Catching up!

I've just realized that I've neglected my little blog. Well, there's a reason for that:

This summer was full of craziness, renovations, demolitions, camping, and working.
Trying to keep up with everything seemed to be impossible. But, now that I have caught up, I can share with you what we've been doing on this crazy farm!

Fist came the wedding. On May 23rd, my awesome big brother married his awesome wife at our farm! I held the honor of being his "best man"!
Now, it may seem odd to see a woman as a best man - but my big brother was my maid of honor at my wedding. :) We're a little backwards like that...or maybe we are just that close and love each other that much! It was a beautiful day, no rain, little wind, lots of dancing (crazy dancing), and one heck of a headache the next morning. ;)

The bride and groom 

Looking off into the distance at their future

Here is me and my wonderful grandmother! 

It was an amazing event. I was so touched that I got to be such a big part in this wedding, as host and "best man". 

After the wedding, we began getting ready to convert our 114 year old two story house into an updated one story. The top floor was gutted, stairs removed, yard cleared, etc. We were ready for two whole months as we sat and waited for the rain to stop. Apparently mother nature decided that she didn't like what we were planning and she was going to offset it as long as humanly possible.

While we waited, I worked on my usual every day things. Many woodworking projects. One of which was a giant ash log that I pyrographed with my teeny tiny little wood burning tool:

I thought that log was going to be the death of me. It was chainsawed sort of flat, then planed with 60 year old planing tools that my father found in the back of the garage at his new farm...very rusty, but still quite sharp!

Now, this sign is one that I painted and hung in my mother's greenhouse while she was on vacation. It is one of my favorites and I'll be making quite a few more with different designs.

 

This kitchen piece is pyrographed onto a milled chunk of cedar, complete with fork stands. :)

As the summer went on, we tried our best to find a time frame that would allow us to get on with this crazy house project. We finally found it in the middle of July. I came home one day (extra kid in tow) to my husband crunching up the second floor of our house with an excavator. I knew it was coming, but was a bit terrified to actually see it happen. This first night...it rained in our living room. A lot. With the help of some family and friends we kept on chugging. One night we even got to shower while looking at the stars! It was quite peaceful!

We had a rough 4 days of non stop grueling work to get the main floor cut down to size and the new roof put on and closed up. I never thought this project was going to end, but we did it in record time.

SO many people asked us what the reason was for doing this. Well, when you're heating, cooling, and electric bill costs so much that you can't afford groceries...you make your living situation a little more practical and cost effective. That and our second floor was built (I'm just guessing) by a large drunken family with no construction experience. 

Walking up to the second floor, you'd enter directly into my son's room. From there you'd have to go through his room, up two more steps into a really weirdly shaped master bedroom. From there, you'd cross the master bedroom to get to my daughters room. Crazy right? Also, our room had those horrible corners. One of which was strategically placed directly over my pillow (I'm pretty sure my husband planned it that way). If I got up too fast at night, I'd smack my forehead right on the edge of that corner and knock myself back out...

So, we built a 20 foot addition on the front of the house in November of 2014 (where the front porch is in the top picture below) and moved downstairs into rooms that didn't try to kill you or give you brain damage.

Here's the before and after of our insanity:

It may not be the nicest after picture (this was before we'd finished all of the cleanup) but it's done! Our house got its haircut and we get a smaller heating and cooling bill, with less head injuries. Pretty drastic change right? We're planning on running the porch all the way across the front and adding a roof above that as well.

Like always, I'm still the crazy chicken lady in these parts. I haven't forgotten about my beautiful birds. They are still a big part of my every day life and will be for some time to come. I've had many birds come and go, but they're a part of the family no matter how new or old they are. They supply me with delicious eggs every day and a never ending supply of bird poop.

Colonel Sanders ^

Roxanne ^ who grew up to be a rooster...

Now, Before this post gets so ridiculously long that you end up saying to yourselves, "Is she ever going to shut up??" I'll bring it to an end.

I apologize again for neglecting you, little blog. I hope there are no hard feelings and I will be visiting you every chance I get from here on out.

Thanks for reading and let me know what your summer was like!

~Mary, the crazy chicken lady.