Ottertail Country

Ottertail Country
Ottertail South

June 14, 2011

It's mid-June!!!

A couple of notes:
Thanks for the card, Beth, and congratulations on your little one.

Melissa, thanks for the note you left on our door.  Sorry we missed you, please stop anytime you're going through.

New photo at the top of the blog.  Some of you probably recognize the walnut tree and the red-leafed maple.  If not, this is a view to the west of our house.





One of the wonderful things that happened in the middle of our kitchen building and moving projects was a clogged drain at the Carlson homestead...... Dawn was due to arrive in a week, so I needed to get this solved.




I found a local plumbing outfit, The A-Team, that had a power drain auger.  Brent showed up with his rig and we set to work.  This thing has an electric motor that feeds a heavy duty snake up the drain.  On the end is a cutter tool and we ended up cutting through a bunch of roots.  Above is one of the spools of snake ready to go.




Once the entire 75' of snake was in the drain, Brent spliced on the second spool.  The empty one is in the background.  There is a little gizmo on the tool that engages the spinning snake and actually threads the snake into the drain.  He was on the job about 1.25 hours and the drain was working well again.  I always wondered how those rigs work, now I know......




Just before we officially moved in, we got Josh and Dave to re-shingle the Chalet.  This view is of the original roof from the northeast.  The shingles were about 35 years old as far as we can figure out.  A friend of mine, Swede Johnson helped Nort shingle it when the building was new.




This view from the northwest shows how the shingles had deteriorated.  The worst area was on the southeast corner.




We went with forest green shingles and I think they look pretty good on that building.




And the last corner view.  The roof is complete now and one item checked off the list.





We've had some visitors around the house lately.  Peggy actually got to see the second of a pair of fawns moments after it was born.  Still wet with the mother attending to it.  The ones above were about 15 feet from the house when I walked out the door, and they stayed around long enough for me to fetch the camera and get a picture.




When Tim was up the week before Memorial Day, he and I spent a couple of days splitting and stacking his firewood for next year.  I didn't get any proof shots of him working, but I remembered the camera when Russ and I finished up the last little bit of wood on Memorial Day.  Russ looks like he is ready to bust the splitter in half.




Yes, that was the piece we were looking for.... the last one.  We had some really warm, humid weather that week, but we pushed ahead and got it done. 




A good sight!  A full trailer, no wood left on the ground.




So I got the tractor out of the shed, put the back blade on it and cleaned up the wood yard.  Every little task brought me closer to being finished with that blasted wood.




Looks nice when it's all done though.  And firewood season gives me the chance to give Ivan a couple of shots about wood length.  He has volunarily sawed our wood the last couple of years, and I always complain about the length he sawed it..... I hope he knows I'm kidding.  His work on the pulp pile has made my life lots easier these last few years.  Thanks, buddy!

I just got back into the house after spending an hour and a half on bat patrol.  As soon as the weather warmed up, we discovered that we have a bat colony living somewhere up in the top of the garage.  Not a good thing.  I have been investigating how to get rid of them and the first task is to determine their entry/exit spot.  Now I know where that is and we will start screening those areas so the bats can get out but can't get back in.  We'll add a couple of bat houses nearby so they have somewhere to go besides one of the other buildings.  Finally we'll seal up the places where they are getting in, and maybe we will be done with that aggravation.....



I gotta go, Carlo


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9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Dude, You're welcome, however, I may cut em' into cra----- lengths next year, too!! just because :-)
Also too, I just wanted to let you know that Menards didn't have bat houses in stock yesterday. So we'll have to find some somewhere else, or wait till they get more in stock, mmkay.
LOVE YAZ!!! s.d.

Litzy Margot said...

Blahh I just typed and lost an entire paragraph...

It was something along the lines of, geez you guys work really hard, and holy moly you DIY most everything and I'm always impressed.

Also, that I may need to contract your DIY skills to execute my DIY country wedding....


And, I heard you met my Milwaukee friend! Small world...

Anonymous said...

My head just spins when I read/see what you two are up to ... good luck with it all and "almost-Summer-blessings" ...
Mary A.

Mike said...

Man, your house is really nice, as is your log pile. I only have a wee pile for the stove in our flat. I'll be making it a bit bigger this year though as we nearly ran out of wood mid winter!! I bet that big splitter makes life alot easier.

Carlo said...

Ivan, I built a bat house and Friday I gave the bats their walking papers. I guess I should say 'flying papers'.

Litzy, I heard via Maddy that you are getting hitched! When is this happening? Where? Etc?

Yeah, Mike, that splitter helps. It belongs to a friend. I like the photos you put up of your bike trip. Really beautiful surroundings you have there.

Carlo

Anonymous said...

Wow. I just caught up on the posts....I'm super excited to see the green shingles on the roof, I really like that color :) :) Can't wait to see the kitchen and to be up there during non-winter time, the new top picture makes the yard look very inviting! You guys must be exhausted....Thanks for the updates! ~Rosie

Anonymous said...

Well, happy Father's day Gene, Chris, and the rest of the "reading fathers". So, today for father's day, Gene and I have been working on the house all day.. another layer of drywall mud in the kitchen, put another layer of paint on the entryway, painted the kitchen, did the dishes, laundry and got the upper cabinets ready to hang. Yesterday we cleaned out 2 stalls in the garage so it is now a usable workspace... all such fun... and yes, I am feeling pretty lucky to have married such a genuinely nice, hardworking, and considerate man. Thanks Gene, for being so special. I love you. ps

Anonymous said...

So many things to comment on!
1) Glad you got the pipes cleared! We had to go through a similar project a month back and it's not fun!
2) Green is such a good color shingle on the chalet!
3) The wood pile is looking nice! Now I know how Russ "cross-trains" and is such a good runner :-)
4) That was the first fawn I have seen this year!

As always, thanks for sharing!
Kristi

Litzy Margot said...

EEK! My mother told me she was going to tell the "news" to her siblings...guess she didn't quite finish that!! So sorry you had to learn through Maddie!

But yes! It's true! We're going to tie the knot. Trouble is, we're cheap and don't really subscribe to the idea of what a wedding has come to mean in terms of grandeur (and expense...). So, we're planning something much more 'us' - i.e. outdoor wedding at Devil's Lake followed by a self-catered meal & dancing at a little banquet hall in Baraboo. Hoping our family will make a long weekend out of it and stay Fri-Monday as we're going to rent a 60-person campground in DL for the long weekend.

You'll get a 'save the date' from us in the coming weeks, but just in case...

Please plan to come to Baraboo 6.30.2012 and celebrate with us.

Also...Gene, would you consider playing some music at the ceremony?

xoxo,

L