the little wild kingdom

frustratedearthmother said:

Sounds like it's been your lucky week!

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yes! once in a while it works out. actually i don't have anything to complain about really, i don't have expensive tastes or expensive hobbies for the most part so... simple things are good and we have some good friends so it is nice when it works out.

I have my dad's old sharpening stone, oil & a couple pocket knives. Old! And his boatswain's pipe from Navy days. It's on a hand braided neck lanyard that he made. Back in the day he did a lot of macrame lace -- when the had fancy wood boats for the captains. A lost art now but very used then.

Friday i was finally able to get the bare boards stained to match the rest of the house and restained the cover for the crawlspace entrance. they weren't too bad looking as they were but they'd needed to be done since we put them up and the crawlspace entrance was peeling some and Mom used some old stain to go over it and it didn't match so it looked wrong.

it wasn't too bad of a job to do, it took me more time to get the ladder and stuff out and cleanup afterwards to put it back than it did to do the job at hand. now it is nice to finally have it done.

the afternoon was warm and i got a few more gardens mostly done to be ready for w*nt*r i just have to go back and look for weeds that need to be removed and they aren't too bad so that should only take me about an hour today.

that may have been the warmest day we'll have for quite some time. rains in the forecast for tonight and the next day at least. i hope we get a good soaking rain, we really need it.

Mini Horses said:

I have my dad's old sharpening stone, oil & a couple pocket knives. Old! And his boatswain's pipe from Navy days. It's on a hand braided neck lanyard that he made. Back in the day he did a lot of macrame lace -- when the had fancy wood boats for the captains. A lost art now but very used then.

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rope making skills of old would be interesting to get more into sometime (at one time i was trying to get my neighbor lady to teach me how to tat but that did not ever happen) and of course learning more knots than the few i know would be useful someday... old time skills that people took for granted in some places near the sea or in places with cotton or wool or flax or hemp...

i had a knife that needed sharpening but it had some deep knicks in it that had to be ground out before i could put an edge on it. i ended up using my Dremel tool with a grinding stone to take the blade down enough to where i could get a smooth edge again. i'd forgotten i had it and it would do that, i wasn't the neatest or nicest looking job but it got the job done and i could then get the blade to take a smooth edge again. it felt so nice to be able to use it again the other day (before i got the steel and the stone).

now i have to spend some time working on the rest of my skills needed for getting a good edge on a blade. a few knives i have around need some care so they may be sacrificed for the cause if needs be.

youtube videos help, i try to watch all sorts of different techniques and philosophies before doing things i don't know much about, but i have gotten into this a bit before so i'm not grinding blind this time around... just a refresher course.

we finally got some rain this evening! we've really needed it so very welcome to hear the sounds on the roof.

ah, looks like that is all we get for now. some better than none. so dry out there now we've had fire warnings a few times the past week (which are not very common around here) - this will help for sure and the gardens will be a bit damp at least.

not sure if we're forecast for more rains tonight or not. hope so. we could use a good long soak.

we did get more rains so things are greatly improved. i didn't do much today outside. i had plenty inside to keep me busy.

this evening had a good conversation with the neighbor out back and they are going to plow the field to the south of us this week - reseed it in a month or two. talked about the thistles and that there will probably be some need to spot spray for those. he already put markers out there but i can move them if i want. he only marked off about half the grassy area, but i'm good with almost all of it being turned under and started over. the moles have been making a mess of it for years anyways plus it's not even our property.

the only things i'm concerned about are the water flows from that bare dirt until it gets covered again and we've just gone through two seasons of blowing grass seeds and of course the thistle seeds that have been a plague this year. hopefully it will all work out.

my get up and go left this morning. i've needed a nap all day and not been able to fall asleep. just shelling beans and enjoying the quiet.

flowerbug said:

i've needed a nap all day and not been able to fall asleep.

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Sorry - I stole your nap. (it was a good one too)

frustratedearthmother said:

Sorry - I stole your nap. (it was a good one too)

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if anyone can appreciate it to the fullest it would be you! hope it helped. i did get a few winks unintentionally when watching a few vids, but it wasn't for longer than a few moments. will conk out early tonight.