Today's project is the rustic table, lineman style

Built a table today on cut off dead trees, with crossarms and waste pieces of 3/4 plywood. Should be nice when the weather is good. :D

Beer and paintings.

This weekend we're watching our god-son Mason. We've been busy. :D He's a lot of fun. My new nick name for him is Random Jones.

I got three new beers brewed this weekend: Thundercookie Gingerbread Stout; Maple Sugar Porter; and Carmel Apple IPA. We bottled a porter that gave us some trouble fermenting and surprisingly ended up at 6%. While all that was going on we were hanging Crys*' paintings up on the OSB wall of the studio. That was was originally an outside wall and shows it even though we painted it. The really large paintings were ones she told me to throw out because they were too hard to store. As usual, I didn't listen.

SO, yesterday morning Crys* cleaned and sealed all the paintings, then we worked together to put them up. There were only a few we moved around on the wall, but that was fun too. As the studio progresses there will be shelves in front of the art work and they will be the back drop of our life as they always have been (though unseen).

In fact here's a celebratory pic:

Brewing and prepping

This weekend we'll do the initial boil on 3 beers for winter. A gingerbread stout, an apple IPA and a sugar maple porter. The stout is going now, and we're defrosting the fridge.

Defrosting the fridge you say? Yes. When one lives off grid and had a propane refrigerator it takes the occasional defrosting like in the old days :D. It's easier in the fall and winter, when we put the food out on the deck in coolers there's no rush to get it all done.

We're watching our god-son this weekend. He's 6 and currently watching some cartoons. He forgot to bring a coat so we won't be getting him outside for a while yet. But sometime this weekend his Tia will take him for a wild buggy ride.

We're also gonna try to get Crys*' big paintings from her art school days sealed and hung up in the studio so we can start making shelves for that space and get it to a useable condition. And I might try to make the outside stand-up bar down by the creek. I'll lineman the heck out of that, crossarms and all thread and big holes :D.

It's another good weekend. We plan to enjoy it till it's all gone.

Prettiest Fall so far.

This has been the prettiest fall since we moved out to the place. They've all had their beauty but this fall the nice weather is lasting into late October. The days are warm, the nights are chill and the evening skies are often clear for seeing the stars.

We've been remarkably productive, sometimes in spite of some lingering health "stuff" that tries to keep us down but doesn't quite manage. In addition to getting the deck sealed for winter we got the house all arranged for the cold season and company recently. As is usual it was prompted from someone being nice to us. A friend we're helping get ready for a big move gifted us a new coffee table, end tables and some wicker furniture. SO we re-arranged the living room and cleared out a bunch more stuff to fit the tables. The wicker is out on the deck for lounging. :D. The outside is all cleaned up and ready for snow as well. We even have a dry place to put our rick of wood for the first time ever. Last summer we picked up a nice little snow blower so perhaps my back won't go out shoveling the hundreds of feet out to the critters or keeping the decks cleaned off.

This weekend we'll get to watch our god-son and I'll brew up the 3 beer kits I ordered in. As is usual they're a little on the fancy side and we'll enjoy getting to try them around Christmas :D They do tend to make good presents.

Time to get up and poke the fire. It's only the 3rd one this year.

Since it wasn't going to do itself, we finished the deck.

This morning we are sitting under blankies, with computers and kitties. We're looking out on our 2 weekend project, the deck. It took 3 full on days of sanding. Not a little here and a little there but 14 hour days. :D The first weekend I sanded until dark on Friday night, then Saturday till 7:30 PM, then it rained for 5 days. We started up again Thursday night and sanded till dark again, started up Friday morning and went till dark and I finished the edges at 2:30 PM on Saturday. Crys* was staining like mad and I was trying to keep ahead of her yesterday. A friend of ours (who does not wish to be named here) helped out bringing us more toner and mineral spirits and pitching in on the application. The funny part? The deck wraps around the trailer so to get in and out we had to climb in and out of an open window by standing on some concrete blocks. :D We finished about 5:30 PM so we have today off. We have to keep using the window until at least this evening, so if you come out go around to the west side.