Month 1 Roundup

 

This month we visited a Goatery! Somehow Mom found out there is a goat farm on Johns Island that's being run by a guy she went to high school with. Us gals consulted Olivia's nap schedule and then loaded up and set out. By now you may have picked up my subtle hints that all I want in life is land and farm animals, so my excitement levels were off the charts. 
Oh but it wasn't just goats. Chickens, pigs, donkeys and cows all delighted our spirits that day. We pet them and fed them and watched them poop their various shapes and consistencies. The chickens would follow us around the farm and peck at our legs. They took quite a liking to Mom's suede boots, They surrounded her like little feathered raptors and she stood casually, chatting with her old friend while they clucked and pecked at her and pooped around her feet. 

The cows were nearly the best part. They were beef cows, all black with a white belt of hair around their waists. "Oreos" their keeper called them. One fluffy brown cow had just delivered a baby cow that morning THAT MORNING!! and it was the cutest little sweet thing I've ever seen. Mama Cow wouldn't let us get close but Baby Cow was about the size of Pippa with fluffy grey hair and giant eyes. The cuteness was too much to take in. 
Over in Goat World, we learned lots of things. Diet, mating, rectangular pupils, etc. All hundred and some goats wore a collar with their name stitched on. Sheila, Uma, and Kelsey were favorites. One named Louise had fondness for my lower half. She rubbed her boney head on my thighs and bottom for a full five minutes. Struck me as very funny.

We celebrated Brett's 34th birthday with Ellie and Caroline and then again with his family. His folks kept talking about him turning 33 and every time he or I tried to correct them something distracting would happen and the message would get lost. Brett would patiently take in their musings and then say, "Actually, I'm 34." 
"Clint, don't you need to check the grill?"

"It's my 34th birthday," Brett said again later as we topped off our drinks. 
"Jeff, do you remember your 33rd birthday?" 

I decided to take a mathematical approach. "Yep, Brett was born in 1987. That was 34 years ago. That makes him 34 today!" I said to the whole dinner table. 
"What house were we in in '87?"

Brett and I gave up and decided we would try again next year. 

Over on the Homefront, we've moved into another phase of additions and improvements. 

We plan to continue what has turned out to be an endless paint job on the back porch. We planted forty-one little ligustrum bushes along the back fence in an attempt to eventually block out the neighbors and make me feel less exposed. I haven't fully worked out why I deemed this necessary. We still have side neighbors to worry about and I would never be leaping around in the yard in the nude so the distain I've developed towards the unsavory exposure in the very back seems discriminatory. I have wondered if the neighbors back there see the new hedge for the obvious purpose I put it there. I would like to block you please, yes. 

And just when my upper body recovered from this job, Brett woke me up early on Saturday morning to mix 7 eighty-pound bags of concrete for him while he built new footings under the house. We have wonderfully slanted floors in the house. Nothing sits quite flush with the ground so as you walk through the house bookcases and chairs tremble in your presence as though you are a powerful warrior to be feared. Glasses clink and lamps flicker and while I find it charming and a good reason to mind one's walking posture, Brett is burdened by the "uneven distribution of weight." 

So we're adding two footings to help level the floor and somehow I got the job that is normally tackled by high-powered machinery on wheels. By my fifth bag I had a great technique developed that involved using the hose on full-blast as the initial mixing method. When my pot-o-honey was ready, I lifted that load (lift with the knees!!  - Brett) up, straight up by the handles of the wheelbarrow and the sludge would slowly burble into a plastic tray placed just inside the crawlspace under the house. Then it would be pulled into the darkness by Brett who had to push the hundred pounds along the ground as he slithered through on his belly. I'd begin my next batch. Brett would be gone a good while, spreading and stuffing the cement into place and then he'd reemerge for a few breaths of clean air before my batch was ready. 

After the first footing, Brett was ready to call it a day. I was thankful and did not encourage him to go the extra mile. I started the job in doubled-up socks, thick boots, and an oversized puffy coat. When Brett finally came out from under the house I was barefoot in a tank top. Admittedly, I tweaked a little something lifting the wheelbarrow and had to give the ol' back a few days off. We're rested and ready for the next footing ... and Dad just told us he has an electric cement mixer that can pump it all right into place. 

Also, Aunt Georgia, look at our Bonsai progress.

Let's see, what else? Pup cuddles, family dinners. We've been watching some strange movies. 

We also went for a crisp beach walk and then sat in the sun. It's the little things.