Fifty One degrees. Sounds like a nice fall day. Great for a stroll. Perfect fencing weather. What it is not – good temperature for the inside of the house!
At 6 am we figured out that our normally too warm bedroom was now more like an icebox. So, farmer man went to investigate. Well, and I even wrote this on my facebook post, I could be thankful that in all of the cold weather, we kept running water. Striving to be thankful in all things.
At 8 am when we climbed out from under our covers to take advantage of the daylight hours – the temp was down to 47, and the water was off. So, now I am thankful that we had electricity and the forethought to buy a propane heater.
All of those lovely farm clothes, which I am still quite thankful for, would be employed inside the house as I started up the oven and Jim started up the propane heater. God is so good. I made an entire pot of soup the day before which we didn’t get to eat because we were out running errands. So, at least I had a nice pot of soup to warm up and keep handy on the stove for the day. And since I was going to run the oven anyway, might as well make biscuits!
The little heater and the stove brought the inside temp back up to about 51 before the cavalry showed up with a real propane heater and a couple sets of helping hands! We called the heating and air guy and started working on the pipes.
We’ve been trying to figure out the water problem for days now. Still no water. Good thing the neighbors are our children. No charge for filling up gallon water bottles all day for the necessary tasks of dish washing and toilet flushing. My teenagers are completely over the history lesson of a “time before running water” when the kids had to fetch it.
It brings to mind a story my mother told. One day my grandmother had my mother heating water on the stove to make up a bath for a guest of the home. She had to heat it in a large pot and carry to the tub and pour it in. Buckets of cold water, plus whatever water she was adding made a nice bath. She was not terribly cheerful about this process, I guess. She turned around and said to her mother – “I always wanted running water in this house, I just didn’t know I would be the one running it!” Apparently, my mother was a rather bold eye-rolling teenager sometimes – who knew!
We figured out how to make handwashing stations and dish rinsing stations out of drink dispensers. With a large family, there were several of those on hand.
I am quite ready for my “epic shower” at home (as my kids call it). Thankful that our daughter Candice had been saving water bottles for recycling – so we had plenty to carry water with!
None of the goats have had any babies that we can tell. Callie is requiring antibiotics twice a day. Charlie has a wound we tried to treat and cover – which totally threw her off! At least that was funny!
We brought our little buck Liberty back to our farm. We will already have to set the boys apart from the girls soon, so what’s one more. Trouble is the answer! Adding a goat tips the power balance and freaks everyone out! The ever present “king of the hill” game amps up a few notches. Poor Liberty looked a little rough tonight. I thought he might need a break from the big buck – so Justice is gated off from the rest of the herd tonight. This is the romance part – goat romance – the whole issue is who is Belle’s boyfriend. The soap opera of the barn continues . . .
Thrills – finally getting into my “epic shower” and enjoying a few days of civilization while the big kids manage the goats for a few days from their house, with heat AND running water!
Romance – goat romance, gotta love it!
Adventure – learning to function without running water and problem solving the issue – ongoing.
God is in all of it. In the little stuff. In the big stuff. In the protections, the provisions, the messy stuff of life . . .
brandnewfarmers 