Hunk O' Beef

My Aunt Jane and her honey Donald are up visiting with us for a couple of days. Fortunately the weather is cooperating and has been rather pleasant thus far. They played golf yesterday and I took them over to see the Waterville property today. At least now they will know better what we are talking about when we mention projects.

I stayed over in Waterville after they left and pulled some more stumps. Actually got out the ones I was working on when the Hydraulic hose went last week. Unfortunately in moving some rocks I smashed my finger and now have some moderately severe discomfort.

I am managing to get the area for the shed fairly level. It's tough to see from this picture but it's starting to look lik I know what I'm doing. Only took 6 weeks so far. Now that the backhoe is working again I can hopefully get the rest of the bank dug out. I will need to put a retaining wall on that side also and then probably take the back blade to the surface to do final grading. I figure another 4-5 full days of excavating based on my speed thus far.

At that point we will be able to lay out the building and dig holes for the 6 x 6 posts which are going hold up the above ground posts. We will also lay in some drainage pipe to help keep things dry, put in the 6 x 6 and get a bunch of stone delivered which will make up the floor.

I'm gradually getting timbers milled but have quite a ways to go yet. I would estimate I'm 1/4 of the way done with the needed 6 x 6's. A problem is getting enough 18 foot logs that I can cut timbers out for the rafters. We have one more tall pine by the shed to come down, then we will have to start looking around for more volunteer trees who want to be part of the building experience.

Later this afternoon we went off to Lamoille County Field days to check out the action and people. We figured Jane and Donald should see some more local color. The ox pull was a highlight. In this picture they are trying to drag 11,000 lbs. All the teams were reaching their maximums at about this point. We also checked out the various animals and saw some baby goats which, of course, appealed to Caroline and me. I had a long conversation with the Kubota salesman who was exhibiting about upgrading to something with more horsepower. I feel like I'm constantly on the edge of what my current tractor can do.