on the grass which is super green right now. They don't seem to be bothered by anything including the sounds of skill saws, jigsaws, hammering, etc. Blip has gotten much better at ignoring them although she will still raise hell when they first arrive or when I start to walk toward them. But after a bit, she just walks away. They were fascinated by her for a while and would put their heads down and walk toward her to check her out. I think that more than anything helped her to finally calm down. They just didn't react like the cows! lol
Well, the sun has partly come out and it always feels strange to be sitting inside when I could be outside so I'm going to cut this off here. I know this was a short one but I hope the photos make up for the lack of words.
Progress on the homestead as we keep Movin' On.
You are f- ing amazing. I can’t believe all you have done. My hat off to you!