Grammys Corgi Country

We have learned over the years that it is a wise idea to weave or braid nylon baling twine into squirrel ladders to put into our horse’s water barrels. This is to allow a way for the squirrels to get out of the water when or if they fall in. Now why, when I have a running WAR with the squirrels do I want to give them a ladder to save their rotten little bodies? Because I DON’T want a rotting little body floating in the horse’s drinking water, that’s why!

Small rabbits and birds are also able to use them to escape from the short water tubs in the corrals. Before we finally thought about ladders, we had to check the water barrels and tubs every day or two to be sure that there weren’t any floaters. If we did find one, then we had to dump the whole thing and clean it out because, in case you weren’t aware, animals urinate and defecate when they die, and you can’t expect your poor horse to drink contaminated water, can you? Yuck !!!

The worst time of year was during the really HOT part of the summer when temps around here can get up to 120 degrees Fahrenheit around this area. The horses would drink a LOT of water, the water level would drop and when the little critters would try to reach down to get a drink, PLOP, in they’d go and there wasn’t any way for them to get out once down in there.

We tried to make metal wire ladders for awhile, but the horses would sometimes scratch their noses on them, knock them loose, or they would get rusty, etc. One of my sons finally came up with the brilliant idea to start weaving the nylon baling twine into little ladders to hang in each tub and barrel. Anyway, since we started using them, we haven’t had any drowned critters, so I guess they work.

Have a wonderful day and may there be a ladder if you fall into a deep water barrel situation…

YIPEE!!! The waterline is FIXED!!! You don’t know how wonderful it is to actually have running water at the property and in the house again…To be able to flush and not bail… To turn on a hose to water the plants and the animals, and not have to carry buckets from the big water barrels… To be able to wash clothes here and not have to haul them 20 miles into town to do it… To be able to shower or bathe in HOT water!!! What a blessing having running water is!

I have been growing some plants this year by the side of the house (outside of the yard so the dogs won’t dig them up, etc.) This is the first year that I’ve actually been able to get things to grow. It started when my daughter sent me these tiny little three and four inch lavender plants. There were eight different kinds. I got some Miracle Grow Planting Soil and planted them, putting 4 in each of to large pots. They actually started to grow! I’ve always had a brown thumb before, so THAT was quite a surprise.

After a couple of weeks they had grown so much that I decided to go get some more pots, and while I was at the store, I went ahead and got a pot of basil, one of cilantro, and 6 tomato plants. They all started to grow well, too. After a while, I had to get bigger pots for the tomato plants and I was able to harvest enough basil every two weeks, to be able to make a cup of fresh, homemade pesto (which I LOVE!!!). I did that all summer until about 5 weeks ago when I moved the pot from the tall rack I had it in against the house to a shorter bench so that it would get more sun during the day (days getting shorter, etc.) … THE RABBITS ate it down to the STALKS!!!! GROWL!!! I was DEFINITLY ready for some rabbit jerky THAT day…

Apparently, the leaves and stalks of a tomato plant aren’t liked by the plant eating animals around here because they haven’t bothered them, thank God! I guess I didn’t do a very good job of transferring two of the tomato plants because they sort of withered up most of the way… They maaaayyy come back… getting some green shoots again. The other 4 plants are getting HUGE… they are taller than I am now and covered with three kinds of cherry tomatoes and one of yellow pear tomatoes. They really taste good and I LOVE fresh tomatoes. I’d never had the pear type before and found that they are sweet and much less acidy than the red ones.

A couple of months ago (See pic below) when they were about a quarter of the size they are now, they got a case of horn worms and I was very upset because I thought they would kill the plants, but a couple days after I noticed them, I saw a bunch of big yellow jacket wasps attacking the caterpillars and they ate them all, I guess, because they all disappeared. That was interesting… I didn’t know that they would do that.

I didn’t get a chance to talk to my sister and get that Pozole recipe, but my husband surprised me and made a really good dinner tonight that I thought I’d share the recipe to. He diced up some potatoes and fried them in bacon grease and butter (I didn’t say it was a good for you meal, and we had run out of olive oil). He seasoned it with Pappy’s seasoning. When the potatoes were done, he drained off the grease, added about a half a pound of thinly sliced turkey polska kielbasa to the skillet and heated that through, readded the potatoes and then poured a can of Italian stewed tomatoes over the top and heated it through. It really came out tasting great… My son topped his with cheese — he tops almost everything with cheese — and that came out pretty well, too.

Hope your dinner was a good as mine was… Eat well, and be thankful for running water !!!

Today I am sad … and MAD !!! A friend’s fiancé was killed last night in a tragic hit and run accident. This man was a brother-in-law of another good friend of mine, as well. It happened on the two lane country highway a couple of miles from where we live, and one of the EMT’s that responded with the ambulance, and is also a dear friend, and he had to help with the cleanup.

So many people are hurting today, and it was all caused by someone who got drunk and decided to get behind the wheel of a car, and drive at around 100 miles an hour down a dark, curvy country highway at night. Our friend’s fiancé’s car had broken down, so he was walking down the side of the road to get help when the person hit him. Needless to say, his body was pretty messed up. The driver kept on going and was caught later. We aren’t sure if he even knew he had hit someone.

I know it has been said before, but I’m going to say it again: If you drink, DON’T DRIVE !!! If you do, you are taking the lives of you, your family and everyone else along the path you take, and putting them in danger of sustaining major heartaches, lives that are scarred forever, and in some cases even death.

If you cause an accident that seriously injures or kills someone, ALL of those that you love will suffer along with you as you live (maybe) with the consequences of your actions. So will all of those from the other side that suffer for their loved one’s and their damaged lives or from their deaths.

If you drink, please take a moment right now and think how YOU would feel if a drunk driver injured or killed your son… daughter… mother… wife/husband… or someone else you loved, and then plant it into your head that you will NEVER DRINK AND DRIVE !!! Please don’t say those famous last words: “It can’t/won’t happen to me…”

If this stops just one person from this kind of pain, it is worth passing on… Have a safe day…

I mentioned hunters yesterday when talking about our quail. Don’t get me wrong, I am not against hunting in general, I just don’t like hunters that aren’t responsible people. As I mentioned, we have a LOT of land around us, but some people just aren’t very thoughtful of others…

If they drove past us a mile or so up the road to hunt, then it wouldn’t be a problem, but gunshots at 5:30 to 6 in the morning on a weekend is really irritating. Also, shooting toward someone’s property is stupid and down right dangerous. We have horses out in our pastures, and dogs in our yards that could be hit by a stray bullet.

We have even had people shoot out the mirrors in our truck, and one group of kids who were hunting on the edge of our front pasture, shot at the tree in our front yard. If they had missed the tree, the bullet would have gone through the big picture window and into our living room. When my hubby went out and yelled at them, they shot at the ground in front of him!!!

Of course, as far out as we are from town, they were long gone by the time the police arrived. It is a good thing that my husband is a Christian because he was NOT a happy camper and he won a sharp-shooter award while in the Air Force.

I don’t believe in gun control, but I wish people were more responsible and would have to take classes or at least that parents would start at a really young age to teach kids to respect guns (not use them when real young, but respect them) and their power, and responsibility when they have any kind of weapon in their hands. We did that with our kids who hunt legally and responsibly now for their own family’s supplemental food.

The main rules we had for them were:

1. You only shoot at an animal if you will clean and eat it or if it is dangerous to you or others… as in rattlesnakes on the property (We have had a dog that died from being bitten).

2. You always look at the surrounding area to be sure nothing is near that could be accidentally hit (oil pipes for instance).

3. You only hunt in uninhabited areas.

If you are a hunter, please be responsible toward others. If you are a parent, please teach responsibility and respect in general, to your kids in all areas of their lives and they will, hopefully, remember it if they do go hunting… It’s a good lesson for all of life anyway!

Have a fruitful day…