WEEK 17
It has been a long time coming and yet there’s still so much to do! I have felt grossly overwhelmed this entire week. One might think those sort of feelings would have made themselves known earlier on in this project but things finally peaked for me. I have always struggled with the small stuff and moving over from the camper to the house with so much left in the Quonset had me anxious!
Before officially claiming we were moved in, we worked hard to finish up baseboard trim, bedroom door installations and moved a few furnishings into place. To make things even more comfy, we brought in the living room couch and added a rug we had bound from leftover bedroom carpeting.
Clothing boxes were brought in and I swear I was like a child in a candy shop! I talked sweetly to various items I’d missed over the last 4 months. Crazy? Maybe. But, after 4 months of wearing sweat soaked, paint splattered work clothes, you really begin to appreciate fashion that’s a bit more feminine and not ripped or worn.
Over the course of the week we also secured the kitchen base cabinets in place and worked out the final measurements of the quartz countertop template. Major changes were needed once we realized the sink Menards had placed in the 33 inch sink base would never fit the inside cabinet measurement for either an under mount or drop in application.
That started a waterfall of stress for me because now I had rethink my dream kitchen with whatever would fit. By the way, most two-bowl granite composite (33″) sinks are made for a 36 inch base cabinet…just an FYI. The following picture doesn’t really show how misaligned and oversized everything was.
After some research, I finally decided a 25 inch, one-bowl sink was the best option. Never mind the price, I now had a sink I needed to take back! The new one would at least fit my under mount requirement, be large enough for canning and was made from granite composite in the shade we wanted.
My trip to Menards almost put me in tears; over the edge in a neck-in-a-noose sort of way. No offense to this particular kitchen design staff but spewing out numbers and doing so waaaay too quickly was NOT what I needed.
Thankfully, I was able to take back control and direct things at much slower pace. Thank goodness! I caught a number of mathematical errors made in the crazy rush of numerical vomit and was able to confidentially finalize the order.
Midweek brought a plethora of garden activity which added to the craziness of my week. Once again I was trying my hand at small space preserving and developing ways to store the tremendous amounts of produce coming in.
I was able to steam, de-cob and freeze 6 packages of sweet corn, stuffed and froze 21 bell peppers (2 set aside for that night’s dinner) and packed 3 jars of refrigerator bread and butter pickles (we ate all my earlier batches). I still have more corn to process and have given away a large majority of what we’ve been harvesting. Next year, I should be doing this in a proper kitchen!
Same as the previous week, our animals are all doing great. We did have one minor snafu where Asha, our Catahoula, rolled in some foreign, awfully rank critter poo…but we quickly washed and moved on (Jeff used rubber gloves it was so putrid!).
The adventures never seem to end out here on the farm. I’m still thankful every day for being as blessed as we are to call this farm our home. At least now, I get to sleep in my own bed and type my blog from the comfort of my living room couch!
Dirt On My Plate 