What's everybody doing today?

[Grizzleyette___Adams]

I got nothing done I’d planned for today. I woke up exhausted, bad headache, even my bones hurt after 3 days of doctors, scans, big chores. Only one thing helps me on a day like today, I went plant hunting at one of my favorite places. A man I’ve known my whole life owns 300 acres down this creek, farms both sides. I have permission to hunt medicinal plants on it whenever I want.

I was out of yellow root (Xanthorhiza simplicissima) so I went to harvest a bucket full. I posted about it here last year… https://www.homesteadingforum.org/threads/yellow-root.1526/

It was beautiful down on the creek, temps hit 40 degrees last night so I knew cottonmouths would be moving slow (Agkistrodon piscivorus, pit viper) so it’d be safe to go in there alone.

I was just about done when I busted my backside. I saw a plant I’d never seen before. In my excitement I slipped on the rocks, a big slab. The water was only about 6 inches deep so nothing broke my fall. It hurt all the way to my shoulder blades. Ouch!

That water was cold, my rubber boots were full and I was soaked to halfway up my back. I had on a small pack, pistol, a small machete type blade. I also keep a gallon zip lock for my wallet, keys etc, water proof and if I lose them they will all be in one place.

Anyway, I harvested enough yellow root to make about a pint and a half of tincture.

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Now that I know you're OK, I can laugh because this is so me... over a plant. (If it was a really good plant, I'd be singing like John Cougar Mellancamp, "Oh, that hurt so good.")

I can't count the times I've almost crashed my truck because of a roadside plant catching my attention. Gotta stop doing that.

This creek. OMG, this creek!

 

[Grizzleyette___Adams]

I am marveling over this story...because of the content AND the fact that the news media took time out from covering only stuff that incenses or bleeds to cover one of the most heartwarming stories I have ever read...

https://www.foxnews.com/us/arkansas-woman-texting-father-every-day-response

 

[Peanut]

I am marveling over this story... most heartwarming stories I have ever read...
https://www.foxnews.com/us/arkansas-woman-texting-father-every-day-response

That was neat... always get melancholy this time of year... story speaks.

Remember things...

 

[Peanut]

Worked on the mantle for the new house. Took a post from an interior wall in the old barn, used a belt sander to clean up some bark and splintered wood from one edge and a random orbital to give it a quick cleanup without removing the saw marks. I’ll carve a channel in the back that will fit over a two by four so we can attach it like a floating shelf, but that’s for another day.
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Now thats a cool piece of wood!

 

[Sewingcreations15]

Another long day here today .

Started off the morning with church and seeing our friend there whose Mum passed away and he had such a positive attitude of celebrating his mothers life rather than being sad. I wore a very colourful dress to church and told our friend it was in memory of his Mum who loved to dress in bright colours and gave him a big hug, he knew what I meant. We had a good morning at church and spoke to quite a few people.

Got home and then we went down to the RSL club to help out down there hand out hampers and pet food donated to the club. We stayed for bingo as DH being the treasurer handed out the winnings to people. I won 3 times so came home with $40 more than we started off with and everyone at our table won at least once which was nice. I bumped into a lady with back/disability problems who dropped something and gave her a hand to pick things up. Turns out she is the same lady my friend told me about that lives two doors up from me. My friend wanted me to visit her but as yet I haven't had time so I gave her my phone number and told her to ring me and drop in when she wanted to.

Just mud mapped out another fortnightly grocery order for early next month as I can still use the same discount code and get another $15 off a $160 order and use our 5% off with our roadside assist club discount which will all up give us all up a total discount of 14.37 % discount. It is surprising when you do a stocktake just how many things you need and we are still increasing our food storage too. I will put in the order on Tuesday and likely pick it up Friday which is most likely going to be the day of my friends funeral.

 

[Amish Heart]

Had to pick up twins at 11 last night from homecoming dance. Their first high school dance, about 900 in attendance. Grandson said everyone was dancing "grinding" or twerking. He thought it'd be dancing. Hopefully the very small Kansas high school next year won't be like that. Our KOB online news site left me with my jaw dropping when I read a CYFD article this morning. Foster children will be placed with illegals, and the illegals can collect money for them till they're 21.
Supposed to be warm today, will have lunch outside. Then the cold starts again tomorrow. Granddaughter and the neighbor girls have a picnic planned this afternoon, grandson has a scout meeting to prepare for Klondike winter camping and events, and our youngest coming for dinner tonight. Popping into the dollar tree today.

 

[phideaux]

@Sewingcreations15 ...
Please interpret for a country boy.

"Just mud mapped out another fortnightly grocery order for early next month"

Jim

 

[Terri9630]

I read a CYFD article this morning. Foster children will be placed with illegals, and the illegals can collect money for them till they're 21.

Maybe its just me but the first thought I had was "I wonder how many of those kids are going to be trafficked".

 

[SheepDog]

I think I will bypass all that is wrong with this idea. Illegals given custody of legal citizens???

 

[Dadio]

I’ve got a small workbench in the new home so I’ve been working on a French cleat system for it. These are fun little projects. Excuse the out of focus pic- I hate this new phone.

 

[Sentry18]

We have a new neighbor two houses down, so the wife and youngest daughter are making a loaf of banana bread and a loaf of cinnamon apple bread for her. They are even using some wheat flour and sugar in them! What a horrible way to eat. Anyway the new neighbor is a single woman who also happens to be a school teacher at my youngest daughter's school. So we now have three single women in the neighborhood, which seems sort of odd. Two school teachers (Intermediate School and High School) and an HR Specialist. All 3 of them are in their late 20's and now all 3 of them are homeowners. The funny part is that two of them commented to my wife that one factor that drew them to our little culdesac is the fact the two LEO's and a full time Army NG soldier lives here, which was apparently part of the realtor's sales pitch. The same realtor who sold us our home and dates one of my former officers who now teaches martial arts full time.

 

[phideaux]

We have a new neighbor two houses down, so the wife and youngest daughter are making a loaf of banana bread and a loaf of cinnamon apple bread for her. They are even using some wheat flour and sugar in them! What a horrible way to eat. Anyway the new neighbor is a single woman who also happens to be a school teacher at my youngest daughter's school. So we now have three single women in the neighborhood, which seems sort of odd. Two school teachers (Intermediate School and High School) and an HR Specialist. All 3 of them are in their late 20's and now all 3 of them are homeowners. The funny part is that two of them commented to my wife that one factor that drew them to our little culdesac is the fact the two LEO's and a full time Army NG soldier lives here, which was apparently part of the realtor's sales pitch. The same realtor who sold us our home and dates one of my former officers who now teaches martial arts full time.

Would it help if I sent some banana bread?

Jim

 

[Sentry18]

Would it help if I sent some banana bread?
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Jim

That's what it would look like if I tried to make it!

 

[Terri9630]

Just going through game camera pictures. I have about a million pics of the trees blowing in the wind, about a dozen of deer and a few of the UPS truck and the neighbor going up the driveway.

 

[Peanut]

@Sewingcreations15 ...
Please interpret for a country boy.
"Just mud mapped out another fortnightly grocery order for early next month"
Jim

@Sewingcreations15 just guessing... a dirt map, rough sketch, outline of finished list?


Today... Mopping again or never stopped…

The night of the 25th just before my house started flooding I had spent 2 hours mopping all the laminate wood floors… a good cleaning with the Swiffer pad, then dry… another good cleaning with the spray cleaner for wood flooring, then dry… finally a 3rd pass, a good rinse then dry…

Then 24 hours of floods, muds, trash… every dust bunny in the house swimming for it's little life... agh!

So the mopping starts again.

 

[snappy1]

Had Church this morning and then local grocery for a few things. Came home and put my shower curtain together and back up (it had fallen down). It''s nice and clean and Christmasy, just a little early. Didn't want to take it back down to put Christmas one up in a few weeks. Did up my vitamins for the next month and helped a neighbor with some clean up outside.

Have to run around tomorrow morning for awhile. Will update on outcome tomorrow.

 

[SheepDog]

I just got back from four hours at the range with my #1 son. We shot targets at 100 yards with 223, 243, and then 50 yards with the 22s. We jumped over to the pistol range for some practice with the plates.We fired 9mm, 38 Spc, 357 magnum, and 40 caliber. We had a blast! pun intended
He is getting better with his revolver shooting 38s and 357. He really likes the triggers on my 9mm and 40 S&W. I taught him that his revolver was faster to get on target if he used double action and he liked it enough that he is going to spend time shooting double action instead of cocking the hammer back for each shot. I told him for close work double action was better but if he was going to shoot further than 25 or 50 yards single action would be more precise.
At the same time my wife was over visiting with his wife and their two girls. It turned out that they had as much fun as we did.

 

[hiwall]

Just going through game camera pictures. I have about a million pics of the trees blowing in the wind, about a dozen of deer and a few of the UPS truck and the neighbor going up the driveway.

Were you looking for one of these?

 

[hashbrown]

Beautiful day here, I spent it with my thoughts.

 

[MoBookworm1957]

Did up a load of bed linens, washed dried and replaced on the bed.
It would not have ended well for me probably if I had tried to bend over and get linens out bottom drawer.
Been chilling for several days now.
No fever though.
Weather must be going to change.
Probably not for the better either.
On to other news:
Baked a whole chicken in oven this morning.
Tossed in some potatoes, carrots, mushrooms, garlic, onions, Rosemary and Thyme out of the garden.
Figure to get at least 5-6 meals out of that bird.
Already had chicken stir fry with fresh vegetables.
Made up chicken broth in a medium stockpot out of chicken bones.
Will get that into freezer in the morning, maybe 4 pints in food saver bags for noodles etc.
Deboned half of the chicken already.
Will make that into chicken pot pies for the freezer.
The other half will be BBQ chicken pizza, chicken alfredo, chicken tacos, chicken enchiladas.
My chicken pot pies are the size of a miniature tart pan.
Hope to get six of those.
Hope to make homemade noodles up next week for the freezer too.
Weather is turning cooler, might have snow next week.
Need to get plastic up on windows yet.
Need to get bread make up too. And no I don't have bread machine.
Grand daughter has been ill with croup,pneumonia and she likes to share with Granny.

 

[Peanut]

I’ve got a small workbench in the new home so I’ve been working on a French cleat system for it. These are fun little projects. Excuse the out of focus pic- I hate this new phone.
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Looks like poplar... either my eyes or the camera...

 

[Dadio]

It’s just pine.

 

[Terri9630]

Were you looking for one of these?
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Nope! Definately not! These are much better.

 

[Amish Heart]

We had the skunk variety in our yard last night. Hopefully he'll catch up with the raccoon that ate the heads off of my young Transylvanian Naked Necks.
I had the same thought about the illegal fostering, Terri, especially since the article mentioned that the children would be aged 12 and up. Hopefully we'll be finalized on our granddaughter's guardianship soon. Need to get her out of foster care.

 

[Spikedriver]

3:14AM and I'm wide awake. Of course, I did fall asleep at 6:15 last night, so I've had plenty of sleep...4:45 is wakey time, so I'm only an hour and a half away from my first cup of coffee...

 

[Sewingcreations15]

@phideaux mud map is a general plan/idea that is open to change . I made the list in my online cart for groceries but it was up for some changes depending on items needed most and time we could get there to pick up the order. A mud map is also a map you make with a pencil and paper to get to an unknown destination such as turn left, second right and also can be a plan to build something so it is something that is proposed but not yet finalised.

@Peanut very close indeed .

 

[Sewingcreations15]

Today we started off the morning with DH having a conversation with the RSL president and sorting out bills/bankin and purchases. That took a little too long so we were rushing to get to DH's psychiatrist appointment so dashed through the showers and snatched and grabbed necessities on our way out the door and left.

The appointment went well and we then stopped in and posted our travel/meal allowance for with details so we can be reimbursed by DVA for travel and meals. On the way home we got a whole chicken and chips and sat in a nice park and ate it and shared a little with the begging magpies who appreciated it.

Once home I watered all the gardens and potted plants and put in another grocery order after I sorted out more of what was needed to be picked up on Friday. Been on the phone to a friend as we are trying to organise 4 ladies including myself to dress our friend who just passed away and a time that suits us all and the funeral director. As we are all busy this can be challenging to accomplish.

We called our chicken and chips dinner so no cooking tonight and I had fruit before I left.

 

[phideaux]

Got it SC...
some down under terminology just intrigues me and baffles me at times


Jim

 

[phideaux]

I spend way too much time sitting in my car in parking lots .
While the wife is shopping.

Ft Campbell, Oak Grove KY.

Jim

 

[phideaux]

Still at it.
Y'all pray for me..

Clarksville TN, other side of Ft Campbell..she is serious about her shoppin today.

Jim