Jest Another Day in Pear-A-Dice - Higgins Rat Ranch Conservation Farm in Alberta

[CanuckBock]

U make a strong case....but i will pass....its 74 degrees f here. Our windows are open. Getting kabobs ready for the grill....

Our windows are cracked open too right now...get that darn woodstove going too hot and heat all outa house and home, eh? Like in the chook coops too...always have air circulating! We are all bags of water that breath moisture. One of the keys to happy conditions is not to have a draft...so moving air is good, but not blowing winds on living things, I figure.

Grill...that be a BQ...yeh...use ours year round me Fella, too! Man Porch is lovely at any temp. We had shake n bake (nfi) chicken and baked potatoes on the BQ...uh, five days past when it was running at -27C/-17F in the Man Porch. Mind you I did not go out to flip the chicken pieces in my ginch...but then again...I am way past the age where anyone would find that image a good one...

BTW, 74F is too warm...I prefer 20C which is 68F. Far too larded up for winter I suppose to stand that much heat...LOL

I recall a book Rick read by Farley Mowat where they brought an Eskimo (Inuit) down to stand trial. He had fed a choice piece of meat to I think it was a police officer and the cop died. The best piece of meat by their culture back then was spoilt meat...never gets warm enough to have meat go bad...a choice delicacy I think that was given to an honour guest. At least I think that was how the book went as I never did read that one of Mowat's. Anyway, the point is that they had him stay in an ice cooler for meat when not in the court room. Even then he was pretty sweaty.

Round about February/March, I can totally relate...we all get acclimatized to our own conditions where we love to live.

Best we stay where we like it my Man--where we thrive and feel alive. I appreciate those that can tolerate the heat...but that is just not me and not in my genetic makeup either; my ancestral roots come from areas like Northern Europe!

I love the Great White North with her Chanteclers, igloos, back bacon, blue nose mittens, Red Green, maple syrup, Kids in the Hall, RCMP, hockey/lacrosse, Timmy's, Mary Walsh as Princess Warrior, Chev Maple Leafs, Red Rose tea, Polar Bears, SCTV, Avro Aero, Shaun Majumder as Raj Binder, yogurt, Moose, grey colours, Cathy Jones, Coffee Crisp, Beavers, Space Arm, John Candy, Crappy Tire bucks, Loonies, Canada Dry, CBC, 5 pin bowling, Canadian Geese, poutine, toques, Hosers EH?, much better beer...don't get me started on the Rye versus Bourbon...

Tara

 

[Northie]

Oh my goodness! No girls do not get a fair deal when nature calls!
and now with the kids... It never fails get everyone suited up and then just before you get out the door, or just after.... "Moooooooooom I have to PEEEEEEE!!!!!!!"
Our little guys like the tractor by the way

 

[CanuckBock]

Fry Pork until golden brown...in oil and butter...yes, can you feel the arteries clogging?

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Pop porkers in oven to drain out excess fat! Can y'all jest smell that parmesan in the mix...whee hee hee...who FARTED????

Then on to the Chicken Fried Rice...made a mix of regular type white rice and some wild rice yesterday morning...allowed the cooked rice to chill that day.

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Cooked up the chicken eggs for the rice dish -- Hmm, sure glad the birds here love laying alot of WINTER eggs, 'cause well...we used alot of them up yesterday...hard boiled for salad and egg salad sands for Rick's lunch...whipped up for dipping cutlets for them to accept yet another coating, whipped up for fried egg for the Chicken Fried Rice...yeh, thank heavens for glorious happy hens, eh!

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For whatever reason, I bought a new kind of dark soya sauce...man alive it is dark and I have to be careful how much I use in recipes because it sure adds rich colour and wonderful flavour! Brand is Pearl River Bridge (nfi) and labelled "superior dark" Soy Sauce. Kinda nice when you blunder upon a nicer product...have enough hiccups where you get something different and it sucks compared to what you usually have.


So today, nice and warmish...only -17C/1F and already at -14C/7F...yee haw! Great for the creatures.

I decided today since Rick and I are both working, be nice to come into a home full of comfort food smells...Today it is Chili.

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Fry up the beef burger in some garlic clove flavour....drain, fry up the diced onion, celery, two types of fresh mushies, then mix all together with washed/drained kidney beans, can of tomat soup, whole tomatoes along with chili spices...all into the crock pot on low. Sweet....

I think I got enough time to even do up a batch of fresh bread in the bread machine later on...oh my...should be good! Maybe a tad too good...hope it gets cold again so I can justify the winter FEASTing...hee hee...work it off, work it off! Slug thru the winter whites...trudge trudge!

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Quote:
Originally Posted by LindaB220

Hey Tara, hope you are feeling better. I had to go back and read for a spell. My computer was on the fritz for weeks and I still am catching up. Loving your pics. So different from my dry brown scenes in Louisiana. We won't get much if any snow and it's nice to see it. Don't want to actually BE there. I'm spoiled to the temps.

I must be feeling better...getting the hungry hungry hippo cooking splurge going down...eek!

Another person with 'puter problem...yikes. I hate that...or is this a trend for some of us to get a NEW one for Xmas? Bwa ha ha--jest joshing!

Yeh, it is too much fun we all have different winter views...a brown one is fine, green, white...all sorts! The brown one kinda goes with a desert terra cotta kinda colour scheme! Reddish clay pots and pretty dessert scenery. All sorts of different winter to enjoy and we all are to revel in our differences I guess.

See I don't mind the colder temps...I would be miserable in the heat--absolutely sulky!

I get over heated and then start looking at ways to stop the misery. Hot climates...so like when you are in an iced up tub of water and still too hot...what's next? Skin peeling? Bwa ha ha.

Nope, when she gets colder...you put on another layer, space out the chore routine over a few trips with ones to return back to the house to warm back up before going back out--put another log on the fire too. You eat more comfy foods...generate yer own firey furnace--dress for success. Yeh, we all seem to thrive in different places and I would hate it if we humans all had to be in one area only. Then too populated.

The sandy beaches and hot climates are safe--safe from the likes of me visting...I'll never willingly go there. Laying on a beach ... like a beached whale...hee hee...I would abhor that. If I ever win a prize where it is some sun vacation...it'll be up for grabs to the highest bidder...LOL

Oh my goodness! No girls do not get a fair deal when nature calls!
and now with the kids... It never fails get everyone suited up and then just before you get out the door, or just after.... "Moooooooooom I have to PEEEEEEE!!!!!!!"
Our little guys like the tractor by the way

Hee hee hee...yeh strategic dressing to go outside..."are we all clear, can we begin the process?" I get to see the little ones dressed like the Michelin Man (nfi)...try and get their little bods in those snow suits and big ol' booties...up in the school bus! The real young ones...kinda look perturbed because it is like the first step in the bus grew taller overnight...just to stump them!

I watched yesterday afternoon as the kindergarteners came flooding outta the school for the buses. One girl literally dove head long into the powdery snow along side the side walk...and lay there enjoying it looking up at the sunny blue skies. Yeh, the wonderment of a child...suits us adults to see the world with their new eyes...the simple pleasures in our world to enjoy and embrace, eh? Nobody has told this kid yet to hate snow. Hee hee...not quite yet!


Ah yes, the tractor...after getting a few trailers (never wanted a diamond ring...I always wanted a stock trailer...hee hee--my idea of jewlery usually involves some sorta chrome or cogs...useful things like engines and such!), it was a want of ours to be blessed with a tractor!

Tractor = Freedom to thrive on your piece of dirt.

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Could have bought almost three new cars for her but would I trade it in...never when I reside here! It so allows you to enjoy living in the boonies so much better. Allows Rick to do things his mind wants to do without even hesitating. I don't think I will ever underappreciate what good men and equipment can accomplish. Boys and their toys, eh!

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The very first job the tractor accomplished was helping with the roof installation of the Taj Mahal...back in 2010. Quite frankly, not sure how he would have lifted and stabilized his design for the roof without the use of the tractor and her pallet forks. We upgraded from the original size of tractor we had been looking at because of what my pallet forks (for my 40 bag pallets of bagged rations!) where capable of lifting. Did not want to have the tractor under powered for what we intended on using her for.

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No job was too intimidating...here he is erecting the back gate burl log...wonderbar!

Rototiller, two buckets, snow blade, pallet forks, bale spike...luxury to have the implements to be able to use all the capabilities of the tractor.

Same can be said of the trailers we have bought--all have a dumping feature... We laughed and laughed..."Any of us here hillbillies get missing the carny coming to town...have an up we go and down we go ride on the trailer, eh?"

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It often takes huge effort to load these trailers up...flick of a switch and to have them dump themselves...

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We can reserve our energies to do so much more with these conveniences.

Some of the loads the trailers have been asked to carry were HUGE...jest HUGE HEAVY loads!

Like this one fulla furry TRAILER TRASH!

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The last Maple Leaf (mine!) was hauled home on the bigger trailer...the fact that it tilts makes loading the trucks on so much easier. The farm yard she came outta was greasy (early spring--lookit the gooky muck on the tires!) and Rick says it took mere minutes to winch this one on...simply because the trailer tilted down and up she went!

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We can buy our whole grains in bulk...in totes! Good product and economically priced too.

Then the added bonus of the hay spike (which we justified and paid for in only one season!)...holy Hannah...we were buying 350 small square bales at $5 (climbed now to $7.50 = $2,650 and the one supplier made his bales twice as light and kept the same price...$3,500 per year!!) which was making us wonder...how in the world did people afford to keep horses (which eat WAY more than my crew) because we had a few goats, coupla llamas and small flock of sheeps...about a bale a day in forage...costing $1,750 during a good year for hay buying...well we found out. Rounds are way cheaper!

Trying out rounds of oat straw for bedding this year...at $20 for a round...huge savings all over again! With the bale spike, can load them right inside the Hay/Straw barn...no messing with tarps the rodents chew holes in to ruin the bales and the snows become heavy with ice and hard to lift the tarp off to even get at the bales.

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You can shop around at so many other producers so you don't have to buy thistled up hay (one year I can still feel the pricks in my hands and arms...infected from just giving out the flakes to the ruminants!), or crap hay (well I guess Timothy is good horse hay but the sheep hate it...and so do I...the seed heads get matted in their fleeces...blah to that!). So the freedom of a tractor is marvelous in so many many ways!

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Dumping out used goose bedding...under the watchful eyes of the next benefactor...nourishing the dirt with composting materials so the grown forages are awesome! Even more good grasses to come.

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You can laugh but when the decision was made to get a bigger bucket for the tractor than the gravel/sand sized one...its arrival was celebrated with much fan fair! Lookit all them ACDogs gathered around--like you would have to get thru them to get to that special big bucket.

Even they knew how to appreciate what a bigger snow bucket meant! Rick would be home in his chair sooner than later...to share his foody treats with the pack earlier in the evening because he got the snows cleared away so much faster and more efficiently. Being a gradermen... Like when is he gone? When the snow flies...and yet, he has snow of his own here at home he likes to tend too. It is in our best interest to lessen his work load at home...sorta like a life insurance plan--an extended life expectancy because he is not completely drained of all his energy because he has the tools to do the work better.

Doggone & Chicken UP!

Tara Lee Higgins
Higgins Rat Ranch Conservation Farm, Alberta, Canada

 

[CanuckBock]

Heel low:

So take the veg trimmings (got cauliflower, broccoli stalk and celery) out to the geese...GOOSE GOODIES!

Hear the shrieks of great goosey delight?​

So I am divying out the veg and I turn to see this sight...

"Yeh...really?"

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You know one of the small benefits one enjoys after moving a loaded sled to do some chores...usually means a lighter and less cumbersome sled on the way back--cause you EMPTIED IT...but not this round!

Looks to be "self-filling!"

"You know I know you love me...retired Warrior Princess that I be!"

"You told me that we would be playing dog time, a tiny bit after you get this goose thing over and done with...
Could you like move it along a bit FASTER...dog's don't wait too well!"​

"Yeh...could you hurry it up a bit? NO? OK...I am licking the sled...Hmm, no use...sled is not metal!"


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What Fixins did not realize is that the two canopies joined up here...needed the snow coaxed off the roof...warmer out, a good job to see completed since we are suppose to get some more snow soon enough. On the way to play time but a small task to be completed on the way!

There...snow has been roof raked off...What next? Oh yes...that dog needs a few toy tosses to wear her edge off...​

Llama boy BTU is at the pasture gate to greet us. It is warm out, eh!​

Finally...it is DOG TIME!



One of her more funny faces...​

She is out and about here...sniffing Snowshoe Hare...so intent on hunting scents...she has closed her eyes so there is absolutely NOTHING distracting her from the SNIFFIES! What a dog!

Rick just called...he gets to come home early today...started early too...2 a.m.! Will be way nice for him...about the time he arrives home, the bread maker is timed to begin baking the loaf to go with the Chili...how kewl is that!

Doggone & Chicken UP!

Tara Lee Higgins
Higgins Rat Ranch Conservation Farm, Alberta, Canada

 

[scottcaddy]

Hope you and Rick have a good quiet night!
I got a two spike bale fork that will also do pallets 48 inches or less.
A very handy tool for a tractor owner to have if he has critters to feed and clean up after!

Scott

 

[scottcaddy]

Yes Tara, I did look

way too much GOOD food in play here.
Also is (nfi) the same as no F****ng idea? I have to ask, sorry.
Scott

 

[Wisher1000]

N-o F-urther I-nformation?

 

[Wisher1000]

N-eed F-ixins' I-nput?

 

[Wisher1000]

Not Fully Intelligent?

Never Fight Incontinence?

Nasty Frog Innards?

Nuclear Fart Interrupted?

 

[scottcaddy]

N-eed F-ixins' I-nput?

LOL!! I Agree Needs Fixins Input!!