Monday

We got the barn all painted yesterday. At least we used up the paint in the one 5 gallon bucket we started with and thought we had a whole bucket left but it ends up that the other bucket of the same company paint was oil-based and a totally different shade of red. We had all the sides that you can see on the barn painted and had 3/4 of the back side done when we ran out. We will leave it like that for now until we get some more paint.

Today we did homeschool like usual and after lunch I went to metigoshe ministries to vacuum. When I got back Jonathan was doing a final till in the garden so I went down and put a homemade latch on one of the barn doors. I came up with the design. It is just a piece of re-bar cut about four feet long, bent at a 90 degree angle five inches from the end (for a handle). The handle goes through a upside down "J" slot in the door and the top fits into a hole that goes through the top of the door into the barn wall. When the door is unlocked the handle rests in the bottom of the slot and the tip of the re-bar is flush with the top of the door. When it's locked the handle sits in the end of the "J" that is a few inches higher than the bottom of the slot and the re-bar is sticking up through the door into the wall. So far it has kept the doors shut.

This evening Mom made a new recipe that we hadn't had before. It was for bagels. They tasted really good! She had to boil the dough in water for a certain amount of time and then bake them. I will look forward to having them often!

Peter

Barn Priming

Today it got to be about 70 degrees so we were able to finish priming the barn. We all went down the hill to work on it right about noon and had lunch a little later and then finished it about 4 o'clock.

If it is warm enough tomorrow we put the paint on it. This morning Dad went to town and did some shopping and errands and then in the afternoon installed a window upstairs in the room where the bathroom will be.

Most every day Jonathan and I have been practicing music together and we like to listen to music while we work, so we brought the CD player down to the barn and played one of our favorite bands "Blue Highway." It was kind of funny to watch the animals reaction to the music. They were all sitting in the shade of the barn (because it was actually hot in the sun), chewing their cud and almost every single one of them (including the cow and horse) had their ears pointed towards the CD player and their eyes shut, listening to the music. We were wondering if we sped the song up would they chew faster? We didn't try it.

Mom is cutting everybody else's hair tonight. I had mine buzzed not too long ago so I don't need it yet.

I guess Dad is going to go read G.A. Henty to us so I will stop here.

Peter

Hi again,

I think it's supposed to be nice out today but right now I feel pretty chilly! We didn't bother to start the wood stove this morning so my toes are cold. Yesterday Jonathan helped me put another door on the barn we built last fall. When Jonathan and I designed the barn, we made it with a 12'x8' door on each side so that it would be easier to clean out and let air flow through. Earlier this year our friend Steve came and cleaned it all out with his bobcat and it fit through the doors nicely. It's not a very big barn, 20' x 32', but it is big enough for our needs right now. It has 10' walls so we can add on an addition if we run out of room. Anyway, we had put up the doors on the north side last year but hadn't put the ones up on the south face until now. Now the snow won't blow in as much. We made the doors in two 6' sections that hinge and the part we put up yesterday was only the top 4' of the door so there's room for the animals to go in and out when the doors are shut. We will hang something over the opening that they can push through so it blocks the wind a little more. I'm still milking four goats and getting two quarts each time so we've been having yogurt for breakfast sweetened with homegrown raspberry sauce. Yum! If it warms up enough we are going to prime and paint the other half of the barn before it gets really cold out.

The cow is looking really big now so it won't be long until she has her calf. That will be fun to have a bunch of cream and butter!

Peter

Wow!

"Wow!" that's what Mom said when I told her I was going to blog! It's been over a year now since I blogged last but now I would like to start it up again.

Today we spent the most of the day cutting up one of our pigs. Andrew and David helped Jonathan kill, gut, and skin it yesterday while I was away doing my vacuuming job at metigoshe ministries. We sold the other pig to two people and brought half down to the butcher in town for them to process and delivered the other half to people that wanted to cut it up themselves. We just finished cutting the fat into smaller pieces to be rendered into lard when Mom is ready.

This week is supposed to be really nice weather like today so we can get a bunch more outdoor things done before snow.
I've been having fun driving myself around. A week ago or so I passed the test and received my driver's permit down in Bottineau. The day after I got it we were going to Minot (100 miles away) so I got to drive there. It's not too difficult in the rural areas but I'm not comfortable driving in town yet. I have a silly kitten sitting in my lap right now that plays with anything he can reach even if he has to climb up your leg to get to it. He's watching my fingers typing ready to pounciiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii-ggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggg---------------o0oooooooooooooo he just walked on the keyboard and typed his uyfrrrrrrrrrrrrr message to you.

Peter

We're getting some rain!

Hello,

We're finally getting some badly needed rain here. Someone said about 65 hundredths of an inch. We might be getting more tonight. In the fields our hay is only a couple of inches high so we have to move the goat pens twice a day instead of once.

This is our super inexpensive goat pasturing pen. It is four cattle panels put together with a pen on wheels that is detachable. I fits about four mothers + kids. We detach it with the goats in the cattle panel area and then move that and then move the shelter and re-attach it. In the picture is my fancy milking stand that folds up against the pen. It works really good!

Here's one of our kids.

Yesterday and today we practiced doing a little survival skills getting ready for an event coming up in New Salem called Prairie Days. Jonathan is going to help with a survival hike. Yesterday we made a water purification tripod (I don't know what it is really called) and drank lake water. Here's a couple of pictures:

You pour the water in the top through the grass, then it seeps through the sand, then it goes through charcoal.
The water on the right is pure lake water and the one on the left is water that was filtered. It made it a little bit clearer when we filtered it.
We poured it through another cloth to strain out any silt that got in there and Jonathan and I both tried it and thought it tasted pretty much like regular filtered water.

Since it rained last night we tried another way of gathering water today. You are supposed to tie a cloth to your leg and walk through tall grass, but we just dragged a rag around to the old cabin and back and along the way squeezed out the water when it got wet enough. The water from that wasn't as nice looking as the filtered lake water but we tried it and it tasted like distilled water. You're supposed to do it in the dew instead of after it rained but we thought it was close enough. Hopefully we won't ever have to depend on those types of getting water but it is good to know.

Peter

Today

Hello,

A lot of things have happened since I last wrote. We had the ND homeschool convention, Dad and Jonathan went to the State Republican convention, and yesterday we got back from Glendive Montana. And one of the most exiting things is spring is here! Here's some pictures of various things

This is me at a State park near there. We stayed at a family's ranch that had asked Dad to come and do a talk on the biblical concourse.
They use an airplane that they put together from a kit to check on their cattle. They have a lot of land to check on!
They flew us around on a ride for a while and then went and checked the water tanks for the cows and checked for cows that were having trouble calving.
This is some of the terrain they own. Pretty hard to get around without an airplane.
We saw this cow moose on our way to transplant seeds at Paulette's.
We also helped her put up her hoop house.

Peter

Eclipse of the Moon

Hello there,

Last night there was an eclipse of the moon. We watched it and I took these pictures through our telescope! The shadow is just starting to cover the moon.

It's about half covered in these pictures.
Almost gone here.
And this is it completely in the shadow. That is about as red as I saw it. I went to bed around 9:30.
This is as good a picture as I could get with our camera without looking through the telescope.
This is our telescope. Steve Schadler gave it to us when he was cleaning house! Thank you Steve!
While I was trying to find the moon through the telescope I found this planet. We're pretty sure it is Saturn. Through the telescope you could see the rings around it! It isn't as clear in the picture as it is just looking through the telescope.


This is a video through the telescope.

Peter