happy valentine's day....and some other stuff!

happy valentine's day to all of you! hopefully you are celebrating the reason for the holiday and NOT the commercialism!

here is a beautiful rainbow that jambaloney got a picture of the other day! the rainbow goes from one side of the Manor clear over to the other side - i find it very beautiful and calming to know of the renewed promise that a rainbow brings (Genesis 9:13 KJV).

we haven't really had much snow this winter but we got a good dumping of it today - about 15-20cms with drifts here and there. my poor man jambaloney will be out tomorrow plowing the driveway with the atv. which kind of sucks for him as he is dealing with an abscess tooth of all things!!!

he has been doing some contract IT work from home for a local company these past few weeks and last wednesday he had scheduled to go in and do a demo. just as luck or murphy would have it, he woke up wednesday morning with a golf ball in his cheek and an abscess tooth!!!  but he went into town and delivered his demo and then went into our town of St. Peter's to see if a dentist could see him. of course, like usual, that little town is always friendly and will find a way to help you out of a bind. the dentist saw him and put him on 2 different antibiotics and jambaloney will go back in this coming wednesday and have the tooth pulled.

so after all of that - he put in a full day! and then had to drive home with his tooth throbbing and the golf ball in his cheek growing! but you can't stop a man who loves you! he made sure to get me some roses!

he also got me some blood pudding and brussel sprouts! nothing says love like blood pudding and brussel sprouts - bahahahahah! (but he knows how much i love both things!)

a happy valentine's day to all of you - and may you spend the day with someone you love, be it your partner, your friend, your mother, your children - whoever!

xox

added support and infernal engine bs!

jambaloney here!

last winter i jacked up a part of the lower 1/2 of the manor - this year i was determined to finish the job!

please don't judge me on this - the mess is not my doing!!!

basically the whole middle of the lower half has joists (2x6 not 2x8) running across creosote beams that rest on 2, yes, 2 phone pole sections buried in the ground - nice huh?

for starter, i got these old car jacks from my brother g - i painted them with a metal mistint i got for cheap!

i did the easy one first - jack on pt lumber glued to a piece of concrete ... this on has a clearance of 12 inches - oh yeah - i HAD FUN!!!!!

pipe wrench and turn - it pushes in both ways as in compacts the ground while i jack..

this angle gives you a good view  - shovelling out the dirt was a real chore!!!

all finished - later on i will give it another twist or so... the goal is NOT to even the floor, but stop the  sagging..

next up the other side under the bathroom - 19" here so i am using different tactics... jack and press...

move to one side, repeat and place in section of phone pole on hand!

and shim with ceder shingles - you can get a big pack of crap-grade shingles @ home depot  for less than 10 bucks - they make awesome large shims - i didn`t trim the shims as i may have to drive them in a bit more when the house settles. I was sure to use a rubber mallet!

here is a nice piece of tamarack - looks short, eh?

that`s because it is! - this spot under the bedroom is only about 8 inches in height!!!

and here it is finished and shimmed!

next i added some support under the load-bearing wall - this spot is about 19 inches in height...

I used a phone pole section again..

and a railway tie to span 2 joists

here is a better look..

finally - a 4x4 spanning two joists ..

and another... you can see my previous support in the back at the right..

in all i placed 7 extra supports in the basement- each one will support no less than a ton (probably way more). that is plenty to keep the sagging at bay!! case closed!!!

kymber`s last post mentioned the glue-sniffing squirrels...

it`s not a joke... here is the nozzle  on some carb cleaner..

and..

the pressure valve off a gas can!!!!

speaking of which - i gave up and took the ATV into the shop, it needed a lot of work and the carb was filthy again after a new one last spring  - they cleaned it and found the culprit  see that gas gauge?

out it comes - the metal parts were rusting!!!

here is a good look - dropping rust crud into the gas!!!!!

so i removed all the metal and re-sealed the plastic  top. after a week from the shop - the atv stopped working -  i had to clean the carb again as the float needle stuck and drained all the gas - i took off the gas tank and got the last out then put it all back together - the fuel valve on the petcock won't fully close so i used small vice grips to clamp the fuel line shut for good measure. additionally the battery wasn't working quite right either as it had fully discharged too many times - i got a better one and it comes out after each use and into the trickle charger. FINALLY i think i have the thing figured out!

i hate engines...

winter so far has been kinda crappy - either warmer but rainy/snowy and windy or sunny and frigid, and windy. but it has also been really gray and a little depressing!

but spring will be here soon!

cheers all!

storm update...oh and squirrels sniffing glue!

ok. so storm update. yawn. snore. another snore.

huh? wha? oh crap...i fell asleep trying to write this post.

so ya, the storm was a big yawnfest. we had some wind, some snow, some rain, some other stuff but overall it was a big giant naddalot of anything. good for us though. we made sure that we had all of our storm preps ready and we were ready for it...it just wasn't anything out of the ordinary!

jam got sick going into town, brought said sick home and now i am sick. dangnabbit - i wish we never had to go into town!

but wanna see some real sick? oh i know that you do. i hate bragging - but we have some of the sickest squirrels on the planet! don't believe me? well then have a look-see:

our squirrels are so bad-*ss they don't just huff glue - they huff spray adhesive. yep. oh ya. that's how sick our squirrels are.

kids...i just took some nyquil in case you haven't noticed. i am hoping to go down for the rest of the day.

i hope you all have a great weekend!

calm before the storm!

it's a beautiful and freezing cold day!

the whole east coast is going to get blitzed by a doozy storm! thankfully, our little part of the island is going to escape the worst of it! we'll get some snow and some fierce winds but nothing like the rest of nova scotia is going to get!

but no worries kids - we had french toast for breakfast and everyone knows that pure nova scotia maple syrup can get you through just about anything!

pure nova scotia maple syrup is pretty awesome stuff - but not even close to the stuff that jam's step-dad makes!!!

we just finished all of our preparations for this storm - generator is ready, our 23,000 BTU kerosene heater is ready, candles: check, lanterns: check, tons of food: check. jam's been out in the yard tieing various things down and we've done a general sweep around the house.

to all the people in the provinces and states that have had serious weather advisories - we hope that you will be ok during the storm. it'll be an interesting couple of days, that's for sure!

happy 14th anniversary to my love!

we met on january 19th 2001. i have had my digital camera only since 2007. one of these days i am going to scan all of our older pics. but here's a few good ones from days gone by.

notice the bunny ears? i had those things for years and wore them. for real. i'm bad like that!

 one of the worst winters in ottawa! he was out snowblowing every. single. day. poor guy!

but he got lots of rest and relaxation.

and we got him a canoe - he looooves that canoe!

this was his first time seeing our beautiful Morrison's beach.

and his first time fishing in it.

it's been 14 years babe! it's been an amazing adventure and it has really only just started! i love you more with every passing day....except that's not possible. not when my heart is already so full of you. thank you for everything!

(UPDATED TO ADD: we both forgot it was our anniversary. again - bahahahahaha!)

a nice winter so far....lots of reading.....and a DUCK!

after a snowless and gray entire month of december, january has been much brighter!



we haven't had any major storms or anything so it has been a nice winter so far. *knocks on wood*

this afternoon we spied this little guy:

sorry for the bad picture but i took it through a window. he is a male mallard and at first we thought he was hurt. jam went out with a towel to take him in, in case he was hurt, but he flew away. 10 minutes later we found him out under the bird feeder and he's been there ever since!

it looks like we have a duck - woohoo! he doesn't seem to be going anywhere anytime soon so here's hoping he'll get a mate and bring her back with him. then in the spring we'll set up a pool for them. if he ends up choosing to stay here, we'll turn him into our guard duck! bahahahah!

kids, what is it about january that makes me crave potstickers?

i honestly don't know but every january i go on a pot sticker binge.

january is also a month that we spend our afternoons in the bright sun reading through our Harrowsmith magazines.

these magazines are like Mother Earth News but were published in Canada. we have over 10 years of these magazines that jam's mom and stepdad gave us before we left the city. we enjoyed reading and learning from them back in the city but they were a godsend for us during our first winter here - shivering, freezing, pipes blowing up, losing power, freezing, more shivering, flooded basement, bathing in bins, melting snow for water, more shivering and freezing BUT bundled up in clothes and blankets and reading our Harrowsmith magazines!

we break them out every winter and re-read the lot of them. and we have learned so much about homesteading/gardening/prepping/self-reliance and we relearn all of this great information every winter.

my mother used to say that if the house was burning down, she would make a bee-line to her photo albums to save them. we would grab our cats and our Harrowsmiths!

hope everyone is having a great week!

driveway "enhancements"

jambaloney here!

first off - i spent 2 weeks in early december completely re-doing the septic drain field by hand - i will spare you all picture of that! mercifully the weather held, it didn't freeze and i was able to get it working properly as opposed to the nightmare that the previous owner cooked up!!!

on top of that - our driveway is a never-ending chore..

it is always rutting and i am forever re-trenching and filling in by hand - it is a lot of work so this december - i decided to REALLY try and change the way it is fixed... look - old chain and free iron!!!

i have lots of old chain that i got over the years scavenging - i had no idea how expensive it is!!! this spring i will oil the whole lot, but right now, no time...

look at this awesome thing - too heavy for my purpose though... chain on other plates

and rutted driveway - AGAIN!!!!!!

the ruts become ditches and it gets worse near the bottom over time...

first, i dug out all the big rocks with a pick-axe - my teeth rattled for days after..

so the plan is to scrape the driveway flat....

not really much of a dent..

but this worked well..

and so did the hookup...

so i brought out the "i-don't know what"  - i found it in the trash of a nearby fisherman - i THINK it is some sort of boat spade - the rollers are definitely for a boat..

here it is behind the truck..

it worked okay

but there is still room for improvement - problem is, the soil is clay so i ended up doing the whole thing by hand anyway - no matter - the trenches needed another scraping - i put the excess soil and rocks in the ruts - no pics as it snowed the day after i was done - i do this kinda work in the rain when the soil is soft..

you can see some added soil here..

part of teh problem is that water drains around the curve at the top...

so i am trenching that curve..

and laying in perf pipe (thanks ted!)

here it is all dug out...

it needs some soil fabric wrapped around to keep the soil from clogging it (this was a bit less porous that i would have liked, i ended up using different fabric on the ends)..

and a mesh cap on the end...

i got rocks from the beach, put a small bed of them down first, and laid the pipe in place, then covered it with more rocks... the round rocks are perfect - i used a lot for the septic drain field as well....

here is a different angle...

back to the beach for more rocks - i have to use a wheelbarrow - i got stuck in the sand ONCE ;-) that is a new 9 foot surf rod i bought - no bass this day though ..

back to finish the trench

here is a good view of the finished job - it works really well - almost all the water that comes down the top part of the driveway is now diverted into a ditch - in the spring i will place a couple more in strategic places, add more rocks, grade and the driveway should be MUCH better...

things i should have bought years ago - after the trench was finished - i found i could buy a 150 foot roll of perf pipe with fabric sock included for 80 cents a foot including tax - oh well it is there for spring ;-))

it is now cold but not as cold as the rest of you - no more outdoor projects until then it warms up.


cheers all - stay warm!!