It's that time again...

The dogs had this poor little guy cornered the other day.  Luckily, Fergus didn't get wind of it and by the afternoon, the dogs wandered off and this little guy escaped to freedom!

We never did see his head.  He couldn't burry any deeper due to a rock so he just stood really still all day while the dogs pawed at him and woofed his little armadillo ears off.

I can't help it - I think they are neat.

New Kitchen Light

I have had my eye on replacing the fan in the kitchen for a while now.  It was old and pretty dated.  Plus, it was grossing me out how much dust it was collecting...and blowing around...right over where I was cooking our food.

So, on a totally random night and trip to Home Depot, I found a replacement for it.

Just as I expected - this house use to have popcorn ceilings!  Scream!!

And the new one.

I was going for understated.

Truth be told, the kitchen lighting needs a total overhaul.  I'd like to see can lights in there.  No more fluorescents.  But, thats another day and a bigger dollar.  For now, I'm tickled to not have that big fan looming anymore.  It's like my ceiling in there just got taller!

Tractor Repairman

Mar 23 - April 4 -- The tractor project!

One clear blue day, our tractor died.  Just like that.  Wouldn't start.  It wasn't without warning - we knew it was having trouble from a few weeks before this event.  What we also knew was that it was most likely the started and going to cost us a pretty penny.

Enter JL.  He had told me that he had planned to work on the tractor himself before we even bought it.  This was just a perfect opportunity for him to hold true to his word!  Of course he could replace the starter!  All he had to do was unplug the batter, move a few cables, life the engine out, unhook the starter and then put it all back together again.  Uh huh.  Sure.

Here he is on day 1.  Just about to life the engine out.  And let me just say - it's not light.

Got it!

Now what?

Enter a few YouTube videos, an order for a new starter from Amazon, and a little bit of confidence and viola!

Now....where did that red wire go again?

Low and behold - he did it!  He replaced the starter and got everything back together just fine!  And now the tractor is working better than it ever has!

Guess he's earned his hat and rancher status.

That Blows

Feb 25th - Our ranch was hit with 50+ mph wind.  And I'm not talking wind of that speed for an hour.  This was ALL day.  It was really scary.  I have never EVER experienced wind like this.  Not only was it loud and made me and the kids feel like we were blowing away to OZ, it also did quite a bit of damage.  

For us - the windy day meant a loss of 7 of our trees.  6 of them were dead anyway (remember our fun drought from a couple summers ago?)  But 1 oak was as green as it could be.  It was really sad to see them falling.  Loud - and sad.

JL came home early from work so we could move the boat out into the middle of the driveway away from any potential falling trees.  We also parked his truck in the middle of our front lawn for the same reason.  It was quite a day.  

As I mentioned, 6 of these trees were marked to be cut down because they were dead anyway.

Alas, our trampoline was struck down.  Luckily, it didn't put a hole in the black top - just the net.  We are still able to use it.

JL cut up the trees and harvested the wood for our smoker/fireplace.  But the branches and twigs met another fate...

We all enjoy watching a bonfire!

April 2 - This spring has been unusual.  In our 12 yrs here, we have never had a spring like this.  We've been abnormally cool!  It's been wonderful!!  And we have been getting some rain!  Not lots of rain (we are still behind and technically still considered to be in a drought) but every drop is precious and we enjoy it anyway!

On this particular day - a big storm blew over and dumped over 2 inches on our place in just about 3 hrs!

A Fantastic Crop

We have had an outstanding crop of Bluebonnets this year.  The spring has been cool and rainy.  We saw our first blossom in February!  I thought this was a bad sign, but the weather held and we had seas of blue this year!  

Bluebonnet Pictures Round #1.  They were just coming up (Early March)

By Mid-March!

Not only have our bluebonnets been impressive - but we have grass growing like crazy too!  GRASS!

Just a beautiful spring morning.  James and I captured this photo while we were waiting for the bus.  He and I thought the clouds looked like a big hand coming up over the house with giant fingers extended.  :)

The bonnets are in abundance.  But there are also a lot of other really pretty wildflowers to be found on the ranch right now.  Me and E went on a flower hunt the other day and found just a few of them.