Sticky note failure or why I can't find anything

My household records have fallen apart. That I was stuffing things into a small spiral note book may have had something to do with it.  I'm in the last stages of a head cold, the part where you don't feel terrible but not exactly great. Anyway I was writing in the propane tank level in my over stuffed note book when i dropped it. Five years worth of random information exploded from the little book. Scattering sticky notes all over the kitchen. So I've begun a re-organizing mission,. Thus the birth of a House Binder.  

Google came up with a billion web sites and printables for recording even the most minute details of ones life. I  have gone with  a much less detailed system.  My binder, which I found in the back of office closet, still had lined paper.  So I did a phone list, a birthday page,  the housesitter info I can never find when I need it,  A House section ,  a section for my menagerie, and the larder.

The house section has stuff like the running tally of the propane usage and the firewood guys info. It still being winter these are vital stats. 

The animal section is mostly full of goat stuff but also has a vaccine schedule for my dog.

The Larder section is where most of the post-it's came from. This has five years of fruit  picking info and  canning records.  So I know now that I picked 232 pounds of cherries when the cherry fiend was here in 2009.

I'm hoping this cuts down on the time I spend wandering around the house looking for stuff.  A rather tall order for a person who regularly finds screw drivers in the lettuce crisper. I should get points for trying for a more organized life though.

Links for templates : really more pages than anyone could possible need

Life Your Way

The Harmonized House Project

Goat templates

Milk records -- The Prairie Homestead

Breeding records - from Eden Hill

Health record template -  Better Hens and Gardens

a drippy situation

Lots of melting this week. Everything is dripping; including my water heater. I thought the biggest problems for the week would be sock knitting and getting Thing 1's birthday gifts shipped. No such luck. The much feared heel was fiddly but impossible.

The really irritating thing about the dying water heater is that the warranty ran out last month. I just know there is some sort of built in timer to ensure this.


**The sock monkeys are for Thing 1 and 2 for their birthdays this year. There are matching kid sized flannel pj's made by Mom.  Thing 1 already has a cape and mask from last year.

Baby, it's cold outside

Saturday brought clear skies and single digit temps. We haven't seen blue sky around here for quite some time, so Mom and I took a drive toward Lake Roosevelt. The sun was just right to make the snow look like sanding sugar on the fields. Everything was sparkly clean with its blanket of snow.  

Of course riding around in the heated car does make you forget that it's facing numbingly cold out side. I refer to this as instant face lift weather. As in your face (and any other uncovered tissue) will contract and tighten up two steps outside. It will also freeze pipes and convince a frost free faucet to freeze solid and back up into my well house. 

So that was Sundays project.

Then and Now

. My house circa 1920 with the original family. We think this is the Loft family shortly before they sold the property to the Makynen's. Over the weekend descendants of the Makynen's that had moved to the east came out to the house.

Mom and I were amazed to find that many of the outbuildings dated to the 1930's. Our woodshed was the original woodshed. The root cellar hasn't changed at all over the years, but the real shocker was our chicken house. Originally that room was a sauna. When we moved in it had been used as a bulldog lounge and where the beer fridge lived. The footprint of the building is the same but there is no trace of the sauna.

 Winter in 1970's  - dig the pink and gray siding! 

 It really was a treat to see the old photos and have the grandchildren of some of the original owners tell us about the property. When we moved in there was very little landscaping. One old apple tree at the back of the house and a clump of day lilies next to the house. I felt a real connection to Mrs. Makynen after hearing that her gardens were nearly in the same layout as ours. We've even planted a pair of Snowball bushes in nearly the same place she'd had them. Funny how things come around again. 

The week; a list

1.  I fell down the stairs. My 100 year old stairs in my 100 year old farm house are narrow, steep, and painted. About once a year I forget these facts and test the limits of friction and gravity. Usually on the third step from the bottom. It's an evil step that's out to get to me. Or at least my big toe. I have a strange square shaped bruise where my toe attaches to my foot and a sore spot on my bum.

 **note to self - buy gripper strip for evil third step.

2.  I'm going to put a hex on my former chimney contractor.

 The five year saga of the wood cook stove has come to an unceremonious end. Bad chimney people, I shall call them Soon to be Hexed (StbH). Insisted we have a dedicated chimney installed for the cook stove. I paid StbH a lot of money to put in the new chimney so everything would be safe and to code.

The chimney leaked.
StbH came back.
The chimney leaked less.
StbH came back. 
The chimney still leaks.
StbH came back. Spent three hours doing something and then said it was my roof and not his chimney and for $$$$ he would re-roof half the house.
StbH was asked to leave and never return.
The chimney still leaks.
New chimney people come for annual cleaning/inspection and joy of all joys for an insurance certification.
Wood cook stove does not meet code requirements. Boo. Wood cook stove has been installed too close to combustible materials. Chimney pipes have water damage and are rusting.
"How long ago was this put in?" New Chimney people ask.
"5 years ago." I say showing him the work order documents.
"5 years, really? This doesn't look right." New guy scratches his head looking at the paper work. "You don't have these braces or this heat shielding. And these pipe pieces don't exist."
"What do you mean they don't exist?!"
"They are imaginary pipes. Sorry ma'am."

Wood cook stove is disconnected and still leaky chimney is capped. All work done by StbH will be removed from the house later this month.

I need a voo doo doll. 

3. The raspberries are producing 2 pints a day.  Yippee!

4.  The allergist has proof I'm allergic to shellfish, weeds, mug wort, a mystery preservative, and paint. The shellfish I knew about, and anyone not allergic to mug wort is surely an alien. The preservative is apparently what causes my head to swell and gain pool sized lips; weird. Good to know.
I should have been Amish or a least a hippie.

 5.  I found three balls of mohair yarn. I don't know why I have mohair. I hate working with mohair. It tangles, knots, pulls, and is itchy.  Maybe this was part of a mad chemo induced yarn binge that had gone undiscovered until now.

 

I started a shawl.

6.  Bill brought 6 new Nero Wolf books from Paperback Swap! 

What, you don't know your mail man by his first name? 

Bill brought Bucky a bone, too. 

Everyone likes Bill.

7.  I got 15 rows into the shawl pattern and remembered why I hate mohair.(see # 5) I put it aside to go shift the sprinkler before ripping out three rows. I came back to see the cat shredding it. She'd helpfully separated the work from the skein and was running thru the house with the tattered remains stuck to her back foot. 
It was very traumatic for all involved.
The cat hates mohair too.


8.  Adding wheat germ to waffle batter gives it a nice nutty undertone. Adding raspberries to the maple syrup is even better.